Life has been crazy, to say the least. Between three preps a day at school, tutoring, keeping the house cleaned, and spending time with my family - I don't have a lot of free time on my hands. I am so busy soaking up every second of my crazy/busy/awesome/bless life that I don't take the time I should to record what we have going on. But I just wanted to make a quick list of the things that Caroline is saying and doing because I know I won't remember them and they are precious.
*She calls a spoon a shoom.
*She calls a rhinoceros a moss-ous.
*When we hand her something she says, 'Thank you!' in this high pitched voice and if you say thank you back she says, 'Welcome!'
*She plays hide and seek and she'll put her head around the corner and say, 'Are you?'
*She'll sit down in her seat with a book and say, 'Read it. Self.'
*She says 'shoom geem' for 'excuse me'.
*She will say something and then nod her head and say, 'Yep. Mmm hmm.'
*She has recently started saying 'awesome' and 'sassy' - correctly.
*She will walk up to something and say a long drawn out, 'Wow!'
*Every time she sees our Christmas tree she says, 'Tree. Cute!'
*She is now aware of stop lights and stop signs. When she sees a stop sign she'll say, 'Red. Sign.' and I'll ask her what it means and she'll say, 'Stop,' and put her hand up. When I ask her about green she'll say go and when I ask her what yellow means, she'll say 'fall down' instead of slow down!
*She says 'odher moan' for other one.
*All of her c's are t's right now. So she is Tarowine, she drinks from a tup, she asks for a tookie, etc.
*She has started to change the teddy bear's diaper and she'll say 'lay back' and 'mediss' like we do when we change her diapers. (Santa spoiler - she's getting a baby doll for Christmas and she is going to LOVE it!)
*She is getting better about using her manners. We still have to remind her more often than not to say 'thank you' and 'please', but she is now saying, 'Thank you, Daddy!' and 'Thank you, Mommy!'
*She has also started to say 'Bye bye, Daddy!' if he has to leave before us in the morning. She'll also get behind us and push our legs and say 'Come on, Mommy!' if we are trying to leave and one of us is being slow.
*She'll grab Jason's hands and pull and grunt to help him up.
*When she gets tired and ready for bed, she'll bring us the Aquaphor and say 'whip' because we put a little bit of the Aquaphor on her lip before bed so her 'daci' (pacifier) doesn't irritate her mouth. Speaking of bed, she loves going to bed and asks for it a lot of nights. We give her a hug and a kiss, put her in her crib, close the door and we don't hear from her again until morning. It is pretty awesome.
*When I tell her that we are about to do something she'll say 'Ok!' in this really emphatic voice.
*A few weeks ago I asked her to give me a hug and it dawned on me that unless I showed her how to really give a hug, she wouldn't know. So I took her arms and I showed her how to wrap them and really squeeze. Now she gives the BEST squeezing hugs ever.
*When she wants to be picked up and carried she'll say, 'Hold it!'
*When she gets 'hurt' (she is so super dramatic, so hurt would be in air quotes if I could) she'll come over and say, 'Foot. Hurt. Kiss it.' and when we do she'll say, 'All better!'
*She calls nuggets 'nunnets' and says 'nummy' for yummy.
*She calls ice cream 'i keem'.
*The whole time she is in time out now she says 'Listen. Carowine. Listen.' At least she's got the right idea!
This is just a little bit of what she is doing that is awesome and funny and perfect. She is a fantastically weird little person and I am so lucky that I get to be a part of her growing up. She is so smart and she is learning so much every single day. The words she says and the things that she can do never cease to amaze me. My sweet little girl is growing up so quickly and I want to remember all that I can! I love you, whack a doo!
It really is true that once you think you've got the hang of things, you get a whole new batch of new things to become the 'master' of. We are in a new batch of things right now.
It's been a while now that Caroline has been able to say the word no. It was one of her first few words and it was super cute those first few times she said it. Fast forward to her sassy 21 month self, and no has taken on every bit of of its intended meaning. When she says no, she now knows exactly what it means and she is beginning to find out the repercussions of saying those two little letters at the wrong time. She has gotten her butt popped a few times and she has had her butt put into time out a good few times for saying no to us when we ask her to do something (which begs the question why her butt gets punished for what her mouth is doing!). Now we, as her parents, are having to watch what we say - and I don't mean in terms of cuss words. We have to watch how we phrase everything we say to her and make sure that any question we ask her, she really can say no. We can't say, 'Hey, Caroline, do you want to go take a bath?' when we know darn well her behind is getting in the bathtub whether she wants to or not. I had no idea how often I would be inclined to ask her a question instead of telling her what to do. I guess in a perfect world I would ask her if she wanted to do everything and she would do exactly what I want for her to do every time. But this world is far from perfect and that isn't the way that we all roll. So now if I need for her to put the book back that she got out, I make sure to say, 'Caroline, put that book back.' When we are having dinner, I ask, 'Hey, do you want some strawberries for dinner,' and if she says no, I offer something else. Granted, I don't give her the option of cookies and ice cream for dinner, but usually when I give her the choice between strawberries and apple sauce, she will pick what she wants and it will be gone in a few seconds!
Do we get this right every time? Of course not. I catch myself asking her something and then starting to get mad when she says no, but when I think about it I just asked her if she wanted to do something and no was a perfectly good answer. So I try to be aware of it so that she knows exactly when I mean business about something and when she has a chance to pick for herself. The world is a much better place when she knows I mean business!
It was on this day that my first born took her first pee and dump in the potty. Is she potty trained? No. Is she potty trainING? No. She just got down from the table one day and said, 'Bathroom. Potty.' So I walked into her closet and got Anna's old potty that I had grabbed a few weeks earlier, put it on the floor, took her clothes off and she sat down. She looked up and said, 'Uh oh.' When I checked, she had peed in the potty. So I high fived her and told her what a good job she had done. Then she said, 'Uh oh' again and sat back down. This time she stood up and there was a giant man sized turd in the bottom of the potty. She looked at me with a worried look on her face and said, 'Uh oh' again. I again told her that she had done a great job and high fived her. Once she saw how the potty was going to emptied and she was going to be wiped, it then became kind of fun for her. So after a little while she sat back down and I'll be dag-oned if she didn't pee again.
I have heard horror stories about potty training and I know that unless the kid is ready, there is no sense in trying to make potty training happen. So I decided that unless she talked about it, I wouldn't make it a big deal. So for a few nights after this she would sit down and pee, but that was it. Every once in a while she will say pee pee and run to the bathroom and when I get in there to take her diaper off it is warm. So that means she is starting to put two and two together, but I think we still have a while.
My Targaholic self is also addicted to Pinterest. It is SUCH a good time waster - like I have a ton of time to waste!
The other day I was on there and saw a pin that said something about changing YouTube videos to mp3 files. I tried it with Philip Phillips 'Home' (I love that song, don't hate) and it worked like a charm and I was so excited. How had I never thought about doing that before? So I tried another song and it said it wouldn't work. So I laughed at myself for believing it and clicked out of Chrome and didn't think about it again.
