Don't Want to Forget

At age two and three months:

My favorite things Bria says lately is "Hi! I'm Bria!" She says it constantly and usually in a high, squeaky voice. It is often accompanied by a hand shake and a "nice to meet you!"

Her imagination is starting to blossom. Apparently, Swiper the Fox has been living in our couch (behind the cushions) and Bria lives in a constant state of terror that he will get her. There are also frogs and elephants who live in her blankets, who all have to be removed at nap and bedtime.

She also loves to talk on the phone (usually a tv remote or a domino) to her various cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and friends. One of my favorite pretend conversations she had was with my oldest sister, Amy:
"Hi Amy. What a doin? I watchin' Dora a Boots. You wanna come? Oh. You in Cannafunna (california)? Oh. Ok. I love you! Bye!"
Her favorite books are Sandra Boynton books. On the back of each book has a small picture of many other books by Boynton. After we read any of the books, Bria points to each picture, we tell her what book it is, and she says "I have it?" If the answer is yes, we continue to the next book. If the answer is no, she says "at the library?" to which I say yes.

Bria has started to understand some reasoning. Today she asked if she could walk on a sloped ledge by some outside stairs and I said no. She said: "it's too dangerous?" I replied yes, even though it was actually because I just wanted to go inside. She also asked to go to the play place at Chic-Fil-A, and I said no (I don't always say no!) and she said, "the slide is too big for me?" And if I tell her not to pick something up off the ground, she responds, "it's dirty?" or "it's not ours?" She may not always truly understand why she can or can't do certain things, but at least she gets that reasons do exist.

Bria is a real daddy's girl. She is always anxious for Sam to come home from work. He usually calls when he leaves work, and then he calls again when he's close to see if we feel like picking him up from the metro. The other day, Bria and I were in the car finishing up some errands when Sam called as he was leaving the office. Bria was so excited, and she called out from the back seat, "is he close?" to which I responded, no, he wasn't close, we were going to go home and make dinner, and then it would be time for Daddy to come home. She was really upset about this. She kept saying "no go home! no make dinner! get daddy!" I explained that he wasn't close yet, he was just leaving work, and he was just getting on the train, so we couldn't get him. Bria then proceeded to tell me to drive to Washington D.C. and get Daddy at his building. I was astonished that she understood the situation well enough to know that there was more than one way for Dad to get home, and the fastest way would be for us to drive directly to him. As charmed as I was by her quick thinking, I couldn't not be lured into rush-hour traffic, so I had to take a tantrum-throwing Bria home with me. I have a feeling she will be very crafty teenager.

Bria's favorite imaginary friend is her sister. And, no, that is not an announcement. But Bria's "sister" follows her everywhere. In fact, Bria told me today that they are getting married. I'm not even going to try to explain the problems with that one.

One of the cutest things I have ever seen Bria do is try to catch a butterfly. She was running in circles, reaching for it, calling "no butterfly! no fly away! come back here butterfly! get over here! stop it! come 'ere butterfly!" so darling.