Saturday, February 4, 2012

Twice as Long on the Outside as the Inside

You are eighteen months old now, my little Poppet.


That means you've spent twice as long out in the world as you spent growing within me.


I did not think it was possible to love you more than I did when you were first born and I could hold your soft, warm head in the palm of my hand and your tiny fingers clung to one of mine.


But every day as you become more and more you, I do seem to love you more, impossible as I thought that to be.


At eighteen months you are an enchanting, assertive, creative,  adventurous, talkative, friendly, courageous, helpful and loving little delight.


You love to draw and start demanding 'draw, draw draw' as soon as you catch sight of pen and paper. 


You follow your brother around lovingly, and when he is not in sight you call 'bruva, bruva' plaintively. If he is sleeping you do your best to wake him.


On the other hand you are very quick to plop down on your bottom when he races past. You will attempt to grab food from his mouth if it looks particularly nice. Despite the fact that he is twice your size. You love to play 'chase' with him on the trampoline, and to play 'mummy and daddy monster.'


You love the 'playgrou' and could sit in a swing and be swung for hours. You will go down a slide again and again, even if you do always overshoot at the bottom and fall on your (luckily well padded) behind. 


You still love stories, particularly small ones or ones with soft things you can touch or things you can make squeak. 


You are the dress-up queen. You are constantly bringing us shoes to put on you - even if you have shoes on already. And woe betide us if you see any shoes out shopping. "Shoe, shoe, shoe," you squawk like a little bird. You don't have such a great idea of size. At present you are trying to put your brother's croc on over your little red shoe. "Shoe, shoe," you are telling me (As in, mummy, this shoe!) 


This morning you were experimenting with your brother's Buzz Lightyear undies as a hat. Later with your pyjama bottoms. You still love all creams and put them on happily. You like getting dressed and having little clips in your hair. 


You communicate beautifully. When we go out you wave at everyone and tell them 'Hi-ya' or "Hur-roo," in a lovely little lilt. You wave goodbye to the playground, the shops, dogs that we see, people that we meet. 


You love to give kisses, but as you learnt to blow a kiss first you give them with big puffs of air! You love to give hugs too and will come up and lay your head against us or put your arms around our neck. You hug Issy too, and you would hug the Sprocket but he is too quick. If I say 'gentle hands' you will softly stroke my cheek.


You have so many words - new ones every day. Dinosaur was this week. Grandpa, pretty, dirty, book, cold, hot, flower. I keep meaning to count but I know I would miss half! 


You look like a little elf girl - with a halo of blonde hair and eyes that we still can't work out the colour of. They have a streak of brown. But they have a dark blue rim and sometimes look green and sometimes blue and sometimes grey. 


You have not got your brothers long dark lashes or low maintenance hair. Them's the breaks little girl. Your little ringletty curls are so sweet I hope you won't find them a drag later on. Your face and voice are incredibly expressive. You do mischief and joy particularly well. 


At present you are being very independent. You want to walk. You want to walk by yourself. You want to do stuff and go places and if brother can do it, you want to. This is a little worrying as the Sprocket climbed up a tree branch onto the top of the rather high shed yesterday. And later got stuck 7 feet up the cypress tree. I am not that tall so getting him down was tricky. One climber in the family is quite enough, my angel-baby. 


You still love fruit. Particularly watermelon and honey dew melon, grapes and strawberries. I am not sure but I wouldn't be surprised if you could eat a whole watermelon in a day. 


We call you our 'May-May-Mu', or the 'May-May-bird', sometimes 'Maisie-Mu'. None of these are that close to your name. But you seem to call for diminutive nick names.


It is so hard to write up the magic that is you - you are lying on your back at the moment, stretching your legs up in the air, grinning and calling for Issy. Now you have gone in search of 'bruva'. 


Our Poppet - you are our joy. 

5 comments:

  1. she'll love to read this when she's older - and I love to read it now- thanks

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  2. So glad you enjoy it! I do hope she'll like reading it when she's big!

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  3. Oh she does sound delightful!
    My littlest Miss is 18 months old too, and I love watching her blossom into that little girl!
    My favourite age!
    xx

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    1. It is so special! I don't want to forget a second of it! Thankyou for dropping by!

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  4. Also you're a troublemaker. Mummy forgot to mention the crying without pain, and the accusatory fingers you point at the brutha who still sleeps....

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