The day after the bridal shower, we had a surprise baby shower brunch for Nikki & Mark, since their baby is due about a month before the wedding. Apparently she had no clue, even when she walked into the restaurant and saw Mark’s family there. She was under the assumption that the brunch was for Matt & I, and was terribly confused as to why her in-laws would be at our brunch.

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I think Matt was maybe a bit TOO devious – he hid one of the eggs in the sub woofer for Dad’s computer. Of course, I was no better, stashing plastic eggs in with Mom’s basket of wooden eggs. After opening baskets at their place, Nikki, Mark, Kial & Laurel headed over for Easter at Mom & Dad’s. At first Laurel didn’t seem to recognize me – it had been since Christmas since she’d seen me last, and she’s not quite 2 yet. She didn’t seem to recognize Matt, but he had shaggy hair & a beard at Christmas. Of course, it didn’t take her long to recognize me – at Christmas I would lift her under her arms and make like I was going to toss her, and she would shriek and giggle and come back for more. I only had to do that maybe once, and she seemed to remember me. Every time I set her down, she would come running back to me, stomp her little feet, put her arms up and say either “Up!” or “Whooshy!” She did that at Christmas too, but it was more of a “Slave! My feet have TOUCHED THE GROUND! Pick me up!”

So after having tossed her a few times, I had a new permanent shadow. It was especially fun when I pulled out my DS Lite with Sudoku. Apparently Laurel is starting to learn some of her numbers, and the DS has a TOUCH SCREEN, which she discovered made noises and did things when you touched it. So after attempting to actually play for about 30 seconds with a 2 year old in my lap “helping” me play, I gave up and we turned it into a game. “Which one is the 6, Laurel?” “Good Job! You hit the 6!” She was actually pretty good with it, when she wasn’t trying to yank it out of my hands so she could hold it herself. I’m not crazy enough to let a toddler hold my DS Lite.

All in all, I was shocked at how long she lasted without a nap – Nikki said she got up at 6 or 7 am, and we tried to put her down for a nap around 1 or so, and she was having none of that. We could tell she was starting to get cranky, though – she got a diaper change around 4pm, and left the bedroom running full tilt, slipped on the tile and landed hard. All we could hear was “BANG!” followed by wailing. That’s how you can tell she’s cranky; Nikki doesn’t make a big deal out of it when Laurel falls and bumps herself, so she doesn’t learn to start wailing at the littlest thing. Unless she’s tired.

Nikki picked her up, and then passed her off to Mark, who then passed her off to me. Apparently she wanted me, because she stopped screaming as soon as I took her. It was at that point that we started commenting on the fact that she had gone quite a while without a nap, and like that, she nodded off in my lap. At that point, everyone started heading home, and Matt & I started packing to head back to Grand Rapids. The drive down was much better than the drive up; the weather was much nicer, and for whatever reason the drive down always seems faster than the drive up.

Which brings us to Saturday. Mom called Saturday afternoon; apparently she got their photos from Easter developed, and was going through them with Laurel. Mom always plays the “Who is This?” game with Laurel, pointing out people in pictures and waiting for Laurel to identify them. She’s actually pretty good at that game; she can point out quite a few friends and family that she sees regularly. I know Mom & Nikki were trying to get her to say “Aunt Carrie” but it always seemed to come out as “Ah Kah,” which is pretty close I guess. So when Mom got to a picture with me in it, she turned to Laurel and asked who was in the picture, seeing if she would say “Aunt Carrie.” At which point Laurel pointed to me, and said “Whooshy.” That’s right, I exist to toss her in air.

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