Learning Curve

At age 2 years and 9 months, Annalee has ridden a sled, her Jetsons-like one-girl car, her friend May's pink scooter, roller skates, and her tricycle. While either her mom or I have hovered helpfully nearby for just about all of these ventures, she has grown more autonomous on the trike, able, for instance, to steer competently within the confines of the sidewalk on the way to the playground as well as pedal more or less steadily on flat surfaces and down hills. Uphill is still a minor challenge. Luckily, I am never farther than a few feet away, so a push is proffered and, eventually, accepted. Unlike four decades ago, a helmet is de rigueur for all of the toddler gravity games.

We swam in Barton Creek today, after watching performers celebrate Mother Earth Day at Zilker Park. Annalee bragged to her mama, "I went under the water and came back up all by myself!"

Upon Awakening

Someone got her first pair of roller skates yesterday, along with her first set of elbow and knee pads. She already had a helmet to wear while riding her tricycle. The skates, made of bright pink plastic, are the sort you strap around your shoes -- with a heel cup for extra stabilization. I drove up to find my beloved child practicing on her new wheeled shoes, her mom ever-present for support and sudden catches, with the widest eyes and biggest smile I may ever have seen. "I'm a big girl, Daddy," she said, sweat pouring from under her pink helmet, when I opened the car door. "You sure are," I said. "This is incredible."

She wanted to skate one more time before bed, in the pitch dark, and something tells me I know what she's going to want to do when she wakes up.

Big Girl

For her own reasons, Annalee spent the last couple of hours of yesterday referring to her mom as "Grandma" and myself as "Grampa." Kim and I have theorized that she is doing so to poke fun at us (she clearly loves it, and keeps invoking our new appellations in every sentence -- "OK, Grandma?"). She may simply miss her grandparents, all of whom live far from Texas.

She is wearing "big girl" underwear more and more, diapers less and less. She insists on putting on her own clothing, which she has learned to do in the last month. She can put on her own shirts, underpants, pants, socks, and shoes (with minor left-right guidance). She insists, too, on having a go at tying her shoes with laces before allowing Mom or Dad to finish the job.

She says, "I'm a big girl" many times a day.

Peek-a-boo!

Annalee has been told, fairly, that her eyes are not only brown. They are, at certain times, the dark hue referred to by Russian novelists as "black." They are always as magical, and as lively, as she is. I have, out of mental laziness perhaps, told her once or twice, "You have the most beautiful brown eyes," and I have been corrected. "No, Daddy, my eyes are purple." They do have, in certain lights, a purple ring around their broader, dark-brown rings.

She continues to love a wide variety of peek-a-boo games: From behind pieces of furniture, around play equipment at the park, from beneath blankets and sheets. Peek-a-boo!!

Chocolate

Annalee doesn't mind the taste of chocolate. Indeed, she starts most days with hot cocoa. She also receives an M&M for each successful demonstration of toilet-targeted elimination, and I suspect that no other enticement would have worked. Yesterday she said, "When I'm bigger, I'm going to work, and I'm going to eat the whole chocolate." I have no reason to doubt her!

Time for New Books

After some quality time with Mom and Dad at the playground, Annalee ran the quarter mile home, uphill, without stopping. It was lucky for us the house was that close.

She continues to invest much importance and love in her coterie of babies: teddy bears, stuffed movie figurines (e.g. Shrek), and actual baby dolls. All have names, many are pretend breast-fed by their proud mama. Few trips anywhere in the family van can be initiated without bringing two, three, or four of the beloved along.

Books are not supremely popular at the moment, which I fear is a result of watching too many movies and kids' videos. On the other hand, it would be just like me to enforce a level of intellection in my child that takes the fun out of reading for life. If the phase does not prove to be a phase soon, though, I will have to at the very least buy some new books.

New Look

I postponed getting a haircut for several months. Among my reasons was not wanting to lose the curls that Annalee had a habit of playing with, especially when tired. I admit, too, that strangers telling us all the time that they could see where Annalee got her curls from was a bond between us, a thing of which I was proud. Eventually, though, I bit the bullet. The long locks had become a bother, and I wanted my old short-haired self to re-emerge, if hopefully wiser.

"Daddy, you got a haircut," she said, when she first saw me. "I like it." So much for her being devastated. The next morning, she saw me again and said, "You still have your haircut, Daddy." A little later she said, "I like your haircut, I didn't like your curls."

She had recently been expressing interest in her own first haircut, and within a few days of Daddy's new look, Annalee was not to be deterred. Mommy brought her to a fancy local hair salon, and she had about an inch taken off her golden-red curls. I dreaded her haircut as much as I dreaded my own, fearing the loss of I don't exactly know what, her innocence, I suppose, and was happy to see I didn't love her less with her stylish new 'do, a little more, if anything.