Now You Are Two

Dear Amelia,

Last Saturday you turned two years old. I was so excited to celebrate your birthday with you after being away for a two day conference. Your daddy had to work, but we went out to breakfast when he returned home from third shift in the morning. You had a cinnamon roll instead of cake, but were too hungry to wait for us to sing Happy Birthday before you ate it:

Mmm, cinnamon roll!

Opening your maraca- you also opened a Thomas the Train interactive book and a new outfit.

 
We also went to an indoor playland in the evening with our friends. You had a great time and were so excited to see Bela and play with all the new toys:

Vroom, vroom!

Playing with your friend, Bela.

This past year with you has been so very fun. Other parents warned me that toddlerhood could be very difficult due to the possibility of you running all over the place and getting into things. On the contrary, you were so cautious that I never had to worry about that. You are becoming somewhat stubborn and even more determined as you grow older, but you are always loving and give the best hugs.

Random things about you at the age of two:

• You like: Thomas the Train, Sesame Street, Bubble Guppies and pretty much any movie. 
• You tell me "Hit it, Mommy!" when you want me to put a movie in for you.
• Your taste buds are much like your daddy's- you like french fries, chips, and other salty foods, as well as burgers, pasta and popcorn. You aren't  a very big fan of vegetables but like lettuce and peas.
• Music seems to be something you are very interested in. We go to Musikgarten together every Monday, and you have a CD in the car that we listen to all the time. If I try to listen to regular music, you tell me "No, Mommy! Apples and bananas!", which is one of the songs you like the best.
• You are very good at building, stacking, and organizing. 
• We sleep together about 50% of the time, and I love your cuddles.
• You say 'please' and 'thank you' all the time, and I am so proud of you for having good manners. You usually say 'EXCUSE YOU' when you burp, but if you fart, you say "POOP!" and giggle. We have no idea where you got that from, but we find it hysterical and find it hard not to laugh along with you.

There are 500 more funny and loving things that I could say about you, but our family is coming over today to celebrate your second birthday. I love you more than life itself. Today you will open many gifts, but YOU are the greatest gift I've ever been given.

Love,
Mommy

A Night Away

Dear Amelia,

Tonight I am away at a counseling conference. You are spending the night with your daddy. You and I have had a difficult couple of weeks with your canine teeth coming in and a cough that you have. It has left me a little frazzled. But, as your daddy predicted, I cried when I left this morning, and when I called this evening and you were crying on the phone from being tired, I cried too.

On a positive note, I spoke to you on the phone twice today and realized that this is the first time I've talked to you on the phone! This morning you told me "Hi, Mommy! Puppy! Puppy!!! Bye, Mommy!" and then this evening, once you calmed down, you said "I wuv you!" Twice. And it melted my heart.

Remember this- no matter how frustrated I become, or how thin our relationship ever would be due to anger, arguments, or anything else-- I am grateful that you are my daughter every single day and I love you with all my heart.

Hugs and kisses,
Mommy

Rough Week

Dear Amelia,

It has been a rough week. You are getting all four of your canine teeth and sleeping in your own room for the first time, plus you have a bit of a cold. You aren't sleeping very well because of all this. Although I also switched rooms and I'm in the bedroom right next to you, I love you so much that I worry that I won't be able to hear you if you need me. Because of this, I'm having a hard time sleeping too.

Since we are having trouble sleeping, I let you sleep with me last night. I loved waking up to your smiling face this morning and kissing your soft round cheeks as soon as you opened your eyes. You watched Elmo on my phone while I cuddled you.

Even though we haven't been sleeping well, lots of fun things happened this week. We played with the leaves outside:

We went out to lunch, where the owner of the restaurant was totally impressed with your language skills (you said "Highchair! Please?") and thought you were the cutest thing ever. And she's probably right:

And yesterday we watched your cousin Max while Auntie Becca had to work. You loved on him even though he pulled your hair and made you cry. I guess you returned the favor though because ten minutes later you threw your plush ball in his face, scaring the daylights out of him and making him cry too.

I love you very much. I'm glad I get to spend the rest of this Sunday with you. We will probably watch movies and go see Grammy and Papa.

Hugs and Kisses,
Mommy

Change Is Good

It's been over a month since I've posted here. Certainly it is not because I've had a lack of anything to say. We have been adjusting to my husband working a different shift, Amelia sliding into her 'terrible two's', and enjoying the fall season. It provides plenty to write about, but I think that the truth is, at the end of the work day, I just cannot bear to touch my computer. I love my job, and I think I still enjoy writing, but after 8 hours of staring at a screen and having my toddler patiently wait for my attention, I haven't been motivated to post anything. I even briefly entertained the thought of abandoning my blog, but I just can't.

