Or am I just easily impressed?

We are having ‘alone time’ right now (a.k.a. nap time, but Alethea seems to resent the implication that she might need a nap, so I tell her, “That’s fine, you don’t have to take a nap, but Mommy needs to be alone right now,” hence the ‘alone time’.)

Anyway, the tornado sirens just went off because it is the first Wednesday of the month.

This is what I overheard from Alethea’s room:

“Sirens!”

pause

then in a perplexed little voice:

“But it’s sunny outside!”

I was surprised at the reasoning skills she must have been using, but I’m her mother, so like I said, I realize that I may just be easily impressed.

Today is Alethea’s 26 month birthday.  Happy birthday, my Dear Girl!

Now that she’s turned two, I’m not necessarily planning on doing an update for Alethea every month, but being as she’s been doing so much growing up these past few weeks, I thought I’d better write one before I forget all the cute things she’s said and done lately.

And kids do say the darndest things, right?  Well, mine does, that’s for sure.  Today we ran out of tomatoes and Alethea was quite upset and kept asking for more at lunchtime.  I told her I would buy some at the grocery store tomorrow and then asked if there was anything else she thought I should get.  After a moment’s thought, she said, “Apples.”

“Okay, I replied, “We can definitely get apples.  Anything else we need?”

She nodded and then matter-of-factly said, “Toys.”

I’m not even sure why she wants more toys since she hardly plays with the ones she’s got.  Her favorite pastimes recently include playing with sticks and rocks outside, washing the dishes with Mommy, coloring with her markers and climbing up on anything that might lead her to stuff she’s not supposed to have.  (As a side bonus, her new desire to get into things that should be out of reach has created a greater incentive for me to keep my kitchen counters tidy.)

Another thing that Alethea doesn’t seem to get tired of doing is playing with her baby sister, and let me tell you, Lydia just eats up the attention.  No one can make Lydia laugh as much as Alethea can and it is delightful to hear them cackling away together over something silly that Alethea is doing to entertain her sister.  And while it can be hard at times for me to figure out just what is so funny, there is no doubt that their sweet laughter is infectious and I can’t help but join in.  And even when all Alethea can get for her goofiness is a blank stare from Lydia, Alethea will still turn to me and say, “Ee-ya thinks I’m funny!” at which point I nod, smile and say, “I’m sure she does, honey.”

Of course Alethea’s biggest transition of the past month or so has been the move into her toddler bed.  She seems to be handling it reasonably well.  She’s been up late a few of the nights and did skip her nap on Sunday, but overall, I’ve been impressed with the fact that she hasn’t cried during the night and her room is relatively tidy come morning.  No books or toys have (yet) been destroyed and I can find no evidence of attempts to climb or move furniture.  So over all, I’d say it’s going about as well as we could have hoped all things considered.

We are certainly enjoying this time in Alethea’s development.  She keep us on our toes and does have a stubborn streak (wonder where she gets that from, huh?), but over all, she is a sweet girl who wants to please her Mommy and Daddy.  Her little sister adores her and she generally gets along well with other children.  Watching her grow in her expressiveness and creativity is a process of discovery each day.  What a marvelous adventure!

Tonight was the big night.  We finally took the plunge and converted Alethea’s crib into a toddler bed.  We also bolted her dresser to the wall and removed her chair and the toy storage cubes to try to prevent her from doing any climbing.

I did my best to prepare her for the change by talking about it all day.  She at one point asked me if she would have Dee in her big girl bed and I assured her that he would be in the bed along with her blankie, nuks and other stuffed animals.

I also bought her a new pretty purple sheet with flowers and butterflies on it and she was very excited to put that on the mattress tonight before bed.

After the bed conversion was complete, Alethea double checked to make sure it still worked for a trampoline…

and then spent several minutes putting all of her comfort items back in the bed…

The end result?  Well, it’s 10:21 and she just finally got quiet.  She seemed to be fine as long as she wasn’t in the bed, but every time she climbed in, she’d start crying.  Poor girl.  I really thought she’d be excited about having the freedom to roam around, but it only seems to be making her feel insecure.

We’ll see how the rest of the night goes.  I have a feeling I may be visiting her room several times.  Mainly though, I just hope she doesn’t fall out.

MORNING UPDATE: Alethea did not cry at all last night, although I did hear her playing at around 3:00am.  When I woke up in the morning, she was standing at the gate in the doorway waiting for someone to let her out of her room, but the room itself was very neat.  She even put her books back on the shelf in a nice stack!