my little milk potato and drama queen

Tessa loves it when I’ll turn on a movie she likes (like Elmo, or Baby Signing Time) and set her up on the couch.  She really likes to slouch back in a comfy couch corner, twirl her hair and down a cup of milk.  Here she is today in the “sweet spot.” 

Note: this is her favorite cup, she won’t drink out of anything else unless it’s A) naughty (ie – not her cup) or B) she’s DYING of thirst.

Tessa is just a pure joy.  She is cute as a button and loves to laugh, tickle, and just be silly.  Just watching her waddle around carrying things brings a huge smile to my face.  I am thinking seriously about making a short movie of her now for me to watch every morning later when we’re going through the terrible 2’s and I won’t like her anymore.  You know, just to remind me how cute she is and how much I really do love her (kind of like the video she watched every morning on the movie “50 First Dates”).  I sure could have used one of those movies when Sophie was 2, remember this?

Speaking of Sophie, here’s my drama queen “stuck” on top of this tube slide yelling for help at the park last week.  Funny thing is that if I tried to go help her down she would say “No mommy help to me, I want those boys to help me.”  And she’d point to a group of three 2 year-old boys playing nearby.  I told her they were too small to help her down but she just shewed me away and kept crying for help.  She likes boys, heaven help us!  I know I looked like a terrible parent when I began had to ignore her.  I’m thinking it’s time to borrow, The Boy Who Cried, “Wolf!” from the library, don’t you think?

Sophie has really been growing up lately.  It’s crazy how much her vocabulary is blossoming, she surprises my daily with new words I didn’t know she knew and even uses them in correct context.  She is also getting really smart and uses her smarts to manipulate friends and even her parents to give her what she wants.  I thought it was clever of her this afternoon when I told her it was time for her nap she said,”No thank you mommy, let’s just sleep tomorrow!”  We’ll just do it tomorrow, is something I tell her all the time when she asks to do various things we don’t have time to do that day.  She is also a master of distraction, whenever Tessa wants the toy Sophie is playing with she’s learned to quickly find an alternative, and it usually works. 

Another funny story about Sophie happened last night when we were trying to put her to bed.  It was Dan’s turn and he had read to her, brushed her teeth, taken her to the potty and all that.  He closed the door and she came out 5 min later (as per usual) and asked to sit on the potty again.  Anyway, she tries to stall on the potty and had been sitting there for like 20 min by the time Dan told her she was done and it was time to sleep.  She said, “No sleep, JUST TIME-OUT!”  Which is funny because time-out is in her room… with the door closed, just like how she goes to sleep.  So Dan took her to her room and closed the door.  Sophie hit the roof just screaming and crying.  I went in there later and was she was talking to me a lot (she can really get going sometimes) about everything that had happened that night.  She was re-telling of how she went to time-out and shocked me with how similar her “fake” cry is to what I hear whenever she’s in time-out and think she’s really crying.  I’ve been fooled by a 3 year-old.  She’s good.  I think she’s some sort of child-prodigy actress.

In closing, some of Jessica’s thoughts:

I know it’s kind of a weird thing to say, and I don’t mean to brag, but I really feel like I live a charmed life.  I know I am so lucky to have my 2 wonderful children, a great husband (who is in his LAST week of law school by the way), many close friends, awesome extended family, I feel so blessed to have a healthy body that allows me to run and exercise, many gifts and talents I enjoy doing, a REALLY flexible job, a testimony of the true restored gospel, and a nice place to live.  Do you ever feel like things are going too right?  Something bad has got to be coming?  I don’t mean to be pessimistic but it just doesn’t seem fair, and I suppose it’s really not, that I have so much.  I hate watching friends and family suffer, I often wish I could give some of my blessings away, but I guess all I can do is share.  I’ve often heard that if the cards were laid out and we had to choose we would choose our own trials over those of others.  Do you think that’s true?