Wordless Wednesday: Naughty or nice?

Wordless Wednesday: A pneu way to sleep

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On the board

There is a dry-erase board outside Baby B’s classroom at school. It generally gives a recap of what they did with their classmates that day: played outside, practiced their focus letter/color/number, sang songs, etc.

I was so proud when I read Tuesday’s update!

It said all the kids took turns counting from 1-10 by themselves, and it said, “Baby B rocked!” My heart swelled with pride to read that, especially since she’s one of the youngest in the class now. I should mention that they almost never single out children on this board, unless they’re mentioning someone’s birthday or something. So to see her singled out like that was extra special!

Wordless Wednesday: Just like that! But with more emotion!

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Another 10K closer

The 10K is in the books. Next stop: half-marathon in Indianapolis.

Our trip east for the 10K went well. We hit the road immediately after work on Friday, grabbed dinner just out of town, then set about on the small, winding roads to Eastern Kentucky. We arrived in town just after 8:30 p.m. This is the town that my parents grew up in, and that’s where both sets of grandparents lived until their deaths. (My grandparents passed away in 1994, 1997, 1998, and 2004. I hadn’t returned since about a month after my grandfather’s funeral in 2004.) Even though it’d been 4 1/2 years since visiting the town, so much of the place was exactly the same, as though the hand of time left the town untouched. Yet there was enough different that it caught my attention, mostly the addition of some major national food chains in the commercial district.

We checked into the hotel, got settled, and put Baby B to bed since it was past her bedtime. We finally got her settled down and asleep — hiding outside the bathroom for 15 minutes so she wouldn’t see us and want to get up again — then I took a hot bath to loosen my leg muscles before going to bed by 10:30 p.m. to get plenty of rest for the race. Surprisingly, I managed to sleep well during the night even though I did wake up several times.

We got up in the morning and I got ready for the race. I nervously looked outside and expected to see frost on the car windows, but there wasn’t any. Don’t get me wrong, it was still cold, but not as cold as I dreaded.

The race finally got underway just after 9 a.m. I’d say it was probably a group of 30 to 40 runners with me doing the 10K run, then probably another 20 or 30 people did the 5K walk, so overall it was a pretty small group, but I expected that for a race in a small town. The first mile was pretty tough as I tried to get used to the cold air coming into my lungs (I do have asthma), but that became easier to deal with as I went along. I quickly saw that I was going to end up near the back of the pack, and I was right. That’s pretty frustrating mentally (and running is 99% a mind game), but I kept reminding myself that I wasn’t racing the other people; I was racing myself. After the first two miles, all of the runners but one had passed me.

Around the three-mile point, a stray dog took up position beside me and pretty much ran with me the entire rest of the way. That was quite distracting because I was afraid she was going to get hit (even though the local police had a rolling roadblock set up for the runners). I had several stretches when I had to run for a quarter-mile or half-mile, then walk for maybe 30 seconds to catch my breath, but I managed fine…and remained in second-to-last place the rest of the way.

My time goal for the race was an hour and 15 minutes, and I crossed the finish line in 1 hour, 8 minutes, and 14 seconds, so definitely under what I was hoping for. The race organizers had bananas, doughnuts, cookies, and sausage biscuits for the runners, so I ate and we hung out until they had the results ready. I figured I’d just get a little participation medal, but get this: I finished first in my division (females 30-34) and received a trophy!! Of course, our little secret is that there were only two people (including myself) in my division, and the second-place woman in the division was the only person I finished in front of!

Baby B’s favorite part of the morning was chasing down the dog that ran with me since she (the dog, not Baby B) was hanging out near all the sausage biscuits at the finish line. She’d spot the dog, yell out, “Dog-DOH!!!” and run toward her, but then as soon as she got near the dog, she’d slow down and put out her hand with her palm turned up to give the dog a chance to sniff her first.

On our way out of town, we stopped at the cemetery to visit the graves of my four grandparents (obviously none of whom had a chance to meet Baby B since they’d all passed away before she arrived). So in that sense, it was her first time “meeting” her four maternal great-grandparents, which was pretty sweet.

I definitely learned a few more things that will help me with the half-marathon that is now 13 days away. Thirteen days. Six more “short” training runs and one more long one. I’m almost there.

At the start:

Almost at the finish line:

Baby B and me after the race:

With trophy:

I’m tickled

A lot of moms who do not return to work say they couldn’t bear the idea of missing any of their baby’s “firsts.” I’ve been back at work since Baby B was three months old, and I can say we’ve never missed a major milestone — those have always come at home. Sure, we’ve missed some smaller things along the way, but I quickly learned that I love when she shows me her new skill for the first time; I get so giddy and I’m so proud of her for showing me what she’s been working on. No, I’m not the first to see some things like that, but I get so, well, tickled when I get a demonstration of something new.

A couple days ago, I went to pick up Baby B at daycare so we could go to swim lessons. When I walked in the room, the teacher, Baby B, and three other toddlers were in the corner reading Are You Ticklish?, a book that has animals with different textures that you’re supposed to tickle. The teacher would ask, “Can you tickle the zebra?” and all four kids would take their turn to tickle. It was so funny to watch because Baby B was the most eager one, standing closest to the book and so excited to get her turn to tickle. This was a new thing for me to see; we tickle Baby B all the time, but we’ve never seen her do the tickling herself.

A couple other parents arrived, so storytime broke up and Baby B grabbed the book and brought it to me to sit down and read some more. Even though we needed to get to class, I could see how much she wanted to read, so I plopped down with her and helped her tickle the elephant and lion. Every time she did it when I said, “Can you tickle the animal?” I was so incredibly proud of her. No, I wasn’t there to see her do that for the first time, but my first time seeing it was priceless. A Major Meltdown ensued when I had to make her put down the book so we could leave; she liked the book that much.

Later that night, we were doing our bedtime story, and I asked Baby B if she could go tickle Daddy. She romped right over to him, put her hands on his chest, and wriggled her fingers in a tickle motion. He proceeded to ask if she could go tickle me, and at once she made a beeline for me and did the same thing. As an additional test, I wanted to see if she recognized her own name, so I said, “Can you tickle Baby B?” (well, I used her real name). She thought for a few seconds, then reached down and tickled her own tummy with a big grin.

I’m quite tickled by this new skill.

Wordless Wednesday: The baby mullet ponytail

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Wordless Wednesday: Can we please get every food on the cob for this picky eater?

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Nein. Non. No.

