Little miss fix-its

It's amazing how fast two little girls can get into so much trouble... The other night we were over to Blair's house for dinner. Bella and Cara were playing with a doll stroller, racing it down the hallway. At some point the wheel broke off of the stroller - but no one seemed very upset by this, and the kids went on playing, running in and out of Bella's and Max's rooms. A short while later everything got quiet. When things get quiet with three kids in the house, you know something is brewing. A few minutes later, Max comes out to say "Bella is doing something very bad" - When I went to check, I found Cara and Bella in Blair's room, huddled over the broken stroller wheel, over which Bella was pouring an entire bottle of Elmer's glue. The wheel, and good portion of the rug and not to mention the two girls, were covered in glue. The girls looked up at my intrusion, and you could see they were so pleased... thinking "look! We're fixing it OURSELVES!!!" These two are T-R-O-U-B-L-E

Cara has started trying to say some new words. Today we were watching the Baby Einstein "Baby MacDonald" video, which is about life on a farm. Rather than trying to say the animal names, like a normal kid, Cara's trying to say "tractor" - it comes out like "tra-te" - and she says it everytime a tractor appears on screen. She likes the animals, but doesn't seem overy interested in trying to name them.

We've also been playing a game during her bath, where I put a little rubber duck on the edge of the tub and cover it with a cup. Then I say "abra-cadabra" and slide the duck out into my hand below - and show her the empty cup. This game never gets old, and Cara will play it in the tub until I make her get out. So tonight at dinner I gave her a little bowl of peas to eat, after she finished all the ones on her plate. She ate most of them, but when there were just a couple of peas left, she turned the bowl upside down and said "abbbra-ra" and lifted it up and laughed. Apparently she was trying to make her peas disappear by magic.

We were also delighted to have a quick visit from Uncle Evan today. Cara was thrilled when he came out to say hi while she was eating her breakfast.

Here, Evan is demonstrating his babysitting skills while I ran upstairs to do some laundry - apparently sinks work very well as makeshift play-pens. Evan is nothing if not resourceful. For her part, Cara was having a blast. I should have remembered Evan's philosophy about kids... "hey, babies pretty much take care of themselves."