Random updates and milestones

Milestones for Tammy include getting her first tooth May 13th, and the second one followed just a few days later. Also, she's been doing the Miley Cyrus tongue thing that we're all familiar with from the VMA performance brouhaha. Ms Cyrus is going to be attending our alma mater in the fall, incidentally. We're excited to have yet another reason to enjoy singing "Wrecking Ball" to the children, in addition to the time when I shoehorned myself into that pizza wrecking ball shirt we bought Rip at the children's request. (Note: can fit into children's size 10. Weight maintenance clearly going great, seven years in. Post-nursing bosom status clearly sadly deflated, though.)

Exactly three days after the arrival of the first tooth, Tammy finally decided very very recently that food was okay. The food that won her over was... polenta. With parmesan cheese. Well done, girl, you've matched your brothers in the self-parodying food preferences department. Since then, it's like a switch went off and she also decided she likes pancakes and potatoes and crackers, and will gamely try to feed herself anything we put in front of her. She started sitting on April 26th, albeit with a degree of wobble, and now we've finally converted the high chair and given her a spot at the table, which is very exciting. She definitely prefers to feed herself, but is less resolute about that than Jolly was.

Rip is enjoying underwear around the clock with surprisingly little adjustment. He completed potty training at his Doma and Dopa's house which is covered with oriental rugs and there were no accidents. Also, the children didn't break anything after spending nearly two in a house that is choc a bloc with antiques (caveat: not including matchbox cars), so it's all pretty amazing really.

Rip-isms: "ALL OF IT AND ALL OF IT AND ALL OF IT!" is uttered frequently in a sassy, 2-year-old tone, most often referring to how much of something he would like to eat.

Jolly-isms: "NEVER EVER EVER!" is still de rigeur, and has been taken up enthusiastically by Rip as well.

Tammy-isms: She does a lot of "BBBBbbbbbbvvvv!" noises right now, in a variety of moods (including on the rare occasions when she loses it because she's tired and would like to sleep).