Some Second Child Musings

Olivia is a short 9 days away from the 6 month mark and that got me
thinking about how differently we've patented her. Some of the
differences, like laying her down to fall asleep in her bed by
herself, have been very intentional. Others have been out of
necessity, like letting her hang out in the crib so I cab shower with
Abby getting at her. And some are just the product of "been there,
done that". Either way, I've noticed that we've been a lot more laid
back with her - especially in the area of hoovering watching for
milestones. And being a lot less cautious about letting her interact
with bigger kids, mostly because there is no way around it.

A Bowl on the Table...

Is worth a mess on the toddler, right? It is in our house anyway. We have some bowls that have a handy little suction cup on the bottom. They work great for keeping little people from picking up their bowls of sloppy, wet cereal and walking all around the house. At least I thought they did. Then Abby tried to pick up the bowl to drink the milk out of her cereal and the entire bowl of cinnamon toast crunch ended up coming down on top of her. I laughed so hard I couldn't breathe for a minute or two, then I took her picture, then we cleaned up the mess.

We also cleaned up a very big mess inside. We had a bathroom with a major ceiling mildew problem. Part of it was pre-existing, but the rest was our own creation from not running the vent fan so that we didn't wake up Abby any earlier than she got up on her own. Needless to say after scrubbing the ceiling with bleach and repainting the whole bathroom, no one in this house will be showering without running the vent fan. But, the bathroom went from a blah (and dirty) light blue to a fabulous "Tinkerbell" green, so I think it was well worth the effort in the 80+ degree heat.

Olivia and Abby are both cutting teeth. Abby has her last two molars just about through and Olivia has been chewing her fists for a solid 3 weeks. They both also developed snotty noses over the weekend, which for Abby has always been a sure sign that the teeth were just about through. No coughs, no sneezes, no fevers, just icky running noses. I hope their little teeth hurry in - Olivia kept me up most of the night since she couldn't lay flat to sleep and she is definitely too big to be crammed into an infant car seat, even if it is the most comfortable way for her to sleep. So, after keeping me up all night (I'm operating on maybe 3.5 hours of sleep today), Olivia took a big long morning nap. Of course, I had to stay awake to watch Abby who is wearing her big girl panties today. So far no accidents... I hope she can keep that up.

Welcome Home to the 1437th!

The local troops returned from their deployment to Iraq this afternoon, so I hauled Abby and Olivia out in the cold, windy, almost rainy weather to stand by the road and watch them come home. We don't know any of them personally, but I wanted to start teaching the girls early to value the sacrifice of our military. We are looking forward to "Uncle" Ron to be home soon too - I'm sure "Aunt" Meghan is even more excited that he will be back! Abby really enjoyed watching the soldiers come back through town. They had a police and fire escort along with dozens and dozens of motorcycles from the local VFW. We waved our flags and I talked to Abby about how special it was that the soldiers would protect her. We also had a little lesson about the American flag and how one star was for Michigan, where we live.

Olivia screamed for most of the parade. She really hates loud noises. I can't even yell at Abby or Maize without making Olivia cry. And she didn't want to nap today, so that only made her more irritable. But she did love holding onto the flag like her big sister. And she had fun playing with Abby in the double stroller. They are getting great at entertaining each other.

Couch to 5k

We had a great weekend! We managed to get the yard almost entirely
cleaned up (finally), including some much overdue weeding in my flower
beds. We also found some great wooden rocking chairs for the deck on
sale and a rocker for in the house 80% off. I need to take Steve
shopping with me more often - he must be good luck. Abby has been
enjoying the new chairs with lots of outside time. And Olivia has been
enjoying the rockers too. They gave the deck a much needed facelift.

I decided yesterday that some personal changes would be fun. So...
First I cut myself some bangs. I now look a lot more like my high
school senior picture (except a little older and heavier). The new
look prompted a new idea - getting back into my high school running
habits. So today I started the couch to 5k interval training program
since it has been at least 4 years since I've gone out for a run. We
will see if I can make it for 9 whole weeks.

Photo Shoot

My cousin Deb & her husband Cody stopped by yesterday afternoon on their way to Tahquamenon Falls. Deb does wonderful pictures, which would turn out even better if I had children who cooperated. The kid in the big sister shirt basically refused to cooperate and the kid in the little sister shirt will not smile for a camera unless you can get her laughing way before the camera comes out. There were a couple cute photos and I'm sure with Deb's photoshop skills there will be a few more. I love the one with Olivia standing up - it just depicts her little personality so well. The "Little Sister" does not like to be sitting down. She is a stand or nothing girl!

Need Versus Want

Does anyone have a good way to explain the difference between the words "want" and "need" to a toddler (and a baby too... but I'm willing to give her the benefit of her age and not scream because she doesn't understand). Today seemed to be an all day battle over listening and responding to what I was asking. For example, I want to sleep later than 6:30 a.m., but it's not a need. And today it didn't happen since Abby decided to crawl into my bed, kick for about 30 minutes, and then loudly announce that she needed breakfast (which she consequently did not eat, so it must have been a want, not a need). I, personally, needed coffee. Not wanted... needed.

Then there is my favorite recurring dialogue:

Me: "Abby, do you need to go potty?"
Abby: "No, I don't want to."

