I have a confession to make. . . .

When Mattie turned two, I thought to myself, these terrible two's are not as bad as everyone says. Yes, we had our moments, but for the most part things were great! And I may or may not have thought to myself, I guess we did a pretty good job with her (insert pride here). And ya'll, now that we are weeks away from her turning three I am googling "how to discipline a spirited child." Parenthood is SO humbling!!!

Now don't get me wrong . . .my Sissy is still an amazingly delightful girl most of the time! She is hilarious and silly . . .

loving and creative and happy and loves to play.

There are moments when my heart feels like it cannot take it, I get so proud of her and full of love. She will give me the most ferocious hugs that I think I will explode. Yesterday we worked on writing her letters for the first time and, look at that tongue out . . .

and look what she was able to do! Really, I thought I would burst with pride I was so excited.

And then she yells things like I DON'T CARE, or tells a fib, or we have a knock-down, drag-out tantrum for thirty minutes over who pulled the drain out of the bathtub. Aye yi yi. So I am reminded again and again that just when you think you have it all figured out, the joke's on you :) Every once in awhile we have to just reset, and work on setting boundaries and giving choices and letting her deal with the consequences, even if they aren't fun for me to implement. (Like yesterday when we didn't get to go to storytime.) It is so hard to have fun plans, then threaten to take them away and then actually have to do it! Only making threats you will follow through on is tough when you feel desperate. You might hear me say, if you do that one more time I am going to throw your dollhouse in the trash! Ha! The "resets" are tough, but we are usually back in a good grove after a day or so. So prayers for consistency and patience are in the regular rotation right now.

It kills me to think about how fast she is growing up and terrifies me to think about how important the foundation is we are laying with our day to day choices. Most of all I just love this girl so much and want to do her justice!!!