For a while we’ve known that Baby B understands what we mean when we say “no” to her, but this turned around on us recently when she started using the word. All the time. Like it’s going out of style. (And boy I wish it would!)

Yes, it looks like we’ve reached the dreaded “no-is-the-answer-to-everrything-in-the-whole-wide-world” stage.

“Baby B, would you like to eat dinner?”

“No!”

“Do you want to play outside?”

“No!”

“Can I have a hug before you go to bed?”

“No!”

“Can I have that back?”

“No!”

You get the idea. In a way, it’s kind of impressive how certain she is when she asserts her little “no!” Our approach so far has been to honor her “no” whenever she says it, hopefully so she’ll learn that it’s not a game and that the word has a meaning and consequences to saying it.

I’ve had to start to be careful lately about how I say things to her if it’s something that’s non-negotiable. If she says she doesn’t want to play with the dog when I ask, that’s fine. But I can’t have her refusing meals, so I try not to word that as a question and instead say, “It’s time for dinner! Let’s go eat!”

We’ll see how long this approach works for us!

Oh, boy!

For the record, it doesn’t offend me if someone sees Baby B and thinks she’s a boy. She wears a wide range of clothes and we’ve never felt the need or desire to overgirlify her so that her outfit screams, “Hey, people, I’m a girl!” So in some cases, especially since Baby B has very little hair, I can see how the mistake would be made. And I don’t make a big deal about correcting them if they ask how old “he” is. I usually just answer the question with the correct pronoun and let it go.

But what truly baffles me is when people make the mistake when she’s dressed girl-appropriate. When we were at the airport last week, two different people at security called her a “he.” What was she wearing, you might ask? A medium pink shirt with dark pink cherries and dark pink pants. What part of that ensemble said boy, I wonder? Like I said, it truly doesn’t offend me, but I’m more amazed at the sheer ignorance.

On Saturday, it happened twice within about 10 minutes at two different stores. We went to buy Baby B some summer sandals, and the cashier asked if she could give “him” some stickers, which she obviously picked from her boy pile of stickers because she ended up getting ones from the movie Cars. I just accepted the stickers and didn’t say anything otherwise.

Then we went to a pet store right after that, and Baby B was looking at the bunnies and ferrets. Another mom walked by with her toddler and saw Baby B looking at the bunnies and asked us how old “he” was. The Husband politely corrected the woman: “She. She is 16 months old.” The woman apologized, and I made some lame joke about the fact that we’re still waiting for hair. This time, Baby B was wearing the outfit pictured below: red shorts and a spaghetti-strap shirt with black, red, white, and pink stripes. Maybe I’m out of the fashion loop here (which is quite possible, I’ll admit), but I would never dress a boy in a spaghetti-strap shirt, pink stripe or not.

Travel tidbits

I’ve got a ton of random stories/thoughts from our trip last weekend, so I’ll just compile them here as they come to me:

*Baby B did great sleeping in the Pack N Play in our room. I was afraid that we might wake up her, but she slept perfectly while we were there, despite some of her naptimes being super-late due to our activities that day.

*One of my favorite moments was in the Manchester airport when we were waiting at our gate. She led The Husband by the hand (which was unusual because she usually doesn’t want to hold our hand when she’s walking) and took him all around the seating area, waving and saying “bye-bye!” to all the other passengers. She had everyone in stitches.

*The most challenging part of the flight home was when Baby B had a dirty diaper blowout that required not just a diaper change but also a change of pants. The Husband tackled this duty in the airplane bathroom, and he deserves a medal for it.

*I’m not sure why, but Baby B has recently decided she hates having her diaper changed on hard public changing tables, which obviously makes being out of town a difficult task. If I take her near one, she either stiffens up or becomes jelly bones and cries a cry that’s panicked and unlike any other cry she has. I’ve had to start mastering the art of the standing diaper change, which I didn’t expect to have to do for a while, but I don’t see any other option. She’s just fine during diaper changes at home.

*The descent in an airplane most definitely bothers Baby B’s ears and makes her cry from the pain. It sucks because there’s not much we can do; I don’t nurse anymore, she doesn’t have a pacifier, and she doesn’t take a bottle. We tried some crackers and a sippy cup, but once the pain starts, she won’t pay attention to anything else until we land.

*For the record, I still hate strollers, but taking ours on this trip really did come in handy. I guess I’m going to have to get over that stroller thing because she’s too big to use a carrier, too heavy to carry in our arms for long, and we’d never get anywhere on time if we let her walk on her own the whole time.

*Related to my stroller distaste, I just don’t get why people who are pushing strollers are so completely oblivious to their surroundings. I made a vow to never be like that (or at least keep it to a minimum!), and I think it’s so far so good on that front.

*We went out for ice cream one night, and we let Baby B have bites of what we got. She kept asking for “maw!” of The Husband’s mocha chip and pretty much ignored my chocolate chip cookie dough. She really tends to like the things that I never expect her to like.

*At the children’s museum, she found a little green ping-pong-type ball floating in one of the water stations. She played with it there for a few minutes, then took off running down the length of the museum (with The Husband in close pursuit) all the way to the exhibit at the end of the building. What was there when they arrived? Several stations set up with these little green balls, which is obviously where this stray one had come from. She obviously had no way of knowing that’s where the ball came from since we hadn’t been to that exhibit yet, but it’s still fun that she did find where the ball came from before we figured it out!

Museum o’ children

We made it to Boston just fine — both flights were uneventful and landed right on time — and ventured downtown today to visit the Boston Children’s Museum with Baby B and Baby O in tow, and we really had a great afternoon. We spent most of our time in their PlaySpace, an area especially for kids 0-3 years old. There she could play among kids closer to her size as opposed to the kids on school field trips who were a little bit older, more energetic, and less careful about where they were running.

Probably Baby B’s favorite part was this playground thing that had stairs (her new favorite “toy”; we don’t have stairs at home, so she’s loved going up and down at Serenity’s house) and also a slide. She’s definitely a climber, as she quickly figured out how to climb up the slide from the bottom and then slide down that way. They also had a boat exhibit with water stations set up for the kids to play in, including one at just the right height for young toddlers. I’m so glad we ended up going there, and even though I’m sad that we don’t live here and can’t go back except during visits, it was great for Serenity to be with us so she could see just how much fun Baby O will have there, say, a year from now. I think they’ll end up having a lot of fun.

