Safety first

At the children’s museum in Dayton, there is a rope climb that leads from the ground floor to the second floor, then the kids can either visit other exhibits on the second floor, or they can take a big, twisty, enclosed slide back down to the ground floor.

Baby B loved climbing the rope climb, so The Husband and I took turns going up with her, staying right behind her in case she lost her footing (which she never did), while the other person waited for her at the bottom of the slide. At the top of the rope climb was a vertical part that was a little more difficult to climb because of the steep angle. I’d boost Baby B up that last few feet and then hoist myself up there.

One of the times I went up with her, I lifted her up to the end of the rope climb on the second floor and had a challenging time getting myself up there. In all, it took maybe 15 or 20 seconds, so not long at all, but a lot can happen in 15 or 20 seconds.

I got my footing — and Baby B was nowhere to be found. I didn’t panic, thinking maybe she’d already gone down the slide. I looked over the railing down to the ground floor, but The Husband was still down there waiting for her. I looked around the play area on the main floor.

No Baby B.

I still didn’t panic, but I became more frantic as I searched the immediate area. Where could she be? Did she wander to the other exhibits on this floor? I don’t want to go there to check in case she reappears in the climbing area. But what if she’s wandered away and can’t find her way back to the play area?

We’re always very good and stay right with Baby while while we’re out, yet in the span of 15 seconds, I couldn’t find her.

It was quite an eye-opener.

Needless to say, we found her just fine. Turns out she had gone down the long twisty slide, but she hadn’t reached the ground floor yet, so that’s why neither I nor The Husband saw her when I looked over the railing. In all, she was out of my sight for maybe 30 seconds to a minute, but the idea of what can happen in that amount of time is scary, to say the least.

After that incident, I decided it was time to order some SafetyTats, which are temporary tattoos with your phone numbers on them. This isn’t a paid product endorsement or anything, but just something I thought was a good idea and wanted to mention to other moms. If someone finds your child, they can find your phone numbers on the tattoo and call your cell phone to help locate you.

The more I thought about it, the more I thought this was a good idea.  Baby B is at an age where we’re teaching her things that would be helpful in a situation like this, like her last name and her phone number, but what if she gets scared and doesn’t want to talk to an adult who is trying to be helpful? We are getting out and doing enough things in big crowds (zoos, children’s museums, outdoor festivals) where the likelihood of her becoming separated from us and lost is much greater, especially since we haven’t used the stroller in 8 months.

If I was separated from Baby B for maybe a minute at the most, I can’t imagine the level of anxiety that stems from a much longer separation, not knowing where your child is and if he or she is safe. I hope no one ever has to call us after seeing the phone number on the temporary tattoo, but if there’s anything I can possibly do to help reunite us more quickly, then it’s certainly worth the cost and effort.

Wordless Wednesday: Dancing in the rain

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You rang?

We had so much success with potty training using the timer method that it occurred to me one day recently: Why don’t we use the timer for other things?

Brilliant!

So now if Baby B seems to be resisting bedtime, we set the timer and tell her that when the timer goes off, that’s when Mommy and Daddy have to leave. Amazingly, she goes along with it and doesn’t put up a fight when this happens, perhaps because we’ve absolved ourselves of the responsibility for the decision, at least in her eyes. To her, it’s the timer that’s deciding she needs to do something, not us, so she doesn’t have that natural urge to rebel against our wishes.

It works for so many other things, too.

She’s taking too long to get dressed? We tell her when the timer goes off, it’s our turn to dress her, so she’d better do it herself before it rings.

She won’t use the potty before we leave the house? Once the timer goes off, we’re the ones who will pull her undies down and place her on the potty. She doesn’t like that, so she’s motivated to do it herself before it comes to that.

Of course this method won’t be successful forever, but I’m always excited when I find new ways to conquer challenging toddler behavior.

Something fishy going on here

I think I forgot to mention that both of the fish we bought in mid-May have made their way to the big fishbowl in the sky.

Oops!

Baby B thinks they “had to go somewhere.” Thankfully that explanation has satisfied her, though she’s been asking for some new fish lately, so The Husband took her out to get some new ones yesterday.

The latest additions to our family: Marby and Grandma, both (obviously) named by Baby B. No idea why she picked either name, but that’s what she went with. Here’s hoping they have a longer stay with our family than our previous guests!

Potty night

We were very, very, very, very lucky (very lucky) that Baby B slept through the night early on. Around 6 weeks old, I stopped setting my clock to wake her up, and she started sleeping through the night then and we haven’t looked back.

As I said, very lucky.

We’ve been blessed with unbroken sleep for nearly 2 1/2 years, so you might think it strange that I was excited to have to get up with Baby B during the night on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning.

Why?

Because she woke up at 2:45 p.m., cried out an urgent cry, and said, “I need to go potty!” The child who doesn’t stir during the night woke up, realized she had to potty, and said it out loud so we could come help her. I was so excited to jump up and take her to the bathroom. And sure enough, she woke up dry later that morning.

We’re not officially doing nighttime potty training, but we’re keeping track of how often she wakes up dry, and she gets to put a smiley sticker on the calendar if she does, which happens maybe three days a week right now. Mostly we started doing this so we could see how often she wakes up dry, but she loves putting the sticker on the calendar on dry mornings — it’s the first thing she says when The Husband goes to wake her up — so it’s also giving her some incentive. We’re working on explaining to her why sometimes she wakes up wet (like if she has too much water to drink at bedtime) so she better understands the mechanics of what’s going on and she can eventually control it herself. So I guess I shouldn’t say that we’re not actively working on it, because I guess we are taking steps to help her in that direction. Perhaps I should say we don’t have any timeline in mind for accomplishing this goal.

