Category Archives: toddlers

First Chore

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Reese has her first chore.

A few weeks ago, Andrew began asking Reese if she wanted to help him feed Miles. She got really excited about it and would follow him around, getting the food, filling the bowl and then, her favorite part, giving the command, “Miles, EAT.”

The other night Reese was coloring in the kitchen when all of a sudden she got out of her chair and ran past me muttering to herself, “I have to feed Miles.” I cracked up. I thought she was going to pretend to feed her or something, but no, she busted into the office, opened the office closet door (whaaat!?!) took out the Tupperware container filled with the dry dog food, carried it into the hallway, set it on the floor next to Miles’s dish, stuck her hand in and began putting the food in the dish, piece by piece.

I know this probably doesn’t sound like a big deal, but it was. I was blown away. It’s a mom thing I guess (I promise I mean that in the most un-obnoxious and maybe slightly sarcastic way possible.) In that moment she was now officially a kid. Baby no more.

It took her at least 15 minutes to fill up Miles’s dish. Miles waited patiently nearby, a puddle of drool forming at her feet.

Thus, Reese’s first chore was born, and we have learned that she is fiercely protective of it.

Last night when Andrew asked her to help him again, she got real pissed, real fast, when he tried to pour the food out of the container into the dish. She kept yelling “By hand!” which we can only assume  means she prefers to take the food out morsel by morsel using her hands. She gets even more fired up when the canned food is introduced into the mix. When Andrew began spooning it into the dish she yelled, “get away!” Sidenote: I know for a fact that she got that phrase from me so I just cowered in shame while Andrew looked at her in disbelief.

We have no idea why she hates the canned food, but think it has something to do with the fact that she feels that it messes up the dry food creation she has carefully crafted.

I vividly remember heated arguments with sisters over whose turn it was to feed our dog back in the day, so I am embracing this brief period of time when chores are new and exciting and being helpful is fun. Like most other things, I’m sure it will be over before I’m  ready.

Little Things

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My first purchase for our new little one.

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I love it.

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Searching for the perfect mobile for baby’s room was one of the first things I did for both babies. With Reese, and now with baby # 2, we did not find out the gender, so nursery décor could be challenging, but Etsy never fails me.

Here is Reese’s mobile.

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After being moved from above her crib to above her changing table, this no longer hangs in her room. Once she started being able to reach up and grab it we took it down and I never found another spot that seemed right for it.

It is still one of my  favorite little things and I don’t plan to pack it away anytime soon. I hope to find a spot for it in Reese’s new room; a small reminder of  babyhood that is still cool enough to hang in a “big girl” room.

Talking Back

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Hearing Reese suddenly bust out in new sentences/phrases never, ever gets old. Sometimes we recognize them immediately as things we say often, other times we have no idea where they come from. Those are my favorite.

These are some gems that we have heard over the past few weeks.

Andrew: Reese, do you want a veggie burger for dinner?
Reese: How ’bout a bagel?
Note: She has probably had a bagel twice in her life, and I rarely have them in the house so this was pretty random.

Me: Those are Mama’s crutches.
Reese <in menacing voice> : REESIE’S CRUTCHES!!!

Reese: Let me get that.

Gammy: Hi Reese
Reese: No!
Gammy: I wasn’t asking a question, just saying hi.
Reese: No hi!

Reese to Daddy: Calm down. <Said in a quiet voice, while holding her hand up in the air, then slowly lowering it down, just as he says it to her.>

A glimpse of the sassy teenage years to come perhaps?

Potty Dances

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This is our Elmo potty. Note the pretend “flusher.” When pushed, Elmo’s creepy laughter echoes throughout our house. The back of the potty shows Elmo wearing a scuba mask and swimming underwater. I have a problem with this, as I feel like it is implying that Elmo is swimming in the potty which is gross, and in my opinion, sending the wrong message about how potties are to be used.

We haven’t been great about consistency with “potty training”, if you can even call it that. We put Reese on it every now and then, but up until this week she had probably only gone in it once. The rest of the time she just sat on it and read books or “magazines.”

She has also learned to use it against us. She quickly realized that whenever she would say “pee pee” or “poo poo” we would stop whatever she was doing, take off her diaper, rush her to the Elmo potty, and read books to her. She used this to escape bath times, bedtimes, naps, and basically anything she deemed unfavorable.

The past two nights Reese has done a poop (TMI?) in the potty before bath time. Each time she does it, we make a big deal. There is applause and a song and dance that includes roof raising on my part and circular running with arms raised on her part. The song goes “Reesie went in the pot-tee, Reesie went in the pot-tee. Yea Reesie yea!” You can tell she is extremely proud and it might be the best part of the day for all of us.