Some pics from our day at the children’s museum:

Revolving door

I’m a little unhappy with the instability with the teacher situation in the toddler room currently. When Baby B moved to the room in early February, Teacher A and Teacher B were leading the class. Last month, Teacher B left her position due to health reasons, but Teacher A remained in place and they brought in Teacher C to take over. So currently we have Teacher A and Teacher C.

Well, today is Teacher A’s last day; they’ve hired Teacher D to take her place. So as of next week, we’ll have Teacher C and Teacher D in the room. That would be fine if that’s where the changes ended, but Teacher C is pregnant and due in July, so obviously she has just a limited amount of time left in the room. I’m not sure if she’s coming back, but obviously an additional teacher (Teacher E, who to my knowledge has not been chosen yet) will have to come in and at the very least cover 6 weeks while Teacher C is out. So if she doesn’t come back, we’ll be left with Teacher D and Teacher E. If she does come back, we’ll have Teacher D and Teacher E temporarily, and then Teacher D and Teacher C a few weeks (or months, not sure) later. And that’s assuming that Teacher D sticks around this whole time! Otherwise we’re moving onto Teacher F.

I do like the idea of Baby B understanding that people other than Mom and Dad can take care of her and meet her needs, but I also feel like she needs some sort of stability in her caregivers, because otherwise it’s hard for them to build the trust they need to build in order to feel comfortable and safe. I understand daycare positions do not pay well, and often a 50-cent per hour pay increase at another job is worth it for a teacher to leave (this is why Teacher A is leaving). We did not have this problem in the infant room, so it’s frustrating to have to deal with it now.

The good thing is that so far, Baby B doesn’t really seem to mind who is taking care of her, as long as she is in a good environment, which she seems to be (despite the teacher turnover). And, you know, the advantage to being at a center is that it’s the director’s responsibility for finding a new teacher, not mine. If we did at-home daycare and my provider decided to quit watching kids or take another job, I’d be the one scrambling (this is actually one of my main fears of in-home care, actually), so at least I’m not in that position right now.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery

I just love watching Baby B do things in imitation of us, and it always leaves me a bit in awe when I see her mimicking something she saw us do. Of course it started out long ago with making silly faces at each other, but it’s progressed to more advanced things now. My two favorite ones come during bathtime.

We have this shampoo rinse cup, which has a flexible silicon edge that goes against the forehead to keep water and shampoo out of the eyes. After we’re done washing Baby B, we run the water and use the cup to rinse her, then we keep the water running and let her play with the cup. For the last several baths, she’s filled the cup with water and has put the soft edge to her own forehead and tried to tip it back so the water spills over her head, just like we do with her. (She’s often unsuccessful because the water makes the cup heavy and hard for her to control, but we often give a little help without her knowing it by nudging it upward when she makes the motion.)

During last night’s bath, she took the cup, filled it with water as usual, and brought it over to The Husband (who was in the bath with her) and poured it over his body. She did this several times, filling the cup carefully each time, then rinsing him off…again, just as we do to her each bath.

It’s times like these that really make me aware of just how much she’s learning on an everyday basis just by observing what goes on around her. I think sometimes we as parents get caught up in (and sometimes overwhelmed by) all the things we need to teach our children, but it is nice to see proof of just how much they pick up on their own without our direct instruction. Their capacity and eagerness for learning really is amazing.

Monday roundup (yee-HAW!)

*Baby B loves to turn off the lights when we leave a room. If we forget to let her do it, sometimes she’ll whine until we turn the light back on so that she can turn it off.

*Baby B’s current words (with recognition of what she’s saying) include: ma-ma/mom-mom (mom), da-da (dad), dog-doh (dog), ba (ball), cat, and nana (banana). I know there are a couple I’m forgetting, but I’ll add them later if I remember.

*We’re working on making sure Baby B understands our single-action commands, especially “come here.” With her really enjoying walking, she likes to just take off (usually in the opposite direction of us!), so we’re trying to make sure she knows what we mean when we tell her to come to us. Sometimes I’m convinced she knows, other times I’m not so sure. I think a lot of it is that she understands, but then chooses to ignore it. I suspect that’s not the end of that whole game.

*Baby B loves to climb steep hills, whether it’s the grassy incline in our backyard, or one of the many super-steep driveways in our neighborhood. She can usually navigate down them just fine, but seems to prefer going up.

*Baby B usually gets a bath on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, then a fun bath (no washing) on Sundays. However, since daycare puts sunscreen on her (including on her head since she doesn’t have much hair…and what she does have is thin and fine), we have to get that out each night, so The Husband has been taking a shower with her when we get home. I can’t see us doing that permanently in lieu of baths because she loves her baths so much, but it’s been a good solution when we do need to get the sunscreen out each day. She loves the water coming down, and she giggles when The Husband throws water in his face.

*Baby B can now get on her rocking horse all by herself, and she can get off it by herself, too.

*We went out this weekend to buy Baby B some spring/summer clothes, as she had none in her current size…everything that fits her is long-sleeved winter stuff. We went ahead and bought most things in 12 month size, which should last her throughout most of the spring and summer. (Believe it or not, she’s still mostly in 6-9 month or 6-12 month clothes, though she did have a few 12 month items.)

*This morning, The Husband reported that one of the daycare teachers put on a some kind of “fun time” CD, and three of the girls (including ours) came running over and started dancing by the CD player. Like, waving arms and shrieking. The other two girls lost interest after a minute, but Baby B continued dancing for the entire song, making herself dizzy and falling down twice. At the end of the song, she clapped eagerly.

*Baby B can stand in one spot and turn herself in a circle.

*I’m doing pretty well with the post-weaning time. There are times I do miss it, but most days I actually don’t ever think about it…and it almost seems weird that I would’ve possibly continued. So, it was definitely the right time to do it. I’m glad to have my body back again.

*Baby B has perfected her high-pitched scream. She does not do this when she’s angry or upset or frustrated. She does not do this when she’s happy. She does it at completely random times, just whenever she feels like testing it out. It’s kind of funny, though thankfully she hasn’t done this in public. Yet.

*When we ask, Baby B can point out where her belly button, nose, and ears are. We’re working on the other parts of the body, too, but so far she’s not real consistent with those.

*She’s very drawn to lions, and whenever she sees one or when we say, ”What does a lion say?” she’s quick to break out her roar: “RAWWWR!”

*As we move forward in time, I am so, so, so thankful that I’ve kept such detailed records in this blog. It’s sad just how many things I’m forgetting about Baby B’s early days. 

Mom rules, part 2

Just so you don’t think from the last post that I’m one to abide by all the parenting “rules” out there, here’s a list of a few things we chose to do despite most expert advice advising against it. Please do not call Child Protective Services.