I told myself we wouldn’t use Pull-Ups at all, but we did make the decision to switch to them at night. Here’s my thinking: We’d made such a big deal about switching out of diapers during the day, and diapers are for babies, etc., yet we were still putting overnight diapers on her at night. While Pull-Ups might feel similar to diapers, they are designed differently enough to seem different for night. Pull-Ups weren’t for us for daytime training since I wanted to make the switch to undies full-on, but the fact is most children don’t train at night as quickly, so we needed something different but similar at night. So far it’s working well for us.

Still no issues with daytime. I feel like I can confidently say she is trained during the day. I don’t get nervous when we leave the house, wondering if she’s going to have an accident. I know she might will at some point, but I feel confident that it’s not nearly as likely. I’m so proud of her!

Wordless Wednesday: Um, look out for that shark!

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From her mouth to our ears

Baby B: “You’re not wearin’ shoes. You’re wearin’ toes.”

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Baby B: “Good grief!”

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Baby B: “You say sorry, Mommy!”

Me: “I’m sorry. You’re right, I shouldn’t have done that.”

Baby B: “THANK you!”

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Me: “Who do you love?”

Baby B: “Mommy. And Daddy. And [The Dog]. And [Cat 1]. But not [Cat 2].”

Me: “Oh no! Why don’t you love [Cat 2]?”

Baby B: “Because he poops!”

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Baby B: “I did a big, big poop!”

Me: “You did?! That’s great!”

Baby B: “Yeah! Just like Daddy!”

Raise your hand if you’re sure

On Saturday morning, we went to our local independent bookstore for a performance of a local children’s band because we thought it would be something Baby B would like.

Boy were we right!

She loved it. We sat on the floor and she stood a few feet in front of us dancing her little bottom off! She would clap along with the songs (on beat, even!) and would clap in appreciation after each song. Whenever the musician would ask the audience a question (”Who here likes peanut butter?”), she would raise her hand without hesitation — and without looking back at us first. That was the best part to see — her making these decisions on her own, without our prompting her.

This is going to sound corny, but it nearly brought me to tears (in a good way); I was just so proud of her for immersing herself in it and not looking to us for direction on what to do or what to think. Because isn’t that the ultimate goal of all this? Getting to the point that (eventually) your child grows up and makes their own decisions about things. Of course we’re a long way from the end goal, but I love to see these steps toward true independence along the way.

Excuse me

I really try hard not to laugh at some of the things Baby B says to us when she’s doing something she’s not supposed to be doing, but some days it’s way harder than others. Baby B’s latest thing seems to be making excuses, so below you’ll find some of her current favorites, which aren’t just one-time excuses; she uses them repeatedly.

Me: “Baby B, no running! Walking, please.”
Baby B: “I not runnin’. I’s just skippin’.”

Me: “Baby B, don’t (insert whatever misbehavior you want here).”
Baby B: “I’s not. I’s just fixin’ it.”

Me: “Baby B, come back here, please. It’s time to go to bed.”
Baby B: “I’s just takin’ a break.”
Me: “I think you need to take a break in bed because it’s time to go to bed.”
Baby B: “I’s got to take a break on the green chair.”

Me: “Take a bite of your cheese.”
Baby B: “I not take a bite. It’s too hot.”
Me: “Well then I guess our fridge is broken!!”

Wordless Wednesday: 2009 Father’s Day sketch

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Baby Safe Ball

I wonder if this Baby Safe Ball comes in a toddler version too.

Slide into summer fun

So the secret getaway for Father’s Day weekend was the Gatlinburg, Tennessee area. I’d thought about some other locales but ultimately settled on the place we got married since we usually just do daytrips down there (it’s about 3 1/2 hours away) and don’t have much of a chance to do a lot while visiting. But mostly I chose it because the hotel I found has an indoor/outdoor waterpark, which I thought would be fun for all of us.

We left on Friday morning and arrived in the Gatlinburg area at lunchtime, so we went to the restaurant where we had our “rehearsal dinner” before our wedding. (In quotes because we didn’t actually have a wedding rehearsal, but we hosted a dinner where our families met for the first time.) Did a little shopping at the Osh Kosh outlet, then went to the hotel around 1:30 p.m. to see if we could check in early. Thankfully we were able to, so we brought in all of our stuff and got Baby B settled for a nap. I’d gotten a one-bedroom suite at the resort, so she was able to take a nap undisturbed and we were able to do other things in the living area.

After Baby B woke up, we got our swimsuits on and headed down to the waterpark. We started first with the indoor stuff, which included a children’s pool, a regular pool, a hot tub, and two big enclosed slides. It’s kind of funny because after all those weeks about talking to her about staying dry (in relation to potty training), she didn’t like getting her bathing suit wet at first. Some other kids were there and she warmed up to it just fine. We then went outside (where it was in the mid-90s all weekend — PERFECT!) to enjoy the kids pool out there in addition to another hot tub, regular pool, and lazy river. (No, Baby B didn’t get in the hot tub. We let her dip her feet in there once or twice, but that’s it.)

We got dressed and went to The Husband’s restaurant of choice, The Old Mill Restaurant. We had about an hour wait and didn’t get seated until 9 p.m., so we were those parents out with their young child at 10 p.m. But the good news is that Baby B did wonderfully, and we were even able to eat our dessert there instead of taking it back to the room (which I was prepared to do).

