What did you say, honey?

Everyday Kathleen speaks more and more and we get more of a glimpse into her little world. She can effectively (if not always politely) convey what she wants or what she thinks. She still often needs to be prompted to say please, but generally remembers to say thank you or "danks." She'll call, "Mommy check Mah-lin, Mah-lin crying," when she hears her sister wake up. She yells "knock" as she pounds on a door and then immediately enters a room. When she can't find something or someone, she walks around the house calling, "Where are you?" And if all's right in her little world, she looks up at us, beaming, and says, "Happy!"

Kathleen still enjoys commanding us to sing, and now will sometimes sing along. She does a pretty decent rendition of portions of "The Wheels on the Bus" -- she knows "round and round," "wah, wah, wah" and "shh, shh, shh," among others. My personal favorite is her bus driver, who says "moof on back." (She makes a little fist and moves it as she sings, only she mostly moves it forward, rather than back.) The Itsy Bitsy Spider, Old MacDonald (e-i-e-i-o) and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star are also on her repetoire.

Lately I'm particularly grateful that I don't have a problem with cursing, since living with Kathleen is a bit like living with a parrot. Fortunately "Rats!" is the only exclamation she's repeated. There's something rather comical about watching her chatter "Rats! Rats! Rats!" after I've exploded at some minor home catastrophe.

And it's a good thing I don't have many secrets, because Kathleen certainly has enough vocabulary to blow my cover. A few weeks back I had one of those worst days of mothering, when Madeline fell out of the bouncer onto the floor. Madeline was fine, thank heavens, but we took her to the ER just to make sure. Kathleen can recount the whole thing for you, "Madeline fall bouncer. Hurt. Car go doctor." There's no predicting what will inspire a retelling of my truly low points, but she can do it with gusto. Of course, Kathleen also thinks that any bump now warrants a trip to the doctor, so we wind up saying, "No, honey, we don't need to go to the doctor today for that," more than I'd have imagined.

Kathleen is constantly picking up new words and putting them into use, sometimes before she's even sure of what they mean. One of Kathleen's newest words is "favorite" and she uses it all the time. She obviously knows that it means she likes something, but as often as she uses it, we're pretty sure she doesn't know how much she likes it. This week hot dogs, pork chops, cereal, yogurt, grapes, strawberries, water, milk, the christmas tree, playdough, the church nursery, a collection of books, throwing a ball, coloring, and playing "ring around the rosies" (which she calls "pocket," as in a "pocketful of posies") have all been favorites.

We had a bit of mystery last week when Kathleen kept saying, "Summin open doken." She'd say it rapidly, and a few times in succession, and she'd do it at various times throughout the day. Jim and I were at a loss as to what it meant. We'd ask Kathleen about it, but she'd just repeat it again and laugh, looking at us as though we were complete idiots for not being able to understand. Jim finally figured it out as we were waiting at the ID card section on Thursday to get me a new ID card. (Kathleen had slid mine down the window of the car and into the car door, where it landed with a thunk, taunting me with its irretrievability. We've replaced it now, though, and I can once again go grocery shopping on my own. Well, as on my own as you can be with two children.) In a flash of brilliance Jim asked, "Do the hokey pokey?" And Kathleen shouted,"YEAH!" (Which, to be perfectly honest, sounds a lot more like "deah.") Mystery solved, the four of us wound up doing the hokey pokey in the waiting room at the ID card section, to the great amusement of the crowds of people also waiting...

And as much as Kathleen talks now, I think Madeline will talk even more. She's cooing and babbling and smiling all the time lately. We have entire (unintelligible) conversations with her. Madeline also has begun laughing, and her laugh is so sweet and happy it always makes me teary. She'll laugh outright for her daddy -- big, long laughs that are like a conversation themselves. The only way I can get her laughs is to steal them. But at least we know she's ticklish!