A recent conversation with my child, who's still having trouble with this whole "authority" concept:

"I wanna be the Mommy AND the Daddy."

"But then what would Daddy and I be?"

"You can be a frog and a pumpkin for Halloween."

So the child and I went for a walk on one of the trails in the area, and passed a group of a couple of dozen Chinese tourists/students/both. They beat us back to the park, and Gracie took a minute to stare in fascination - she's not heard much Chinese spoken and wanted to listen. I asked her if she wanted to say hi, which she did most cheerfully, and all twenty-four of them turned around, saw her, smiled and waved.

Twenty-four pairs of eyes, trained on one three-year-old.

Total preschooler glee.

She lit up like she'd just swallowed a spotlight, flung her arms out, waved, and said "Hi! I Gracie!"

I've gotta get that kid into some drama classes...

It's no secret that I miss my mom like crazy, but given her total revulsion for all things nasal, it's at least a good thing that she missed out on the following discussion between myself and my daughter, as I was trying to explain the concept of "bad cold" to her:

"Mommy, why you talking funny?"

"Because by dose is all stuffed up."

She bent and peered STRAIGHT into the offending organ and pondered the situation for a moment. "But Mommy, why I can't pull it out for you?" Accompanied by horribly descriptive gestures...

So. I took my child to the grocery store today, along with her stuffed bear Bearbear (smart children can't name ANYthing, as I know from my own experience). About halfway through the store, she decided it would be fun to fling Bearbear across the aisle. "Gracie, don't throw your bear."

She picked him up, tiptoed across the aisle, and dropped him on the other side.

"Gracie, don't DROP your bear."

She picked him up, put him down, and punted him back across the aisle.

"Gracie. If that bear leaves your hands again, you are not seeing him again until naptime."

Silence. Approximately 30 seconds of blissful serenity follow before I HEAR her being smug and look over to see her ambling behind me, holding the bear by one ear...in her teeth.

I'm beginning to think that heavy liquor may be required to make it until kindergarten.

Gracie and I are having many, many discussions on the concept of authority, namely that I have it and she doesn't. The latest of which started when driving to a friend's house, when she declared from the back seat, "You have to do what *I* tell you!" in a tone of smug certainty.

"No, I don't. You do what I tell you, because I'm the mommy and you're the Gracie."

*thoughtful pause*

"Can we pretend you're the Gracie and I'm the mommy?"

...and people wonder why I'm tired all the time? Keeping a step ahead of this kid will do it.

So my darling daughter is coming up fast on her third birthday, and is apparently determined to take full advantage of the remaining few months of two-ness available to her. We've had many, many...conflicts. Most of which she retells to me a day or two later, in an utterly cheerful tone of voice. ("Remember when I hitted you and we couldn't go to the store? That was nooooooo fun.")

But. Took her to a McDonald's playground today (and it's an awesome thing; I would've killed for a playground like that when I was a kid), where she played with assorted random kids while I had lunch with friends and watched through the window. The playground has a covered spiral slide. Remember this, it's important. When it was time to leave, the kidpack was down to Gracie and one reasonably articulate small boy, who I'm guessing was an advanced five years old.

So after the standard discussion where I give her the chance to come along like a civilized human being (I figure if I outline the steps often enough, she may try following them one day), things got fraught. From Gracie there was setting of jaws and planting of feet, from me there was fast-fading rationality.

Me, maintaining Pathologically Reasonable tone: "OK, honey, one more time up the stairs and down the slide."

Gracie, making no move toward stairs or slide: "Lots and lots of times!"

*repeat x2 or 3 while things escalate toward the dread Spanking Threat*

Me, doing the "Mommy's not backing down" thing: "Out of the playground on the count of three, or I'll have to swat you. And I don't want to swat you in front of other kids."

Small boy, helpfully: "I can turn around."

Eyeroll. Gracie grasps the notion that I Mean It about going home, meekly climbs stairs and goes down the slide. When she sees me approaching with shoes and socks in hand, scowls and proceeds to try and climb back up the slide to try and get away from me. This would be more effective if she didn't keep, well, sliding. I inform her that I will carry her to the car* if she doesn't sit still for shoes and socks. More scrabbling ensues.

Small boy, earnestly: "I think you can smack her now."

I thought I was only supposed to worry about interference from adults...?

*I have done this. I have done it with her in my arms and chanting "Mommy, Mommy, you no nice, you no nice", and I have done it with her slung over my shoulder and screaming bloody murder. We won't even talk about the time I had to cart her out of the local museum in a stroller, angled parallel to the floor like a cute little Hannibal Lecter so she couldn't drag her heels.

