Sunday, September 18, 2005

the care and feeding of belly buttons

Claire is currently obsessed with rolling up her shirt as high as she can to show her belly. She is only allowed to do this in the house. I hate it, of course, but I'm banking on her getting it out of her system now.

So today I notice that her belly button (a bit of an outie, btw) is a little dirty. Easy enough to fix. I alert Claire to the situation and she is instantly fascinated with learning exactly how to clean this schmutzy belly button. I tell her we'll do it with lotion and a q-tip. She's cool with that. We go into my room, I get out the supplies and apply a dab of lotion to her belly button and swirl it around. She is enjoying this way too much. Then with the clean q-tip, I sweep around the bellyish button and remove the schmutz. I show Claire the teeny bit of dirt on the q-tip to prove my point - mom wasn't lying about the dirty belly button. The following conversation happened when we were finished:

Claire: MOM! My belly button is so clean! And smooth! We should do this every day.
Mom: No sweetie, every day isn't good for your belly button. Only once in a while and mommy will help you.
Claire: OK. Wow Mom, you really knew how to do this. You're a GENIUS!"

Yes baby, I know. I'm glad you've figured it out this early. Please help me to convince your sister. I love ya.

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