Reese particularly enjoys the cheering part. Sometimes, she will sit down, make a few grunting noises, then stand up, point to the empty potty and say, “Yay! You did a poop!” (there is some confusion surrounding pronouns) and clap for herself. Sometimes she’ll add a, “Good job!” in there as an extra pat on the back to herself. When she fakes it like this, Andrew and I always remind her, “No Reese, you didn’t do a poop, but thanks for trying.” The other day she sat down, pretended to go, jumped up, started clapping and pointing at the empty potty and said, “Yay, you did a poop! No you didn’t.” then sat back down.  We had witnessed an internal battle and truth had prevailed.

So this is our method. There is no real method. We sit her on the potty at the same time each night and if she goes, we have a party. If not, that’s ok too. If she pretends to go, we just remind her of the cold, hard truth,  “No you didn’t.”

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PS Please disregard the giant bruise on Reese’s head. She fell the other night in the kitchen and knocked her head on the floor. She took it like a champ but it was a nasty one.

This Is Happening……

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I’m no fan of selfies, but this is what I look like now.

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Yup.

Baby number two will be here in February and everyone is pretty excited around these parts.

Three months in, this pregnancy is a little different than with Reese and of course a little more difficult, but I haven’t experienced any nausea or morning sickness. Headaches and exhaustion are the worst of it right now, so I am considering myself lucky.

What’s Different This Time: There were basically no symptoms in the beginning of this pregnancy. Last time the  gigantic, sore boobs started immediately, and I felt slightly nauseous in the mornings; this time I didn’t feel any different those first few weeks, until the tiredness set in.

What I’m Craving: SALT. Potato Chips. Cheese and Crackers. Grilled Cheese. Pickles (has anyone ever tried the homemade pickles from Whole Foods? They are amazing and I’m hooked.)  Kraft Macaroni and Cheese (no other brands will do, and Andrew learned the hard way that box directions should be followed precisely, i.e. don’t try to skip the butter because I will know, and I will come for you.) With Reese I craved a lot of juices and citrus fruits and still ended up gaining 50 lbs so I can already tell that it is not going to be a good scene up in here in a few months.

What I’m Trying to Force Myself to Eat: Greek yogurt, Luna bars, greens, blah blah blah blah.

What I am Tired of Hearing: “Pregnant women only need 200 extra calories a day; that’s equivalent to  about a cup of yogurt.” No wine, no coffee and now no excuse to “eat for two.” Thanks.

Weight Gained: 3 lbs according to me, we’ll see what the doctor’s scale says next week.

What I’m Doing: Still trying to run for as long as I can, and making an effort to get up and walk around more at work. I signed up for a 5K in mid September, so I have to keep running at least until then. Pilates, walking, pregnancy workouts on Skimble. These things are done only when I feel like it. 3 times a week is a great week.

What They Told Me This Time That They Didn’t Tell Me Last Time: No soft serve ice cream. Ummmmmmm, hold the phone. Dairy Queen is delicious and I feel bad for the fetus who doesn’t get to experience it. I don’t remember this being a restriction with Reese but I guess I could have blocked it out. Very sad. Not going to lie, I haven’t been following this one 100%.

What Reese Thinks: Not much. We talk about babies and sharing a lot, and Andrew bought her a book  called “What To Expect When Mommy’s Expecting” which, in my opinion, is a little more detailed than necessary. Call me crazy but I’d rather not have my toddler telling  people that there is a baby in mama’s uterus. Actually, just don’t talk about my uterus at all. Or know about it.

We are already dying to meet this baby but are taking more time to enjoy moments with Reese that are all hers. Six months to go and three months behind us.

“No Boy!”

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“No boy!”

This is what Reese yells at other kids who would also like to use the playground. Reese owns the playground and if she wants to play on a piece of equipment, all others should vacate it.

Actually, she doesn’t own the playground because it’s in a public park, and she definitely does not own the massive toy train which can easily accommodate 7 kids. However, the little boy who tried to play on the train at the same time as her still got an earful of “No boy!” She often greets other children in this way; sometimes accompanied by a clearing-the-table kind of hand motion.

The kids usually just ignore her and I try to avoid eye contact with their parents.

This kind of stuff causes Andrew and I to fantasize about what it would be like if adults acted the way our 1.5 year old acts. It’s become a favorite game and we always find it hilarious.

“Imagine if we flipped out if we got something we didn’t like at a restaurant and threw it in the waiter’s face.”

“What if we demanded to hear ‘Old MacDonald’ wherever we went?”

“Imagine if we just walked up to random people on the beach and stood REALLY close to them and then silently held out our hand for them to give us some of their snack.”

Reese’s reactions are the purest, most honest forms of expression and in the adult world I would refer to it as “telling it like it is.” I am not a person who tells it like it is; I usually just smile and then complain to anyone who will listen about it afterwards.

