Little lady

Kaylee's been having a great time during the holidays. First we celebrated Christmas with my family, so much fun and I haven't been in town the last 3 Christmases (we were celebrating with Eric's family in PR - which as also wonderful!) so it was like old times. Then for New Year's, Eric's parents are staying here and we'll celebrate their Christmas as a family tomorrow.

Kaylee is of course showing off for all the family and enjoying the attention. It's really fun that she has been more adventurous with food lately and will try more things. Also, she can say so many things and even makes jokes for everyone - it makes for a good get-together! Our little socialite. For my family, she'd come into the room and smile a huge smile at everyone, beaming "HI GUYS!" and then she'd leave the room, look over her shoulder saying "Bye, Guys!" She is picking up new words all the time and sometimes I am shocked I know I didn't teach her it and that I might never even say whatever it is. Recently, she pointed to my "necklace." Also, her newest favorite thing to say is "Okay" and "Not okay." She loves to ask for something and uses "okay" as a way to try to get something or convey excitement. "Mommy, can I have a cookie?" and before I do anything she says with a smile "Okay, okay okay!" Also she reprimands the dogs by saying that what they're doing (even if it's nothing) is "Not Okay-yuh!" (Okay for her is three syllables) She must have learned this at daycare because we don't ever say "Not okay." She also says that they're "Not nice" and we try to explain you only say you have a problem with something if the dogs are doing something bad and have spent more times letting her pet them and talk nice with them. All she knows is this is a sure-fire way to exercise her newfound ability to have authority over someone, since the terrible twos are all about exerting their independence.

Kaylee is quite the little lady. She still enjoys trying on all her shoes and parading around the house. And now she also wants to make sure she has her "Pony Ta-yule" (ponytail) on her head at all times. She cries when we take it out to give her a bath, she's so used to it now. (As you remember, it is necessary because of her hair-twirling habit.) She also loves to try on other people's shoes, and since her grandparents are here has enjoyed stomping around the house in them. Kaylee has also started to want to be able to choose her own clothes, and since that's not really possible or time-efficient I give her two shirts to choose from each day - by far she chooses the green shirts always. This is her new favorite color. She also would love it if I let her try out my make-up and gets very upset that I don't share with her. She likes to take my blush brush and swipe her face. Kaylee is still trying to figure out how to dress herself and loves wrapping herself in my pajamas, ending up with them around her neck for the most part. She loves to carry around a little panda, monkey or baby around and wrap them up in her little washclothes. She tells them "Sh,shh. Nite-Nite." I reach to tell the baby "nite-nite" and she says "No!" and then I say "Oh I forgot you're the Mommy." and she nods at me "Yey-yah." I'm amazed that at this age, she's already showing her gender characteristics so clearly without any prodding on our part at all. She has her share of boy toys and she loves them as well though. She's loving her new train set she got for Christmas. Her "choo, choo Trey-ane."

My little lady is growing up so fast! My goodness...and here comes 2010!

Dancing and Frolicking in her Party Dress

New development: Kaylee is starting to show signs of empathy or caring for others. She has said “bless you” and “thank you” for quite a while now but what I’m seeing now is a deeper realization that we all have feelings. She sees me get hurt (I’m very clumsy as all who are close to me know) and I say “Ouch” she then turns looking very concerned and says, “Mommy, You okay?” If Eric coughs a whole bunch she asks him that and if I just look kind of crabby she’s asked me if I’m okay. So, now we’re realizing just how perceptive she is and how we need to be aware of it.

I’ve been having mini conversations with my Kaylee baby. And so has Eric with her. Today at breakfast she said,
“Mommy, you like that?” gesturing to my breakfast.
I said, “Yes, Kaylee do you like that?” and she responded “Yes, I like it.” “Mommy, can I have more?” “Yes, here’s more” and with a giant smile, her eyes soften gently as she realizes she conversing and being understood.

She seems to be tantruming a bit less as her conversing is increasing and our rule-enforcing /routine has been more obvious to her. A couple times shes hit me and I just give her a look, I say “Don’t do that” and she smiles and nods, “Okay” and starts being a good girl.

