Stitches-free

For the past week, Kate has had four stitches in her knee. She got them after she fell on some rocks while we were on a walk (if you read my post from May 12, you'll understand). It wasn't a very deep cut, but since it was on her knee, the doctor wanted to stitch it up to keep it closed while it healed. The words "stitches", "hurts", "band-aid", and "doctor" have now become everyday words in her expanding vocabulary.

James took Kate to get her stitches out yesterday. The nurse taped the stitches to a tongue depressor and wrote Kate's name and the date on the back and gave it to James to keep. I am not a very sentimental person, and I never would have thought of keeping stitches! But, we have them (at least for now) in a keepsake box with other odds and ends. The nurse informed James that there is also a Stitches-Fairy who takes the stitches and leaves money in a Tooth-Fairy fashion, but they decided Kate was a little young for such a ploy. I wonder what genius, accident-prone kid (or parent of one) thought up that one.

I've always been sort of proud that I'm not one of those first-time mothers who freaks out about every little potential hazard my child goes near. But this incident made me think that maybe I don't freak out enough and I should be more protective (not that I was letting Kate run free on a bed of rocks - I was trying to stop her, but she thought it was a game...). I don't know. Parenting is hard. And I'm just beginning. Maybe she will learn from this like she learned not to push away from the table with her feet (When she's finished with a meal, she now says "bonk head" and rubs her head as she remembers falling backward in her chair). Life is full of tough lessons.

There's someone home!

Now that Kate is talking so much, she's really beginning to show us what she knows. She loves her magnetic letters and letter puzzles (and now even bathtub letters) but never seemed to know more than "O". Lately she has been coming up with more letters (some correctly) and sometimes replaces the letter with its associated word from her puzzles. U is "Bewa" (for umbrella) and I is "I-kee" (ice cream).

Last week she started counting along with me when I was counting something in the car. She has something against odd numbers though, as she only says two, four, six, eight, and ten. But, she also knows some Spanish numbers - "Kwako" (quatro) is my favorite!

She also will tell you her name, if you ask - "Khaki Mae!" (said emphatically, as I would say it if she were in trouble...)

It's so much fun seeing her catch on to all these new little things. But my favorite thing is her singing. She attempts the alphabet song (B,C,D,C,B,C...) and she likes doing the motions to "The wheels on the bus". But the best is her singing "God is so good", which sounds like "God i-good, God i-good" in this cute little falsetto voice. I love it! And God IS good.