Elena turned two almost a month ago. She is so much fun right now. I love this age even though she's much more high spirited and easily frustrated then her sister was at two. She is communicating up a storm. She wants to do everything her sister does and is very screams when she can't. She doesn't like it when we drop off Eliza at school and she's stuck with me. I've been letting her run into Eliza's classroom this past week and this morning, while the older kids clustered around the incubator with the newly hatched baby chicks, Elena raced over to the fish tank, then sat the in the reading chair like Queen Elizabeth on the throne. When I came to retrieve her, she held up her hands and said, "No, come back!" She wanted me to leave her there and come back.
Elena loves to sing and dance. Her dance moves now mostly consist of her running in circles, spinning in circles or doing these little knee bends with her hands on her hips. Yesterday she was so engrossed in her dance moves, she really didn't want to leave when it was time to take Eliza to school. I had to forcibly carry her to the car while she screamed. Once we got to the car, she resumed her little knee bends and hands on hip action. I don't know what song she was dancing to in her head but she really didn't want to get into the car.
At a school meeting on Friday that I had to attend with Elena, she kept running for the closed door saying "I want to go home." She also likes to say "I can do it" with if a smile if she can do it and screaming angrily if she can't do something. "I get out," she says when I meet her at the crib or she wants out of the high chair. "I get down," she says when she wants help getting off Eliza's bed. It's so cute to see her hanging off Eliza's bed on her stomach, her little feet dangling to the floor. It's not a far distance but she won't get off Eliza's bed without help. She is cautious.
She is wonderful, even more independent than Eliza. She is happy to entertain herself and needs little beyond food, drink and diaper changes from me. She loves the bath, wandering around the playground, strawberries, pressing buttons on the phone and board books. She loves her little body and is increasingly proud of all the new things she can do. She repeats a lot of what we say and imitates Eliza to a hilarious degree.
She worships her sister. When it's time to pick up Eliza as school, she says "Yay, Eliza!" and runs to the door to get in the car. When Eliza comes running out of her classroom, the two girls hug. Then Eliza takes off to run outside with her classmates and Elena screams and sobs behind her. "Yiza!" she wails. "Wait!" She screams when other students take Eliza's hand. As the little sister, Elena wants to be the sole owner of those perfect little Eliza hands. Eliza and Elena will walk up and down the sidewalk together. Then Eliza will want to play with her friends and she'll extract herself from her sister. Elena will reach rather pitifully after her, screaming with abandon. Poor Eliza feels guilty about it but I tell her to go ahead and have fun.
We are having so much fun now. We are such a cool little family. The other night, the two girls were entertaining each other in the bedroom and I realized, it's only a matter of time before they barely notice my presence. As proud as I am of their relationship, this saddens me. My days as the be all to end all in their eyes has already passed. I hope to get a life beyond them, sometime soon.
But for now, they are delicious, they are my little loves, my wonderful girls. I am looking forward to a fun summer.
