Gluttony, mirth, and bike riding

I am almost too tired to write this entry. Not because I have been sleep deprived. Kate has actually slept fairly well here, although she has been waking at the ungodly hour of 5am. Rather, I am exhausted from eating. This that I speak of is a special type of eating. Eating that I was not born into but am trying to learn to keep up with. Chunks of meat for each meal followed by and sometimes paired with sugar in various forms. I thought my mother had taught me about sugar. She had a dedicated sugar drawer in our kitchen filled with all kinds of sweet treats. Christmas in my in-laws home though is a whole new adventure into sweets and deliciousness. Although my tastebuds have delighted, my digestion and my blood sugar are not sure how to manage this rollercoaster and I might be forced to take a break soon.

Not that Kate has noticed. The poor girl is living the life her hypocritical parents have forced her into: one of no processed foods and no white sugar. She isn't going to know what hit her one of these days.

Despite the fact she isn't operating as though on a sugar high she has been moving as though on one. Her three year old cousin got a bike from Santa and he has been practicing riding in in the circle that connects kitchen-dining room-living room-and hallway. My sweet, quiet daughter has been chasing him every moment of his biking. Her one year old little legs racing in her attempt at a jog as she tries to catch him. As a result, she has been crashing, and crashing hard. For Kate, crashing looks like happy-energetic Kate on steroids. Which is followed fairly rapidly by cranky, whiney, moaney Kate. Today she was actually so tired she almost fell asleep while eating lunch: head hunched to the side against the headrest of the high chair (so THAT'S why there is a headrest to the highchair!), eyes slowly sinking closed... Poor kid. She then took an almost-three hour nap to try to recover for the second act.

Yesterday she enjoyed watching her cousin open lots of presents while curled up on daddy p's lap eating breakfast. She also enjoyed stealing these new toys to play with when said cousin was either napping or looking away. Her unaware parents brought no presents for her and were saved by her grandparents who purchased two noise making toys (a remote control and a pretend camera) that make music that she was thrilled to dance to. This did not prevent her from stealing her cousin's new drill as he napped and walking around the house "drilling holes" in the wall. Apparently my dad has done enough work on our new house that she knew instantly knew what to do with it. I was very surprised and happy to know that in a few years I will no longer be responsible for hanging anything up, or affixing anything to walls.





Today she met her first cat (liked, but didn't want to get near) and her first horse (neither liked nor wanted to get near). All in all I say this proves just how brilliant my little daughter is. It has been in the twenties here with a fierce wind though so we all bundled up mightily to make the outing and miss kate was more than happy to come back inside after not too long.