Conversations with Cerys

I put the girls down for bed tonight at the normal bedtime of 8:00. At 8:30 she called me to say she needed to go to the potty, so after arguing about whether she really needed to poo or if she just didn't want to go to bed, I was convinced that this was the real thing and we headed downstairs. Twenty minutes later we got back upstairs after she did one of her man-sized poos in the toilet. Tim and I are not sure where she manages to keep such large amounts of waste, as she's quite a tiny thing, and we sometimes call eachother in to say, "Look at this!" I attribute it mostly to the fact that she eats about 5 pieces of fruit a day. Here are some snippets of the conversation we had while she was sitting there:

Greta: "Cerys, Mommy is going to be really cross if you don't really have to go poo and we go all the way downstairs."
Cerys: "Oh, I know."

Greta: (After she has pee'ed) "Are you finished?"
Cerys: "No, I almost finished. I need to go poo."

Cerys: (after seeing me rub my eyes) "Are you sad?"
Greta: "No, I'm just tired and ready for bed."
Cerys: "Oh, are you a bit tired? Needs to go to bed?"
Greta: "Yeah. Are you finished?"
Cerys; "No, I almost finished, again."

C: (Pointing through the bathroom door, through the kitchen, to a painting hanging on the far side of the lounge) "Look, Mom, there's a horse."
G: "Where? I don't see a horse."
C: "Over dere"
G: (seeing where she's pointing) "Oh yeah, on the painting?"
C: "Yeah, dere's a horse."
G: "Are you finished now?"
C: "No, I almost finished, again."
G: "Mommy's going to count to 10, and then we're going back upstairs, okay?"
C: "Oh, alright. Sounds good."
G: "1, 2, 3....10 Okay, are you done?"
C: "No, I jus going poo."
(And, to my amazement, she really did still have to go)

C: Oh, are you doing the dishes?
G: Yeah.
C: You doing Cerys' plates?
G: Yeah.
C: Oh, dat's very clever.
G: Thank you.
C: You doing spoons and knifes?
G: Yeah.
C: Oh, you're very clever.

C: I very tired. I have to be quick. I need to have to go back to bed.
G: Yeah.
C: You need to go back to bed? You very tired?
G: Yeah. Are you finished?
C: No, I almost finished, again.

C: Mom, I need some water.
G: You can have some water when you're finished.
C: I all finished.

While washing our hands:
C: You wash your hands too? You go potty and wash your hands?
G: No, I just had to wipe your bottom, so I have to wash my hands, too.
C: Oh.

G: Okay, up to bed.
C: I need some water.
G: What color cup do you want?
C: I need to choose.
G: (Handing her a stack of one blue and one green cup) Okay, choose.
C: (Pointing to a different stack of two orange cups) No, I need to choose the orange ones.
So I hand her the orange ones, she takes one in each hand, holds them out, looks at them, sizes them up, moves them up and down as if weighing them, then chooses the orange one in her right hand while handing me the identical orange one in her left)
C: Dis one.
G: Okay (puts the other back on the shelf)
C: My do it.
G: Okay (holds Cerys up to get her own water in the cup)
C: (after taking two sips) I all done.

I wish I had a tape recorder with me to catch the inflections and accents. She is such a funny mix of English and American. She's so precocious. She's so lovely. She's so aggravating. And she's so MINE.

Tears

I've been doing a lot of crying lately. I don't know if having children has naturally made me a more empathetic person, or if the Holy Spirit is prompting me to pray by having me feel other people's pain, but whatever the cause, I cry on a regular basis these days. It started when my friends the Stavs announced their pregnancy. I burst into tears of joy at the thought of my good friends finally getting pregnant (with twins!) after nearly a decade of trying. I cried harder a few months later when we thought they had miscarried and harder still when we found out that their little boy had severe heart defects along with a cleft palate. I cried every day for the month leading up to their birth, anticipating the death of their little boy and just not knowing how they were going to survive. Little Will didn't die, in fact he's doing quite well after a successful heart surgery, but I still cry for them as they watch him work to breathe and eat, and I cry tears of joy when I see pictures of their healthy little girl and the four of them as a family. I cried when a friend relayed to me some painful childhood memories that she's working through and cry when I think about the damage done to her self-esteem. I cried when another friend told me about some marital difficulties she's going through and again when a different friend relayed some dissapointments she faced and how they made her question her faith. I cried Saturday when my little girl was in pain from the thrush in her mouth. I cry when I'm lonely for my family, when Hubby and I have an argument, when I feel too tired to get through the day. I find it amazing all the different things that will set me off. I never used to be like this. How do tears manage to express so many different emotions so adequately? Pain, frustration, sadness, joy, anger, disappointment. Crying over death and new life, marriage and divorce, in grief and with joy. Thank God for tears, which help me to connect with and care for my friends, to let go of pain I would otherwise hold too close, and to express emotions that I can't convey in any other way.

Comments

I was so surprised this morning to find that I had a whopping FOUR comments in my inbox! And then I realized it was just a slimy salesman playing on my emotions to get free advertising space. Thanks a lot.

From: "Anonymous" Add to Address Book Add Mobile Alert
To: greta_davies@yahoo.com
Subject: [Changing the world one diaper at a time.] 7/01/2006 02:07:25 AM
Date: Fri, 30 Jun 2006 18:07:27 -0700 (PDT)
This site is one of the best I have ever seen, wish I had one like this.
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Posted by Anonymous to Changing the world one diaper at a time. at 7/01/2006 02:07:25 AM