Izzie as of late.

I knew this was coming.

People warned me.

I’ve witnessed it with other children.

Isabelle is in her twos. I’m not saying ‘terrible’ because she is still the cutest thing ever born. But.

She suddenly has this attitude that proclaims “I do what I want. I’m two.”

She runs away from me all the time. Time to brush your teeth! She flees. C’mere, let me put your coat on. Aaaand shes gone. The more pregnant I get, the more fun it is to peel her off of the floor behind the rocking chair.

She bit a few holes in a foam sword last week. Like chunks of foam. Like with her teeth.

Tantrums, laying on the floor in super clean public places. Classic toddler stuff.

This morning we had some new friends over to play, and she hardcore shoved a one-year old on the ground. Not like a playful push, like a GET AWAY shove. Horrified, I grabbed her and took her out of the play room to discuss. I guess it is time to have that conversation with Jazz about “what do we do here.”

She is still so much fun- the stuff she says lately is KILLER. She says “momma” after everything. No, momma, yes momma, more momma- it’s my favorite. When she answers me in the affirmative, she says “I do I do I do I do!” like she’s so excited she can hardly stand it. She also says stuff like, “No I don’t wanna go nite nite” She also wants to help do everything. I hide! I see! I help! I climb! So emphatic and so proud of herself. I’m proud of her too. She loves to color, and I showed her how to trace her hand so she does that every time she sees paper. Looks less like a hand and more like squiggles, but thats okay. She also draws the sun (more squiggles) and snakes, which definitely are squiggles, and she just calls them “Sssssss!”

Jazz had a minor bike accident last week and scraped up his leg pretty good. Every time Isabelle sees his leg, she runs to the bathroom for his “medicine” which is just antibiotic ointment and brings it out to him, pretends to squeeze it on his leg, and proclaims it all better.

She loves to walk around the preserve and feed the ducks. We take a bag of duck friendly food and sit on a bench about 20 feet from the pond and the ducks are NOT shy at all, they literally start waddling up to you as fast as they can. There is one rogue goose who I guess has an identity problem but whatever, and seriously I thought it was going to sit on my foot. We like to yell SHOO at them until they get the point and get back in the water. Makes her laugh hysterically every time.

The other night, I was rocking her to sleep which I haven’t done in awhile…usually she is so tired, she passes out on her own. I held her like I do and sang her favorite duck song and recited the goodnight book. I watched her little face fall asleep and her mouth pop open and of course I started to cry. Because I could see her soft skin and her perfect features, because I could feel that her soul is so close to our Heavenly Father, and because she is all mine. I felt hot tears on my cheeks, and without opening her eyes, her brows furrowed and her tiny sleepy voice asked, “Mama sad?”

With a closed throat, I told her I wasn’t sad, that I love her so much that it makes me happy and sometimes happy people cry. As she gets more independent, I’m realizing that I will never, ever regret the time I have spent rocking my little child to sleep.

Even if she does run away from me.