We were all tired as we got an early start on Saturday morning, but once we got going, we were all fine. We’d tried to look for a good, easy hiking trail in the Smoky Mountains, but they were all either too difficult for a toddler or had dangerous cliff dropoffs. (No thanks! Again, not with a toddler.) So we decided to go into Gatlinburg proper (we stayed in Sevierville) and visit the Ripley’s Aquarium of the Smokies. The Husband and I had been there on our honeymoon, but obviously without Baby B. We got there when it opened at 9 a.m. and had an enjoyable visit (except for the one minor fit Baby B had when she wouldn’t hold on to our finger and wanted to run away from us). After that, we headed across the street to the Pancake Pantry. (The Gatlinburg area is overrun with pancake houses, so it’s sort of a thing to do down there, but this was the original.) Since she was being so good on the trip, we let her have M&M pancakes with a peanut butter syrup. My omelette and buttermilk pancakes were superb.

We headed back to the hotel after that, making a quick stop at the Harry and David outlet store to load up on goodies. Baby B hit the bed for a nap while I had a chance to do some fun reading and The Husband went to the pool by himself for a little while. Once Baby B woke up, we all went down to the waterpark again and had a blast. I was afraid this waterpark wouldn’t be as fun as the (much more expensive) other one that is also down there, but it was awesome, especially for a family with a toddler.

We got dressed and headed out to dinner at the Applewood Farmhouse Restaurant at the Apple Barn, my favorite place to eat there. (Any place that serves apple fritters with apple butter when you sit down is MY kind of place!) Baby B made a friend almost exactly her age, and they had a great time playing together in the gazebo outside while we waited. Our server that night was a dud, but the food was excellent.

We got Baby B to bed for the night (she did great all by herself in her own queen bed) and packed up the room for our departure early the next morning, as I had to be at work at 1 p.m. It was hard to go home, scarf down lunch, then leave immediately for work, but it was fine and I made it through the night okay. A little tiredness during the day was well worth all the fun we had during the weekend.

And Baby B was a potty training STAR! She not only had NO accidents all weekend long, but she also pooped in the potty while out in public and had dry diapers overnight BOTH nights. (I’m going to start tracking the frequency of her being dry overnight to help determine when/if we should try night training. She was dry again last night too.) It was very nice to go on adventures and not have to worry about getting extra diapers, though of course we had extra clothes nearby just in case. It’s a little different now since we have to plot out the availability of restrooms when we go out to make sure we stay accident-free, but it wasn’t really that hard to do. I’m glad we had this trip planned when we did, right after switching to undies, because it sort of forced us to get out and take the potty training thing on the road, and it showed us that we can do it successfully. I might have been nervous about it otherwise, but this way we had to do it, and we came out successful in the end.

We all had a wonderful time together as a family, and the only drawback was that the weekend seemed so short. There’s so much to do in the area that you could easily spend a week there and not do it all. Still, I’m thankful for the time we did spend together there, and I can’t wait to go back sometime (hopefully for our 5th anniversary next year).

Daddy dearest

To The Husband,

When we exchanged wedding vows (almost) four years ago, we agreed to be each other’s partner in life, no matter what challenges were presented to us. At the time, I had no idea how necessary that would be when it came to raising a child, but I can’t thank you enough for being my partner in raising Baby B.

I am so fortunate that you are such a hands-on dad. I see other dads around who don’t seem to have an active presence in their children’s day-to-day lives, but you’re just the opposite of that.

In the diaper days, I’m almost certain you changed more than me overall — without even complaining about it. Now that Baby B has been potty trained, you’re just as likely to volunteer to take her to the restroom with you so you can help her.

If we’re visiting friends and Baby B is down on the floor playing, chances are very good that you won’t be found on the couch chatting with the grown-ups, but you’ll be sitting down on the floor with Baby B, taking an interest in what she’s doing.

If we’re at dinner and Baby B is not eating her food, you’re the one who’s coming up with new (and fun!) ways to get her to eat.

You do the fun things. You do the not-as-fun things. It’s a package deal — both the good and the bad come with parenting –  and you’re up for it no matter what.

It’s a sad thought, but if for some reason I were no longer around, I have full confidence that you could take care of Baby B for the rest of the time she spends in our house. I suspect not all moms are as confident in their husbands’ parenting competence.

Happy Father’s Day, and thank you for everything you do for your family! Who has more fun than us?!

Potty pooper

So sorry to make this week’s posts so potty-training heavy, but this is a big deal right now, and I want to make sure I capture the experience. Just a few random thoughts today:

• I am so unbelievably proud of Baby B! So far, that one accident on Monday at daycare is the ONLY accident she’s had all week.

• We’re going out of town this weekend, and the only diapers we’re taking are for overnight. I do not feel a bit nervous about this. She’s ready. And if there are accidents, you know what? We’ll deal with it. I’m not even sure if I’ll take the potty chair (though it might come in handy if she has an “I gotta go!” moment while we’re on the road without easy access to restrooms. I’m still leaning toward no potty chair.

• Using the timer has worked very well for us. Baby  B doesn’t necessarily wait for the timer to go off — she’ll use the potty when she needs to — but there are times that we need to get her to at least try to use it (like if we’re about to leave the house). We’ve stopped using it in 15-minute increments, but in order to avoid the struggle of “Mommy wants me to do this, so I’m therefore not going to do it,” the timer comes to the rescue. If I’m having trouble persuading her to try, I just set the timer for a few minutes, it goes off, and SURPRISE! Potty time! The cow timer said so! Not Mommy. The cow said so, therefore we must try. So far it’s worked beautifully.

