The Power of Words

Grace has added a few words to her vocabulary lately that are quite powerful. The first has the power to turn my hair gray and tempts to me yell at the top of my lungs, "Because I said so, that's WHY!!" (Of course I never do that, but it is definitely tempting!) Oh yes, we've entered the stage of WHY. She asks me "why?" all. day. long. I'm actually exhausted at the end of the day because of this one little word. Just for fun, I set the timer for 5 minutes and kept track of how many times she said those three little letters. It was 11. That doesn't sound like much, but that was just in 5 minutes. That's 132 an hour or 1,452 in the 11 hours she's spends awake each day. Honestly, it's probably not really that many, but it's a lot, and I'm tired, and I now understand why parents use the phrase "because I said so."

She has also started saying "thank you" all by herself with no prompting. These words hold the power to melt my heart, and she knows it, so she says it often. If "why" has the power to zap my energy, these little words have the power to build it back up. It's one of those little things we've been working on for a long time, and it feels good to see she's finally got it.

Finally, she has added a word that has the power to make me giggle every single time..."honey". It makes perfect sense. Jeff and I call her honey all the time. We call each other honey. But there is something so funny about a two year old saying, "I'm all done eating, honey," or "Be right back, honey." It's especially funny when she's upset or whining..."Don't put my toys away, honey!" Oh my, she's so funny.

While we're on the topic of powerful words, I have a few for Jeff who I married 8 YEARS AGO today. How could it possibly already be 8 years!?! Anyway...I love you honey! Thank you for being an amazing husband and father. Grace, Charlie and I are all so blessed to have you as the head of our family!