Good Company.

Oh, look, a whole new holiday, year, and birthday event have passed since last I blogged.

That is mostly because I can't seem to organize myself or my time worth a toot lately.

This may all change as my counselor has decided to refer me for ADD evaluation.

She actually told me I exhibited a lot of characteristics of an adult with ADD, so she wasn't really surprised when I admitted that I had a couple of college professors ask me if I had been tested back in the day. I always assumed those peeps were cracking wise, but I guess maybe it's something worth looking into.

One of the only real "resolutions" I made over New Year's was to say yes to opportunities, and getting cured of my inability to even keep up a simple blog is too big an opportunity to pass up.

Anyway. Enough about me. You all come here to read about that little girl I made anyway :-)

SHE IS SO AMAZING!

I know I can say that because I made her, but I really am totally enamored of her. And amazed at all she knows. She just learns and does so much more stuff all of a sudden! She likes for me to read her "Ham" aka "Green Eggs and Ham" and tonight while we were reading, near the end of the story, she points to Sam-I-am and says, "He want him try it." We were on the page where that other guy, who Lilah just thinks is the Cat in the Hat, was FINALLY going to try the green eggs and ham. And sure, I've said to her before that this is what was going on when we get to that page but that she REMEMBERS it is amazing to me. And then we turn the page, and they are both smiling and she goes, "Oh! He happy!"

I fully admit to using the "But don't you think you should try this, like Green Eggs and Ham"? line on Lilah at every meal where she refuses to try something I offer her. She has yet to draw the parallel between herself and Not Sam. I'm sure that's coming.

We are *so* into Tinker Bell. Tinker Bell vomited all over our house between December and January and Lilah couldn't be happier. I'm amused and disturbed at the same time, only because I want her to like her own things and not be caught up in the machine of Disney, but it's damn cute when she watches the first Tinker Bell movie, which is Tinker Bell's origin story (Fairies get born when a baby laughs for the first time, btw) and talks about "BABY BELL!" and gets truly into the movies and the action, getting excited during exciting parts and upset during upsetting parts. She may well be ready for a real live movie theater experience soon. We'll see.

She also knows all about Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. I hate hate hate that I let my young child sit and watch two solid hours of tv in the mornings, but I'm kind of in the middle of cleaning and dressing myself, so what else should she do? Play tiddlywinks? Plus, at least Mickey is teaching her something. She knows more about shapes all of a sudden than I ever realized. And she knows all of the characters like they are her friends: Mickey, Minnie, Daisy, Nonald, Doofy, and Tuto. I am trying to get her run-down recorded just because it's so cute how she says them. And again, she watches with such....I guess it's empathy! If something happens, it's "Oh, no! Doofy, oh no!!!"

She is deathly afraid of the car wash. After Snowpocalypse hit and there was salt and dirt and all kinds of nasty stuff on the road for weeks, I realized I needed to get my car washed on Friday...along with half of Greenville. I know she's scared of the car wash, but having to wait in a line three cars back from the entrance was nearly torture to her. I swear she thought we were driving into the mouth of a monster. Every time we pulled closer, she said, "Oh, Hode Baby's hand, Mommy! Hode hands!" and reached out to me so desperately it broke my heart. But what a trooper. With her little downturned, almost about to cry pout, she bravely said in the middle of the wash, "Is just brushes. Just brushes" and never did cry for real. I told her she was super brave and that I was proud of her.

Just like I was the other day when she had to get two shots. Now, I thought she was good to go until we got closer to school age, but she apparently had two boosters that were due. I should have further investigated that before taking her, but hey - hindsight, right? Anyway, she was so big and brave that she let us pull her little pants down and didn't say a word until the two sticks occurred...and man, what sticks! Both drew blood, so I knew the needles were big enough to really hurt. And later she had a bruise when I took off her "sticker." She cried but only for about five minutes...I promised her some ice cream. And I think I did really well preparing her...I didn't lie. I told her it would hurt but only for a few minutes. But I know she didn't fully understand. So it was hard. But she did so great. And she did get her ice cream, a Dilly Bar from DQ, so all the better.

She even takes punishment relatively well. Whenever I make her stand alone in the corner to think about things, she always does. She stands there, facing the wall, not smiling, not being cute, but accepting her punishment. And she doesn't try to wander out of the corner or get your attention. It's like, "Baby! If you had just minded me this well when I asked you to do X thing, you wouldn't BE in the corner!" But I always go get her after her two minutes and tell her again why she was there, and ask her to follow the directions again, and really, 9/10 times she will go do it. And sometimes she says, "Thank you, Mommy" and it's like, Oh, now I feel like you are thanking me for beating you or something. I can't watch her stand in the corner. It hurts my feelings! But she's really just so, so good.

I don't think she gets that from me.

What was it she said to me today that I just went, HUH?....Oh yeah, "I patending, Mommy." She was playing with her little people - "PEOPLES!" as she calls them - and she just randomly said, "I patending, Mommy!" and said, "Well...yes, and you are doing a great job of pretending!"

Please tell me it's not just me who secretly wishes you never had to correct all the cute ways your kids say things wrong. Because I like Nonald and Doofy. I like our friends Datie, Baby Enree and Now-nine and cousin Feff. I like that at her birthday party, my baby stood between her two doting grandmothers and - with utter amazement - said, "DUE MEMAS!!!!" Also, I like to count "On, due. On due!"

I love being this child's mom more than I ever imagined possible. I always thought parenthood was mostly hardship with some fun thrown in. But I feel like I learn as much as she does. She teaches me tenderness and sweetness and a different kind of honesty. She teaches me patience and humility. When I correct her flaws, I am corrected my flaws, because she is just a mirror of me. I know I fuss to much at the dog for going after Lilah's food because Lilah now has a near heart attack if the dog is within 50 feet of her while she eats. Thank goodness they are still good friends anyway...in fact, the dog wanted to sleep in that girl's room tonight so I pulled her bed next to the crib so they could sleep together. The dog just didn't want to be alone, and Lilah is good company.

Indeed.