Mommy Kahdib

Dear Emerson 32 Months
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Hi Emmie-Baby,

I guess I have to call you that here...if I call you that in real life you insist that you are a big girl...sigh. Yes, I know, but you will always be my baby. Always. You are getting to be so grown up with a huge opinion of your own. You are mad as heck at a stuff nose and we learned that "Puke is not your favorite friend!" You love to be fancy and think that chapstick is makeup and pigtails classify as "princess hair". You picked out a pair of super girl flowered shoes for "Easter" at Target (your favorite store because I always buy you a smoothie) and wore them around for the whole day even though they were hurting your foot.

I'm sorry that this letter is so late this month...it might be the latest yet--15 days! This month brought more illness...I'm so done with it all. You've learned about germs, coughing into your elbow, washing your hands...something I swear I would never do to you. I'm not a germ-a-phob. I'm so far from it. But when you and Chase keep getting everything I figured we had to do SOMETHING. You got your first "Earring Fection" and it was pure and absolute misery. You hate the doctor. She's really very nice. But you scream when I even mention going there. I bribe you with dum-dum lollipops and promise you a trip to Blockbuster to get princess movies and you still cry a bit. We are operation lose the soothies. You know that when all of the current ones in rotation have holes or get lost we aren't getting anymore...but I fear that once they are truly gone it is going to be sheer hell. Some mothers let their babies comfort suck when they nurse and have a hard time weaning them...you never comfort sucked and weaned from breastfeeding easy...I fear it is going to be the pacifier that we have the nightmare weaning from. I joke that you will take one with you to college.

You are definitely into testing boundaries--and your brother's head as a launching pad for many things. You hit, throw, and scratch him and try to do it on the sly but you're starting to figure out that he screams and sends out an alert so you can't get away with it. You know that sometimes we all need a break away from each other...being in confined quarters all winter long had given us all cabin fever and I respect that. You know when you've hit him a safe place for you to calm down is on the stairs where you can take a break...sometimes you cry a bit there, sometimes you sit there calmly, and sometimes you don't want to go at all. You're two. I'm just realizing that. You need rules and boundaries and someone to control the chaos and help you to make it all make sense...I'm the mommy...that's my job.

The biggest news this month...the nap. You were my best best best sleeper. Then you've decided that naps are for babies. But you have SUCH a hard time making it through the afternoon as tired as you get. By about 5pm on days you are "skip-a-nap" you're about ready to fall asleep in your dinner...but we pull through with some colored bath water and a few stories and you crash at 6:45pm and sleep until 7:30am so I really can't complain that I lost my middle of the day break when I gained so much time at night. You love to cuddle and snuggle and whisper cute things to me in the night when you're falling asleep and often give me a kiss on the cheek in the dark like I have done to you for so long. I want to freeze you in time and space because even though you're hard at times, you are hilarious, brilliant, fun-to-be-around, creative, cute, cuddly, funny, fun, witty, full-of-life, spontaneous, and my own little girl! I will love you from here until forever....you bet.