Kinsey

Kinsey is between 2 and 2 1/2 years old this summer. She is small for her age, but has long brownish hair with beautiful curls and big brown eyes with long lashes. I think she is absolutely adorable, but strangers are constantly telling me how beautiful my children are so I can say unbiased-ly, she is (well, they are) pretty darn good-looking.

Kinsey is quite reserved in new situations and with strangers, but once she is comfortable in a place or situation, she takes off, sometimes literally. And she will talk non-stop at times. She went to see Kung-fu Panda at the theater with her dad a few weeks ago as a special treat and she still will suddenly start talking about the "panda movie was soooo funny." Then proceeded to talk about and laugh about it for about an hour. She speaks quite well, but sometimes she is saying so much that there are tons of filler words that even I can't understand, and I'm around her all of the time. Recently she started saying "That's my favorite" and "I love it" as a way to describe either ownership or feelings about something. As in "That's my favorite shovel. I love it" meaning you can't use it.

Kinsey is afraid of dogs, and has decided that she wants a cat. Since neither is an option at the moment, she still has time to get over her fear of dogs and make her daddy happy by agreeing to get a dog. She is also afraid of the blender (we can't make smoothies) and the vacuum (my floor is constantly somewhat dirty). However she is very friendly with other little kids. We went to get something to eat a few weeks ago at a fast food place that was practically empty and there was a little girl sitting at a table waiting while her mom worked. Before we ordered our food Kinsey had climbed up at the table with the girl who was about 6 or 7 and was talking away with her. I think the little girl may have only spoken Spanish so she probably didn't have a clue what Kinsey was saying, but wow. She isn't shy sometimes.

Kinsey loves to read books, play with dolls and do anything outside of the house. We got some play-do toys the other day at the thrift store, and she has been playing with them for hours recently. She kind of plays by herself, but usually wants someone to play with her. Well, someone besides her brother who just like to take the toys that she is playing with away from her. Neither has really learning to share yet. She also loves to sing and it amazes me that she can remember the words and sing the songs from nursery or that we sing. She loves to scream, laugh, jump, and run. And she loves the dentist (obviously had a good experience there). She loves Dora the Explorer and Clifford also.

Kinsey has a favorite bear named Dega. Well, that's how I'll spell it, since she named him herself such a long time ago. I'm not sure how he got the name, and I'm afraid that I made him a he even though he is pastel purple with white dots. We found another recently, and I told her it was her lucky day since we found another Dega, so she called the second bear Lucky Dega--but still shows preference for the original. She also came up with her own nickname "KiKi" because that's how she pronounced her own name long ago.