Red Lobster
Rob has been trying to get Ally to eat croutons forever, but she just sakes her head no at him. Last night we went to Red Lobster for supper. When we got our salads, Ally reached over calm as can be and stole a crouton and ate it. We were all shocked.

Part of my meal was popcorn shrimp, and she actually ate some of them when I offered it to her. That's not too shocking, becuase they are breaded, and the only meat she eats is breaded. What was shicking was when she pulled the breading off and ate the shrimp by itself!!! I wonder it we can duplicate that?

pool swimming
We went swimming last night in Gma Darra's ppol at the hotel. It was a little chilly, but Ally had a good time. The Crowne Plaza pool has the hot tub right next to it, so you can sit on the ledge with your feet in the pool, or turn around and your feet are in the hot tub. Ally liked that a lot. She also liked to climb out the steps, walk around to the other side of the railing, and "jump" off the ledge to someone's arms. The only problem we had with that was that she wouldn't climb the stairs right. She'd hold onto our fingers with both hands, put both feet on the stairs, then relax (or even lean back). That meant we had to lift her til she was vertical again, then she'd do it on the next step too.

She loves it when someone goes under water then pops back up.

bathtub swimming
Lately Ally has been sliding down on her belly in the bathtub to "swim". She kicks her legs and grins. I've had to start putting less water in the tub so she doesn't get it in her nose. She slid down one day when there was too much water in, and wasn't all that excited about it. She reminded me of a dog smelling snow for the first time. She slid down, got water on her nose, straightened up a little, blow out her nose a little, slid down again, got water up her nose, and then sat up and gave up on it all. But, I let some water out and she laid right down and "went swimming".

sandbox
Ally thinks it's great fun to pour sand all over me. I always end up just as dirty as she does and I'm not in the sandbox. She gets 2 shovels going at a time. She pours the sand from 1 into the other (and loses half of it) then pours what's left on my leg. She likes to pur it on her own leg too. i always have to be careful when I take her shoes off at home. They almost always go outside to play at day care, so her shoes are always filled with sand. I forgot that yesterday at the Dr office, and pulled her shoe off and sent sand flying everywhere.

sleeping
Ally only woke up once last night, and went back to bed rather easily. I wish that wasn't a cause for celebrating. I wish she'd just give it up and sleep.

18 month checkup
Ally had her 18 month checkup today. I scheduled it so that I could pick her up right after lunch and get her back right around nap time. Usually, I get her back around lunchtime, and she falls asleep on the way. Then we have to coax her awake to eat lunch. When I got to day care, she was mostly finished with lunch, but had 1 fish star left. I told her we were going, so she grabbed it and slid off her chair. We got to the Dr office, and she had little pieces of fish breading everywhere. The Dr says everything is fine. She's 45% weight and height (25 lb and 31 3/4 in) for her age. She got 2 shots given by the nurse I like. Last time she got shots, the nurse was terrible. Ally still has a lump in her thigh from one. (The Dr said it's not standard, but not uncommon. He said it's soap. Basically the fat in her thigh reacted to the vaccine liquid and solidified like soap. Reminded me of Fight Club. It should go away within the next couple years, but might not ever. Strange. That nurse will never come near Ally with a needle again.) This time, Ally started crying, but basically got over it when I opened the door and told her we were leaving. She walked out with me and got mad when I wouldn't let her leave through the fire exit. Then, of course, she didn't fall asleep on the way back to day care for the first time ever. She cried and cried when I left her.

screaming
I feel like screaming. Ally screamed most of the night instead of sleeping. I'm going to lose my mind. She lays down and goes to sleep on her own with no problem whatsoever. Why can't she go back to sleep on her own in the middle of the night when she wakes up???

G'pa Bob and G'ma Glinda
Ally had visitors today. Gma and Gpa came over for lunch and played in the yard. We threw her slide in the little pool and let her play. Ally was asleep when they arrived, and took a long time to wake up. She was acting shy all day until right when they were leaving. the little stinker. She hardly said a word the whole time they were there but talked her head off the rest of the night. She had fruit and 6!!! nuggets for dinner.

G'ma Jan
We went for dinner at my Mom's house. Ally sat all by herself at a little folding table and chairs (that we just learned have been recalled) for her lunch. She played and ran around with the girls for a while and just generally visited. She discovered the guinea pig and loved to pet him/her(?). The day was pretty laid-back. She took a long nap when we got home. After, we took a walk. She loves stroller rides, and Rob and I need to walk our butts off. literally.

