Odds 'n' Ends

Life with a 12 week old and a 2 1/2 year old....

- There is an ice cream truck that cruises through our neighborhood twice a day. When he drives by, Ellie gets excited and yells, "The music truck!". If you ask her about the music truck, she'll explain that it drives around all day playing music for the children. She has no idea that he also sells ice cream. I have a feeling that won't last next summer!

- Audrey is our little over achiever! She has rolled from her stomach to her back four times now - at 9 days, 6 weeks, 11 weeks, and 12 weeks. I think it's a manifestation of how much she hates tummy time! We also think that she's teething - she drools incessantly and now sucks her bottom lip all day.

- A few weeks ago, Ellie and I ran into our local convenience store for a cup of coffee. They didn't have decaf brewed though so I explained to Ellie that I couldn't drink the other kind. Two weeks later, I was walking out of CVS with Ellie and asked her if she would mind running into the same convenience store with me to get coffee....

Ellie: OK and maybe this time they'll have decaf.

Jana: What?!?

Ellie: You know, the kind in the orange cup!

- Audrey has slept through the night for the past two nights! She slept for 9 hours both nights. Her definition of morning still needs a little work though - today she woke up at 4 am but luckily went back to sleep after nursing until 6:30!

- Ellie's vocabulary grows by the day. Some of my favorite words and phrases...

hostipal = hospital

walla = water

yesterday = anything that happened before today, whether it actually was yesterday or 6 months ago

tomorrow = any day in the future

"That's a good idea!"

"Mama/Mommy, come here, I have a surprise for you!" (said from the bathroom every time she poops)

- Audrey has the cutest dimples! She has three - one in each cheek (to match her sister's) and one in her chin.

- Have I ever mentioned that Ellie LOVES onions. She picks them out of everything to eat first. Tonight we had tacos for dinner and she picked every piece of raw onion out of her taco and then she picked out every cooked piece of onion from the taco meat! This was before she ate the meat itself, the cheese, and the shell. She has such funny eating habits!

Life is certainly never boring around here!

Little Miss Fix-It

If you leave a tool laying around our house, Ellie will find and use it! It's amazing how many things need fixing :-)

Sprinkles!

Since Audrey and I came home from the hospital, I have been trying to spend time alone with Ellie. Let's face it, it's easier to manage a newborn than a 2 year old so when you add that to the time spent nursing and providing other newborn care that you have to do, the toddler gets less attention. On the weekends and when Lori gets home from work in the evenings, I've been trying to do something with Ellie. Tonight it was decorating a cake for Lori to bring to Girls' Night at our friend's house. As you'll see in the evidence below, there were sprinkles everywhere!

Our finished product!

Reality check

Toddlers can be brutally honest....

I gained more than 30 pounds when I was pregnant with Audrey. By the time she was 3 weeks old I had lost 30 of those pounds and was feeling pretty good about my post-baby body, until I had the following conversation with Ellie...

Ellie: (pulling up my shirt and putting her hand on my belly) There's no baby in there!

Me: That's right! Where's that baby now?

Ellie: In the bassinet!

Me: That's right! Audrey used to be in my belly, but the doctor helped her come out and now she's here with us.

Ellie: (after a pause) Why you still got a big belly?

Ahhhhh, honesty. At least she didn't ask about the stretch marks!

Sticker pox

Thanks to the binky fairy (see the post below) and her gift of a huge container of stickers, we've all come down with sticker pox! Warning: it's highly contagious; if you come to our house, you're sure to catch it from Ellie!

Fun post!

In the midst of all the yucky stuff we're dealing with right now, we're still managing to have lots of fun with Ellie....

