All-in-One

Below are thoughts that have been stewing around in my head the past few days for quite some time. Rather than write 30 separate posts, I decided to just post an "all-in-one". I warn you... it's overkill!

1. There's this blue bird that hangs out around our house all the time, and I've named him Bluey. Of course I can't be sure that he's the same bird every time, but I like to think that he is. He's very pretty. He has a bright blue streak that goes down his back and he has some of the same on his head. He has a whitish/grayish belly. He may be a Western bluebird, but I really can't be sure. He seems to have some black on his head and body, and it doesn't look like the Western has that. Anyway, whenever we go outside to play, he makes an appearance. I would love to get him (or make him) a birdfeeder. I like him very much and I wish I were a better photographer than this. Hopefully one of these days!


2. Emily starts soccer a week from tomorrow, and I'm SO excited! I can't wait to watch her first Pee Wee "game". (I say "game" because the kids are so young and are just starting to learn, so I doubt it'll be much of a game; it'll be more of a lesson, I bet.) She's going to play with her friend, J, who she's known since birth. Stephen and I met J's mom and dad at our childbirth preparation class in the fall of 2004. Lisa and I ended up having our girls only three days apart!


3. My parents' 50th wedding anniversary is a little over a year from now (in July of 2010). My brother and I were talking Thursday morning about how we really should start making plans! I need to create a Yahoo! group for us siblings so we can start researching, discussing and planning.


4. That same brother, Jaime, and his wife, Debbie, just bought a beautiful new home in Massachusetts. They moved in this week and sound very happy. (They're in the same town they were in before, so the kids didn't have to change schools, which is nice.) I'm very happy for them and wish we could go see the house (and throw them a housewarming party)!


5. Since he's on a roll, I'll mention one more Jaime thing. When he graduated from Harvard Medical School in the early '90s, PBS aired an episode of Nova which had, up to that point, been following several of his classmates, documenting their journies. That original episode was called So You Want to be a Doctor?. I remember getting excited when I saw my brother speaking in a scene or two. Anyway, when I couldn't sleep the other night and was flipping channels at around 2 a.m., I flipped to PBS and somebody caught my eye. I soon realized that he was one of the young doctors who was featured in So You Want to be a Doctor?. It had been years since I'd seen that original show, but I still recognized him. I watched this episode (called Doctors' Diaries, which is a follow-up on the doctors some 20 years later) as long as I could, hoping to maybe see my brother, but I never saw him (and I ended up falling asleep at around 2:40 or so). At one point I wanted to get up and go program my DVR to record the show, but I didn't, because I didn't wanna disturb Leah. Fortunately, Jaime gave my parents a heads-up a few days ago that the show was about to air, and they ended up recording it. I hadn't realized that it's actually a two-part show. I'm looking forward to seeing it in its entirety. (And in case you're wondering, my brother IS shown a couple times, but very briefly. His coverage isn't as good as it was in So You Want to be a Doctor?.)


6. I'm loving AI this year. I think the order should end like this: 1)Adam Lambert, who's from my neck of the woods, by the way, and is a BRILLIANT artist and performer; 2) Allison Iraheta; 3) Kris Allen; 4) Danny Gokey; 5) Matt Giraud; 6) Anoop Desai and 7) Lil Rounds. (Poor Lil Rounds is not very good. For some reason there was so much hype surrounding her in the earlier weeks of the season, and she was so overrated. She really isn't that great of a singer, and is a pretty bad performer, in my opinion.)


7. Facebook's addictive! (MySpace is obnoxious; Facebook, I like. And Twitter, I just don't get.)


8. Angie, one of my best friends, (we met during my short year in Illinois, when we were sophomores in high school), is over 35 weeks pregnant right now with her third child -- a (third) baby girl. Her babies tend to make early appearances, so Baby Girl J #3 could come any day now. I'm very excited for Angie and wish I could be there to meet the baby!


