Merry (belated) Christmas everyone!

We've been up north celebrating with my family and are now back in Calgary getting ready for a New Years bash at our house. I was lazy and didn't take many pictures at Christmas (I'll steal some later from my sister-in-law ;) but here's a fun shot from Zoolights here in Calgary before we left. We've gone every Christmas since we've moved here (3!), and with the same friends, so I guess we are starting to form some Calgary traditions. It was slightly chilly but the snow was so beautiful and the girls were having the time of their lives. I don't think I've ever seen Elianne so excited, and she had to run up and touch nearly every set of lights that were in a shape that caught her eye (ooh, giraffes! oooh, flamingos!). Only Mehdi, the African of the family, was suffering in the cold...so the girls and I bought him the warmest pair of mittens we could find for Christmas. There will, after all, be more of these outings to come.

It's cold and blowing outside and we're not sure we'll ever get our cars out of the giant drift in our driveway, but the girls don't seem bothered by a day stuck inside. Mehdi and I are both tackling the piles of marking we have to get done for our classes, but the girls are happily entertaining themselves with a game of "Native American ". (See costumes below; one pair of Chinese pajamas, one jerba from Dubai.) As I write this, they've moved on to creating a realistic-looking firepit in the teepee they've constructed out of chairs and blankets in the dining room.

Their little adventure had me reminiscing about Anissa's earlier obsession with Native Americans back when we lived in New Hampshire. Her first month of preschool, she started asking me odd questions like,"Do Americans drive cars?" and it had me wondering whether Mehdi and I were spending too much time analyzing the American/versus Canadian way of life. That is, until we realized she was asking about the Native Americans of long-ago that they were studying at school. (Just now I heard Elianne declaring, "I am American!" to which I had to agree that, yes, she is indeed!)

Notice anything off with Anissa's smile? Her two front teeth have been loose for weeks now and keep moving closer into the middle, sideways, in all kinds of crazy directions, but refuse to fall out. I can't help cracking up every time she greets me with one of her kooky grins.

Oh, my girls, my sweet little girls. I must kiss them a zillion times a day. Someday they won't put up with it anymore, so I'm sneaking in as many as I can right now!

Way back I-don't-remember-when, maybe even right after last Halloween, Anissa decided she wanted to be a dolphin for Halloween this year. My Dad always helped me assemble my Halloween outfits as a kid, and we came up with some pretty awesome costumes: Erik the Red, with real fur garments and a Viking helmet; a mad trapper (reused those furs!); Miss Piggy in a sequined dress. I have fond memories of the time we spent together building those out of whatever we had at home, so I thought I would try my hand at making a dolphin costume.

(Okay, I confess...I first did a few checks of local thrift stores in case I would stumble across a more convenient option. I also searched online and found a $1600 mascot costume. Hmmm...)

I don't sew and don't have a sewing machine, but I found a few ideas online and melded them together to make my own plan. Anissa helped me pick out the felt and I set off on a hot-glue-gunning adventure. Earlier last week, Elianne watched Anissa try her costume on and declared that she no longer wanted to be a princess. She wanted to be a dolphin too. Back to the fabric store, but there was bad news: the grey felt was sold out. So I had to buy the expensive, 3 times the price per meter, heavy duty felt in order to make a second dolphin. The next day, Elianne changed her mind yet again (upon receiving a horse costume from friends) and we now have one and a half dolphin costumes.

Fast forward to Halloween night. I was curious what Elianne would decide to wear ("Please, don't say you want to be a dolphin," I mentally pleaded, as the hot-glue gun was not even plugged in to finish the job). To my surprise, she announced she wanted to be Dora. This is why, in the photo above, she just looks like a regular girl out gathering candy. There was no time to throw together a freakishly-large brown bob wig, and there was no way I was cutting her hair. Oh, and by the way, the photo doesn't do my dolphin justice. It looks much better from the side ;)

A few shots of our little family taken this Thanksgiving weekend by my sister-in-law's sister, Tyla Lippai.

