Lydia is sleeping over at her cousin’s house tonight, which is a nice change of pace, as we’ve had friends of hers over three nights in the past week. I usually don’t mind when her friends spend the night, but a little goes a long way for me, and three nights in one week is a bit much. The last sleepover was Saturday, when one of the girls from across the street was here. Around midnight she suddenly wanted to go home. She said that nothing had happened at both she and Lydia said they hadn’t been fighting or anything, but the little girl was crying and inconsolable. I think she was afraid that we wouldn’t let her go home because it was so late, but she needn’t have worried. We had her call home and say she was coming back, then Olof walked her home and all was well. Lydia is still a bit baffled by it, but Olof and I both told her that sometimes a person just wants to be home and there’s nothing to do then but just to go home.

Tage has managed his first sentence. He’s said “Mamma, titta!” (“Mama, look!) at least a half dozen times today. I know it’s only two words, but everybody has to start somewhere. Poor little guy, he’s had a rough couple of days. The worst of it was yesterday when he pulled the fireplace screen over onto his face, and got some pretty good scrapes and bruises on his cheek. He looks like he’s been in a street fight. I don’t know if it’s a difference between boys and girls, or just a difference in their personalities, but Tage is so much more rough-and-tumble than Lydia ever was, and he’s been hurt so many more times than I remember her ever being hurt. He’s only sixteen months old, and he’s already had numerous fat lips, lost a fingernail, and chipped a tooth, in addition to myriad other bumps and bruises. I’d daresay that he’s been roughed up more in sixteen months than Lydia has in her entire life! I cringe to think this is a sign of things to come.