9. Fallbrook is hosting its annual avocado festival tomorrow, and we might go. I *love* avocado, and besides, it's an excuse to get outside and walk around with the kids in what I'm sure will be fabulous weather. Fallbrook's not my favorite place in the world, but for an avocado festival, I'll try to overlook its faults and enjoy myself. ;-)


10. Since I'm on the topic of food... a couple days ago, my mom made an old family favorite for dessert and sent some home with Stephen. (He picked it up from her house on his way home from work.) It's banana pudding with Nilla wafers, and it's yummy!! My sister, V, used to make it all the time when I was a kid, but it's been a while since any of us have had it. Thanks for making it for us, Ma!


11. One more food post... I want NEED to try this place. It made the list of the five top American burger joints on CNN... and it's here in SD! Actually, it's in OB. Their burgers look AMAZING. To DIE for. We MUST go. NOW.


12. Kathryn's 40th birthday is today (happy birthday, Kat-ryn!), and we're going to her party tonight. She's renting a bouncy house for adults. Did you catch that? Bouncy house. Adults. Adults will be drinking yummy Stone beer... wearing funny hats... and bouncing. I'm there!


13. It's springtime. What does that mean, you ask? It means Xyno's hair is falling off his body in mad chunks and it's time to get him shaved! It's times like these that I am SO glad we have our new floors. (I also feel surges of gratitude for these new floors when someone spills something. Now when we have a spill, we think, "What, a spill? No prob. Bring it on.")


14. Speaking of springtime, the Carlsbad flower fields look cool. We should go. Maybe next month.


15. Emily learned about camping from Olivia. After she watched that particular episode, she asked me if we could go camping soon. I looked at her and said, "What a great idea!" After all, it's been YEARS since I've been camping. I can't even remember my last time camping, it's been so long. (I was definitely a little kid at the time -- possibly when we went to Yosemite when I was 10 or so?) So seeing as how Stephen and I have never been camping together, and it's been so long since either of us has been, and seeing as how Emily's NEVER been, I thought it would be nice for us to pack up and go in the somewhat near future. I told Stephen what I thought and he thinks it's a good idea. He thinks we should start out on a small scale and choose a local site. Maybe he's right. (I was thinking we should venture far out, but I'd be willing to go close by.) We bought a nice tent years ago, and we finally might have a reason to actually use it!


16. Another thing we've never done, even though WE LIVE IN SAN DIEGO, is Legoland. I hear all the time that it's ideal for kids Em's age, and I do think she'd really like it. They even opened a *really* nice-looking aquarium nextdoor to the park which I'd like to check out. I happened to see it featured on an episode of Jon & Kate Plus 8 (which I do NOT watch regularly, by the way; I just couldn't sleep one night and when I flipped to it, I saw that they were in San Diego, so I kept watching!) -- the Gosselins were on vacation here and they visited Legoland and the Sea Life Aquarium. They were actually the first-ever visitors to the aquarium; it wasn't even open to the public when they were there, but the officials let them tour it anyway. It's just all so gosh-darn expensive! Maybe one of these days.


17. Stephen and I are going on a date to see The Offspring in concert at SDSU's Open Air Theatre in early June. This'll be our fourth(?) time seeing them live. The last time we saw them was at Open Air, and I was about a week pregnant with Emily. (Didn't know it yet.) We really like the feel of OAT, because it's relatively small and kinda cozy. I'm looking forward to this!


18. G, my beautiful goddaughter/niece, turned 12 a few days ago. It happened to be a hectic day for me, and I tried calling her on my drive home from dinner out with friends, but she was unfortunately in the shower and would be in bed by the time I got home. I told her brother to pass along our love and "happy birthday", and that I'd hopefully talk to her soon. I'm glad I was able to send her a birthday card last week and that it got there on time!