• I know we’re not out of the woods yet, but I’m amazed by how (almost) easy this has all seemed. But then I think it goes back to the fact that we wanted to wait until she was ready, and we didn’t push any arbitrary deadlines on her. At least in our case, I think that has been crucial.

• I have no timeline in mind for overnight training, but Baby B has been waking up with less-wet diapers lately, and this morning she woke up with a completely dry diaper. We’ll continue to monitor things and let her lead the way. She’ll let us know when it’s time to drop nighttime diapers.

• Baby B can get up on the toilet by herself without the aid of a stool. That’s great, of course, but it kind of annoys me in public because she has to use the toilet seat as a handle, and I can’t help but think of all the germs. I’m not usually a germophobic person, even with bathrooms, but the thought of her holding the toilet seat makes me cringe. You can believe we wash her hands really well afterward.

• With diapers, we used the euphemisms wet and dirty to describe them more discreetly. I can’t really think of a good alternative to poop and “she pooped in her undies.” Saying “dirty undies” doesn’t seem quite the same, for some reason.

Wordless Wednesday: The benefits of a video monitor

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Let’s have a potty to celebrate!

Our switchover to undies this weekend was a terrific success!

(Go ahead and skip this post if you don’t want to know specifics. It bugs me to no end when parents go around telling anyone with ears about their child’s potty-training successes [and failures] against their will, but this is my space to record such things, and people come here voluntarily, so I’m not forcing it on anyone. You can choose to read, or you can choose to skip it.)

Both Saturday and Sunday, Baby B stayed completely dry during the day, including during both naps! The only thing that day that could be considered an accident — and I don’t really consider it a real one — is when she woke up from her nap on Saturday, she started leaking a little while walking to the bathroom from her bedroom. I don’t count it, however, because she knew what to do and was just seconds away from making it to the toilet to complete the task. She did have one poop accident on Sunday when she was outside helping The Husband with some yardwork, but I’m told she did not like the feeling of it in her undies (as expected) and she pooped in the toilet another couple of times that day and again this morning. That was a bit of a relief because she hadn’t done that on Saturday, and I was afraid she was withholding on purpose, but she seems to be back on track in that regard, at least for now. It was also a relief to see that her stools were formed, which as you know they haven’t been for a year and a half now.  I hope that trend continues.

So today the potty show moves to daycare. We sent some stickers to daycare for them to use as rewards, and she seemed excited to go to daycare in her new undies. We sent plenty of extra undies and clothes along with her, but I suspect she’ll do well. I’m told she is super-eager to use the potty there, so I think the biggest challenge will be making sure she doesn’t get too involved in playing that she forgets to take a potty break.

Our next challenge comes this weekend when we go out of town for a special Father’s Day trip (which is a surprise, so I can’t reveal The Destination until afterwards because The Husband reads this blog). I think she’ll do fine, but the biggest thing is we’ll have to make sure we plan for easy access to toilets while we’re out and about (and maybe keep the potty chair in the car for absolute emergencies). We travel by plane at the end of July, so I’d love to feel 100% confident in Baby B’s potty use by the time we take that trip.

We’re well on our way!

Cow says, “RING!!!!!”

Today is Operation: Official Undies Switchover, Day 1.

We started by talking about the switch to panties a couple days ago, then I took Baby B shopping with me on Friday evening so she could pick out some (more) big-girl undies. I would have bought her whatever kind she wanted, but I’m so so so glad she didn’t buy the Disney Princesses one, or the Hannah Montana ones. We put some undies on after we got home last night, then went to an overnight diaper for bedtime, which I suspect we’ll do for a while until she’s ready for night training.

This morning we got up, took off her diaper, and declared that today was the day for no more diapers. As a symbol of this commitment and to help illustrate it for Baby B, we had her put her remaining diapers in the “trash” (they just went in the living room trash; we’ll get them out and keep them in the garage in case we do need to make the switch back, but here’s hoping we don’t have to). At first she was hesitant, but then she stuffed them in there quite eagerly.

Next plan of attack was to use an egg timer to set 15-minute reminders to go potty. She can go hours staying dry, but with the switch to undies, we need this to be a constant thought on her mind as she’s switching to relying on feeling whether she needs to go or not. Our egg timer is a cow, so we set the cow, and when it goes off, she says, “Cow says, ‘RING!!!!!’” We declare: “Pot-ty TIME! Pot-ty TIME!” and march and clap to the bathroom to use the toilet. So far she’s done something every time I’ve taken her to the potty, including twice at a friend’s house we visited this morning and once when we were at the library after that.

I just put her down for her nap, and so far so good…no accidents to report. So far she hasn’t pooped, however. Judging by what’s happened at daycare the past couple of weeks, I think she may be withholding on purpose and not going on the potty, so I think she’s going to have to just poop in her new undies and see how it feels in order to not be encouraged to do that. If that doesn’t work, we have a few other things we can try. We’re going to try our hardest not to go back to daytime diapers, as most success stories I’ve read or heard say that you just need to make that commitment and not look back, even if there are occasional small setbacks. Obviously if there are any major setbacks, we’ll adjust according, but it’s full steam ahead right now.

Happy birthday to Mommy!

Wordless Wednesday: How do YOU eat a banana?

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Stick it to me

Stickers? HA!

Band-Aids are where it’s at with Baby B.

One of her (many) latest obsessions is putting Band-Aids on her boo-boos, and by “boo-boos” I mean: 1) a real boo-boo, 2) any place that used to be a boo-boo within the past month, or 3) any place she’s bumped where she thinks there should be a boo-boo.