Discussion with the child tonight, as she was busily playing a tractor when she needed to get ready for bed: "Gracie, time to read stories." "No! Tractors don't like stories and so don't Gracies."

Changing diapers this morning, and the child poked her stomach and said "What's that?"

"That's your belly button."

She giggled. "Noooo, that's a hole where the woodpecker pecked."

So Gracie thwacked her knee on the (wooden) side of her bed and was understandably distressed. I did the standard Mommy thing and kissed her knee with explanations of how kissing it would make it better. She promptly curled up into a ball and kissed her own knee.

She boogies down at the slightest provocation and was happily dancing on the porch when she proclaimed "Mommy! I can do a belly dance! Wanna SEE?" Somewhat bemused, I told her to show me. She proceeded to jump up and down in place while slapping her stomach.

Well, I suppose that counts...

So the child just got her first swat in about four months, after digging three or four times in my beading supplies bag - which, aside from fragile and/or easily unstrung beads, contains numerous poking/cutting/pinching implements. The first two times, she got explanation plus an attempt to shift her attention; the third time, she was looking directly at her father and daring him to do something about it. Hence the butt-swat.

Which was why we wound up with a Babycuda parading around the bedroom and declaiming "...and I have a bag and I push and pull in it and if Mommy wants to play with it I say NO!! and take it away 'cause it's MY bag and I carry it." At length. In detail. I gave her a short string of beads to play with, and she further salved her wounded pride by refusing to let me touch them.

Meanwhile, it's been forty-five minutes, we just put her to bed, and I distinctly heard "..and I put them in MY bag and carry around." She's got a whole dialogue going with stuffed animals asking to play with her nonexistent beads as she gleefully refuses them.

And I thought I held grudges...

Apparently my daughter's either going to be a freestyle rapper or a tour guide. Or possibly a nature-documentary narrator, given that cats inspire her to wild flights of verbal genius.

In the bathtub last night, Fat Cat decided to jump up on the counter and supervise from the comfort of the bathroom sink. (Dubious comfort at best, since he can only squeeze about half his mass into the sink.) Gracie was playing in the tub and started narrating without missing a beat: "...and his name's Wivingston and he have paws and he's in the sink and he's FAAAAAAAAAT and comfortable..."

We went to the pet store this morning (poor man's zoo, with air conditioning. What more could you ask for?) and stopped by the cattery up front where they keep a few adoptable cats to charm people. Accordingly, we were quite charmed by the little orange Scottish Fold who very politely rubbed his cheek across both our hands. I told Gracie that cheek-rubbing was how cats said hi; she brightened up and said "Hello kitty! My name's Gracie and this is Mommy."

So I'm too tender-hearted to just say "get out of here, you fuzzy bastard!" when removing a cat from someplace it's not supposed to be (the counter, the top of my monitor, the sofa when I want to sit down). Generally it's scoop up, scratch behind the ears, say something affectionate and put the cat down.

Gracie's apparently picked this up from me, and demonstrated it when Fat Cat decided to jump up on the kitchen table this morning. "Wivingston, we wove you and wove you, but you can't sit on the table and have Mommy's breakfast. Kitty get down!"

...but my daughter went and made her first pun.

Dinnertime, and Husband Unit and I are trying to have a real live conversation without making her feel left out. At some point I get an "I yove you!" from the baby, and tell her I love her too. She grins wickedly and says, "nooooo, you yove me THREE! Do you yove me four?" We made it all the way up to eight before she lost interest.

On second thought, I think I'll skip both previous reactions and go straight to "awwwww".

So at two-and-a-quarter years, last night saw Gracie's first official NO! moment. She's recently decided that Naps Are for the Weak and consequently was very, very overtired when it got around to actual bedtime.

Gracie's usual way of getting around parental orders is to say "Maybe I can..." and come up with something she'd rather be doing. Negotiations never go anywhere, but this doesn't seem to upset her. So last night at bedtime, there was the usual warm-n-fuzziness, with stories and goodnight kisses and standard baby fare. Then we announced "Time to go to bed, Gracie." She considered a moment, flopped down flat on the floor, and gave us a muffled "Maybe I won't."

Followed two seconds later by a completely simultaneous, completely unrehearsed "Oh, yes you will" from both parents. We somehow got her in bed, beared and blanketed before making it out into the hall and cracking up.

Gracie's latest achievement is mastering the art of the belly flop.

I take no responsibility for this whatsoever.

But it's great fun to watch her clamber onto the bed, wiggle to be sure her weight's set properly, and yell "WOP!!" as she topples.

