T-R-O-U-B-L-E

When Daughter #1 was born I felt like I had just fallen in love all over again. Before having another child, I think most parents contemplate how they will ever be able to love another child as much as their first. All I can say is that Daughter #2 has totally captured my heart and has me wrapped around all ten of her tiny little fingers. So I thought I'd take a moment and list a few reasons why this child knows my number and how she keeps me on speed dial.

She has two smiles.

One exudes complete joy and the other one spells T-R-O-U-B-L-E!

Double-edged sword - She loves to play with my hair. Back in the middle of February both girls were sick, and playing with my hair was one of the ways the baby soothed herself. She could be feeling miserable and then suddenly relax just by reaching up to hold a lock of my hair. She's also realized though that this is a great way to get mom's attention and has no reservations about pulling it when she's feeling mischievous.

Another way she soothes herself is by resting her head on my chest over my heart. She completely melts like butter when she does this and so do I. I love holding my babies!

Two weeks ago, Saturday February 16th, was a momentous day for her. Her parents eventually realized that they were no longer able to impede her improving mobility and we finally installed a baby gate at the top of our stairs and lowered the crib. With her increasing mobility also comes an increasing appetite, and I had forgotten how she used to open her mouth like a little baby bird when she was hungry until she recently started doing it again.

Can't go under, can't go over it, might as well go through it!

Another interesting aspect to meal times is that her improving coordination has led to flailing arms and feet when she gets excited resulting in oatmeal in mom's eye.

And back to the title TROUBLE, the incident went along like one of the many tales I've heard from my Pops of how his little brother seemed to always incite some type of trouble at bedtime. Since she had made it perfectly clear that she wasn't interested in cooperating with our feeble attempts to get her to sleep, we decided to go ahead and place Daughter #2 in her crib. Well, the two girls share a room and needless to say she wasn't interested in sleeping in there either. The only logical thing to do would be to incite a riot with her older sister resulting in Daughter #1 getting in trouble for not laying down and Daughter #2 getting her picture taken for being so cute. Looking back I can clearly see the injustice and will promptly add more money to Daughter #1's savings account to pay for future therapy bills.