19. Stephen's brother, Mike, has been coming to San Diego for business on a monthly basis lately. Sometimes the two brothers meet at a restaurant for dinner, and sometimes Mike comes to the house to see the girls. Emily always looks forward to seeing Uncle Mike. Whenever he comes knocking on the door, she hides from him and he has to go find her. He was just here the other night, and Emily enjoyed entertaining him like usual! :-)


20. Speaking of Lawlesses, it looks like all seven Lawless siblings and their spouses and kids will be descending on Oklahoma in August. I'm bummed because Em, Leah and I won't be able to make it. I'm glad Stephen's finally able to get out there to see his family and visit their properties, though. His brothers and parents have been out there for a long time, and this'll be Stephen's first time visiting, which is great.


21. I realized the other day that I haven't been to my OB for an annual well-woman check-up since my 6-week postpartum appointment after Leah was born. I really need to get on the phone and schedule that. (I'm surprised they didn't send me a reminder in the mail!) Oy, I also recently realized that I haven't scheduled Leah's 15-month well-baby appointment yet. Gotta do that first thing Monday!


22. How come when I feel like I'm "caught up" with my housework (like yesterday), I then slack off and let things go to heck again? On Tuesday I picked up and vacuumed in all the bedrooms, I swept and picked up in the rest of the house, I cleaned the kitchen, cleared off the hi-fi furniture piece in the entryway (the "hot spot" of our house), and cleaned the main bathroom. I felt pretty good about myself, but instead of maintain or tackle other areas, I totally vegged Wednesday, and come Thursday I was completely annoyed with myself. Speaking of cleaning house, I've heard good things about FlyLady, and I keep meaning to take time to thoroughly check out her website and ideas, but I never get around to it. Someday.


23. Another complaint... why is it that I feel like I'm exercising my butt off, but not seeing or feeling results? (I was doing so well with an exercise routine up until October of last year. For some reason I stopped working out, and I then went on to gain between five and 10 pounds between November and January. I'm just now getting around to doing something about it. Ugh.) I know it's only been a few weeks since I started a workout routine again, but I just hate how I don't see or feel any change. It's so discouraging. My gut says it's because I'm such a night-owl... I go to bed too late (and end up late-night snacking) and consequently I wake up too late, and I don't eat breakfast like I should. I don't think I eat poorly or too much; I just think I need to be better at my scheduling and I definitely should make breakfast a priority and I need to cut out night-snacking. The exercise isn't the problem (I've been enjoying regular activity, whether it's step aerobics or Tae Bo, and I look forward to jumping on the treadmill again really soon); the problem is eating right. *Sigh.*


24. The other day, I was reading a blog post written by a woman who's due to give birth to her second child any day. She said that a part of her wants the baby to hurry up and come out, but the other part of her knows that her first will be an only child for just a short while longer, so she's trying to savor every last minute of alone time with her. Reading this prompted me to think back to when I was due to give birth to Leah. I do remember making a conscious effort to lie down with Em and cuddle her. I remember trying to filter everything out and simply focus on enjoying her, because I knew our alone time was running out. They were beautiful times; precious moments. Until reading that woman's blog, I hadn't really thought about those days since they happened. I enjoyed going back and remembering what it felt like to enjoy my Em... when it was *just* Em. What's crazy is that we'll never have those days again.
    Along these same lines, I do cherish the time when Em's in school, and I get to focus on Leah alone. She and I do lots of cuddling and snuggling during those three hours twice/week. It's heavenly. I do it because I know time goes by so fast!


25. School has been SO GREAT for Emily. She's really thriving. Every Monday and Wednesday night, she looks forward to the following morning so she can go to school to see Mrs. M. and play with D, T, A, and all her friends. She loves it when they paint, and she still loves to "vacuum" her classroom. She also digs snacktime and playtime outside. Mrs. M. is a wonderful teacher (my goddaughter/niece, G, had her when she was in preschool, too), and Stephen and I are very happy with how Em's first schoolyear's been going. She's really come out of her shell socially, too. A year ago, she was literally hiding her head when we were in a social setting she wasn't comfortable with; but now she seems very confident, playful and friendly. We're thrilled!


