Sunday, December 12, 2010

Stay just like this... now.


We had a wonderful weekend. In all honesty, we have had an incredible month.

Sadie made the transition to another new nanny in the middle of November, and Mark and I can't believe how fast and how well she has adjusted to another change. Our new nanny was truly an answer to a prayer and she is already feeling like a member of our family. Sadie bonded to her very quickly, and nothing could make me happier. Even in our very chilly last couple weeks, the house has been warm with celebration as they make cookies, lots of great art projects, and play pretend games like turning the house into a restaurant complete with menus, waitresses, and quite an array of choices. It is a wonderful feeling -- Mark and I both remarked the other evening -- to come home and hear Sadie laughing and singing, so very happy with what she is doing.

And thus, the weekends have been great too. We saw The Nutcracker for the first time yesterday. Sadie didn't quite make it though the length of the production -- she and her best friend Bella insisted on sharing their seat and once things got a little scrunched (in the second hour), there was a little bit of a battle over who was going to move :) And I forgot to bring a snack (the play was from 2-4:15 or so) and the lines for the food there were way too long during the intermission. We have learned that Sadie is a different child when she gets some nuts or some other protein mid morning and mid-afternoon for her snacks.

Today we rewarded her great behavior recently with letting her sit up in the balcony at Church. She loved being so close to the choir, and most of all, the massive organ that is St. James's.  There was a few times that my heart skipped a few beats as I worried that she was about to thrust the hymnal over the balcony's edge to the crowd down below, but that never happened. And up and down the stairs we went, first for Children's Chapel during the sermon (kids go to another smaller chapel), then to sit on the stairs of the altar during the Liturgy of the Eucharist, and finally during Communion.  Sadie loves going to Church though, and I could use the extra stair climbing workout.

It is nice to be writing this blog about how great things are, rather than sitting at the computer researching  the Internet to see if a developmental phase will pass. It is tempting to want to freeze her right here, right now. She is so loving, so apologetic when she misbehaves. She wants to do chores... loves to help sort the laundry, put it in the washer, fold her sheets up (though most of that happens on the rug in her room, which no doubt has some dog hair on it).  She helps me unload the dishwasher, and puts the silverware away. Pinch me and wake me up!!

I love to see her growing and changing, but it scares me sometimes to see how fast it happens. We received a Christmas card from a wonderful friend from my childhood this week and her grandchildren, who I babysat for when they were infants when I was in college... two of them recently got engaged. Shouldn't they still have their braces on? Speaking of braces, one of my nieces got hers off recently and I just saw some profile pictures she posted on Facebook which are... quite grown-up.  Not in a bad way... but not in the fun loving wide ear to ear grin that I am used to seeing. I won't stop them from all growing up, I just want to freeze my own little one.

I remember when Sadie would wake up during the night for, let's say, maybe 2 years?? Something like that. And I would think "when will this pass??" I was impatient.  Now she sleeps on, very well, from 8:00 last night to 7:40 this morning, and woke up in the best mood that Mark and I can ever remember. Pinch me.

The days do fly quickly, and what I can do is write about them. Try to memorialize the funny things she still says. The way that she has asked me so many times how Jesus could be born in the manger with no doctor there, and then resolved it as she play acted with her own manger and found some hospital equipment under the hay. She's a creative girl, always finding the solution. I just need to listen for it every day.  She has indeed completed our family.

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