This year I happily hosted my sister and her family and my brother and his family (separately!) in my little postage-stamp sized condo – at one-bathroom, one-bedroom plus den, it’s an intimate arrangement.  I am not sure how much longer my nephews and nieces, never mind my brother and sister’s spouses, are going to entertain overnight visiting as much-fun, but for now they keep coming and I love hosting.

It is during these visits where I am included in the little worlds that my nephew’s and niece’s inhabit as they curiously expand their intellect.

A few of my favourite moments this year in no particular order:

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It’s a miracle!  I am cooking in my condo kitchen for my family.  Mind you I am making the simplest of dinners – fajita’s.

We are chatting away, my nephew and niece are playing with bits and pieces of Lego when I hear this question:

“Aunt D-D, why do you need a kitchen in your hotel room?”

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“Aunt D-D has the biggest house! She even has an elevator!”

As they enter the smallest living space they’ve ever seen in their life-time.

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We leave my condo, I pull down my prescription sunglasses so I can see what I am doing and I lock the door. My nephew quietly twists and turns making his way down the hallway in front of me reaching the elevators first.  We can hear the “beep, beep, beep” of the elevator as it climbs up to our floor.  In serious thought my nephew turns to me and dead-pans:

“Auntie D-D,” long pause as he fidgets his shoe against the carpet, he stops and stands-still looking directly at me, “You look K-E-W-L”

He doesn’t wait for an answer, he turns around to focus on the nothing at the other end of the hallway.

Points for me and my shades!