(Just some quick Scarlette snapshots from around here lately. A) Helping me decorate the Christmas tree B) Playing with her friend C, who is 11 months old and C) Wearing her daddy’s boots, which is just about the cutest thing ever.)

(1) Probably it is not a good idea to leave me alone with a carton of eggnog and some gingerbread men if you were hoping to have any of either for yourself tonight.

(2) You should not ask Scarlette to say the word “sit” if you have a delicate sensitivity to offensive language. Because apparently my child has a lisp. It’s very cute. She says some of her S sounds as G’s, such as her name “Gar-Yick,” and some of them as SH’s like when she asks for candy and says “shweet!” or when you tell her to take a seat and she says “sit, sit!” Only she doesn’t say sit. <- Re-read that last line in a slow motion voiceover like this

(3) I just recently discovered Very Jane. Have y’all heard of this site? And if so, why did none of you tell me about it? I’m so excited because I had these leg warmer boot cuffs bookmarked FOREVER and I just got them for over half off. I realize that you are probably looking at these and thinking to yourself “Self, I can see that your child has calves the size of a toothpick. There is no way these are going to fit her.” And you would be correct. I ordered these for myself. In the child size. I am not even exaggerating when I describe myself as “elf-like.”

(4) Scarlette and I are about to start doing some advent activities. Several of them involve gluing marshmallows to things. I feel as though this is just going to encourage my child to be a paste eater.

(5) I would really like to know how y’all do Santa Clause. I’ve been seeing so many different things on Pinterest and around the internet. This is the first year that Santa will visit and while I plan to keep that portion of our holiday small I do want it to be fun and magical. What happens at your house? Does Santa wrap presents or no? Are stockings in bedrooms or on the mantel? What gets left out for him? I want to sift through some ideas and get a feel for what our own Christmas mornings will look like.

1) Yesterday was the day that I exploded an entire two liter of Ginger Ale and then subsequently spent the next hour wiping down every single surface in my kitchen. My George Foreman may never recover. Today is the day I learned that Scarlette is much more domestic minded than her mother as she’s spent most of the morning pretending to wipe down all of the cabinets. I’m going to totally milk that when she’s older.

2) I am currently embroiled in a land war in Asia bitter battle with the flipping ants that invade my house every. single. July. in their search for water. See: ants in my flippin’ iron, y’all.  They keep coming in Scarlette’s room, which means Scarlette is sleeping with me because I am far too neurotic and paranoid to let her sleep in her own bed when I’ve seen an ant in there. Which basically means no one is sleeping in this house. I just sprayed apple cider vinegar everywhere and I’m seriously about to start marching around the outside of this house singing “Joshua fought the battle of Jericho, Jericho, Jericho!” I’m putting the God smackdown on these stupid ants. And by that, I mean I just smashed one with my Bible.

3) One Direction. Oh my gosh. There is something about going through your formative years during the boy-band era that makes it completely impossible to turn the radio when they come on.

4) I’m really behind on getting up my book reviews (case in point, I read this months ago) but seriously, Let’s Pretend This Never Happened is hilarious. I have not laughed so hard at a book in I don’t even know how long. I keep sending one sentence emails to my girlfriends with quotes from the book like “WHY DIDN’T YOU TEACH ME COUCH ETIQUETTE?!” I’m not an annoying friend at all. There is a ton of cursing in the book but as a pseudo-curser myself (oh crumb!) that doesn’t bother me so much but now you are duly warned.

5) If you follow me on insta.gram then you know that this morning when I opened the fridge to make myself a chai latte, I found a little bow and three brightly colored balls nestled in the door next to the salad dressing. Jeff is really getting out of control, y’all.

I always get questions about Scarlette’s clothes but 90% of her wardrobe is hand-me-downs i.e. those shoes, so I don’t always have sources like today. Her dress + headband are c/o my friend Martha at Little Boo & Pie, who makes children’s clothes/accessories from vintage items. Her blocks are the Really Woolly Baby Blessing Blocks c/o DaySpring. Her necklace is an amber teething necklace (molars!) from my friend Karalyn and it TOTALLY helps.

• I took my niece and Scarlette (who my niece refers to as “Beans”) to the library last Saturday. I was wearing Scarlette in my sling and reading books while my niece worked on some puzzles. After a little bit, Scarlette began squirming to get down. My niece looked at me and said “Keeka, I think Beans would feel happier if you took her out of your purse.”

• You know you’re a child of the 90′s when the bath-time song you sing to your baby is derived from an old Backstreet Boy’s album. After we get through with “Splish Splash” and “Rubber Duckie, You’re The One” I like to launch into a little “Everybody, ye-ah, wash your body, ye-ah, everybody wash your body right. BATH TIME’S BACK ALRIGHT!”

• One day this week I went got myself a spray tan. Later that night I was rummaging for a snack and Jeff offered up some pixie sticks from his last business trip. He always has candy in his suitcase when he gets back from a business trip. Apparently, when Jeff leaves home he hits up the closest gas station like an eight year old boy. I looked at him and I was like “I have a spray tan and a pixie stick. I’m just one flipper away from being on an episode of Toddler’s and Tiaras right now.” To which he replied “I have no idea what you’re talking about but you look like the really tan woman from There’s Something About Mary and I am a little frightened by it.”

• I’ve spent months teaching Scarlette sign language. Last week we went to storytime at the play gym and they sang “Jesus Loves Me” with signs. One time. They signed it one time. And ever since my child has been randomly coming up to me and signing “Jesus.” Then on Sunday, I told her to sign “Jesus” so that my mother in law could see it and she looked right at her and said “Jesus!” Out loud. And I was like “What?!” So now she can say “Mama, Dada, Doggie, Go, Ball, and Jesus” I think we can all agree that my child is a genius. And also, she’s kind of winning every conversation we have now. I’m like “No, it’s too hot for us to play outside right now” and she’s all “JESUS! JESUS FOR THE WIN!”

• Thinking it will be okay to let your baby play bare bottom in her wading pool because your only swim diaper is in the wash. Note: It definitely won’t.

Here is what I’ve learned upon coming out of quarantine:

Lesson One: Do not give your car keys to your toddler in order to occupy them while you are grocery shopping. It might seem like a good idea at the time, brilliant even. But those few moments of quiet while you google how in the heckfire to know if a cantaloupe is ripe will result in discovering that said toddler no longer has said keys upon checking out. Only do this if retracing your steps through the entire grocery store before it occurs to you to see if someone turned them in to the customer service counter sounds like a fun way to spend a Wednesday morning. Note: It isn’t.

Lesson Two: When taking your child to a beautiful little park while visiting your father for lunch, don’t forget to pack your expensive camera lest you have to use your cell phone for all potential photo ops. On the other hands, praise the good Lord for cell phone cameras because how sweet is that baby with her Pop?

Lesson Three: Don’t assume that just because your sweet baby girl is cuddled up close to you in her sling means that she won’t dart her hand out like a ninja and sweep a thirty dollar hand painted wine glass off the shelf of that trendy little boutique you thought you might stop in. Because, oh she will. She will.

Lesson Four: Relish the fact that apparently, she inherited those ninja skills from you as you caught said overpriced wine glass right before it hit the floor and saved yourself thirty odd dollars plus tax. Left handed while baby wearing no less. Write about this on the internet because you’ll probably never have such good hand-eye coordination again in your life. See: failed tennis lessons.

Lesson Five: Plan a play date and then cancel said playdate upon discovery that your child has Hand, Foot and Mouth. You take your kid to ONE PARK after a six month quarantine and this is what happens. This is not a lesson so much as it is a SERIOUSLY?! SERIOUSLY?!