Longest. Post. Ever.

Annalise is now 18 mos old. Well, she has been for a week.
Kelley recently posted 39 things she loves about her 39 month old, so I'm being a big, fat copy-cat and doing my own version.

1) Her fake laugh. She does it when I'm laughing about something and she wants to fit in.
2) Her helpfulness. She loves to help.
3) The way she grunts like she is squeezing SO hard when she hugs.
4) Her love of tea.
5) How she likes to pull the perfume samples out magazines and carry them around sniffing them.
6) How she says things are "Hot-Hot!"
7) When she lays on her belly and says "Back? Back?" because she wants a backrub.
8) The way she wants to hold me close when she sleeps at night.
9) "That? Cat? Meeeoooow!"
10) Her love of dancing.
11) How well she shares with others.
12) Her brilliant little mind.
13) The way she will zoom by on her ladybug Wheely Bug and laugh manically.
14) Her willingness to try new things.
15) Her sense of humor.
16) How she holds up her index finger and says "one" when she wants a snack or a bite of what I'm eating.
17) Her complete and total disregard for propriety.
18) Her little voice saying "mama."
18.5) The way she'll ask if I'm done with my cup (or bottle or can, etc) and if I am, she wants to take it to the kitchen for me.


Nothing much going on this past week. It rained on Friday, so Annalise and I stayed inside (obviously). I knitted and she rode her "bike" and tormented the poor cat.

Trendon is still on nights, so we're left eating dinner on our own. Which is actually pretty ok. EB and I like to eat spicy red beans and rice, and Trendon does not. So he's at work eating ramen or those Marie Calendar lunch things, while Annalise and I meal on phenomenal cuisine. Sorry that was a boring and probably grammatically incorrect sentence.
Saturday (yesterday) we went downtown since it was such a pretty day. It was incredibly windy, though. Luckily for us, we have a kite! I packed a lunch of, what else?, beans and rice (I added chicken and southwestern corn to round it out) and Trendon made homemade tortillas...from scratch. Can you believe that? He's always making random things from scratch. It's nice, though, since I'm such a fascist about Annalise's food intake (I've calmed it down somewhat). We ended up eating lunch under a tree on "the lawn" in front of the Smithsonian Castle. Turned out there was a climate rally going on and one of our favorite bands, Against Me!, was giving a free concert. It was fantastic!
And photos...

It was a good day. I just wish there weren't SO many people. I guess we could start going during the week, but MetroRail has reduced fares on the weekend!

And the final part of this post: dreams.
 Doesn't anyone else have particularly vivid dreams? I have the most intense dreams all the time (when I'm asleep, clearly).
Nightmares, dreams about high school, old friends, people I don't even know, things from movies, weather patterns, everything.
It's driving me crazy.
I wake up exhausted because I've been plagued by these god-forsaken dreams all night.
When I was pregnant with EB, I had many many dreams about being chased by tornados.

I don't put much stock in dream analysis, but maybe I should start?