There has been a pretty big change in our household lately: Mommy's got a job! I've taken on a contract teaching ESL to adults with the Calgary School Board's adult ed department. It's only four mornings a week and only until Christmas, but since Elianne still naps in the afternoon, I see much less of her. Luckily, it worked out that Mehdi could be at home with her two mornings and she goes to a good friend's in the neighborhood the other two days. While it's gone relatively smoothly so far, the teaching and all the prep and correcting makes for a lot more juggling and much less "flex" time than we're used to.

Being a working Mom for the first time has me appreciating even more the time I get with the girls...like the day we took this photo, on a "hike" we went on at Nose Hill Park near our house. It was gorgeous, and lasted about...well, 10 whole minutes. Elianne was in an especially whiny mood and wouldn't walk at all, so we packed it in and went to Costco for lunch instead.

I was downstairs in the kitchen this evening and heard Elianne calling from the bathroom. "Nobody come wipe my bum?"

Mehdi, who was also upstairs, offered to help then corrected her, saying, "You mean, somebody." Her reply, "I want my Mom to be somebody!", had me laughing. I will try harder to be somebody, my little one.

I wrote this 11 days ago and never uploaded it:

11 days and Anissa is back at school. Grade One! I was picturing her sitting at a desk, doing actual work -unlike the dress-up, toy kitchen, circle and nap time activities of kindergarten - and I got worried that she would be disappointed with all the changes. I brought it up with her today (after a shopping trip for new school shoes, during which the only purchase was a pair of shoes for me), hoping to gently break it to her that grade one was less play and more work. "Oh, don't worry, Mom," she said, "We went to the grade one classroom and the teacher showed us the bigger kid toys." I asked her what they looked like and she shrugged and said, "I don't know what they were. I'd never seen them before." Maybe they're manipulatives for math? Puppets? I taught grade one ages ago during my practice teaching and don't remember many toys around. I think Anissa's going to be fine. The one who will suffer most from the return to school will be Elianne, as her big sister and full-time Activities Coordinator will be no longer be around to schedule the day with craft time, story time, gym and role play.

August, like July, has been flying by at a crazy speed. The girls and I spent 10 days up at my parents' sort-of farm, and Anissa can now identify more garden vegetable plants than I can. The girls did all the usual - riding the tractor and quad, gardening, helping Dad take care of the horses - and I attended my 20 (!!!) year high school reunion. Mehdi met us up there for a weekend of camping and boating with all the family. One night as the sun was setting over the lake and we were sitting around the campfire, Anissa came up to me and whispered, "Mom, I think this might have been the very best day of my whole entire life. I'm not sure yet, because it's not totally over, but so far it's been fantastic." Her voice was giddy with joy while she described all the things that were so great about that day: roasting marshmallows, boating with her cousins, playing on the beach, watching fireworks, and sleeping in a camper.

Yup, summer is good. Maybe too short, but I guess that makes us appreciate it more. At least that's what I tell myself whenever I question our sanity over choosing to live in a place with such a harsh climate!

Well, today was Anissa's first day of Grade One. All went well, and her only disappointment was that she didn't get any homework yet!

Well, the snow is long melted and it's been ages since I've written. It's been such a wonderful July, so great that I've been mostly collapsing in bed each night with little thought to blogging.

At the end of June, we threw a 60th birthday party for my Mom and had a lot of laughs singing karoke into the night with family and friends. I hope I look as good as you do and have your energy at 60, Mom!

Then we started summer holidays off with a bang: I picked Anissa up from her last day of maternelle, drove to the airport and picked up Mariella, her best buddy since infant-hood in Montreal, her little sister Antonia and their parents, our good friends Dan and Natasha. They were here for 10 days, and it couldn't have been better. The girls got along unbelievably well, they got to be here for Anissa's sixth birthday party (and were a huge help!) and we squeezed in a lot of touristy business: the Stampede for our first time, which was a blast; Lake Louse; Drumheller with the dino museum and hoodoos; Calaway Park, and more. The days flew by and it was really hard for us to say goodbye. Thankfully, the day they left we had some packing to do to keep us occupied...we left the next day for 10 days in Montreal.

