Emma's personality has changed in two pretty drastic ways in the last month or two - one of which is a little sad, and the other of which is just plain annoying.

After years of looking as fancy as possible at all times, she is now actually content to dress like a normal person. At her dance class, the kids can wear whatever they want. Most of them just wear regular clothes, but Emma has always made a big deal of picking a matching leotard and tutu before class. The last three weeks, however, she has just worn normal clothes to class. Then today we were cleaning her room, and out of nowhere she said she wanted to pack away her dress-up clothes. What??!? So we went through her endless poofy, glittery dresses and with each one I asked her if she wanted to keep it out or pack it away. "Pack it away," was her reply for every single thing! She even wanted to pack away most of her dance stuff! I called Steve later and told him about it and we are both feeling a little sad. Her obsession with fancy stuff was so charming and quirky and such a big part of who she was for a long time. Sniff.

The other thing is not the end of something, but rather the beginning. In the first four years of her life, Emma has been about as un-picky about food as any one person could possibly be. She ate everything. The one thing she wouldn't eat was raw broccoli. Now, she has suddenly become a picky eater. She'll tell me she doesn't like something, without even trying it, even if it's something she's eaten many times before. Like last night, she saw me cutting sweet potatoes to make fries, and right away she said, "Ew, yuck. I can't stand sweet potatoes!" I reminded her that she's probably eaten sweet potatoes a hundred times and she's always liked them before, but she still refused to eat any. Grrr. I hope it's just a phase that will soon be over, but for now I'm just working on getting her to say she doesn't like something a little more politely. I can't believe how much it irks me to cook something and set it on the table, only to hear someone say that it looks gross.

Even if she is picky, she is still darn cute. Yesterday she was playing with Play-Doh and she came to me and said. "Mommy, I made something FABleeous! I know you'll want to take a picture!" Apparently it's me, wearing a dress, and playing ball with my friend Allison, who happens to be wearing overalls. (Because, according to Emma, Allison would look very pretty in overalls.)