Perhaps this blog should be titled giggles.

I have decided that one letter a year to e is not going to capture all his little details so I've decided to blog.

Tonight as I laid down beside him to go night night, I hoped I would remember every little detail of this evening.
Let me begin:
• e: Mommy where is your forehead? |said with a paci in his mouth, as he pushed back my bangs| me: e what are you doing? e: I lick your forehead Mommy. |giggling| me: gross. |in a silly voice|

• Evenings are spent either on the couch or in his bed reading books. This evening it was the couch. So I gave him his paci and cup of milk and I made myself a Chai Latte. We got ourselves nestled under the covers and he sipped on his milk as I on my Chai. All of a sudden he stopped and decided he wanted to stick his finger in the froth....e: ummm Mommy, I like it. me: e drink your milk. e: more Mommy. So I stuck his paci in it and with excitement he put it back in his mouth.

• Still on the couch...e: Mommy I tooted |giggling| me: Silly. After the second time I asked him if he needed to go poo poo before bed on the potty. After some coaching he finally agreed and we headed to get his stool and toilet seat. He managed to strip himself down out of his footed PJ's and sit up on the potty. He asked for his magnets. His magnets are part of a potty chart of which he's awarded to choose and move to a day of the week if he practices. The organization of the chart has been scrapped and we've chosen to play games with them, tonight we chose the parrot magnet and the game, which hand is it in. You know the one where you place your hands behind your back and ask to choose the left or right. I play as I check in with him from time to time to see if he's concentrating on going poo poo. e: yes Mommy, I have to go poo poo on the potty. He then takes the parrot and puts it behind his back. I just wait for magnet parrot to fall into what could be a poop filled toilet. His version of the game is to choose the hand that it's in for me with a big grin on his face. I then check back in with him to make sure he still has to go. me: e does your body need to potty? e, is your body telling you that you need to poo poo? e: |looking down at his belly| body? do you want some coffee? |pronounced poo-kie| yeah? ok, |using his imagination he pulls a cup out of thin air and begins to drink it| me: |giggling| what are you doing? e: talking to my body Mommy. Don't ask me where that came from? Needless to say the poo poo never came so we headed to bed.

• Laying down beside him looking at his big dark dark brown eyes. me: I love you buddy. e: I love you too Mommy. me: I love you Elliott. e: |getting louder| I love you Mommy. With his sweet, high-pitched, getting even louder voice he kept saying I love you Mommy, I just giggled.

• me: e can we pray to Jesus. e: Daddy, La La and Pop. |said very quickly as if I'm done, move on to a song please Mom| Daddy and his Grandparents made it to the top of the list by-passing anything to be thankful for. After giggling I brought him back to the order of things...giving thanks then blessings. After I sum up the day and we cover everyone by saying "all our family and friends" I say Amen and it's as if I've prefaced it with a "can I get a..." cause his Amen...quite loud and pretty soulful!

Those of you with children may find the sweetness in each of these details of my evening. Those without kids will not have made it past the first bullet point of him licking my forehead. But in order to completely embarrass my boy during his most impressionable teenage years I MUST get all these details down on paper more than once a year. He changes daily. He is SO much fun. I could not enjoying being a Mother any more. I am overwhelmingly proud of him already at the age of 29mnths.

I love you e.