Ruth is BIG

Today Ruth folded her arms all by herself TWICE for prayers before dinner and for prayers before bed!   ALL BY HERSELF! We've worked on it, not too diligently, for the last little while, but it makes me feel like she is so BIG now that she does it on her own!!! She doesn't continue to keep them folded, haahaa, but we'll work on that.

Today Ruth also came up to me several times just to give me a hug. She lays her head down on my shoulder and really gives a hug. It is the sweetest, most precious thing in my life.

Today we also made a fort out of the couch cushions. Ruth likes the cushions OFF because then she is tall enough to crawl onto the couch and sit on it. The way she sits though, is just hilarious. She KNOWS she is 'big' sitting up there and acts like she's all that. I also let her jump on the cushions. Bad mom? Maybe. But hey, they're off ksl, and they're not red, so hopefully they don't last forever :). She jumps all over the place, and was hilarious until I started tickling, and then she bonked her head, and 'its all fun and games until somebody gets hurt'. Yeah, I made her bonk her head twice today. But she still seemed to like playing with me, haahaa.

Today I was pretending to sleep on the floor while Ruth bounced her bum on the couch cushions, and she would come over and pull on my eyebrows, move my arms away from my body, pull my hair, until suddenly I would jump and ROAR and tickle. She got this deep-throated BIG girl laugh. It almost made me want to cry. It was the most adorable thing in my life, but it wasn't a baby laugh anymore. It's also hilarious that she really can't run, so when she tries to run away, she falls over, spends a full minute rolling onto her knees with me roaring behind her, and then frantically tries to scramble/crawl away. SO SO SO funny.

I also think she scared herself today when she stepped off the couch onto what she thought would be a couch cushion, but she stepped in the crack between, so she went right down to floor. It was a further drop than she had expected and I heard that little catch in her throat when her foot kept sinking. She looked a little uncertain and then she grinned up at me. Such a funny girl.

She still loves her bear. When she gets hurt, she likes me to cuddle her, but she'll reach out for her bear, and ONLY once she has it will she snuggle down and let me comfort her.

Her and her friend Olivia play so well together, its adorable. This morning I was tying handkerchiefs on their heads like little orphan girls and they'd pat each other's heads and smile and smile and smile and giggle at each other. That, of course, led to needing to pull it off and having it put back on five hundred times, and mom got sick of that MUCH quicker than the girls did.

Ruth cracks herself up, and that just is hilarious for everyone. She was playing on a stool and she could ride on it like a horse, and she thought that was great fun. Well, then she went over to another stool, that was much wider, and spent five minutes getting her tiny little leg to lift over to the opposite side, and once she did she just sat there and laughed for a full minute at herself. She was so impressed. HAAHAA.

She yelled at a lady in the parking lot today. Ruth was sitting in the cart while I loaded the trunk with groceries. The lady said hi, and I said "Ruth, say hi." and just kinda smiled at the lady as she continued to pass on. But Ruth kept watching her, and about fifteen seconds later she YELLS to get the lady's attention. The lady actually did turn around again, and Ruth waved. It was SO funny. Then the lady, of course, had to come back and try to wave again, and Ruth just sat there like she was so proud of herself.

Basically, I have the most hilarious, wonderful, most beautiful, crazy little red-headed daughter in the history of the world. It's okay, you can all be jealous. You can also volunteer to babysit for free whenever you feel the need :).