Too much JOY in her heart

My lil' girl can't make the pitiful face that gets Popsaroo out of lots of trouble. She will almost get it and then she cracks a smile. Her entire face lights up. We tell her she just has too much joy in her heart not to smile. It is the only contest that Popsaroo ever wins.

I picked her up from her first day of school after she had been sick all week with the crud from beyond. Her first words to me were in form of a confession of having her color changed to yellow. She followed the confession up quickly with a demand to stop at the gas station for a doughnut.

She whines in her defense, "Mom, I was just talking, it is what I do! I didn't even get a warning!"
"Yellow is the warning- no gas station doughnut for you!"

As you can imagine, that did not go over well, she was trying to practice a little emotional eating. Now if someone would just stop me from doing the same thing!

I am amazed how cranky one little girl can get when her emotional eating is thwarted. She got mad, slamming things around in the car, and just well, put out! Somehow it became my fault!

"Darling, where is the joy in your heart?"

"I don't have any joy in my heart and I don't want any!" OUCH!

Of course I chose this time to entertain myself and encourage her to do a pitiful face since she had no joy in her heart. I mean it was the perfect time. She might just get it right! She refused. I even told her that is how her Popsaroo gets out of so much trouble. She still refused.

I really wanted to see if she could do it. Sorry, it's a weakness.

Back home and several chicken nuggets later, she starts to perk up, a little. Now she is worrying herself to death over what Popsaroo is going to do when he sees her yellow. I think she was worried about him not having joy in his heart because she made me go over every possible scenario that might occur. Amidst her frenzy we finally made it to swim practice-late.

Do you know that when she climbed out of that cold water, she was a different child? She was! My cranky lil' girl was now in a great mood. I asked her, "Did you get your joy back?"
Holding her towel close around her cold little body, she did some silly little jump and smiled up at me with her whole face as she laughed,"Yes, I have my joy back!"

Oh, Joy!

I've got the joy, joy, joy down in my heart, down in my heart, down in my heart.

I've got the joy, joy, joy down in my heart, down in my heart to stay!