groovy dentist appointment

The girls had their first dentist appointment today. I tried to prep them a little to let them know that we were going to see a dentist who was going to look at their teeth and brush them. Stella was the most apprehensive about it. "No dentist", she kept saying. We picked up Grammie on the way there. That always makes them happy.

The dentist saw each girl one at a time. Mabel was quiet, but very very tense. The dental assistant who was trying to clean her teeth kept saying how strong that she was when she would clench her jaw. Mabel would hold my hand sometimes during the procedure and she would squeeze as hard as she could. I was surprised at how hard she could mash my fingers. The dentist said that her teeth looked very clean, were "groovy" (bumpy surface, i think) and a little crowded.

And then it was Stella's turn. She was the exact opposite from Mabel. It would be inaccurate to say that Stella was relaxed. She was more unclenched and a bit loud. Loud enough for the dentist to close the door. The dental assistant took a positive spin on it. She said that it was a whole lot easier to clean Stella's teeth because her mouth would open wide when she cried. Stella managed to keep it closed when the assistant was trying to put fluoride paste on her teeth. Afterward she kept spitting and saying, "yucky". Then she started licking my shirt to try to take the taste away. Stella's teeth are a little less crowded than Mabel's but are very clean and groovy.

bee sting

Mabel learned a little more about bees today than she would have liked. One was inside the house on the window behind the couch where the girls like to play. It was really scary because both girls started screaming at nearly the same time. I thought that maybe they had gotten burned by the heater, but they both kept talking about bees and Mabel was holding her wrist and trying to scratch at it. Sure enough, after a few minutes a little welt started developing on her wrist with a tiny red spot in the middle. I found the bee on the window, captured it in a cup and let it go outside. We talked about how the bee was scared because it just wanted to go home and couldn't get out of our house. We also talked about not touching bees anymore, but I think they already figured that out. The welt went away really quickly. There were no traces of it after about a half hour. I was thinking that maybe she didn't get a full-blown sting, because the bee still had it's stinger attached afterward.

Egg coloring

It was a good thing that the weather was nice today. It meant that we were able to color easter eggs outside. If we had done it inside, I fear that our kitchen floor would have been permanently colored pink, blue, green and murky brown.

Teo, the four-year-old who lives on the other side of our dorm, came over to join in the fun. Mabel and Stella loved dunking the eggs into the cups. Stella liked to pull them out right away and put a new egg into the cup. Mabel didn't bother pulling the eggs out, she just kept plunking new eggs on top of the ones already in there. She managed to get four eggs into a single cup and then moved on to filling up another. After all the white eggs were colored, they re-dipped the colored eggs, making some really nice colors and patterns. By the time we were finished, their hands were just as colorful as the eggs. They loved it.

the Easter bunny is a little scary

The Easter bunny made an appearance at our local CVS. We went to go see him. I tried to warn the girls that it was a big bunny that we were going to see. They were very happy about getting to do it. I wonder just what they were picturing in their heads when we were talking about seeing a really big easter bunny. Whatever it was they were picturing was nothing like what they actually saw. Mabel was a little startled when we walked in the door of the CVS and saw a giant white bunny with creepy eyes and a purple vest sitting all alone on a wicker chair. My plan was for them to sit on the bunny's lap, Santa-style, and have their picture taken. Their plan was to stand about fifteen feet away from the bunny and stare at it. I can hardly blame them. The bunny creeped me out a little too. There was something wrong with it's eyes. They were dark openings that did little to disguise the human eyes peeking out from within the bunny's head. And he didn't move much. He sat straight ahead with his head very still and his hands perched on the arm rests. Every now and then a hand would raise up and wave back and forth. I think it was trying to say hello. It was clearly a very nervous bunny. He made everyone around him nervous.

The girls and I managed a compromise, they sat on my lap while we got our picture taken next to the bunny and they didn't have to look at him or pet him.

A Sandbox is Born

We brought home 650 pounds of play sand from the local garden center. It's very nice sand, soft and clean. Mabel and Stella helped push over the bags of sand into our sand box under the slide. After it was filled, they were both a little hesitant to climb right in. They didn't like getting dirty. Mabel said "fa-fa di-di" and sat with her feet up in their air. This translates to "flip-flop dirty". And she didn't like it... at first. After we played in it for a while they both began to accept it. I really like our sand box. I think I'm going to have just as much fun playing in it as the girls will.