“I wanna Band-Aid. I have to!” The sense of urgency in her voice cracks me up every time.

And you know, I don’t really see any harm in letting her have a Band-Aid, even for the fake (to me) boo-boos, especially since she thinks it seems to make things better.

Who am I to argue with the power of the Band-Aid?

The good place

We seem to be in a really good place with Baby B right now.

I love being in a really good place with Baby B.

From what I’ve read and heard from others, the terrible twos stuff goes in cycles and spurts, and we seem to be experiencing a reprieve from the “terrible” part right now.

She’s still picky with most meals, but not putting up a fight.

She wants to do nearly everything herself, but we give her the space and freedom to do just that whenever possible, so it’s almost never a struggle.

Instead of running through store aisles, she actually holds our hand (actually, she grabs onto a single finger) as we walk and doesn’t try to make a break for it.

She climbs into her car seat 99% of the time without resisting.

She’s even more polite than ever (if that’s possible), and she’s even more fun than she’s ever been (again, if that’s possible).

She’s resumed her potty training eagerness (she’d cooled off a little after she got her cast off), and we’ve let her pick out panties. We may get brave and try to make the switch next week. (I’d like to give it a week to talk to her about going to no diapers so it’s an expected change and she feels more a part of it. Plus I need to get more undies since we just bought one pack.)

Life is good.

Friday is my day

I have to admit that one nice thing about my new work schedule is having a day off during the week. That means I can not only get some things done that are easier completed during the week (car maintenance, doctor’s appointments, shopping, etc.), but I also have available child care since we’re paying for it anyway, so I don’t have to take Baby B with me to all these types of things. I love going out with her, but let’s be honest: so many errands so much easier/faster if you don’t have a little one to tow along. (Which is exactly why we do our grocery shopping on Saturday nights after Baby B is in bed.)

I’ll keep Baby B home with me on many Fridays (I did last week), and I’d planned to keep her home with me this week, too, but since she missed two days earlier in the week, I figured I’d go ahead and send her for the day. Today was a good mix of things for me on a day off. I was able to do a little light magazine reading, slept a couple more hours after sending her off to school, took a leisurely shower, ran some errands, paid some bills, had some computer time, did a little light yardwork, and made a nice dinner. (Whew, that’s a lot! No wonder I’m tired now!)

I don’t like giving up my Sundays (in fact, I hate it), but I’ve got to live with it, so I’m trying to find the positive side, and this is definitely one of them.

Show me!

Baby B was going through a separation anxiety thing a couple weeks ago at daycare where she didn’t want The Husband to leave when he dropped her off. He would always do what you “should” — say goodbye, but don’t draw it out, never sneaking out, etc. But she still had issues.

That is, until he started saying, “It’s time to show me out, Baby B!” She LOVES doing this. She gets a big smile on her face, holds his hand and walks him to the door, opens it, gives him a big hug and kiss, and then shuts the door for him and he leaves with no problems.

It’s been so successful that she’s started doing it at bedtime, too ( so that might be another idea for those of you with kids out of the crib who don’t want you to leave at bedtime). Baby B is so happy to show us out that she’ll do everything I listed above, then go right to her bed and tuck herself in (we watch her on the video monitor) or play with her baby dolls sitting on the futon for a few minutes before deciding to lie down and go to sleep.

I think it really plays to her desire to be independent and self-sufficient and gives her some control over the situation. We haven’t had separation issues at daycare since she started doing this, and bedtimes are so easy with this approach. (They weren’t hard before, other than her asking a couple times for us to stay [which we didn't give in on], but this has made them even easier.)

I think it’s so sweet to see her do this. Every time she grabs my hand and walks me to the door after I said, “Baby B, show me out,” I have visions of taking her to school for her first day of kindergarten, with her eager to give me a kiss so she can rush to join those kids who will become her new friends. I know that so many of the things we’re doing now are preparing her for situations she’ll encounter in the future, and it’s times like these when I can’t help but think we’re doing a good job.

Wordless Wednesday: A pneu way to sleep

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On the mend

I’m happy to report that Baby B is doing much better today. She still has some chest congestion, but I think she’ll be fine to return to daycare tomorrow barring any setbacks overnight. We all had a good day at home. The Husband was home with her during the morning while I went to work, and they watched some cartoons, played with stickers, and practiced changing her baby dolls’ diapers. I came home at lunchtime and had the afternoon shift at home, eating lunch with Baby B, doing our pre-nap routine, and then putting her down for her nap. The awesome thing about the afternoon shift at home? I get some bonus time with her but also a couple hours to myself! I took advantage of it by getting some things done around the house and on the computer, reading some magazines, and taking a nap of my own. I’m actually glad to be returning to work tomorrow for a full day because I’m so mixed up on my days after switching to my new work schedule and now doing two half-days at the office.

A pneu week

We had a wonderful start to the weekend — my first altered weekend with Friday and Saturday off instead of Saturday and Sunday. Baby B and I had a wonderful time together on Friday, and The Husband and I decided to take her to the drive-in movie on Saturday night to see Up. (My apologies to those who do this, but I refuse to take my two-year-old to a regular movie theater, even for a kids’ flick. Disaster would certainly ensue for all parties involved.) Despite her testing how many times she could climb from the front seat to the back seat to the front seat (answer: 15 bazillion), we had a nice time and she ended up falling asleep, albeit very late for her, before the movie ended.

