Back at home

The girls thoroughly enjoyed our trip to CT, although all the excitement, stimulation, and late bedtimes definitely wore them out. I turned around to check on them as they watched "The Little Mermaid" during our drive home yesterday and saw this:



She had actually pulled her blankie, kitty, and binkie out of the bag next to her in preparation for her nap. She had, in fact, already taken her afternoon nap at Yia-yia's house, but hey, what's wrong with a little 5pm pre-dinner snooze?

Julia seemed to think it was a good idea too:




After seeing everybody at Yia-yia's house, I'm not 100% sure Madeleine understands that Yia-yia, her aunties, and we Rowes all actually live in separate places. I'm pretty sure she thinks that her aunties and Yia-yia come as one package (especially given that she couldn't tell the difference between Auntie Shannon and Auntie Caitlyn half the time.) She definitely didn't seem to understand that her aunties also left Yia-yia's house to go to their own homes. Here's her world vision of where everyone suddenly disappeared to once we were back at our house:

ME: Where's Auntie Shannon now?
MADELEINE: Auntie Shannon's at a CVS!
ME: Where's Auntie Caitlyn?
MADELEINE: She's at WORK!
ME: Where is Yia-yia?
MADELEINE: Yia-yia went to STORE!

Hmm.

Today we got back into the swing of things and had some fun around our town, taking the sixxy-nine bus to the Y in the morning, and going to free swim in the afternoon. Julia was beaming with pride at my praise for her ability to swim many strokes without needing to put her feet down on the bottom of the pool. She then wanted to know if she looks like a "real swimmer," and came up with the following game: "Mom, I'm going to show you all my fantastic swim moves, and you watch, and pretend that I'm a REAL swimmer!" Needless to tell you, it was a riveting game. Madeleine's most exciting moment was seeing a seagull up close and personal, hanging out right near the pool.
"Seagull! Seagull! Gobble, gobble!" she squawked in delight. "I see it! Seagull! Gobble, gobble!" Once the seagull-turkey hybrid flew off overhead, she was broken-hearted, but thankfully we had a chance to watch him circle around in the air for awhile before he was completely out of sight.

Our afternoon faded into evening as we walked home from the pool, complete with music. Madeleine requested a Julia original: "A schoolbuses please Julia?" Before I knew it, both girls were singing "Schoolbuses, schoolbuses, schoolbuseeeeeees!" together sweetly. (Until Julia started sticking her face too close to Madeleine's and then Madeleine started screaming and whacking Julia in the face and then Julia started screaming that Madeleine was whacking her and so on and so forth... but it was nice while it lasted!)