Liar, Liar

While attempting to keep up with Howie physically, we may be struggling even more to keep up with Maggie mentally. I'm not quite sure how to begin describing this, but these pictures do a pretty good job:

She can go from this:

 

to this:

faster than you can blink. (And vice-versa)

The girl has an attitude and vocabulary that leave me perplexed most days whether she is two and a half or twelve and a half.

Every day she insists on wearing a pink shirt, pink pants, a pink skirt, and often her "pink light boots" (light pink cowgirl boots - not to be confused with her "cowboy boots," which are really her galoshes). Most days she tries to convince me to wear her "big pink skirt" (a tutu). Unfortunately, she only has one "normal" pink skirt (and by normal I mean velour, so not that normal), so lately I've felt like a mom dealing with school uniforms in terms of laundry. Most of the time I don't mind at all - as long as I can have somewhat of a say in which pink things we pair together - after all, she's only two once, right?

My favorite phrase she says right now is, "Are you KIDDING me??" She nails it in both context and intonation, and it kills me almost every time.
"Hey Mags, if you stay in your bed all night you can have a pink M&M in the morning."  
"A pink M&M?! Are you KIDDING me??"
"Hey Mags, we're thinking about going for a little walk right now."
"A little WALK?! Are you KIDDING me??"

The most recent thing that may drive me out of my mind is her talking baby talk or gibberish. Within our house, it's just plain annoying:
"Maggie, what do you want for lunch?"
"Hochy-pochy." 

Unfortunately, she also loves to do it in public - mostly with people we don't know - making already awkward toddler introductions just plain painful:
"Maggie, can you say hi?" 
"Doon."

She could be a character out of a Bronte/Austen novel with the amount of brooding she does. Some days I find her walking around with her eyes covered saying, "I just want to CRY as much as I want to!" This week she did something nasty to Howard and I told her quite sternly,
"Apologize to your brother RIGHT NOW." 
"OK! OK!!! Just give me a minute to be SAD!!!"

The other latest development is the knowledge of and the ability to lie. Two situations that still make me laugh/blow my mind:

1. The first week of the big girl bed included a lot of getting in and out of bed, as well as appropriate consequences. One night Gary and I were downstairs and he looked over at me and said, "That was a door. And those are footsteps." Before the sentence was out of his mouth he was up the stairs like a shot. He reached the top of the stairs in time to hear the pitterpatter of little feet and see her bedroom door slam. When he got to her room, he found her lying in bed, eyes closed.
"Maggie, what were you doing??" 
"I'm sleeping." 
"No you're not."

2. Getting breakfast into her is often a challenge. One day was particularly hard and as she danced around the living room I told her I wanted her to eat another bite.
"But I did eat a bite!" 
"No, I want to see one in your mouth." 
"But I DO have one in my mouth..." [fakes chewing]

How does she know???! This whole development is more fascinating than sad to me at this point...And right now her ability to manipulate a story and a situation is making me think she would make a fantastic lawyer someday.

Between the hair, the pink tutu and her propensity to tell tales, she could double as Jim Carey. (Sorry, Dad...and future Mags...)

Bottom line: even on the days when we want to pull our hair out, we are so thankful for our kids, for their personalities and for the joy and laughter they bring to our lives!! Yesterday Maggie was running up the sidewalk ahead of me and H talking and singing and jumping and I suddenly heard her shout as clear as day (to no one in particular):

"I'm the happiest little girl in the WHOLE world!!"


Which pretty much made me the happiest Mama in the whole world.