Eleanor is excited about Thanksgiving

Please don't tell her we eat the turkey.

Trey crawls

He must be trying to keep up with Eleanor. Set up the gates!

Eleanor turned 2...

And in the same week ran out into the middle of a busy road, opened the car door while I was driving down Michigan Avenue, played hide-and-seek all over Bed, Bath & Beyond, started saying "no", begged the neighbor boys to kiss her, drew all over the walls, and who knows what else when we weren't looking. 

Of course Eleanor makes up for any trouble just by looking sweet when she's sleeping or by frequently and emphatically saying "gank you". Joey often points out that none of her recent behavior should be a surprise since our favorite parenting book depicts toddlers like this:

Happy Birthday Eleanor - we love you!

 

At the park

Eleanor, Trey, Dicy, and Halloween

So by now you saw that we dressed up as exhausted, sleep-deprived owners of two cranky, uncooperative, sugar-doped monkeys. If not, see pictures below.

It was actually great fun. Dicy and I go all-out for Christmas, and Dicy independently goes all out for all the other holidays, trying to make them special for the babies. I think she outdoes herself every year. It was almost as fun to watch how excited Dicy got about Halloween and the prospect of dressing the kids up and having them both enjoy it, as it was to watch Eleanor's delight when she learned after the second, "Trick or treat!" how easy it was to get people to give her candy. For manners watchers who may read this blog, you will be comforted to know that Eleanor spontaneously said, "ganks," or "k'you," for every piece of candy she got.

On Sunday night, the Halloween decorations came down, and Dicy sent me and Eleanor out to the garage to find the big, ceramic turkey that has been part of our family since Thanksgiving 2004. Eleanor sat at the table, poking at the turkey, cooing, "Oh, tookey. Oh, tookey," trying to force feed him candy corn.

Trey Gets a Crib

It is no sign of neglect, nor of unequal treatment before the laws of Burtondom that Trey only received his crib in his 8th month. Eleanor was similarly deprived until we broke down and bought her a crib made of wood.

Trey for the past several months has been sleeping in a pack-n-play. And now he's got more stable and permanent sleeping arrangements. The drawback for him, insofar as I understand his grunts and squawks, is that the sides of the crib are not transparent. He arches his back and cranes his neck to try to see over the bumper--in his old bed, the mesh walls allowed him to yell and drool in full view of Eleanor, who despite her slightly-ambivalent-but-daily-more-affectionate feelings towards him, is his favorite person in the world. They share a room, which is not ideal, but which is perfect just the same. Eleanor demands that he be in her room when she goes to bed. He seems to be happier when he's not all alone. They make each other laugh. Eleanor insists on his attention: "Tay! Tay. Hi, Tay! Hi! Awake, Tay! Wake!" She asks for him to come back when we remove him: "Dada, Tay back?" "Yes, baby. Go to sleep right now and I'll bring Trey back." "Okay, Bye." "Bye." "Kiss, Dada." "Okay, kiss." "Kiss, Tay." "Okay, you can kiss Trey too, baby."

Sleep tight, little man.

Eleanor Gets a Big Girl Bed

Today, Eleanor got a delivery. A big-girl bed came, and new bedding with giraffes and ABCs on it appeared, and everything was wonderful in Burtondom. Dicy said that Eleanor discovered the joys of jumping on the bed almost immediately. And that she just sat on her bed reading and talking to her animals prior to taking a long afternoon nap.

By nightfall, however, Eleanor wasn't so excited about the new sleeping arrangements. She asked twice to be put in Trey's bed--her old crib. And she wanted me to sing "Edelweiss," more times than I can say, after which she screamed mightily for 20 minutes before falling asleep.

Far worse, though, was my reaction when I found out the new bed had come. Here I was, sitting in my office, crying because my baby has grown up and even though I'm so happy that she's doing so well, I can't help but feel it's moving a little faster than I can keep up with. She's learning 10 new words every day--today, she told me, "Dada, my sing 'weiss. E'nor's bed. Song." On Halloween it was, "My candy. My home, Nor's house. Show. TV, Dada. Go now." And then there was Eleanor saying her prayers, "H'm'ly fawder, Nor, mama, gammy. Where papa? Jesus. Amen. Yay!" Anyway, it's only a matter of filling in some words here, some syllables there, and she's off to college. I miss you already, Small Princess.