26. I (we) really should be signing with Leah. She (and we) for some reason stopped signing poop after a while, and I never took off with milk like I wanted to. Just now we showed her the Mommy and Daddy signs. There's really no excuse not to do signs with her, especially now that I've found a nice site to refer to.


27. I *knew* I was a mom when I bought this. The first time I saw it at Costco I resisted, but a couple visits later I gave in to temptation. I thought, "This is the answer to transporting cakes and cupcakes!!" I mean, you know how you put cupcakes on a plate and then put Saran Wrap over the top, and the frosting comes off? Or you can only put one layer of cupcakes on the plate, because adding another row on top would also de-frost the bottom row? Well, this fixes all that. I actually have Snapware storage containers -- I bought a set at Costco one day, came home, cleaned out all my mismatched Tupperware, and vowed from then on to *only* use Snapware. (I gathered all the Tupperware and gave it all to my mom. Sorry, Ma.) Since that day, I've only had and used my Snapware... and I *love* it! It was a great move. Anyway, this cake/cupcake carrier is a Snapware product, so I'm pleased. It's great, too, because it comes with three tiers, and you can use one, two, or all three! You can even add on if need be! Oh, and I got it for a MUCH better deal at Costco. ($17 instead of Amazon's $25. Target's much more expensive, too. I think I saw a one-tier unit for $10 at a Target store.) I think this is such a "Mom" thing because I envision using it to take cupcakes to Em's classroom and such. Awwww. I'm a Mommy!! (Sometimes I still have a hard time believing it!)


28. My neighbor suggested I buy a long-handled dustpan for our new floors, since we now do much more sweeping than we used to. I bought one at Target (it was designed by Michael Graves) and I'm pretty disappointed in it. The concept is great (I hate bending down for my regular dustpan), but this model's not so great. The dirty stuff sweeps right underneath the pan and just ends up on the other side of it, rather than inside of it. I found one on Amazon that got good reviews... I'm debating whether I should return the one to Target and go ahead and try the Amazon one. (It's twice as expensive, and if I don't like it, returning it would be a bit harder since it's an online store, but I think I might go for it.)


29. Speaking of neighbors... I love ours! We live in a great neighborhood. I love our street (to be specific, our *end of the street). It's a pretty quiet area, and there's not a lot of traffic, which gives me peace of mind when the girls are playing outside. Even though it's pretty quiet around here, there are still kids around for Em to play with. In fact, two families moved into the house across the street (Steve, his daughter and their dog Scruff had to move out late last year, and we miss them, but I admit it's nice to have more little kids around for Em to play with). The families are related to each other: there are a sister and a brother and their spouses. Each couple has two sons: one's 5, one's 4, another was born just a few weeks ago, and one is due to be born in a couple months. Also, the nice couple who live two houses down have three grandsons (ages 7, 6 and almost 2), and those boys live just a couple streets over (but they're at their grandparents' house at least a couple times a week). They're very nice boys and Em loves to play with them. [As a matter of fact, she was playing with them today (they like to make believe in the playhouse), and I noticed they had a yucky cough. Man, I hope my girls don't get sick. I really don't want Em to have to miss her first soccer game next week!] Then there's Jean and Dearie, who I've known since I was born... their granddaughters (ages 10 and 8) are often over, and Em loves them, too. And THEN there's of course Dave and Lee, who have two kids: J (age 14) and H (almost 12). We've known them since we moved here five-and-a-half years ago, and we've always been pretty close. J and H are both very good with Em. So I feel very lucky to live around such nice people, and I'm thankful that Em almost always has someone to run around with outside! :-)
    * Down the street, it's not quite so peaceful. There's a house down there that's occupied by a bunch of older men who apparently like to drink, yell and play *really* loud music. And by play, I mean THEY do the playing. They break out their microphones, electric guitars and amps, and go to town. Oy. I'm SO thankful I don't live directly nextdoor to them!!


