Inara is getting cooler and cooler by the minute

I can't believe Inara is now 2 years and 4 months. She's quickly closing in on 2 1/2 already. Yikes that's scary to think about. I don't know her current weight, but she has officially hit the 36 inch mark. Yes, my baby girl is now 3 feet tall! She's growing like a weed lately. Every time I turn around I need to pull clothes out of her closet that she has outgrown. Ditto for shoes too. She's now in a 7 1/2 wide shoe. I think we're going to go broke just getting her new clothes and shoes every couple of months. It's tricky with clothes for her because her legs are average (she's in 2T), but she's got a rather long torso, so she has to wear at least 3T tops if not 4T. Thank goodness we can get so many hand-me-downs from Avery. Plus, consignment sales will start up again next month. Hallelujah because it kills me to have to pay full price on clothes for Inara since some she only wears a few times before they are too small. Boy, nobody every tells you just how expensive kids REALLY are. But they're SOOO worth it!!!

I swear I fall more and more in love with my little sweet pea. She's got the best demeanor and personality. You always hear about the terrible 2s, but honestly, I can't say we've hit that stage with Inara. I think she's pretty even tempered. Every kid has his/her moments, but for the most part, Inara is super easy to handle. I think part of it is that I just make a lot of time for her, I give her lots of attention, and yet, I'm getting better about setting boundaries with her and she knows what she should and shouldn't do. Watch...now that's I've said this all out loud she's going to take a turn for the worse. Haha. I find that hard to imagine though because she's such a great daughter in every way imaginable.

Every day I swear she learns something new. She can now take her own shoes off and puts them on the bench by the front door like I taught her. Most of the time she can take her own coat off. She loves to pick out her plate and cup at meal time. Shawn is teaching her how to set the table for dinner. She's getting to be a bigger and bigger helper all the time. She loves helping me dust, vacuum, do laundry, empty the dishwasher, and is getting better and better at these tasks. As I write this, she is helping Shawn make banana bread. She loves to be involved in whatever we are doing. And she always impresses me with what a great job she does.

We enrolled Inara in swim classes every Saturday morning at 8:30 the months of January and February. She's been loving it! Shawn gets in the pool with her, so it's a fun thing daddy gets to do with her. They've started teaching the kids how to blow bubbles under the water, back float, kicking their legs, how to use their arms to get out of the pool, and other basic skills. No surprise, most of the time, all Inara wants to do is jump in the pool like she does at Pop's pool. I've been very impressed with her fearlessness thus far in class. Now in the bathtub every night she loves to practice back float and laying on her tummy while kicking her legs. Let's just say after she's done, half the water is on the bathroom floor. It's so worth it though to watch her swim her little heart out.

Some of her favorite toys right now are puzzles. The kid rocks at putting puzzles together. We have about 7 now, and I think she's memorizing how they go together because she can do them so quickly. For Christmas, she got Candyland and loves to play it with Shawn. She even tells him what the picture on the card is: double yellow, one blue, Gingerbread man, etc. I love listening to Shawn and Inara play Candyland. It's the cutest!

Another of her favorite toys to play with are her baby dolls. She's becoming quite the little mommy. She will rock her babies when they are crying. Sometimes she will tell me her baby is sick, so we have to take her to see Dr. Katz (Inara's pediatrician). Along with this is her incredible imaginary play. For Christmas she got a couple Potato Heads, a mommy and a daddy. I found two little boy Potato Heads in the stuff my parents brought me that used to be mine and Michael's from when we were kids. She loves playing with all four of these, and it's a riot to watch and listen too. The brothers, as she calls the boys, love to play hide and seek, and the mommy and daddy Potato Heads go looking for them. I will hear her saying, "Mommy, watch me" from the playroom and I'll come in to see what's going on. She'll then tell me, "No mommy, brothers talking to mommy potato head." And I will see the brothers getting ready to go down the slide while mommy and daddy watch. It's so funny. She's also doing this with toy cars. She will say one is the mommy and one is the baby, and the mommy car will follow the baby and even hug the baby. I love watching her play like this, because it makes me think she's going to be a perfect big sister (someday hopefully).

