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So this is what one year old looks like.










She is walking (up to 8 or nine steps at a time), finally sleeping a little better and she generally rules our house. It's a good thing she adores our son or he'd probably be fed up with the whole thing by now.

She is incredibly social and loves smiling and waving at strangers whenever we go out. I regularly have to say things like "well, we really have to go now" just prior to moving the stroller at ramming speed in order to part the crowd. Okay, maybe it's not quite that bad but there is one store that I now avoid like the plague as all the clerks rush to see my daughter whenever we're there. They'll actually call to each other "_____ is here".

I still have a hard time wrapping my mind around the fact that this is my life. I was so certain that we would never have a second child that I will probably have to spend just as long convincing myself that we now have one (I guess she'll be about 5 then).

My son is still not convinced he should allow his picture to be posted here. I can tell you that he is reading like crazy now (mainly Asterix and Geronimo Stilton these days) and at the beginning of this past school year he didn't even know his alphabet. He tends to do that to us - worry us like crazy with delays and then surge ahead and cover a year or two of work in a few months (that's how he was when he learned to talk as well). It keeps us on our toes.

I won't be going back to work for another 9 or 10 months and so I am planning on thoroughly enjoying my kids until then (well, after then as well). I could tell you about various things that have happened to us over the last few months (including a Nazi Penguin in our shrubs) but I'd rather read about what y'all are doing. I am posting simply out of desperation as so few of you blog much anymore. I am allowed to quit but you my dears are not.

Hugs and smooches, DinoD