Below is an email from Emma's teacher, Ms. Bertsch:

The good news: We were working on rhyming today and Emma loves to think of new words to rhyme.

The bad news: Emma was rhyming everything with “truck.” You can only imagine the words she came up with!

Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer - Toddler Edition

Casey and I like to discuss what we think Emma will be when she grows up. As her obsession with all things medicine grows, we've discussed careers, such as Pharmaceutical Rep, Doctor, Nurse. She especially likes giving Luke "check-ups" which to me, look a little more like a light beating. But Luke is a good sport and is willing to endure any sort of attention that Emma throws his way.

Lately, we've been discussing her penchent for arguing. She always has to have the last word and usually throws out "but, mommy (or daddy)..." to any sort of direction that we give her. For example:

Stacy: "Emma, please stop poking the thermometer in Luke's ear. You can pretend that you're giving him a check-up, but please don't really poke that in his ear."
Emma: "But mommy, I need to check his ears."
Stacy: "Seriously, Emma, don't."
Emma: "But I HAVE to."

The argument will usually continue until I finally have to take away the foreign object that she's using to torture her brother.

So, last Friday, Johnny Mac came over and brought pounds upon pounds of steak with him for the grill. Casey, Emma and Johnny Mac were outside and Emma is trying to get Casey to push her on the swings. She starts dancing around, holding herself and Casey says, "Okay, Emma - I'll push you but you we need to go potty first." Emma replies, "But I don't have to go potty." And so begins the battle...

Casey says, "Seriously, Emma, let's just run inside and go potty and then we can come back out and swing." Emma's not budging: "But I don't HAVE to go!" Casey says, "Come on, Emma, you're doing the pee-pee dance. Let's just go inside and get it over with." Emma's response: "No, daddy this isn't the pee-pee dance. Its just a REGULAR dance."

See what we're dealing with?!? :)

Funny story to add... Emma spent the day at Karla & Roger's so she was dropped off today at 4:30. Emma is poking around the office and looks at my stereo and says, "Mom, do you have a CD in there?" and points to the stereo. I answer yes. She asks, "Mom, do you dance to your CDs at work?" Hmm... not a lot of dancing going on around here!

Our (rainy) Florida Vacation!

Casey & Emma's spring break finally arrived, which meant one thing: FLORIDA VACATION! I was lucky enough to find cheap tickets to Ft. Lauderdale in early January, so I had been counting down the days until we left. Casey's parents bought a house in Boynton Beach last year so we were anxious to see them both, since they had been down there since after Christmas. It took me about 3 days to pack. I'm pretty sure that I packed mostly everything in the house. The "girls suitcase" was huge, weighing 49.5 lbs when it was weighed at the airport (note: the limit was 50 lbs. Good thing I forgot to pack my shampoo & conditioner!). Our flight left early on Wednesday morning, so we spent the night at the Hampton near the Columbus airport. It was a pretty uneventful night and the kids were awesome on the flight down there. Luke slept for most of both legs and Emma watched her DVDs. It was rainy when we arrived, but that was fine since we were all exhausted from getting up at 4:15 am.

We spent most of our time indoors, since it was raining, but it didn't really matter - we were on vacation! Casey and I were able to play tennis a couple of times (don't ask the score). On Sunday, the weather finally broke and we were able to hang out at the pool all day. Emma had such a great time! We spent most of our time hanging out and doing a little of nothing (which are the best vacations). I was able to finish 3 books.

The best part of the vacation was watching Emma and Luke play together. One afternoon, Emma was playing with empty baby food containers and decided that she would pretend to feed Luke his lunch. So she grabbed his spoon and put his bib on and started to "pretend" feed him. The best part of the whole thing was watching Luke chew on air after Emma had fed him the pretend food. They both thought it was hilarious and had such a great time. Luckily, I was able to catch it on video. Karla said that it was their first time playing together!

The flight home was a little more stressful. Emma was dead tired and Luke (as we later found out) wasn't feeling so great. Once we got on the airplane to Orlando, Emma had a meltdown (can't remember why) and spent a few minutes whining and crying. Finally we got her calmed down. The flight was a short one - only 45 minutes - then we had to pick up more passengers for the leg to Columbus. Emma was still acting a bit fiesty, but I was keeping my fingers crossed that her DVD would keep her occupied. No such luck. She got her fingers pinched while playing with her seat buckle and started WAILING. You should have seen the looks that we were getting. Once she calmed down, then Luke smacked his head twice on the window and he starts in. Then, right as the plane is pushing away from the tarmack, Emma announces that she has to go potty. The flight attendants told us that she couldn't go until once we were up in the air. And the wailing started again... Luckily, everything smoothed out and both kids took a good 45 minute nap.

So, we're back in Cincinnati and the weather is finally starting to break. Its about 60 today so I can't complain. Spring can't get here quick enough. Little Luke is sick again - another ear infection AND pink eye. That kid can't catch a break. The doctor said that he will need to get tubes if he gets another ear infection. I'm hoping that we can avoid that.

Emma, however, will be having surgery #2 this summer. As the doctor put it, she has "ginormous" tonsils. Just another fun thing to prepare for!

Casey is finishing up his spring break today. We're going to mom & dad's this weekend to celebrate Kinsey, Hailey, Mike & Papaw-Great's birthdays. I'm looking forward to it.

Funny Emma story: yesterday morning she got up and was playing in the hallway and I heard her talking. I asked her what she said, since I thought she was talking to me, and she responded "I wasn't talking to you - I was talking to Susie." Oh, okay. So, she continues on, "Susie just told me that we should put on our bathing suits and I said 'No way, Jose!'" It was so cute how she said it.

Okay, I think that's it for now!

Casey and Emma were playing in the basement last week. Emma has really been interested in her Fisher Price "People" lately and is always wanting us to play with her. So, the two of them are playing and she keeps talking about one of the girl "people" and keeps referring to her as "him." Casey finally says, "Um, I think that one is a girl, Emma." In true Emma fashion, she says, "No, its not - he's a boy." Casey checks out the people again and the little girl has red hair and two bows in her hair. He says, "Look, Emma - she has a bow in her hair. It's a girl." Emma replies, "No, its not - its a boy." So, Casey says, "But Emma, this little girl has bows in her hair. Little boys don't wear bows in their hair." Emma looks at Casey and says, "trust me - they do."

HILARIOUS!

Just the two of us!

Last night, mom and dad come over for dinner. They have been in Florida since the beginning of the year so we were all looking forward to seeing them. We had a nice visit. Mom brought back a tie-dyed Marco Island sweatshirt, a book and a hat for Emma. Very cute! So, it was nearing eight o'clock and Luke was getting fussy and it was time for Emma to get ready for bed. We said goodbye to mom and dad and then I took Luke upstairs to get him ready to bed. Casey tells me later that after everyone had cleared the family room, Emma looked over at him and said, "Guess it's just you and me!"

The Deer Hunter

For the past month or so, Emma has been obsessed with locking doors. Luckily, she would only lock them when we were in the room with her. We've told her time and time again that she shouldn't be locking doors. So yesterday, Casey had an inservice so we arranged for Emma to go to Jennifer's house for the day. That meant that I had to take both kids with me and drop them off on my way to work. We were getting ready in the morning in our bathroom area - Luke & Emma were both on the floor playing. I stepped around the side of the wall to put on some earrings and I hear the bathroom door slam. I look over and Emma had just locked and closed the bathroom door. I say to her, "Emma - what did you do?? You just locked mommy out of the bathroom. Why did you do that?" Her response: "I was running away from the deer." Huh?

That kid has a HUGE imagination. We'd better buckle our seatbelts...