Whenever we ask Eliza how old she is she always says, "three!". But half the time she acts like an eight year old so I can't say that I blame her for being confused. The last two years with this little spitfire have been so delightful and exhausting for all of us. The girl is so full of life and sass and either leaves us giggling or gritting our teeth.
Eliza loves her babies. She wants to feed them, burp them, dress them, and take them for walks in their stroller or with her in her stroller.
Austin isn't always thrilled to play with Eliza, she has the tendency to try to take over; but they are starting to play together more and it's pretty precious. Plus it gives me some peace and quiet for at least five minutes.
Eliza is not a fan of getting her hair fixed but she also isn't a fan of her hair in her face. It's quite the conundrum. Lately when I suggest to fix her hair she brushes it out of her face and says, "I fix it!".
Chet and Eliza are similar in a lot of ways. Both are high energy, both can talk your ear off and they always are hungry. The two of them are giving me the most gray hairs.
A few months ago Eliza was always trying to get everyone to sit on her "blap". She really wants to mother her cousin Jack who is only a few months younger then her. "Co-mere Jack, sit on my blap!" Jack is pretty wary of that and gives her a wide berth which is probably wise on his part.
She loves to wear her swimsuit as long as she doesn't get wet...but she loves to tell us, "I swim!".
We aren't sure whether Eliza will be right or left handed. She uses her right to eat and her left to draw with so we'll just have to wait and see. And boy can that girl eat. I've seen her polish off three bananas in a day and they were just her snacks. She especially gets excited when someone gets out cheese. "Dad, cheesa me?"
I got her all dolled up in some of my dresses and shoes and she was happy about it for the first five minutes. But besides walking through two feet of snow, and uphill both ways to school, my generation also had to wear itchy clothes. Eliza has been spoiled and couldn't handle it.
We love hearing her count: "three, four, five, chicken...". One day while out in the yard she gasped and said, "Oh look at that tiny bird!". It was a butterfly. She is always quick to invite us to join her in whatever she is doing, "Mom? Sit by me?" or "reading" books to us.
If she is interrupted, or perceives that she has been interrupted, she says, "I'm talkin!" over and over until she drowns us all out so that she can continue to monopolize all conversations.
Eliza has to say a prayer whenever there is a prayer. They usually consist of, "Dear Heavenly Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen". And if we try to prompt her to say anything else she cuts us off with a "wait!" and says it her own way.
Eliza has loved home church and insists on bearing her testimony every Sunday. She also tries to sing along to the hymns and MUST have her very own hymnbook.
Eliza loves Gus, especially bossing him around. Whenever she gets her hands on his treats she begins shouting out commands, "Comere Gus! Sit! Kenna! Yeave it! Wait...wait..." And good ol' Gus knows that if he just sits in front of her and waits long enough she'll give him the treats regardless with a gusto "Boo-boy!".
Eliza gets so excited when Tanner gets home from work. "Dad! He come! Hi Dad!"
Eliza wants to be just like Mariah, and I'm ok with that. She will find music books and knows that she should either play the piano with them or sing. Her favorite song to listen to is "Lello Goobye" and she could listen to it on repeat all day long.
She recently found this bottle and has now decided that it's pretty cool. Just wish she would have figured that out around 20 months ago...
At the beginning of the year, whenever we asked if she was poopy, she would accuse someone else of having a poopy diaper. "No I not poopy! Grandma poopy!" The blame would also extend to her toots. But lately she has taken great pride in those. One day Chet claimed her toot, and she was indignant, "No Chet! My toot!". The boys have had a huge influence on her as far as potty humor goes. Whenever she thinks it's time to be funny she says, "poopy diaper!". Not my favorite.
For the first time in almost two months we had family come up the weekend before Eliza's birthday. I decided to make the cake then. Eliza loved when we all sang "Happy Birthday" to her. She even sang along for part of it. But she wasn't a big fan of the cake. I thought it was delicious though, which is more important.
On her actual birthday we opened presents and ate the rest of the cake that I had frozen.
She was really excited about her "pack-pack" and "Kitty-cat".
That evening we went for a walk to see the "horsies" and then had popsicles with the neighbors. Then they ran back to their house and made snow cones in honor of Eliza's birthday. When they asked her if she wanted grape or cotton candy Eliza replied, "hotdog".
Exhausting and Exasperating as she may be, we are just crazy about our Eliza girl. She is always surprising us with her big vocabulary and even bigger personality. It just melts me when she says, "Che Chu Mom!" Or, "I love you!". This girl has brought so much to this family and we are all so grateful for the light and laughter she brings. Happy Birthday baby girl!
