The Things She Says...

I learn more each day that being a Mom is the best gift anyone could receive.  Don't get me wrong, I often catch myself reminiscing about the first time we went for a stroll, her very first bite of bananas, and that very first step on her own, but I must say, the Motherhood experience just keeps getting better.  At each new phase, I say, "THIS is my favorite age."  :)  What a blessing to be able to share such precious moments with our children.  How can we help but to love them unconditionally?!  Anna Scott is quickly approaching 2 years old, and I love watching her grow and learn and listening to all she has to say.  I want to share some of the things she is saying and doing now so that I can look back one day and remember.  I will share some recent snapshots along the way as well...

She absolutely loves school. She talks about her friends all of the time.  She went through a little period where she would cry when a couple of her friends left in the afternoon, but she hasn't done that in a couple of weeks.  When we ask her who her best friend is, she names everyone in her class (starting with Mary Cable - the only girl other than her out of the six children).  She talks about Andrew a lot because he is so sweet.  When we leave school each day, she points to the art work in the halls and says, "Andrew did that." She thinks he is very special.  :)  Her teachers are bragging on her daily.  They say she is very smart but they are most impressed with her love of music and ability to carry a tune and keep a beat (when playing the drums in music class). 

Anna Scott is so friendly.  I think she will be my little social bug.  She waves at each class and all of the teachers when we leave school each day, gives everyone kisses, and tells Mr. Danny at the front desk, "By Mr. Danny!  See you tomorrow!"  Precious.  I love picking her up from school and watching her for a little while before I let her see that I am there.  It is one of my favorite times of each day.  Even better is when she spots me and runs to me with arms wide open.  Be still my heart!

Anna Scott is such a big helper these days.  She wants to do whatever I am doing, whether it be laundry, yard work, preparing a meal, or just plain ole' cleaning house.  She is actually rather good at taking weeds to the trash can and putting clothes in the dryer.  (I promise she is not doing chores!)  She is also very concerned about things being picked up when they are dropped or spilled.  She spilled all of her ponytail holders out of their case a few weeks ago and was trying to pick them up one by one.  I think she would have sat there picking them up all night if I hadn't of helped her.

Anna Scott loves broccoli.  When I say loves, I mean she prefers it over mac and cheese.  Shortly after we moved into our new house, we had two trees chopped down in our front yard.  Anna Scott watched as the trees fell.  The rest of the day, she kept saying, "A tree fell down!"  Over, and over, and over again.  About a week went by without mention of the trees.  We were eating dinner at a restaurant and I ordered Anna Scott some broccoli.  She immediately picked up a stalk, and said with eyes wide open, "A tree fell down!"  So funny!

Two of her big phrases right now are, "Let me have it" and "Let me do it."  She can do it ALL BY HERSELF!  We rode by the park the other day (the one we stroll to at least a few times a week), and she reached her arm out toward the park and said, "Let me have it."  Bless her heart.  We didn't get to go that day.

She has learned to sing the blessing before she eats at school.  It goes something like, "God our Father, God our Father, We thank you, We thank you, For your many blessings, For your many blessings, Amen, Amen.  Every time we sit down to eat, she puts her little hands together and starts singing it (even though Mommy occasionally forgets).

I love the way she says "Granmama" (what she calls my mom).  She really emphasizes the GRAND part. It is so cute.  She has talked to my mom a couple of times on the phone after school this week.  I will just hand her the phone while she is in her car seat and she puts it right to her ear and carries on a little conversation.  It is so cute to see that phone pressed up against her little cheek.  I will probably wreck one day due to looking at her in my rearview mirror.

Speaking of staring glancing back while driving, I love to watch Anna Scott sing in the car.  She sings along to many many songs, but her favorite is "Ten Thousand Reasons."  She calls it "Oh My Soul."  :)  You will understand if you listen.  She literally knows every word and it is the sweetest thing I have ever seen or heard.  I try to teach her a new song every day (that we have the time).  She is always singing something!  We used the little resurrection finger puppets during Easter.  Scott walked upstairs the other day and Anna Scott had Jesus on her finger.  She was looking at him and singing "Jesus Loves Me."

We went out to eat about a two months ago and our waiter was an older man who was just awesome.  He was so good with Anna Scott.  We had the best time just having him as our waiter (forget the food!).  He gave Anna Scott a little stuffed bunny to play with during dinner.  Once dinner was over, I walked over to him to give the bunny back.  To my surprise, he told me to keep it; that he wanted Anna Scott to have it.  Well, Anna Scott was delighted and I talked to her for the next couple of hours (as long as her interest in the bunny lasted) about how nice it was for that man to give her the bunny.  A couple of weeks before Easter, I pulled all of Anna Scott's stuffed bunnies out for her to play with in her room.  One night, she went straight to that very bunny, picked it up and said, "That man! He nice."  I was shocked that she even remembered the event, much less the exact bunny he gave her.  I thought it was extra sweet.