This has brought about a lot of thinking about how I can keep my blog, be consistent with it, and not feel like it is one more chore added to my plate. As with anything to do with mommyhood, this has been a challenge of balance, and I think I've developed a solution. Before I discuss this solution, however, I have a confession:

I am horrible at keeping up with Amelia's baby book.

Perhaps I'm not the only mother with this affliction, but on some level, I feel horribly guilty about it. I recall purchasing Amelia's baby book with a bit of dread, knowing that it would remain mostly blank. And, I was right. I think I filled it out here and there for the first few months. After that, I started shoving the medical updates with her growth written on them into the book, promising myself that I would write it all down during the upcoming weekend. I would have friends say "Oh, what was Amelia's percentiles at her last check-up? I'll have to look at my daughter's baby book to see how they compare!" With that sentence, my stomach would turn slightly queasy with guilt.

This is just not my strength in parenting. Things I'm good at- coloring, watching kids movies, ignoring obnoxiously loud toys. Things I'm not good at- keeping up with the baby book, keeping her thousand's of digital baby pictures sorted and backed up, packing up and storing her clothes as she outgrows them. Clearly I'm not much of an organized person; however, I want Amelia to have some kind of record of her childhood. Maybe she will hardly ever look at it, but I would feel better knowing that she has at least something.

So, my new resolution is to use my blog to write letters to Amelia, like this. I don't have the motivation to set up a new e-mail account, as this mom did, but I think that if I can write a short letter to Amelia here and there, it will be motivation to keep up with my blog and will give Amelia something to look back on. If I'm really motivated, then maybe someday I will print out the letters and bind them into a book. They will be all right here, waiting for me, unlike my scattered memories of when Amelia got new teeth in, or those check-up papers strewn across our house.

After all, my little Bean (yes, I've started calling her Bean instead of Peanut- apparently she is so deliciously cute that I can't stop nicknaming her after foods) deserves to have written accounts of how I love her so.

Manners, Manners

It has been a while since I have mentioned anything about Amelia's development. Mostly, I've been griping about work and failed weekend getaways. Never fear, Amelia is healthy and happy and well.... a talker. We saw early signs that this was going to be her strength, but it still amazes me daily that she can say so much and speak so clearly. I'm not sure that I can claim much responsibility for this. I have always talked to Amelia a lot and never really did much baby talk with her even when she was an infant. However, it often seems like my reading to her is infrequent and that she watches entirely too much TV since I work from home. The only thing that saves me from feeling guilty about the amount of TV she views is that she has probably gained a fair amount of vocabulary from it.

And, I doubt she learned the phrase "Oh, shit" from the TV. I will take the blame for that one.

In any case, her most notable speech development recently has been learning manner words. I have tried hard to model this from the beginning. My parents and family are big on manners. I rarely recall getting away with asking for something at home without saying "please". If I forgot to use that word, I either didn't get what I wanted or I got the evil eye and quickly rephrased my request. While I found it terribly annoying as a teen, it is certainly something that I'm grateful for as an adult, particularly when I am speaking with students (or parents) that are lacking in the manners department.

We started first with Amelia saying please when she asked for something. This started out as "PEEEESSSEEE?????", then went to signing please when she refused to say the word. This sign is supposed to be rubbing the middle of your chest in a circular motion. Usually she looks like she is rubbing both of her nipples, which I find to be fairly hilarious. We went on for a few months with her saying only this phrase, but me continuing to tell her to say thank you, you're welcome, I'm sorry, and excuse me.

I should note here that this sometimes gets me some odd looks. Amelia is rather petite, so although she will be two in November, she is still wearing mostly 18 month clothing. And, I think that people have this perception that if a child can't say something, then you shouldn't ask them to. I think they forget, though, that one day she will say those words because I've been telling her for months to do just that.

And now she is. Although not always correctly placed.

This became apparent last week when I sneezed and Amelia quickly said "Sorry, Mommy!" This was particularly funny because Amelia has had an increase in some mildly aggressive behavior-- towards me only-- since my husband started working a different shift. I have a variety of ways that I handle this, but my approach always includes telling her to say "I'm sorry"-- which she never does because she doesn't really understand those words yet. But since I view it as planting the seed to grow good manners and respect, I keep telling her to say it. And she is. When I sneeze. And also when she runs into the dog. But never to me when she hits me.

It's a work in progress.

Another phrase that we've been working on is "thank you". Growing up as an only child, I have heard the false belief that I must be spoiled, and therefore do not appreciate what I have. I'm sure people have realized from some of my posts that this is not the case, and it is of course important to me that Amelia be grateful as well. And she seems to be, as evidenced by her saying "thank-you-you're-welcome" when I hand her a cup of milk.

