They Make Me Laugh

I love my babies, and they remind me of that everyday in every way. Today, when I was reminding Rigel to include "please" with his demands, he stubbornly refused. His response was clever enough to make me smile and relent (just this once):

Rigel: Mom, you do it. I don't want to.

Me: How about asking a bit more politely?

Rigel: (sigh)...please.

Me: Nope. That doesn't count. Start your request over, and then say please.

Rigel: (Begrudging sigh)...That was my last one. I don't have any more left.

Me: You don't have any more pleases left?

Rigel: Nope. Maybe later, if you ask me again, I might get some more. Then, I can prob'ly say please. But not now.

Also, as an attempt to describe a complicated task, I caught Rigel swearing: "What a pain and a heck!" That's his version of Mama and Daddy's "grown-up words."

As for Izzy, we haven't quite gotten into conversations, yet, but communication is definitely not a problem. She surprises us continually with just how much she picks up on. Tonight, for instance, I made chocolate truffle cookies (from Trader Joe's Brownie mix), and she noticed from across the room. She ran to the bathroom, grabbed the step stool, and stood peering over the counter at the cookie sheet as it filled up with rows of chocolate globs. "What doin, Mama?" she asked. When I told her I was making cookies, she replied, "No! Not koookies! It brawn-ies!" Now, how she knows what brownies are is a mystery to me, since I've never made them for the kids before. They've never been alone with anyone else long enough to bake brownies elsewhere, so I'm stumped. And, for the rest of the night, Izzy followed me around the house saying, "Ont brawn-ies!" and, "just ooooonnnne more. Okay, Mommy?"

A couple days ago, while Rigel was in pre-school, Izzy entertained me. She dumped out a bag of blocks and refilled it with her chips, then perched on the side of our pillow basket to watch the Halloween ghosts flying around on our front porch whilst munching. It's those silly little actions of hers that amuse me, so confident and yet so innocent. Like the next day, when we visited the museums at Balboa Park: while taking a restroom break, she discovered a hand-drying machine. This was more fascinating to her than any of the exhibits thus far. She stood beneath the hot air blower as if taking a shower, running her fingers through her hair with her eyes squeezed shut. Coaxing her out of there was a challenge, as she kept insisting, "not yet. Ooonne more."

And yes, I took a picture (in a public restroom, no less!)