30. I wrote down 29 items, and I just had to write down a 30th, so here it is. Hmm. Did I mention I get to bed too late? It's almost 2:00 in the morning!!

Raves!

... and one rant. ;-)

RAVES:

• Safety 1st tot loks
  These are the BEST child safety locks that I know of. I discovered them when Stephen and I were visiting my brother- and sister-in-law years ago. They had these on their cabinets to keep their (then) very young sons out. I liked them so much, that I bought a bunch when we had Em. The only thing to keep in mind with these is you can't lose the key! Like my sister-in-law used to, I keep my main key on my kitchen sink (it's magnetic, so it sticks to the metal), and it's not allowed to leave that spot. I also have a back-up key in a secret spot, in case we misplace the main one. When someone's not used to using the lock and key, it can be a bit tricky to line them up and unlock a door, but with practice, it becomes second-nature. In my opinion, they're so much cleaner and easier to use than all other locks I've seen. I love these things!


• The First Years hands-free baby gate
  I love, love, LOVE this baby gate. It's a step gate, so in order to open it, you step on a pedal. You gotta put some weight into it, too, so it's pretty difficult for a young child to open it (assuming they even know how to open it). We have one up in our bedroom doorway, and it works great to keep dogs out, and to keep kids in or out when necessary. It's been in that doorway since Em became mobile, and I love it. Actually, it was only a few months ago that she really started learning how to open it, and now she's a pro. But it lasted a good few years with her, and I'm hoping will do the same for Leah! Like I said, though, it's good for dogs, too. It's nice to keep our door open at nighttime, but we keep the gate closed so the dogs don't come jumping on the bed. ;-)
  My brother, Jaime, actually bought this for my parents one time when he was in town years ago (I forget which grandchild it was meant for -- it actually might've been intended for Lily), but they didn't get much use out of it. So we inherited it! I highly recommend it.


• shampoo rinse cup
  Little ones hate to get water and shampoo in their eyes, of course. I bought this on a whim for $5 or something like that, and it works pretty well, but I'm thinking this one might work even better.


• (Mini) Co-Sleeper
  We co-sleep around here. Emily slept either in my arms or in the Co-sleeper for her first two years (or around there), and then she slept on a crib mattress next to my side of the bed between ages two and three. The night of her third birthday, she slept in her own bed in her own room for the very first time. Like Em did, Leah starts out in the Co-sleeper and sleeps there for her first three hours or so. Then she ends up in my arms for the remainder of the night. I'm hoping she starts to sleep more hours in the Co-sleeper soon, but if not, that's okay. The Co-sleeper's nice because, after adding leg extensions, it's flush with our bed. (Our bed's pretty high.) It's super easy for me to just scoop the baby out of the Co-sleeper and pull her into bed. It's nice for breastfeeding/co-sleeping families. An added bonus is its ample storage underneath the mattress!


• Q-See baby video monitor
  A couple years ago, we bought a video monitor from costco.com, but as soon as we tried it out, we weren't happy with it. (It really didn't work at all.) A little while later, I saw that costco.com was selling a video monitor from a different maker, and it was on sale ($50 off!). We decided to go ahead and try it, because we knew that if we didn't like it, we could just go ahead and return it to a Costco warehouse and get all our money back (including shipping!). To our pleasant surprise, though, the Q-See worked (and continues to work) very well. It sees well in the dark, so we can keep an eye on Em when she's sleeping in a different room, or we can keep an eye on Thello, who just recently started sleeping out in the living room with Xyno because he announced that he's a big boy now. We've had the monitor for a couple years now and we still love it. I can't believe we only paid $100 for it. What a great buy that was!