*She slept in her swing for the first 8 weeks. I think she felt the most secure and cozy there, plus it was a good solution with her reflux. We were very fortunate that she transitioned just fine to her crib.

*She has slept on her tummy since she was 6 months old. Most experts recommend back sleeping for the first year, and we were good about putting her down on her back for the first six months. Around that time, she showed a definite preference for tummy sleeping. At first, we would go in and flip her over to her back when we’d notice her doing this, but I think we not only gave that up within a month but also started putting her down to sleep on her belly.

*I sometimes let her play with items that she probably shouldn’t play with. I’d like to add the disclaimer that it’s ALWAYS with my constant supervision. I feel pretty strongly that kids need to learn not just from toys designed for learning but also by interacting with everyday items. So even though a pen, for example, might be a choking hazard, I let her play with that and other things from time to time. Again, with my closer supervision.

*We didn’t read to Baby B as part of our bedtime routine until she’d dropped the bedtime nursing session. Now, we did read to Baby B at other times of the day, and she’s always had access and exposure to books, but we didn’t include stories as part of our bedtime routine until January. Bad Mom-mom!

*For a while, around 8 to 12 months or so, we let her nap on us. It was the only way she’d take a nap longer than half an hour, so we’d sit in the recliner or on the couch, lay her tummy down on our chest, and snooze away together. Thankfully around 11 to 12 months, she transitioned to taking one long nap a day (as opposed to two super-short naps), and she also was much better at napping in her crib at this time. I do miss our tandem naps, but I’m afraid to disrupt the long crib nap habit for fear of her not doing nearly as well as she does now (finally).

Mom rules

As moms, we all have our preferred parenting issues that we take more of a stand about than other issues, and it’s certainly not the same for each mom. Some moms are strict about feeding their kids only organic foods, for example, while other moms don’t find that to be as important. Yet those non-organic-feeding moms may feel strongly about flipping their baby back to their back once they can roll to their tummy, while that’s not as big of a deal to other moms. We all certainly have our own comfort level for when we make our parenting decisions, and sometimes those decisions can be explained fully, but other times it’s just something you feel strongly about (or not) but can’t really put your finger on why.

Here are some of the parenting issues that we’ve felt pretty strongly about following. (And I’m not making judgments about those people who do the opposite of what we do; some of these are very personal decisions. I’m just including some of our reasons for making our choices in these matters.)

*We made all of our own baby foods. I like to cook and bake, and I liked to cook for Baby B because it helped me feel like I was including her more as part of the family when preparing our meal. It really wasn’t that hard, even with working full time, and I liked knowing exactly what was going into her food and knowing that we were using the freshest possible fruits and vegetables. We never did use any jarred foods.

*No juice. I’d much rather she get her fruits through actual fruits than through juice, so we set a no juice rule. She drinks water and milk just fine, so I don’t see the point, really, since I feel it’s empty calories that can really do a number on her teeth. We’ve made it clear to the daycare that she’s not to get juice with her snacks (they serve it with both snacks each day; they get milk with lunch), though we’ve learned that Baby B is the only kid in her class to not get juice. We did allow them an exception and will let them serve it for occasional holiday parties, but at no other time. She does not get it at home.

*No padded crib bumper. Chances are good that she’d be okay with a padded crib bumper and wouldn’t succumb to SIDS or suffocation, but we didn’t feel comfortable with the risk. Even if only one child died in a ten-year period, that’s one too many deaths if it’s your child who died. We used no bumper at first, then bought a breathable mesh bumper once we saw she was getting her arms and legs stuck between the slats. It’s worked very well for us. It might not be as “cute,” but I’ll sacrifice cuteness for safety.

*Nothing in the crib until after a year. We took this one very seriously, and she had no blankets, stuffed animals, or other toys in her crib until she turned a year old. Again, the risk for suffocation isn’t great, but we figured why risk it when it’s something we can easily prevent?

*No co-sleeping at night. This just wasn’t something we were comfortable doing for a variety of reasons. Sometimes we would bring Baby B to our bed on weekend mornings to nurse there so I could get some more rest after I returned to work (though rarely went to sleep because she always wanted to play after nursing), but even that stopped when I weaned from nursing. I feel pretty strongly that I’d like to keep our time in bed as being sort of a retreat/escape from being a parent. We get little enough alone time as it is, and I’d prefer to keep that time in bed as ours.

*No pacifiers after 6 months. Okay, we “cheated” a little with this one, only because Baby B weaned herself from the pacifier around 4 months old, so it was never really an issue that we had to address, but it’s still one that we felt pretty strongly about and would have taken steps to make happen had it continued. It makes me uncomfortable to see some other toddlers in Baby B’s class (and especially in the 2s/3s room) with pacifiers nearly all the time, and I didn’t want her to be in that position.

*No Bumbo seat on raises surfaces. I’m really surprised by how many pictures I see of kids sitting in a Bumbo on a tabletop. Bumbos were recalled in order to include a warning against doing this, but even before then, I don’t think it ever really occurred to me to put it on a table or other raised surface because it seemed like a bit of a hazard.

*No diaper bags hanging on strollers. A smaller issue than some of the ones above, but I’m also surprised by how many diaper bags I see hanging on strollers, even though every stroller owner’s manual I’ve read says not to do this. I’d much rather carry the darned thing than risk tipping her over accidentally.

*Very little exposure to TV. We try to have music turned on most of the time when Baby B is playing. We never have her sit down to watch TV shows or DVDs (though really, I can’t imagine something keeping her attention enough to sit through and actually watch, as I’d consider her very active and I suspect she’d choose to do other things instead).

*No headbands, head bows, or earrings. I personally think they look silly. And I’ll just leave it at that.

Well-baby check. Check!

We went to the pediatrician for Baby B’s 15-month check-up early this morning, and it went well. She weighed in at 21 pounds and 9 ounces, which puts her in the 25th to 50th percentile for the first time after hovering in the 10th to 25th percentile range before now. So, the pediatrician said he’s not concerned about her pickiness with eating because she’s doing more than fine with weight gain. He said we can give her a vitamin if we feel she has a particularly bad day, which has been our approach already. (Though I’m glad to report that moving to the booster seat does seem to be helping somewhat.)

She measured 30 inches tall, so a solid 2 1/2 feet from top to bottom, and a 1 1/2-inch increase from her 12-month appointment. That keeps her in the 25th to 50th percentile for height. Her soft spot has completely closed, and her tubes look great. She’s got bulges in her gums back in the molars area, but so far none have come through.  (I suspected that was the case, but she won’t let me feel back there.)

