Wii Played All Weekend

Charlotte is really starting to push those boundaries ergo she's looking for Adam & me to really set them. So, starting next 'no no' I'm implementing the corner. I'd already gotten the opinion from Noni & Popi and I talked to her pediatrician about it earlier this week and she confirmed...Charlotte Rose Wilson is old enough for the corner. Next time she yanks on Moses' whiskers out of meanness...there will be consequences (if she doesn't straighten up after warning #1 but there will only be 1 warning).

The rest of the appt went well. Charlotte's right on track with everything...she even ran for the doctor - a layman would probably think the run looked a little uncoordinated but luckily there are people that specialize in this. I've been reading to Charlotte all wrong. Lately, I've been letting her pick the story and then we go through it and I "read" it to her in her terms...For instance:

Literal translation of book: The baby duck saw a big, brown, hairy duck and he asked, Are you my mother? And the dog said Bow Wow.

Mommy's translation of book: LOOK Charlotte Rose!!! A duck! Where's the duck? Where's the dog? GOOD! What's dog say? pant, pant, lick...(note to reader: our dogs don't bark, our dogs pant and lick) Look at that silly dog! What do we tell doggies? 'hey dog' and 'no no no' (point and shake head).

It rained last Saturday so we all took a trip to Toys R Us. Charlotte got her first dollhouse and a mommy & baby cat that meow and tickle each other. We picked out the house, she picked out the cat. Adam picked out Nintendo Wii. http://wii.com/ Is it funny to anyone else that Adam and Charlotte go shopping at the same store? We came home and set up the dollhouse and Charlotte started playing with it! Appropriately! Well, until she tried to get her kitten to sit in the doll's chair. But she knew the chair was for sitting! Adam and I are hanging out in her room - 'look! she's doing it! she's playing with the house!' We're nuts.

And then Adam went and played with his new toy. While I, very maturely, sat on the sofa and read. I was completely uninterested in his juvenille game until he pulled up tennis. Holy cow! It is so much fun! Like you're really playing tennis! I mean overhanded serves, volley's, forehands, backhands, spin! SO MUCH FUN! I'm embarrassed to admit this but I was sore on Monday! Can you believe that? Charlotte came running in from her room - thought it was hilarious - she's in there giving the winners high fives, jumping around like she was playing too. Great 21st century family fun. Game night just took on a whole new meaning.

I guess you could say we had an over-indulgent weekend. Charlotte got a sandbox on Sunday. I was tired of her playing in the dirt and in the birdseed in the backyard. Bless her heart, she needs tactile exploration.

Where is the cool weather? It's September and I have to set up a fan outside for Charlotte when she plays. I was so excited, I thought it was coming...I've started 10 projects in the backyard thinking it's about to be cooling off. Wrong. So I had to dig like 10 big holes all by myself in the heat with the gnats. Disgusting. We went to do the river Sunday morning. I actually put a jacket on Charlotte, for heavens sakes...what was I thinking?! And I put on a heavy t-shirt. Which Adam made me pull off halfway through the ride so he wouldn't have to hear me WHINE! Oh the whining...at least Charlotte comes by it honestly.

Charlotte is having a very fun time outside picking all of the flowers off my mums. Luckily, mums are cheap. $5 will buy you about 500 blooms = 20 minutes of Charlotte fully-focused play.

Last night Adam was outside playing with Charlotte and he asked her what a dog says. She panted (just like Eloise, EXACTLY what Eloise says), then a cat, she meowed. A cow, she mooed, a bear, she roared and a lion was a slightly different roar. He asked her what a turtle said, she was silent...EXACTLY! Turtles don't say anything. I didn't even know she knew all that. But we have been reading 'Polar Bear, Polar Bear, what do you see?' She picked it up in the library from the spanish section. So, I can't read the book. I have to make the words up and we make alot of animal sounds while we read. So much for teaching my toddler spanish.

Moses' hair is falling out and I think it's stress. He likes to snuggle up in Charty's blanket basket in her room. She use to just pelt him with stuffed animals but lately she's been running over and squeezing in beside him (really more on top of him) and bless his sweet heart, I have to save him. So there's that. But also, she's found the pot lids. She's started banging them. I'll think she's playing quietly with her crayons on her table, Moses is sleeping sweetly on the kitchen rug when we hear CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG! I scream a little and then I find a clump of Moses hair. Poor boy. I don't know what we'll do when Charty develops the dexterity to dress him up in clothes.