Last weekend was the end of the pacifier! We had warned Ellie for several days that the binky fairy would be coming on Friday night to take her binky and give it to a baby somewhere who really needed it. Yes, that's the Friday night after the oncologist appointment when Ellie's parents just wanted a good night's sleep and did not want to even think about a night spent comforting a toddler who wants her binky. But even cancer can't stand in the way of the binky fairy! That night Ellie decorated an envelope for the binky to go into and then she dropped it in and helped me seal it up. She put it on the front steps before she went to bed and HAS NEVER ASKED FOR IT SINCE! This coincided with her first night in the toddler bed (because you know they're not allowed in that kind of bed, right?) so she was up a few times getting used to the bed, but she never even asked about the binky. The next morning, this is what she found on the front steps from the binky fairy...

Just as a side note, we borrowed this idea from Supernanny Jo Frost and obviously would recommend it to anyone wanting to separate a toddler from her pacifier!

That same weekend, Ellie rode her tricycle for the first time. The pedals are still a little hard for her to reach but she enjoyed the new experience. We all cracked up watching her do it!

She couldn't quite get it right though....

Ellie seems to have a talent for memorizing her favorite books. In this video, she's "reading" her new favorite book (Butterfly, Butterfly). If you were familiar with the book, you would hear that she is actually saying the correct words for each page. We're just not quite sure why it sounds like such an aggressive reading!

On the same day of the above book reading, Ellie wanted to perform for the camera. In this video she's singing Itsy Bitsy Spider with a little extra surprise added in at the end...

Soccer star

Since college will be around $2 million a year by the time Ellie is 18, Lori has decided to focus on an athletic scholarship as Ellie's ticket to school. Right now Lori is starting Ellie off with soccer and then is planning to introduce lacrosse later on. So far, Ellie seems to have a natural gift for just running up and down the sidewalk. We're not so sure about the hand-eye coordination yet.

No, she's not looking at anything in the sky. If you notice there's a trend in these pictures of the head tilted and looking up - that's her new picture pose!

Ellie's quotations

I couldn't wait for the days that Ellie would begin talking. Everyone warned me though that once she started she wouldn't stop and I would miss the quiet days. While that may be true sometimes, she has such a funny sense of humor and keeps us laughing most of the day. In the past couple of days, she has said a few very funny things I had to share...

Cheap entertainment

For a two year old, a glass of seltzer can provide minutes of entertainment (that is, until the bubbles stop). Ellie LOVES seltzer water and whenever one of us has some, which is every day, she wants a small glass, too. The other day she took her first sip and was fluttering her eyes and making a funny face in response to the bubbles so we laughed. Then she leaned down and stuck her nose over the glass and said, "Hello, zippy water. Come up my nose!". I think I almost feel off the chair.

You have fan?

Our conversation tonight while I was rocking her before bed...

Ellie: That fan? (pointing at her humidifier)

Me: Yes, that's a fan.

Ellie: You have fan, too?

Me: Yes, I have a fan in my room.

Ellie: That fan, too? (now pointing at her ceiling fan)

Me: Yes, that's a fan, too.

Ellie: You have one?

Me: No, I don't have a ceiling fan but I wish I did. We only have that kind of fan in your room and the play room.

Ellie: Oh, okay. I buy you one with my money. Okay?

She said this with such a serious face that I didn't know if I was going to laugh or cry. It was so funny and I was amazed that she was able to put together that you can buy things like a fan with your money. But it was also so sweet to see such evidence of our generous girl.

Broccoli!!

I think because of her food limitations, Ellie really loves most fruits and vegetables. Sometimes though she surprises me with her preferences for some foods, like really spicy things and foods that I think a more grown up palette appreciates. At the grocery store this weekend, strawberries and broccoli were both on sale and were on display next to each other. I was excited to see the strawberries and asked Ellie if she wanted some, but all she wanted was broccoli. I kept trying to explain that we could have both, but she just wanted broccoli. She even had to hold it in the buggy while we shopped. When I told Lori the story, we thought maybe she was just being obstinate and wouldn't really like it as much as she thought. Well, I made it last night and she picked out every single piece....to eat FIRST! She didn't eat the rest of her meal until every single bit of broccoli was gone. Tonight we had it again and when I was putting the plates on the table, she was running around screaming, "Broccoli, broccoli, yay, broccoli!". Our healthy little eater! She made up for it though by having vanilla ice cream for dessert :-)

Elmo's World

All toddlers love Elmo and Ellie is no exception! Thanks to two of her special aunties, Ellie now has a very cute outfit to celebrate the red furry monster. She loves it and couldn't wait to wear it to school last week. She took off her coat as soon as we walked in the door so that she could show Miss Dee.

