#109 I'll Race You

After dinner Russ and I had divvied up the chores (one of us had dish duty--one of us had kids-ready-for-bed duty). In full "mom mode" I said to Russ, "I'll race you!" After having said all day, "I'll race you!" "I'll time you!" "Let's see how fast you can do it!" and "On your mark!...." it kind of just slipped out.

Russ looked at me and said, "I'm 31." Interpretation: I don't fall for tricks like that anymore.

Brecken, taking Russ's words as a boast, said, "Ha! Ha! Does he mean he's way faster than you?!" Interpretation: I thrive on falling for tricks like that. 

#108 Button Pushing

Hallie is good. She is really good. At what is she good? Well, a lot of things, but button pushing is up there at the top. We recently had a few girls over at our house and they fell prey to Hallie. Their first mistake was each bringing a special blankie to our house--which wouldn't have been a mistake except for their second blunder--letting Hallie know how special they were to them. For a period of about 30 minutes Hallie would chase them through the house, maneuver the blanket away for them, listen to them cry for about 3 seconds, and then drop the blankie somewhere for them to retrieve--only to begin the whole process over. After the thirtieth minute it became a game to them. As soon as it was fun to them Hallie lost interest (did I mention these girls were older than Hallie?). They ran upstairs with their blankies, and Hallie remained downstairs. This is what ensued:

Oldest girl (age 6): (in a playful, taunting shout) Hallie!!! Come and get me!
Hallie: (shouting back) What?!
Oldest girl: (truly believing Hallie simply didn't hear her) Hallie! Come and get me!
Hallie: What?!
Oldest girl: (a little less playful) Hallie! Come and get me!
Hallie: What?!
Oldest girl: (all signs of "playful" gone, the tone of frustration setting in) Hallie!!
(ten seconds of silence)
Hallie: What?!
Oldest girl: (frustration full-blown) Come! And! Get! Me!
(another ten seconds of silence)
Hallie: What?!
Oldest girl: (less frustration--more anger) Hallie! Come get me!
Hallie: What?!

...(ten minutes later)

Oldest girl: (almost broken down) Hallie! Come get me!!
(sixty seconds of silence)
Hallie: What?!

...(fifteen minutes later)

Oldest girl: (almost crying) Hallie!... Hallie!!... Hallie!!!!..... Come get me!

Button: Pushed

Hallie: What?!

I'm pretty sure that had the oldest girl seen the surly smirk on Hallie's face that she would have stopped believing  Hallie's problem was that she couldn't hear. No.... that's not Hallie's problem. Hallie has a different problem.

I'm not sure why this is cute to me. Probably because I have full confidence that Hallie will grow up to be sweet. And right now, as a three-year-old she plays out this scenario out a dozen different ways every day. Oh, Hallie.

#107 I'll Share

Hallie came to me holding small bottle of my fingernail polish. She asked (the last few sentences almost singing with allurement):

"Can I have this? I'll share it with you. I will--you can have some of it. I'll share it with you."

Her sing-song voice trying to charm me into giving her what's already mine... so that I can have some of it.