Miscellany

Annalee's voice is husky and musical, like a miniature version of her mom's. "Choo-choo," she says softly, with a parenthetical question mark. "Shoes," she says like the command that it is ("Get up, we're going outside"). When she's fighting to stay awake at the hour mom gets home from work, avoiding her afternoon nap as though it meant something utterly horrible, she whispers, "Mom, home." Her laugh is, like many of the things she says, throaty.

While I was in the kitchen preparing dinner, I heard a scratching sound in the living room, but didn't register it. I heard it again and went to see what was causing the frenetic, restless sound. One of mom's colored art pencils was being employed to reconfigure a square column (just one side, fortunately). I knew it would eventually happen, and managed to simply say, "We can't do that, honey." Only time will tell if we in fact can or can't.

Later in the afternoon, after a few failed efforts to get her to see the light of reason on the subject of napping, I found her slumped in her high chair (where I'd left her with a pen and a pad of paper while I cooked), her eyes open, but only barely. A few ounces of ba-ba later, she was happily asleep. My precious angel.