Not alone
I just found a new internet friend (Hi, Jenny). And do you know why I love her? She also uses sheets and fabric to make her own photo studio at home! I'm not the only one. I bought a couple big pieces of fabric before Anya was born, because I had always wanted to and had never gotten around to it yet. My problem is that I have nowhere really good to set up for a photo shoot except my living room. And there's nowhere to arrange a backdrop there. But, i found the solution. I'm getting this for Christmas. Whether I get it as a gift from someone (hint, hint) or buy it for myself remains to be seen. But, I did it anyway last night. What do you think?

Free gift with purchase - Sibling Rivalry

Remeber how Ally wanted to be a green monster for Halloween? Hahaha... i outsmarted her. I tried. I really did. I don't know how many costume places we loked, but we found nothing that passed her inspection. Nothing that matched her vision of a green monster. The only detials she ever gave us were that green monsters had eyes on top of their heads and said Rar!  Not much to go on. Add to that the fact that costume makers expect little girls to want to dress up like princesses and witches and I was SOL.

BUT... She wanted to be a green monster AND a pumpkin. So I went out and bought Anya a pumpkin costume. it's so very cute. It has padding around the belly and it's going to make her so squeezably round and cute. Plus, it has pumpkin slippers with it. Soooo cute. Anyway. It came with the added bonus of Sibling Rivalry. Yay. Ally wants to be a pumpkin.

So we went looking for a pumpkin costume and I had a panicky momnet where I didn't think we were gonig to find one in the right size, but the "One size fits up to 24 months" fit her wonderfully. I have serious doubts it would fit anyone under the age of 18 months though. Yippee. I'm going to have 2 almost matching pumpkins for Halloween. i can't wait.

Why I'm an idiot...
Reson # 18,408: Unilt yesterday, I thought that those simple white men's underpants were called "tidy whiteys". It was pointed out to me that tidy makes no sense, and that they are actually "tighty". Makes much more sense, huh? Doh!

too beautiful

The weather has been so weird here lately. Thursday, it was freakin' cold! Then Saturday, I was pretty nice. Sunday it was kinda warm, and today? Supposed to be 87. WTF!?!?

Anyway, I took Anya and Ally out to get some pictures Thursday, and they were just beautiful. Ally didn't cooperate though. Saturday we all went out again, and didn't even need coats. The pictures are just gorgeous. I'm doing something with them soon, so check back at the scrapbook link over there  -->

various body parts

Anya has found her toes. Most often you can see her sucking her thumb with the toes of one sock either in her mouth too, or in her fist of the thumb she's sucking. The daycare said they found her the other day with both socks soaking wet. She doesn't put her toes in her mouth when she's not wearing socks though. She just holds them.

She's an equal oppurtunity thumb sucker. We went to Meghan's (step-sister-in-law) wedding shower this weekend (left Ally with her dad at home) and Anya was starting to get a little hungry and sleepy. She sucked her thumb and everyone thought it was just the cutest thing. Then she pulled it out and sucked the other one. This is a sign for me. When one thumb just isn't doing the job, and she has to switch back and forth, she is getting tired. The other ladies she thought it was adorable. Everyone asks me if she's teething, since she drools so much. But, no... she just drools. Ally was like that to a lesser extent. We thought she was teething for the longest time, but  - no teeth. Anya just is  avery oral kid. She even chews on her blankets. The cutest thing is when I see her sleeping with a corner of a wet blanket wadded up in her tiny little fist. She has these little infant soft books. You know, the ones with the crinkly pages? ally never cared a bit for them. Anya loves them. But after she's had one for a while, you don't want to touch it. very wet. yuck

No ear infections yet it seems. I was just looking through the past posts and discovered Ally's first one was about this age. I'm going to keep watching for one though. I don't expect to be lucky enough that Anya got my ears instead of Rob's. The pediatrician WILL refer us to an ENT faster this time.

I have a sickness

I can't help myself. Every time I do it I tell myself it will be the last time. That I won't do it ever again. I give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it. I am weak. I bought to more cards this weekend - just in case.

I have a collection belated birthday cards sitting in my file cabinet. I love birthday cards. I could spend hours in a good card store. You would think that by having cards on hand, I wouldn't have need of belated ones. I could look at my calendar (of which I have an entire one devoted solely to birthday os various people in my family) and wa-la I have a birthday card in my file I can send them. on time and everything. It doesn't work like that though. Usually I think "hmm blank's birthday is coming up, I should get them a card." And then I promptly forget about it. Until the day before. Then it's too late to send it on time. So I have a constant need of belated birthday cards. So I stock up on them.

