new paint!

Uncle Dougie sent a big box of paint. Pete opened the box for Zoe and she ran out of the room and came back with her palette. Today I drew her a Halloween picture. I usually squeeze the paint out for her but she wanted to do it herself today and she did an amazing job! I'm so glad I was video-ing this because I love it when she decides that her paintbrush is too small. This is just a small example of what I believe is the key to success in life: options. It is impossible to choose something when you don't know that it exists.

Zoe told me twice today that she needed to potty and has had no accidents and no diaper changes! So fantastic!

Uncle Dougie also sent a 30-piece puzzle that is a picture of a barnyard. We've had the puzzle for a few days and I think we've put it together no less than 20 times. I help Zoe get the edge pieces sorted out and the first few times I talked to her about how the pictures match. Now she has it all memorized and she says "where's the horse? here's the horse. where does it go? right here. I did it!" Now she also knows what hay bales and wagon wheels are.

This morning she was making this really weird noise and I asked her what she was doing and she said "I'm an elephant!" and then she tried to stretch her head out in front of her and she said "I'm a giraffe!" and then she was a monkey [eeh eeh ah ah] and a kitty and a dog and a lion and a dinosaur.

Pete still has his old skateboard in the garage and Zoe is adamant about trying to ride it whenever she is allowed in the garage. Yesterday Pete got her to balance on it correctly by spreading her feet apart and bending her knees a little and then she rode it around the driveway by holding onto Pete with just one hand. He is dying to take her snowboarding. And since kid's start skiing at age 3 here she might just get to go this winter. It sounds dangerous, right, but then when you are laying on the side of a mountain thinking about how bad your legs hurt and a dozen 3-year olds blaze past your head it makes you wish that you had learned how to do more things when you were bendy and had a low center of gravity.

I made some ghosts and paper chains for our front porch and we put up a black light so they glow at night. Zoe has watched me cut all of the ghosts out. I was surprised when I was hanging them up and she said "look, decorations!" in her little voice. Such a big word. And this morning I opened up the curtains by the front door and she saw them again and said "look, it's a party!" and then she asked where the cake and candles were.