Attachment

For the past few months Rory has phased through several evolutions of thing attachment (I am sure there is a more technical term, but whatever.) For a few weeks she could not be separated from a very specific pink soft baby. She demanded the baby be with her when she ate and slept and it got tossed in the bath more than once. Then she branched out a bit to some very similar pink dolls and we could thankfully interchange them when the original was downstairs at bedtime (or buried deep in the sandbox at school for three days). This weekend she even carried a blanket around Linus-style. I just put her to bed and she wanted nothing to do with a baby or a blanket. She wanted Jilli's shoes. So I put my sweet baby girl to bed cuddling a pair of worn out smelly sandals. My...the second child changes everything.

Conversing

M: Jilli, do you want to bless anyone before we go to sleep?
J: Yes, Bless Angie and Bless Angie and Bless Claire and Bless Flower and Bless Pillow.
M: You are being silly.
J: And Bless Angels. Mommy? Sometimes I see angels by the moon.
M: Really? What do they look like?
J: They are angels, but sometimes I can't see them.
M: I think they are there even if you can't see them. They protect you.
J: Yeah, angels are to protect you. They protect you from grizzly bears. Because bears are mean.
M: (laughing)
J: But not Baloo. He is a nice bear and he lives in the jungle with his friend Mowgli. Mowgli is a boy, not a girl, and he doesn't wear a shirt.
M: (convulsing)
J: He doesn't wear a shirt because its hot outside. Mommy? I want to go to school tomorrow for pajama day.
M: Ok, do you want to say 'Bless' to anyone else?
J: Yeah, Bless Angie and Bless Angie and Bless someone we don't know.
M: Who is someone we don't know?
J: We don't know someone Mommy.
M: Ok, do you want to say Amen now?
J: Mommy! Now you said it! Now we have to start all over again!

Jitters

I woke up this morning wide awake at six am. This is in direct contrast of course to the three mornings I try to be at work before 7 and (maybe) drag myself out of bed at 6:30. We are headed to the new house this morning for the inspection. I am hoping it won't hold any surprises, but really I am excited about walking through the house again and doing some fun dreaming about what we'll put where and the few new purchases we will make when we move in. Jilli wants to paint all the window frames because she doesn't like white (pretty sure that's not happening) and she wanted to make sure the house had lots of windows. She also has some design plans for her new room that involve something bigbigbigbig, but after she says it fifteen times I think she forgets what it was she wanted. Rory will go with us this morning and I was certain Jilli would want to check out the place too. But when we gave her the choice of new house or school, she hands down chose school. Rory's share partner is at school today so she'll have to tag along with boring old mom and dad. Kind of reminds me of all those years my parents were planning and designing the home we moved to when I was 15 and the seemingly endless trips to construction sites and home depot on the weekends....

Pics of the week

The past few weeks have been harrowing, in part with all the house madenss but also for other reasons I can't quite put my finger on. There have been plenty of in between moments as well; a wrestling match and Jilli's dawning awareness of jokes, she thinks every line is funny and is particularly creative with the chicken-cross-the-road genre, and Rory's new words. She tells you the cow moos (and the duck and the chicken incidentally), she says downstairs and No Sketch and a word that means Jilli but I can in no way replicate along with tons of others that are escaping me now. I realized recently I almost never even think of bringing a stroller with us anywhere because suddenly the girls are big and independent and I need to grab some of these pictures fast so I remember the slower pace that we find our rhythm in....

Rory

Jilli Sleeping, Part 2

We found her in our bed a few nights back. She snuck by us as we watched our 3000th rerun of NCIS in the office. Not unusual to find her sleeping in our bed- but the care with which she arranged the covers around her face to shield her eyes from the light warranted a picture.

We did it (almost)

Our house is under contract and we have a contract on a new house. Neither of these were achieved without an excessive amount of anxiety and frustration (and a late night contract drafting session.) As long as everything sails through from here (fingers crossed) we'll be moving in about six weeks. Without further adieu I present our almost-as-long-as-everything-goes-fine-new-to-us house.....