Eeeeeee!

Recently, I taught Madeline about smiling. I thought this would be a simple concept but we encountered some difficulty.

She already knew about lips and mouth so it felt counterproductive to point to my mouth and declare, "This is a smile!"

So I resorted to an exaggerated smile every time I said it. I would cheese a huge grin, wrinkle my nose, squint my eyes and say, "Smile! Eeeee."

(I'm not sure why but saying "Eeeee" seemed like the appropriate sound effect for smiling.)

Anyways, the point of the story is... she got it! She now knows what to do when we ask her to smile.

It comes out like this:

It's a smile that scares strangers but I think it's darling. Especially since she says, "Eeeeee" every time she smiles.

Also, seeing this picture reminded me of most of our wedding pictures. I was a little too enthused that day and wrinkled my nose and squinted my eyes for most of the shots.

Like mother, like daughter.