bittersweet

ce crawled into bed with me this morning. ruby was nursing. ce pointed to my chest and asked if ruby was 'on the right' (so funny) and if she could use the left. "i used to have it to go to sleep when i was a little big sister. and it used to make me stop cryin mumma." i've read that a lot of times when kids stop they lose the ability to latch on, so i let her try. she let out a big sigh. "why is there no milk mumma?" i told her once we get big and don't need mummas, they don't work anymore. she pondered that for a minute then asked "why is cow milk so coooooolllld?"

maybe i'll have to start nuking her cow milk :) 

stories

"mumma, do giants have mommies?"
"i think so, where else would they come from?"
"matagonia."

and butterflies.

we've been having quite the conversation this morning.

"cece what should we do today?"
"um. JUMP. ON THE COUCH!!!!"
"haha. ok. that's something."
"and... rake outside!!"
"oh! that's a good idea, but it's raining today."
"oh no!"
"it's ok, it's good for our seeds."
"yes. and the trees. and erin & mark's trees. and neighbors trees."

***
she's playing this gingerbread cookie app on the ipad right now, and she always picks circles for the cookie's eyes, nose & buttons. so i asked her if circles were her favorite. and she said "yes. and butterflies."

<3

dirty carrots

In case you haven't had the pleasure of dining with Cece, I'll start by saying normally she's an excellent eater and will try most things. Tonight, however, was not one of those nights. I made a pot roast in the the crock pot w/potatoes, carrots, onions- the works.  Carrots are her fave, so I gave her just about all of them.  Extra delicious carrots that have been cooking with the roast since about 9am. We all sit down to eat and she's not having ANY of it.  No carrots, No meat, NO MUMMA!!!

After we'd eaten, I had a thought. It took me by surprise- thoughts are hard to come by these days.

"Cece!" I said, "Can you eat a carrot with your eyes CLOSED?! I bet you can't"
What child can resist such a challenge. I know you're wishing for pictures right now, but I couldn't risk the distraction. (very unlike me, but my phone was charging across the room).

Tonight we learned Cece can in fact eat carrots with her eyes closed, and meat, AND a zucchini. (Well, she peeked at the zucchini.) The onion was a no-go, but she gave it a shot.  There was lots of applauding at all these eyes-closed eating skills. This system all worked pretty well until I tried to get her to eat another carrot, with her eyes open.

"No mumma. yuck. dirty."

Oh well, more dirty carrots for the rest of us.

I have to start writing down all of the hilarious things Cecelia has been saying lately. she's really been breaking into sentence territory.

Yesterday we were watching Curious George and they were eating popcorn. her word for popcorn is something like 'dahkah' (kind of like da's car, so you can imagine my confusion). when i finally realized what she was asking for I exclaimed "popcorn! you want popcorn!"  and she said "yes! bye mumma. go kitchen." rofl.

Today she was in the bathtub and I heard the cat jump up onto the table so I yelled out the door to him, and she piped up "hey moo! Get off the table moo!"

there is something so funny about hearing these things coming out of the small fry's mouth.

kisses

there is lots of kissing going on in these parts these day.

milestones!

not that there aren't a million tiny changes every day- but she knows some words, she knows some letters (mostly o),  she knows blue & sometimes yellow, and the number 8.

but today she has done several tumblesaults AND finally started calling my mom something. it sounds more like buhramma than gramma, but,  we like it!

brilliant!

cece did two amazing things today. first, we went outside to bring baxter to go "hurry ups." she was in fleece pjs and i didn't plan on staying outside long. as we stood on the deck she said "ha!" (which is cece for a couple of different things) so i asked "ha?" she put her hands on her head: "HA!" (hat!!)  genius!!

she also told baxter to "go go!!" which is new and adorable.

later we were playing in the living room. she's taken to this bunny, so i was showing her how bunnies hop. she put him on her trampoline and made him hop there. 'puh puh!'

My Favorite Christmas Thing of 2010.

Since we got our tree earlier this month, every morning when Cece & I get up (ok, sometimes she gets up way before me with her dad, on those days when I finally drag out of bed) she runs to the tree and points:

"Tee! Tee!"

It took me a while, but I eventually realized she wanted me to turn on the lights. Most mornings she gets up around 5:30 so it's usually very dark still. I turn on the lights and she gets the biggest grin ever. Sometimes she points to the lights (ee-iigh's), sometimes she steals an ornament. Sometimes she just eats a banana & sits on my lap. I like that part the best. Anyway, for a few minutes every morning, before we turn to climbing and running and chasing for the day we have a snuggle & look at the Tee. I know next year will probably bring a new routine, so I'm enjoying every day I get of this one.

gravity and magic.

well, gravity IS magic, of course. cece has been conducting some experiments. yesterday, baxter had disemboweled one of his fluff filled toys- so cece was picking up the fluff, holding it over her head and letting it fall. this was all extra cute because she was standing in front of the fan and would greatly enjoy as it blew away.  today she tried the experiment again with a block from her shape sorter. it fell much quicker and would land on her face, or roll down her arms. she thought this was pretty great too.

tonight we went out to dinner. it got pretty loud in the restaurant and cece would put her fingers in her ears. as she took them out, her eyes would light up and she'd crack a sly grin. holy crap, i can control sound. this is magic. she's a pretty cool kid.

na-na na-na?

we're lounging around this morning and cece starts signing for milk & saying "mummummummum" (which means she wants to nurse) it was a long night of nursing, so i said 'not right now baby' she paused for a minute, leaned over with a big grin and said "na-na- na-na??" (banana) her second favorite food, i guess! :)

take time to smell the flowers.

we have some sprawling pile of flowers in the backyard that cece marches over to, plunks down, leans over and says "mmmmm!" as if she was smelling them and they smell great.

more Ceceisms

Cece is a whirlwind of activity these days, keeping up with her is keeping me from keeping up this blog!

i wanted to write down a couple funny things she did this morning,
she's got a fake laugh, which usually sounds like "ha ha ha!" which is funny enough alone- but this morning she was gesticulating wildly that she wanted my coffee. and i told her no, coffee is for mummy, and mummy needs coffee because of cece. which got a big fake laugh "huuh huhh huhh!"

she's also been playing with the little egg cups from andy's poaching pan. this morning she was excited to combine that w/the cats water dish & discover it's like an indoor water table. after all she has a little scoop for her outdoor table. how'd she get so smart.

<3

Ceceisms

Cecelia still isn't much for talking with 'actual' words, but she is still very chatty. she has returned to calling the kitties  something that sounds a lot like kitty. sort of a 'ki-teeteeteee!' and i think she might have said 'gentle' the other day (since we always say 'gentle gentle!' when she's near any of the animals) Baxter is also a kitty, but, to be fair, he's smaller than most of the kitties.

balloon is "ba ba ba" and she has a great time with the balloon we got her for her birthday. it's pretty deflated by this point but she likes to crinkle it and hug it. i'm tempted to fold it up and save it for her, but i imagine it won't be as cherished when she's older ;)

she can sign for milk & all done- although the sign for milk now means pretty much anything she is interested in and all done for anything she does not want. i guess we should work on learning a few more!

one of the things she got for her birthday is a  little elmo mailbox. it's a shape sorter- but she took a good look at it one day and opened up the front of it and just puts everything in that way. it's much more efficient!

and more good news- we got the results of her blood tests back and she is no loner anemic! her iron levels have reached the normal levels, so we get to stop supplementing. we're all very excited about that.