But, I have a weird sense of humor. My stock of cards just doesn't fit most of the people that I would need to send them to (One of them has a picture of a dead rat on it - It's funny, believe me). So they sit in the cabinet gathering dust. Besides, I don't ever have stamps anyway. I do all my bill paying on the internet. Who needs snail mail? Except that the cards are just too funny to resist. So now I have a bunch of cards that I can send to a select group of people. But, I'm just too lazy.

Someday, I'll stop buying them. Until then, did I forget any of your birthdays? And don't be surprised if you get a birthday card from me a couple months after your birthday. I didn't forget it, I just had this great card I wanted to send late.

Halloween

Do you know how difficult it is to find a green monster costume for a (almost) 3 year old? Ally wanted to be a cowgirl for a while. That I could do. Now she's changed her mind. She wants to be a green monster. and a pumpkin. I figure I give her a pumpkin basket to carry her candy in and that will be that part, but the monster? not so easy. The costumes in the store are all cutesy.  Am searching the internet now because i can't find one in the stores. Would check e-bay, but work won't let ebay sites past the firewall. Have to try it at home later. Why couldn't she be a normal little girl and want to be a fairy princess or something?

Anya's costume will depend on Ally's/what I find/how lazy or cheap I am. In other words - I haven't decided yet.

5 months old
Anya is five months old. Last week I got her pictures taken again. She was still pretty wobbly sitting up. This week, she's not very wobbly anymore. Last night she sat for a good 4 minutes before she dropped her little book she was chewing on and lurched over on her face to chase it. I also took her outside to sit in our jungle backyard. Ally hated the grass when she was young. But Anya was absolutely entranced. She swiped at it and grabbed it and looked all around. She sat up on her own for quite some time. She liked it a lot until she got cold and I had to take her in. My kids are so different. Or maybe we just had more time to mow the grass when we only had 1 kid, so it wasn't as interesting/was scratchier? I can't wait until the leaves start falling. We're going out and having fun with the camera this year. (Last year I was too busy puking) if only it weren't cold and windy.

Christmas

It started early this year. God help us all.

I need some help. I don't really like Santa. I think most people use him as a cop-out - as a way to threaten their children to elicit good behavior. The original concept is kinda neat. A happy old man that gave toys to those who didn't have any. That concept has been too comercialized. I want my kids to know that they have family that loves them. I don't want their presents to come from some random fat guy. Christmas should be more about gathering your loved ones and spending time with family and such. You know, more like Thanksgiving. Plus, there's the issue of lying to the kids. Santa's not real. Why pretend?

But I also see why you would pretend. There's something magical about it all. The excitement of coming up/down the stairs/around the corner and seeing all the magically appearing presents. They weren't there before bed. And they are just sitting there waiting to be picked up and played with. Already out of their boxes. Already filled with batteries. Just waiting for you! It's something that teaches kids to wonder and to experience fantasy and just to believe in something intangible. I also think that's important. At this age, there's not much capability for intangible lessons. I want my kids to believe that anything is possible. The problem is that it's just not true.

So how do I handle Christmas? Ally's in day care and already knows about Santa. She knows the legend. I don't want her to be the only one that knows the truth. She probably wouldn't believe me anyway. If all the kdis say it's true, who am I to disagree. I don't want to actively lie to her, but I don't know how to handle it. I am very waffle-y. Can't figure it out.

Enlightened

Sorry I've been away...Ally was sick Tuesday night.

Rob and I spent most of the night rearranging Aly's room to try to find space for her to play admidst the toys. She had PB&J for supper. Anya went to bed around 7:00 She woke up around 8 and wouldn't go back to bed. Ally went to bed at 8:45. Rob read her stories and instead of rolling over and going to sleep, she started to whine for me. I was upstairs willing Anya to sleep. Didn't work. For the next hour, Rob and I handed Anya back and forth and tried to get both kids to sleep.

For a little bit, I was close to tears. I was so tired. Anya has been having some trouble sleeping lately. Not bad, but enough to frazzle me. I laid Anya down on the couch on her back and she smiled at me and cooed. It just about made me furious. I just wanted to sleep. I love her so much, but at that moment, I didn't want to. I just wanted to stop loving her so that I didn't have to put up with this shit anymore. And she just stared at me knowing that I was there to keep her from rolling off the couch if she tried. And of course, she did and I did. But oh, I resented it for a while.

Finally Anya was close to sleep, Ally was quiet, and Rob went to bed. I rested on the couch waiting for Anya to be 100% alseep (f*ck that whole drowsy-but-awake theory. Not tonight!) before laying her down. 3 minutes after Anya went to sleep, Ally started crying loud. I put Anya in her crib and went in Ally's room. I turned on her mobile (it has a light) and saw that she was sitting in a pile of puke. ugh! She says "There's something on my toes!" Yeah, honey. that's your supper. Anyway, I threw her in the tub and woke Rob up. He cleaned her sheets while I hosed her down (Ally screaming all the while) with the shower head. Got her settled back down and she fell asleep almost instantly. 10 minutes later I was in bed and heard her cough. Jumped out of bed, but was too late. Once again Rob changed the bed, but this time I just cleaned her off with a towel. This time I was smart and put a blanket on the floor to lay on. Easier to clean up. We went through lots of blankets and a couple pillows.