Then, this weekend, Jason was watching the Bubble Guppies with C and I thought to myself how much I would love to have those songs in my car (because the music is actually pretty good). Then it dawned on me that that website may be able to help. So I found my first Bubble Guppies song on YouTube, put the URL into the website and crossed my fingers and BAM - it worked. So then I found the next and tried it again and BAM - it worked again! 25 Bubble Guppie and Elmo songs later, I am the coolest mom on the block and Caroline is happy as a clam to listen to her favorite tunes in the car.
I am not opposed to rocking out to some good ol' Kumbaya in the car, but I am trying to delay that for as long as possible. So I am stoked that I have music that she loves and that I actually sing throughout my day of my own free will!
Now for the part you have all been waiting for - DRUM ROLL, PLEASE!
Warning: Some songs are not able to be converted. I'm not sure what makes some work and some not, but the majority of what I have tried has worked very well! I have the music on iTunes and CDs in my car to prove it!
Hello, my name is Sarah and I am a Targaholic. I must go every few days and if I don't, I start itching all over. I just love it. Whether I am going for one thing, twenty things, or nothing at all - I. LOVE. IT. I don't know what it is about it. It could be the Red Card that really does save you 5% off on every single purchase. (If you also love Target and do not have one of these cards - go get one RIGHT NOW. It is a debit card that pulls money straight out of your checking account, but just takes 5% off of your bill every single time. There are no fees (I have had mine for over a year and have not had to pay one penny) of any sort. It is just that awesome because Target is just that awesome!) I loved it before my Target was a grocery store (with a dag-on Starbucks in it!) and once they made the switch I told my husband we were never ever moving. Our Target is literally around the corner for us, which allows me to satisfy my need fairly easily. I love picking Caroline up from school and going to pick up that imaginary item that I came up with just so I could go to Target. I have stood in line at the Starbucks that is now nestled into my sweet little land of joy and had conversations with people about how much we love Target. Does that happen at Walmart? It may, but you won't have that conversation with me.
Which brings me to the point of this post. I have started planning our meals out week by and week and doing the grocery shopping on Sundays. It has saved us from a lot of produce going bad and it has also saved us from the terrible What Are We Having For Dinner? question that I got so sick of. So the first Sunday was pretty fun because it was a new way of doing things. I was in charge of the kitchen (which has not been the case since Jason is the true chef of our family) and I had my list and I was ready to go. Michelle actually went with me, which made it a bit easier. I was in and out and it was not TOO painful. But don't get that tangled and twisted - I was by no means a fan of that place. There are just TOO many people trying to get to the same stuff and it is overwhelming and overcrowded and I overhate it. The next Sunday was worse. I spent all Saturday dreading the trip. The next weekend I ended up just going to Target and getting enough to get us through the week until I could build up the whatever-I-would-need to get back to Walmart.
Last weekend I set up a challenge for myself. I wanted to see how much more expensive Target was than Walmart so I would know that I really did need to go to Walmart to save the most money for my family. (Side note: Since I am the money person for our family, this is VERY important to me since I see the money go out and come in every month.) So I took my list for that week and I went to Target and priced every single item. Target had every thing that I needed for that week. Then I went to Walmart and told myself that I would buy anything at Walmart that was cheaper. Honest to goodness, I left there with one bag full of maybe five or six things. Their canned goods were a few cents cheaper and there were a couple of other items that were cheaper, but it wasn't by much. Everything else I ended up getting at Target because they were cheaper. So not only is Target cheaper on most items I was looking for, I also got 5% off on top of that! It was awesome! If I had really been doing my research as the mathematical brain that I am I would have calculated average percentages and exactly how much cheaper Target was, but I did not. Honestly, I did not think Target was going to be cheaper, so I wasn't prepared for that part of the challenge. Maybe another Sunday!
So needless to say, I am very excited about my Sunday shopping trips to Target to get ready for the meals for the week!
Here I am wiping my brow and being glad that we made it through the past few weeks!
We just completed our third week of daycare. When we first started, Mrs. Val told me it may take a couple of weeks for things to start to calm down a bit. She was exactly right. Last Friday (the end of the second week) we started talking about friends on the way to school. When we got in the car we talked about how Mommy is going to go to school, Daddy is going to go to school, Chell is going to go to school, and Caromine (her new pronunciation) is going to go to school. Then we started talking about her friends at school and how much fun she is going to have. Some of the kids are the same as last year and some of the kids I have never met before. So I sneaked a peek at the names on the cubbies so that I could add to her list of friends. So we talked about Ayden, Tanvi, Dreama, Patrick, Jackson, Neil, Mrs. Nita, and Mrs. Val. I'd say the names and she would repeat them back. She got especially excited about Tanvi (I think they are close buds) and Mrs. Val. Last year she LOVED Mrs. Nita, but I think she is more about Mrs. Val this year. By the time we got to school we had talked about all of her friends and how much fun she was going to have. So I went to get her out of her seat (every time before this this is where she would really start crying) and I told her we were going to see her friends. She got right out, I grabbed her hand to walk her in, she dropped my hand once we got to the door inside and asked me to open the door. Then she walked right in, ran to Mrs. Val, told me bye, and I turned and left. It was AWESOME!!!!!!!
This is how every morning has been since then and it has been awesome. She is hanging her coat up in her cubbie, asking for Mrs. Val, and walking herself right in. I give her a kiss and peace out for my day. It really is an easier way to start my day and lets me head to work thinking about work and not about my heart breaking for her. Bonus this week was that we got a 2 hour nap out of her on Wednesday and an hour and a half nap on Thursday. Those days she came home my sweet girl. She was not fussy or whiny. She listened, used her manners, and was just much more fun to be around. We played outside, we laughed, and we spent those hours just enjoying each other. The days she doesn't naps are just afternoons that we have to get through and I will admit they are not a lot of fun.
Some people told me to enjoy the times that she wanted me because soon she would not. I'll tell you what, I got no pleasure out of her crying for me and having to be torn out of my arms. There is nothing about that that made me feel extra loved by her. It made me so sad knowing that I had to leave her feeling like that for 8 hours. Now that she walks in by herself and gives me a kiss and tells me bye, it makes me so happy and proud that she is confident and feels safe and secure in knowing that I always will come back to get her and until that happens, she has lots of friends and two great teachers to spend her day with!
A year ago I was dropping Caroline off at daycare for the first time. A month in I wrote this. The moral is that daycare sucked, but that we were all getting along just fine.
Fast forward to May and I was picking her up for the last time before summer. That's when I wrote this. Well, our summer was AWESOME. She was just getting to the age where she wanted to learn anything and everything. She was a sponge and I was glad to be there to pour in everything I could. She learned all sorts of stuff and became a pretty decent conversationalist.
Then came August when summer ended and we had to go back to work. Thanks to my mom, we got her to stay for a week and Jason's mom to stay for a week so that we didn't have to pay for daycare at all in August. That was really sweet of them and awesome for us because we got to focus on school starting and not have to worry about her. We knew she was at home and getting a good nap and bopping around and having a good ol' time. She would cry for us when we left, but I'm sure that was more for our benefit than hers. I think it lasted 2.5 seconds and then the Bubble Guppies or her blocks would grab her attention.