She wasn’t too crazy about the physical exam, crying throughout, but she calmed down when she was picked up again. I didn’t get to answer any weird milestone questions on the piece of paper this time, though the doctor did ask me things about her verbal development, if she can understand some of what we say to her (I said that yes, it always surprises us just how much she understands of what we say), and if she was walking yet (he wanted to see a demonstration to make sure she was where she should be). The nurse came back in for one shot in the thigh, which brought on the tears, but she did fine once I picked her up again.

We return in late July for her 18-month appointment (holy crap…she’ll be 18 months before long!!), and hopefully we’ll keep the pediatrician visits to a minimum before the next well-baby visit.

Toddler tidbits

There are so many little tidbits I want to share, but they don’t necessarily warrant posts of their own, so I’ll just collect them here.

*We’re going to buy a booster seat this weekend and see if that helps Baby B with her eating. She eats breakfast and snacks fine (not in the high chair) and she’s done well the last few nights being in her high chair but without the tray, so I’m thinking maybe it’s time to try the booster. I’ll keep you posted.

*There is not much better than having a toddler in the springtime. The weather around here has been absolutely perfect–upper 60s/low 70s and perfectly sunny–so we’ve really taken advantage of it the past few nights. When we first get home, we take Baby B outside and let her walk by herself on the sidewalk (well, I mean, we’re right there, too…I just meant by herself in that she’s not in a stroller) and play in the grass in the front yard. Then we get out the stroller, leash up the dog, and take a nice walk around the neighborhood. I’m already looking forward to doing it tonight, too.

*Baby B loves to go outside. She notices everything, including airplanes flying overhead (we live a few miles from the airport, right on the incoming flight path) and loves pointing out things she sees, especially dogs.

*Baby B calls nearly every animal she sees a dog. Or a “dog-doh,” which is her word for dog. We’re working with her to differentiate the animals. She did say “cat” the other day, so I think she’s starting to see there’s a difference in what these other animals are called.

*I really make an effort around the house to make Baby B walk everywhere we need to go despite the pre-walking habit of carrying her around. Quite often she gets sidetracked when something more interesting draws her attention, but she’s usually pretty good about following along when I tell her where we’re going and what we’re doing.

*It’s funny that I recently made a post about Baby B not really being drawn to stuffed animals because shortly after that, she started to take a liking to them. We let her sleep with a soft dog that lets you record your voice (thanks, C!), and she loves to hug that before bed. She’s also got a neon stuffed turtle (thanks, L & D!) that stays in her crib. She usually doesn’t snuggle up with them, but I know she plays with them sometimes. We’re fine with her keeping these toys in the crib for now, unless she starts to throw them out of the crib. Then we might have to reevaluate.

*We’ve resisted buying a video monitor because we aren’t comfortable with the idea that they’re not digital (the only digital ones I can find don’t have good reviews), which means that any neighbor could tap into our system and watch Baby B whenever the monitor is on. I have a feeling we may cave when it’s time for Baby B to sleep in a toddler bed and she can get up and play in her room whenever the mood strikes. Hopefully by that time comes around, there will be a good digital monitor on the market.

*I learned yesterday that Baby B loves dill pickle chips. I just gave her tiny pieces of mine as I ate them because I don’t want her to have too much sodium, but it was still fun to see her so eager about it. Why, oh, why can’t pickles be loaded with tons of vitamins and minerals?

*We got some light-up bath toys that have suction cups on them, and Baby B has fun playing with those. Suction cups have turned out to be a very good learning tool for her. You never really think about the fact that you have to learn how they work. As adults, we just know how they work, but it’s new and fascinating to a toddler. I think that’s one of the best things about having a child because it forces you to take a new look at everyday things and not take things for granted.

*I really should try to think of a new blog name for Baby B; she’s not really a baby anymore.

*Baby B devours bananas, but she prefers to hold it herself in the peel. Banana slices are still usually eaten, but they don’t go over nearly as well as whole bananas in the peel.

*At the end of “Down by the Station” (one of our bedtime songs), you pump your arms as though tooting a train whistle, and Baby B sometimes will do it along with us, at just the right time.  We start out “The Grand Ol’ Duke of York” with an extended, “Ohhhhhhh!!” We sing the song twice, but sometimes she lets us know she wants to sing it a third time by singing out, “Ohhhhhhh!!!!”

*She has started doing intentionally silly walks, which I remember my niece doing when she was around this age. Unfortunately, they’re pretty hard to describe properly in words, so I’ll have to work on getting some video I can post. 

Wordless Wednesday: Pondering all the reasons to ignore Mom re: touching the dog food

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Walking the walk (for realsies!)

Pretty much ever since Baby B was 9 or 10 months old and started using the walk ‘n ride at daycare, everyone has been saying to us, “Oh, she’s going to be walking so soon!” We were very excited for this milestone, as it’s a big one, but weeks and then months passed and still nothing. I knew she was still well within the range of normal for this milestone, so I tried not to think about it too much, but mostly it was just frustrating to hear everyone else saying how soon it would be and then come up empty week after week. She became good at walking while holding onto just one of our hands, but she never became brave enough to try it on her own. I’ve said for a while that when she took her first steps, she was going to pretty much take off instead of it being just one or two wobbly steps.

I was pretty much right!

This evening after dinner, we were playing with Baby B on the floor in the living room before it was time for bed. She showed some signs of wanting to stand on her own, which she really hadn’t done all that much, so we let her do that and didn’t really expect her to take off–but she did! She walked about five or six steps back and forth between me and The Husband countless times, diving into our arms excitedly at the end of each turn. After a while, we stood up and decided to see how far she’d walk if one of us wasn’t right in front of her, and one time she took 8 steps, and another time she took 10 steps, pausing at times to maintain her balance before carefully proceeding further.

We made our way to the bedroom so we could get her dressed for bed, and the walking thing was so exciting that The Husband and I plopped down in the floor, about 4 feet from each other, and had her walk between us again. This time she really surprised us because she left my arms, starting walking toward The Husband, then pivoted 180 degrees so that she came right back to me, slowly, but without losing her balance.

