Curly Straight

Julia is holding her sippy cup horizontally and singing Baby Milk, Baaaabbyyy Miilllkkk while rocking it back and forth, oh so gently.

Julia loves looking at books, magazines, photo albums, anything with pages and pictures.

She repeats everything you say, as she points at the picture, pretty much verbatim.

The one phrase she doesn't have down yet is "what is that?" - instead she points at a picture and says "da da daa?" which so clearly means "what is that?" by the inflection of her voice.

Works for me.

I am cutting Julia's waffle into smaller pieces because she can't fit the last couple into her mouth.

TJ: Dada cut them too big. I need to tell him.

TJ walks into the bathroom where John is in the shower: Daddy, you cut Julia's waffle too big and next time you need to make the pieces smaller so she can fit them in her mouth.

Daddy: ok, I'll make a note of that.

TJ: And put it on the counter or in a secret place so next time you make a waffle you can look at it and remember to cut it smaller.

John is reading The Cat in the Hat to TJ and Julia.

Julia points to a picture of the little boy. "TJ," she says.

John says "is that TJ? And is that Julia?" pointing to the little girl.

She gives a tiny little nod and whispers "yes."

TJ is wiping Julia's nose. He ran to get a tissue as fast as he could and then ran over to her and wiped her runny nose.

It is very cute.

True love.

TJ: I just burped.

Mama: Did you say "excuse moi?"

TJ: No.

Mama: That's how you say it in French.

TJ: We're not in French.

If I had an elliptical in my house, I would be on it right now.

We have a Kindness Jar in our home and whenever someone does something really nice or kind, they get a little note in there. Every now and then when TJ does something nice, he demands it gets documented and put in there, but mostly it's when we catch them committing a random act of kindness.

We have filled it up twice since we implemented it in October or so.

It's nice to sit and read the kind acts that the kids have done. After John and I take turns reading each kindness, we all applaud. Mostly it ends up that TJ gets a lot of praise because although Julia is pretty sweet and kind, she hasn't quite figured out the good deed thing yet at her tender age. In the future, I'm sure she will have many more.

Here are the kindnesses we read about as we emptied the jar on Saturday evening.

TJ got Julia her milk when she couldn't reach.

Julia gave TJ his car. He was sitting on the potty.

Ava (TJ's little friend) gave Julia a book so nicely.

Julia is always smiling in the morning.

TJ shared his eggnog with Julia.

Julia gave TJ a hug just because.

Thomas put Julia's coat away for her. Also, at school, he cleaned up when she took out a doll.

TJ helps Julia get down from her chair.

Julia let TJ read a story to her.

TJ whispered in the morning so Julia wouldn't wake up.

TJ and Julia played so nicely with her new dollhouse.

TJ helped Mommy make delicious beef stew.

Julia helped pick up all the cars.

TJ and Julia shared their spiders.

Julia gave TJ his shoe.

Julia gave TJ a Christmas kiss.

TJ gave Julia a pizelle out of the kindness of his heart.

TJ helped make his lunch.

I have a sweet son and a sweet daughter.

I find it amazing what a difference in the day it can make waking up to a clean kitchen.
And entire house, for that matter. Although I would have no idea about the latter.

Le Grand Pinot Noir

(Black Sheep)

A nice, delicious, light red.

Introduced by Gail.