This week was the first week of 'school' for C and it was rough. I wish I could go back to myself last year and explain what a breeze taking her to 'school' was then because she didn't know any difference and was happy just about anywhere you put her. Now that she is 18 months old, she is very aware of where she is and where we are. So when we get to school I walk her in and she starts crying as soon as we walk in the door. I know she doesn't remember Mrs. Val and Mrs. Nita from last year, but they LOVE her and have been so patient with her. So they are right there to help take her and distract her. So I either hand C over or they take her while she is crying harder and yelling out for me. I tell her bye bye, that I love her, and that mommy always comes back. Then I close the door and walk to my car as I can hear her crying for me. It is absolutely heart breaking. Then I drive to school (only crying one morning this week when I left!), put in my full day of work, and get in my car as soon as I can. When they open the door she walks out to me crying because they have just told her that I'm there and she starts crying because she is reminded that I've left her. Then they tell me either she slept for 45 minutes or just cried the whole time and hasn't had a nap at all. When we get in the car most of the car ride home consists of her saying, 'Mommy' and 'back' and me reassuring her that Mommy will ALWAYS come back. Then every once in a while she'll through, 'Daddy' and 'back' in there, just to make sure that Daddy will always come back, too!
As rough as this week has been, I have to believe that it will only get better from here. It seems that she is playing a little more each day and doing a little less crying. They say she is eating just as well as she always has, so it isn't like she is so distraught she can't eat. Home girl just needs to take a nap!
So we made it through this week. It was tough, but we made it to Friday. So when the bell rang this afternoon I rushed to my car, scooped her up, and got her home. We started our weekend together by watching 3 - THREE! - episodes of Bubble Guppies in a row. She usually gets one in the afternoon and that is it. Today, I didn't give a shit how many she watched and what it may do to her. All I wanted to do was sit with her and kiss her head and get her a snack and pay attention to only her. It was the perfect way to start off the weekend and I don't plan on doing anything but making sure to get some good QT in with her.
I hope I can come back in a couple of weeks and wipe my brow and be glad that we made it through!
Thank you, Darius Rucker, for helping me believe that this will get better!
From 'It Won't Be Like This For Long'
And when he drops her off at preschool She's clinging to his leg
That is so crazy! I can't believe my sweet little baby girl is not a baby girl anymore! We are in full fledged toddler-hood.
*She is still wearing 18 month clothes. The 12-18 month stuff is getting small on her, so I think she has caught up with sizing. She is in size 5 shoes. She is in size 3 diapers during the day and size 4 diapers at night.
*We went to the doctor a couple of weeks early because somehow we missed out on the 15 month appointment. At her "18 month" appointment she weighed 23 lb. 9.5 oz. (43rd percentile) and she was 32.5 in (80th percentile). She was healthy as a clam and her doctor was very impressed with how verbal she was.
*Even though her weight percentile is low, she eats SOO well. She will eat just about anything and eat plenty of it. She loves ravioli (olis), mac+cheese, hotdogs, watermelon, canteloupe, pears, etc. We don't ever have to worry about her being hungry!
*We have had to institute time out at our house. I was spanking her (and I am not stopping, nor am I opposed to it) but it just wasn't working. So we started sending her to time out. We have a chair that I wrote Time Out on and we put it in the corner of the front room. It separates her from us, but lets her still see us. She hates it, which is a good thing. She shouldn't want to go there! I leave her for no longer than 1 minute and then I go and explain to her why she was put in time out, make her say I'm sorry, give her a big hug, and I tell her I love her. I want for her to understand, above all else, that even when she messes up I will still love her.
*She now has all sorts of friends in the crib with her. Sometimes it is just the normal gang (Daci, Bobo, piggy, pig, and elephant), but occasionally she'll invite some new friends in there with her. Hey, I'm all about her feeling loved and not lonely!
*Within the past week, she has come up with this crazy obsession with Dora. She doesn't watch the TV show at all and hasn't really seen her since Grands' Camp this summer. For her birthday she got a Dora outfit. She has worn it once or twice before this week. Now all of a sudden she goes into meltdown mode when she can't wear Dora. Jason's mom was with us this week and she found some Dora pajamas. Those also cause fits if she can't wear those. Today I went and got her a little $6 Dora figure and I am hoping that does the trick and lets her hang out with Dora no matter what she has on. Dora is in the bed with her right now and she is in her monkey pjs, so it may be working. It is crazy what they get stuck on!
*She knows ALL of her colors very well and knows all body parts. There really are very few words that she can't say that she needs. She also knows all of the Sesame Street characters.
*She LOVES to help me feed Harley. I get the food into the cup and then she carries the cup to his bowl, dumps it in, carries it back, and closes the lid. She asks if we can do it all the time.
*She loves Harley. When we are somewhere and she wants to get out of her car seat all we have to say is that she can get out once we get home and she can see Harley-boo. She'll say, 'Har-boo' until we get there!
*When you ask her where something is, she'll say, 'I on't know' and shrug her shoulders and look really concerned.
*She is still saying 'Oh, pay' or 'Oh, fay' for okay. I hope that is something that never goes away - even though I know eventually it will.
*She is a master with a fork and a spoon and she LOVES to drink out of cups and does a pretty good job already.
*We worked really hard not to make her OCD. We let her be dirty with the intention of her not having to be clean all the time. Well, her OCD developed on its own. She cannot have dirty hands and she'll say, 'Mess' any time something spills. We made smores and she could not eat them because her fingers were getting dirty.
*We can tell her to put her hands on the ground, then her head on the ground, and 'Go!' and she will do a forward roll! I think we have a gymnast on our hands!
*We have an elephant that blows colored balls into the air. Caroline could care less about the balls and just holds her head over the blowing air like a mini-Marilyn!
*She LOVES to wear hats and sunglasses.
*We got her her first puzzle recently and she LOVES it. She will put the animals where they need to go over and over again.
*We brought home some Legos from when I was growing up and she has LOVED those. She will build and build towers and talk about the colors. We recently got her some bigger blocks and she has LOVED those, too. She can even say 'tower' once she builds it high enough.
*When we get her dressed or I fix her hair, she'll look down and say, 'Cute!'
*She still loves to talk on the phone. She is getting better at it all the time.
*She loves to take a shower (which is funny because she was so scared not long ago). After drying off she will ask for the towel and when we wrap the towel around her shoulder she'll say, 'Cute!'
*Showers have also led to the boy/girl conversation. She can point to my lady parts and call it a tuta and point to Jason's and call it a wee wee.
*She still LOVES LOVES LOVES the Bubbles. She wants to watch it ALL the time, but she only gets on in the morning and one in the afternoon. Partly because I love that she will sit in our lap for that 20 minutes and not want to get up.
*Now that she has had something to drink other than milk and water she is all about having some of everyone's drink. She'll keep saying 'dink, dink' until someone shares-and she has said please!
*She likes to pick up things and take them to the appropriate person to make sure everyone has their stuff.