I'm constantly getting compliments on how well spoken she is for only being 2. Her vocabulary is unbelieveable, and our conversations are very lengthy now. When people ask how old she is, they are always surprised because she and I can have quite mature conversations for her age. I promise I'm not doing anything out of the ordinary or even crazy. I just talk to her ALL the time, take the time to explain things to her, and we read non-stop. We read so much that Inara has begun memorizing books to an even greater extend. Just the other day I was folding laundry in my bedroom while she was reading in her room. I stood in the hallway and listened to her. The girl was able to tell the whole story from the book Pinkalicious because she remembers what happens on every page. I was in such shock. In the past, she has been able to tell us random sentences from books, but this time she was able to tell the whole story on her own. When I came into her room, I sat down and told her how proud I was of her reading her book. She then said so proudly, "Mommy, I read all by myself." She's starting to remind me of myself with her love of books and reading and takes such pride in reading all by herself. That's my girl.

Along with her love of reading is her love of ABCs. She sings the ABC song perfectly and loves to do so. She's also starting to learn her letters. We will be out and about, and she'll see a sign or billboard and say, "Mommy, there's D for Daddy." Or "There's an I for Inara." No matter how many times she says it, it still amazes me. I can't get over how smart she's getting. To practice her letters, she loves to "do letters" on the computer. This was something Shawn started with her. She will sit on his lap, and they practice letters on the keyboard. It cracks me up when she does this. She even loves to make happy faces and sad faces with the punctuation marks. The best part of her love for letters is that she can now spell her name! Yes, my 2 year old spells I N A R A. Again, to explain how this all came about it was just me taking the time with her to explain things. She made a handprint Christmas tree for us at school and on the bottom of it is her name. She knew it was her name, so when she would go up to it, she would point to the letters and I would tell her what they were. Before I knew it, she was starting to say the letters of her name on her own.

Along with singing ABCs, Inara is becoming quite the music aficionado. She LOVES to sing! No car ride is complete without my sweet pea singing me songs. Her favorites right now are from a Winnie the Pooh CD I believe I bought at a garage sale. She will even request certain tracks. "Mommy, I hear Rain Rain Rain." Or "I hear Tigger song now, peas." Yes, she has her own opinion and a strong one to boot. She also loves singing along with the Curious George soundtrack by Jack Johnson. She's always loved this CD, but now she sings the songs on her own. It's great to see how she has grown with this CD. First, it was just listening to it. Then it was recognizing the songs in the movie. Now it's singing the actual songs herself. I'll hear her sing "Reduce, reuse, recycle" from the back seat and totally crack up. So crazy how much she has grown in just the past 6 months. Of course, we also sing the Imagination Movers songs, some of mommy's favorites. What really cracks me up though is when my favorite song right now "Sometime Around Midnight" by Airborne Toxic Event comes on, and she says, "Mommy's favorite song." Guess this means she's heard this song a few times and knows that I love it. Her memory is incredible!

One characteristic of the 2s that we have seen is the ME/MINE phase. This is very typical of two year olds, and it's very true for Inara. The world revolves all around her. When playing with me or Shawn, she will randomly hold a toy and say "my toy" or "mine." This is true with people as well. We went shopping the other day for a birthday present for our friend Max. I asked Inara to help us find a gift for Max. Her response: "My Max?" Yes, sweetie, your Max. She says this for all of our family: my Avery, my daddy, my Pop. The Mine stage really showed it's head when Inara and I worked at the MOPS nursery. A little girl really took to me and wanted me to play with her the whole time. We sat down to read books and the little girl came to sit on my lap. Inara wasn't having any of that. She pushed her way onto my lap as well and was sure to let the little girl know "my mommy!" I then had to explain to Inara that while I was of course her mommy, I was playing with this little girl too because she was sad and missed her mommy. Inara finally eased down and the 3 of us had a fun time playing.

