My girls have been so sweet these days. We have rough moments, but mostly I'm just loving and drinking in being their mom right now. Willa is still independent, stubborn, and a little self-conscious, but I also see so much growth and maturity. The other day we were hurrying to get going and she was putting her socks and shoes on by herself. Trying to hurry us up, I surreptitiously started putting the sock and shoe on the other foot hoping she wouldn't notice. Well, of course she noticed but instead of totally losing it, she said, "Oh, you remember Mama, that's my job." It was such a calm response! In still in shock a little bit about it.

She's got a lot of love to give and a lot of excitement for life. I hope she always stays excited and young. I love that right now she's more interested in Octanauts than in My Little Ponies right now and that she loves Dr. Seuss books and Mo Willems. They seem much more innocent and childlike than Barbie books or princess books. Of course she likes those too, but she forgets about them pretty quickly and loves to come back and back to Pigeon and Elephant and Piggie. In fact, she has all of them memorized so that she can "read" them with us. She probably has over fifteen books that she can recite to us at any given time. Of course, she's extremely frustrated whenever we get a new one because she tries to read it right away, but doesn't know the words and gets angry if we try to help her. I've noticed that she's started recognizing and trying to sound out words. She'll get the first letter and then guess at a word that begins with that letter. I can't believe that she's figuring these things out!

Here we are at Savers having just found her new bicycle! ( Ignore the transition lenses on her glasses!) Ryan and I were talking this morning about whether not she wishes she had a new bike or even knows the difference between a new and second hand one. I'm sure if she saw them next to one another she would know, but I like to think that we're still creating good memories with shabbier things. I hope she looks back fondly on driving out to the second hand store to find her a bicycle and how excited we were when we found a purple one that was just the right size. I'm not against buying new things, I love new things, but I also love deals and it feels great to pay $8 instead of $80.

Willa has been really into making these crowns. She draws them, cuts them out, and then decorates them. She even came up with the idea of taping a strip of paper around the back.