There were a lot of moments when I just wanted to yell "Shut up already. I know your belly hurts, but it's going to be worse if you stay awake and whine about it" But I didn't. I tried to explain that it was okay and that she was sick, but she'd get better and that she'd feel better after she slept some more. And I started to feel better myself. Not less tired. Of course not. I got almost no sleep. And I was still a little cranky. But she curled up on my shoulder and wrapped her (stinky - ugh) arms around my neck and had utter faith that I was there to help. She whined constantly, but she never had to question that I was there for her.

I got past the anger. These kids aren't infringing on my life. They ARE my life. I never want them to have to wonder whether I will be there to catch them. Or to hug them. Or even to wipe the puke out of their hair and sleep on the floor with their sweaty stinky selves. If that means I have to occasionally miss out on some sleep, I think I can live with it. I will still have bad days, but I hope that I can hold on to that feeling. It may get me through some rough times.

After a 3.5 hour nap the next afternoon (which started when she fell asleep on our stairway landing mid-"Mommy, come get me. I can't walk. You carry me") she was just fine. Seems like it was a 24-hour stomach bug or something. They both slept last night. Anya woke once to eat, and once because she was cold. The battery in our thermostat is dying, and it reset the a/c to 48 degrees. I covered her up and turned it off, and she went right back to sleep. Ally slept all night and woke up quite chipper this morning. Me too.

more food!
Last night Ally asked Rob for some of his meatloaf! with no prompting! and she ate a bite! She had 3 bites of meatloaf, 2 bites of corn, some raisins and licked a piece of spaghetti, but didn't eat it. I gave her a little brownie for trying the new foods. The meatloaf and corn, she chewed for a very long time. You could tell she was either full from the raisins or just didn't like them much. But she didn't spit them uot.

what happened?

Can anyone tell me where the weekend went? I can't seem to remember. I know I went to Walmart once, and I got Anya's pictures taken (By one of the ladies that I really don't like at Penney's. She's always trying to rush and doesn't always try too hard to get good ones.) Other than that, I can't remember any actual activities. 

Oh, but it's getting cold here. I really don't like jacket weather that much. I'm not a big fan of wind. It sucks. (or blows. heh, heh) We tried to close up our pool for the winter, but failed miserably. The kids just had different plans for us. like opposite nap schedules. Bleh. Someone tell me a joke to cheer me up.

More foods we can add to the "Ally actually deigned to try me" list

It has taken a lot of work, but Ally is trying more foods.

mac & cheese - she actually ate this twice at home and tried some at day care

cheeseburgers - she will eat them without the bun (about 3 bites at least)

soup - she tried a couple sips in order to get crackers. We're hopeful about the future, cause she seemed to not hate it.

chicken patties - again without the bun

corn - last night, she finally relented and tried some corn Rob cut of the ear for her. She dipped it in butter, but hey, I'm counting it aas a success.

spaghetti - The day care assures me she tried a couple bites. I haven't been able to duplicate it though

rotini pasta - I got her to eat 1 noodle the other day with spaghetti sauce on it. This is the sole reason I am not sure the day care was lying to me about the spaghetti.

I hope this list gets longer. Yay for progress!

Like mother...like daughter

ummm... like sister and dad too. I think we're going to need a bigger bookshelf

A dingus, I tell you!

We all know I believe my daughter is a dingus. But I now have irrefutable proof.

• She knows how to spell her name, red, green, and blue (they are teaching spelling-colors-songs at day care). She can (most of the time) recognize the words Mom and Dad
• She knows that 1 and 1 are 2.
• 1 and 2 are 3
• 2 and 2 are 4
• 3 and 3 are 6
• 4 and 4 are 8
• 5 and 5 are 10
• 30 is OLD (Rob turns 30 this year. I'm teaching Ally to mock him now)
• If you have 4 and take one away, you have 3
• She taght me a song about the days of the week yesterday.

See, I told you so.

We haven't talked about poop for a while

Last night, Ally pooped in her potty. Hooray! She got up and looked in the cup and said "A crocodile!" How can you not laugh at that? "Nope, it's just poop, Ally"

Crikey!

youTube

I never post videos here because they take up too much storage space. But, lots of people have been using a new web thing called youTube. So I'm trying it out too. You'll have to tell me what you think once I figure it out. I am currently uploading videos. We'll see how it works. Grrr. I can't manage to make tripod let me embed the videos directly, so I'll just have to link them for now.

