Adeline

I've had this post started for a few weeks now. There is so much to say about Adeline.

She is 3 1/2 but she is big for her age and acts older much of the time. Folks have asked us a lot this summer when she'll be starting kindergarten. Hmm, not yet, preschool, yes. Her maturity has made it hard to take her 3 1/2 year old moments. I forget sometimes that those moments are age appropriate. But it's also made me realize just how much has changed in 3 short years and now more than ever living and enjoying the moment (as much as I can) feels pressing. Already, when she says things like, "I'm not going to talk to you right now" or "I'm not going to say" when we ask her questions I get visions of my 16 year old daughter. Ah! I know she's realizing, now, that she has more choices, more control, and she's playing around with it. It's good practice for us, I guess, figuring out how to build and deepen and grow this relationship, respectfully and lovingly, with guidance and boundaries so that when she is 16 we'll be ok! Well, probably crazed a bit, but ok!

She's especially exerting this newly realized power with Elliott. She loves him and she loves to exert her big sisterness on him, for better or worse,whether she's moving his body from one place to another to dictate his play or leading him outside just to come back inside to play by herself or taking the toys he chooses for himself but throwing a serious fit if he does the same to her. Oy, such an interesting dynamic. But she also loves on him and cares for him and assures him,

"Big sister is here, Elliott. It's ok"

"You want mama? She's right there."

"I can carry him, mama. Here Elliott."

We've realized that through probably both nurture and nature, and probably as our first child, that she's not so flexible. She requires a warming up period and if anything is different from the usual without fair warning or sometimes even with, there could be challenges. Addy likes predictability, most kids do. Change and separation have been hard. Thankfully, she rolled with the breaking of her favorite headband (see picture above). This headband started out as just the occasional headband but then it grew to an all the time headband, from daytime, to bathtime, to bedtime and in between. She even figured out how to wear it on her forehead while wearing her helmet to bike. This headband became stinky and dirty like a boys baseball hat. You know that smell, right? Well, it broke, and thankfully, we found a purple one to take its place.
Addy is loving accessories, pink and purple, sparkles, jewelry, flip flop sandals, dresses, skirts, and tank tops. When it comes to accessories, it's really about quantity, not any thing else! I think she wore shorts a handful of times this summer and they had to be the "star on the butt" ones. She loves to dance and the way skirts and dresses feel when you twirl, well there's nothing like it.

There's been a lot of pretending, independently, with Elliott, us, or friends. Her names for imaginary people or characters in her stories have changed from unusual sounding names like Avanascheena or Wakalunga to names like Zoe, Clementine, Astra. These stories become quite involved and sometimes when I forgot who she is and I call her Addy, she gets upset or just corrects me!

Our fish!

Our climber! And check out that facial expression. She's full of great expressions and hand gestures!

And here are some of the conversations we've had lately I wish I had been better at writing them down. There have been some really great ones, but here's a few:

We were looking at pictures of Addy when she was a baby and she said:

Where was elliott?
He wan't bornyet.
He was in your belly?
No
But he was in your belly?
Yes, he was an egg in my belly.
How do you make eggs?
Well your body makes eggs. And you have eggs in your belly already, but they won't be babies for a long, long time.
I have eggs?
Well, in your ovaries. They are right here (I point to general ovary area)
They'll be babies when I'm 7?
No, that's; too young. You have to be older,
18?
No, still too young,
65.
Whoa, that's too old. your eggs will be too old then.
Geerrrosss!

and

Addy says things like "Sure" and "All right" which sound so grown up. We needed to leave to head out for the day but Addy hadn't eaten a very good lunch. She wanted to take her soup with her but I thought it wouldn't really travel very easily. So she said,

I suppose we could leave my soup and take my sandwich.