The kids had a great time playing on the stepstones in the front yard, which were placed hurriedly by the previous owners of our house right before they sold it to us. Now, nearly 10 years later, that temporary measure is still there. We don't move fast.
Katrina continues to impress me with her instability and lack of balance. Are we related? Even I'm not this clumsy....oh wait....yeah, I am.
She will step down very short steps now without climbing, sometimes. It's more fun to follow someone and make it a game though.
Fun's over! Time for the whole family to go to a lighting store. Whee.
We had a plan though: two cars, we make some final decisions, Dave takes the bunch home before the store pleads with us to go, and I stay behind to do the painful ordering part. I was expecting mayhem on a Sunday afternoon, but it was eerily dead.
One kind saleslady amused herself by setting up our little clan with crayons and paper, and they had a great time. Katrina really took to her, talking and pointing things out that she'd drawn.
We actually escaped with a compliment about how well-behaved our kids were!!!
It was so funny when we first arrived, and the lady smiled at her, and Katrina put her head down and finger in her mouth, with a pout. "Aww, shy, is she?" Yeah, shy, that's Katrina all right. It was more like a passive-aggressive gesture of resistance, which turned to confident friendliness moments later.
The same lady asked me if it was different having a girl after two boys -- turns out she has a 5-year-old boy and 3-year-old girl. I really have a hard time agreeing with that -- it is different, but moreso because of personality than gender. Katrina does girl-things, but the things about her that dominate my experience with her aren't really gender-specific. She's very verbal and chatty, I guess that's more of a girl thing (it still shocks me to think that at 2-1/4, Gabriel was just just barely starting to say a few words). Julian's language was at least as good, but he didn't yak quite the same way. She likes to wrap stuffed animals in blankets or diapers sometimes, the boys never did that (other than Gabriel once trying to nurse his teddy bear). Ahhh, I just hit upon it: BOSSY. Katrina orders everyone around to the point of rudeness. That's different.
Today after her nap, I held her for a few minutes -- or rather, she stood there and allowed me to put my arms around her. I had something on the stove, so I stayed as long as I could, but then moved away, and to my surprise, she put her arm out around my neck, as if to hold me there. I gladly stayed, but then I felt her trembling slightly, as she often does just after waking up. She didn't want me there for comfort, she needed a leaning post! Well, I'll take it. What are moms for, if not to help steady their child?
1/25/09
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