Monday, July 15, 2013

summer berries

friday night was a rough one. most nights kahree ends up in our bed but friday night she requested an entrance much earlier than usual. and she didn't feel one bit like sleeping.

when she spends the night with us i try to quietly coax her to sleep while disturbing craig as little as possible. it takes a lot of snuggles and back rubbing and bum patting. but goodness, she can be so stubborn. she shook me awake, wide awake herself, and wanted to have quite the lengthy conversation, ignoring my pleas to go back to sleep. sometimes i get so tired or frustrated i feel desperate. i wish i could keep calm all the time. she deserves more patience than i usually give. she always proves that she isn't a malevolent dictator after all, she's just so little and still learning how to show me what she really means.

eventually she slid off the bed and walked to our door, a tiny little ghost in her white pajamas. i got up with her and opened the door. she toddled to the kitchen without a word and stood in front of the fridge. when i opened it she picked up a container of blueberries that our friend jenny picked for us earlier that day. and plopped down on the kitchen floor.

she's been so hungry lately, eating every meal and snack i make and asking for more in between. she must be growing. i guess growing babies deserve nighttime snacks. and you know what, so do pregnant mommies. so we sat there quietly on the kitchen floor and split a whole container of blueberries between us at 11:30 at night. she popped them like candies. i took mine two at a time. it was perfect.

i wish i could tell you everything about kahree lately, everything she does and everything she says with her sweet, toddler voice. i'll try to tell you a little bit at least. she's been learning so many new words and she's even learning and remembering people's names. mostly family members but when we had a play date with a little boy named jaxon kahree told craig about it later, said some gibberish along with a very clear "baby jaggy!" she loves babies. she's got a lot of love in her.

we asked her what her favorite animal was one day. she said a word that sounded very much like "tiger." we don't talk about tigers much, they aren't in any of our favorite books and we've never taught her what they say. lions and bears, yes. tigers, not so much. so we asked her if she even knew what a tiger was. she got up and ran off. we figured she wasn't into our conversation and moved on. a few minutes later she came back with a little plastic tiger my dad gave to me. we keep it on a bookshelf in her room. i must've told her what it was once and she must've remembered. and that's her favorite animal now. so neat because when i was little it was my favorite too.

we've been spending our summer days with craig alternating between awesome adventures and serious relaxing time at home.  we love both. we went to the beach with some friends the day after independence day and as soon as she saw the ocean she told me it was "water." water, like she asks to drink at home all day long. she knew just by looking at it. she loves being there as much as we do.

for the past 5 days the very first thing she says when she wakes up is "where's daddy?" and then she cries when i tell her he's at work. he had to work all weekend and i think she knew it was unusual. it breaks my heart but i love how much she adores him.

her favorite movie right now is "how to train your dragon." she brought me the case the other day and said "draggy!" and she hasn't let up since. every chance i give her to watch a movie she picks that one again. there's one part in the movie where she shouts "NO!" every single time. she can be so dramatic and adorable.

she's really hard to take anywhere these days. she just wants to run around as fast as she can. it makes church and doctor appointments and eating out pretty impossible. she's just so adventurous and curious. it's hard to deal with but i don't want to squash her spirit. every day we go outside just for the sake of exploration, at least for a little while. we've also been spending a lot of time at the pool, the splash park, and the library. she's all signed up for the summer reading program and it's been such a blast. she just loves books. craig and i read to her every night before bed and she never, ever wants it to end.

she has a little stuffed toy joker, maybe you've seen it. it's the only joker she's ever known, he's a cute little baby-esque villain and we haven't bothered to show her any of his other forms yet. but the other night i was wearing an old shirt of craig's with a stylized version of heath ledger's joker. she pointed at him and said "joker, joker!" she's the coolest. i worry for the day she realizes her snugly little joker pall isn't so nice sometimes. but she'll always have batman. always.

we laugh all the time. she tells me stories and jokes and laughs and laughs. we chase her through the house, tickling and tackling her, and she giggles so hard she can hardly breathe. when she wants to  tickle us she grabs our feet and fake laughs with all her might, as though it's the sound of her laughter that forces us to do the same.

she's been giving high fives for a while but now if you present her with a fist and say "top shelf" she'll make a tiny fist and punch yours. kind of the best, ever. i wish so much she'd stay little but my resolve keeps slipping when she continues to get better and better the older she gets.

friday night, almost midnight. all of our blueberries were gone. i gave her some water and started closing the fridge door so we could head back to bed. she slipped in before i could and emerged with a carton of strawberries. here we go.

i love this summer.

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