Katharine Lange: Arwyn Week 51: Squirmy Wormy

Arwyn has really been demonstrating this week that she's listening to us, understanding us, and able to comply with our requests (when she chooses to at least). She actually listened to me and complied when I asked to to stop banging and climbing up the glass table. I didn't even have to go pick her up and take her away, she just stopped when I requested. She will also come crawling to you from across the room if you call to her and ask her to come. She likes waiving at Daddy when he comes into the room, and even sometimes when he leaves. Plus, when she hears his voice, she stops what she's doing to try to look around and see him. She's also been attempting to stand up without any support, but she still falls pretty quickly, so I guess she still needs more practice with that one. She's been a little more Mommy needy these days. I'm finding that more and more often she doesn't want to be put down to play by herself, but insists that I keep holding her. But then I hold her and she squirms and worms and tries to get down, so I put her down and she freaks that I've let her go. I don't think she knows what she wants either!? Oh well, at least she's so cute, sweet, and snuggly that it makes it all ok.

Leia made big strides in swimming this week. We started going back to the Alpine pond, but clearly I have my hands full when I'm there alone with two kids, so I make Leia wear her special float vest so I don't have to worry about her. She was pretty pissed until she realized how fun it was to float around after flopping in the water, and she started experimenting with going slightly deeper, but still where her feet could touch. The next time she went with Josh, she was distracted by a game of water fetch, and found herself in the really deep part with no problems what-so-ever. Next thing he knows she's yelling at her friend Echo, "Come on Echo, let's go in thudded end! I'm not scared anymore!" Talk about great progress! This week was voting week, and I stopped to drop off my presidential primary ballot on the way to school one day, so I had to explain to Leia what I was doing. I compared the whole thing to Jake and the Neverland Pirates, since that is something she really understands, and said we were all voting for who was going to be the "captain" of our country. She says to me, "I think Daddy should be the captain." I laughed, and said sure, we can vote for Daddy. The next day when we drove by the polling location, it jogged her memory and she bursts out, "Did Daddy get to be the captain yet?" I was so floored by both her memory, understanding, and cuteness, but explained that he wasn't captain yet, we have to vote one more time and he has to try to beat Hillary! Unbenounced to me, Josh had actually (independent of any knowledge of his new campaign manager Leia) declared his own candidacy for President on Facebook, running under the Party Party. So it looks like we are officially in the race...vote Josh for Captain!

We had another funny couple sessions of imaginary play where Leia tells me, "You're the girl, and I'm the Mommy." Then she goes through the entire scenario of our real days, where she explains to me that she's dropping me off at school and going to work. Saying she will pick me up, not Daddy. Telling me my school schedule, like play nicely with my friends, then eat my snack, then take my nap. Comes to pick me up from school, and we go home, where she proceeds to cook me dinner (something very weird she calls "tallipai"). She also decided to clear off her train table, which she does in a manner that looks like a classic cartoon character hunting for something in a box where they just throw everything else out over the top of their head. She literally just picked up each object one at a time and threw it all over the floor behind her...so ridiculous. But then she spread out her monkey blanket like a nice table clothe, and set the whole table with our meal very nicely. She talked to me constantly about making good choices and playing nicely with my friends, and gave out lots of very "reasonable" lectures. It was so hilarious because, between the content of her words and the manner of her speaking, I could literally hear her teacher's voice coming out of her mouth! She really does take in and process everything we say!