More Cinderella

Charlotte likes to play complicated pretend games and she wants you to play with her, but she tells you line by line what you are supposed to do and say. And she stops and corrects you if you get it wrong. She wanted to act out the scene from Cinderella when the Prince first sees her at the ball and then they dance and then she runs away and leaves her slipper behind. She danced with Derek a bit but Grace called him away. She then said I could play with her, but I had to pretend to be a boy. OK, got it. She wanted me to run after her when it came to the part about the clock striking midnight and Cinderella running away. She realized as she explained it that I am not very into running these days (I always veto the parts in the game where I have to run, although she did convince me to do jumping jacks the other day which I sorely regreted immeadiately afterwards.) She stopped sort of mid-sentence and said "and then we're going to run - er, um - walk fast over there to my carraige and then you're going to...".

3 years old

Here are a few quick images from Gracie's birthday yesterday. It was a nice day. 3 doesn't seem to quite get the once a year excitement and anticipation as well as 4 does and Grace is not really the most natural center of attention, but I definitely think she had fun. It was really nice to be with Mom and Pat and Ron and Laura throughout the weekend to celebrate another year of my little daughter's life.

Expressing her desire not to be photographed.



Some present opening. If it says Disney Princess, you know it's a big hit.






Her Cinderella cake. Grace loves Cinderella. She says Cin-da-wella, with the accent on the last 'wella' part.




Charlotte wearing the Cinderella dress that Grandma got for Grace. It fits Charlotte great, so Gracie only needs about 3 inches before it is perfect for her. Halloween, for sure.


Derek will be mad that this is not in color, but to me it just begged for black and white.

A new toy

Charlotte and I went to Toys R Us about a month ago and bought a Nintendo DS as sort of an impulse buy. It has been a big hit. It is a nice little system. It is very stylus-based and both kids picked it up quick. Charlotte plays many of the kid games like a pro and figures out pretty quick how to do stuff. Grace plays much better than I would have guessed, too. They both totally get it.

Right now, they actually play very well together (although I definitely see buying another one in our future). They share and take turns and watch each other play. And the clouds open up and a beam of light shines down straight into my heart.




Is it wierd that I consider this one to have serious enlarging and framing potential. One of my favorites in a very long time.



Grace playing by herself.




One of the things that I looked forward to doing with my kids before we even had kids was video games. I love video games. This has been really fun for me, actually. Charlotte and I play Super Mario Brothers together. Either she runs and I jump or, on hard levels, I control Mario and she manages the mushroom/flower/shell inventory. The other day our neighbor Crystal was over to play and she and Charlotte were in the bedroom playing the Disney Princess game on the Nintendo. From my office I heard Charlotte tell Crystal proudly, "my mommy has a game, too, and she lets me play it with her!" Like it was such a big deal. And to borrow a line from Dooce, I almost passed out with love for the little twerp.

The Attempt

I have been eyeing fields with bright yellow wildflowers since spring came. I finally found the (almost) perfect field. Early in the day, Charlotte agreed to come out to take some pictures, but by the time the evening light was good she was a little tried and cranky. We tried anyway and she really was a trooper. She was cold, she had to go potty, plus she is never all that thrilled with me photographing her. We got these that I like and some others I havent' edited yet.




The little one was the big ham of the evening. You know, many days she wants nothing to do with me. She loves Derek and I think she struggles a bit with the whole pregnancy thing. She loves to play rough and be chased and be carried alot, none of which I do very well. But suddenly when she realized that Charlotte and I were going somewhere and she wasn't really included, she was my very best friend. Derek brought her out to the field after we had been shooting for awhile and she called and called to me "Mommy! Mommy! I found you! I found you!" When I gave Charlotte a break and Derek took her back to the car to get out of the wind, Grace ran around and laughed and hammed it up for me. These two I like alot.




Both girls are into wearing dresses these days. They show off the height difference alot. I pretty much buy the same size clothes for them these days because they are about the same size around the waist, which seems to be the important thing for small child clothes fitting. The dresses come to Charlotte's knees or a little below. They go all the way down almost to Grace's ankles. She is actually very cute running around in them.

Today

It was a 5 tantrum day today. At least, I may have forgotten a few. The good thing about almost 3 is that she is much better at explaining to us what the problem is. She still gets stuck on things, though, and has a hard time moving forward. A half an hour later she'll still be lamenting, "Daddy open the straw! I want me do it! Daddy open it! I not want Daddy open it!" And by lamenting I mean huddled on the floor in a little ball with tears all down her face. Well, at least we know what the issue is. 6 months ago it was just lots of incomprehensible wailing and gnashing of teeth.

But then she can turn it right around and be so darn cute and irresistable.



I asked her where her toes were and her attention was drawn to a scratch on her foot.

Her nest

Charlotte took to the top bunk of the new bunk beds right away. I wasn't 100% that should would be willing to actually sleep up there, but she has loved it from the very first night. I think she likes the privacy and the cozy feeling of it. She hauled all kinds of stuff up there and made a typical Charlotte nest. See this post from when she still slept in the crib.

Where She Sleeps

Funny Charlotte story - today she was working on an art project for homework to take to school on Monday. She was carefully cutting and gluing and labeling, wporking at my desk and Grace was behind her jumping on the couch and singing a song that only she knows the words to. Really loudly. Charlotte asked her to stop a couple of times. Then, she turned to me and with a completely straight face said in this exasperated tone, "Mom, it is really hard to do something when somebody is bothering you." Really? Wow, I have never experienced that.

As I am typing this post, Charlotte is currently bouncing on that very same sofa and talking to me non-stop about Grandpa's birthday on Tuesday and the flowers we are going to buy for the garden and her playdate with her friend Patrick next weekend and about 8 other things that I wasn't paying attention to. Turns out, she's right. It is hard to do something when someone is bothering you. Who knew?

The Middle Child

Derek helped me take some pictures today of very pregnant me and my two beautiful daughters. The girls had fun and I am very glad to have the pictures to remember. When I have a chance to work on them I'll consider putting them up here. I have to practice my liquify tool skills.

The first three I edited were some shots we did afterwards of just Gracie. It's been awhile since she let me shoot her in the studio. I love these of her!

Recent

I left Grace outside alone for awhile this weekend while I helped Charlotte and her friend Crystal (our next door neighbor) in the house. When I got back I found Grace very happily digging in the dirt. Like the outfit? It's her pj top and her Cinderella costume. It made me laugh.



One of Charlotte in the studio. She was helping me test the new big softbox.