Thank you, Robyn and Mary!

Is there a seal in our house?

Ellie has had a relatively healthy winter compared to the last two winters. For the past two years, Ellie generally caught a cold or some bug every 10-14 days. This meant a lot of time out of work for us. This year she has only been out a few times and the ilnesses were shorter lived than before. All of them except the croup from earlier this winter. The croup was awful. Ellie was so sick and would eat only popsicles for a couple days. No one got much sleep and she was out of school for the week. Not fun at all for anyone.

Well, it's baaaaaaacccccckkkkk!

Last night Ellie had a babysitter while Lori and I went to see a play. When we got home everything appeared to be fine and Ellie was sleeping peacefully. At 3:30 this morning I woke up to a strange sound over the monitor so I went to check it out. When I walked into Ellie's room, I heard her cough and knew instantly that either she had the croup or there was a seal in her bed. Ellie looked at me and said, "Ellie coughing. Ellie sick", which answered that question. So we whisked her outside to breathe in some very cold air, which was what we were told to do last time. It seemed to help and she settled down into bed with us with a little wheezing. This morning she seems better but has a slight fever and that glassy eyed look of a sick kid. Lucky for us, Lori was already planning to stay home with Ellie tomorrow because her day care is closed in honor of President's Day. We're just hoping this isn't as bad as last time - I'm not sure that any of the three of us could handle that again!

It's 9:05 am and it means that now it's a reasonable time to call the pediatrician without appearing to be the crazy parent!

Mama talking to the pediatrician (She told us just to wait this out and see what happens tonight. Croup usually lasts for a few nights so we'll expect coughing and wheezing again. We only have to go to the ER like last time for medication if she's having trouble breathing.)

Ellie's croup/potty training outfit - the sweatshirt and socks to keep warm but no pants to quickly pull the Pull Up down when it's time to potty!

Poo poo in the potty!

I know, gross subject, but big excitement in our house! We've been halfheartedly introducing Ellie to potty training for the last few months. This really means that on the weekends we sometimes put her potty in the middle of the living room and let her run around without a diaper, in hopes of catching her in time to put her on the potty. She's gone "pee pee" in the potty once this way. This afternoon though Lori found her pooping in the potty all by herself and she was so proud!

Later note: Just an hour after we posted this, Ellie went pee pee, too! She was just as excited and couldn't wait to get her sticker reward. I think we'll be going diaperless tomorrow afternoon, too!

Compliment

(By JPC)

Ellie almost always notices when we have on new clothes or something that she hasn't seen us wear in a long time. She usually points at it and says, "Neeeeewwwwww!", which is what she did this morning when she saw me wearing a new maternity shirt from the clearance rack at Target (very nice for $5!). She must have forgotten though because when we came home this afternoon, she was surprised when I took off my coat. She inhaled sharply and said, "Ahhhhh, mama cute!". Such a nice thing to hear when you have a rapidly expanding waist line and constant nausea!

The fashion plate herself wearing Mrs. Potato Head's glasses

Bun bun

(By JPC)

Ellie has a bunny that she calls "bun bun" and she sleeps with every night. She loves him and he is the second thing that she wants when it's time to go to bed (the first is binky of course). We actually have two bun buns - when we realized how much she loved him, Mimi bought another as a backup. Somehow Ellie ended up with both of them in her crib a few weeks ago. This is the scene that we found in her crib one night at bed time. And I swear that neither of us did it!

Those are her two pacifiers that she has somehow managed to balance on bun bun's face on top of her pillow. She really loves her "babies"!

