the busy heart

Her adorable lamb costume finally arrived in the mail at five this afternoon. The party was at six.  I tried to put it on her and she screamed and writhed, as I somehow knew she would. Long before today I tried to decide what she would be for Halloween, but I kept imagining her tugging at whatever I put on and saying "No like it!" It was sort of like that, only she just screamed and writhed on the floor.  So I abandoned the lamb and put on her pinkest, fluffiest dress. I thought about how grateful I was to the Target dollar bins for these wings I bought months ago. I told my inner feminist tough beans, and I called her a fairy princess.  This was the only picture I took, and it's not great.  I felt terrible as we left home for the church party. I felt spread too thin and not nearly creative enough as a mom. I felt so tired.  Luckily, a fabulous Halloween takes so very little when you're two. I'm pretty sure this was the best night of her life. At first she was c...

Henrietta no longer believes in bedtime. She believes in fighting with every tool available to her until she falls asleep on the couch, watching Scooby Doo  (known in this house as "Dooby") at way too late an hour. I'm not a big fan of this development, but we go through phases like this now and then, and things ought to change soon.   Until then, we're exhausted. Sam usually volunteers to stay up with her, but it's his turn to sleep. So it's 9:36, and I've been grading papers, and we've been eating popcorn, and she's been practicing reacting to the scary parts. She runs to the couch, looking behind her frantically, gasping, and saying, "Oh no!"  And now I'm done grading papers, and her head is on a couch pillow, and we're watching The Wizard of Oz, and she's practicing saying "witch" and I'm suddenly so happy to be sitting by her that I can hardly stand it.  "Wish!" she says.   "W...

At two, she seems poised on the edge of knowing, of actually meeting and growing curious about the planet. Sometimes now she seems so much like an alien: by which I mean, not yet of this world. She's the most gorgeous and funny alien I've ever met. On the morning of her birthday, I talked to her as we walked, pointing out all of the important stuff: trees, leaves, squirrels, the colors of cars and houses and flowers. She participated, repeating the words she knew (tree! sqwrrl! car car car!) and asking, occasionally, "What's that?" She asked that once when we passed an animal smashed in the road, and I said, "Oh, that's nothing, nothing." And kept strolling. I don't have to introduce her to that part yet. Please don't make me introduce her to that just yet. My heart was full of her two-ness as we walked. I carried all of the days of our acquaintence around with me, and I felt sure I would weep at something. But it wasn't the dead c...

Helping me make cookies. 1. She calls water "otter." 2. She calls yogurt "ogre."  3. Tonight she did "this little piggy" on my toes. It sounded like this, "This! Piggy! This! Piggypiggy! Weeweewee Piggy!" 4. She comes up to me, holds out her arms and says, "Again?" This means she wants me to do "Itsy Bitsy Spider" up and down her arms. Then she does it back to me. 5. She counts. She counts like this: two? two? three! six? nine?  6. She's devoted to saying thank you. She says it when anyone gives her anything, or when she gives us something, too. My favorite is when she says, "Thank you  much ." 7. Her favorite activity is undoubtably running circles through our living room, kitchen, and dining room, chasing us or being chased. She growls, we growl, and then we all giggle.  8. Dancing consists of spinning around in a circle saying "Dance-a! Dance-a!" 9. She can say  ...