It’s pretty bad that I have to make a guest appearance on my own website but here goes! Tonight for the first time McCanless slept in her big girl bed without mommy or daddy having to get in bed with her until she fell asleep! Just thought that you might want to hear the good news. Now if we could only work on potty training a bit!
McCanless and Mommy had a great Labor Day at the pool. Daddy joined us later on for lunch.
McCanless, Matthew and Charlie…The “two” crew. (Charlie and Matthew are already two, though. McCanless isn’t too far behind)
McCanless loves this slide!
This is Charlie!
“The Crew”
McCanless loves to take care of the “babies.” She talks to them in a cute, little high pitched voice.
The Wild Men….would you want to keep these two!??
This is Jacob, whom McCanless talks about everyday! She names all of her baby dolls Jacob.
Just for kicks, I recently viewed my archives and was amazed at how far we all have evolved. McCanless is a person and Mel and I are parents. It still amazes me sometimes that I can actually say that. Mel and I are parents.
Today, I thought it would be fun to take McCanless to Burry’s Bookstore downtown. After a long nap and with diaper bag and snack in tow, we headed out the door. Proud mom and smiling toddler hand in hand, counting the steps leading off of the porch, I thought, “Yes, this is a great idea…a great learning experience and a fun outing.”
Thirty minutes later as I browsed the fiction section, McCanless sat quietly on the reading bench with her new Baby Moods book imitating various moods. I watched her out of the corner of my eye. She was smiling, pouting and even sticking her tongue out at her book and peering at the mini mirror on the last page. She was laughing and talking out loud to her new friends on the pages and would often yell out, “MOMMY LOOK!”
It only took a few times of grabbing every Elmo book on the children’s shelf and a few runs around the store to get to this point. Everything was great.
Until the wind blew or the tides changed or whatever force of nature caused my little angel to immediately evolve into a “terrible two.” All of a sudden, she yelled at the top of her lungs, “I NO LIKE” and threw her book and herself onto the floor. She actually kicked and screamed and beat her hands and head on the floor. She even rolled over a few times. (Just like in the movies) Where was my sweet, innocent baby girl? I tried to find her under that screaming toddler. I tried to hold her only to get kicked in the face and every time I tried to scrape her off of the floor, she would “noodle arm” as Mel and I call it, and just melt out of my grasp. So I did what any good mother of a toddler does, I just ignored it and began searching for my book again. Of course there were glances from others in the store and I’m sure they were wondering when I was going to acknowledge my screaming child on the floor below me. (Clearly, they had NEVER raised a toddler) I was almost proud at that moment. I am a parent of a toddler, a serious triumphant feat.
I had now become a member of that elite group of experienced parents who would always look at me with my sweet baby girl, McCanless and smile and say, “Just wait.” So this is what they were talking about.