We finally got to meet the girls' little cousin, Rayan, and had a great time with Mama Jo (visiting from Tunisia) and Uncle Aziz and Aunty Eolie. And roaming the streets of Montreal once again was magical. We squeezed in visits with old friends and Anissa got to hang out a little with her old play group friends Chloe, Zach, Clara and Leo. We made a quick trip out to Quebec City to see Frank, his mom "Mamie Jo", Annick, Lukas and their new baby, sweet little Isaak. They were amazing to take us in as guests, even with a tiny newborn fresh out of the hospital. Merci.

Since being back, we've camped at Drumheller with my family, had my niece Saterra come for a stay, and have been doing all the usual Calgary summer stuff with friends - Calaway, playgrounds, wading pool, etc. Vive l'ete!

That was our deck on Saturday morning. I dug out my Northern Pikes CD and played the girls an old favorite, "Snow in June".


Oh please don't cry
We'll live on the moon
Smile with me, yeah
When it snows in june

There's room for two
We live on the moon
Smile with me, yeah
When it snows in June

Thankfully, things have since returned to what June should look like. We enjoyed a quick visit from Memere and Pepere, then today Elianne hung out with some of her buddies at Heritage Park. Here they are taking a cruise around Glenmore Reservoir on the steamboat.

We had a fun, sunny weekend which included friends over for dinner Friday night, two kid birthday parties, an adult birthday BBQ Saturday night and Anissa's school performance at a theater at the University of Calgary campus. We even squeezed in some yard work - Mehdi's got a sore back from digging out all those dandelions! Needless to say, I'm too tired to write much but I will share some of the shots I took during/after Anissa's school show. Their music teacher is amazing, and the numbers each class performed were funny, moving, just plain awe-inspiring. Anissa's class sang "Si tu aimes le soleil" and then a rap version of "Moi, J'ecris des mots". Surprisingly, Anissa was not terrified like she was at the Christmas concert and actually looked out at the audience with a smile on her face while she sang. Bravo, ma fille!

(She's the one in the hot pink dress)

Elianne has been calling me Grandma for about a week now. It's a result of she and Anissa playing house and Anissa insisting that Eli call her Mom and that I am actually their grandma. I've been half-heartedly going along with it, thinking it would pass as all phases do, but this morning I had to get tough and insist on being called my proper title just for clarity's sake. Elianne kept calling "Mommy", I kept dropping what I was doing to find her upstairs only to be told, "No, not you, Grandma. Anissa's my mommy." Then, when she really needed me and started calling, "Grandma, pretend, actually my Mommy not Anissa!", I decided it had gone to far.

Someday, I will love hearing someone call me Grandma, but for now, Mommy is just as sweet.

This has nothing to do with my own two girls, but close enough: my niece, and god-child, Matayla's team, won the gold medal for their division in the National Open volleyball tournament this weekend. It was such a thrill to be there to cheer them on. Go LIgers Go! We're proud of you.

There will be no Mother of the Day award for me, that's for certain. The morning started off normally enough, with the usual panic to send Mehdi and Anissa out the door on time for school. As soon as they were on their way, I hurried to the garage to get my potted plants, that I had rescued from the hail the night before, and put them back in the yard for a little sun. We have an attached garage, and I carried the flats of plants through the garage side door and into the yard, and on the third trip I let the door close behind me. The moment I heard it click shut a feeling of dread washed over me: since I had gone through the garage, neither of the two back doors that lead to the deck would be unlocked. Elianne was inside, alone. 

