File Under: Things I Want to Remember Forever

Have I told you yet about the way Isota runs? She really puts her arms into it, swinging them at little 90 degree angles, like a serious racewalker. Like she is on a mission to get where she is going. It's pretty amazing. She also started doing this little shoulder shimmy when she is really happy about something. If you ask her about something she likes or wants, she grins and shakes her shoulders up and down a bunch of times in quick succession. Total ham, this one.

There are all these tiny little things cropping up now that I want to hold onto because I know she is going to outgrow them soon. The shoulder shake, the funny run, the way she says her own name ("A-zsha-zsha") while she scrunches up her face. She shocks us near-daily with something new. It's like she has reached a new threshold of how she plays. A new savviness about the world around her. Sometimes just witnessing that could bring me to tears. How she knows how to pour us pretend tea with her new tea set and serve it with a spoon so we can stir in our pretend sugar. How she knows to cover her ears when a siren goes by. How she finds a lipstick in my bag and takes the cap off and pretends to put it on. How she goes "mmmmmm!" when she eats something yummy and how she says "ooooooh" when she admires her own artwork. Today I asked her if she was a baby and she said, "NO WAY!!" Then I asked if she was a big girl and she said, "YEAH!!"

She's fun as hell right now.