Just as the movie ended, rain started coming down, and I think it startled her and she began to cry in her sleep. But it wasn’t a normal cry; it seemed very distressed and pained, and definitely different than usual. We thought maybe molars were coming in because she had told us her mouth hurt earlier and she’d had a slight clear runny nose, so I thought maybe she was actually getting a cold instead.

We took her home, got her to bed right away, and went to bed ourselves. Thereafter, about every hour and a half, Baby B would wake up with the same crying wail and was totally inconsolable. Needless to say, it was very frustrating not knowing what was wrong or how to help her. About midway through the night, she started having trouble with her breathing; a couple hours later, it was full-on wheezing, fast, labored breathing with her sucking in her chest on each inhale. When she finally woke up for the day around 8 a.m., she was not herself at all. Clingy and lethargic. No smiles to offer. Still the issues with breathing that her albuterol didn’t seem to help.

“Hrm,” I thought. “I’ve seen this before. Sudden onset. Breathing issues. Pneumonia.”

Sure enough, that’s what the diagnosis turned out to be. I called the doctor that morning and The Husband took her to the doctor’s office (they were taking patients on a Sunday morning, god bless them) and they said it sounded like small spots of  pneumonia when listening to her chest. Honestly, I would have been surprised if it’d been a different diagnosis. He didn’t send her for a chest x-ray but went ahead and prescribed antibiotics in case it’s bacterial (which it likely is since that’s the kind that hits so suddenly).

Boy, that sure did blindside us. She’d had just that slight runny nose and a slight — very slight — cough when she was laying down the night before. That’s it. And I think it especially surprised us since she’s been so much healthier during the past year compared to the year before (when she had pneumonia at least three times and all her ear infections).

When I came home from work on Sunday night, Baby B was in much better spirits, making jokes and laughing and dancing and playing. This morning I took the morning shift at home and she ended up sleeping until 10:30 a.m. I’d gone in to wake her around 9:30 a.m. and told her I’d come back to get her when her breakfast was ready, but I saw she’d gone back to sleep and I didn’t have the heart to wake her right away. She still wasn’t quite herself when I went to work at lunchtime, but her breathing was much more normal, so that’s definitely a good sign.

We’re definitely keeping her home tomorrow, then will judge on Wednesday if she’s okay to go back. If it’s bacterial, she shouldn’t be contagious now that she’s on the antibiotics, and if it’s viral, she shouldn’t be contagious if she doesn’t have a fever (which she hasn’t had much at all, and when she’s had one, it’s been under 100, so not even a fever in the technical sense). But we’ll use our common sense when making the determination of when she returns. The good thing is that pneumonia itself isn’t contagious, just the illness that led to it. (Sort of like how ear infections aren’t contagious, but associated illnesses are.)

And Baby B makes three years

Three years ago today, I found out I was pregnant with Baby B.

On that day, I started this blog to document my journey of dealing with a pregnancy after miscarriage. I have continued the blog as a place to record all those stories — big and small — that I want to remember but never will on my own — a virtual, comprehensive baby book, if you will.

I have gained that and so much more in those three years.

This blog has allowed me a place to vent when the pressures of parenting have become a bit much. This blog has introduced me to wonderful people I would have never “met” otherwise. This blog has given me a way to sort things out, absorb issues we’re dealing with, and gain the necessary perspective to make our decisions and become a better mom.

I write 100% for myself and my little family. I don’t write for comments (though they’re always nice and always brighten my day); I don’t write to make money from advertisers. Pure and simple, I write for us. We all go through life and want to know we’ve left some mark of ourselves behind. My blog is just a tiny speck on the Internet, but it’s here claiming real estate of its own.

This is the story of my family.

All the stories I capture here? These are all things I’ve wondered about my own childhood. I would love to read through my mom’s state of mind when I was a young tot. I’m able to do this for Baby B, so I make it a priority in my life right now. I don’t know how long I intend to keep this blog. At some point I might have to cut down to once-a-week posts, or maybe just twice-monthly updates. Or maybe circumstances will lead me to end it completely at some point. But I want to continue as long as I can, as this is yet another way I have to profess and record my love for my family: The Husband, Baby B, and any future children we may have.

I love you all so much.

Happy blogoversary to me!

Wordless Wednesday: My prisoners of love

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Snapshots

I feel like there are so many stories to share about Baby B — too many to include on this blog even if I had time to write about her all day long. So here are a few snippets from the last few weeks:

We’ve tried to be more strict about the no-running rule in our house, but Baby B clearly has a career as an attorney ahead of her, as she’s already looking for loopholes. The other day she was half-running and half-skipping through the house when I said, “No running.” She came up to me and said, “I no running, Mommy. I skippin’.”

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Baby B put me in timeout the other day (even though this isn’t really something we use with her). She said, “You go to timeout, and you sit there and you cry!”

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Baby B has finally started calling me Mommy, as opposed to Mama. The best part of my day is when I pick her up at daycare and she cries out, “Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!” when she sees me. She’s never really had that excited of a reaction for me picking her up before, so I’m loving every minute of it.

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I asked Baby B to feed The Dog the other day, and she looked at me, rolled her eyes (two-year-olds roll their eyes at their parents already?), and said, “No, I already fooded him.”

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Baby B is learning a sense of urgency with things and is applying it to her life. She’ll want to do something and will look all serious and say, “But I have to!” like her life simply depends on it. No doubt this will get her through the teen years.

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Baby B’s classmate: “Who has a dirty diaper?”

Several of Baby B’s classmates: “It’s Baby B!”

Baby B: “I no have a dirty diaper. I just tooted.”

