Night Owl

Saturday night, well really Sunday morning, I was awoken by Evie calling out, "Mama!" It was 2:30 am.  I walked out of our bedroom and turned toward hers and saw that her light was on.  In the last few days she had learned to turn her table lamp on and off.  I opened the door, and there she sat, in her rocking chair, with the table lamp on, reading a book.  Now, I love that she loves to read, but I told her it was bedtime and she needed to get back to sleep.  I turned off the lamp, tucked her in bed, and walked out of the room.  I looked down the hallway and the light in the living room was on, so I opened the door, and there Seth sat, on the couch, lights turned on, reading.  Like father like daughter, I guess.  I told him I thought they were both nuts for being up so late reading and that I was going back to bed.  Unfortunately about 15 minutes later, when I had just fallen asleep again, I heard a rustling noise and, sure enough, when I went in to check, there was Evie with the light on, reading again.  I didn't want to set a precedent that this was okay (I thought about just reading the book to her so she'd go back to sleep, but I didn't want her to expect that to happen nightly), so I told her she had to go back to bed, and again I turned the light off.  About half an hour later, I was woken up again by the rustling.  There she sat again with the light on and a book out.  So this time I unplugged the table lamp, like the monster that I am.  Needless to say she was very sleepy the next day.

Saturday morning, before the night owl incident, I took Herbie to the vet and Evie came with us.  She loved the fact that Herbie was riding in the back, behind her seat, and she enjoyed looking at the cats that were up for adoption at the vet.  As I was talking to the vet about Herbie's ailments, Evie started talking too.  When I didn't pay attention to that (because I had to talk to vet!), she started patting my cheek with her little hand and then resorted to giving me repeated kisses on the cheek.  And when I finally finished explaining my concerns to the vet and looked at her, she put her finger on my lips and said, "Shhhh, Mama, I talk."  Then later as the vet was describing the treatment, which included mention of putting the pills on a spoon with some peanut butter, Evie, who had been on the floor playing with Herbie and seemed to not be listening, said, "I like peanut butter!"  This kid keeps me in stitches.

Another Evie-ism that emerged this week was Sunday when I picked her up from the nursery and she said, "It's Mama Mayne!"  Evie's learned her last name and responds with her full name whenever she's asked what her name is, so it's funny to see her generalize it.

Today when I went to pick her up from school, we saw a chipmunk in the church yard.  She called it a "stutl" (squirrel) but I pointed out to her that it was a chipmunk and you could tell because it had a short tail.  She saw it going off into the bushes and she said, "Chipmunk going to its home!"  Such a bright little girl.