Ups and downs, I guess. Penny spent most of the day Saturday pushing my boundaries. She wasn't quite bad enough that I wanted to give her to the gypsies, but I was certainly relieved when she finally went to sleep.

And then, like magic: poof! Sunday she was adorable and sweet and well-behaved and my best girl.

It helps that the weather has been beyond gorgeous, the last couple of days. Several times, Sunday, I appeased Penny's constant desire for something different by simply taking her outside and letting her blow bubbles.

No more than a scrim of bubble-soap in the bottom of a disposable tupperware bowl, and a pipe instead of a wand, and all I had to do was sit on the steps and watch her go.

(Of course I took pictures. I took movies, too. Today or tomorrow, I hope to get the photo album updated.)

Somewhere in the afternoon, she started using the bubble pipe to "paint" on her legs. I didn't even try to stop her. It's soap -- what's it going to do to her? I figured the worst of it was that it might make her skin a little sticky, and then I'd take a wipe to her legs when I changed her for bed -- but once it dried, it was like it had never existed. Cool stuff.

She told me she was drawing circles, and then an airplane, and then a bird, and then water. I agreed dutifully that each was very nice (though I didn't make out any of them except the circle) but she's not often willing to attempt to draw pictures on her own -- mostly she wants someone else to draw to her specification. And if what it takes is a medium of bubble-soap on a canvas of her own skin... Sure, why not?

She was having fun, at least.

Thank goodness we have a huge can of bubble-soap under the kitchen sink, eh?

Penny is totally obsessed with dresses right now. Part of her "princess" phase, I guess. I was really beginning to sweat dressing her this morning, but then I remembered that about a year ago, Sam's mother sent us a whole bunch of adorable little handmade dresses, left over from when Sam's nieces were little.

The one I pulled out this morning has a pattern of geese on it. Penny usually wants to stay in her crib and play for a while, but when she saw that dress, she was ready! To get up! NOW!!!

In fact, when I turned back to the closet to put the hanger away, she started to panic.

So I guess we have a new favorite. It's a little bit big on her, still, but that's just fine with me -- she'll be able to wear it straight through the summer.

(I sense that someone is going to have a princess-themed birthday party this year.)

--Liz