Open Letter to Willa

Dearest Willa,

How you make my heart thump. You attempt things that I never dreamed possible. In our bedroom, you climbed on a stool and then on top of our laundry hamper to reach my perfume bottles. They are way up high on a shelf. You never noticed them before. You didn't even mind that the hamper was collapsing under you. You wanted them that badly.

You constantly stand on the back of the living room couch and attempt to unlock the window above it. It scares me because I know you'll figure out the locks someday. You take the kitchen cabinet locks off and then put them on again, and cheer for yourself when you're done, so the window locks can't be far behind.

Our main floor hardly has any furniture left in it because I have to lock it all on the porch when we're home. Otherwise you'd keep climbing on the countertops. Or you'd flip the light switch on and off forever. But the couch is too big to move. So we're stuck with that one.

In the basement you climb on the back of the couch and attempt to scale the wall to get to an upper window. I saw you stacking things on the back of the couch to stand on to make yourself taller. You are relentless and we can't play in the basement anymore because this is all you want to do.

We went swimming recently and anytime someone touched you in the water you screamed, "No! Myself!" Even though you plunged under the water numerous times, you screamed it over 100 times because you did NOT want any help swimming, NO THANK YOU!

When we are outside you don't want to sit on the swing. You only stand on it and fling yourself around. One day, I saw you perform a full back flip off the swing, land on your feet and keep on running. You're only one year old! What will the future hold for you? Can my heart take it? Please have mercy on your poor mother. I'm feeling old and slow.

Love,
Mom

A lot of Willa-isms

These are from the past few months, so there are a lot:

Willa: "Knock knock?"
Joe: "Who's there?"
Willa: "Wipe!"
Joe: "Wipe who?"
Willa: "Grape!" [laughs]
Jia: "I don't understand her!"

I couldn't figure out why Willa was intently watching me in the bathroom, then she started clapping and said: "Yay Mommy! Pee potty!" (Willa has been using the potty a lot these days! We're proud of her! And apparently she's proud of me too!)

Willa to me, after pinching me, deliberately: "Sorry Mommy, pinch you much." [Then she leans in like she's going for a hug. But instead...]
Willa: "Push!" [Pushes me. Laughs.]

Jia: "I'm going to go to a place with no little sisters. That means Willa cannot come!" [Looks up at me, and feels sheepish.] "Uh, I'm actually just pretending. Willa can come to this place. She just needs to move VERY SLOWLY there so she can't get ME or MY STUFF!"

Me: Jia, where did you put your dollar coin?
Jia: I don't know.
Me: Did you lose it?
Jia: No, Mama, I didn't lose it. I just don't know where it is!

We were eating ice cream and I said, "Pretty good ice cream."
Jia: "Yeah! Better than a bowl full of dirt and soap!"

Willa saw some pictures of China and Taiwan and said, "Taiwan! China!" Then she said, "Chinese! Ni hao!" (We're amazed she understood that connection!)

Willa: "Time-out Mama!"
Me: "Time-out for whom?"
Willa: "Me!"
Me: "Why?"
Willa: "Push!" [Pushes me.]

Jia to Willa after Willa put a coin in her mouth: "Willa, if you eat that you could get really sick. You could hurt your tummy. You could go to the hospital. AND YES, you could get a shot!"

Willa, looking at a picture of a sad character in a book: "Feels sad. Mama. Uppies. Lovey. Blanket. Crib. Light on. Books." I love how she articulated everything that makes her feel good!

Here's an example of how they're interacting lately. [We were in the car.]
Willa: "Look! Big truck, Jia!"
Jia: "Actually, it's a medium-sized truck."
Willa: "No! Big!"
Jia: "No! Medium!" [And the "No!" continues...]
Me: Do you have to argue about everything?
[Both girls nod yes very seriously.]

Jia and Willa were playing together in Willa's room and I realized they had been quiet for a bit. I said, "Are you guys okay?" Jia replied, "Yes! We're having a LOTION FESTIVAL!"

Kid-centric highlights

Here were some of the girls' favorite low-key things this summer:

Edible jewelry (made out of chives):

Our kids and the neighbor kids had chive breath all summer!

Hitting an awesome splash pad!


Learning to use chopsticks. They are both getting pretty good! Many, many black beans were consumed that day.