• Em's vtech Kidizoom digital camera
  I put this on Em's Christmas wish list, and her Aunt M bought it for her. (The *pink version, though.) It was a GREAT choice. She uses it a lot, and I love the fact that she can just go crazy taking pictures because it's digital. It's neat to go back later on and actually look at some of the pictures she took -- there are some pretty cute and creative shots in there! There's one she took of Leah that is really funny. I should download it and post it. The camera also has a few little games on there that Em likes to play, one of which is a puzzle game. It takes one of Emily's pictures and creates a puzzle out of it! I think that's cool. She digs it, too.
  * I think M bought the camera for ~$40; not sure why the price has gone up so much (to $60) on Target/Amazon. vtech's site has it up for $50.


• wooden toys
  I would love to have a 'no-plastic toy' rule for this house, but I know that's kinda unrealistic. I have started buying Em more wooden toys the past few months, though, which is good. Wooden toys are just prettier, nicer, and seem to be more fun in my opinion. She has a set of Melissa & Doug colored wooden blocks; a Melissa & Doug slice-and-bake cookie set (really cute -- a big hit) that our neighbor, Lee, gave her; a coffee and toast set that Martha gave her; and a cupcake set that Stephen and I gave her for Easter. (She'd been wanting that cupcake set for a long time! It's really cute. I'm glad I bought it for her. I got it at Target, but unfortunately I can't find it online to link to.) I saw a bunch of other adorable wooden toys on Amazon that I'd like to gradually get for the girls. (They all happen to be Melissa & Doug.) Here are the links to some of them:
  -- sandwich-making set
  -- birthday party birthday cake
  -- food groups
  -- pizza party
  -- beginner pattern blocks
  -- pattern blocks & boards
  -- See & Spell -- looks neat!
  -- shape-sorting clock -- this one looks really cute!


• Netflix
  Blockbuster kept disappointing us by changing their policies for the worse, so we finally jumped on the Netflix bandwagon. I'm glad we did. We currently only subscribe to the cheapest plan, which is only $5/month (because two movies/month is all we seem to have time for!). Really, two movies is all we need. I don't even have enough time to watch the shows on my DVR, much less movie rentals! I love how easy this system is, though. Putting the movies I want in my queue online, and then receiving them in my mailbox a few days later... that's wicked awesome! :-)


• GE SmartWater water filter/dispenser -- and -- GE SmartWater water cooler/dispenser
  For far too long, Stephen and I couldn't get it right when it came to good drinking water. Stephen's parents bought a water cooler when they were living in Ramona, and we followed suit and bought the same one for our Carmel Mountain apartment (except ours is the counter-top version). Stephen was skeptical that we'd actually use it, but here we are, eight years later, still using it daily and loving it. It's fairly small, it's compatible with 3- or 5-gallon jugs, it dispenses cold and hot water, and it has a child safety switch on the hot side. (We don't leave our hot switch on, though, because it obviously uses more energy, and we don't need hot water enough of the time to justify it. It's nice to switch it on when we want tea or something, though. It doesn't take long at all for the unit to heat the water. We always leave the cold on, of course! I need cold drinking water all day long!) The thing we couldn't get right, though, was the water itself. We never had (and still don't have) a refrigerator that dispenses good, filtered drinking water (and everyone knows how San Diego-area tap water isn't fit for human consumption), so we used to fill up 3-gallon jugs from the vending machines at the grocery store. But that just got to be too tedious. After years of doing this, we finally resorted to buying the Pur faucet water filter. We bought it from Costco, so it was very reasonably priced, and it seemed easy enough to use. We installed it (it attaches to the faucet), and it worked great for a while. It was easy to place the jug underneath the filter to fill it up, and I liked the way the unit had light indicators to let us know when we needed to start thinking about changing out the filter. And best of all, the water tasted great. We were happy for a while there. But then, something started happening with our (brand-new) faucet. It started leaking a bit and shooting out thin streams of water. Stephen tried tweaking it and fixing it, but it soon became evident that the Pur was the culprit. Stephen then announced that the Pur needed to go. I was disappointed because I really did like the product. Finally, we decided to go ahead and do what we'd always thought about doing, but never took the time to just DO -- we bought and installed an under-the-sink filtration unit and a separate, small, dispensing faucet that mounts next to the regular faucet. It's similar to this one, but it's not dual-stage. Its filter lasts about a year, which is awesome, and while the water doesn't taste quite as good as the Pur water did, it's plenty good enough. This system is convenient, easy, and does the trick. I'm so glad we finally found a good, permanent solution to our problem. It's awesome!


