Be still my beating heart...

No man can claim credit for this one though, my heart stopped and about burst at the same time because of my girls!

Tonight in the bathroom, after a long, but not bad day, my girls turned bath time into the best part of my day (by a mile!). Our day was a fairly normal one, we took our 2+ mile walk with Monica and Rylan; Grace had a nap; Lily and I had some quality time; Kelli, Monica and Rylan came over to play; We swam in the kiddie pool; Grace ate a sizable breakfast and dinner... It was a good day, but for some reason I just did not want to deal with bath time, and I like bath time... I got Grace washed (while Lily cried in her bouncy chair) Then picked Lily up and sat her on my lap while Grace put all of her Rubber Duckies in Time Out. Now I am wondering "Do I over do 'time out'?" "Is Grace understanding 'time out'? "Is it bad that she is playing 'time out?" you know all the things you wonder when you second guess your parenting skills. Admittedly, she had the 'time out' routine down pat! She sat the duckie down in the corner, told him/her "No biteing!" (the duckies were biting each other??) and moved away from the duckie. Then several minutes later she returned (I thought she forgot about this game) and asked "Why 'time out'?" (translation: Why are you in time out?) and hugged her duckie and brought him/her back into the mix. It is almost verbatim our time out routine/dialogue. But I digress, this was not my story...

Lily is on my lap and we are watching Grace play and splash and squeal. After one of Grace's squeals Lily responded in a similar high pitched, all be it drool muffled, squeal. This caught Grace attention so she started squealing at Lily and Lily continued to respond until one of the squeals from Lily became a laugh. (Baby laughs are the best laughs in the whole world!) Then Grace laughed, so Lily laughed again until the two of them were just cracking up together. It was... The best, happiest, most heart warming, stress relieving, therapeutic sound I have ever heard in my life. If I could have bottled it.... I only wish that Brian had been home so that someone had been able to video tape it, but with Lily on my lap and Grace in the tub, my hands were full...