Last night we hosted a small dinner for two of Sumie's friends from medical school. One of the girls brought along her two 6 month old puppies, which completely made Mimi's day.
They were a bit more energetic than her old friend Harrychan was, so she'd get a bit scared at times, but on the whole, she really enjoyed it. I'd have to say that, behavior wise, she was on par with the dogs. And given that they're 3.5 in dog years already, that's not too bad a showing for Mimi.
Mimi didn't fall asleep last night until almost 10. I was rather surprised by this. Granted, the dogs definitely brought out some baby adrenaline, but Mimi had been going full blast all day. Not one to sit idly by, Mimi insisted on helping me clean house and prepare dinner. This meant that every task I attempted took 17 times longer than normal. Below is a quick look at how Mimi "helps" us around the house.
The day's help often begins in the bathroom. Mimi swipes the shower squeegee from me and thoughtfully cleans the outside of the glass shower doors, which are, naturally, perfectly dry and streak free. She'll get through 2 or 3 swipes, each accompanied by an almost guttural "wheeeee!", before she moves on to wiping down the cabinets, hallway walls, and television. The squeegee eventually ends up in the living room, most often under the piano bench, but only after Mimi has taken another bite out of one of the poor squeegee's corners.
After that, it's time to get dressed. Mimi runs to the dresser and immediately picks out an outfit. Unfortunately, these outfits usually consist of a sweatshirt and 7 pairs of pants, so I always have to make a few substitutions. Out of sight, of course.
Picking up after Mimi during the day isn't much of a challenge, but cleaning up the house, with Mimi still in it, is well nigh impossible. Let's say I want to put away Mimi's toy chest. That's code, at least to Mimi, for her to jump inside it.
The only way to get her out is via distraction. Thankfully, she's a sucker for Star Wars, much like her father.
Mimi loves books, which makes me very happy, but she doesn't quite understand the concept of putting them away. She prefers them strewn across the floor. So, whenever I start shelving books, Mimi takes this as her cue to take out as many as possible. In fact, in the middle of that last sentence, I had to get up and remove from Mimi's violent hands my copy of "Open" by Andre Agassi. In four seconds she had pulled the book off the shelf and ripped the dedications page. Nice work, Mimi.
I have always loved books, but living with a toddler has shown me that there's one thing I hate about them: dust jackets. They make having a library with a child a living hell. And whoever came up with the insidiously fiendish idea of putting these on children's books should, quite simply, be tortured with a very pointy fork.
Putting away toys is another challenge. For some reason, whenever I put a toy into Mimi's toy basket she interprets this as me wanting her to immediately take that same toy back out and throw it across the room. I don't really enjoy this game, but Mimi certainly does. Here we are attempting to put away her stacking rings. Note the 1978 Remote Control R2D2 in the background. It's one of her favorite toys.
As I was putting away a few of her books the other day, Mimi decided to lift this same R2D2 over her head and then drop him squarely on her big toe. It's amazing just how quickly cleaning up books can shift to cleaning up blood when you have a toddler. And yet, I'm a bit happy Mimi hurt her foot. We now have something new in common. I lost a nail after inadvertently smashing my big toe with a "Return of the Jedi" arcade cabinet. Father and daughter, each with a digit damaged by the work of George Lucas.
As I bring this entry to a close the house is, amazingly, still quite clean. It feels good. And, if I'm lucky, it will remain this way for another 20 or even 30 minutes.
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