One.

My beautiful baby, Squish, is one today.  I've been doing that parent thing where I think back to exactly what I was doing a year ago, up until she was born at 3:38 p.m.  We have had such a sunny and fun first year.  It's amazing how much more relaxed I was with the second.  Even in just two years though, baby contraptions and raising ideas have changed.  Squish is just gorgeous, all incredibly soft skin and rosy cheeks.  She still has tiny feet with delectable toes.  Her hair is super-soft, but it is also very thick in the back - I think it might be a different texture than her sisters.  She murmurs mama and dada, but I don't think she knows them yet.  She makes noises that my mom and I can her pterodactyl noises.  Sometimes she will look at me and seem to repeat a word I just said, but surely that can't be.  She tries all foods, but at various times has rejected bananas and kiwis.  She loves cheese, crackers, strawberries, carrots, squash, eggs, pasta and many, many other foods.  She ADORES her big sister  - when they first get up in the morning they shriek at each other.  I don't know what they are saying, but they are clearly having a conversation.  Her face lights up when she sees her daddy and she loves to roll around on the floor with him and when he tosses her in the air.  She likes to chew on bath toys and stack blocks.  She isn't moving much yet, but when she wants something she finds a way to get to it.  She, like her sister, isn't much of a snuggler once they gained head control.  But every once in a while she'll nuzzle in and it is the sweetest.  She smells like sweetness all the time - strawberries mostly.  Probably because a chunk is caught in her neck folds.  She has this crazy method of getting around.  A combination of roll-sit-flinging that is terrifying and hilarious at the same time.  I am deeply, madly in love!  Happy Birthday my sweet Junebug!

Three

Bug turns three today.  Three is so strange.  I remember three as being my best year of childhood.  It was just so much damn fun.  I hope Bug feels that way about her third year.  She says and does some really adorable things. She calls eyebrows, eyebrellas.  She calls knives, sharks (because they can bite 'cha!).  She says "Shiver me timbers!" and "Ahoy mateys!" and "Kiss my grits!" and "Exsqueeze me please" when we pass someone in the aisle of a store. She says, "Happy 'scuse me" instead of "May I be excused" when she is done with dinner.  She knows all of the numbers in our address, but not in the right order.  She will tell you today she is "free years old."  She learned about Band-Aids and tape in the same week and now thinks mommy can fix anything.  Staples and glue are going to blow her mind.  She is so brave outside with the other kids if she falls down or gets hurt, but inside, a too-sharp tone can bring on the tears.  When she cries, she asks for a tissue, blows her nose, then throws the tissue away.  Everything isn't all better, but close.  She loves to eat M&Ms, mandarin oranges, pizza, pepperoni (but not on her pizza), and her daddy's bread, waffles and scones, but not his blueberry muffins.  But just plain blueberries, she can eat two pints a week or more.  She is my oxygen, my young pair of eyes.  I love that little girl so much it hurts some days.  Happy day sweet Bug.  Enjoy your purple door!