I was able to take a short video of her second set of steps (the first caught us by surprise, so I didn’t have my camera on, though thankfully it was nearby), so I’ll be posting that tomorrow for Wordless Wednesday. (The video is only about 9 or 10 seconds because at the time, she would only walk toward me, so it was hard to film her while also having my arms ready to catch her hug bomb. But I got it all the same. )

The games kids play

When I picked up Baby B from daycare yesterday, I found out that they took advantage of the nice day (in the low 70s) and went outside for some playtime on the playground. This was the first time Baby B had gone out there, so I asked how she did. They have one of those little plastic cars (the kind that’s red with a yellow roof–I know you know the type I mean), and for the first part of playtime, she sat inside there with her elbow resting on the window of the car and her hand against her head, just watching everyone else play, probably to get a sense of what to do. They said she then came out of there and went right for the little baby slide, climbing up (oh yeah, we’ve got a climber for sure) the tiny slide and then sliding down with a squeal. Oh, what I would’ve given to see that!

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When I picked her up yesterday, her back was to me when I came into the room, so I stood at the door and watched her play for a few minutes. I love doing that, watching her play like that when she doesn’t know I’m there, so I do it every chance I have. We don’t get much time like that at home since she still needs to be in sight when playing, so at daycare is the perfect chance for that.

Anyway, she finally saw me, and usually she comes crawling over to me excitedly so I can pick her up. But this time, she started crawling away from me excitedly. I laughed and asked, “Where are you going?” She went straight for the back corner of the room, where the daycare had set up a new pyramid play center (pictured here, though ours doesn’t have the mirrors) that they’d just gotten over the weekend. She took two steps up the slide and plopped her butt down so she could slide down it. The grin on her face couldn’t have been any bigger as she bounced up and down when she got to the bottom.

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I love the little “games” that Baby B makes up on her own. This is one she does in the bath from time to time, and I’ll do my best to describe it. We’ll run the bath water to rinse her using a cup. We fill up the cup and while it’s still under the faucet, Baby B will put in her little bath-toy fish in the cup and push it down. We’ll pour the water on her, fish and all, and she’ll pick up the fish. We refill the cup and she does the same thing, and if she doesn’t put the fish in the cup under the running water, she makes a special point to do it as soon as the cup comes toward her. Before we pour the water, she’ll take the fish out, put it back in, push it down, take it out, and put it back in. Then we pour the water and fish on her, and the whole thing starts over again. It sounds pretty dumb to narrate the whole thing here, now that I’ve got it all written out, but trust me when I say it’s amusing to watch. Well, amusing for her parents, at least.

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Another new game for her is playing with pillows. She loves to rearrange the pillows on either our bed or the futon in her room, and she stacks them up like blocks and then dives into them. Earlier tonight, she stacked two pillows on The Dog and then went headfirst into all of it. I swear The Dog puts up with so much (trust me…he loves it!). The funny part is that I’ve always had quite an affinity for pillows, so she’s definitely showing signs of being my daughter with this new game.

Monitor mornings

For the most part, we have to wake up Baby B in the mornings, so she really doesn’t have all that much time to play in her crib by herself. But sometimes on weekend mornings she’ll wake up before us (usually around 8 or 8:30, so we’re very thankful we can sleep in a little) and will entertain herself for anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes before crying for us to come get her up. I love those mornings, getting to listen on the baby monitor to her coos, squeals, and “talks” as she plays with the crib aquarium.

It’s those mornings that I would love to have a video baby monitor so we can watch what she’s doing, but I hesitate to get one because there’s only one on the market that’s digital, and that one hasn’t gotten good reviews. It doesn’t bother me as much to have a regular monitor that isn’t digital, but it really makes me uncomfortable to think that someone could watch our baby if our signal crossed with theirs, so I think that digital protection is a must before I’d buy a video monitor. It’s a little disappointing that video monitor manufacturers have not realized this yet.

Wordless Wednesday: Full moon hanging low

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Ear we go again

Yesterday I needed to contact the ENT office’s financial person because they require that we pay our deductible (which has increased to $750 from $250 this year…grrr) prior to the ear tube surgery. She had warned me that she’s on the phone all day and I’d probably have to leave a message. I called on my lunch break at home (since I’d left her number at home accidentally) and told her to call me back at home if it was before 2:30 p.m. and at work if it was after. I got no return phone call while I was still at home, and I got back to work to find my voice mail light blinking. I checked my messages and sure enough it was her, calling at 2:20. When I’d asked her to call me at home before 2:30. 

I immediately called her back, but it went straight to voice mail. I left another message and told her I’d be at my desk all afternoon. I literally did not get up from my desk all afternoon, until it got to be about 1 minute before 5 p.m. and I needed to use the restroom before heading out. I joked that, “Watch, she’ll call now!” and sure enough, I was gone for approximately 90 seconds, and in that time, she called me back.  Argh!! I continuously hit “redial,” hoping to catch her before leaving. It took about 15 calls, but she finally picked up and said she had her coat in her hand to leave. Finally I was able to give her the payment information she needed.

So I went home and hoped to enjoy dinner, but it was horrendous. Baby B didn’t want to eat anything, and she even made herself throw up twice (once all over my hand). It became frustrating to the point of me breaking down in tears and running off to the bedroom to calm myself down. I was in a pissy mood for a good chunk of the night, but eventually came out of it before going to bed. It’s just hard when I spend at least half an hour (sometimes more) fixing her a variety of foods in the hopes that she’ll eat something that I’ve made, then all that time and effort is gone to waste when she throws up even more than she’s actually eaten. I know this is just the beginning of The Battle o’ the Independent Child, but so far we’re losing big time.

This morning, Baby B woke up with a bad runny nose, a bit of a cough, and a fever of 100. She’d had a touch of the first two symptoms for a day or so before, but we were hoping it wouldn’t go into anything. No such luck. Thankfully it wasn’t in her chest. I nursed her and tried to figure out what to do about the work day. Obviously we couldn’t send her to daycare because she was so clingy and fussy on top of her cold symptoms. Cue breakdown #2, mostly from the frustration of dealing with the constant illnesses. We finally decided that I’d go to work this morning and The Husband would go to the office in the afternoon.

When I got to work, I called the ENT’s office and told them about her cold and asked how that would affect her scheduled surgery tomorrow. They said they could still do it if she had an ear infection, but she needed to be on antibiotics if that were the case. However, if she has a fever or cough tomorrow, the surgery will need to be rescheduled. I called the pediatrician’s office and told them the situation, and they had The Husband take her in at 9:30 a.m.

