Naomi recognizes classical music

The other day an instrumental version of Ave Maria came on while we were listening to one of our CDs. Naomi turned to me and said something that at first I couldn't figure out. She's used to that, so she repeated it, and I eventually figured out what she was saying: "Ave Maria, Mommy, Ave Maria! Ave Maria, Mommy, Ave Maria!"

If you're trying to get a bunch of baking done

and you have two small children in the house, my advice is to hire people to come do crown cleaning on the trees outside your kitchen windows. It provides at least a couple of hours of entertainment. Guys swinging around on climbing gear from treetops seem to have a special fascination for children, especially if accompanied by the occasional tree branch falling or ladder being used.

Play imitates life

sometimes a bit too closely. The day we got the new-to-us Little People, as Michael and I were on our way to bed, here's what we saw in the bathroom:

The potty that came with the house is by far Naomi's favorite part of the set. There *must* be a way of taking advantage of this in toilet training.

Hannah is amused

by the kids on the radio who think we celebrate Jesus' dying on the cross at Christmas. We were listening to a station that has little kids say things about what Christmas is all about, and one child said we're celebrating Jesus coming to earth and dying for us on the cross. I could see what he was talking about, although I was just thinking to myself that the Incarnation itself is a pretty big thing to consider and celebrate this time of year when Hannah piped up with,

"We celebrate Jesus' birth at Christmas, not his dying for our sins."

So we had a discussion about how Jesus coming led to his dying for our sins, but how it's an amazing thing that God came as a baby. What a mystery, and a reason to celebrate. When another child later on as we were listening talked about the baby being wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger, Hannah was relieved. "That child knew about why we celebrate Christmas."

Hannah is disappointed

that we won't be doing all our Christmas shopping in a hurry. Um...what? She heard a radio commercial that assured us that we could do all our Christmas shopping in a hurry.

"Why don't we get to do all our Christmas shopping in a hurry, Mom?"

Did that sentence have the phrase "get to" in it? Good grief.

"Well, sweetie, we do our Christmas shopping earlier so that we're not stressed out by shopping right now."

"Oh."

A key to parenting

is to learn patience early. And often. And exercise it when your 4-year-old decides she'd like to fingerpaint. And you (we're not mentioning who, but starts with an M and ends with an L and has ichae in the middle) particularly dislike the dirty hand feeling, even to the point of it bothering you to witness others having dirty hands for more than, say, a few seconds at a time...And you still facilitate fingerpainting. And even take pictures of the destruction for posterity and loving friends and relatives around the country. Even if said pictures give you the willies. Because just look how happy you've made said 4-year-old. She adores you.

Never give up!

Someday, somehow, you might just learn how to boof your own belly.

If imitation is

the sincerest form of flattery, than Naomi is doing some serious flattering lately. To everyone. Some of the cutest are when we are saying goodbye to people and her versions of "See you soon!" and "Goodbye!" "Drive carefully!" "I love you!" all tumble out all over themselves. The drive carefully one is especially funny if we're the ones who are going to be driving away. :)

A while back Naomi realized that when I nurse her I always get a burp cloth first, and often when she asked to nurse I would say, "I need to get a burp cloth." Well, this wasn't difficult for her to solve, so now when she wants to nurse, *she* goes to get the burpcloth -- or "buppoff," in Naomese -- and follows me around with it. Now she's taken to "nursing" her stuffed animals and dolls, and if she decides they need to nurse, she'll tell me earnestly, "Nuss...buppoff," and go find a burp cloth, then sit on the couch and "nuss" the baby.

Good grief, how did I keep myself entertained before children?

Snippets

I have been neglectful of the blog, but that's not because nothing is happening, so I'll try to give a few cute stories.

Naomi has started saying, "Bless you," when someone sneezes. It's very clear and VERY cute.

Hannah puts her babies (dolls, stuffed animals) that she's currently playing with in the front hall closet so that Naomi doesn't get to them. Hannah has something of an overactive fear of Naomi getting her stuff. It's amusing, though, to open the closet to put something in the recycle bin and find that Baby Gretel is sleeping on top of the recycle bin. Also amusing to host guests and offer to take their coats, open the closet, and have Nanny the Rabbit and Charlotte the Bear fall out.

Naomi loves saying,"Look at me, Daddy!" She usually has an impish grin on and is doing something vaguely dangerous.

Hannah realized today that guests are coming soon. "We're going to have to clean up!" was her observation. It's not actually that bad around here, so I was a bit surprised, but then she said, "You tell me the day before they're coming so I can clean my quiet time things out of the guest room."

Naomi has also figured out the shape sorter and is having a great time putting the shapes through.

Snow!

This afternoon we had some friends over for the afternoon and dinner, but this morning, despite some necessary preparation, we had some time to hang out together. Some of us were a bit tired, due to some others of us having a bit of a rough night and early morning...

This afternoon it started snowing. The girls were very excited, and I took the opportunity to take some pictures with snow in the background.

When I brought Naomi down after her nap and it was snowing, I said, "Look, Mimi, it's snowing!" She looked outside and said, "BUBBLES!" It was very cute, and really the highest compliment she could give to it, since she absolutely loves bubbles. She persisted in calling the falling snow "bubbles" for the rest of the day.

Hannah was beside herself watching the snow. "A snowstorm! I can barely see anything because of all the snow!" [Probably brought on by the Little House descriptions of blizzards, since it wasn't remotely snowing that hard!] "Can I touch it? What happens if I go out and sit in it with my snow pants on?"

And as you can see, it wasn't a paltry little fall, either. The footprints are from Michael going out to move our deck bird feeder. It was getting a bit weighed down by the snow. We've got probably 3-4 inches on the deck. It's still lightly coming down, too.
You can see the newspaper Michael put over Hannah's cilantro on the end planting box there. Yes, cilantro is growing in our planting boxes at this time of year. It may not survive the snow, but not because we neglected to cover it up!