Oh the bliss of reciprocated affection!

We've been teaching Phoenix how to kiss for months now. She's still a bit clumsy with it, and she does not give out affection freely. You can beg and plead all you want for the simplest peck or lightest embrace, but no, she does not bestow these affections lightly. She surprised me once when I was buckling her into the carseat, as I was leaning down, she leaned forward and gave me a kiss. It was mostly sound effects (a hearty "tsk") with very little contact, but it was her own doing, which moved me.
But today was different. Maybe it was because she has outgrown her morning nap and she was a bit delusional from fatigue. We were in our next-door neighbor Leah's apartment. Phoenix was exploring in her usual harried, manic style and at one point she sort of sidles over and backs into me and leans against my legs. So I pick her up and she turns to me and throws her arms around me, squeezing my neck with almost as much force as she usually uses to push me away and she kisses me. On the lips. For real. And keeps squeezing me and looking at my face. It was amazing. She usually doesn't so tricks on demand, mostly won't perform publicly, so this was indeed special.
Later that same day we went out for a walk with Leah, and her daughter, Selah. When we got home I was picking her up out of the stroller and she does it again. Wraps herself around me and plants a huge kiss on my lips so forcefully that our teeth collide. It was absolutely breathtaking. She's really catching on to this kissing business. And although I would love her to hug and kiss me when I ask for it, it is so much better to receive it completely unbidden and by surprise. I know there will come a time when she will slam her door in my face and tell me she wishes I weren't her mother, so I will play those kisses over and over again in my memory to remind myself that I'm not a bad mother, really, most of the time.