Sure enough, she has an infection in both ears. *sigh* Instead of an oral antibiotic, they gave her the shot Rocephin, which is a concentrated antibiotic that is equal to 30 doses to amoxicillin. It’s typically used in serious illnesses like meningitis and when other antibiotics don’t do the trick. Our office typically gives two doses, so she had the first today. If she has surgery tomorrow, I don’t think she’ll get the additional dose, but if she’s too sick to do surgery, she’ll have to have another shot tomorrow. They did test her for both RSV and flu, and she tested negative for both (thank goodness!).

So I did some work this morning and just had an overall frustrating time of it, with little stuff popping up to make things difficult. I left at noon and when I got downstairs in our building, my cell phone rang. I answered it, and a voice said, “This is 911. Do you have an emergency?” Confused, I said no. The woman said, “Well, your cell phone called 911. We wanted to make sure you didn’t have an emergency.” Still a little confused, I said, “Uh, no. I’m sorry.” I have no idea how my phone called 911. It has the keylock on (though maybe you can still dial 911 despite that? I’ve never had to do that, so I don’t know. I do know my one-touch 911 thing is deactivated), plus my phone was on the very top of my purse, so I have NO idea how ANY buttons could’ve been pushed. The operator didn’t make me feel crappy for the mistaken 911 call, but I sure felt crappy about doing it, especially on top of everything else.

I got home a little after noon and called the ENT office to find out our check-in time, which is 7:15 tomorrow morning. She’s been asleep in bed ever since she and The Husband got home this morning, which isn’t surprising because 1) she’s sick and 2) she didn’t sleep well last night. I just hope this medicine kicks in and she can still have the procedure tomorrow. We won’t hesitate to reschedule it if they don’t recommend going forward with it tomorrow, but mostly I hope it happens because that’ll mean she’s feeling better.

I’ll update as soon as I can tomorrow when I know more.

Eat it (eat it), eat it (eat it)

If there’s anything I’ve learned about parenting, it’s that everything is a phase with kids. After all the complaining I’ve done over the past couple weeks about Baby B’s eating issues, she’s done a 180 and has eaten very enthusiastically so far this weekend. (It’s enough that I’m wondering if she’s going through a growth spurt.) I can’t really explain it because we’re not really doing anything different, and she’s eating foods that she’d previously turned down before, but it’s a welcome change. Very welcome.

She’s really taken to feeding herself with a spoon, even though she’s quite a mess when she finishes her yogurt. Her parents with the neat streak cringe slightly at the disaster zone, but she has so much fun that it’s easy to forget about the mess.

UPDATE: He once was lost, but now he’s found

A neighbor who saw our signs called and e-mailed this morning, and they were pretty sure they’d found The Big Cat and had him inside. (He was found before the storm.) I went to their house (five down from us) during my lunch break and sure enough, it was him.

To say I’m relieved doesn’t even begin to touch it.

Wordless Wednesday: Hope she grows out of this pothead thing!

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Party time! Excellent!

A big thanks to Soupy at Life in the Soupbowl, who passed along this excellent rating to my blog. I adore reading her blog not just because her daughter, K., is crazy-mega-happy all the time and reminds me a lot of Baby B, but also because she updates her blog sometimes multiple times in a day! I love that! So I’m super honored to get this rating from her!

I could easily pass this along to any of the blogs on my blogroll, as I truly enjoy checking each day for updates. But I’m going to give it to Kathleen at Random Musings, who just had her baby on January 14. There’s something about her posts that make me feel like I’m right there with her, experiencing the good and the bad along the way. You’ll have to check out her birth story, too, as it’s one of the most detailed I’ve seen.

Wordless Wednesday: Cousins meeting for the very first time

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Turn off the lights

Goodbye, 2007!!

Happy New Year, everyone! Looking forward to many new baby adventures in 2008.

All the best,

The House o’ Baby B

Wordless Wednesday: The Christmas rocking horse

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Holiday tag

I’ve been tagged by a couple of bloggers to complete the following survey. Seeing how it’s Christmas Eve and the topic of the survey is Christmas, I’m going to pass on tagging any other bloggers. Have a Merry Christmas! 

 1. Wrapping paper or gift bags?
Almost always wrapping paper, unless it’s something that’s a pain to wrap, then I might use a gift bag.

2. Real tree or artificial?
Artificial. I wouldn’t consider myself a hard-core environmentalist by any means, but there’s something that bothers me about cutting down a tree to keep in my house for less than a month.

3. When do you put up the tree?
We generally put it up the first weekend in December.

4. When do you take the tree down?
Usually the first weekend after Christmas. That won’t happen this year, though, since we’ll be out of town.

5. Do you like eggnog?
I like the taste, but I don’t like the thick texture…it almost makes me gag.

6. Favorite gift received as a child?
I remember having the best reaction to my leather bomber jacket and my big Casio keyboard. I also (nerd alert) loved the adding machine I asked for and received one year.

7. Do you have a nativity scene?
We have a small one (about six inches across) that my parents gave me, but we don’t really celebrate the religious part of Christmas, so I put it out just for my mom’s sake.

8. Easiest person to buy for?
Baby B and The Husband.

9. Hardest person to buy for?
My step-mother-in-law is difficult to buy for sometimes.

10. Worst Christmas gift you ever received?
Wow, I can’t think of anything right off. When I was in middle school/high school, my mom had a talent for buying awful sweaters that I didn’t like. My dad ended up picking out better clothes than her, so I made her take him shopping with her in the future!

11. Mail or e-mail Christmas cards?
I send Christmas cards in the mail, then sometimes send e-cards to my closest friends (in addition to regular cards).

12. Favorite Christmas movie?
Um, kind of embarrassing, but “A Very Brady Christmas.” I also like “Love Actually” a LOT.

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas?
Sometime around mid-November, though I’ve started earlier before and have started later. We usually need to be done with shopping by early December since many of our presents need to be shipped out of state.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present?
Yes, but nothing bad…just a couple things that weren’t my style but that were the style of someone else.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas?
Cheeseball. Pumpkin pie. Honey ham. My mom’s cookies. I’ll take it all, please!

16. Clear lights or colored on the tree?
Clear. I grew up with colored lights and for some reason don’t like them now. I think clear lights usually make a tree look a little…I don’t know…classier?

17. Favorite Christmas song?
O Holy Night, O Come All Ye Faithful

18. Travel at Christmas or stay home?
We stay in town for Christmas.

19. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer?
Yes, I can.

20. Angel on the tree top, or a star?
Angel that looks like it’s made of stiff lace (hard to describe).

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or Christmas morning?
Open one gift on Christmas Eve, but the rest on Christmas morning.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of year?
I hate the shopping crowds.