Finally, we have the words 'excuse me', which she says as "excuse you" because that's what I've been telling her. I don't know why it didn't occur to me to tell her "Say excuse me" instead, just as I have with all of the other phrases, but it does make me laugh when I sneeze and she says "EXCUUUUUSSEE YOU!!".

We are still working on 'bless you'. Parenthood. Always something to improve upon :)

Learning good manners is exhausting

There's No Place Like Home

The last time I posted, I mentioned that I was getting the hell out of here. While I continue to LOVE my job, I am discovering that the first few weeks of school are insanity. Last week I worked about six to eight hours more than I had to (no, I don't get overtime) and had the persistent feeling that I was drowning. Add to that a husband that has just changed shifts at work, leaving me feeling like I'm a single mom with a grumpy, unavailable roommate, and let's just say that things in our house have been stressful. Even Amelia seems to be impacted, as she has been starting some minor aggressive behavior-- towards Mommy only. Good. Times.

So clearly, life has been challenging lately. I know we will get past it and things will improve. My initial coping mechanism was to escape, so as I said, Amelia and I went on a little getaway a couple weeks ago. We went to a local waterpark/hotel with my friend, Anna, and her daughter, Bela. Amelia adores Bela, and will often follow in her footsteps (for better or worse-- let's just hope Bela doesn't rob a liquor store some day. I guarantee Amelia would be her co-conspirator.) I thought that if Bela enjoyed the water areas, Amelia surely would to.

Nope.

Amelia spent most of the time either sitting in my lap in the shallow end, uninterested in playing with any water toys, crying, or sitting next to Anna on the ledge of the pool. Much like an old lady. It was still fun in that we were able to spend time with good friends, but I wish that Amelia had enjoyed the main reason that we were there rather than having to work up courage to get within feet of the water.

Our lovely ladies, ready to head back home.

Last weekend, we packed up and attempted camping a second time. While it was fun overall and less anxiety producing for Amelia, the campground that we chose did not have nice boundaries like the first time we went camping. This led to a lot of me telling Amelia "No, don't go over there. No, don't get close to the road. Come back here, I can't see you when you are over there." Top that with some rain our first day, which made the majority of our site muddy (did I mention that we also have a large dog to watch and minimize the muddiness of?), and it just was not the grand picture of relaxation that I had painted in my head. As a result, we headed home after two days rather than staying the full three days that we had reserved.

Morning cartoons, camping style.

Molly enjoyed the camper-- please note that is MY bed, she was supposed to be sleeping on the lower section.

My little buckeye fan exploring a playground near the park.

This is not to say that I didn't enjoy the last two weekends, but I definitely have gained an appreciation for relaxing at home, where there are DVR'd cartoons for Amelia and boundaries that she is already familiar with. With working from home, I often think I need to physically get away to diffuse some stress, but clearly there are times where I am more at ease within the confines of our country home.

With that said, I have to say that this has been a nice weekend so far. We have enjoyed spending a lot of time at a local art festival, I made some treats for my husband's police department, and was able to make a nice dinner for him last night before his twelve hour shift. Apparently, all of this down time is making Amelia rather sleepy.

Zonked out at the art festival.

Here's hoping that all of my readers are having an equally relaxing weekend :)

The Great Escape

I don't know what happened to me last weekend, but I was super productive. I cleaned the majority of our house, including the bathroom, kitchen, coffee pot and disgusting area behind the coffee pot, microwave (inside and out), pulled weeds, washed, dried and put away a load of laundry, swept, and wrapped our spare change to put in Amelia's savings account... $37 worth. I also cleaned Amelia's room and then organized the spare room so I can start utilizing it as a craft room/office and complete projects like this more often:

My friend's wedding invitation and program are inside the ornament.

It was terrific that I could get all of this done because on Monday, Amelia started to seem a bit off. Fussy, poor appetite, impatient... something just didn't seem right. By Tuesday, she was throwing her morning milk up on me and sleeping a lot during the day:

We think it was either a little stomach bug or some sinus/allergy issues that were making her nauseous. This lasted all week- the week before students start at the online school I am a 12th grade guidance counselor for. You know what happens when you are a high school guidance counselor the week before classes start? You get several phone calls per day about schedules:

•  Why did you schedule me for this? (You need it to graduate.)
•  Why didn't you ask me what I want to take this year? (You were supposed to complete the scheduling survey in May.) 
• Why am I a junior this year and not a senior? (You keep failing all your classes, we don't just hand out diplomas out, OK?!?)

Did I mention that I had three cavities filled this week too?

Yes. It's been a super week. I have to get the hell out of here. And I am, with these lovely ladies:

Amelia and her BFF Bela at our local county fair.

Let's get this party started...