She cares for her baby doll a lot more now than she has in the past.  It occasionally gets to drink some milk and may be rocked once or twice a week (this is an improvement).  She put a blanket over her baby's feet recently and said, "Feet cold baby."  I have attributed these motherly instincts to her newfound interest in the golden book, Baby Dear.  She is slowly learning that she needs to care for and love her baby dolls just like I care for and love her.  :)

She is all about "my stuff" and "my toys" and "my this" and "my that."  She also recognizes when something belongs to someone else.  I feel like she has grasped this concept pretty well for an almost 2 year old.  Hopefully, sharing will come easy to her and she will learn to accept that she can't have what everyone else has but to be happy with what she does have.  That is a hard lesson for anyone to learn, even us adults!

When we are doing something to her she doesn't like (wiping her face, cleaning her hands, brushing her hair or teeth) she says "Sorry! Sorry!"  This is her way of telling us that we need to say we are sorry.

My favorite thing she says:  "I love you, Mommy."  "Hold you Mommy" and "What you doin, Mommy?" and "Mommy do it" and "My do it" are some other favorites of mine.

When we talk about anything in the air, she says, "Up in the skies!"  She loves to use that phrase.

She sings the song "I love you, you love me" until we are ready to pull our hair out.  :)  I couldn't name all of her favorite songs, because there are just too many.  If the child is angry, there is one thing you can count on to cheer her up, and that is music and singing.  If she is singing a song and I start to chime in, she will often say, "No Mommy!"  She wants to sing it by herself and for me to listen to her.

When we catch her dancing or singing to music without her knowing we were watching, she'll look at us and say, "I like the music."  :)

She loves to tell me that things are too heavy for her.  "Too heavy Mommy!"

She must have gotten this from school:  "How'd they do that?"  I laughed out loud the first time she said it.  Just came out of nowhere!

Allison gave Anna Scott some sweet surprises for Easter that included a Hello Kitty coloring book.  We went right upstairs and sat at her table to color with her new crayons and book.  When she sat down, I opened the book for her and she said, "I don't believe it!"  :)  That may be from school as well.

She also loves to tell me that it is too dark whenever there is not enough light in the room.  When we get home in the afternoons, the first thing she says as we walk in the door is, "We're home!  Turn on the lights!"  :)

She role plays a lot now and is real bossy to her animals.  She tells them to watch TV, go to sleep, eat, sing, sit right here/there, etc.  I feel very sorry for them.  She is a tough boss.

She loves basketball.  She really loves all kind of ball but we have a basketball goal in our back yard and she is exposed to that sport the most right now, so she talks about it more than the others.  Hopefully, tennis will take its place down the road, but I love basketball too, so it's fine!  :)  We are very big Alabama fans (as if you didn't know), so Anna Scott hears about Bama a lot.  Every time she makes a basket (on her little goal or bath tub goal) she claps her hands and yells, "Yea Alabama!"  or "Yea Nick Saban!"  It is the funniest thing!  We did not teach her to say "Yea Nick Saban."  She just associates him with Alabama and says his name too.  :)  I am excited about the upcoming football season.  She is going to love cheering for the Crimson Tide.

We were driving down the road late one afternoon and the sun was quickly setting.  I was listening to the radio, minding my own business and I guess she got tired of not having anyone to talk to.  :)  All of a sudden I heard her say, "Goodnight sunshine.  See you tomorrow!"

She says, "Okey dokey" a lot.  Cracks me up.

I love how she says, "There it is!" when she finds something she has been looking for.  Makes her so happy that she actually succeeded in finding whatever it was.  (Especially if it is that paci of hers)

She is still in the phase where she repeats everything I say.  I love that about this age (though I really have to watch what I say!)

Scott gets up with her and gets her ready for school a lot of mornings because I have to be at work before him most of the time.  In the morning, he always asks her, "Did you sleep good?"  Not too long ago, she woke up and the first thing she said to him was, "Daddy sleep good?"  He smiled and said, "I sure did."

We have talked about friends a lot since she started school, so she now calls everyone "friends."  She will just walk up to Scott and me or whoever is standing around and say "Hi Friends!"

She will tell me if something is "too loud."  She has that concept down really well (until she wants to scream herself).

She enjoys scrolling through the pictures/videos on my iphone.  It is so funny seeing her little thumb scroll to the left and right so quickly to find the picture or video she is looking for.

Things she loves:  Airplanes, Mary Poppins, Broccoli, Ring around the Rosie, Bubbles, Basketball, Castles (since we returned from Disney, she calls all big buildings and churches castles), The Wiggles, Music, Books/reading, coloring, the park, stickers, Praise Baby, sweets, her paci (wubba-nub), the outdoors.

Anna Scott's teacher sends a little "daily review" note home everyday telling what she learned, how she ate/napped, and something cute that happened that day or something special about Anna Scott.  When we got home from school today, I anxiously pulled out her note to see what Mrs. Laura had to say.  She had written, "I was telling my husband about Anna Scott last night.  After I finished telling him all about her, he said, 'so you're telling me she is a 2 year old Southern Belle...'  That describes her perfectly!"  Made me smile.  I thought that was worth sharing.

Well, my little Southern Belle is about to awake from her nap, so I need to get a few things done around the house while I still have time!  We have lots more to share, so visit us again soon...