My heart pounded as I raced to the front door, the one Mehdi and Anissa had left through just a minute before, only to find it also locked shut. I must have automatically locked it behind them. I ran back to the deck and peered in the window, banging on the French door to get Elianne's attention. She came over, smiling and waving, and I could hear her little voice through the glass. "I wanna come water the flowers, too, Mommy. I wanna come outside, too!" I smiled and tried to stay calm, my mind racing over what to do next (stupidly, we have no spare key hidden outside anywhere. We do now!). I spoke loudly through the door, and asked her to get the stool in the kitchen and slide it over to the door. After some confusion over the high island counter stools, she got it and brought it over. I instructed her to stand up and try to reach the lock above the doorknob. I couldn't see if she could reach, but she said she could. I told her to turn it, but she only wiggled and jiggled it and it didn't turn. She was starting to get upset, but I tried to be cheerful and make it a game. I asked her to take the stool to the front door and try the same thing. I raced around to the front and watched her through the window dragging the stool across the living room. She tried the lock and once again didn't turn it forcefully enough. 

My best bet, I decided, was to start leaving messages for Mehdi at work and hope he hadn't gone straight to the gym as he sometimes does in the morning. I explained to Elianne that I was going to leave for just a minute, to go get a phone and that I would be right, right back. I ran next door and, thankfully, our neighbour was home and lent me her phone. I left a somewhat frantic message at Mehdi's office - he wouldn't be there quite yet, as he was dropping Anissa off at school - then borrowed her cell phone, as she was on her way out for the morning, and went back to Eli. I found her crying by the front door, putting on her shoes because she wanted to come find me. It felt horrible to not be able to reach through the glass and hug her.   

All I could now was wait for Mehdi. I asked Elianne if she wanted to play a game with me. She stopped crying and got excited, saying she wanted to play penguins. I thought, okay, we'll pretend we're penguins...but what she meant was a board game Anissa has that involves penguins balancing on an iceberg. She wanted to get it off the shelf in the basement, but it's high up on a large bookcase and I envisioned her trying to climb up and hurting herself, and me being unable to see her or get to her. I begged her to stay upstairs with me. She cried that we couldn't play penguins and started saying, "I want you, Mommy. I want you!" I had to try hard not to cry myself, and kept telling her that Papa would be here soon. I tried him from the cell phone - still no answer. It had now been over 15 minutes.  I tried again in a few minutes, but this time the cell phone ran out of minutes and wouldn't work. 

I realized I had to start thinking about a back-up plan, in case Mehdi had gone to the gym. A locksmith? Breaking a window? I wanted to try calling him one more time before I resorted to such measures, though, and I had to get another phone. I saw another neighbor in his open garage, about to get in his car, so I ran across the street and asked if I could borrow the phone.  Thank God, Mehdi answered. When I asked if he had heard my message he said, yes, he had, and that he had been trying to call me to find out what was going on! I nearly lost it, the poor neighbour observing my rant about "and how the hell was I supposed to answer the phone when I was locked out of the house". Mehdi said he was on his way, so I went back to find Elianne, sobbing by the front door. It takes about 10 minutes for Mehdi to get home, but thankfully telling her Papa was on his way calmed her down. It was reassuring to me, too, until I came to an awful realization:

The key Mehdi has, like the one on my keychain, only works on the front door. And the front door has an extra deadbolt on the top, one that prevents the door from being opened, even if the other locks are broken. Had I locked that, too, as I rushed Mehdi and Anissa out the front door? We would only know when Mehdi got there.

 

Mehdi pulled into the driveway, and very kindly did not give me any kind of "what an idiot you are" speech, and tried his key. The door opened only wide enough for us to reach through and hold Elianne's hand, but the deadbolt was firmly in place.

 

I was defeated. "I'll go find a neighbour who's home and call a locksmith," I said. Mehdi wanted to try Elianne one more time, even though I told him she couldn't do it, so he instructed her to go to the backdoor with her stool and try the lock. She succeeded in opening it on the very first try. I can't describe how great it felt to take her in my arms, and she was beaming with pride as Mehdi and I cheered and told her how proud we were.

