Lingering Lullabyes

I will eventually put up a post of all our 2010 Christmas adventures…but today I just want to talk about my sweet, baby girl. Daily, I am watching her move from that baby stage to a full fledged toddler. It is the most bittersweet thing I’ve ever experienced. It seems that everyday is more fun than the last, and yet there are moments when I miss her “itty-bittyness” and wish time would just stop moving so fast!

At almost 21 months, Cecilia is talking up a storm, she has just really started putting sentences together in the past two weeks. The first one I heard her say was the day after Christmas, when I had the stomach flu. Cecilia had been very good to play with Daddy and let me rest, but later in the day she was starting to get frustrated that I wouldn’t get out of bed. She got excited when I jumped up and ran to the bathroom, but then really upset when I closed the door behind me. She started knocking on the door and saying, “Mama! Mama? Knock, knock! Mama?” This went on for awhile before she started getting louder and started throwing herself against the door – finally her irritation came to a crescendo, and she yelled out very clearly, “Watcha doin in there, Mama?!” Without a doubt that is the first time I’ve ever laughed while my head was over a toilet bowl!

One morning last week she was very upset when I went to work , I left her sobbing and reaching for me and it was, of course, very heartbreaking. But Mom said it didn’t last long and she was distracted by other things. A little while later she saw Mom look out the window and she said, “Mama said bye-bye Ceci”. She has also been asking about people when they aren’t there, like she is starting to realize that there is a world beyond exactly where she is at that time and place. Ryan went to get her out of bed one Friday morning after I had left for work and she said, “Hi Dada! Mama sleeping?”

She also talks a lot about her friends and her cousins. She will list off all of their names when we are in the car over and over and I often hear her in her playroom making phone calls to them, “Hewwo (Hello) Parper (Parker)” and so on until she names them all. She was even making phone calls to Parker’s dad, Jason, the other day!

She has continued her love of Curious George and now has two stuffed “Georgies” that she keeps a pretty close tab on. She loves to watch George and when we let her, she gets so excited she can hardly contain herself. She has been walking around the house lately holding George’s hand and saying, “ornery George, ornery George” and then kissing him emphatically, “MMMUUUAAAH”! Ryan and I have realized that we’ve been picking up her mannerisms…and have to laugh when we go to give a kiss and automatically say “MMUUAAH!”

She has also started replacing “Mama” with “Mom”. It’s a little sad to think she is already outgrowing the “Mama” stage. I thought I would be “Mama” for years and then it would graduate to “Mommy”, but she has skipped “Mommy” all together! I have to admit, it is just as sweet as “Mama”. She usually calls me “Mama” when she is trying to get out of trouble or when she’s loving on me…but during the normal course of the day, she has a sassy, new, little voice she uses for, “Mom, Mom, hey Mom!” I try to get her to say it over and over, because it sounds so hilarious to me!

She is very, very social and loves to talk to people – she knows no strangers.  As soon as we walk into Wal-Mart she starts greeting people and if they ignore her, she just gets louder and more persistent! I love watching her make people smile and feel so honored that I get to be the one pushing around this amazing, little bundle of energy and joy! At one such visit to Wal-Mart, an old man with a long, white beard saw her talking to someone so he came up and said hi to her. She turned and her mouth just dropped open. Finally, she started saying, “Ho ho ho, Ho ho ho!” I finally realized why she was staring at him in disbelief, she thought he was Santa! When I told the man, he smiled and quickly said in a loud, deep voice, “well, I am Santa Claus!” and broke into character. Such a sweet moment, we couldn’t stop laughing when we left.

Over the weekend she managed to scribble with a blue ink pen all over our computer monitor, climb on top of the table and empty the salt shaker out on it, figured out how to open the door to the basement stairs and took a tumble down them, decided a good way to let me know she was done eating was to throw her fork to one side and her bowl of food to the other…and then say, “Oh No! Mess!”, started saying, “oh, dross (gross)!” whenever I change her diaper and various other toddler style antics. I am finding more and more that I really need Ryan to be good at being stern and using a good “dad voice”, because I can’t seem to keep a straight face…ever! No matter how rotten she’s being, it all strikes me as hilarious and adorable and it is all I can do to get on to her. I’m pretty sure she knows who she’s got wrapped around her finger and I’m pretty sure it’s not a good thing…but, I keep reassuring myself with my Grandma Yoder’s words, “oh, you can’t spoil a good baby!” (although, I’m pretty sure that’s not what she meant at all). Cecilia knows she’s cute and when she gets caught she automatically wrinkles her nose and smiles this really ridiculous smile and says, “sowwy, Mama” or in the case of the computer screen it was, “sowwy ‘bout the puter, daddy”.

There is no doubt we will have our hands full with this one, but I’m okay with that – I love every bit of her - the good, the bad, and the ugly!  She is, undoubtedly, more fabulous than I ever could have imagined. I hope I can always remember these moments and never forget the joy she is filling me and Ryan’s world with.

These precious days of baby powder and lullabyes are quickly passing by, so I will cherish the little glimpses she still gives me every now and then. Saturday night, riding home in the dark, her tired, little hand reached out to mine and she said, "hold you, mama. Sing me." She held my hands tightly and I sang her our favorite song. Her eyelids closed and I felt her relax...but she never let go of my hands.