*Anytime we put on deodorant she'll run up and say, 'Some!' and we pretend to put deo on her.
*She eats cereal every morning. She loves plain ol' Cheerios with milk and fruit for breakfast. Can't get much better than that.
*Now that she has names mastered, she will just randomly scream out people's names. Today we went to lunch with most of my side of the family and she would just randomly scream 'Will!' or 'Papa!' or 'Mimi!' or anyone else's name and just smile when they looked at her.
*When she sees a baby she'll say, 'Baby!' and then say 'Aww!' with her head cocked to one side.
*Even though she can talk a ton, she is still only 18 months old and gets very frustrated. Lately she has been telling other kids to share as she is ripping things out of their hands and not sharing one bit. She is also a screamer when someone tries to get in her business.
*She loves watching Elmo videos on YouTube. I have a list that we watch on my Kindle Fire, so every time she sees it she asks for Elmo. She also asks for 'Stars' every time she sees Mom's phone because they watch 'Twinkle, twinkle' on there.
*I think she is going to have an awesome memory. A few times we have said something to her before bed and she wakes up asking for it.
*Her hair is long enough to make a ponytail. It is awesome. Her little curls will pull out of it and she'll have a ponytail with curls at the nape of her neck.
*When she gets really tired she'll say 'Night, night' and go run to her room. Can't beat that.
Thank you, sweet girl, for giving us the best 18 months of our lives! You are trying out those boundaries and we want you to do that - even though it frustrates the mess out of us sometimes! We know you are going to be your own person and could wish nothing more for you. We love you a bushel and a peck!
SUCKS. It's no wonder that there are so many entitled brats in this world. Disciplining your kid is definitely not the easy road. It sucks to be the bad guy. But when I have asked you not to do something and you look directly into my face and do what I have asked you not to - aww hell nah, Mama don't play that. You are going to get your butt popped. There are some things in this world that are not acceptable. Running out into the street. Non-negotiable. Putting your feet on the table that we are eating off of. Unacceptable. So if you do these things (among plenty of others), you are going to get popped. Yes, it breaks my heart to see you cry. Every single one of those crocodile tears weighs on my heart when they fall. But I love you more than life itself and I am not going to let you act like that. So after you have stopped doing whatever it is that I asked you not to (and your butt got popped for) and I give you a hug after we talk it out, that hug is my way of showing you that I still love you even when you frustrate the mess out of me. So what that I let bath time be a little longer and you get to watch an extra Bubble Guppies before bed after an especially rough day. I may not have liked you very much at points during the day, but my love for you knows no bounds. You are my sweet girl and cuddling up with you is exactly what we both needed at the end of the day.
*She refers to herself as a 'hot mess' now. When she does something funny, she'll just say 'hot mess' completely unprompted.
*She calls herself 'Carowine'. She started doing this when she would walk around with a fake phone and say 'Hello!' and then hand me the phone and I would ask if they wanted to speak to Caroline. It is precious.
*She knows just about all of her colors. She can point to and name blue, green, yellow, red, pink, purple, white, and black. She will walk around to stuff and say, 'Color's that?' It's pretty awesome to see her want to learn.
*If you count, she'll give you the even numbers up to ten! She will also go 1, 2, 6!
*She can point to all the different things on her face. She can close her eyes when you ask her to and she will stick out her tongue if you ask her where hers is.
*She now has some friends with her in bed. It used to just be her paci (now called 'Daci') and her bobo, but she is now joined by an elephant, the pig she took her pictures with, and another little pig we got at Ikea. She does a check before she goes to bed.
*For a couple of weeks now she has been telling us when she needs a new diaper. She'll just walk up to us and say 'biper' (diaper) and when we check she will usually have a pretty nice present in there for us. Do I see some easy potty training in our future? I'll keep you posted on that one. *She has started to say 'love you' unprompted. Most of the time she will say it when we say it to her when she is going to bed, but every once in a while she will throw it out there on her own. *Since she has been talking she has said, 'Oh, bay-bee!' I have no idea what she is really trying to say or where she got it, but she says it all the time and I can't help but laugh. *I am getting a glimpse into a girly-girl. Mimi had some plastic bracelets and Caroline loves to put them on and walk around with her arms up so that they stay on. Mimi gave us a set to take home and she has walked around most of the afternoon with those things on. She is also into brushing hair. She'll brush anyone's hair that will let her and she is a fan of me letting my hair down so that she can get it nice and straightened out. Pretty soon I'll be like my mom and pay her a quarter so that she will play with my hair!
*She is requesting songs. She'll say 'Itsy', 'Happy', 'Star', or 'Sunshine' and then dance along as we sing them for her. It is cute 98% of the time - it is not cute anymore after a 4 hour ride home from the coast when we have gone through all of them a few good times! *Her laugh is still one of my favorite things of all time. When we get her going she will belly laugh and then she gets hiccups EVERY SINGLE TIME!
*She still loves the Bubble Guppies and gets SUPER PSYCHED when they come on. *I wrote in the last update that she was getting to the mean stage. That has gone almost as quickly as it came. The hitting and kicking is gone for the most part, even though she will scream when she gets told no. She has also gotten her butt popped a few good times for it!
*Her vocabulary is pretty big. There isn't a whole lot that she does that she can't ask for/talk about.
*She LOVES to buckle stuff. Sometimes we can clean her up from a meal and leave her in her seat for a good 10 minutes buckling her strap. She also has a habit of walking around to ALL strollers and trying to help them buckle their belts.
*We have been to the beach/pool a good few times this summer and the girl loves her some water. She is in that weird stage of wanting to be completely let go and hating to wear any type of flotation device. She'll kick it in her little boat for a bit, but the novelty wears off quickly. We went out into the ocean and she was pushing off of me so that I would let her go, but she LOVED being thrown over the waves. She also sits in the waves and says, 'Wee!' every time a new bit of water laps over her. This last time we went to the pool she would stand on the edge and start to count and semi-jump in. She also figured out that she can play on the steps and not have to be held by anyone.
*She still loves to brush her teeth and gets pretty mad when you go into the bathroom and don't put her up on the counter. She'll just stand there and say, 'Ahh!' until you help a girl out.
*She is starting to cut her eyes at you. Her facial expressions are out of control already!
*She will do something and then turn around and say, 'No, ma'am!' before we can. Then she runs the other way laughing.
*She tells Harley, 'No, sir!' even though she LOVES HIM. When we go on walks, she loves to hold his leash and she'll see 'Harwey walk!'
*She knows everyone's name in the family. She can say all grandparents, cousins, aunts, uncles, etc.
*When we are telling her to do something and end with OK, she'll nod her head and say, 'Oh, pay!'
*At almost 17 months she is in size 12 - 18, 18 month clothes, size 3 diapers, and size 4 shoes. The diapers and the shoes will be changing in the not too distant future - especially with all this growing she is doing!
It is time for the annual Grands' Camp!! Last year was crazy and this year was even CRAZIER! To hear it straight from the horses mouth, Mimi herself is a guest blogger and did a GREAT recap for a GREAT week!