Cold

Remember how I've said many times how much we love Fall? Well, the novelty of this new season has worn off for me. I had forgotten how painful it is to be woken up at 6 am on the weekend by my daughter yelling over the baby monitor, "Mommy, up, oatmeal!" when the house is so cold!! Sometimes it's just too hard to get out of our warm cozy bed. And the worst part of all? Fall is followed by winter when it's going to be REALLY cold when I hear that call in the morning!

Short Ellie updates

Just a few quick updates on Ellie....

- She is feeling much better and seems to be almost completely recovered from the croup. She went back to day care on Thursday and then was home with Jana on Friday as usual. She still has a cough, which we were told would last 1-2 weeks. Thankfully, no more wheezing!

- Ellie is making up for lost time in the talking department! As we described before, she has been talking in 2-3 word clusters for a few months. Now she is forming full sentences. Last night she said, "I don't want to, Mommy," and this morning she said, "I don't like it". Notice the common sentiment, continuing with the "no" trend!

- Fall has arrived with a bang - Monday it was 80 degrees and yesterday it was 63! This week, Ellie wore socks and sneakers for the first time since May and last night she wore long-sleeved footy pajamas for the first time since April. Brrrrrr! Today we're off to a farm for pumpkin picking and hayrides.

- Oh my goodness, Ellie will be 2 one month from today!!

Say cheese!

(By JPC)

Last night, we were lucky to have Mimi and Boppa stay over. They took us out for dinner and Ellie had such fun showing off at the restaurant and at home. The photo below is one that Boppa took with his cell phone while we were all playing on the couch. He held the cell phone up to take a picture and when he called Ellie to look at him, she turned around with a big smile and said "cheese!". I have no idea where she learned that from (we have never said that to her while taking a picture) and you can see the shock on our faces! Where do they get this stuff?!?!

The little things...

Obviously everyone knows that their baby is going to grow up and become a toddler, a kid, a teenager (gasp!), and someday a full-fledged adult (double gasp!). It's when you see, or in my case hear, it happening that it becomes real. One of Ellie's first words was "la la" which meant Elmo. If you watch Elmo, you know that's because Elmo's opening song on Sesame Street is "la la la la, la la la la, Elmo's World". About a month ago, though Ellie switched to calling him "Elmo", which sounds a lot like oatmeal. It happened so suddenly that I don't remember the first time that she did it, but it signalled an end of something.

Today's change though I did notice and will remember. Ellie asked for milk and I offered her water. Normally her response would be "yes, wa wa" and I would then prompt her to say please. Instead, today she looked at me and with great focus it seemed said, "yes, waaaaa-teerrrr". What?!? Water?!? I was so startled that I didn't even ask for the please before handing her the cup. Later this evening she asked for wa wa as usual, which was reassuring to me in some way. But I know that it's only a matter of time until the remnants of her little-baby speak are gone. I look forward to all the funny toddler things that she'll have to say, but tonight I'm missing the days of "la la".

Sentences

About six months ago, we were worried that Ellie was a bit behind in her verbal skills. Although she was able to say several words (probably more than 50), she wasn't putting any of them together into two-word phrases, like "want milk". We were quickly reassured by our pediatrician that we had nothing to be concerned about since she clearly understood what we were saying and would respond by acting on it. That and she was only 18 months old (parenting books and magazines can be very useful but can be a bad thing for a paranoid mother!). The pediatrician said that she would talk in her own time.

Well, it appears that her time has come! Within the last two months, Ellie's talking has increased by leaps and bounds. Her first command was "up babies" to her dolls one morning, which recently progressed to "up my babies" last week. She also now says your name or her own name when addressing you so instead of "no", it's "no, mommy!" or "Ellie do" instead of "me" when she wants to do something.

My favorite occurred this morning. When we were leaving the house today for work/school, I could smell that a skunk had been in our neighborhood earlier this morning. Ellie took one step out the door, turned to me with a wrinkled nose, and said, "Peeeyew, it's stinky!". I laughed out loud and wished that her mommy had been there to hear that one!