Approaching 3

It has been an amazing year with my daughter and watching her enormous growth in knowledge, life, learning and growing into her own personality. It literally amazes me some days the things that come out of her mouth and to see how she interrupts and see's the world. I was nervous about the second year because every says, "Oh God the terrible two's are awful!". As a first time parent, naturally I was preparing for the worst. However, the two's were easy breezy. As I embark on the three's, I feel the need to stock up my wine collection ;) Of course I love every age and watching her grow as a person, but let me tell you that three is going to be a challenge. In order to illustrate exactly what I am saying, I would like to take you through some recent conversations between my daughter and I:

"Mommy! Just relax and calm down!" (as she whispers and motions with her arms to calm myself)

"nǐ hǎo Mommy! That's hello in Chinese!" (my eyes are looking at her trying to figure out if she just spoke in Chinese or if it was my imagination)

I walk into the room where she is playing with her dolls and over hear the following;
" Listen to mommy, ABCDEFG,HIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ, now we know our ABC's, next time sing with me! Good job! Okay now we have to go sleepies......No no you have to go to sleep......Don't be naughty! your going to go in time out!"

A Daily Communication: "Mommy PLLLLEEEAASSEEE, please mommy!"

"Mommy, I tell you a story...Once upon a time a princess lived in a BLUE castle and a big GREEN dragon came!"

"Daddy!, Daaadddyyy!  JON!, Jon!!!!"

"Mommy, Grandad and I are going to the store, we will be back in 5 minutes, ok? You stay here and don't worry we will be back soon, bye!"

The list could continue forever because everything is just hilarious, maybe because she is my little baby and now she has conversations and opinions! However with knowledge, understand and opinions comes attitude. Let me tell you that drama and attitude go hand and hand. If you don't have a discipline system worked out by now your screwed. They can smell fear I have decided, so I am rock solid in what I will not accept, and sometimes it helps and sometimes nothing helps. She knows the foods she likes and tends to try and demand them, and then move onto the next parent or authority figure to get it behind the other's back.
It is amazing being a parent and I love the fact she understands me and everything now, but she is EXACTLY like her mama, which is scary and means my mom got her wish that I would have a daughter just like me ;)