Butter My Butt and Call Me a Biscuit

I can't remember the last time I heard someone actually say that, but I ran across it in a catalog yesterday and it made me laugh all over again. That's a pretty funny saying. And you know what makes it even funnier? Hearing a 4-year-old say it.

Yes, I taught Heather to say that. And every time she says it, I laugh gleefully, which only encourages her to say it even more. Last night she was taking great pleasure in saying it over dinner. Which, in hindsight, was not the best time to teach it to her because we were about to leave for the girls' Wednesday-night church class. J. cautioned Heather not to show off her new trick "at church or at school."

I added, "Yeah, just do it at home."

And Heather said, "And at restaurants?"

I'm not sure how thrilled J. is about Heather's new saying. I should probably feel bad for teaching it to her in the first place. But you know what? I don't. Because it's really, really funny.

We got to their church class early last night, so I dropped off Janna and Heather at their rooms and then let Kelly run amok in the hallways for a few minutes. She found her way to her room and started to play with the puzzles. That's when I realized that I still had Janna's and Heather's money for shares (the $.50 they give each week for missions, etc.). Kelly's "angel" wasn't there yet, and I didn't want to leave Kelly without her because she can be difficult to rein in, so I tried to get her to come with me. I kept saying, "Come on, Kelly. Kelly, come on." And she kept ignoring me. Finally she looked at me, moved her arm up and down, and said, "Bye bye."

That's not something a parent would typically be happy to hear. But in Kelly's case ... I had never seen her wave before. I had never heard her say "bye bye" except when she's repeating after someone else. I had never heard her talk socially like that before, especially of her own initiative. I was ecstatic.

Also, when J. first dropped us off, Kelly didn't want to run inside like she usually does. She stood in one place and kept staring at J. in the van. He said "bye, Kelly" to her and put out his hand to wave. Kelly went back to the van, stepped off the curb to touch J.'s hand, and then came back up to me on the sidewalk. Then she walked slowly backwards, watching the van until J. rounded the corner and was out of sight, and then she turned and ran inside.

What great improvements she's showing!

Janna, meanwhile, is beginning to take after me more and more. In good ways and bad. She started writing a story a few weeks ago, and then she set it aside and started writing a new story. This past weekend she started her new story over, changing it a little bit as she rewrote it. That doesn't seem like a big deal, except that I started writing a novel a couple years ago. I got about 60 pages into it, and then set it aside and started working on a new story idea. Last spring I restarted my original story, changing it a little as I rewrote it. Pretty neat how those happened so smiliarly! Every time Janna writes a new paragraph to her story, she wants to share it with us. Heather is constantly asking Janna if she has more the story; she loves to sit and listen to Janna read the stories she's written. She'll ask questions about the characters and the plot, and sometimes we'll hear Heather reenacting the story with her toys. Here's another interesting similarity in our writing: in Janna's story, her character finds a little black puppy in some ivy and names the puppy "Ivy." In my original story, the protagonist gets a little white puppy and names it "Ivy." Great minds think alike!