I'm going to start throwing stuff out on this blog that I don't want to forget. I'm terrible about writing things down and I need to record things so Clara will know she existed as a child. And not just any child, but also extremely opinionated, verbose, and a little bit strange child.

-her practice of tucking anything and everything into bed, at anytime, and anyplace. Mostly this involves her collection of stuffed animals, which she loves loves loves, but it's not limited to the logical. My favorite is when she made me lay down, covered me with a blanket and told me to sleep. At first I tried to get back up after a minute, but after she shouted me back down, I realized this was actually a fantastic opportunity to rest for a bit.

Here's the photographic evidence. Top left: all the crew (okay, part of the crew) tucked into bed. If she runs out of blankets she layers her clothes into a stuffed animal and t-shirt trifle. Top right, rubber ducky all cozy on the bathroom floor. Bottom left, jar of daphnea that Cameron brought home from the lab tucked under a blanket of magazines. Bottom right, a block of wood tucked under a block of wood blanket on a block of wood pillow. You'll just have to trust me on that one.


-extremely opinionated. Do not try to argue or rationalize with this girl. We've had heated debates about whether Mowgli from the Jungle Book is a boy or a girl. Also whether or not the apostle Boyd K. Packer is male or female. I can understand the confusion regarding Mowgli, but I can't quite see where she's coming from with the other one. Back me up here:

-related to Disney movies, since we've been watching them quite a bit since my mom donated her VHS collection to us. I loved it when Clara would refer to me as "my darling" or "my little darling", as in "come here my little darling, sit down". She would also occasionally address me as "your majesty" as in "yes, your majesty" which I thoroughly enjoyed, although I don't know if I should be too flattered considering most Disney "Majesties" are pretty wicked or obnoxious. Still. Sad when that phase ended.

-Clara recently completed potty training with flying colors. I was dreading it, but it ended up being pretty painless. Needless to say, bowel movements have been a pretty hot topic around here. This is a conversation the other day:
clara: momma! momma! Come LOOK!!!!! Come look what I did in the toilet!
me: (admiringly) Wow, that's really nice Clara. Good job.
clara: it's kinda scraggly isn't it? (long pause as we contemplate)...but I still like it.

and this is a collaborative drawing we did. I drew a snowman and was then art directed to draw the rest of the snowman family. With cheese hats and faces. At a park.  Clara then took over and drew them each a toilet with pee and poo coming out of them. She then directed me to write what each was saying. Note: this is not related to any actual events.

mother snowman: You went poo in the park!
little snowman: Oh sorry mama, I went poo.
father snowman: We better get you some new undies!

Do I have a budding award-winning screen writer on my hands here or what?

Well that's about all for now. I'm going to try to be back here more regularly as life occurs. I'm sure this was super boring for anyone not related to my darling offspring or really into poop, in fact, if you are still reading I suggest you unsubscribe now, as things are probably not going to get more interesting around here anytime soon.