23. What I love most about Christmas?
What don’t I love about Christmas (except the answer to #22)?! I love spending time as a family. I love the traditions. I love the food. I love putting the ornaments on the tree and thinking about the history or meaning of each one. I love the time off work.

Wordless Wednesday: Belly laughs

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Mom-mom and da-da-da

Mom-mom. That seems to be Baby B’s name for me. Sometimes she’ll say “mama,” but most of the time it comes out “mom-mom.” I love it. The Husband is known to her as “da-da-da.” She uses our “names” with increased frequency each day, and I really think she has a basic understanding of which name belongs to which person.

When she babbles, which is all the time now, it feels like there’s a real difference in what comes out compared to even a few weeks ago, like she’s trying to form simple, short “sentences” in her own language. She’s using the same sounds as before, but there’s just a noticeable difference in how she says them, using more of a structure than just random syllables. I know I keep saying this, but it’s just amazing how much I can tell she learns each day.

Talking turkey

We spent Thanksgiving Day at my parents’ house yesterday and had a nice time. Baby B has been feeling mostly better, though still not quite 100% yet, but she did well while visiting her Nana and Poppa. It was just the five of us this year because my sister and her husband and daughter spent the holiday in New England with her in-laws, so it was a low-key affair for us, but I have a relatively small family that’s scattered across the country, so that’s sort of the norm anyway. Baby B got in the holiday spirit when she had her cranberry yogurt before dinner, then she joined us for some turkey and pureed sweet potatoes. Later, she has some pureed pumpkin that we’d saved from a month ago when we made up a batch after going to the pumpkin farm. It was nice that she was old enough to get to share in the event, even if she didn’t fully understand the point of it all. That will come in time.

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It’s been almost a week since I stopped pumping, and so far it’s going well. In a way, it was good that Baby B was so sick because it gave me a natural distraction from the emotional fallout from quitting. I’ve been able to continue to nurse Baby B in the mornings and evenings on workdays and all day on days off work, so I’m hopeful that I can keep this up for another couple months until we reach the one-year mark.

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As I mentioned, Baby B is feeling mostly better now, but earlier in the week she was pretty ill, probably the sickest she’s ever been. To see her struggling with each breath was a very scary feeling, especially knowing there wasn’t anything we could do. Her breathing is fine now despite some lingering congestion, but she gets tired very easily still and has to take a lot of breaks or naps throughout the day, which is very unlike her. She spiked a fever of 102.9 at one point yesterday, but that was controlled fairly quickly with Motrin. At least we have two more days to relax at home before she needs to go back to school.

Almost human

Um. Well. Without getting too graphic, Baby B’s dirty diapers have finally turned a little too human-like, if you get my drift, in the past few days. Ewww.

That’s it…we’re going back to feeding her only milk from now on!

Reaching out

In the past week or so, I’ve noticed a significant increase in the number of things that Baby B is actively reaching out for. She just recently started reaching up for the fish that “swim” in a circle above her swing, and I was pouring water over her for fun during her bath tonight and she reached up for the cup in my hand. She always wants to grab the book during storytime, she reaches out to touch The Dog, and she tried reaching for my water bottle tonight when I was feeding her (probably thinking it was one of her own bottles).

But you know what I’m so eager for her to do? I can’t wait for her to reach up with her arms to indicate that she wants me to hold her. Sure, after a while, that may become tiring for me, especially when she gets to the point of wanting to be picked up all the time, but right now my heart warms when I think about it.

Along those same lines, I cannot wait for Baby B to kiss me back. I smother her with kisses daily, and she puts up with it quite well, but I can’t wait for her to understand what it is I’m doing–and for her to do it back to me!

Waterbug

Yesterday was a gorgeous day here, so we decided to take Baby B to the pool–a real pool–for the first time. Naturally she had quite the dirty diaper that I had to clean up when we got there, though thankfully it was before we made our way into the pool, so I was able to rest easy knowing it was unlikely she’d have another dirty diaper while in the water. After cleaning up (while she giggled) in the bathroom, we headed to the water ready for fun. We first went to the huge shallow (at most, about three feet deep) kids’ pool, complete with a huge pirate ship with spewing water in the middle. (This is certainly not the kids’ pool of my generation! We just had a small 10-foot-square pool with stagnant, pee-laden water to swim in. And we walked uphill both ways in the snow to get there. And we liked it.)

This pool has a gradual, sloped, beach-style entry, so there’s shallow water that laps up onto the “shoreline” of the pool. We sat down with Baby B in the inches-deep water and let her get used to everything around her. She was very curious about all the people around, and the most fun she seemed to have was when other people, especially kids, would come up to her and talk or make funny faces. We walked her around this pool, closer to the pirate ship, for a while, then sat back down at the “shore” and splashed around. She wasn’t quite her normal giggly self, but she also wasn’t crying like I saw several babies her age doing when they’d get in the water.

We decided to move to one of the adult pools where we could more easily do things like let her float and jump up and down with her in our arms at chest level. She was still really intent on looking around at everything and everyone, and so many people made comments about how cute she was. We got out after a while and dried off, having spent about two hours there. I thought we’d be lucky to last a full hour, so I’m very happy with how her first pool trip went.

It was fun to look around at all the kids that seemed to be about the age Baby B will be next summer and see that there’s even more pool fun in store for us. I’d like to make maybe one or two more pool trips this year (hey, might as well while she’s free!), and in the meantime, she’s still enjoying her little baby pool at home.

Zoinks! The case of the phantom dirty diaper

Here’s a case that not even Shaggy and Scooby would be able to solve.

Picture it: You’re sitting in the recliner with your adorable infant, either letting her relax or doing something to entertain her (it doesn’t matter which). All of a sudden, the airflow shifts just enough that you catch the scent of something foul, and you quickly remember all of the butt sounds you’d recently heard. The smell is faint at first, but then becomes unmistakeable in nature–something that rancid could come only from a baby’s butt. All activity (or non-activity) ceases, and a quick break is made for the changing table to remedy the situation. The baby kicks happily as you detach the diaper tabs and prepare for the horror that awaits down below. You pull the front of the diaper down and there it is…

Nothing.

It’s another case of THE PHANTOM DIAPER!

There’s not a bit of dirtiness in the vicinity of the diaper. The smell sometimes lingers, but not always. You start to question why you even thought there could possibly be a dirty diaper in the first place, yet you were so sure of it at the time. There is no explanation, so you must chalk it up to yet another case of the phantom dirty diaper!