Grands’ Camp – 2012
The week began
with Leslie and her family arriving on Saturday. It was a big night for Anna because she got
to sleep on the top bunk for the first time.
How exciting and she is “almost 5 (Mimi’s rule), so it was okay!” Early Sunday, Leslie and Will left on a
business vacation, so Mimi walked with Anna and Jack to her school and played
on the playground. FUN!! Sarah and her family arrived Sunday
afternoon. Anna, Jack and Caroline were
SO excited to see each other. Jason and
Harley headed back to Winston for football.
Leslie’s family brought a recordable card to Mimi for her birthday a
couple of weeks ago. On that card after
Anna and Leslie’s message was a song recorded in 1950 by Doris Day, “I love
you, a bushel and a peck, a bushel and a peck and a hug around the neck…”! Well, little did we know that it would become
our theme song for the week! All the
kids learned it, sang it and danced to it a hundred times – PRICELESS!!!
Day 1: Nia
and Penelope arrived early, so we got things started! Everyone made T-shirts with their handprint
fish. SO cute!! Then two pools filled
with cool water and a Slip-N-Slide made for a fun filled morning. All the cousins played and swam and slipped
and slid and drank pink lemonade (Thanks, Mrs. Mabie for the PERFECT gift!!!)
and just had the BEST time. Papa, Mimi
(yes!), Sarah and Michelle just couldn’t let the kiddos have ALL the fun! The ‘big people’ had their turns on the
Slip-N-Slide, too! It was an AWESOME way
to spend a HOT summer day!! We had a
picnic with sandwiches, chips and lemonade for lunch. A warm bath for the little ones and dry
clothes for the big folks and then nap and quiet time!!! Nice!
The evening was spent just watching the cousins play.
Day 2: Day
1 was so much fun, we did it again!! We
did add Papa’s tractor ride to the fun.
He attached the wagon to the tractor and he and Jack (the drivers!)
pulled the rest of the kiddos around the yard and up and down the street. NOBODY wanted to stop-especially Jack the
driver!! Greg showed up for lunch and we
had another picnic and added watermelon this time. It is FANTASTIC to eat watermelon outside,
with bathing suits on, sitting on the slip-n-slide! Mimi’s nephew, Oren, arrived in time to get a
little fun time in his bathing suit. A
warm bath and naps for the babies and Mimi and Papa took the three ‘big’ kids
for the afternoon at the N.C Aquarium, followed by a trip to Sweet Frog for a
treat!!
Day 3:
Today is beach day!!! We packed
up all six kids (yes, there WAS a time that Sarah and Mimi looked at each other
and asked if they were crazy!) and headed to Oceanic Pier. The water was PERFECT and everyone had a
BLAST!!! Michelle met us there to lend a
hand and we were SO glad. All the babies
liked-or didn’t like-different things about the beach. We are expecting to get a letter from
Wrightsville Beach fining us for taking so much sand away-Jack loved eating
it! We arrived home, filled the pool and
everyone dipped in for a while to rinse off.
Then dry clothes, lunch, and naptime for the babies. The older three made yummy strawberry
jam. Then Mimi took them to the Teeter
to get all the fixings for pizza. We
came home and made the dough, rolled it out and topped the pizzas with favorite
toppings. We have some excellent chefs
in this family!! Our neighbor, Mrs.
Shirley arrived with some donuts right as we were finishing the pizza. Boy, was that a real hit with everyone! Nellie yelled, “Nonuts!” THAT will surely stick with the Collins fam.!! Nia and Nellie spent the night – there were
kids sleeping everywhere, but we could get it done for one night!! Next year there will be no pack-n-plays and
they can all stay in the same room!!!???!!! A quiet house was a wonderful thing!!
Day 4: The
big kids had SO much fun at the beach in Day 3, we decided that all the big
people would go back for the morning.
Papa, Sarah, Nia, Oren and Anna headed to meet Greg and Michelle for sun
and fun. Mimi stayed home with the three
babies and they just played and played.
We read and sang and counted and played!! FUN!!
After lunch, Oren left with his mom and dad-we LOVED having him! All five kids that were left took a really
good nap. Papa headed to the airport to
pick up Leslie and Will and we all met at the pool at Greg and Michelle’s
apartment. Jason surprised us and joined
us there, too. We swam and played and laughed and had a great time. G and M grilled delicious hot dogs and we
even had s’mores for dessert at the fire pit!
A wonderful way to end precious days of cousins being together!!
All of this fun
would not have been possible without my girls, Sarah being here from beginning
to end and Michelle for coming during the days to help out. Thank you from the
top and bottom of my heart! I love you a
bushel and a peck!!!
I am writing this
Saturday morning. Leslie and Will had to
leave yesterday for other family functions.
Sarah, Jason and Caroline are staying until tomorrow morning. Yesterday afternoon, as Sarah and I were
sitting in the den floor watching Caroline play, the quiet was
overwhelming. Caroline was missing
everyone terribly! Good thing we are
getting together with Jeffro and the girls and Greg and Michelle tonight for
one last burger and a laugh! Tomorrow
afternoon will be totally quiet – I think I’ll take a nap!!!
It really is cool to watch how much she is growing and learning every day. Since it is summer time (hell, yeah!) I am soaking up every second and making sure that I take a second every day to appreciate this time I get to spend with her. She has had a vocabulary explosion and is a complete parrot. She is also learning how to do stuff and complete actions with and without us telling her to do so. These are just a few things that I want to remember of this time in her little life.
*She can say any animal sound you give her. When she sees animals in TV or in real life, she is very emphatic with her animal sound that goes with it.
*She is getting good with names. She loves looking at pictures and naming the people in them. Her favorites are Anna (which sound more like a really loud German Ana), Jack Jack, and Leslie (Wesie) since we see them the most often. She also knows the grandparents' names and walks around practicing. Any time she sees a gray-headed man, she'll say Papa really loud.
*Thanks to Baby Wise, she loves to go to sleep (most of the time). When you can tell she is getting tired (aka when she starts fussing a lot and getting mean) you can say, 'Let's go night night' and she'll say 'night night' and head straight to her room. Before bed at night when we have the whole routine, she can say night night (very Southern bell-ish) and love you (love eww). Talking about a great way to end a day!
*The girl loves her a cheese stick. Now when you give her one she'll say, 'Aahh, cccchhhheeeessseee' and get really excited. She saw one in the drawer in the refrigerator once, so now every time I open the fridge she yells, 'cccchhhhheeeessseeee!' She also LOVES mac and cheese and just calls it cheese.
*She loves a bath, but went through a phase of being a little bit skittish about getting water dumped on her head. I figured out that as long as I told her what was going on, she does better. So I usually wash her hair first to give her some bubbles, which she will start to ask for if I don't have any working in the first few minutes of the bath, and then I was her body. Tonight I washed her hair and then I was going to let her play and she looked at me and said 'toes' and then held her foot up. She knows after we wash her hair I soap up the fish sponge and we work from her head down to her toes. She'll start holding her feet out of the water as soon as I start working on her arms.
