a Rachel update

So I haven't written much about Rachel lately.  Here's what she has been up to as of late....

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talkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalkingtalking

...and then talking some more.  Every so often she takes a breath.  She doesn't stop to eat (we have the same conversation at dinner every night:  "Rachel, you need to stop talking and eat your food!") or even to use the bathroom ("Rachel, you need to stop talking and go potty.").  Is this my child???  Anyone who knows me well knows I'm often about as quiet as they come.  I guess maybe she took it upon herself to fill in the silence.  There is no longer ANY silence in our house!

I guess she talked this much before Rebecca was born....I just didn't notice because she was the only one I had to pay attention to.  Now that my attention is divided, I find her talking to be just too much to take in sometimes. 

She's been obsessed lately with listening to stories on the CD player in her room.  It all started with this:

A friend of mine sent her one of these Tag Reading Systems.  She LOVES listening to the stories (she now has four of the Tag books and listens to them over and over).  Then another friend of mine sent her this:

She sent both the book and the CD.  So Rachel started listening and following along--over and over and over!  So the last time we were at the library, I looked for some books on CDs.  I found the Bearenstain Bear stories and she's spent countless hours up in her room this past week listening to those stories over and over again.  Since she's enjoying it so much, my next quest is to find a chapter book to read aloud to her--I'm thinking of starting with Stuart Little.  I looked up books to read aloud to preschoolers and that was one I found listed in a couple of places.  Anyone else have any other suggestions? 

Rachel is a character with an imagination that runs wild.  She pretends and pretends and pretends all day long.  Lately she's been playing a lot with her dolls and stuffed animals.  She's particularly taken with her Care Bear, Love-a-Lot Bear.  She goes almost everywhere with us (and then sits in the car while we're in the store or wherever it is we've gone).  She and Love-A-Lot Bear (and sometimes her other dolls and animals) play school, doctor, babies, princess, and all sorts of things together. 

I love my crazy girl.

(And her little sister!...who is the one who is REALLY supposed to be sitting in that chair!)