Little Miss Grace

Miss Grace hasn't had a post written about her for a long time, so I'd better take care of that and let you know what she's up to and all about these days...

1) Being our potty-training miracle:  Grace potty-trained in one day.  Wow!  I was so impressed.  It was just like a snap of the fingers.  The day we started (keep in mind this was in early June), she was so excited to put on her big-girl panties.  Shortly there after, she had a potty accident - well placed on the bathroom floor.  She was a little perturbed by this, but we just cleaned it up and moved on - I was mostly thankful that we had gotten the accident over with before having to take Liv to bible camp.  After that, no accidents.  If it tells you anything - we've never even brought a spare set of clothes to daycare.  Only a couple of days after potty-training, Grace started wanting to go diaper-less at nap time.  And about a week after that, night-time.  Man, does that girl have some bladder control!

Matching panties and sandals - how cute!

2.  Whining:  After the previous paragraph you must be thinking that I'm immune to my daughter's faults and think she is 100% perfect.  Well, I certainly think she's awfully precious, but I could do without the massive amount of whining we've got going on these days.  I'm going to take some personal blame for not working on this issue more this summer; mostly, I think I didn't take immediate action because it wasn't sooo bad at first - although her whiny voice must be specially designed to trigger a button in my head that gives me an instant headache.  However, because the occasional whine became more like an hourly occurrence, we've recently taken some action:  reminding her to talk in her big girl voice, counting (1, 2, 3), and then time-out - mostly, we just can't give in.  She seems like she's getting it, and I truly hope this isn't my imagination!

This cutie couldn't ever do anything to give her mom a headache, could she???

3.  Being silly and sweet:  Grace loves to be silly.  Lately she's into tackling, licking (kind of gross), crawling around on the floor (either acting like a baby or a puppy and insisting you refer to her as such - no I'm not kidding about this), and wearing interesting outfits.  When you combine all this with her fly-away hair and really expressive face, it's pretty fun...and sometimes exasperating.  She likes to end sentences with "poopy" - this word is unfortunately popular at our house right now - for example:  "Grace, sit down and eat your breakfast"..."Okay, Mommy, poopy."  Really?  Grace is super animated - everything she's really interested in, scared by, or excited about is always coupled with hand gestures, voice inflection, and anything else she can do to get you to relate.  Every day we talk about when and when she can't wear her "cheer-leading skirt," and, if she's not wearing that, she's most likely sporting her pink tutu, leotard, or princess dress.  She also wears headbands across her forehead and calls them crowns and wants to wear my wedding necklace whenever possible.  She's obsessed with her "ice-cream" jammies and pouts when they're in the wash.  Grace is loving, always wanting a kiss AND a hug goodbye, and she likes to cuddle more than ever before.  She takes great care of her babies and is good little sissy too.

4.  Growing up in general:  Grace's language is really coming along.  She's slowly getting more clear, but sometimes it's hard to understand her because she's also using longer sentences and many new words.  Thankfully, she doesn't have a problem repeating herself (see whining above)!  She's still my little peanut, but she's got some nice leg muscles and is definitely growing taller.  She is, however, losing a bit of her fearlessness as she's starting to understand danger as a concept in general.  Grace is independent - she puts her panties and shorts on in the morning but still needs help with her shirt, brushes her teeth and has finally figured out how to spit, combs her hair, and puts her shoes on when she wants too.  Grace loves reading books at night and sometimes wants to put herself to bed.  Her favorite phrase is either "I have tiny toes" or "I have big toes" depending on if she thinks she can't or can do something.  She loves to tell everyone she's 2 1/2 while holding up three on her fingers and talks about how she gets to go to school next year when she's 3.  What a crazy thought!

This face just says trouble...