The other Great Baby (mis?)Adventure was yesterday's bird rescue. We were out walking when we found a mockingbird trapped on somebody's screened porch. I carefully explained that we couldn't chase the bird, and she couldn't try to pet him because "he gets scared easily, just like Bo". (Having a semi-feral rescue cat has done an amazing amount toward teaching her some empathy.) So I told her we would have to find somebody at the apartment office to get the bird out of the porch "so he can go home".

Gracie CHARGED off to the apartment offices, burst into the office, and told the manager at great speed and volume about the bird who was trapped in the porch, and how he was scared and stuck and needed to go home. I could pick out about one word in three; the poor manager got lost after "birdie". As best I can transcribe it, it went "bliggle bliggle birdie stuck bliggle LOUD URGENT bliggle, birdie scared, bliggle we have to save the birdie!!"

So the manager and I duly reassured her and we went back home, accompanied by the imaginary brown dog that's been showing up for most of our walks lately. ("I see a bown dog." "Where?" "In the tree.") She told Husband Unit all about her bird-rescuing adventures (thankfully at a slower speed) and eventually went to sleep, still very proud of herself.

In the aftermath of my mother's death, I was thinking about Gracie and how crazy Mom was about her. I seriously doubt Gracie will be able to remember her, so I was hoping I could get people to come here and post a story or two in the comments section, especially anything about Mom's reaction to Gracie. I've written down what I knew of (including the time during my pregnancy that Mom missed her freeway exit because she was gleefully yelling "BAAAAAAAABY baby baby baby!") So if anybody has anything they want to add, that would be very much appreciated; I'm planning to print them out and add them to Gracie's baby book.

This site's set up to allow anonymous comments, so you don't have to worry about having an account with Livejournal to post.

Thanks,

Avery

Gracie's opinion of recycling, after seeing me in my favorite do-the-chores raggedy shirt: "Ooooold shirt. Mommy throw in the trash, get new shirt." Then, after a thoughtful pause, "Poor Mommy."

So a month or so back, I was worried about the baby's mental development because I hadn't seen her playing pretend, which my vast library of toddler books said she should've been doing by then.

Then she started looking for mermaids in the shrubbery, and I figured we were doing all right.

Fast-forward to this morning's walk, where she found a fire hydrant that alternated between being a fireplace ("Pile eeves on it, make a fire, see in the dark!") and a set of bongo drums (WHAM wham WHAM wham WHAM), a pile of pinestraw around a tree that was promptly dubbed "slippery slippery mountain", and a patch of bare dirt that she informed me was quicksand ("Stuck, pull me OUT!"). There was also the afternoon we spent stomping around the house and "Arrrr!"-ing ("Mommy BIG pirate. Gacie TEENY pirate."). Somehow, I'm not worried about her mental development any more.

Meanwhile, the baby's officially two, God help us all. Her party was a small cupcake-and-crayon affair, and she is in love with the little Fisher Price farm we bought her. She's about as willful as anyone would expect (possibly more so) but makes up for it with moments of appalling sweetness. Such as the other day when I was reading to her on the bed; she levered herself up, aimed carefully, and kissed me on the nose before announcing "mmmm-WAH! I kiss Mommy onna nose." This makes up for a lot of craziness.

Recent baby quotes:

She planted both hands and feet on the floor, looked upside down at me from the London Bridge-shape she'd just made, smirked and said "Sideup down!"

Upon seeing a kid's TV character in royal regalia, complete with one of those crowns with the red velvet poufs behind the spires, she looked at me in mild confusion and said "Cupcake on head?"

"Hat!" (proclaimed as she upends a soup bowl/oatmeal bowl/fruit cup/plate of chicken on her head. Thankfully, they're generally empty.)

She's gotten obsessed with Disney's Winnie the Pooh recently. Has everybody down pat except for Kanga, who she insists is "Mommy Roo".

After visiting a new church, one of their deacons stopped by to visit. We opened the door; Gracie beamed and proclaimed "Pizza!" This says more than I'd like about my dietary habits.

Eating breakfast in her highchair, she proclaimed "I kick 'a table!" *thud* *thoughtful pause* "I hurt 'a toe."

And my current favorite: she's allowed to sleep with a single book each night. Last night it was "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish", which she was holding upside down when I carried her to bed. She looked at it thoughtfully and started "reading" from the top down: "Blue fish, red fish, two fish, one fish". So proud of herself.

Overheard this morning, while my husband was watching Gracie and I was working in blissful ignorance:

*SQUAWKreeow!*, followed by the thunderous sound of Fat Cat fleeing.

"Gracie, do NOT tackle the cat!"

"I fall down!"

...I shut the door a little tighter and kept quiet.