Big Toddler, Little Toddler

I've been having kind of a difficult time keeping up with Greta lately. Especially compared to Anja, she is a real handful as a toddler. She's a climber AND an eater-of-everything. Yesterday while I was picking up whatever it was I was trying to keep out of her mouth, she ran over and started climbing up the ladder back kitchen chairs. What is she doing climbing the chairs? Often she is trying to get to the table to eat the dirt out of the flower pot that's there.



However, Greta IS a pretty good napper, and yesterday during her nap, this is what Anja and I did: We'd had to come in a few hours before (while Greta was awake) because I simply couldn't keep her from eating one nasty thing after another. (One example of nasty: The hair from the bathtub drain. SHE EATS IT.) But after she was napping Anja and I went outside and spread a picnic blanket on the lawn and I was able to get a lot of knitting done while Anja stood by the fence singing and looking for the neighbors' cat. We read some Peter Rabbit. We chatted. She picked flowers and showed them to me:

It was really nice! And then Greta woke up.

For the past two days this week we went up to my mom's house in the afternoon and swam with The Cousins. The first day both girls had a really good time. The second day Greta had a good time, but Anja fell asleep in the car on the way and had a TWO HOUR nap on Ooma's couch! So we were in for a long evening. We took a walk around the block, which lasted approximately one hour.


Greta pushed and was very mindful of Daddy and Anja bringing up the rear.

Pink-Pink rode along, as always.

And this is a wonderful picture of Anja that has a wonderful story behind it. I've seen various poll-like questions over time about lying to your kids and if/when it's okay. In this case, we say it's okay. Before I begin the story, let me clarify, in case there is any sort of misunderstanding: Anja doesn't just like her cousin Grace. She is completely obsessed with Grace. And so, yesterday she wanted to wear this dress to bed that used to be Gracie's. (Although that turns out to be not quite true, even though we didn't lie about that, we were just mistaken.) The problem with wearing this dress to bed (or ever, on these summery days) is that it is not a summer dress by any means. It's long-sleeved, heavy cotton, and since it's about four times too big for her, it comes down almost to her feet. She wore it all winter. If she had worn it to bed, she would've cooked in the night.

So we told her a little lie. We found a different dress, better suited for summer bedtimes, and we told her it had belonged to Grace too! She wasn't buying it. So Martin made a little phone call (to Time & Temperature.) He talked to Grace, described the dress, and "Grace" said that it was indeed her old dress! Hooray! But what makes it even better is that at the time, Anja was also wearing a pair of Gracie's underpants because she'd had a little accident up at Ooma's house and there is a drawer full of extra clothes there for just such occasions. So when I asked Anja if I could take a picture of her in Gracie's dress to show to Gracie, she posed like this--showing the underpants too! Hahahahaha!

Ahhh, two-year-olds. DEFINITELY my favorite!