1 Mother 2 Another

Cora will periodically head upstairs to
our dress-up area and come back with boxes full of costume jewelry.
She’ll then proceed to deck out the living room with
necklaces, rings, earrings, and bracelets in preparation of some
game. In months past, she’s clipped earrings on pillows,
given every member of the family a plastic bag, and told us we have
five minutes to find all the “presents”. When Cora
called “time”, whoever had the most
“presents” won a prize, usually a hug from Cora.


For the past few days, it’s been “Christmas”:
Cora has draped necklaces all over the room – fireplace set,
chair legs, anything you can think of. Bracelets and necklaces are
stretched strategically out on the coffee table, and we’re
each assigned a spot at the table. When it’s
“Christmas” time, we rush to discover our presents all
over the room, then gather at our particular spot for our regular
“gifts”. And of course, the pillows are all festooned
for the holidays with clip-on earrings.

Well, last night Cora and Maddie came up
with another game – Clip the Shirt. I’m not fully up on
the rules of this game as I have yet to play it – though Cora
has scheduled me in for a round before lunch today – but as I
understand it, there’s lots of running as one person tries to
successfully – you guessed it – clip an earring on the
other person’s shirt. If the girl succeeds, the roles are
reversed until someone passes out with exhaustion.


This is all part of a bigger trend in our household: Maddie and
Cora now play happily – and energetically – with each
other every night after dinner. Last year Maddie was too tired to
do anything but wait stoically for bedtime, but she’s hitting
her school stride and finding her stamina. For whatever reason, the
girls are playing well together these days and I can see they now
look forward to their time after dinner when they run around like
puppies, making up a new game and scampering until bedtime.


I love standing in the kitchen washing dishes and listening to them
shriek with joy for half an hour. I love seeing them collapse on
the couch in a sweaty, panting heap for a moment before bouncing
off and starting it all over again. We’re in a sweet spot
family-wise and it makes me happy to see their bodies and
imaginations getting such great exercise every day.


And now I’ve got to run – apparently I’m about to
try to avoid getting Clipped. Only I’ve been told to run slow
enough to be caught, so my chances don’t look good.