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Baby B took her baby doll Ashley in the car with her on Friday morning and took Ashley in to see her friends at daycare. Unfortunately, with all the bee-sting stuff going on Friday afternoon, I forgot to get Ashley when I picked her up that day…which meant we had to make it through the long weekend without her beloved Ashley. I kinda feel bad about it, but I knew that “I left her at school” wasn’t going to fly, so I made up a story about Ashley. I said that Ashley was visiting her daddy over the long weekend but she’d see her at school on Tuesday. Thankfully Baby B bought the story, but The Husband laughed at me for telling our daughter that Ashley comes from a broken home. But I said (to him, when she wasn’t around) that I sure didn’t see any dad in the picture, supporting Ashley. Perhaps Ashley’s dad lives with the fish that “had to go somewhere.”

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I got brave over the weekend and trimmed Baby B’s bangs, which were getting down into her eyes too much (and she won’t keep in barrettes or headbands). I want to wait until closer to our trips this summer before getting the rest of her hair cut, but her bangs weren’t going to make it that long. I figured worse comes to worse, I could always blame her for getting her hands on the scissors if it went horribly wrong, but thankfully I didn’t have to do that since it turned out well.

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Baby B’s teacher today said, “I don’t know any other kid her age who talks about her garage and what’s in it. She was talking about her wagon and her tricycle and that they both stay in the garage. None of the other kids here are talking about their garages!”

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When The Husband and I get off the phone with each other, we always say “love” as a replacement for “goodbye.” Apparently Baby B has heard this enough now that she’s started saying “love” as a replacement for “goodbye”  whenever she is leaving a room and closing the door behind her. I adore that she’s picked this up from us.

Crib notes

The end of an era is upon us. The end of the crib era (at least for Baby B).

Since she had been doing so well sleeping on the futon with apparently no desire to sleep in the crib since making the switch a month or so ago, we decided to try to take the crib out of her room this weekend. If she wasn’t cool with it, we’d leave it there.

I thought it would be important to have Baby B help us take down the crib so it wasn’t too drastic of a change. (Toddlers aren’t so big on the whole change thing, that much I know, if nothing else.) We let her get in there one last time, jumping up and down holding onto the front rail like she used to do with The Husband right before laying down. We took off the front rail and let her lie in it like a toddler bed (it does convert to a toddler bed and then a full-size bed, but for a variety of reasons, we decided not to do that), then put the mattress on the floor and let her lay on that.

A couple times in the process, she was unsure of what we were doing, despite being excited at first when we asked her if she wanted the crib out of her room. But she wasn’t having a freakout about it or anything, so we continued the process and explained things to her along the way. I vacuumed the room once the crib was down, and then we enlisted Baby B’s help again to move the futon to a slightly different spot in the room, closer to where the crib was. She was more than happy to jump up on the futon once it was in place to make sure all was well.

No problems at all with the first night in the cribless room. I really don’t feel sad or bittersweet about this change at all, either. Yes, she’s growing up — and very fast — but with each passing day, I can see success in my job as a parent. My duty is to prepare her for life as an independent, self-sufficient, kind, caring, well-adjusted young woman, and so far we’ve got a good beginning.

Last time in the crib:

Where’s the crib?

Futon in place:

That big fishbowl in the sky

Our new red fish, Hermit, is no more. He has ceased to be, as they say in the “Dead Parrot” Monty Python skit. Thankfully Baby B was satisfied with the answer of , “He had to go somewhere” when she asked where he was. (Thankfully The Husband found the fist this morning before Baby B noticed.)

Guess we need to figure out how we’re going to answer these types of questions because something tells me that response isn’t going to hold up for the rest of her childhood years.

She caught herself a baby bumblebee

A couple weeks ago, I thought I’d introduce what I thought was a new song to Baby B, starting out with, “I caught myself a baby bumblebee…” I was quite surprised to have her pick up with, “Won’t my mommy be s’proud of me?” I said, “Wait, you know that song?” I can only assume they’ve sung it before at daycare. So anyway, this has been a very popular song in our house for the past couple of weeks, and I love to hear her belting out the second line: “Won’t my MOMMY be s’proud of ME?!”

Little did I know that soon it would become a very appropriate song.

I got a call from daycare around 4 p.m. on Friday, informing me that Baby B had been stung by a bee on the playground and wanting to know if she’d been stung  before and had a reaction. She hadn’t been stung before, so they said they’d keep a close eye on it just in case she did react to it.

So I got more of the story when I went to pick her up. Apparently she was playing on the playground and walked up to one of her teachers holding out her right hand, then told them, “I have a bee sittin’ on my finger.” Sure enough, there was a bee with its stinger sunk into her middle finger. She wasn’t crying or bothered by it at all, but calmly let them pull it out, clean up her hand, and examine it. On the way out the door, she told me, “Miss [teacher's name] told me, ‘Baby B, you no play with bees anymore!’ I don’t play with bees on the swings.”

And I swear to you, without my prompting at all, the song she began singing on our way home that night: “I caught myself a baby bumblebee!”

Yes, she certainly did!

Lay off!

I wanted to write today about how Baby B can write the number 10.

Or how she’ll pause on the other side of a doorway and look back at us and say, “Bye-bye! I’m leavin’ you here!” and shut the door behind her.

Or how she woke up the other morning with her upper body dangling off the futon and was crying — probably because she was confused waking up there — until we rescued her.

But instead I get to write about the fact that even though I’m very fortunate to have survived a round of layoffs at work (including my part-time proofreader, which I’m very upset about), I’m very unhappy about the fact that my schedule is now changing to a Sunday through Thursday schedule.

