Beware the Ides of March

Don’t I look cute in my new apron from Grandma? I helped Mama make baked beans and brown bread and it kept molasses from getting on my pjs. I like my new apron.

Before she forgets, Mama wants everyone to be advised that I continue to use a word I’ve been using since I could just barely talk. You know those little pils you get on your sweater, fleece and old blankets? Those are called kneebuhcabs. Be advised that I don’t like kneebuhcabs touching me. Mama was washing the bedclothes and hadn’t put the quilt on the top of an old blanket yet when she laid me down to dress me and the world nearly spint off it’s axis.

In other news, tomorrow Mama and I are going to investigate a new school for me to start in the fall. My friend Pippin might be moving, but if she’s not, we’ll get to go to school there together. I like her, she’s a nice girl (my exact words).

Otherwise, it’s same old same old here, we’re just trying to keep it together in the last days of the winter which shall not be forgotten. I might have another cold, or I might just be recirculating the flu for the fifth time. I’m ready for summer. I told Mama I want it to be warm so we can get ice cream.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

This is me loving two things: chocolate and Grand for bringing me a huge chocolate heart. Between that and the stickers I got from Grandma, I’d say my home made Valentines paid off.

It’s been about six months since Mama last attempted to post something here. In that time so much has happened, but my hair still hasn’t really grown. Oh, you may look at that photo and think it looks longer, but it’s just straight right now. Still, Mama broke down and trimmed me some bangs last week because the three strands that kept getting in my eyes were becoming bothersome to me. As soon as she trimmed them I looked at her and said, “Thanks, Mama!” and threw my arms around her neck. She didn’t realize it had been bugging me that much.

This morning before Grand’s visit, Mama made me go outside and take a walk. It’s a nice day here but I wasn’t really in the mood for a walk and begged her to carry me a bit. I’ve been like that lately. I think something is happening to my body, and sometimes I get scared that soon I’m going to be too big for Mama to carry me, so I want her to carry me. All.the.time. Mostly she makes me walk, but every once in a while she remembers that soon I’ll be too big to carry and she picks me up.

For Christmas, Santa brought me a 23 animal farm set. Grand tried to tell me that one of the horses was named Lucky. I kept telling him that was not his name but he wasn’t hearing it. So now, I have four horses. When Mama asks me I say their names are Not Lucky, More Lucky, Quite Lucky and Also Lucky. But there is no Lucky in there at all.

Since just before Christmas, I’ve been home with Mama full time. We’ve looked at a few places where I might go, but nothing seems to fit. Instead she’s been working and taking care of me full time. No wonder she gets sick on the weekends. I’m noticing it, too, because I ask her every day if she’s feeling well today. This morning, my own voice full of frogs, I asked her if her throat hurt today. I worry about her.

I worry about my Daddy, too. Some mornings when we’re going through our routine, I’ll cry and say I don’t want Daddy to go to work today. On the mornings when Mama says she has to go do something, I get all upset about that, too. I just want us all to be together. That seems like too much to ask any more.

Every week when we get near my school’s parking lot, I start giggling really loud. Then Mama gets me inside the building and I run down the hall to my classroom. Last week, I came back into the hall crying for Mama to find Ms Doreen. Turns out she was hiding behind a wall made from the tumbling mat making a surprise Valentine’s gift with my friend Pippen for her daddy. I love Ms Doreen.

I.don’t.like.dat.

So, not much has been happening in the way of rebuilding my site. Not much has been happening in the way of spending a lot of time with me. I.don’t.like.dat.

Today, Daddy took me to run errands so Mama can attempt to jam out on some work. Mama asked him to take some snaps of me at his office (my first visit!) at idFive, which I’ve been talking about nonstop for the last few weeks.

I’ve also been exceptionally interested in Mama’s desk, and grabbing whatever I can off of it and running away. Last night, Mama brought my desk up out of the basement, wiped it off, and then showed me all the things I can do with it. I love my desk, I just wish it was in Mama and Daddy’s office. They’re going to have to make room for me soon.

Mama would love to upload a photo, but she doesn’t know what size to make it any more since everything is still all kerflewy.

Update: still kerflewy, but had to post this pic.

Technical Difficulties…

Daddy is rebuilding the weblog after a catastrophic meltdown which blew up the entire thing. Thank goodness for scheduled backups and fresh coffee!

Halloween at My School

Yesterday Mama dressed me up and put some ears that she’d made me on my head and said I was a kitty. Then she put on some red and black striped socks and a big hat. The first time I saw her like this I said, “Oooh, Mama, you’re a princess!”

After we did our morning rituals, and before we went out to recess, we took a costume parade to the 3s class. It was a little confused since we’re all only 2, but it was good for me to see my buds in the 3s class again (I disappeared on Mama a few weeks ago, only to be found in the 3s class checking out what they were doing). Once the parade was over, I saw that Miss Amy, the 3s teacher, was disappearing to the front of the room with a large orange bowl. Never one to be called late for supper, I made sure I was first in line (I’m also always first in line for the hand stamps Miss Doreen gives us after each class). As I sat down next to her, Miss Amy asked me how I was and I answered, “I’m Feelee”. She doesn’t know me, so she has no idea that’s my name.

