Incredible Things

Elena stayed late both Saturday and Sunday, to my delight, but she's not yet ready to spend the night.  We swam, ate dinner at Beto's with Freda, made a painting for her mommy, and watched a few episodes of Wild Kratts and The Einsteins.  I introduced her to Dr. Suess and she thought "Cat in the Hat" was hilarious, interrupting every few pages to ask, "Why won't he just try it?"

Wild Kratts is her all-time favorite Netflix series--all about animals and their individual "creature powers."  I highly recommend it if you have small children around who want to watch movies on your laptop.

"You know what I saw last night when I opened the door?" I asked.   "A big fat raccoon was in the bird feeder, eating all the leftover sunflower seeds!"

"That is incredible!" she said.  Then, after a pause, "Another incredible thing is that Mommy saw a huge porcupine on her run yesterday."

I asked Freda if Elena reminded her of her granddaughter at three. "Jessica wasn't nearly so chatty," Freda said. Neither was my Will.  But Aunt Day was exactly like Elena in her chattiness.  I used to have to bribe her with an Oreo to stop talking for five minutes. Elena, like Day at her age, has many opinions and stories to share, and she likes to contribute a great deal to adult conversations.

If she gets sufficient attention, she will embellish her stories.  "Sometimes I slide off the saddle and fall on the ground and everybody thinks I'm dead," she said. (This has never happened.)

She had a meltdown, Will said, at her Meet-The-Teacher day last week, so we're all wondering how she will fare when she's dropped off on Wednesday for her first day in the company of a roomful of terrifying three-year-olds.  I think she'll wind up liking them--especially if they have animals to tell her about.  If she doesn't, that will be incredible.