Kaylee had a good weekend. We all went to a holiday part Saturday night. She wanted to be with the big girls but they didn’t want to play too much with her. She was amazed by their big Christmas tree and took delight in the attention of all the adults around her. On Sat we went to a 1 year old b-day party. Kaylee was a good girl, sharing the balloons and not doing a tantrum when I told her we had to not play with them anymore. Saturday night she went to her Aunt/Uncle’s to be watched and was fantastic for them. They got a kick out of seeing her “read” to herself and do pseudo yoga on their yoga mat. On Sunday she went shopping with me and my friend, and was very patient with only one little fit after her nap was cut short. What a good girl Kaylee is! We are so blessed! So fun, cute and now…caring.

Holiday Posts about Kaylee

All Holiday-related things about Kaylee

- Kaylee loves to sing “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” She can sing some words and it has been known to even calm her out of a tantrum, and saved us from red,teary eyes and boogers during her Holiday portrait sitting. She can also sing some of “Jingle Bells” and “Frosty the snowman.” She loves listening to our holiday Christmas carols CD.
- Kaylee did meet Santa at my holiday work party. Her reaction when asked if she wanted to meet him was to shake her head No furiously. Santa did come over to meet her. He was very nice and played peekaboo from afar with her first, and then gave her a very nice Nutcracker ornament. It’s funny to hear a toddler try to say “Nutcracker.”
- Kaylee helps put her winter jacket on and pronounces the word, “Gacket” sometimes.
- Kaylee loves the snow-men in people’s yard decorations – she exclaims “snowman!” when she sees one and is delighted there are so many around.
- Kaylee can tell you what the ornaments on her own tree at home are.
- Kaylee wants to carry a blanket around everywhere lately. It’s a new thing.
- Kaylee absolutely loves driving around to look at Christmas lights. She says, “Oh, pretty lights!” and “Mommy, a star!” and “Christmas tree.”
- Her favorite color lately is green – she tries to pick out green clothes to wear every day whenever she has the chance.
- Kaylee has been wearing a very cute gingerbread barette above her ponytail, where she can’t reach it and pull it out. It is so amazing to the kids in daycare, they look at her head and try to play with it.
- Kaylee doesn’t want to wear her boots because they aren’t as cute as her rain boots. She would rather wear them. Kaylee has a slight shoe-fetish and loves sessions of trying them all on. She rejoiced today because I let her wear her red patent-leather shoes to daycare with her red outfit. (I brought a back-up for the daycare folks if this wasn’t going to work for activities during the day.)
- Kaylee knows how to say, “Cold…Brrrr!” when we get into the carseat to go somewhere. She wants a blanket on her to keep warm while in the car.
- Yesterday I very carefully pinned all our Christmas cards on our window for display. I heard Eric giggling to himself over by his computer. I went over to see what was funny online. He said, “Take a look at what Kaylee’s up to.” She had taken all the cards down very swiftly, and was playing with them all on the floor. Very happily talking to herself about her new cards.

Update on the sleep routine/Holiday preparations

Sorry I have not posted in a while, I have been on a deadline at work and working a few extra hours so that means also when I've been home, it's crazy too with trying to catch up on things! Hope everybody has had a safe holiday season so far...

Update on Kaylee and how she's been doing at night - I can report that after 4 days of letting her cry after transferring her, she stopped crying(pretty much). What happens is that we still have the bottle (I know- slap on the wrist!) and rock, and after cuddling for about 1-2 minutes we transfer her NO MATTER WHAT! That way she can count on it...her reaction, for the most part, is to allow us (Eric or myself) to cover her with blanket and after about 30 seconds of standing nearby we leave the room. If I leave the room too fast, she cries out in protest. But I no longer sit back down in the chair to wait to leave...so that's improvement. Sometimes the transfer comes with some whining and we worry we'll have to start over again and so we hold our hands on her for a minute or so and that calms her. I can also report that I have successfully moved my one nursing a day to the morning....first step in phasing out the last nursing... hooray! I can also report that last night and the night before - she slept through the night! OH JOY!