This is Ally telling Anya to roll over. She sings everything lately. I'm encouraging it. It's better than screaming.

This is Ally and I talking about her day after day care while we were waiting for her dad. Talks pretty well for a 2 3/4 year old doesn't she? How do I make her stop?

This is Anya moving backwards off her blanket. She gets so frustrated when she can't get to her toys. but, she is making progress. She's able to get up on her hands and knees. That's no easy feat when you're almost 18 pounds!

sleep issues

I have mentioned before how Anya sleeps like Ally never did, right? Well, Thursday that all went by the wayside. Friday night I gave her some green beans (did I mention I've been feeding her food yet? I don't think so. Anyway, I've been giving her cereal in the daytime, and mostly bananas at night, but tried green beans Friday night) She hadn't slept great the night before, but that happens sometimes and wasn't terrible. Well, Friday WAS. She scereamed bloody murder if I even came close to attempting to set her down. She farted her way through the night and I ended up with about 3.5 hours of sleep total (and on the way to the aquarium the next day oy-vay!) Thought it was the beans. Turned out it wasn't. She had no beans Saturday, but still had a bad night. I got 4.5 hours of sleep. I think maybe I figured out the problem though. I had a breakfasst casserole on Thursday morning for breakfast. It had lots of cheese and probably other dairy too. By the time I breastfed her that evening, most of it had probably left my system. However, I still had 3 bottles I had pumped during the day. She ate the first (most concentrated) one Friday. Had another on Saturday. I threw the 3rd out. Just in case. Don't know for sure if that was the problem, but better safe than sorry. I'm also not going to try green beans again for a while.

She slept 7 hours last night. woke up and ate for 15 minutes. slept another 4 hours. Much better.

Shedd Aquarium

We went up to Chicago this weekend to take Ally to Shedd Aquarium. Had been thinking about it for a while, and now that Rob has weekends free, it's much easier to go on trips like that. Ally had a great time. We told her about it Friday night, and Rob showed her the website. She was fascinated with the snake she saw. She really wanted to go see that snake. At bedtime, she gave no arguement, because she needed to get lots of rest so we could go see the snake tomorrow! When she woke up, she was bouncing off the walls. She had switched from the snake to the sharks though. We got to hear something like this:

"When we swim with the sharks they will bite us!" "Are we going to see those bad sharks?" "Sharks will bite our fingers and they will fall off" "Sharks are in the water and when we go in the water they will bite us!" and so on and so forth. But the weird thing was, she wasn't acting scared, she was just acting excited about it all. I think she watches too much Discovery Channel with her dad.

Anyway, we spent the day wandering about, and Ally had a great time. Anya sat in the stroller and rode around staring at everyone. Rob and I alternated lifting Ally up to see things, and we basically wore ourselves out. We saw lots of sharks and fish and whales etc. There was only 1 snake though, and he was kinda balled up so you couldn't see much of him. Ally was disappointed in that. We stopped at Rob's dad's on the way home, and let Anya get down a little. She was going crazy not being able to squirm around on the floor all day.  We let Ally watch the portable DVD player for the first time. She absolutely loved it! which is why we hadn't let her watch it before.

sick?

last week Ally didn't sleep one night. It rained all night and the sound of the sump pump kept waking her up. The next day she was very cranky at day care. They even called me to tell me that she had fallen asleep reading. So they woke her up to take her temperature. And she didn't have one. What did I want them to do? DUH! Let her go back to sleep. if she can sleep in a room full of 2 year olds, she's obviously tired.

Anyway, I left work to take her home so she could have a nice long nap, but that failed miserably. She woke up screaming her freakin' head off. She said her belly hurt. She screamed for about 15 minutes before I called Rob to ask his advice. We decided to take her to the ER just in case. I mean she wouldn't stop screaming!! So I loaded her up, and went to pick him up from work. She quit screaming about alfway there, but we went ahead and took her anyway, because she said her belly still hurt. Once there we were informed that an axillary temperature wouldn't suffice, and we had to have oral of anal. Ally wouldn't open her mouth. Poor kid. I had no part in it. Rob held her still for the nurse. Ally blamed him. That evennig I heard something I thought I'd never hear coming from my kid's mouth:

"Daddy put it in my butt and it made me sad. I didn't want him to"

I had to make sure and tell the day care what had happened the next day so that they wouldn't call DCFS on us when she told everyone about it. But, she will tell you herslef that the next time, she will open her mouth and lift her tongue when we tell her to. Hard lesson to learn. Funny though.

Oh yeah, she quit acting sick and started to answer inconsistantly about where she hurt, so we left before we even saw a doctor. She was fine