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Last night as we were making our way home from my in-laws, Sophie said to me, “Mommy, I can’t see the moon!”  She actually has a habit of looking for the moon (and coyotes) when we’re driving at night, so the statement didn’t come as a surprise to me.  I replied to her, “I know, honey, I don’t see the moon either.”  Then she says, “Where is the moon?”  I told her, “Well, sometimes the moon hides behind the clouds at night and then you can’t see it.”  On this particular night, there happened to be not a cloud in the sky, so obviously I was just making up something to tell her that would make sense to her as to why she couldn’t see the moon.  So of course I told her the first thing that came to my mind that I thought she might actually understand.  Much to my surprise, my 2 1/2 (almost) year old daughter is much more perceptive than I had thought and she responded to my statement with, “But Mommy, I don’t see any clouds in the sky.” 

My husband and I looked at each other and started laughing, somewhat quietly; both of us obviously stunned by the astute observational skills our young toddler had just displayed.  She asked again where the moon was and I managed to cease all questions with the response, “The moon is just hiding right now…it does that sometimes.”  We had just played hide and seek at her grandparent’s house, so I figured that answer would suffice.  I’m just not sure that she would have understood moon phases and how the moon is currently in its last quarter and, therefore, does not actually rise in our night sky until around 1-3 a.m.  Perhaps I should have just gone with that……next time.