But sometimes I really do just want to yell “no boy!” at people who stand too close in coffee lines, who cut me off during my morning commute, or to people who have a b attitude and don’t hold doors or say “thank you.” I feel you Reese.

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Miles has got my back at the playground.

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This is the face I make when other kids enter the playhouse.

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Sometimes I let Daddy play on the train. Sometimes.

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Reese: 20 months, 9 days

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I haven’t provided an update on the subject of this blog for a long time. Actually, I’ve been posting for about a year and it looks like I’ve only provided two updates. Ever. Maybe I should stop talking about myself so much. God.

Reese is progressing as predicted. Tipping the scales at 29 lbs (90th percentile), no one would believe that we struggle to get her to eat most foods. Maybe a girl can live on pean alone.

She is like her mom in the way that she lives for consuming large amounts of carbs; loves include grilled cheese (wooo), waffles, oatmeal, baked beans, and “appasaw!!!!” (applesauce) which she demands fiercely and randomly, even while playing in her pool or sitting on the potty.  She’s not like her parents, or like anyone we want to know, in the way that she refuses almost all meat (except for these awesome turkey meatballs that I can sometimes trick her into eating.)

Reese is a shorty (75 cm and in the 16th percentile) and still has a huge, lovely head (95th percentile for head circumference), only these days it is full of bumps and bruises from her crib, the coffee table, the china cabinet, the steps, the floor, mom’s head, etc.

Words are her strong point and she uses sentences often. The other night in her bath she was talking to her bath toys and said, “Sit next to me, frog.” Andrew and I just about died.

She is a good sleeper except for the fact that daytime naps are not consistent. Many days she doesn’t nap at all. So maybe that makes her a bad sleeper? Not sure.

We recently took away her “baba” (pacifier) because she kept biting through it and small pieces were coming off in her crib, which was freaking me out. This event coincided with the end of daytime naps. She sleeps well at night without the baba, finally, but it was rough in the beginning. I was a thumb sucker myself and I vividly remember the comfort it offered, so it was a little sad to watch her go through the transition.

Each day we get another glimpse of the person Reese is becoming and we have begun to see a bit of her parents laid back nature, some of her mom’s  timidness, her dad’s smarts and dance moves, the sweet nature of her grandparents and a toughness for which I am thankful.

What I hope for most is that she grows up to be kind. This is what I tell people. Secretly though, I also really hope that she is hilarious. I think she will be.

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Where We’ve Been

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Here I am.

Summer has happily gotten in the way and I haven’t been able to write as much as I would like. Here is what we’ve been up to the past couple of months

Lots of pool time in the yard because it has been HOT

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Quick, post-work trips to the lake

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Our cousin turned 2 and we partied!

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Tried on dresses for my Auntie Kris’s wedding

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We went to the lake for a week. I swam, saw the sights, went to my first amusement park,  and ate my first ice cream cone, which was a mix of emotions.

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Now it’s August and we are savoring our evenings outside because we know we won’t have them for much longer. Bedtimes have been pushed back and baths are sometimes skipped. And we are loving it.

No

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Unfortunately, we say this word around our house. A lot.

If you think about it, a 1.5 year old is basically not allowed to do anything. They can’t open the cabinets, they can’t drink the bathwater, they can’t stand up on their “bikes”, they can’t go outside with no shoes on, they can’t go up/down the stairs, they can’t run wildly through public places, they can’t cut the line of 4 kids waiting to use the slide, they can’t hit the dog, they can’t open the oven, and they can’t eat their hair clips/socks/mom’s glasses/an entire jar of peanut butter. Really, what else is left in life?

I never really noticed how much we use the word “no” until Reese started saying it back to us. It was one of her first few words.

When she was younger, she used to say it randomly, or say it while doing something she knew she was not supposed to be doing. She would run up to the electrical sockets, touch them, look at us, and say “No, no.”

Now, she has discovered that “no” can also be the answer to a question. She has decided that it is the answer to every question.

Sunday morning, she grabbed my cell phone off of our coffee table, ran over to her toys and stuck it inside of her toy airplane.

“Reese, can you please bring my phone back over to me”, I asked, expecting her to either ignore me, or, if I was lucky, to actually bring it back to me. Instead, she kept her back to me, looked over her shoulder at me and said, “No.” Then continued trying to shove the phone in the front seat of the plane.

Um, what? This was actually pretty funny because she said it so nonchalantly, and it threw me. As if we were just having a conversation and she was letting me know that, yes, she had heard my request, and no, she would not be honoring it.

Suddenly, the sound of my own parents voices years ago saying, “Don’t tell me no”, rang in my ears. It actually is pretty annoying when your kid just flat out tells you that they will not be listening to you, or even better, acts like you aren’t even there at all and continues eating her hair clip with reckless abandon. Awesome.