Kiddo found me in the kitchen today and announced that she was dressed up as a super hero. We'd recently found the cape we have, and the stickers for a cool super hero decal, and she was all decked out. She thinks this will make a great Halloween costume, which it would. After explaining to me how she was a super hero, she then informed me she wanted to practice flying, and started climbing onto a kitchen chair, from which she intended to jump to the (laminate) floor. That seemed overly harsh to me, so I suggested that she jump from the (shorter) couch to the (carpeted) floor in the connecting room. This seemed great to her, and she enjoyed herself for a while.Then she suggested that I come and catch her when she jumped. I told her absolutely not, and explained that it is really hard to catch people that way, and we wouldn't be doing it. We did refer to jumping into pools, and how we'd get a small pool for our backyard, not to be confused with our neighbor's big pool... and she kept jumping happily.
And I kept on doing whatever it was I was doing (unloading the dishwasher) and listening to the happy squeals of two small girls playing with each other. I looked at them, took this sweet picture, and went back to the kitchen.
Then, the mother voice in my head said, watch them. So I did. I looked up in time to see Babs stand on the couch, Kiddo raise her hands expectantly, and Babs jump into them. I then watched Babs' momentum knock Kiddo to the floor, with Babs falling on top of her, and Babs knock her head on the couch. (Not seriously, as indicated by her rolling over, laughing, and climbing back onto the couch.)
I still can't formulate the words to express my utter amazement at this scene. I, of course, but a stop to it immediately. Kiddo can barely catch a ball coming straight at her - how could she possibly think to catch her little sister, who weighs in at 75% of her size (although Babs was coming straight at her!)? Did she completely not listen to my explanation of "this is why we don't jump off the couch into people's arms?" How often, when I think I'm explaining something, do I just sound like an adult in a Charlie Brown video to her? to others?
Now I see that picture, and realize that there are clearly two smiles, and the grip of death around the older one's head.
