Little miss independent

I think having an older brother that really isn't much older along with her very independent personality has made Dominique pretty advanced for her age. She talks in sentences "I don't want that", "I don't want to" (as some examples) and has very definitive ideas that she is adamant about. This morning she pulled out some dirty clothes from her hamper that she wanted me to put on her. I told her I was not putting them on her (it was bad enough that we let her wear them for the remainder of the day as filthy as they were). Well, I'm not kidding, she almost got them on all by herself. She's not even 2 yet, which means she is only 1 years old, a deceptive number for a child's age (12 months and 23 months are totally different ages). She started with her shirt which she stepped into but was unable to get over her shoulder. Then she tried her shorts and would have gotten them on except that she put both legs in one hole. She was furious. I finally found something else she wanted to wear and hid her dirty favorite outfit in a laundry basket far, far away from her little eyes. She puts her own flip flops on, often on the wrong feet and/or between the wrong toes, which causes some difficulties in walking, but so help you if you try to help her!

She also wants to attach her chest strap on her car seat all by herself, without any help. When she does it she excitedly proclaims "I did it!"

Meanwhile Ivan prefers to be coddled. He can dress himself but refuses every morning. He wants me to dress him. Today I played dumb, acting like I didn't know which way to put his shorts on or where to put his arms. He mostly did it himself today when he saw how incompetent I was. He has also decided that he wants me to feed him. Just on the foods he doesn't want to really eat. He has no problems with yogurt, ice cream or pizza. Dominique is happily chowing down and Ivan is crying out "I need help". It's laughable really, except when it's frustrating.

My exciting news is that I get to fly to Canada for 10 days at the end of the month and go to my cousin's reunion in Edmonton!!! One of my cousins is sharing her air miles to get me up there. How cool is that! Speaking of cool, I'm looking forward to it. I have been way more nauseous than with the other pregnancies. Not throwing up, just feeling sick all the time- day, night, afternoon, evening. I eat so much ginger, I think it's seeping out of my pores. It helps but only for about 30 min. By the time I fly up, this should be disappearing (I can hope right?) and I'll get to enjoy some relief from the Texas heat and see family ;) yeah, yeah.

The kids and Brian are going to hang out in Houston while I'm gone. So they will get a vacation too, only mine will be noticeably calmer ;)