Being Mommy

First of all, just so I don't start getting angry emails and phone calls from family members....

Maybe a picture?  

Isn't she cute?  Yes?

Well, she's also incredibly...busy. (thus, my excuse for blogging so rarely these days) I love this little squirt. She's growing up so fast.  I don't feel like I get to treasure her sweet little two-year-old self nearly as much as I would like to. And sometimes - probably most times - I get so distracted with any number of things that I miss moments in her life that I'll never get back. I want to enjoy her more, as well as her sisters who are also growing up too fast for this Momma's heart.  Each one of them is in such a unique and darling stage and I don't want to miss one moment of it.

• Paige talks more and more every day.  It's a bit of a mix between English and Indonesian. She says words like habis for empty and tidak for no.  I've been called Bu instead of Mom...usually when she's mad she says, "Tidak, Bu!"  That's Indonesian for "NO, Mommy!"  
• Brooklyn is just so grown up these days.  She finished her first real chapter book a little over a week ago.  She helps a lot with chores.  And she  is sitting beside me right now, practicing her hand-sewing.  
• Maddie has been such a sweetheart lately. We regularly have "I love you most" wars.  First, I tell her I love her and then she responds, "I love you most!"  To which I respond, "I love you more than most!"  And then she'll say, "I love you more and beyond!  Ha!"  Can you tell that we recently bought the "Toy Story" movies?!
• Paige is really in to playing with her baby doll and other toys lately.  She's a good little Mommy and she also uses her little play cookie set to bring her Mommy a cookie now and then.  I regularly find the wooden cookie sheet with it's wood cookies "baking" in my oven.  I've tried to convince Paige that her cookies will cook just as well in a cupboard but she's no fool. Cookies come out of the oven!  (I don't know where she learned this.  I've baked cookies maybe twice since we've been here.) Luckily, in order to light the oven, I do have to open the oven door, so I always catch it before starting a major fire!
• Brooklyn made a book recently titled "My NEW Living and Moving Book."  She looked up all the flags of the different countries that she's lived in and drew them.  Then she wrote about some major event that happened while we were in that country.  It's a very good little book!  Maybe I'll ask her permission to share it on here.  But I am a little disturbed that she has left another dozen or so pages blank at the back of the book to fill in for later. 
• Maddie is extremely competitive.  Every time we play a card game she starts to cry the moment she begins to lose.  I don't know how many card games have ended in tears lately.  Part of me wants to fix every game so she always wins but the other part of me knows she can learn a lot of good out of not winning.  But she is really, really intense about winning.  Come to think of it, even our "I love you most" wars are just another game she must win!  Luckily, at the age of four that competitive spirit is still pretty cute ;-)  That, and Brooklyn is not all that competitive and is willing to let her sister win now and then.