- She's about 3' 2", and she weighs 36 pounds... however, whenever she stands on the scale, it always reads "2 pounds." It's nice, because it reads "2 pounds" whether she's standing on it, or I'm standing on it, or Grandma's standing on it, and is a VAST improvement over her old mantra - "200 pounds!"
- She's a very good communicator. Not only can she express her needs concisely, but she also has a pretty good understanding of her own emotions, and can express them verbally - most of the time. Yesterday, she came into our bedroom and said, "Mommy, I'm feeling very sad today." She sat down and looked at the floor for a while, then sighed, and left the room, telling me "Well, I want a cookie." Fabulous! She'll also answer our questions; "Liza, what would you like for dinner?" "Mmmm.... How about yogurt?" "You have to have something else, too, Liza girl." "Oh, I do? Ok... How about yogurt?" "How about some chicken?" "No." "Well, chicken is what we're having tonight. You can either have chicken and some yogurt, or not." "Oh. Ok. How about some yogurt?" "... and chicken?" "Ok, and yogurt."
- She is loving. She wakes up every morning with a big smile on her face, and says, "Oh, good morning, Mommy!" She laughs like waking up and seeing us is the most exciting thing, and after she's done rolling over, rubbing her eyes, and stretching her arms up, she usually gives me a big hug and says, "I love you, Mommy..." before she exhibits this trait...
- She is a TALKER. Immediately following these sweet morning moments, there are, depending on the day, between two and four hours of seldom-interrupted chatter from her direction. She will talk about anything, but her favorite subjects right now are tickling, hiding, "you can't catch me," and Nana. She loves to talk about her friends (again, most frequently 'my friend Nana'), and when she's in a group of kids, she will do anything they like as long as she can talk while they're doing it.
- She is friendly. Very friendly. I'm not sure she's ever met a stranger. Every person around her size, she categorizes as either, "that baby," "my friend," or "the big kids," but she's never frightened of any of them.
- She is empathetic and sensitive. With her parents, with her friends, with babies she hears crying in the grocery store, she is sensitive and interested in their welfare. She "takes care" of us quite well - yesterday, I woke up not feeling well - "Mommy, do you feel good?" "No, I feel icky today, love." "Well.... would you like a cough drop? Here, here's a cough drop {shoves it in my mouth}. Now you feel better, Mommy!" A frequent refrain from her is, "It's ok, be happy!" to just about anyone, or to any child younger than her "Oh, baby, you're so CUTE!" (accompanied with a kiss). She loves the people around her to be in harmony and loving each other, except when
- She is Officer Elizabeth. She has a VERY solid moral center - an "Elizabeth, when you hit, it makes ______ feel sad. It's naughty, and not good to do. Please don't do it again." will usually do the trick for most things. While this does make her more easily correctable and simpler to discipline, it also makes her something of a little tattle-tale. Little story on this one - last night at her birthday party, her cousin bit her. We found out right away, because from the other room we hear in a scream, "NOLAN, YOU MUST NOT BITE!" Nolan said he was sorry, and gave her a hug, but she still came to me and had to tell me, over and over, "Nolan, he was naughty! He bit me! Nolan bit me, and that was naughty! Mom, he was naughty, he bit me!" It took a while to get her to acknowledge that he was sorry, and the issue was, for all purposes, closed now. This strong moral center also manifests itself in pretty funny ways. We were driving down the road recently, and she saw some graffiti on the side of a building - just a happy face. When she saw it, she gasped and said, "Mommy, someone colored on that brick wall!" It took me a while to find it, but I finally did, and acknowledged that they had, indeed, colored on the wall. "That is VERY naughty!" I told her yes, it was. "You only draw on PAPER!" her little indignant voice intoned from the back seat. It was really hard not to laugh, mostly at the thought of my three-year old chastising a group of vandalizers, telling them - "You only draw on PAPER!"
- She is SMART. As of her third birthday, she can count to 20 (and I think that the only reason she can't count further is because we haven't taken the time to teach her any more), she can solidly read the letters s, t, o, l, k, and m, and is learning q, h, x, and y. She loves to read to herself, and did I mention she is a pretty good talker?
- She's the light of Mommy and Daddy's life. We can't wait to watch her grow, and see what kind of loving, sweet woman she becomes. We are praying for God's ability and grace to raise her into that woman.
That is, of course, if we can ever get her potty trained!
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