For those of you out there who don't want to hear about nursing and pumping - the next paragraph is entirely on that topic so you can skip down if desired...Now she does ask to nurse about 3 times a day and I always say no unless it's at the time when I want to, which I've been consistent with no matter what time we are nursing. Saying no, at first, was accompanied with protests and crying but now sometimes she even laughs when I say no. At first it was after work (but that got in the way of her eating a good dinner), then it was at bedtime (got in the way of her sleeping because she would say to me "nurse" and then say "other side" and then when done with both she would keep trying to get me to do the "other side" over and over nonstop - suffice it to say, that wasn't working) and now I'm hoping that with the morning routine sometimes having to be real quick that we'll just forget or forego the nursing one of these days. I'm not sure what my body will do but that's a whole other story...I don't want to get engorged again like we did at 1 year with the sudden need to stop nursing - OUCH! Slow weaning is the (best, most pain-free) way to go all you mamas out there. And I don't know if anybody's with me, but I hate the pump. It's got it's purpose but I don't want to break it out again - had enough of that thing and haven't had to use it since she transitioned to soy milk during the day at 1 year - good riddance! Pump breaks I think are hard for most people to fit in, but at my job I found that I really couldn't count on a certain time of day consistently when I had a lot of client meetings or a lot of deadlines which was the case many days. Memories return of pumping in the hospital bathroom where we conducted our meetings - let me just say you worry about not only the way it sounds to people nearby but the sanitary conditions of the act! I am always so glad when designing a building, they integrate lactation rooms into their program and have had the honor of designing a few of them. In one case I was asked to design my dream lactation room, so I put in a counter with built-in sink, undercounter refrigerator, a flat-screen TV, phone, art over the counter, lamp, dimmable lights and internet connections. As to be expected, it was value-engineered (costs were cute). Glad that era for me is over and done with. Not looking forward to doing it again, but I will do it for another entire year or more (if cross your fingers, I conceive again) if I have to in order to have the nursing relationship - I think it really was great for both of us!

Now onto the next battle du jour. Kaylee has been having lots of tantrums in the evening. As you all have followed she has been having terrible twos very early, but this is on a whole new level! So, we are on a path of ignoring all tantruming during the evening. We think that Kaylee thinks that the way to get her Mom to do things is to cry and if she doesn't get what she wants, she will keep up until she reaches a full-fledged tantrum (kicking and screaming on the floor). Eric says that when I'm not there she doesn't do it. It is very difficult for me to not respond when she cries, but like I said this has gotten out of control and very unpleasant for all of us. She also has a lot of stamina and will go on and on, doesn't make you want to be around her after work which is a first time ever! So, I have started totally ignoring it. The best method is to do chores while she's doing it. She feels a little less slighted because it's slightly a distraction from what she's doing and my blood pressure doesn't rise quite as much as just sitting there watching her do it. I'm not sure if her daycare pickup routine change has anything to do with it or not.... I think she is upset with me and wants more attention from me, but approaches getting the attention in a way that we just can't handle, continue responding to. ....last night I did the ignoring and she tantrumed the whole time I did dishes and prepared dinner (about 1/2 hour) and then when dinner happened there was no crying at all. The whole rest of the evening we played very closely together and had a a great time. She and I practiced putting barrettes in her hair, doing "mommy turn" and then "my turn," then sang songs, played blocks and had a bathtime with lots of laughter and smiles. I put her down easily and went to bed very happy. So, if that's the way it's going to be - have tantrum,/burn off steam/think to herself "hey guess it's not working"/move onto something different -- that would be lovely!

As you all know, I no longer post Kaylee's new words because there are too many to count and now she's stringing them together. One of the things that is Eric's pride and joy that I'm not sure if I mentioned here (she's done this for a couple months) - he taught her how to watch a football game together. When she sees there's a football game on, she runs into the room saying "Football!" and then raises her arms in the air and says, "Touchdown!" As you can imagine, Eric beams from ear to ear when this happens. I am not a football fan but that sort of bond/cuteness may just convince me to become a fan.

