A LOVE LIKE NO OTHER

Sisters. When I decided that, yes, in fact I did want kids, I dreamed of having sisters. Two little girls who would play together, stick up for each other and sneak cookies while the other stands as lookout. There's so much in life for little girls to learn, so many secrets to whisper and dreams to share.

When we found out that Elyse was coming along, I let my brain run wild with visions of sleepovers in the living room, tea parties and fits of giggles. Then the reality of Lauren losing her status as one and only hit me. How would she actually be with Elyse? Would she be jealous? Begrudging? Hostile? Or would she accept Elyse into our lives and our hearts?

Thankfully Lauren has been even better with Elyse than I dared to hope. She snuggles up to her every chance she gets, announces to anyone within earshot how cute she thinks Elyse is, and includes Elyse in everything possible. Her eyes light up when I tell her that Elyse is awake and she runs into her room to reach through the bars of the crib while cooing, "Hi, babyyyyy!"

Lauren tells anyone who will listen - at the next table, walking through the store or not paying any attention to her at all until she calls their attention - that Elyse is, "Sooooo cuuuuuute!" Heaven forbid they not agree.

She enjoys cuddling close to Elyse when she is a bit tired, places her fingers in her mouth and gently sucks on her fingers while caressing the side of the baby's face. I love that Elyse is Lauren's happy place and one of the centres that her life revolves around. While Elyse will crane her neck to follow Lauren's movements around the room and I know soon enough she will be trucking around right after her. My prayer and hope for the two of them is that they continue to live as if they are in a dance together, constantly close and always coming back to reconnect and hold each other tight.

#MYKIDISCRAZY

Two and a half year olds are crazy! She goes from happy to sad in seconds (please note that she will be out for a walk, running along, laughing and then she is suddenly standing dejected for no reason saying, "I sad." When asked why, she does a big sigh and, exhaling, says, "A-cause."). She (literally) runs in circles, her average speed is break neck and she does. not. stop. talking! It is fun and exhausting at once.

Here are some other of her latest Laurenisms...

She points to my eyebrow. "Mom has an eyebrow." Then points to her own. "Rauren has a rainbow."

She's started being a mini-hoarder. Every day she selects two or three objects and they must accompany her everywhere. And they are not practical objects. Today it was her Cinderella stuffie, an orange bouncy ball and a blue piece of ribbon.

Lauren loves brushing my hair. She loves it much more than I do. She's not very good at it.

Any time she hears music, I get pulled to my feet and we must dance. There is no choice in the matter.

And now she wants me to take turns doing somersaults with her. Adults shouldn't do somersaults. There is something unnatural about them.

Potty training is going really well. That's how she earns her Halloween candy. I would like to thank the neighbourhood for funding my child's toilet habits.

Lauren has begun to understand that mealtimes are the time for conversations. She's not quite clear about how that works. She will interrupt everyone to say, "No, I talk to   insert name here  .... People say yeah." Then she looks at you expectantly. Yes, Lauren. People say yeah. I have no idea where that comes from.

Monday mornings are the only time for grocery shopping. Lauren and I each pull our own baskets and she decided what items go into her basket and what items go into mine. And at some point in the trip, she wanders over to the shampoo area and plunks a Cinderella shampoo into her basket. We now have Cinderella shampoo in every bathroom in our house and my parents house. It's a good thing it smells nice.

If I want Lauren to do anything, eat anything or pick anything up, I need to tell her it is a tiny baby one. Here Lauren, eat this bite of egg. No. It's a tiny baby bite of egg. Okay. And she eats it. The piece of egg did not change.

USUALLY SHARKS ARE DEADLY...

...but ours got killed by a little girl who likes to call herself Cinewewa.

Lauren had a costume of epic proportions. It was an amazing grey shark costume. A full costume that was bought for her when she was first born and we had been waiting with baited breath for the day when she would fit into the suit. Well, it finally fit. And she refused to wear it. I pulled out my favourite strategy of M&M bribery and even that was refused. I was out of options. The shark was relegated to the back of her closet.

Lauren still enjoys Tinkerbell but Cinderella, or Cinewewa as she says in her little lady accent, has taken over her heart. So as much as I wanted to get away from Disney as a Halloween costume, we found ourselves there once again.

As a kid, my mom made all of our Halloween costumes and they were amazing. AMAZING! No matter what we chose to be, she could make it happen. I don't even want to think about the many hours that she spent finding the perfect fabrics, altering patterns, cutting, pinning, sewing and fixing. Those costumes stayed in our dress up box for years. They were borrowed by friends and are now stored away in a box for my kids to play with in the coming years. When I decided to give in and make Lauren's Cinderella dreams come true, I knew that if I wanted it to actually be good, I had to get my mom in on the party. We decided to divide and conquer. She did the dress top and skirt and I did a huge floor length tutu and headband. Put together, the look was perfect.

Lauren loved the dress my mom made so much that she wore it to Home Depot the night before Halloween.

Elyse got into the spirit on Halloween morning and I think she enjoyed her onesie more than her duck costume, but what a cute duck she was!

Lauren loved loved loved her costume. As her mom, I loved seeing how special and beautiful she felt.

We found Cinderella slippers at Winners and she smacked around the house in those for awhile but, since they were three sizes to big, those weren't a part of her trick-or-treat get up.

Lauren was hard to keep contained until 6pm. She practiced trick-or-treating, ate a bunch of candy because she caught Matt and I getting into it, and then we sent her out hopped up on sugar (she needed her energy!). Lauren did a great job of saying trick-or-treat (twick o tweet) and thank you (demp you) at each house while running to keep up with the groups of bigger kids. She marched right up the flights of stairs and had many homeowners afraid of the speed that she would fly back down them. They probably thought that we weren't doing a good job by letting her do some stairs by herself, but when you live with a kid who is afraid of nothing, you learn that she can do lots of things by herself that you otherwise wouldn't have thought she could. 

Lauren owned Halloween. She had a fantastic time and the dress has already been worn the day after. I'm sure that won't be the last we see of it. I'm expecting it to be on pretty high rotation.

PS - Two years ago on Halloween, Lauren was rushed to the hospital by ambulance after she had a vagal attack and passed out in her high chair because her heart wasn't pumping. I loved that when I woke up in the morning this Halloween that day two years ago was only a fleeting thought in my mind before Lauren came running into Elyse's room and insisted on going with Matt to a client meeting while wearing her pjs. There's no stopping that girl!