With a blink of an eye

I've just returned from being away for work - a whirlwind tour of Vermont, Boston and NY (and driving in between them all which was tiring). I picked up the girls tonight from their respective school/daycare and was greated by 2 girls I hardly recognized:

Kara ran up to me with a bag of crackers and said "Can you open my bag of crackers so I can eat them please mummy" as crisp and clear as anything. I didn't even recognize it as her voice! (Evidently she had found a bag of animal crackers in her bag in the morning (Lance ... ??) and her teacher said that she would have to wait and ask her mummy if she could eat them .... Kara obviously remembered this ALL day and was (im)patiently waiting for me to arrive so she could ask - but I'm impressed she remembered her manners in the excitement).

Sophie stepped toward me when she saw me. Not crawled! Stepped! She stood up and took 3 steps before dropping to the ground and madly crawling the rest of the way. Ms. Lyn said she started taking steps today, so I almost saw her first steps! Plus Sophie looked liked she had grown another inch (height and width!).

So I go away for 5 days and return to find one girl (almost) walking and the other speaking like a transformed Eliza Doolittle (her speech for the rest of the night went from babytalk to babbling to extremely polite, lengthy conversations ... then back again).

Thanks for taking care of the monsters Lance!

PS#1: 2 days until the arrival of Grandma - whoohoo!!!
PS#2: The weather was sensational on my trip 70-80* every day ... while it snowed 2 days here in Seattle. (My gosh, I have resorted to blogging about weather ... sorry).