Later in the car, when we told Anissa the story, sweetheart Elianne said, "Mommy, I will save you again tomorrow." She's probably right about saving me again, someday soon, but I think I've had enough excitement for at least a few weeks. 

 

Last weekend was an exciting one for the girls: Memere and Pepere took them to the circus. Unfortunately, the mall that was hosting the circus got scared off by activists and banned any animals from the act under the big top. The girls didn't seem to mind, though, and loved the clowns and "atrobacs" and cotton candy. 

The rest of the weekend was spent cheering on big cousin Matayla's volleyball team at provincials. Saterra, another big cousin, and the girls got dressed up in matching outfits and did a pretty good job as cheerleaders - although poor Elianne got hit twice in the head by an out-of-bounds volleyball! She kept pointing out different players and asking, "That girl hit me in the head?" 

It's 9 o'clock, the girls are in bed and I have that nice "Sunday night after a wonderful weekend" feeling. We had dinner at friends' Friday night, a birthday BBQ on Saturday, brunch with more friends here this morning and a fun bike ride/nature walk in the afternoon with the girls. Anissa carefully planned out the nature part by making list of things we needed to find: rocks, acorns, pine cones, a stick, grass, and a leaf. One thing she didn't put on the list, though, but we got anyway was another snowstorm. It started coming down shortly after we had parked the bikes in the garage. 

It's been nearly 2 years since we moved here and I still can't get over the mood swings of the weather. It's the second time this week that we enjoy a warm spring afternoon outside and get hit by a dump of snow immediately afterwards. Tuesday afternoon was even more extreme than today - it was 20 degrees and we played croquet in the backyard in the late afternoon, and then after dinner it snowed. And a lot, not just a few flurries, and all night long. If I wasn't feeling so warm and fuzzy inside from the lovely weekend I'd be more than a little annoyed about the blanket of white stuff outside. Wait until tomorrow morning when I have to clean it off the car!

Today the girls and I attended their friend Lochlan's birthday party, which included a home visit from the pet store and a menagerie of exotic animals. The girls got to see and touch a bearded dragon, a tarantula (I held it but Anissa couldn't bring herself to), a snake (Anissa did hold it, very calmly and bravely, even when it was approaching her face with its tongue), a rabbit, a puppy, a ferret, hermit crabs and a cockatoo. It was very exciting! After the animals were gone and we were in the bathroom washing our hands, I asked the girls what their favorite animal was. Anissa voted for the snake and Elianne the rabbit, but Elianne felt there was one animal that should have been included. "But," she said, "there was no hippo though!"

Now that would be some birthday party!

We spent nearly 13 hours in the car for a few days at my parents' house this weekend, but it was worth every second. The girls got to meet Pepere's new colts, paint Easter eggs, jump on the trampoline with their big cousins and woke up Saturday to a trail of chocolate eggs leading to many goodies from the Easter bunny. This shot was taken with my Mom's mom Lucille, their great granny.



A little aside: yesterday, Elianne and I dropped Mehdi off at work and stopped in for a visit at his office. Elianne hasn't been there in recent memory and kept asking, "This where you live, Papa? This where you live?" It feels like he lives there sometimes! On our way out we stopped to chat with some of Mehdi's colleagues and Elianne put on a show in the hall for the marketing department: she ran around in circles singing, "panties, panties, PANTIES!" Something she picked up from big sister.

On our way upstairs for bedtime stories tonight, Elianne spotted her hot pink sunglasses on top of the TV armoire. She insisted on wearing them while I read her the usual three books, peering over them in order to see the pictures in the soft light. When it came time to put her in bed and sing her a few songs, she refused to take them off. She said she wanted to sleep with them. I explained that it might not be very comfortable, but she screamed in protest when I tried to gently take them off. We both got a case of the giggles as I sang her a new bedtime song: I Wear My Sunglasses at Night. I know I'm potentially encouraging a new habit but I couldn't help myself! She did fall asleep with them on in the end, after a few requests for me to come back in the room and place them back on her head.

