Here's the bullet-point version of an update from our family, in no particular order:
- The biggest news: Two weeks ago, Tyla started calling us "Mom" (Lisa) and "Mommy" (me) AND telling us she loves us ALL IN THE SAME DAY. It was awesome - and funny - because she couldn't stop saying it, and would tell anyone who would listen (servers, salespeople, strangers in the mall) that she "loves her two moms".
- My name has been amended to "Mama", which Tyla thought might "fit me better". She's trying it out for a while - "because she can".
- It snowed. Briefly. Tyla loved it, and made snow angels in about 2 cm of snow. By the end of it, they were mud angels.
- Soccer is going well, but I'm still not really enjoying being a coach. In typical Erin fashion, I don't usually enjoy things that I don't feel really good at (okay, perfect at), and coaching soccer is one of those things.
- We went glow bowling last night. It was fun, and Tyla was fascinated with the blacklights - there was a constant flow of questions about how everything glowed, and why it glowed, and if it would still glow when we went home, and if it made people bowl better, and whether other bowling alleys glowed like this, and if other people had seen the glowing before...
- We've had a bout of head lice at our house. Not fun. Right now, Tyla is playing with her stuffed animals and is pretending to comb the lice out of their hair. Before that, they all had to be shampooed to get the bugs out. Too funny.
- We hosted our first play date, which was interesting. There was lots of dress up - mostly rock stars - and a climactic ending (read: two 6-year-olds not speaking).
- Tyla has discovered a love of cooking. One morning she proudly helped us make bacon, eggs, and toast for breakfast. She's a real pro at cracking eggs now, and barely cracks any outside the bowl. This afternoon we're going to make banana chocolate chip muffins, and she's very curious about how the "rotten" bananas can make good muffins. She also likes to clean on occasion (and would likely do so more often if it was for money!).
- School is going well, too. We made a crazy hat for "Wacky Hat Day". Tyla had a part in the Remembrance Day assembly, but unfortunately neither of us could be there because we were at work. Her line was, "Peace is playing with my friends", and she was very proud that she said it perfectly. She's only been to the principal's office once so far. She's starting to read, and gets giddy when she figures out a word. Last night when we were reading together she kept exclaiming, "How did I figure that out? That's CRAZY!" every time she got a word right.
- I picked up my thesis from the printer this week (yay, grad school is officially done!). When Lisa explained to Tyla that Mama had written a book, she was fascinated. When she actually looked at my "book", she thought it looked pretty boring... until she saw the "pictures" (my thesis has a couple of models in it). However, she figured that it must be a hassle for me to always look through hundreds of pages to find the pictures (which she decided must be "very important"), so she took it upon herself to draw the main model with brightly coloured crayon for me - complete with big words (dehumanizing, self, society, supports). She said it I should stick it up in my office so that I don't have to search through my book so much. Everyone at work thought that was just about the cutest thing ever.
- Tyla had a good Halloween. We carved pumpkins with Auntie Jo & Jake. She was a pirate for her school party, and then was 2 different princesses when we went out trick or treating. Since then, she's proven that she can be pretty stealth when it comes to sneaking into the cupboards in the wee hours of the morning to get candy. The other day, she'd consumed an entire package of Hubba Bubba before I got up at 7am - and I didn't hear a thing! Needless to say, the candy has been moved to progressively more remote hiding places... but she seems quite committed to finding it, no matter where we stash it. Hiding Christmas presents ought to be interesting...
That's about it for now. We're looking forward to the next few weeks, as it will bring lots of new experiences and interesting moments!
