Daddy's Little Landscaper

My very favorite part of our weekend was a walk we took on Sunday afternoon...it took us about an hour and brought us about one block from the front door. E loves to walk the sidewalk, very, very slowly. The only thing that speeds her up is the occasional kitty, running for its life. She will give chase with her arms stretched out in front of her, laughing and screaming and full of joy. Otherwise, she moves at a snail's pace, picking up anything interesting off of the sidewalk, and quite often tasting it.

To her credit, the stick that she chose to taste during this walk DID look an awful lot like a pretzel, which she announced just before licking it. After deciding it was NOT a pretzel, she resumed her favorite activity, cleaning. She had a stick in each hand, one of which M gave to her as a walking stick. In her hands, each stick was a not-very-functional broom, sweeping the concrete clear of pine needles, leaves and rocks. At one spot, she worked for several minutes with one of the brooms to get a little pebble out of a crack...finally she bent down to pick it up and threw it away with a disgusted "Yuck".

The other job she had taken on during walks is weeding for the neighbors...she grabs at any little green thing growing where it doesn't belong, just like M. I don't know if she picked this up from him, or if it's genetic, but she truly is her Daddy's daughter. Maybe they're both photosynthetic, removing the competition for sunlight. Either way, watching them together, looking at leaves and picking at clover, is enough to melt my heart. The perfect hour ended with us sharing hot cho-loco-late in the warm livingroom, hers in a sippy cup so we could cuddle on the couch. Sunday afternoons are just the best, aren't they?