Given her extensive vocabulary and wonderful conversation skills, sometimes I can't help but crack up at the hilarious things she says. Whenever she drops a piece of food, regardless of whether we are indoors or out, she always says, "Uh oh mommy. I just leave it for the birds." I said this to her in the past when she dropped food while we were outside. Now this is the answer for EVERY time she drops food. Another funny thing she says is when she is trying to convince me to give her a certain snack, and usually after I've told her she doesn't need a snack. She will follow with "but mommy, it make my cough better." Ah yes, you must eat some Goldfish right now because it will help your "imaginary" cough. So smart she is. She's continuously asking to go to people's houses. More often than not, she's asking to go to Nee Nee and Pop's house or Mickey's house (aka Disneyland). Impressive how much the girl remembers Disneyland after only going two times thus far. The other day she asked if we could go to Grandma Di's house to play with Parker (the dog). At least once a day, she asks to go to Avery's house to play with Isti, Jack, Avery and Abby. Another funny thing she said was this past Sunday when she woke up in a fantastic mood. Shawn went in to get her as usual, and I heard them laughing up a storm. She came downstairs, ran to me, and said, "Mommy, I go get DONUTS!" Her favorite Curious George episode is about Man in the Yellow Hat going to get donuts with George. She's now got her daddy wrapped around her finger when it comes to donuts. It's a ritual when the two of them go get donuts early one weekend morning, with Inara still in her jammies even. One of our favorite things she said recently was when Shawn was getting her ready for bed and asked her what she wanted to do tomorrow. She thought for a second and then replied, "Eat pancakes and play toys." Hilarious!I love it when she says such adorable things. I mean seriously how can you not think she's the coolest kid in the world when she says things like this?

A frequent conversation we've been having is about birthdays. I taught her when her birthday is and it's so cute when you ask her when her birthday is and she says, "September fifteen." So one day she and I were driving in the car, and she randomly started asking about family member's birthdays. It's so funny how she kept asking: "Mommy, what's daddy's birthday called? What's Avery's birthday called?" And so on. Suddenly, she asked, "Mommy, what's Abby's birthday called?" Yes, she asked when Thane's dog's birthday is. I thought that was so smart of her to ask. Abby is part of the family too, so why not ask when the dog's birthday is? Another cute story about family pets. One day she was talking about going to Avery's house to play and talked about Abby and then asked what's the cat called. I told her Baylee. "No mommy, the udder cat." "What cat?" "The udder one." "Do you mean Keeta?" "Yeah mommy, Keeta." I felt so sad because Keeta passed away early in 2009, yet my daughter remembered her. She used to love watching Keeta when we all lived together, but I was so impressed that she actually remembered this cat given she was only 18 months old when Keeta died. Like I said, her memory always impresses me.

Along with her great vocabulary and conversation skills, I have to share two embarrassing moments. Shawn, Inara and I were shopping at Eddie Bauer one day. I was looking at some clothes while she was peeking inside the rack. Suddenly, she disappeared inside the hanging jeans. I asked her to come out. She peeked her head out and yelled, "Mommy, I go poopy!!!" Oh my gosh, was I ever embarrassed. I leaned down and told her not to yell so loud. Next thing I smell is this god-awful stench emanating from the jean rack. I look up at this woman shopping in the same area. She clenches her nose, holds her breath, and walks away. I was so mortified. I took Inara by the hand, found Shawn, and headed to the restroom. Too bad it was a mile away in the food court. As we were riding the escalator upstairs, Inara yells again, "Mommy, I go poopy." Thank you, sweet pea, I heard you the first time.

The other funny story took place in the restroom at the bookstore. She had a pee diaper, so I took her inside the restroom to change her before we left the store. For some reason, Inara loves to find the changing tables in public bathrooms. So we entered and she was yelling and so excited to see a changing table. I get her all situated and started changing her when a lady enters the restroom. Inara asks, "What that lady called, mommy?" "I don't know sweetie. I don't know that lady." "Oh I know her, mommy." I started laughing but tried to just keep my cool and change her as quickly as possible. Then Inara's eyes got huge, and she asked, "Mommy, what that noise?" I'm dying laughing now and answer, "It's just bathroom noises." "No mommy, someone going pee." Yes, my dear, someone is peeing. I'm crying now I'm laughing so much. She then asks, "Mommy, who peeing?" I couldn't answer because I was laughing. We suddenly hear from the bathroom stall "It's the lady you said you knew." I was officially laughing my ass off. I was a bit embarrassed but more so thought that was one of those moments that I was impressed by how smart my baby girl is. She rules!!!