Evan and Emily: Just Us Girls

I cannot even describe how wonderful of a time Jane and I had on our trip to Florida! It was great to spend quality one-on-one time with her, especially on her first airplane trip! She is a blast to travel with, and got excited over the littlest things, which was the best part for me. The weather was still a bit chilly, but we were able to enjoy the pool for one entire day, room service every morning (ordered by Jane and normally something super sweet like pancakes and waffles), a movie before bed, and of course, DISNEYWORLD!

I thought I'd take a quick moment here, since this post will be very "Jane-heavy" and provide further examples of some of the funniest things she's been saying lately, especially around being extremely literal and by-the-book. She is an incredibly intelligent young lady and she never ceases to amaze Evan and I with what she says, what she remembers, and just how she acts in general.

#1. Although 95% of the time Jane and Luke are amazing eaters, we found ourselves one evening struggling to get Jane to eat her dinner. Whether she was just choosing to be stubborn, or truly didn't enjoy the dish (I can't remember what it was), she was stating that she didn't want to eat dinner. Using all the old tricks in the book, Evan and I very calmly told her that she needed to eat dinner, and that she should be thankful to have a warm meal. We proceeded on our own diatribe for at least 5 minutes on how hard we work to have money to pay for food, and how there are some people who don't have enough money to buy food, or have dinner every night, etc. I'm imagining you all have found yourselves in this spot before too. Our barely 3-year old, very calmly, looks up at us, after graciously allowing us to finish, and states, "Well.."some people" (emphasized) can just borrow my money then." And that was it, problem solved. She rationalized to herself that if the problem was them not having money, they could borrow her money and therefore, end of story, she wasn't eating dinner.

#2. We waited in many lines in Disney World to meet all characters, and I was stunned with how patient and excited Jane was for this. She hasn't had that much exposure to the Disney characters but she definitely wanted to meet every single one. We were next in line to meet Daisy Duck, and the Disney employee stated to us that Daisy would be right back, that she needed to go to the bathroom (aka, a change in shifts). Upon hearing this, Jane became very puzzled, and almost agitated, so I quickly told her that Daisy would be right back and it would be our turn to meet her soon. And, yet again, I was wrong in reading my daughter's body language. She simply said to me, "But Mommy, Daisy doesn't even have a bottom, so0 she can't even go to the bathroom". Grrr. Uh, yes, Jane, er..that's right. I quickly recovered and said she needed to check her make-up and somehow that got her back on track.

#3. It's unreal how much our daughter observes and remembers. Her memory would rival anyone's and sometimes can make for some funny moments. Evan's mom (the kids call Mimi) watches Jane and Luke every Friday and the kids love going over there to play and hang out. One Friday Jane walked into the house, and the first thing she said was, "Uh, Mimi. You wore that last week". Unreal! The same "wardrobe identification" happened again when Aunt Leslie asked Jane if she wanted to have another slumber party at her house. (Last summer, Jane and her 2 cousins, Maddie & Katie, spent the night at Aunt Leslie's house and I remember - because I also have a freaky good memory - that Jane was wearing a multi-colored striped tank top for that trip). As soon as she heard "slumber party at Aunt Leslie's" she immediately ran over to me, and in an excited tone asked if she could go with Aunt Leslie and wear her striped tank top again because it was sooo pretty. This was an ENTIRE YEAR later and she was only 2 1/2 for the first trip!

Ok, enough stories, on with the great pictures!

Very excited for the plane ride. She said, "You hear that Teddy, we're going to Florida!"

As soon as the plane took off, Jane shouted "WA-HOOO"!

Waiting patiently for our luggage. As we were flying over Florida, she told me that "Florida looked like a big pool".

Skip nap and stay at the pool? Um, yes please!

Ah, now the real Ariel.

Here she is with Daisy, post-makeup application.

I have no idea why she is standing like she's in the military. She was beside herself to meet the princesses. I was more just tired as we waited for over 2 hours....