As you watch the documentation of these moments, be sure to catch the expression on my face as I get caught attempting to cadge another treat, as well as the look I get when one of my classmates has a meltdown. I.don’t.like.dat!

My Halloween costume

Yesterday at school we all got to wear our costumes. Mama went as a witch and I went as her black cat. She’s saving my whiskers for Halloween night. There’s a movie to follow, but for now…aren’t I cute?

Daredevil antics. I has them.

This weekend Mama packed me and Daddy up for a ride down to Grand’s for the annual St. Mary’s County Oyster Festival. This year as we were departing the vehicle, Daddy looked longingly over at another family’s stroller and commented that we should’ve brought ours. Mama reminded him that it would be for the best that we didn’t, as she already knew there was no way I was going to stay in mine and that she’d never be able to keep up with me in the crowd if she had to drag that thing behind her.

After some preliminary delicacy trying (fried clams 1, fried oysters 0, St Mary’s County stuffed ham sandwich, also 0), I was ready to get up and at ‘em. My little ears had perked right up when we walked in the door, and I was not to be denied some live music. Off I trotted at full speed to find the dance hall, where I enjoyed a lovely blue grass band.

I ran all around, doing my circle dance, cutting off the flow of traffic in the midway, and just generally acting a goof to my heart’s content. I got so worked up I needed to take a much needed break in the shade with some lemonade. My Grand told me that he had some pink lemonade at his house that he would share with me. I took a deep drag of my lemonade and then asked him, “Do you have pink ice cream at your house?” Pink ice cream was on my mind yesterday, and I brought it up several times after that (we didn’t get any. boo!).

When my break was over, a good Irish band came on—and they even brought their own house party dancers. I didn’t dance so much this time as I was too interested in the music and watching the other people dance. This touched me in a much different way. Mama says Celtic music and dance does that to her, too.

I hung out for the briefest of moments with AC, PUDG, Uncle Rob and Karis, but then I needed to be on the move. Mama had had it in her mind that maybe we could ride some of the carnival rides, but she had no idea which carnival ride I was going to want to ride first. THE SLIDE!!!

Mama was relieved that I liked it so much, because the idea that I was going to fling myself off of her on the way down had her sweating and shaky. No worries about that, Mama, because as soon as we hit the bottom, I was ready to climb back up the top. Immediately.

I was so determined, in fact, that when Mama stopped me so that Daddy could pay his tickets to ride the slide with me, I threw a fit on the stairs. No matter what Mama said to reassure me that I was going to get to ride it again, I was not hearing her. I was too busy screaming, “NOOOOOO!! I RIDE SLIDE AGAIN!! WAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!”

Then, I rode slide again.

Mama and Daddy thought that maybe I was going to want to ride it again, but I was more interested in hitting the other rides. I had my eye on the spinning plane/spaceships, but Daddy wanted to try me out on something that went in circles first. Silly Daddy, wanting to do things in increments. Still, I humored him.

This moment you see here? About the extent of my interest in this ride. Ho. Hum.

I practically ran off this ride and over to the one I wanted to get on. Oh, my, goodness. I got to ride it all by myself, which kind of took some of the punch out of my interest. And then the lady put me in and I just kind of sat there wondering what all the big commotion was. Then, something clunked, my spaceship began to rise, and for a split second I didn’t so much like the idea of being in this thing all by myself. But, just as quickly, I realized I was going to go up and out—and that was exciting!

Mama watched me very closely, saw the telltale signs that she recognizes in herself, and asked the lady if she would stop the ride because I was getting sick. The lady said, oh, oh, yes, and let me off. I ran straight to Mama, let her pick me up, and told her that I wanted to go on the cars. That were also going in a circle. Mama said ok, watching me for signs of sickness, and all she got was boredom. I got off that ride and ran straight for the sickness maker. Mama said absolutely not, and she, Daddy, Grand, Uncle Rob, Karis, AC, and PUDG dragged me screaming out of the carny area and back toward the food. They had a little snack that none of us really liked (deep fried oreos), and then Mama said it was time to go to the petting zoo.

We walked across the fairgrounds toward the 4-H hall and found stall upon stall of large animals that I wanted absolutely NOTHING to do with. Mama was sad that I wouldn’t pet the cows who were the friendliest cows in the world (Seriously, I’ve never met cows like these before. They must be therapeutic cows). I knelt down and watched a lady feed the goats from her hand, but for some reason this scared the crap out of me. Mama said it was a good thing that my school field trip to the petting zoo was canceled this last week due to rain, because it was full of goats. Mama was looking longingly at the pony rides (something else she’s been trying to schedule time to take me to the last few weekends) when Daddy asked if we should give it a try. Mama said that I was freaking out about the smaller animals that were behind wire and that maybe he shouldn’t get his hopes up that I’d go through with it, but she began digging out her money anyway.

I wasn’t so keen on getting on the horse, and when the lady told me to hold onto the saddle horn, I wasn’t having that either. But then Daddy took hold of my hand and everything was ok. After a while I got a little more comfortable with the horse, whose name is Peanut. Peanut is a therapeutic horse, so he was all about giving me a gentle ride, and his handler made sure that there was nothing bad happening to either of us. Mama even got a few shots of us, but because I was interested in looking everywhere else but at her, this is the best shot she could get.

