Making pretzels with Kurt over the weekend. They came out great, but the baking was the best part!
I've been so enjoying the girls lately. Recently they were in a REALLY difficult sibling stage, full of whining, constant crying, wrestling and generally doing their best to abuse each other AND me. I felt terrible and drained and overwhelmed and helpless and every other word you can think of to describe the total powerlessness that parenthood sometimes serves up.
And then it stopped.
Just... stopped. Cuteness reigns supreme. Talk of the baby is everywhere. Anna is determined to get up in the night and rock the baby back to sleep "if" it wakes up and cries. Silvia tells everyone that her little sister (because no way will she consider we might have a boy) will be here soon and Mama will feed her mommy milk from my "nibbles" (by the way, I've tried to get her to STOP telling people this, but since it makes Kurt laugh and snort his coffee, she won't). All the stuffed animals go through speedy pregnancies every day, complaining about their backs and needing naps.
On top of that, Silvia cannot stop talking. I remember this stage with Anna, where everything was a running monologue ALL DAY LONG. Not that she's stopped, mind you, but the flow of words has slowed down some and she even sits quietly for long moments, reading her books.
Now it's Silvia's turn and, boy oh boy, has she embraced the moment! All through every meal, all day playing, on the potty, during stories-- every minute seems filled with her observations. She's delighting in rhymes right now, making up silly words to go with whatever she's saying.
"Can I have that book-dook, Anna?"
"It's time to take a bath-dath-math!!"
All these things, of course, send her into hysterical giggles at which point Anna also collapses. Because, you know, there's nothing more contagious than giggles. And I tell ya, having the house filled with screaming laughter most of the day is WAY better than shaking down with screaming tantrums.
Last night we were watching a thing on the History Channel about how the Earth was formed. They like all the space pictures and get all gasp-y and excited at the shots of a volcano-covered planet. During one of those scenes, Silvia started talking rapidly about olives. Olives?
"And the volcanoes are full of olives and they come out and are hot all over the world and make the planet! Look at all that olives!!".
Anna got up and went to the TV, really scanning the screen for olives, totally confused. Then I figured it out.
"Lava? Do you mean lava, honey?" I asked. She nodded vigorously.
"Yeah. Olives!!"
