Magrilless

Introducing Princess Butterfly-butterfly-purple-pink Effy-effy-come-on-lets-hide Fluffy-fluffy-white Collins. Or at least that’s what she told us her name was a couple days ago. And it didn’t change when asked to be repeated. Otherwise known as Maggie, this girl is just full of It. Full of imagination, of energy, of humor, of trouble-making, of obstinance, of smarts, of curiosity. She fairly refuses to wear anything except a dress, is newly obsessed with buns in her hair, and is moving steadily toward no more diapers at nighttime. It is still difficult to get her to school (every morning before school she tells me “I don’t want to go to school”), but I whisk her into the car and by the time we get there she hardly remembers to say goodbye to me. She read her first book a couple weeks ago, about Mat and Sam. They sat. Then one sat on the other. And they switched. And Maggie could sound out or recognize all the words herself. Last week she went down the water slide at our rec center by herself. It’s 38 steps up and a half dozen curlicues down, and as long as Daddy was at the bottom to catch her, she’d do it over and over again. Maggie sometimes takes the initiative to interact with or soothe Tessa and is very much looking forward to the day when they share a room, and then in the future have bunk beds! She comes up with things that just melt me, like “Thank you for a delicious dinner, Mommy.” And then makes me want to pull out my hair by doing things like aiming her pee out of the toilet onto the floor while giggling madly. She gets thoroughly excited about the most wonderful things, such as a new tube of toothpaste or street-sweeper going past our house. And just in general makes our days as unboring as we couldn’t ever have imagined.

Can I just say “Oh, what a cutie!” and have it suffice for these posts? I have a bit of trouble doing Fridays because Tessa is just such an easy, easy-going, cheerful baby. She just goes along with the flow, really. She’s sleeping through the night, from 7:30 to 5:30. She eats anything we put in front of her with gusto. She likes going places or not. Being inside or out. Walking in the stroller or in a carrier. Singing, laughing, interacting. The things she doesn’t like are being held by someone else when she can see me, being on her tummy and being encouraged to learn to crawl, and having an interesting toy taken away from her. She still thinks her sister is fascinating and hilarious, likes to be licked by dogs, and enjoys a good float in the swimming pool. This is nigh a perfect baby!

First off, sorry for taking a week off. We were in the midst of moving back home and into the new kitchen etc. (more on that another time, I promise). So there was very little time for shenanigans like blogging, laundry, cooking, and the like. And in order to break the suspense, there are no new teeth. Nor do there seem to be any on the horizon. Just a couple of cranky days, I suppose. She is back to her normal, chipper, cheerful, smiley self. Although very much attached to Mom. Bill can’t really hold her while I’m in eyesight; and I can’t for very long put her down on her own before she commences fussing. I always feel a bit sorry for folks who want to cuddle this darling girl and few seconds after being placed in their arms, she’s squirming back and reaching for me again.

As for the dietary experiment I took on, we seem to have found the culprit. Greens have indeed made a huuuuuuge difference in her expectorating. I’ve gotten a little cavalier in the past few days, and the spitting up has increased, although not to the level it was before I cut things out entirely. I have expanded the color category to include kohlrabi and cauliflower, and have also determined that plain old lettuce is fine. We are, I think, a much happier family without the ick factor of all that. No matter how much you repeat “I’m not grossed out. This is fine. It’s not her fault.”, it’s much nicer to live without it.

This week is dedicated pretty much to flooring. We’re getting slate tiles laid since it turns out we had no hardwood underneath the carpet-linoleum-carpet-linoleum layers. It feels like this will soon be a place where we can live again. Well, we’d better be able to, since our housesitting gig ends next week. Now that all the cabinets are up and the counters are in and the maze of boxes in the garage/living room/back yard is shrinking, it seems like this may be realistic!

Lest you think we could move in tomorrow, however, the front yard is still as much a disaster as ever. Think our neighbors loooooove us? But after our first neighborhood dinner party to show off the kitchen, they may forgive our prolonged trashiness.