Postcript: After writing the above last night, I googled the lyrics to that Corey Heart treasure. I was sure the jumbled version I sang Elianne was nowhere near correct. It's been a long time since I played that cassette tape over and over in my room on my "ghetto blaster"- since grade nine, in fact. The lyrics are completely ridiculous. "Don't switch the blade on the guy in shades, oh no." What on earth does that mean???

Oh, and there was no request for the shades tonight at bedtime. Maybe Elianne didn't want to hear my horrible Corey Heart impersonation again!

Some of my fondest memories from childhood are of sleepovers with my cousins, whether it was Jenny and Stacey who grew up next door or Nadine who had come for the weekend from a few hours away. We did air guitars, made strange milkshake concoctions, played orphans and put on performances for our families. This weekend, Anissa and Elianne had the special treat of cousins - Nadine's kids- sleeping over at our house. Our friend Barb, who I didn't know as a kid but feel like I did, also came on Saturday and her two girls joined in the fun. We were treated to a lovely dance performance complete with accordion music that had Nadine and I reminiscing about our own little shows thirty some years ago.

It's been a long, hard winter and, being suburbanites, Elianne and I have spent an embarrassing amount of time in the mall while Anissa is in school. We meet up with friends, take the kids to the play area, hit the pet store, occasionally splurge on a coffee and a cookie. Very little shopping is ever done because that's not the point. Yesterday, though, it was finally a nice enough day to break from the routine and take a stroll around one of Calgary's trendy outdoor shopping areas, Kensington. The shops are depressingly expensive, but we had a great time hanging out with Wendy and Sydney and having a breakfast lunch out at a fun little diner, Nelly's.

At home, the girls have been staying (mostly) happy with pure silliness. They hammed it up for me a few days ago wearing Anissa's (clean!) panties on their heads, but of the zillions of photos I took my favorite is the last one, when the underwear/hats came off. 

It started with Halloween, and the gingerbread house we made at Christmas sealed the deal. Elianne is a sugar addict. She'll take sugar in any form, and demand more and more, and has recently started asking for candy (from the house, still in our living room), cookies, or chocolate. In the beginning, she only pleaded a few minutes before giving up. But now, she goes on and on and has a tantrum and just won't let it go. This morning, Mehdi caught her on the kitchen counter scooping sugar out of the sugar bowl with her hands, shoving it in her mouth. This afternoon, she cried and begged and yelled, "Elianne NEED candy! Elianne NEED it." When we asked her why, she paused with a long "uuuuuuuuuh", then replied, "because Elianne is sick." Yes, it's a sickness all right. I've thrown out the gingerbread house and we are getting tough on sugar!

Mehdi stayed home with Elianne on Friday afternoon so I could help out with the rollerblading clinic Anissa was having at school. It was extremely entertaining watching all the kamikaze kindergarteners whip around the gym, and Anissa impressed me with her confidence. I guess those ice skating classes she's been taking are paying off. She's been so into it lately that last week at her lesson, while watching an older girl's hockey team warm up, she asked me when she can start playing hockey. Oh boy! I spent a good portion of my childhood cowering in net while my big brother and friends fired snapshots in my direction, and it's not really what I had envisioned for my daughter. Then again, I was always the puniest, wimpiest kid in class and she's always been strong and tall, so who knows.

One of the girls' favorite songs in the past few months has been Raffi's, "Going to the Zoo". The chorus goes:

Mommy's taking us to the zoo tomorrow, the zoo tomorrow,

Mommy's taking us to the zoo tomorrow, we can stay all day.

We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo,

You can come too, too, too,

We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo.