*The girl still loves some ice. Any time she sees ice or hears the ice machine from the fridge working she starts saying 'Ice, ice, ice, ice, ice, ice,' like a mad woman.
*We have reached the frustration time in her development where her mental need for indepence far out weighs her physical and verbal abilities. She has started showing her anger with yelling, hitting, and kicking. It helps to understand why she is doing this, but it doesn't make it any easier. Where is our sweet baby? Our sweet baby is growing up and it's our job to let her know that it is ok to be mad, but that she can't yell or hurt anyone else because of it.
*One of the very few parts of the above statements that is pretty cute is that she can now say sorry. I don't know where she got it from, but she says 'sah-wee' with her head cocked to one side. Pretty dag-on precious. Once she figured out when to use it, she'll now say anytime that someone has knocked her down or made her upset, kind of like saying they need to be sorry!
*The girl is also obsessed with shoes. Any time she sees her 'ssshhhoooooeeeesss' (said with some seriously pursed up lips), she wants them on. She'll grab them and get us to put them on her. Any time I go into her closet, she'll say 'sssshhhooooeeeessss'. Any time she sees anyone elses shoes she'll bring them to that person and get them to put them on.
*She is getting good at completing tasks. For instance, every time that Jason gets ready to go, she'll go and grab his sunglasses off of the table at the front door. If he doesn't need them or isn't ready to go anywhere, you can tell her to go put them back and she will.
* She loves to brush her teeth. Any time you say anything about brushing teeth or if she sees us doing it, she'll say 'Ahh!' and try to get up there with us.
*She has started spinning. I'm not sure where she learned it, but she'll start spinning and then hold her arms out like she is a little dancer.
*She LOVES LOVES LOVES the Bubble Guppies. Luckily it is a super cute show with some really good music, but all day she will point to the TV and just yell out, 'Bubble!' As soon as it comes on she gets the biggest smile on her face and starts grooving with them. We have to limit her Bubble time every day because she would already watch it over and over. Thank goodness for DVR!
*She is doing so well with talking and using words to help get her point across. One thing I cannot and will not handle is a fussy, whiny kid (haha, yeah good luck to me). So even now when she starts to fuss we tell her that she needs to tell us what she wants. Then she can say pretty much everything she needs - eat, hungry, pease (she has been signing this for a while, but has just started saying it which is really nice), drink, milk, more, help, ice, etc.
*She has about 16 teeth in her head. She's working on the 15th and 16th (her upper canines), but she can tackle anything food wise we give her. It is crazy to see her smile or laugh and see all those teeth! It wasn't too long ago that she had those two little nuggets and that was it!
*Changing her diaper has kind of become the same concept as the bath - as long as you tell her what is going on, she's happy as a clam. Through the use of the play-by-play, you can now tell her to put her legs up and she'll swing them up and hold onto them and say 'legs'. She can also say 'tuta' (stolen from Leslie and Will) and reach down and pat it. I guess that is the same as little boys (aka all males) reaching down there and just playing with their twig and berries just to make sure they are there.
*She has a snack when she wakes up from her afternoon nap (we are beginning the work of dropping that morning nap and getting her down to one a day) and as soon as we ask her if she wants a snack she yells out 'Nack!'
*She still loves to read books and it is crazy what all she knows now. You can ask her to find stuff on a page and you can see her eyes moving all over the page and then she'll point out what you asked.
*When the dogs start barking she'll say, 'Hush!' I wonder where she got that from?!
I'm pretty sure she is doing a thousand other things that we think is awesome and intelligent and precious, but this will do for now! We have one smart, precious, sassy little girl!
Today I picked Caroline up from her last day of daycare until August! Even though we LOVE where she is, I am so excited about her getting to sleep good naps and getting to spend the whole summer with her.
I love time lapsed pictures, so let's compare:
Here we are the morning of the very first day. Notice that my eyes are swollen from all the crying I was doing (and was about to do). She was just 5 1/2 months here!
And here's our hot mess this morning. She is now a big 15 month old. Walking and talking and sassing all over the place. Now notice that my eyes are closed because I'm smiling so big that my cheeks aren't leaving room for anything else! We made it!
This is a note to myself for the future when I have to do the daycare beginning again (and no, not the near future) and all other parents that have the big 'D' hanging over their head with a baby on the way or a little baby that is going to have to head to daycare pretty soon.
I was very blessed and lucky to have a husband and a family that was there to support me and allow me to stay home for a full 12 weeks with Caroline and then go back to work for a few weeks until summer hit. So unlike a lot of parents that have to send their kids to daycare when they are 6 weeks old, Caroline was 5 1/2 months before I had to drop her off for the first time.
I wrote a post about the madness of finding Caroline's school and I also wrote a post a month into the school year about how it sucked, but that we were doing ok.
Now that summer is so close I can almost taste it, I want to reflect on the year and what role daycare has played in our lives (so I can reread this is in August when we have to start this whole thing up again and down the road when we have another little one that I am going to drop off for the first time).
The bottom line of that second post was that taking Caroline to daycare every day sucks. When I get down to that very bottom line, that hasn't changed. In a perfect world I would be able to stay home or only work part time so that I could spend as much time with Caroline as possible. Unfortunately, that isn't going to happen - which I have totally accepted. I do love being a teacher and while I am at school I work really hard and like to believe that I am good at what I do. That doesn't make me miss Caroline any less.
I remember asking my good friend Alexis if it ever got easier to drop your kid off at daycare. (This was during the early days when I would show up to school crying because I had cried all the way from C's school to mine.) She assured me that it did and she was right. Over the past year, it really has gotten easier. There are mornings when I know she is tired or that she doesn't feel good and I want nothing more than to just take her home and let her get in her bed. Other than that, dropping her off has just become what we do. We are moving so fast in the mornings that it really does help that I don't have time to think about it. Jason gets her up and gets her breakfast going while I get showered and dressed and start packing us up. Then we wipe her down, make sure everyone gets sufficient kisses for the day, and we are off. I like to have dance parties in the car, because that always makes her wiggle a bit in her seat with a big smile and the occasional laugh. That is enough to get me through the day. Then I put in my 8+ hours and wrap things up so I can get in my car and go get her as soon as I can. When I am at work, I really am able to be at work (which I didn't think would be possible). I have her picture all over my desk and my room and I think about her all throughout the day, but I am able to focus on work, because I know she is being taken care of. When we get home, all I want to do is watch her play for a little bit, listen to her talk and laugh, and hopefully let her get a litle bit of a nap. Then we eat dinner, play for a bit, jump in the bath, and get ready for bed.
With all of that happening on any given week day, the time I have to sit down and let her crawl up into my lap and read a book together is about as good as it gets. Alexis once told me that she is a better mom because she is a working mom. She has more patience because she doesn't have to deal with the same things all day long. Now, I totally understand where she is coming from. If I was home and read 50 books a day, I don't think reading a book to her would be so awesome. Now every single book I get to sit down and read to her gets my full attention and there is nothing else I'd rather do in this world.
