On Thursday nights, Rachel has an hour of dance class and then I have two hours of dance class. Also, Ethan and Rachel go to their Dad’s. Also, Ian takes Hannah and goes to visit his mom so she can have some grandchild time. Also the kids have early dismissal from school. Also, this Thursday was the first Big Snow of the season.

Also, I have a work-potluck tomorrow.

So it was a convoluted day. I get the kids at their early dismissal time. Then we drive home because I figure I’ll postpone getting Hannah until just before Rachel’s dance class. Then I don’t have to wrestle Hannah into her carseat just to drive her home. At home, we kill an hour on computer time and then bustle off to pick up Hannah. We drive Rachel to the hall where the dance classes are. Ethan and Hannah and I would normally then go home until the class was over, but Hannah didn’t want to. “I wanna do My Belly Dance Too.” She said. But when I took her into the studio space, she clung to me and demanded to be picked up. Evidently she wanted me to dance for her. So Ethan and Hannah and I hung around the lobby making conversation with another mother.

There is a motorized chair lift there that kids always try to climb on even though they’re not allowed. And Hannah was trying to climb on it. I said, “Hannah come down from there.” And she, petulantly, replied, “no.”

“Hannah, come down from there or I’m going to have to come lift you down.”

And then she painstakingly pieced together this sentence. She enunciated very carefully as of someone sounding out words for the first time. “I’m… don’t… gonna… listening to you.”

And I had to work very hard not to laugh out loud at her. But she said it again, and again, eventually replacing the “don’t” with “not” and perfecting her conjugation.

Later, when I was telling Ian this story, she earnestly said to her dad, “Well. I’m Not gonna listen to mama.” Pause. Earnest face up to his. “Kay?”

“What kind of two year old says thing like that?” I asked her. Wordless earnest Hannah face turns to me.

“You’re a freak.” I told her.

She’s so articulate. When I ask her what she’s going to be for Hallowe’en, she says casually, “Mama’s making Hannah a Hallowe’en.” “Yes, but what’s your costume going to be? Is it a tri-?” “TRICERATOPS!!!”

Though the other day she told Ian, “I’m not gonna be a triceratops anymore. I wanna be a stegosaurus.”