Thursday

Things are a little crazy this week - with a return from Anacortes, WA, a crushing edit deadline (thank you, Bill for coming up from NJ!), having a crew in WA, and the 37-point To Do List I wrote up yesterday. But I still wouldn't have missed Isabelle's Parent Lunch Day today! The teachers at day care were so sweet - all decked out and wearing red corsages. And it was so much fun to see Isabelle in her element. Mostly she wanted us to go potty with her and read stories. Other attention was given to jelly sandwiches and cake.

I was under strict orders today to be home by 6:30 in order for Dennis to get to his zoning meeting. When the calls started coming into the office at 6:10, I shouted -- I swear, I'm leaving -- in the background. Still, my butt was firmly planted in the edit seat as I was feeling on a creative tear. Although they met me in the driveway (Isabelle's cheddar goldfish in Nelson Mandela's Robben Island cup), there couldn't have been too much of a time crunch since Dennis walked with me inside and then gave some instructions for putting Isabelle to bed. I wasn't even gone a week!!!

You should see Isabelle's deck! Nana and Grampi built a deck on their house, and have dubbed it "Isabelle's deck" because she was a consideration in the specs, and they love hanging out and playing with her on it. It's also a fun place to maneuver the remote control cobra Nana picked up on her latest Saturday morning jaunt.

Smushed goldfish now have a new home in Isabelle's moonwalk. After all her jumping, we were going to take a bath, but she wanted to play with the letters in the shower. She knows exactly where to find the letter "I for Isabelle" and promptly picked it up and stuck it to her belly. She's also pretty good at finding the letters A, B, D and M.

Our cell phones are no longer "Daddy's Hello" and "Mommy's Hello." A twinge of sadness that that description has been replaced by "Daddy's phone" and Mommy's phone."

She refuses to wear "nighttime" underwear (i.e. pull up) to bed. Suddenly I'm back in Urine Town (did we really buy my parents tickets to that show for Christmas a few years back??).

For what I believe to be the first time in my life, I had this thought tonight: "I'm so glad I'm not rich." Were I rich - here's how the night would've gone. I would have called on the Nanny to keep watch tonight with Isabelle while Dennis went to his meeting and I continued editing in the office. I would've missed singing "My Favorite Things" five times in a row (with her turning the pages and repeating the song)... I would've missed watching her sit her dolls down and give them a ride on Thomas the Train... I would've missed sounding out C-A-T with her.

Isabelle enjoyed her special delivery from Anika this week! It was a thank-you-for-the-great-weekend package stuffed with whole almonds, fruit bars and organic dip mix! Thank you, Anika.

Tonight reading the book, "More, More, More," I told Isabelle that the book was a gift to her from Bonnie. I said, "Bonnie loves you very much." And she said, "I love you, Bonnie!" Those birthday sisters!