The world according to Emily

There are no strawberries just "stwawbellies."

on negotiating:
"Daddy, if I hafta wait til afta dinner fo my jiminums I don want 2...I want 5."
or
E: "I want two jiminums"
J: "You can have an M&M and a sticker"
E: "But I want two jiminums"

on breakfast:
"I...WANT...ICE...CREAM!!!"

on respecting her mom:
J: "Baby, did you have dinner at Grandma's house"
E: "Uh-huh"
J: "Well what did you have"
E: with the disdain of a full blown teenager AND and eye-roll: "Food."

Multiplied by the share factor

A while back I was reading my favorite blog when I came across a passage regarding the author's daughter. She was talking about how fantastic it was to look over the head of her 3 year old and lock eyes with her husband in an expression of parental solidarity regarding the recent exploits of their greatest joy. I admit that this is something I have definitely been missing. Jesse is so in love with Emily and every little accomplishment would result in a gasp or squeal of joy from me and a beaming smile of pride or astonishment from him. Lately, these indeed have been the loneliest moments for me. A child provides so much in one's life, but nothing, NOTHING, compares to that special bond of companionship when someone else shares those moments with you. Telling someone else about them is just not the same. ...then along came Ben. Last week having both him and Emily was unexpectedly heavenly. He'd catch my eye and we'd try not to giggle over her mispronunciations. He taught her to call him a ninja and to tell me I'm pretty. I'd catch a look of slight surprise on his face right before he'd declare my baby exceptionally smart. Then, be still my heart, I caught him kissing her on the top of the head and whispering "I love you Emily Gatlin" one morning while they were watching cartoons together on the living room floor. Talk about being made whole.

Emily!

Jackson Parrot: I love you Emily Gatlin! I want you to have a cookie! Do you want a cookie?
Emily: I love you too Jackson! No! I am having pudding!
Janice: Awww, he loves her and wants her to have a cookie!

Cue laughter from the entire restaurant who had been watching the two babies express their love via snack food and a crushing hug.

Sleepy Girl

I am so freakin' tired. Sleepy, wore out, bag under my eyes, the whole bit. I have no idea what the problem is. Stress? New medicine? I'm clueless...and sleepy...and grumpy, the last two of which are my least favorite dwarfs. Oh well.

My daughter has been a darling this week. She thinks she is a kitty and insists I call her as I would a cat. Then, as she makes her way toward me she repeats the call: here key key key. It is really very cute, although a little exasperating. She has decided that I am a dog. Aren't tiny little two-year-old ideas fun?!

Saturday I see my Ben. When I think of him sometimes I cannot catch my breath and I am absolutely looking forward to 9 days of being breathless. Last night I had an away message up that he sent to his friend Dave saying "this is my girlfriend's away message. Isn't that cool?!" My boyfriend thinks I'm cool. Excuse me while I turn red and can't stop smiling.

Sacrilige

"This is just something you're going to have to accept." Hmmm, who'd have thought that math class would take me back to my days of Sunday school and confirmation? But there it was. The prof was going on about something that happens when you do something to X and we were just going to have to take it on faith. Seems to me everybody just has to have something to cling to. Something inexplicable. Living here in the buckle of the Texas Bible Belt there are apparently only two choices: God or Math.

more Emi-isms

According to the Emily, authority on all things vocabulary the English language has been changed as follows: stretchy = crunchy ex) Mama, I love my crunchy pants. Thas what I wanna we-r today.
with = for ex) Mama, come to da bafroom for me.
fork = ferk ex) I wanna use a big ferk lika you!

Paper or plastic?

So I went to the grocery store today, the Saturday before Valentine's day, because I'm a fricken' genius. At the checkout I was faced with the world's most sullen high school student who ran my things through the checkout without so much as a word until he declared my total was $49.31 and I had saved such and such amount pronounced so quickly that I had no time to register how much before I was told to have a nice day and all but ushered out of the checkout line. BUT THEN! I heard the voice belonging to the very same sullen high school student pleasantly addressing the lady behind me as ma'am and asking her if she'd found everything alright. Now wait a second. Where was my ma'am and inquiry as to my ability to locate things? As a matter of fact, I did not find everything alright! I spent a good thirty minutes looking for frozen meatballs. I wandered up and down the aisles of a store bustling with frantic people buying things to make what I assume will be a fantastic dinner for singles awareness day while I puzzled over where frozen meatballs could possibly be kept. I had no trouble locating the "Bubba Burgers" or frozen apple gorgonzola cheese pizza. I was even so lucky to discover that you can purchase some sort of frozen patty appetizingly named "Tofurkey." I could not, however, locate the FUCKING MEATBALLS! When I had finally given up and comforted myself by declaring that I would no longer need to find the obviously hidden ricotta cheese because I would have no use for it without those damn meatballs, I found them. They were in with the frozen potato products. Of course! There's nothing like a tater tot so much as an Italian or even Swedish style meatball. After that I really did have to find the ricotta cheese which was cleverly placed with the coffee creamer in the refrigerators where they keep the milk. This was the obvious choice since it would have been so out of place with the cream, cottage and mozzarella cheeses cunningly placed among the cheddar and those sort of plastic-y American singles. And in those thirty minutes the checkout lines got fuller and fuller so that I was forced to pick the shortest one which was so cheerfully populated by the very essence of checkout boy aristocracy. So dammit, I am 24 years old and the mother of a toddler. I spend my days working through calculus problems and the travel expenses of football coaches. I think I absolutely deserve a ma'am and some questioning about product placement in the store thankyouverymuch you sniveling, self centered rodent boy! But then all was sunny again when I got home and realized that the sacking guy had two brain cells capable of being rubbed together and producing the thought that eggs should not be sacked with the liter of cherry juice.