So, I have been meaning to post many things on here for awhile--pictures from our Scotland trip not least of the list. BUT, here I am in my class. Yes, the one I teach. And, ( fear not, I am not up here blogging as I am lecturing, it is a group work day), yes, I did forget to bring my teaching bag so my plan to use this precious time to grade has been foiled. Thus, I am here wasting time and thinking of all the things I would rather be doing to make said time productive. On my list is blogging, but I don't have access to my pics. So, despite my total inability to multi-task and especially to write with confusion around me, I will try to at least write a little bit about the amazingly cute things Grace has been saying lately.
up first: Dreams
Starting around December Gracie would wake up and immediatley say things to me about her dreams. Of course, she didn't say, "I dreamed..." (at least not at first) she would just start saying things like, "up-high", "Momma", "me", "'[ba]nana". Then it is up to my sleuthful self to decipher the dream. For this one my guess was a dream about Monkeys and being up in the trees. Some of her dreams are easier to decipher, especially when she is reliving something that happened the day before like "dadda", "mamma", "walk" or "go for a walk to the park with Mee-mee." Once it was just a single word. A Gracie true love: "Cheese."
But perhaps most intersting in the dream department was the dream Grace told me a bout a few weeks ago--her birth. In her words, "I dream I was back in mommy's tummy. I came out ." Me: "You were born?! Was anyone there to see you?" Grace: " Yes. Daddy and Shell." What is amazing about this is that besides me, who I think we both assumed was part of the landscape, Steve, and Michelle were the first and second people to see Grace when she was born. Maybe she just remembers me telling her about this, but either way it was kind of uncanny.
next: The Speakable joy of the Train
So again, this is old..March to be exact. But I took Gracie downtown to ride the Trax because she loves trains. We parked at my work and were getting out of the car to go up the elevator and out to the Trax stop, when Grace started making all these "excited" noises and kicking her legs around etc. I think I must have said something like, "this is so fun, I am excited to go ride the train." And then her eyes lit up and she says, "I so essited, mommy. I so essited!!" It was beyond adorable and it was so cool to see her ability to realize that that word was exactly the word she was looking for. She continued to say, "I so essited" all the way to the train and again when the Trax started coming up the street. And her enthusiasm was contagious. All the weary students and others waiting for their commute home couldn't help but smile as they saw this blase moment through the eyes of a child going on her first train ride.
last: Our little adult
Perhaps not surprisingly, considering who Grace is talking to everyday, She sounds like a little adult, and, often, a little 'me'. She has such adult inflections and responses to things I tell her. Just the other day I was driving with her and we passed West High School. I pointed out the students going in and out and then added, "this is where Daddy went to school." Gracie responds, "Ohhhh." With inflection of "Oh, that is so interesting."
A few weeks ago she was helping Michelle dig out in the garden. I put my head out and asked her what she was doing and she told me, "I'm working hard." I actually have a really cute video of this day that I need to post.
Grace is also very playful and for a long time has understood how to joke. The other day she and I were downstairs and I was trying to clean up some stuffed animals on the floor. I pick up a stuffed deer and say, "hey look Grace, a deer like Bambi." She one ups me and says, pointing outsideand smiling "it's raining...a rain-deer." She then launches into "Up on the housetop, reindeer pause." Very funny.
Lastly, as any mother knows, one of the funniest experiences is to hear yourself back to yourself through your child. Often now Grace says things to me that I recognize as phrases I use with her. She likes to ask me, "sound good?" and when she really wants to do something that seems reasonable to her but that I am telling her no about she uses a "just" qualifier like, "I just want to go down stairs and play." Or, in the middle of the night, "I just want a little num-nums (nursing) in the bed, then sleeping, ok?" Yesterday we went to Wheeler Farm and she climbed up on something and turned around and asks, "You wanna come up here with me?" And then later, when she was climbing off the trampoline without my help and I was reacting with much distress, "I'm ok, Mamma. I've got it."
She is such a bundle of personality. Hopefully I can get a few more videos of her good talking up here soon so those of you who don't know her cute voice can hear her for yourself.