I previously worked Sundays — that’s our main magazine production day — and I hated it. At that time, my other day off was Monday, so I never felt like I had any sort of real weekend. That’s solved this time by having off Friday and Saturday, but several disadvantages loom. I will get to see my family for half the traditional weekend. We cannot take traditional weekend trips without me taking off a Sunday (hard to do) or The Husband taking off a Friday. This means The Husband is 100% in charge of Baby B on Sundays, which he did before fine, but I hate putting that on him again. And there’s basically no one to cover me for days off, either planned or unplanned.

But, I still have my job, right?

I need a weekend. Thankfully we’ve got a long one coming up. (My new schedule doesn’t start until after the holiday.)

Out of the mouths of babes

Baby B: No, Mama, you listen to me.

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Scene: Baby B taking her pants out of her drawer at bedtime.

Me: Baby B, what are you doing?

Baby B: I put my pants on!

Me: I don’t think you need pants on right now. It’s time for stories and songs and then bedtime.

Baby B: (looks at me seriously) But I have to!

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Me: Baby B, it’s not time to do that right now. We need to get dressed.

Baby B: Don’t you tell me no again!

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The Husband: Do you remember cheering for Mommy at her race? Are you going to cheer for Daddy when it’s time for his race?

Baby B: (matter of factly) No.

The Husband: (acting offended) Oh! Why not??

Baby B: ‘Cuz you dropped Mommy’s water. (He had, indeed, dropped my water after my race. I can’t believe she remembered that.)

Wordless Wednesday: “Reading”

Dabby diaper

I’m sure there’s a very lucrative deal between Pampers and Sesame Street to have the classic characters plastered all over the top-of-the-line disposable diapers.

But this very well may be what leads to the end of my sanity.

Despite the fact that she has watched Sesame Street maybe twice at the most in her life (both times coming when we were home during the week with her broken leg), Baby B sure has a pretty firm knowledge of all the show’s characters on her diapers. For a long time she called exclusively them all “Elmo diapers” because the red, furry creature was featured on the front of probably 75% of the diapers.

But then she started noticing the other characters on the diapers and became very interested in those. So Cookie Monster is on one diaper, Grover is on another, and Abby Cadabby (who Baby B calls Abby Dabby) on yet another.

(Abby Cadabby? When the heck did this character show up?! I don’t remember her from when I watched the show as a kid. Then again, I don’t really remember annoying Elmo on the show, either.)

Anyway, along with noticing these characters comes having a distinct preference for such characters. To the point that sometimes, she only wants an Abby Dabby diaper. To the point that sometimes she’ll throw a (totally ridiculous) fit if the diaper we picked for her has Cookie Monster and does not have Abby Dabby on it.

The store will let me return all the Cookie Monster diapers in exchange for more Abby Dabby or Grover diapers, right? It works that way, right? RIGHT?!

And if not, maybe we parents can initiate a diaper exchange in the parking lot. “I’ve got three Cookie Monsters that I’ll gladly trade for an  Abby Dabby? Anyone?”

Sock it to me

One casualty of daycare: Baby B’s socks.

When she wears socks, she wears plain white socks, with nothing really notable about them. However, the kids all like to take off their socks and don’t always end up with the socks they started with — and there’s no good way to label socks so we (and other parents) know they belong to us.

So Baby B will come home, for example, in pink socks (with bows on the sides – yuck!), which we’ll wash and send back to daycare the next day…but no one ever washes and returns our socks. I’d say we lose a pair about two or three times a month, so it’s not at a great rate of loss, but it’s still more than we’d prefer.

Wordless Wednesday: Meet Hermit and Bath

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Why-ning

It has happened.

The “whys” have struck.

Me: “We need to put on a diaper.”

Baby B: “Why?”

Me: “So we can get dressed.”

Baby B: “Why?”

Me: “So we can go see the doctor.”

Baby B: “Why?”

Me: “So he can look at your leg.”

Baby B: “Why?”

Me: “Because you broke it and we need to make sure it’s better now.”

Baby B: “Why?”

Me: “Because we want to make sure you’re not going to hurt it again.”

Baby B: [thinking] OKAY!

We’re in for it now.

Something fishy going on here

We have reached a new (and kind of unexpected) milestone with Baby B: the first pet.

Of course, we already have a golden retriever and two cats, but all three of them pre-date Baby B. Even though she adores all three of them, they’re not really “her” pets.

So late last week we were talking and Baby B said that she wanted a fish. We’ve got a five-gallon tank that has been empty for, wow, probably a couple years now, ever since our last fish died. No particular reason that we hadn’t gotten a new fish…just never got around to it. So at Baby B’s suggestion, we decided to go get her some fish on Saturday after my 5K (which I did run). They have one fish in a small bowl at daycare, and from what she tells us, they get to take turns feeding it.

So we hit the pet store, and she insisted she wanted a red one and a blue one. We ended up with a red one and a black one since there weren’t really any blue ones that would work well for the tank. She was so happy to be taking her fish home! We asked her what she wanted to name them, and I was looking forward to her response, but she didn’t have an answer on the way home. (I love her names for things…she has a caterpillar named Peanut Butter and a stuffed dog named Letter.) We went to my parents’ house that night, and on the way home I asked if she’d thought of a name for her new fish. Just as confidently as she could muster, she said, “Hermit! And….Bath!”

So there you have it. Our new fish, Hermit and Bath. May they not be flushed down the toilet for a long time to come!