Truth Yelling

Alexis is obsessed with keeping her bedroom window open. I'm not entirely sure why, but I do know it's not for the same reasons I always liked to keep my bedroom window open when I was her age. My bedroom was on the first floor and it was a very climbable situation. If I wanted out of my room, it was almost easier to go out the window than it was the door, especially at 2:00 am.

Alexis can't say the same.

She's on the second floor and while there is a tree outside her window, it's the kind of tree that will let you fall to your death if you try to so much as lean on it. As an added bonus, it happens to be the tree most prone to bug infestations in our yard, so Alexis definitely isn't willing to lean on it. And, again, I DON'T KNOW WHY SHE KEEPS HER WINDOW OPEN. There is a tree that is often filled with tiny leaf-eating worms just three feet away. Seems like a reason to keep the window closed tightly, but what do I know?

Whatever. If she wants to enjoy fresh air, she can do so. I just ask that she keep her door closed so that the air conditioning from the rest of the house stays in the house where it belongs.

On a completely unrelated topic, Mila is obsessed with Alexis' bedroom. If her big sister is in there, Mila wants to be in there. She mostly sits in Alexis' chair and reads, but she can also be found climbing the loft, sifting through her sister's clothes, and touching all of her things. If it can be touched, Mila touches it. That's her superpower.

Her other superpower is to leverage her sister's open bedroom window for good/evil/mostly good. Mila will often walk up to the open window and yell things to the outside. She yells things like, "BE NICE TO YOUR FAMILY."

For real. She yells it at the top of her lungs at least twice per week.

Normally her yelling is met with silence. Today, though. TODAY.

Mila walked up the window, yelled her message, and was met with a tiny little voice from across the street. The little boy who lives there is probably five or six years old (he's nearly the same age as Mila, but I think he's a grade ahead of her). He looked up over his shoulder and glanced at the window then shouted back, "BUT MY SISTER WAS MEAN FIRST." The older sister, who was standing RIGHT THERE, added to the conversation, "HE DESERVED IT."

I really should spend more time pulling weeds on the side of the house so I can witness these things more frequently.

Everything About This Kid is Swell

She Drives a Hard Bargain

Because life can never be simple, the solar cover for our pool died a tragic death somewhere back on one of those rainy days. No, not THAT rainy day, one of the others. Don't ask me to remember exactly which rainy day because THEY HAVE ALL BEEN RAINY.

Ahem.

The lack of a solar cover means that when it was finally sunny and warm this weekend, the pool was not. ::SadTrombone:: One of these days I'll find an economical heater that will solve this whole problem, but for now we're reliant on the sun and basically I FAIL, OKAY?

Mila was pissed.

She woke up ready to swim and was devastated to learn that the pool was somewhere between "No, thank you" and "OH, HELL NO." It was cold. So cold. All the tiny little girl wanted to do was to swim all day and she couldn't.

So I took her to a playground. Every playground, in fact.

We've decided this is going to be our thing. We are going to try out every playground we can find. It will make for a nice little tour of Pittsburgh, with a lot of focus on the places with all of the slides and swings. At least Mila agrees with this plan in theory. In reality, getting her to leave a playground requires payment. ALL OF THE PAYMENT.

I don't even know where we were on Saturday. It was a random playground that Alexis found via the Google Maps app. It was nice enough and the girls both had a ton of fun, but getting Mila to leave was IMPOSSIBLE. I offered her cash, prizes, and my first-born son but she was having none of it. I had to literally drag her away kicking and screaming, and even then she ran back to the playground the second her feet touched the ground.

So I started getting serious about the bribery.

"I'll give you $10. Let's go."

"No."

"You can pick out a treat at Target. We need to leave."

"I want to stay here."

"We can go get ice cream. Come on!"

"I don't want ice cream."

"Mila, what do I have to do to get you to get in the car?" You know I had to be desperate at that point because it's a terrible idea to offer the world up to a 5-year old.

"You have to let me swim in the pool when it's warm."

OKAY. THAT I CAN DO.

Nobody tell her she was going to get her way whether she left peacefully or not. Shhh!