1.  Get nighttime pacis.

2.  Put on backpack.

3.  Put on hat (sometimes gloves).

4.  Get purse.

5.  Get out blocks.

6.  Build a tower.

7.  Intermittently push baby stroller in circle and say, “Bye! Bye!”.

8.  When asked where we’re going we say, “Grammy’s House!”

When I read to the girls, and when the girls want to listen to me read, they sit quietly on my lap.  Sometimes I prompt them to end the sentence or I ask them questions, but mostly they just listen.

More often lately, however, I think they’re hardly paying attention to me when I’m reading.  They dilly-dally and squirm and tickle each other.  So, I get frustrated and just stop reading as I struggle to see the words and they seem to be uninterested.  Of course when I stop they protest.  But I have found that when THEY read the book themselves, they can really recite a lot of the lines themselves.  It’s really quite amazing and does something for one’s ego when it appears that your 2-year-old child can sit down and read an entire book.  So, I’m pretty sure they are paying attention when I read, sometimes it just doesn’t feel like it.

So, you might imagine my surprise when Nora sat down on the living room floor yesterday, plucked a book entitled “Hanukkah” from her book bin and, somewhat ironically, broke out into a toddler version of “Jesus Loves Me”. 

???