Another thing that I have learned this year is that you can't put a price tag on your peace of mind. When we were looking at daycares, price was one of the first things we talked about. How in the world were we going to find $700 in our bank account? I had friends tell me that somehow, there is enough money to write that check every month. Our life has changed in order to make sure we have that $700 a month and every month, it is right there for us. Even though $700 is a lot of money, I pay every single cent knowing that Caroline is loved, taken care of, learning a ton, gaining invaluable social skills, and having tons of fun. She gets excited when I ask her if she is ready to go to school in the mornings and when we get there and I open that door, she yells to announce her arrival and the kids that are already there yell out, 'Carowine is he-uh!' Ms. Val and Ms. Nita absolutely love her and tell her that every day when I come to pick her up. She doesn't sleep as much as we'd like, but if that is the only thing I have to complain about, I think we're doing ok. I also think that once she starts walking, she will wear herself out and she'll start napping like she needs to. They have an awesome curriculum and do crafts every so often that we proudly hang on our fridge. Since they are a five-star center, they do things as well as they can be done. They are regulated through the state and even though I would totally trust them if they weren't, it makes me feel good to know that they have other people to answer to that are making sure they are doing what is best for our kids.
So at the end of the day, we are all doing great. Caroline is happy and is in a great place with great people while her Daddy and I work hard to make sure she has a good life. We all live for the weekends and those precious moments when we get to spend the days in our PJs catching up on sleep and laughter. And right around the corner is what I have been looking forward to since August 17th - SUMMER TIME!!!
Every day Caroline is walking more and talking more! Just want to make sure I get these down since I am thinking about it. She is 14 1/2 months and these are some things that she is up to.
*She weighs about 22 pounds. We went to the doctor this past weekend for a virus that has given her bumps on her face. The girl has some of the craziest skin!
*Since her tubes, she has been so healthy. I know it could be a coincidence with the time of the year, but either way - I am a believer!
*She is talking so much now. When we say a word she can do a pretty good job of repeating it back. Of course, this is where being her momma and dadda come into play, because they may not sound like words to anyone else.
*One of the big things she was fussing about was that any time she wanted us to pick her up or she wanted to eat and needed to get up into her high chair, she would just fuss because she didn't know how to tell us that she wanted to go up. So we taught her to say 'up' and she uses it all the time now. It is so precious because she really emphasizes the 'p' and sometimes even gets going and says 'up-a'. She is even starting to pick up on saying 'down' because she would get up and then fuss to get back down. We are getting there.
*She loves the boys and they love her and are so good with her. She can say 'Iley' and 'Arley' now when they come around. She gets really excited as soon as they walk in her room when she wakes up and she has to be put down to go 'pat-pat' them. She is also getting pretty good at reinforcing any 'no' way me throw their way!
*The girl loves her some ice. She can say 'ice' and points to just about any cup we have because she wants us to share our ice. If you need her to be entertained for a while, just give her a cup of ice and she is good for about 30 minutes.
*She has started giving real kisses. In the mornings, I usually have her in my arms because I take her to school, so I give Jason a kiss before I leave and lately she has started giving real kisses of her own.
*She is starting to get quite adventurous with her climbing. She loves to get up on the furniture and she can turn herself around and slide off of it on her belly. She can also climb up her slide by herself and slide down.
*When you get the toothbrush out, she says 'Ahh!' and reaches for the brush to work on those pearly whites. She now has all four of her molars (hallelujah!), so she has 12 teeth total.
*She still loves to read books, but walking has opened up a new world. She just walks from wall to wall and one piece of furniture to the next.
Speaking of walking, here she was on April 21st (13 1/2 months) doing her first bit of good walking. Before this she had taken 2 or 3 steps, but this was her first time really taking controlled steps.
This is her less than a month later (5.15) looking like she has been walking her whole life!
I know I have said a hundred times that she gets more fun every day, but it really is true. It is so much fun to watch her learn and grow and become her own little person!
Sidenote: There is less than a month before it is officially summer time!!! WHOOP WHOOP!!
Ever since Caroline's first birthday, I feel like she has exploded with what she is saying and doing now. Just wanted to document what she is up to as a 13 month old!
*She can now do wuff wuff (more in Riley's 'the wind is moving' style), mmmm-ow, and moo when asked what a dog, cat, and cow say.
*Today she said blueberry clear as day and 'slinky' because she plays with a Slinky Dog all the time. She has said 'bubberfly' a couple of times. She has also said, 'Oh, boy!' a few times. Talk about cute.
*She can help me bring the mail in. I get her out of the car every afternoon and she can open the mail box, I get out the mail and hand it to her, she holds onto it for dear life, we walk into the garage and she can push the button to close the garage door, and then we walk in the house and she can put the mail on the entry table. Then she claps for herself after I say 'Good job!'
*When I take her with me grocery shopping she is in charge of holding onto whatever we are going to get. She does really well with the fruit/veggies that are bagged up. She'll hold onto it like she is hugging it, until I pick something else out. Then she'll put it beside her in the seat and wait to hold the next item. By the end of our trip, all of our items are stacked up on either side of her in the front seat.
*She loves to say 'No ma'am' either before or after we say it. She is getting pretty good at it and it is really clear and quite country sounding.
*She has taken two or three steps now on her own. She is not very confident with it yet, so we've got a while before she takes off, but not too long.
*She has her first molar. It is crazy to see her laugh and see that thing poking through back there.
*She is a full-on kiss blower. She'll hold her hand up and then say 'mmm-ma'. It makes saying thank you pretty confusing, but it is awesome.
*One time we were playing on the floor and I got her and laid her on the ground and started tickling her. She belly laughed and got hiccups and loved it. So now she'll be sitting there playing and just throw herself back and lay there until she gets tickled.
*She loves to go outside. I can't wait for her to walk so we can really go outside and play. For now, she'll stand by the door and just fuss until you take her outside.
*She LOVES the dogs. She waves to them when they come into the room and she is getting really good at pat-patting them. When they go away she'll point to them and sign please until I get them to come back so she can pat them some more.
*She loves drinking out of a straw. We forgot her sippy cup somewhere and I just let her try my straw to see what she would do and with a few sips, she had it down. Now she is a fan of juice boxes and just cups of water with straws. Sometimes she won't drink her milk out of anything but her straw sippy cup.
Here are a couple of videos of her doing some new 'tricks'.
When we hear her in her room and she is up from a nap, we usually see her standing like this in her sleep sack with her bobo. On this particular day, she was in a really good mood and didn't want to get out of her crib. So I left her for a minute to go get my phone and when I came back, this is what I found!
She has been able to do 'Patty Cake' for a while, but her she is on video with the last couple of moves.
For Christmas, she got a Vtech alphabet train from her Uncle Matt, Aunt Tiffany, and Alex. That thing is awesome and she plays with it every day. She isn't quite strong enough to make it move by herself when she is sitting on it, so Daddy tied a string to it so we can pull her around. Mimi was up during her Spring Break and gave her lots of rides. Her she is with her hair blowing in the breeze!!
This is one of my favorite things that she does right now. I think I have talked about it before, but I was finally able to video it.
