An Evening with Toots

Hubby and I had our granddaughter for a couple of hours last evening. I picked her up after I got off of school. She was excited to see me, but questioned why I had come. I told her that I had missed her and asked her if it was okay to pick her up. She answered, "It sure is. I have missed you, too. And I want to see my Papa, too, cause I have missed him." (Heart just melts!) We played outside for about an hour. First, we added water to the pond and then watered the plants around it. She squeezed too hard on the nozzle and shot some of the black bark into the pond. Quickly she blurted, "I'm so very sorry. That was really an accident." Do you suppose she has had practice with those statements? Next, I pushed her in the swing. She dearly loves swinging, much more than I like pushing, but we endured. Finally,!!, she decided she would slide down her tunnel slide. Only she wanted me to "catch" her. Actually, she wanted me to drop a leaf on her and say something nonsensical each time. In time, we found the shell of a locust. She was fascinated with it and tore it apart to check it out. We looked around and were able to find 4 altogether. She wanted to know if we could find the locust that crawled on her shirt last week. We checked the place we left it and found it's shell. Of course she had to show her Papa. Before we went to supper at her favorite restaurant, she dressed up in her princess clothes, complete with crown. She decided that she wanted to wear them to the restaurant so they would think she looked pretty. And since I am grandma, I let her. As we walked down the street to the Mexican restaurant, people looked and commented about the princess within their sight. She just beamed. The lady who seated us beamed just as much. And when Toots's favorite waiter took our order, he called her my princess. Before we finished, she was playing "peek and hide" with a boy across the room. She informed me that he was "pinking" at her meaning peeking. (It doesn't do any good to correct her, because she is so sure she is right.) And furthermore, I so enjoy being with her that it is okay to call it pinking!