Haircut
I took Ally to get her first professional haircut today. She quit letting me put in ponytails a little over a month ago for some reason. I could fight with her to make her let me, but then, as soon as I'm looking the other way, she pulls them out. So, I gave up. Without being able to pull it up, I can't keep it out of her eyes when the wind blows. The sides were too long. So I had them cut her bangs and taper the sides a little, so they won't blow in her eyes. Seemed to work. The wind didn't bother her at the park. I wasn't sure how she would react to the haircut, but she did pretty well. I tried to get her to sit by herself, but she wouldn't even think about it, so she stood on my lap (she wouldn't sit down at all). She was not thrilled about the bib they put on to catch the hair either, but she got distracted from whining about it when she hairdresser sprayed her head with water. Then, she just held real still. About halfway through it, she started to relax and slid down and sat for the rest of it. She didn't cry at all. I was so proud.

outside
We spent most of today outside. This morning, we went garage sale-ing and found a little bigger slide for Ally to play with. The only problem was that we sold our truck long ago. Luckily, one of my friends wasn't too terribly busy, and came to my rescue. So, we took it to the backyard and had some fun with the hose. Ally loves the sprayer on the garden hose. She sees Rob water the grass seed and tries to mimic him. She waves it around and is quite serious about it. First, we watered the grass again. Then I went in and got a bucket of warm soapy water and a rag to clean the new slide peices bfore reassembling. Ally thought that bucket looked like fun. She played a while in the bubbles, then for some reason went and got two shovels out of her sandbox. She used one to pour water into the other then carried them over and poured the water on the piece I was washing. I kept her entertained. Then she played on the slide for a while before nap. Later, we went to Lincoln Park to play. She ran around for over an hour and generally tired herself out. She's sleeping now. Hope it keeps up through the night!!

"Melmo"
Last Sunday was the day of no sleeping - no naps either. So I was desperate for something to keep her occupied. I popped in the Elmo in Grouchland DVD, and she loved it. She sat still for a whole 20 minutes. She especially likes it when Bert and Ernie "stop" the movie. Bert is worried for Elmo, and Ernie reassures him that he'll be ok. She danced along to the songs too. When Rob got home Monday or Tuesday, I made the mistake of showing him the DVD case. She saw it and we had to watch it again. Tonight, Rob moved it or something, and she insisted on watching it again. She wandered around the room with the remote trying to get it to work and chanting "Melmo", so we turned it on. She got bored after a while, so we flipped it off and went to take a bath. Afterwards, I put Elmo pajamas on her, and renewed her interest. She was bound and determined to use the remote to find "Melmo". She didn't believe us when we told her Elmo went night-night.

arguing with an 18 month old...
... is like talking to a brick wall. Rob was eating banana slices dipped in peanut butter tonight. Ally was eating a blueberry muffin. She decided his looked better. He gave her a piece of banana with a little bit of PB on it, and she promptly sucked it off. Then she offered him the banana to put some more on. Rob tried to convince her that she had to eat the banana first then, he'd give her another one. She understands this logic. She follows directions when we tell her to do something she wants to do. She acted like Rob just didn't understand what she was saying, so she had better explain it again. If she could talk, the conversation would have went something like this:

Rob: Ally eat your banana first then you can have some more.
Ally: Yeah, "more" that's what I was just telling you - I want some more.
Rob: Ally, you can't have more peanut butter until you eat what you've got.
Ally: But here, I'll give this one back. I really wanted the one with peanut butter on it anyway.
Rob: Take a bite
Ally: Well, maybe if I put it near my mouth, I can fool him.

and so on. I couldn't help but laugh. She was so earnest in her protesting.

Cookout
The annual family cookout is looming... We were thinking of July 16th or 17th. Does anyone have any conflicts for that weekend? Would Saturday or Sunday be best? Let me know... I'd like to get some respomses, so I know if the date would work out or if we should pick another one.

nuts
I bought some oatmeal/raisin cookies with walnuts. (I don't really like the walnuts, but that's what they had) Ally got to eat one on the way home. When I got her out of the seat, the cookie was gone - except for every single walnut. They were all over the place. It looked like she sucked all the cookie off and spit the walnuts back out.

shopping
We needed diapers for day care, so yesterday we went shopping. Ally loves to push the cart. It's not so good though when we're standing in line at checkout and she tries to push into someone in front of us :) I also was looking for a girly looking Cubs outfit, but can't find one. I find all kinds of Cardinals cute little pink and white dresses, but no Cubs.They only have boys Cubs around here. Stinks. Anyway, Ally loves to hand my debit card to the cashier to pay. She gets kinda peeved that they give it back though.

Finally
I hope a pattern is developing! Ally slept all night last night. YAY!!!!!

words
We've added to her vocabulary:

star

straw

car

out

sign language (sort-of) aligator

an elephant sound/gesture (she puts the back of her hand to her mouth and tries to make a raspberry sound)

night-night

bye-bye

cup

go

shoes

moon

and, she's really putting inflection in her jabberings now. You can tell when she's telling you something or asking a question.

I guess I should mention that htese aren't the only words she's added. I just can't always remember all of them. In the almost 2 months since she got tubes, there has been an amazing jump in her communication. I'm a firm believer in ear tubes now. (added 5/26)

Posted by ktjrdn at 07:34 CDT

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sleep
Ally went to bed last night at 9:00 with no problems. We went to bed thinking we'd just have to get up soon, but she didn't wake up until 2:45. Then, I told her to lay down, covered her back up, and turned on the mobile a couple times. I was back in bed in 20 minutes. She woke up aain an hour later, but only stayed up a minute or two and was back asleep. Yay! I hope this will sort itself out soon.

supper again
After the whole picture thing, we went to Applebee's. We didn't really think she'd let us sit and eat, but we wanted to give it a try. We were amazed to be wrong. She sat and munched Kix, peaches, a granola bar, and french fries. We even got to eat dessert! I can't remember the last time we were ready to leave before she was.