Doing her thing at a wedding last Saturday.Today I met an old friend at the mall. This mall happened to be rather new, with an enclosed playground for young children. We took our kids there to munch on our salads and chat. In between conversations I was pondering the joy of the carpeted playground (thankful that I didn't have to contend with loads of sand in Annabelle's shoes) and noticed how quiet the 20+ children playing around me happened to be. The kids and moms were talking, but there wasn't any yelling/shouting/scolding. Well, except for one unruly child off in the corner who kept screaming.
Yes, that would be my child.
Everyone's playground experience was being punctuated by shrill screams every minute or so. And sometimes more frequently.
And unless you actually saw her screaming, you would never imagine that it was my girl. She was the one toddling around in the cute brown dress with a smile plastered on her face. The screams were those of pure joy. I'm guessing she just was so excited that the happiness was overwhelming her little soul and she just had to let it out in repetitive bursts.
At one point I looked to my friend and said, "You hear that one little child who keeps screaming over and over?"
She said, "Yes!", smiling in wonderment.
"That's Annabelle." I replied.
"REALLY??" she answered in (more) wonderment.
It really was pretty impressive, all that screaming. It was quite loud. I think I was the only one laughing about it. Maybe I'm finally used to how loud she is... and that's definitely taken me some time to get used to. But I have just started noticing how other people jump to attention at her screams and screaming-type laughter and realized that used to be me who would startle and get whatever she was asking for. Finally, finally, my nerves have relaxed and I can enjoy her screams as much as she does.