A while ago, Mimi gave Caroline her very first Duck and Goose book - Duck and Goose Find a Pumpkin. Those are the CUTEST books. Their faces are PRECIOUS. Well, we have found that pumpkin hundreds of times since we got it and it is one of Caroline's favorites. The reason she loves it now, is that she can nod her head yes and shake her head no throughout the book. Her is Mimi reading her the book and Caroline getting her shake on!
Jason's parents came up late the Saturday night before Easter and stuck around until Sunday afternoon. They were able to be here for the 'Easter Bunny' and a little Easter egg hunt in Bethabara Park.
Taking a ride down the new slide that the Grammie and Grandpa brought!
Now that Caroline has reached the big ONE, I'm not going to do monthly updates anymore. So, every once in a while I'll get on here and just do quick (haha - yeah right!) updates on what she is doing now a days!
Ever since getting tubes last Thursday, I feel like her talking has begun to really take off.
When you ask her what a cat says, she'll say 'mmmmow'.
When you ask her what a dog says, she'll kind of breathy 'woof' a few times like Riley does when the wind blows.
She asked for 'milk' this morning.
She'll say 'more' now - especially when you are signing and you aren't looking at her!
She loves to say 'No' and shake her head - especially when she knows she has done something you are going to say no to. She now beats us to the punch.
For reasons we don't understand (haha) she has looked at the boys a couple of times and we swear she has said, 'Stop!' I wonder where she gets that from!
When she is eating and something is particularly good, she'll give us a big ol' 'mmmmm'!
To understand the next one, you'll need to watch this video:
When Anna was little, I can remember her watching this video all the time. So whenever we think or talk about Cookie Monster, we always start singing this song in that voice. For Christmas, Caroline got a little Cookie Monster from Jack. We would pick it up and start singing that song. Recently, whenever we hold him up, she'll say 'Cookie' and start dancing. Even if we say, 'Go get Cookie Monster', she'll take off across the room and pick him up and say 'Cookie'!
In school, they work on giving hugs and patting other people on the back. At her birthday party in Jacksonville, she got a baby doll and picked that thing up and just hugged her and patted her back. We hadn't seen her do that before and it was just about the cutest thing we had ever seen! She does it all the time now and we can tell her to give something a hug and she will pick it up and squeeze it and just pat its back. Her is her giving a hug to a dog that sings and his ears flap. The dog itself is funny, but her giving the thing a hug is PRECIOUS!
Along with the hug and pat, she has also started patting the dogs. We've been working on this for a while, but just recently she has started to do it more on her own.
She can blow kisses. She'll hold her hand kind of under her chin, but she'll say 'mmmm-ma'. We've been working on it for a long time, so this is something to get pumped about!
She can do all parts to Patty Cake. They aren't always done together, but she can now successfully patty cake, roll 'em over, and throw 'em in the air!
She has become a pointer. When you pick her up, she will point to where she wants to go. Ms. Val and Ms. Nita were very impressed with that when I dropped her off this morning.
When we are eating, she'll eat what is in front of her, but she will certainly want what is on our plate - even if it is what she is eating.
Her back molars are coming in, so that is making her a bit of a picky eater. She can eat her weight in lima beans, but she won't really touch a banana and lots of other things she loved.
She is getting close to walking. You can tell that she wants to walk and she'll eyeball her destination, but she just doesn't have the confidence yet to take off. She stood for a good long while tonight and she has taken a step or two, but I don't think it will be long before she is off and running!
Once she masters stuff and we think it is so fun, she stops doing it. I know it's what those little brains do to make room for new stuff, so I'll be sure to write an update when all of this stuff has gone away and she has some new tricks!
Since Thanksgiving, Caroline has been battling bilateral ear infections. She has been through 5 or 6 different antibiotics and had a really bad reaction to the augmentin (good to know - not good to have to go through!) and we had had enough. We took her one time and I asked about tubes and the doctor said we would talk about it the next time. Sure enough, we were back two weeks later having that conversation. So I walked into that appointment determined to come out with a tubes referral.
The doctor did a good job of giving me both sides of the tubes argument. We are getting out of cold/ear infection season, she may grow out of them, this may be her last - blah, blah, blah. I listened to him and then quickly let him know that I still want to get tubes. I was tired of her suffering and was ready to do what we needed to do.
So I got my referral and a few weeks later we were seen. Our ENT doctor did his duty, also, and gave us both sides of the argument. He started off with the risks and I thought for sure he was trying to talk us out of it like our other doctor. He asked what we were thinking about both Ja and I said that we were still looking at going forward with the tubes. Just like that, his mood changed and we were on the Tubes Train! He was full steam ahead, ready to go, saw no problem with not doing it. I sighed with relief and we scheduled the surgery.
Last Thursday was T-Day! We had to be at Brenner's Children's Hospital at 6:00. The plan was to get C up and strap her into the car and let her back to sleep. Well, child doesn't miss a thing because Jason went in to get her and she was sitting up in the middle of her crib ready to go. So we got there at 6, checked in, and just when we sat down, Leslie showed up! She had to work that day and came in a little bit earlier to sit with us. It was great! When we got called back, Leslie knew just about every nurse that was working and soon, Caroline did, too! There were awesome animals painted everywhere and while we were talking to the nurses that were checking us in, Leslie took Caroline and started walking her around to see the animals. When they got back she would fuss and point and they'd go around again. As the nurses got their chance to come up and say hey to Caroline, she would lean forward and point to the animals and then they were off. We didn't have to worry about her too much before she went back - she was in good hands! With all of that going on and everyone telling us how cute she was, before we knew it, they were ready to take her back. I didn't even have time to get nervous!
After they took her back, Leslie went up to work and Ja and I headed to the waiting room. I literally sent a text message and read a page in my book before our doctor came out to let use know that everything had gone well. After a few more minutes, we were told we could go back to see her. Once our doctor came out, Ja and I had played rock, paper, scissors when he said one of us would be able to go back. Ja won fair and square, but being the sweet husband he is, he let me go back to get her. She was rocking away in a nurses lap when I got back there and after she drank some apple juice, it was time to go! After we got home and she took a good nap, she was ready to eat and play! We had a great rest of the day just hanging out!
Yay for no more ear infections!
Caroline getting Aunt Leslie to show her the panda bears - for the 100th time! Check out the cute little gown and socks! She was so posing for this picture - what a hot mess!
Hanging out with Daddy and lauging at one of the nurses right before going back!
I could not have been more impressed with Brenner's. From our doctor (who was affiliated with Baptist) to the nurses and the anesthesiologist, they could not have made us feel more comfortable. It was a great experience!
'The good, the bad, the happy, and the sad...I want it all!' - Edwin McCain
I wear my sassy pants daily. I love living and being from the South. I hate stickers and tags. I love peanut butter. Target is my happy place. I love Dirty Dancing. I love sarcasm. I love wine. I am completely in love with my little family.
I married my very best friend in February of 2009. We met through a mutual friend and began our love story over lemon drops at a bar. Our life is crazy and amazing and this blog is a place for me to document our story.
