regression

Zoe is now experiencing her first round of regression to babyness... since Finn started talking and perhaps we make subtle pride in it, she has started mimicing his babytalk. She has also (I don't know if this is connected), had two potty accidents in the house in two days.

"Listen to me"

My favorite Zoe tale for the month.

Zoe standing at the grocery store, arms up like she was holding a very large ball, shouting, "Listen to me." with great pause, then a step forward and "Open".. and the doors would open.

I was with both kids at the grocery store, a store in which the lines end right at the door. Zoe went to the door, and after some experimentation noticed that she had the power to move the door open and shut. She was doing so with great bravado, and I didn't have the heart or care to tell her to pipe down.. it was quite a theatrical performance.

Hey mom, Y and I Rhyme

Zoe has become a master of rhyming and the whole time we were in San Francisco she would find rhyming pairs... sometimes she was just doing it to talk, but about 90% she was very spot on and creative.

Zoe the fairy, the butterfly.. the flier

Zoe loves to pretend to be a butterfly.. or fairy... or anything that flies.. she grabs leaves, and jumps from rocks or just runs full tilt.. I've never seen another girl her age with such enthusiasm ;)

photo

I've recently gotten a real camera.. a Nikon with a lovely lens.. and am finally able to take pictures like this of my beautiful young lady

Zoe the foreign language expert..

We just got back from Ottawa, Ontario, which is really close to French speaking Quebec and I was shocked by how many people were speaking French and how many people preferred to speak it whenever possible. As an indirect result of this, Zoe started speaking in her own language and offering to translate.. I remember a specific instance at the museum of civilization in the Aboriginal section where she said: "Do you know what Cora means?".. "it means run in French"... there we lots of other instances, sometimes things would be an action word, sometimes tied to French or Spanish, sometimes unidentified, sometime translated to meaning "No"...

Finn is saying...

One of my favorite things Zoe has adopted: translating for Finn. Sometimes he'll babble on about something and Zoe will translate for me. Sometimes its just like a translation of what she is wanting/thinking "He doesn't want to eat that" or "He wants to get down"... but sometimes she is spot on.

nobody dies

Zoe is fond of watching Sleeping Beauty and telling me that she dies. While watching on the way home from daycare yesterday (the fairies were putting everyone to sleep), she said: "No one dies. No way. Nuh NuhNuh Nuh NuhNuhNuh"

bad magic masks

Zoe asked me the other day: "Mom, why do you have bad magic masks like the Shadow man?"

This is in reference to the Princess and the Frog... and she was talking about the African masks we have on the wall.. one of the characters in the movie is a Voodoo man.. and the masks at some time come after him. I told her our masks were protectors of us and not all masks are bad and told her about going to New Orleans and picking them out. She seemed satisfied.