After I got off Peanut, we walked around the side to thank him for being so nice to me. I actually put my hand out to touch him, even though I was still a little scared. He put a smile on my face.

And with that, I began violently wiggling in Daddy’s arms to get down, get down, want to go. And I ran back through the petting zoo area, petting every animal I could get my hands on. I like the big animals now.

This morning when Mama took me to SM’s and Stella’s house, I ran right in and told Stella about what I did yesterday. And you know what? I didn’t talk about that slide once.

I’m so beautiful

Here I am on the beach in Hatteras wearing my 2nd birthday dress. I love this dress because I can dance like a ballerina.

In the last two weeks I’ve started telling Mama stories. My first story started like this: “One day there was a picture. There was a Mama and a baby and a big dog and a little dog. The end.” My most recent story was a bit more complicated: “One day there was a monster who went on a pickanick with a pickanick basset and he saw a fuhwog who ate hims bugs and he said no! I said to not to do that!”

I’ve also been waking up nearly every night screaming about some dream. Actually, last night was the only night in the last two weeks where I’ve not done that. I always ask whoever comes in if they’re afraid of frogs or tell them that I’m afraid of frogs. Those damnable frogs. I usually follow frogs with the phrase, “No, I don’t like dat!” in varying shades of emphasis.

I’m also making up a lot of songs, most of which involve the same tuneless tune: “Maaaamaaa I luuuuuvvvvv youuuuu verrrrrryyyyyyyy muuuusssssshhhh”. Mama always bobs her head and smiles.

Otherwise, all is the same here. Oh, this Thursday Mama and I are going to the farm to feed some goats and to pick some pumpkins. I am looking forward to this very, very much.

Ed note: I’ve become even more aware of how quickly time is passing and how much I feel I am missing out on your life. I love you, baby girl.

Happy Second Birthday, Finley Rose!

Dear Babygirl,

Today you turned two, which is lucky because we had an incident two days ago that could’ve easily ended very, very badly, robbing us all of the joy of this day. When the vision of your body rolling in the rough surf comes unbidden I repeat to myself “But it didn’t happen”; as you can imagine, it’s of small comfort in those moments. Giving myself over to this mantra, the years fall away and I am connected to the future mes full of love, hope and worry for the Finley of their time, each of us feeling singular in our pain yet gut-knotted to the same thread like beads on a maternal rosary, stretching to infinity.

I have further distracted myself from obsessing over what might’ve been by thinking about how much you’ve grown in just the last month. You casually throw around words like hypothesis and metamorphosis, continue to practice your wordsmith skills (adding words to our family lexicon like ewokkers and youmeebethink) and thankfully hang on to one of my favorites: gobble truck. You have slipped into calling me Mommy instead of Mama, a change I know is part of your linguistic evolution, but one I’ve reticently come to tolerate with the knowledge that some day you will call me things I like even less. Your self-confidence grows each day, causing you to laugh in the face of danger as you run full speed towards impending doom much like…me. And maybe it’s because of this very thing that I feel conflicted about how quickly you’re growing: some days I think we both wish you were moving out tomorrow and others the fact that each day takes your further away from me breaks my heart.

Even so, maybe it’s because you were late to explore—you were afraid to climb the stairs after falling off the bottom step (to this day you climb stairs on all fours), you refused to climb the jungle gym or ride the slide because you were unsure that you’d be able to get down—that I am retraining my brain to ignore the encyclopedia of what-ifs. I know that if the world is going to get another sensitive, adrenalin-seeking intellect that you need to learn things in your own way and time. That’s why lately I’ve been doing my best to ignore the worst case scenarios and let you explore; just this morning I told your father to be quiet and allow you to climb on something he didn’t think was fit for climbing. I was thrilled that the rickety old beach chair was even remotely appealing to you and curious to see how you would resolve the challenge. Of course you walked away from it as soon as I said it was ok, and this was a lesson to me to try to keep my approval to myself. After all, no one wants to do something their mother sanctions.

My real test came on the beach this morning, as you willfully ran away from me toward a rapidly retreating wave. Instead of doing what a ‘good’ mother would have done—especially one with so fresh a lesson in toddler water safety—I followed at a distance, allowing you to experience the wave on your own. You continued to run forward to greet the water as it returned to shore, stopping to giggle and stomp your feet as the foam lightly crossed your feet. The water’s second approach slapped against your knees, throwing spray up into your eyes, causing you to gasp. The third approach brought friends, and advanced harder and faster than the first two. Instead of turning to run, you simply raised your arms, fell backward, and, eyes still on the growing wave, simply said, “Mama, tum me.” It wasn’t until I had scooped you up into my arms that I felt you shivering, heard your low exhale, and felt the relieved giggles begin.

I’m more than happy to be your safe place to fall as long as you need me to be.

Love, Mama

Now we are two

Happy (quickie) birthday to my babygirl. More to come later while you’re napping, but first, a trip to the beach!