Agua Fresca (watermelon, lime, mint, sugar, some water). To say that Jia LOVES this is a major understatement.


Our tree face (we made a face for one of our trees out of clay). She is now "Miss Tree."

I like these shots because it looks like Miss Tree is peeking around the children.



It has been so warm here that it doesn't feel like summer is drawing to a close. In fact, it finally feels like summer weather around here! Hopefully it will last a while yet!

Back to school!

Jia had her first day of school and did great! Her class is mainly boys again (maybe four other girls in a room of 20) and her best friend is not in her class this year. So I was especially proud of Jia for excitedly running right up to sit in front of the class when we arrived. She likes her teachers a lot and seems quite comfortable. She already learned the other girls' names too so it's a great start!

During the brief moment that I helped Jia put her stuff in her cubby, Willa managed to undo her straps and stand on top of her stroller to gain access to the classroom snacks. That was at drop off. At pick up, I stopped for a moment outside the classroom and Willa instantly ripped some decorations off the class display board. Thankfully, I am carpooling with another mom who has a little one and we'll trade off so we can keep the little ones home.


School update: I wrote the above post a few days ago and didn't get a chance to post it until now. I'll provide a little update on how things are going. On her second day, Jia said some boys were mean to her on the playground. I think they were from a different class and it didn't seem to bother her too much, but she told them they should "go somewhere else and think about being nice!" And they did! I told her I was proud of her for standing up for herself.

Yesterday she came home and said, "I played with my new friends today! Turns out that Libby wants to play with me! I played with her and Anna!" I'm glad she's making some new friends!

Backyard camping

Jia and I spent an evening camping in our backyard. It is quite different camping in the city, what with the sirens, music, barking dogs, neighbor's construction work, and red squirrels blowing raspberries at us for hours (just to name a few things).

It helped that the crickets' volume was turned to extra loud. Our tent has two open panels on the top so the moon and stars were our nightlights. We told some tame ghost stories. We had a camping dinner of grilled fish and camping breakfast of pancakes and scrambled eggs.

Jia slept really, really well! (I wish I could say the same, and perhaps I'll remember the air mattress for next time!)

The girls were SO excited about backyard camping.



We thought long and hard about where to put the tent. We have a more wild area of the yard but the likelihood of being bombarded by black walnuts all night was quite high, as was the lumpiness of the ground. We settled on the flattest, least lumpy spot...under the swingset!


I think this will be a Labor Day tradition!

The State Fair!

We went to our State Fair TWICE this year. Willa could participate in more this year, which was great.

The girls loved being little farmhands. They fed the animals, planted seeds, harvested veggies, drove tractors, milked a cow, collected eggs, sold everything at market, earned money and then went shopping with it! They each chose some cereal with their funds.




We had a lot of fun on the rides this year. Jia spotted this ride on the way in and patiently waited until the end of the day when we returned to it. Is this not the face of sheer delight?

Hot-rodding sisters. Willa did a great job of staying put.

We petted furry beasts.

Of course we ate many things on a stick. The pickle, a favorite:

And what are Joe and Jia eating?


Hotdish on a Stick. Alternating tater tots and meatballs battered and deep-fried and dipped in? Yes, cream of mushroom soup.

Joe said he doesn't need to have it again.


C'mon! How about a third cup of chocolate milk? It's all you can drink!

(We settled on white milk for the third cup.)

I think Joe was more excited than Jia about the prospect of doing spin art...but she was converted once she understood it. It is quite a treasure in her eyes.

All in all - another great year at the Fair!

Happy Birthday to Joe!

Today is Joe's birthday. I was laughing the other day thinking about how different we are. About fifteen years ago he wrote something to describe himself.

He wrote that he likes to play golf, tennis and volleyball;
listens to jazz;
enjoys French films;
watches baseball; and
likes birdwatching.

I have to laugh thinking about it because:
I can't think of anything worse than running after balls in the hot sun;
I would prefer listening to every single type of music over jazz;
French was one of my majors and I never need to see a depressing French movie again; and
baseball and birdwatching don't exactly bore me to tears, but pretty close.

So what do we have in common? It comes down to values. We come at things from the same viewpoint. It makes life so much easier when you have such important things in common. And...
He loves how I cook.
He is a dedicated worker.
He enjoys cleaning.
He is a great dad and husband.
How lucky am I?