We had a pretty darned good weekend.

We had my parents over for dinner on Saturday - BLT salad, which turned out exactly as lovely as I'd hoped, and I plan to make it again soon, before the good tomatoes are completely gone.

Sunday, Penny woke from her nap and was Sad nigh unto hysteria. It escalated until she hit me and I put her in time-out. Like magic (as the previous few times this has happened), almost as soon as we let her out of time-out, she cheered right up and was loving and happy again. Whatever works, I guess.

After she'd cheered up a bit, we took her to the park. We were a little worried that she'd refuse to get out of the swings once she was in them, and pitch temper tantrums when we made her. But she actually let us suggest other activities, and she got off the swing two or three times to go do other things. She did keep going back to the swings, but at least the other kids got a chance.

In fact, she turned around at one point to go back to the swings and saw they were both occupied. She started to raise a ruckus, but Matt and I both firmly said, "The swings are for everybody. It's their turn. It will be Penny's turn in a little bit," and she went back to doing something else.

Whew. Two-ness averted.

I made a warm pasta salad for dinner last night (a recipe I stole from Karen, actually) and both Matt and Penny seemed to like it, so I'll probably add it to the regular rotation of recipes, too. I just have to remember that whole-wheat pasta, like brown rice, takes longer to cook than the more highly-processed, white variety.

I wish I had words to express how fast Penny seems to be growing. And learning. She's a little information sponge.

Yesterday evening, she grabbed the neck of my shirt and used it to haul herself up. It stretched my shirt enough that she could see my cleavage.

"That?" she asked, poking at it. (A new definition of "nuclear family" arises: People who are allowed - or at least forgiven - to stick a finger into Mom's cleavage.)

I sighed. "Those are Mom's boobs," I told her.

"Boos?"

"Yeah, boobs. One day, Penny will have boobs, too."

She looked at her own small chest. "Penny boos!" Then she looked at Matt. "Daddy boos!"

"No, Daddies don't have boobs."

That seemed to be the end of it.

This morning, I was sitting on the bed watching Penny play with her giant rabbit stuffie and waiting for Matt to finish shaving and getting dressed so we could go downstairs, and Penny climbed into my lap. She started to ask for my necklace, then got distracted. "Boos!"

"Boos? ...Oh. Yeah. Boobs."

"If she pulls that out at daycare," Matt said from the bathroom, "I'm blaming it on you."

--Liz