• vinyl plank flooring
  This stuff looks good, it's durable (awesome for kids and dogs!), it's easy to clean, and it's not too expensive. Love it!


• Racket Zapper
  It's springtime, so we've started seeing a lot more flies and mosquito hawks (a.k.a. crane flies) around the house (outside and in!). The flies are obnoxious, and Stephen got fed up, so when we were at Target the other day, he picked up a Racket (bug) Zapper. It's shaped like a tennis racket (which seems a bit dangerous when it comes to little kids, but we of course put it up out of reach), and when you press its button, it charges up the electric shock so that when a fly or other pest crosses its path, it ZZZZZZZ -- zaps it! It kinda creeps me out to use it, but it is easier than using a fly swatter. Although there was a really fast fly buzzing around the kitchen yesterday, and I spent a good five to ten minutes trying to catch the thing! He was just too fast. I didn't get him. Usually it's not so hard!

RANT:

• Rubbermaid (plastic) laundry basket
  Why, oh why, can't I find a decent laundry basket? Both of mine are made of (what looks to be strong) plastic, and both are broken at the handles. Stephen said maybe we should try to find a lightweight metal basket (i.e. one that can't break on me!). I haven't taken the time to look into this, but if anyone knows of a good laundry basket, please let me know!

Leah's First Sign

It's so cool...

Leah's signing! At around 6 months of age (she's 9 months old now), I started signing the word poop to her while changing her diaper. Looking back, I realize she's been signing poop for a while now. It's just that up until today, I wasn't sure she was truly doing it.

But today, there was no mistaking it. She signed poop for us twice today, and lo and behold, she had a dirty diaper. Not only is she signing the word, but she's applying it correctly! She knows what it means!

It's the cutest thing in the world to see her slap those pudgy little hands back and forth. (She doesn't quite have the proper technique down, but that's alright. ;-) I haven't seen anything so adorable since Em did it as a baby.

I'm excited, because I believe this is how Emily was potty-trained at a relatively young age. Starting at around 18 months of age, Em would sign poop before she would soil her diaper, and I would then put her on the potty. It took a good six months to seal the deal (she was about 2 years old when she was fully potty-trained).

Now here we go again. This time with Da Munks! Yay!

Unfortunately I've been forgetting to teach her other signs, like milk for example. Silly me. That's on my to-do list for sure!

Random Thought of the Day

You know how when people go to the store, they love to park as close to the building as they possibly can so they don't have to walk very far?

Well, I don't mind walking far; in fact, many times I park not-so-close so I can get a bit more walking in.

However, I recently realized that it's a good idea for me to park as close as I can to the shopping cart "parking", because that way when it's time to leave and I put my cart away, I don't have to walk far from the girls while they're in their carseats in the car. Many times I've found myself farther away from the cart parking than is ideal, and I'm then confronted with the dilemma of: do I (a) walk a bit farther away from my kids, or do I (b) do the "irresponsible" thing and leave my cart here where it doesn't belong?

And there you have it... my Random Thought of the Day.

Elimination Communication

Very interesting. I belong to a small online group of moms, and one of the women there practiced EC with her infant daughter.

