My Valentines

The girls had fun posing for a little photo shoot last week. Ava is obsessed with pulling hair, so she mostly had fun pulling out chunks of her cousin's hair while they, being trained well by their mom, kept a smile plastered on their faces in front of the camera. The other day Sophia asks me, "Mom, how come you don't like Ava?" I was a little taken aback. My first thought was gee I've been trying not to play favorites so much that maybe I'm doing some damage here. That's why Sophia is so good to Ava, she feels sorry for her. I tell Sophia I love Ava so much it hurts. That I love them both more than the world itself. I ask Sophia why she thinks I don't like Ava. She says, "You always call her a Little Monster and a Brute." Ha! So true, I do that all the time! So I explain that those are names given out of love, even though it might seem confusing. But Ava is a Little Monster and she is a Brute! Meant in an endearing way, of course. We were worried that Sophia would be rough with Ava, but in retrospect we should have been teaching Sophia how to fight back. Ava is quick to pull Sophia's hair (as mentioned above), quick to hit and slap if a toy is taken from her, pitches a fit if she doesn't get what she wants, and tries to rip your face off or poke your eyeballs out, while smiling as she does it. Sophia mainly sits there and takes it. Or screams. But she never retaliates. And while I think this is a great Big Sister thing to do, I kind of feel like Ava needs to be put in her place sometimes. That sounds awful coming from a mom, I suppose. And I would never teach her a lesson in that way; instead I try to distract and remove from the situation, firmly telling Ava "No, be gentle." This is one of those nurture/nature moments where Ava's strong will was forged in the womb. She would kick Julia in the head all the time and I would actually poke Ava from the belly and say be gentle. She's a fighter, this one. And a lover. With equal enthusiasm, hugs are given so tightly. She'll throw herself into my arms. She cuddles. She wants her back rubbed, patted. If I stop rubbing, she'll grunt and nudge me to continue. Ava had her 1 year adjusted assessment the other day. Not only is she meeting her milestones, the girl is meeting and exceeding milestones for a 15 month old. I am so proud, so grateful, so relieved. We have another assessment in a few weeks with another program that is also following her development closely. I still get anxiety with these appointments, but I have a lot more confidence that Ava is going to be just fine. My strong little Valentine.

Sophia is so much fun to be around right now. She's at that age where I feel like she's my friend. We share jokes and stories. She's eager to help with chores. She makes sure Daddy is taken care of. She's negotiates now. You can see the wheels spinning in her head. I feel like that distance we had last year when I couldn't be there for her because of the pregnancy, and then the time spent at the NICU, and then the time spent while Ava was so tiny, that distance is gone now. It really pained me to see her go to Rick for comfort, or tell me she wanted Daddy to do it. She'll always be Daddy's girl, but there also seemed to be that I had betrayed her in some way because I wasn't there for her like I wanted to be, or should have been. I could be reading into it way more than I should, because I do plenty of that. But now I feel like we're even in parenting, Rick and I. Of course she wants Daddy, but she wants Mommy too again. I'm sure that's what it felt like when Sophia and Ava were newborns to Rick. But he's the bigger person in the emotions department, and he sees the bigger picture as well. I get so caught up in the moment, that I can't see there will be shifts in the relationships with our children as they grow. Or maybe the truth is that she's just going to the sloppy seconds while Daddy recovers from the poison oak that seems to be an endless pain in the ass around here. When that clears up, maybe the truth will be told!

I woke up this morning to a beautiful bouquet of red roses. They always remind me of when Rick and I were first dating. And although it wasn't Valentine's Day, I think about this story every year on Valentine's Day. We had gone out for a drink at the local bar down the road. A woman walks in carrying a bucket filled with roses, hoping that some guy will feel pressured into buying a rose for the girl he's with, or maybe hoping some guy will take the bait and buy a rose to try to get lucky. Yes, I'm cynical. What does Rick do? Rick bought the entire bucket and gives them to me. He says, "Now that woman doesn't have to work all night trying to sell roses and she can bring the money back to her family and maybe buy a nice dinner for them all and spend time with them." That was the sweetest thing ever! I am not kidding you, 5 minutes later that same lady walks back in with a new bucket filled with roses. We laughed so hard, we were crying. And this is just one of the reasons I love this man.

XOXO