Mallards and the like

While reading a word book in Spanish, Hannah was curious about who was who in the family of ducks on the page.

H: Is the mommy brown?
L: Yes, she is.
H: Is this the daddy?
L: Yes, daddies have green heads.
H: MY Daddy doesn't have a green head!
L: Daddy Mallard ducks have green heads.
H: Yeah. My Daddy doesn't have a green head.

How families grow

A few hours after seeing a program about adoption on TV, Hannah reflected at lunch:

"Kids are from China, too. But I got my baby brother at my house. Actually, I got him from the hospital."

(I LOVE that she says "actually"--cracks me up!)

Powers of observation

Hannah has loved her Tues/Thurs. am preschool class. She tells me the most interesting things about it. Tuesday's highlight was that one of the teachers had shiny shoes like hers. Her words:

"One of the ladies we were walking with had shiny shoes, too! They were shiny like fish."

Me: "Were they silvery?"

H: "No, fish are kind dark silver. They were light golden."

Grandma's birthday

We celebrated Aunt Natalie and Grandma McCowen's birthdays this week with a family dinner. Hannah was feeling a little under the weather and was not a very cooperative eater. Finally, it was the eat a few bites of your dinner or no cake ultimatum. She thought it over and opted for no cake. She looked up and said, "Grandma, we're not going to have any cake, okay?"

Rainy cheese

We've had some hilarious conversations in the last month. My favorites from this last week:

Lunchtime. I cut up cheddar cheese for Hannah and she requests "rainy cheese".
L: What kind of cheese do you want?
H: Rainy cheese.
L: I don't know what you mean, honey. What is rainy cheese?
H: You know.
L: No, I don't know.
H: Yes, you do. RAINY cheese. You know, when it thunders and there's lightning and the sky is dark. RAINY CHEESE!
L: Rainy cheese? I don't know what you mean, honey. This is the only kind of cheese we have in the house--cheddar.
H: Rainy cheese, like this (makes rain motion with hands.)
L: Do you mean grated cheese, like this? (I get out the grater. I guess it does kind of look like it's raining cheese when you do it!)
H: YES! Now you understand.

Point of view

When he's bored, full or otherwise disinterested, Matthew starts rubbing his food into his hair. He had just had a shower with me the other morning and starting mashing cottage cheese into his clean hair two bites into breakfast. I groaned and Hannah laughed. I said, "It's not funny, Hannah. He needs to eat his breakfast. He just had a shower (etc.)" She said, "It looks funny to me!"

Cut out for supervisory work

In preparation to move on to the next activity, I asked Hannah and her friend Daniel to pick up the toys that they had finished playing with. Daniel started helpfully and Hannah stood by without helping. I asked her to pick up and she said, "I'll be the watcher."

She busted that one out again when she was in the kitchen with me helping make a cheesecake. I asked if she wanted to help with crushing the graham cracker crumbs and she said, "No. It's your turn. I'll be the watcher."