Cute Stories

Settle in for some stories of cuteness and toddler development!

_________________________________________________

Last week Georgia went to the church nursery for the first time. She had become too boisterous for S.S. with Mama back in January and I resolved to figure out nursery. I had it all--doubt, guilt, fear--about leaving her. Our church here is much bigger than the one I grew up in and thus the nursery is much bigger than the one I worked in as a teen. Leaving her just didn't feel right to me so I hadn't. But the time had come.

Then we spent an entire month of weekends sick and I had to get myself all set again to try the nursery.

As I stood in line to check G in last Sunday, the little girl ahead of us was literally thrashing around avoiding her trip over the counter and into the 1 and walking room. I had to turn away. I didn't want G to see that and I could barely contain my own tears.

She happily went over the counter into the coordinator's arms, eyes wide in wonder at all the new people and things to look at. I backed away and watched her lovingly placed in a volunteer's lap for a book and turned to leave thinking, "I exchanged my child for a pager"...big sigh...but she will be fine.

When I came back for an hour and a half later, she was all smiles and had not cried a single tear. I was so thankful. She had snacked on animal crackers and had some of her milk (always a good sign for G: if she'll drink her milk, she's ok with her situation) and came back over the counter contently.

Then it got interesting.

She walked across the lobby and crawled up the two flights of steps to the foyer. She got up on her feet and made a dash for the open sanctuary doors. Church had let out, but the band was still playing and she was immediately and unwaveringly attracted to the music.

She walked down the middle aisle determined as ever and stopped at the bottom of the chancel steps and stood listening to them play. They, of course, were chuckling.

_________________________________________________

She had stairs practice over break when we visiting our friends and their three children one night, so it would then follow that her first day back at the sitter's Jenn lost her momentarily and found her at the top of the stairs smiling proudly. She has never been a stair climber just for climbing...someone has always had to be up above her to lure her up. But she'd figured out there might be fun things up there, too.

_________________________________________________

One morning over break she was sitting in her highchair eating breakfast. She cocked her head to one side and said, "mamaloveyou."

Oh.....worth every moment of pregnancy, labor and delivery, lack of sleep, and developing will moment.

_________________________________________________

There is a thief among us and it isn't hard to see who when she proudly displays her loot of a paci! The rule is paci's are for bed and the car only if she's fussy and headed for bed when we get home.

She knows this. She usually follows this.

When she wakes up, we pick her and with a little prompting, but oftentimes none, she will throw her paci back into the crib.

Then the lights came on that the paci's are in there all the time and with a little reaching, she can get them back.

Thus, occasionally she'll come out of her room with a paci and have to be told to go put it back.

Which she will. Begrudgingly.

_________________________________________________

B-A-T-H-S also need to be spelled out now unless we intend to act on it on mere mention.

And she has figured out that puppies are d-o-g-s, so we now call them K-9-s to avoid an immediate run to a window.

But little dogs, purse dogs if you will, befuddle her and she does not consider them d-o-g-s.

I have been a little sad this week to realize that many of our neighbors walk their d-o-g-s after she goes to bed and she's missing out on them.

_________________________________________________

Toys are great, but Georgia loves real things to learn with. Yesterday it was this thermos, and the coffee cans, and the sugar box, and the tea bags. As Grammy would say, "Such a shame the poor thing doesn't have any toys..."

She's much more aware and thus emotional. Yesterday I took a load of laundry out of the dryer and left to go put it on our bed. She decided to empty the lint trap for me. I heard her yammering away and came back to this:

Lest you think I'm the paps, I just happened to have the camera in my hand and with the ever so easy one push camera feature, I was able to capture this.

For the record, she was doing a good job but got overwhelmed. She had lint from the dryer in a line to the trash.

__________________________________________________

I trimmed her bangs last week. There were a few pieces longer than the others and they were hanging down over her eyes.

It was only her second bang trim of her life and literally just a few snips, but all week we've gotten compliments on her new hair cut.

I pay a ridiculous amount of money every six weeks to get my hair trimmed and I don't get that much notice!

But it did get me thinking...her hair is naturally growing into a page boy and if we don't tuck it behind her ears it actually does have a little style to it!

__________________________________________________

Most nights I put Georgia to bed. Noah gets her ready on weekday mornings and so evening is my time with G.

One night this week I was still working on dinner when it was time for G to go down. I scooped her up and told her goodnight and put her in Noah's arms and they turned to go to her room.

A few minutes later, she came strolling in the kitchen and pointed at me.

Noah was behind her and said, "She wants you to do it."

Well, if, I must...