I said before that I would blog about Emily's potty-training someday, and I still mean to do so, but for now I'll just mention that although we didn't do EC, we did start training at 18 months. It took about six months to really get to the point where we could confidently say that Em was potty-trained. (She was two, which I believe is still pretty young by today's standards.)

I don't think I'll try EC with the next kid, but if parents want to give it a go, I say more power to them! I know the daughter of the mom in my group was potty-trained very early on. The benefits of potty-training early on are many: not having to pay for diapers, making less of an impact on the environment with diapers, not having to deal with diapers, etc., etc.

Bathtime Blues

I've created a monster in the bath department.

Since Emily's so small for her age, we used the infant bathtub for the first 13 months of her life. She's finally outgrown the thing though, so for the past few weeks, I've been trying to transition her to the regular ("big-girl") tub.

She's not havin' it.

I don't think it's the tub that bothers her so much as the running water and the detachable nozzle/sprayer that I like to rinse her hair with.

I draw her water while she's in the bathroom so that she can see it and know that it's nothing to be afraid of. I don't put her in the tub until it's completely filled and the water's shut off, though. I don't want to traumatize the kid!

The sprayer's the worst. Whenever she sees that thing coming toward her, forget it. It's all over. She screams bloody-murder! Actually, this was the case a couple weeks ago, but the past couple of baths have been better. The two times before last, I actually got in the tub with her, and that really seemed to help. This last time was great; the running water didn't seem to bother her much (she only whimpered when she saw it, which really is improvement), and she was finally playing and splashing in the tub. The sprayer, however, continues to be a problem.

This has thrown me for a loop because she's always loved her bath! In fact, she always used to flash a big, beautiful grin whenever she knew bathtime was imminent. And this is really the first time that she's ever expressed fear. I guess she's getting to the age where babies realize that things can be scary. I mean, I can understand why a drain and loud, running water and an alien-looking sprayer thing-a-ma-jig would be frightening. It's no wonder these things scare the heck out of her!

Like everything else, this too shall pass. We're making progress, and that's what counts!

Kisses, Not Bites!

She's actually outgrown this stage by now, but a few months ago, Emily was all too eager to bite her Mommy.

If my thumb was easily accessible, or if she wanted to play around while nursing, I would inevitably be in pain in no time at all!

"No bite, Emily!!" I would scold. "No bites, kisses." And I would try to get her to press her lips to me rather than sink her little teeth into my skin. "Kisses, Emily, NOT bites!"

I think it worked. Except for one time the other day when she was half-asleep, she hasn't bitten me while nursing in weeks (maybe even months!). She hadn't bitten my thumb in a while, either, until yesterday. Hmm.

Kisses, Emily, NOT bites!!!

Too Attached?

Tomorrow's our anniversary. I'd like to go out with Stephen to dinner (The Cheesecake Factory) and a movie (I'd love to see "North Country" -- Charlize Theron & Frances McDormand are supposed to be spectacular in it), but then again, I do NOT want to leave the baby.

Which makes me wonder... is this healthy for her to be so attached? Is it healthy for me? And on the flip-side, is it healthy for me to be so attached? Is it healthy for her?

The thought of leaving her for more than a few hours doesn't sound appealing to me. I'd miss her. I'd miss her a lot. And if I were to miss her, what fun would I be on our date? And if she were to miss me, what fun would she be for her caretakers (i.e. Grandma Rivera & Aunt Cecilia)? I'd probably be distracted and Em would probably be a bear. She'd probably cry the better part of the evening. On top of everything else, I wouldn't want to put anyone through that heartache!

Our neighbor mentioned that she would like to go to The Haunted Trail with her husband, me & Stephen. She said she'd get a sitter for their two kids and "Maybe your mom could watch Emily". I dunno... the thought of standing in line for hours, paying $25 for tickets for me & Stephen, and again, leaving Emily all that time just does not sound good. I think I'm gonna have to pass on that one.

For tomorrow though, we'll see.