The fog has lifted.

Or maybe the caffeine finally kicked in.

Okay - I'm out of my Monday morning funk. And now it's lunchtime! Not too shabby.

I'm sure as in most households with small children this time of year, we've been discussing the upcoming holiday. A lot. Everything from presents, to baby "Cheesus," to Santa and the "boots" hanging on our fireplace. Jo and I were snuggling on the couch after she got up from a nap. We were looking at our pretty tree, with the sparkly candy cane ornaments that I made many many moons ago, and which Josie helped me hang. As you can imagine, there is a large concentration of candy canes in one area on the lower portion of the tree. The conversation turned to Santa, and I was talking about how he's going to come to our house, down the chimney and leave a present for each of the girls on Christmas Eve.

I could see the wheels turning. She turned to me as she processed, and said, "So... Mommy, we're going to get another baby sister Eve this year?"

Whoa. So not where I expected this conversation to go. And no - in case you're wondering, there will NOT be another baby arriving any time soon. :)

It's been fascinating to see her comprehension and decision-making skills develop. She's growing so fast and understands so much and can communicate so well. Of course, have a lot of frustrating bouts of the "whys," but to see her really get something and ask appropriate questions has been amazing.

Patrick's parents came over on Saturday to just hang out for a bit, and ended up staying for dinner with us. This exciting event came the very next day after a much celebrated impromptu playdate with Lucy and Eddie, so Josie was in a very happy place. Her little mouth never stopped from the time Gramma and Grampa walked in the door until well after they left. At one point, she was "making boffee" for Gramma after dinner. Gramma asked her if Grampa could have some, too. She tilted her head and held up her hands and said, "Well, no - there's no cup for you."

She has also just recently started to actually sit and watch movies. She has always watched snippets of tv shows, and bits of movies, but would never sit and really watch for very long before she was off to something better. Eve, on the other hand, is a movie and tv freak - especially anything with Elmo in it. Not necessarily a good thing, but it sure does come in handy once in a while. You know - like when I'm trying to clean something, or maybe poop without an audience - that kind of stuff. Anyway - my point in all of this is that now we're really noticing how limited our kid movie selection is. Gotta add that to the garage sale list for next spring. Jo's favorite right now is "Milo and Otis." I think she watched the entire thing about 3 times this weekend. That's 3 times too many for me. The pug dog and orange cat with British accents are a bit much after a while. Pat's a lot more patient with that sort of thing than I am. Well, I guess he's probably a lot more patient with a lot of things than I am, but that's a whole 'nother topic.

So there. That was a much more satisfying ramble. More later!