There's A Girl In The House!

My wife's sister and her husband have gone to Australia (a.k.a. The Promised Land) for a week or so, and we have been blessed to keep their middle daughter Charlotte (yes, that Charlotte) for a few days. It has certainly been a different experience.

Two quick stories.

Like our Sam, Charlotte is the only person in her family with a nickname: Lottie. Now, having been told explicitly not to call her younger sister Maggie, I was unsure exactly what the proper protocols were. So, in the car on the way out last night, I asked her whether she preferred Charlotte or Lottie.

"Either one is fine," she said, "or you can call me Jewelry" (she pronounced it joolery). Then she smiled.

"Jewelry?" I said, "Like the pretty stuff you wear?" She blushed and nodded, then said, "You can call me that if you want to."

Then, when my wife was walking out to the car (she had been on the phone, natch), Lottie gasped and said, "She is so beautiful!"

As these words had never, ever been spoken in that car, it took me a second or two to figure out what she was talking about. I said "You mean Auntie?"

Lottie said, wide-eyed, "Yeah!" I agreed, and in the back seat, oblivious to all, the boys continued playing their gameboys.

When my wife got in the car and I told her what Charlotte had said, she blushed and said, "You're putting that in the blog, right?"

Right.