In my prepping Annabel for her brother’s arrival, I’ve been telling her that she’s going to have to get used to sharing attention. She looks at me with a blank expression, like, “Share…I have no concept of that word.” But I’ve told her repeatedly that even though mom and dad will be taking care of her brother, it doesn’t mean that we love her any less and yadda yadda. I’ve also told her that we’ll have lots of mommy/daughter days, and daddy/daughter days – special days where she will get the undivided attention of each of her parents.

She’s been excited about the special days, and she asked me over the weekend, “Mama, can we have a Mama/Annie day before my brother comes?” And I realized we totally should. I mean, she and I do stuff just the two of us all the time, but it’s usually her tagging along on the errands I have to run. So I declared the day a Mama/Annie day, and I asked Annie what she wanted to do first.

“Put on makeups! I will teach you how to put on makeups!”

Annie always loves watching me put on makeup, so I kind of expected her to want me to put some on her, but no. SHE wanted to be the makeup artist.

getting my makeup done

I was a little worried I’d look like Ross Geller had applied my makeup, but she was content with putting about 87 layers of powder on my face. “Mama, you have a beautiful rainbow face now!” She declared when she was done.

I asked her what she wanted to do next, and she said she really wanted princess nails, aka she wanted me to paint her fingernails. I thought it might be fun if I took her to get an actual manicure. I figured she was old enough to sit still for one, so I took her to the nail salon at the mall. She was beyond excited while we waited our turn, and she kept saying, “I’m so excited, Mama! I love you, Mama!”

Our manicure stations were next to each other, but Annie had her back to my table.

her first manicure

I couldn’t hear what her manicurist was saying, but I could hear Annie’s side of the conversation…in fact, I think Annie was talking even when the manicurist wasn’t asking her questions. Some of the snippets I heard:

“My daddy is at home vacuuming!” (HA)

“My mommy is having a boy. I want a sister.” (!!!!)

“Are you my doctor? Are you Dr. Looove’s sister?” (The manicurists were all wearing white coats.)

At one point, I heard her recite the plot from Wreck-It Ralph.

Annie picked out a very sparkly pink color for her nails, but the manicurist added white polka dots.

our pretty nails

Annie was extremely proud of her nails.

showing me her new nails
Mama, take a picture of me and my princess polka dot nails!

We celebrated our pretty new nails at Starbucks, where Annie drank “tea” and ate cookies.
mommy/daughter day

When we got home, she ran into the office where Mike was working and said, “Daddy, a doctor gave me polka dots!”

I’ve probably created a manicure monster, and by probably I mean definitely, because she’s already talking about going back and “sitting in the big chairs to get princess feet!” It was a great day with her – I was feeling pretty good, and she was having a charming day (as opposed to an “acting like a three-year-old” day, which seem to be cropping up more often). I’m glad we didn’t wait until after the baby was born to have a special day. I’m thinking we’ll have to squeeze in a few more of these before the end of May.