And it's all because we're lucky enough to have a pretty decent zoo a 20 minute drive away and annual family passes. So Mommy (and Papa too) took the girls to the zoo on Sunday, with friends Aurora and Storm and their Mom, and we did stay nearly all day. Next time maybe you can come too too too?

Anissa has been fighting a stomach bug since the middle of last week, so we've been spending more time than usual at home. This means I've had to be creative in keeping the girls happy: crafts and puppet shows, blanket forts in the living room and, well, watching more Treehouse than usual. On Thursday, Barack Obama made his first appearance in Ottawa so I even got to catch a bit of the coverage on CBC. Later that day, I was putting away laundry upstairs while Anissa vegged on the couch, and Elianne decided to perform some shows for me on our bed. First was a Princess Show: she was Wella (Cinderella), twirling and spinning elegantly. The next show was the Panties Show: she flopped around on the bed, giggling and yelling "panties, panties, panties!". My favorite, though, was the Grande Finale: the Brack Bama Show. She smiled and waved and said, "Hi, Brack Bama! Bye, Brack Bama!" 

Happy Birthday, my sweet, beautiful Elianne.

This is my birthday present to you: I am going to start posting here regularly again. (I know the scooter we got you is much more exciting right now, but someday you'll appreciate this.) Everyday, you wow us with your sweetness, your sense of humor, the joy you bring all of us, and I need to start recording some of the little things that make you so lovable.

Fittingly, you had two parties to celebrate turning two. The first was with your cousins, Uncle Lee, Aunty Tam, Memere and Pepere, the first weekend of February. You shared a penguin cake with Corbin, who turned 8, and got a new doll and a chair "just like Anissa's" (one of your slogans these days). For a week after party #1, you sang "Happy Birthday to Me" all day long, and each morning insisted that, "Today Elianne's birthday!" So you were very excited when the real thing came at last, and on Sunday you had round two of the celebrations with friends. I made you a kitty cake and we blew up the bouncy house in the living room. You soaked up every second of the attention, and though you had fun with your friends you especially wanted to hang out in their parents' laps.  I think, judging by the collection of empty wine bottles in the kitchen, that the grown-up "kids" had a good time too!

What are you like at 2 years old? Everyone always notices your big brown eyes, you are generally friendly and smile a lot. You are also feisty like your sister, and insist on doing things your own way: you want to pick what you wear (your lizard rubber boots, for example, are your favorite, even in the dead of winter), want to climb into the car seat by yourself (although you can't quite make it and it takes minutes of negotiations to convince you that you need help), refused both your highchair and any form of bib a long long time ago, and will not stay in a shopping cart for any bribery in the world. You and Anissa now share a room - though you're still in your crib - and you spend a lot of time hugging and kissing each other. You love to play store, school, house, fairies and princesses. You're affectionate, and often take breaks from your play for snuggles.

Some of the things that make us laugh? The way you say "like this" - Italian style, with hand gestures and an accent - "lika dis!" And you say it a lot, whether you're re-enacting how you fell down the stairs or telling us what you did in the gym at the YMCA. You love the YMCA, and whenever Anissa talks about school, you always jump in to say, "Eli goes YDA!" You also love picking Anissa up from school, especially because she always gives you one of the stickers she got that day. You have a crush on Frosty the Snowman and like to pretend you are other people, like Anissa's friend Holly. And that means I have to be, Kristine, her Mom, for hours on end. You like to sing, and your present favorite songs are Twinkle Twinkle and your own version of Frere Jacques. You also make up funny jibberish songs that you say are French and love to do dancing shows with Anissa in the living room. You speak very well, telling us what you "no like" and "want" and "NEED" (like "one candy, one more time, please?"). You tell people, "I'm Elianne Ranya Moo-ali" and we have a hard time tearing the phone away once you start pacing around the house and gabbing with Memere, Pepere or Mama Jo. 

What else is there to say? We love you! So so so much. Happy Birthday, Eli Belly.