Two minutes later she pees her pants (or worse...). We did this at least 3 times today. Apparently when I ask if she needs to go potty what she is hearing is more like "Abby if you want to use the potty that would make mommy happy, but you can also pee all over yourself and the floor since you are insisting on wearing big girl panties... your choice." Ugh!

Apparently "you need to take a nap" is also not translating well. Fortunately "stay in your bed or I will give you a spanking" was heard loud and clear, so eventually Abby did take her nap. Olivia... not so much. She is going to be one crabby baby later this evening.

A Hitch, A Pump, and A Pony

We spent all week this past week at Grandma Mary & Grandpa Scott's house on a new adventure. About 6 months ago a new family moved to our area and was invited to our Bible study. Since then, Kimberlee and I have become really good friends even though we are just about total opposites on a lot of levels. One of those things that is totally different is family size - they have 6 kids total and a 7th on the way thanks to a blended family. We, obviously, do not have a big family. But we do know a thing or two about being part of a big, crazy, happy family. And I love it :-)

So... this past week Kimberlee's daughter, who is 9, needed to be at DeVos Children's Hospital (where Olivia spent her week in the NICU) to receive an insulin pump, since she has type 1 diabetes. I went into the week not knowing much about the disease, since it is nothing like the gestational diabetes I had with Abby. I can now say I am getting pretty good at helping a little person with the disease (I don't know how to manage the pump yet, but I'm sure that is on the way). It is one thing I pray we never have to deal with for either of our children. But, thanks to amazing modern technology, Evelin now only has to be poked once every few days to move her pump instead of getting a shot before eating anything and before bed. I'm sure she is going to be very happy about that. And, since Kimberlee is getting pretty far along in the pregnancy and wasn't comfortable getting around in Grand Rapids, the girls and I went along for the adventure to keep them company. We were all thankful that my wonderful parents were willing to open their home for a few days. Both Evelin and Kimberlee talked about how much fun it was most of the ride home.And in the process we managed to do some things I was pretty excited about. One of them was having Abby (and Evelin) experience their first horse back rides. Let me just assure you that Abby, as you all probably would guess, was terrified of Lucky the miniature horse right up until the point when I called her a "princess pony." There is nothing Abby won't do if you label it a princess thing. She rode Lucky bareback with me holding onto her and Aunt Emily leading the horse. It was only about a bazillion percent humidity and in the high seventies, so Abby and Evelin rode while the rest of us swam in our sweat. Yuck! We also perfected Abby's swimming skills and taught her friend Huron (Kimberlee's youngest son who is 2 this week). And we had a hitch put on the car just in case we can find a great pop-up camper. That was an adventure in itself (the dealership guy said it would take 2-ish hours... seven hours later I left with a very cranky baby in tow). Olivia was a real trooper in helping me get a hitch put on and dealing with not one, but two toddlers trying to play with her all week. I think all the grandma hugs made up for it.

After all that fun I am pretty sure I need a week (or two) to recover. After I clean all the toddler mess and snacks out of the car that is ;-)

All Camped Out

Okay... this would have been cuter in focus, but you get the point. They had a fun time riding in the hammock
We just got back from an impromptu weekend camping trip and it was wonderful. Steve only had two patients scheduled for Friday, so he cancelled them and we spent the weekend at the Blind Sucker River Flooding soaking up nature (and some rain last night). We always seem to forget at least one thing when we go camping, and this trip was no exception. It was not fun to blow the air mattresses up without the pump, but we managed (somehow... taking turns to avoid passing out). Abby had a great time enjoying nature and learning how to live with no toys or t.v. She was ready to go back to her house after about 24 hours.

Double Trouble

Olivia is a quick study. In the last two days she learned how to roll
from her belly to her back AND from her back to her belly. She is
approaching mobility at lightning speed. She has also become extremely
interested in and aware of Abby. The interest is mutual. I put Olivia
in her crib today so I could shower. When I shut the water off I heard
both girls laughing, so I figured Abby was making faces over the crib
rail. When I peeked into Olivia's room Abby was no where in sight,
then 4 legs popped up inside the crib. It was cute, but now we are
working on teaching Abby that her fun new play place is off limits.
Never a dull moment...

Think Pig

Abby is on a pig kick since her week visiting Hannah and Emily's hogs at the Barry County Fair. We have been watching pig movies, playing with her toy pigs, and changing ourselves into pigs with her magic wand. We even took pig pictures at Great Grandma Jennie's camper when we stopped by their campsite to visit them yesterday. Someday Abby will either love this picture or really, really hate it. Personally I really love it - I crack up every time I see her little nose smooshed up and her squinty eye.

Since the weather on Saturday was bad we skipped camping for the weekend (like we had planned) and instead just made a day trip over to Blind Sucker Flooding on Sunday. We had a lot of fun visiting and brought back a whole GALLON of wild blueberries. YUM! We had so much fun we are thinking of going back to camp this weekend, since the weather is supposed to be much, much sunnier. And it can't get much cloudier than today. We had rain all day - Abby spent over an hour playing in the rain on the deck. Olivia just spent time whining since there weren't any grandmas around to hold her while she napped. It's been a lot of spoiling lately!