LuLu Update- Life in Toddlerdom

It seems somewhere in the last few weeks we've had a shift in alliances - LuLu is being good to the kitties. She loves them, hugs them, pets them, plays with them and talks to them. Sissers no longer runs helter skelter when she sees LuLu - she's still a little tentative but 9 times out of 10 now she gets good love. See Sissers - I told you to hang in there and she'd come around! They are really cute to watch together.

Other new developments, we had our first parent-teacher conference - as suspected LuLu is a genius and as parents we need to focus on keeping her challenged!!! (Personally I think they tell this to all the parents) We also need to focus on helping her talk about her feelings - woah woah woah - as a military brat I am strictly programmed to do nothing of the sort. Feelings only get in the way of what has to happen, and often have such a minimal role in decision making why waste the time??!! (For those of you getting worried right about now - don't - Big E will take care of this for us!) Otherwise all is well.

LuLu has begun to punctuate every sentence with a social laugh - it was cute as first, but now a bit annoying. She's getting good at figuring out how to get things she wants and how to get around a "no." Big E and I are going to have to stay sharp - LuLu gets us alone and pumps us....so far we've been able to stay strong and not cave - but she has powers!!! Back to the business of being smart...sometimes I think I'd like to dumb her down a bit to make my life easier.

Food - ah the prime example of power struggle. She only eats salty snacks and some fruits. However I have discovered if I put it in chicken and dumplings she'll eat it - but other than that she's living off of peanut butter....how does she know my buttons? She used to eat everything now her top three are mac and cheese, chicken nuggets and peanut butter sandwich - it absolutely curls my toes to admit this publicly...we will definitely be working on this!

Language - LuLu is still a "big boy" if you ask her - her "she's" and "he's" are a little jumbled, and her past tense is pretty cute - "you woked up" (instead of you woke up) - but she really is rather descriptive and she has quite a memory - she's actually talking about things that happened over a year ago, back when she could barely talk, in quite a bit of detail - scary but fun!

Otherwise all is well - still working on potty training - and when we are in our home territory we do wonderfully - otherwise though we're still working on it. Our new project is dressing herself - this will take some time, but the hilarity that is to follow is definitely worth the perseverance.

She continues to be a total joy - although these days she knows it - WATCH OUT WORLD, HERE COMES LULU!