Kaylee is starting to know some shapes - she knows circle and triangle and sometimes she knows a heart. We stand together at our little Christmas tree and talk about the ornaments. She loves her special school bus ornament we got her. Eric didn't know that I'd been going over them all with her, and was surprised when he was looking at it with her, that she pointed out an ornament that was a figure with "coach" across it's belly. She called it, "Coach." Eric thought for a split second - "What? ...Dude! Can she read?" and then realized she had them memorized. Speaking of memorization, she still has some sequencing memorized - it's pretty amazing - she'll just start singing "A B C D ....trail off....Q R S T......trail off....W X Y Z" Also she can sequence some numbers "1 2 3 4....trail off... 6 7 8 9 10" Eric and I were talking in the car together the other day and mentioned "5" in our conversation and from the backseat we hear a little voice add, "6, 7, 8, 9, 10!" It's amazing! She will have an orange cup and a green cup. Raise up the orange cup and say "green cup" very proudly, when I correct her "orange cup" she looks unphased and smiles like of course and says "yep, orange cup!" Very very cute.

Kaylee has been putting giant snarls in her hair from hair twirling lately. So we've started sometimes putting her hair in a ponytail in a baby hair band. It's adorable. She looks so beautiful and grown up. Now that ponytail may make it two minutes or two hours there's no telling. She still will not wear barrettes, they won't stay in her fine hair, but loves to try them on.

We took Kaylee to one of the holiday parties a partner at our firm puts on each year. She was soooooo cute playing with a little 2 1/2 year old of my co-workers. They were dancing, jumping (Kaylee with still only one foot off the groud) and also laying on the floor kicking their feet and spinning around (weird, but actually cute too). I hadn't ever seen her do so much it appears she's capable of more than parallel play for sure. She thought the girl's name was Kayla (because all the best friends are Kayla - aren't they?) and called her that. I told her no, the girl was Sammy and she kept saying Sammy this and Sammy that all through the next morning.

I dressed Kaylee up really cute for the holiday party and then -opps- forgot to take a photo. So I hope to take one this weekend in it so I can post it. It is very hard getting anything done for the holidays - like gift-buying (still haven't started) with the deadline at work and the busyness at home when I am at home- not sure what I'm going to do I am so behind. Maybe I'll make some headway this weekend? Hope ya'll are doing better at getting to your holiday preparations!

Report on Night #3

Just wanted to let y'all know how the cry-it-out is going...well I think I have sort of broken some rules and approached this in a kind of hybrid between cry-it-out and the sleep separation technique. The first 5-10 minutes I let her cry, then go in and change diaper/give bottle (I know, first rule broken!) then as soon as I decide she's ready for a transfer to the crib after some cuddles I put her in there, and she protests very much to this. Since she's used to be transferred pretty much while she's konked out. I'm just getting so sick of the transfer-cry-pickup-cuddle-transfer-cry-pickup-cuddle routine that I need to teach Kaylee to do the soothing herself now. So I sit next to her in the rocking chair and won't pick her up again after that. I do encourage her to sit down which she doesn't want to do and cuddle with her blanket. I give her hugs after her standing there screaming a few minutes. She calms, we hug, then I try to lay her down. Then she might cry furiously again, and I'll let her cry and then in a few give the standing hug again. Then lay her down still awake and eventually she caves in, cuddles into her blanket and goes to sleep. The sleep routine has been cut down from 2 hours to about 1/2 hour now. What a relief. But what's happening is my body doesn't know what to do now. I am not used to going back to sleep so fast and last night, I laid awake for a long time afterwards. Not really sure if it's biological or if it's guilt...I'll get over it and adjust I'm sure.

In this process, I am pursuing being very consistent. I wish I wasn't giving her the bottle and guess I know how much I'm breaking the rules with this, my only explanation is that I'm trying not to change everything at once for Kaylee. Though integrating the changes together may have made some sense...I'm obviously hoping she'll decide all the screaming and crying isn't worth the effort to wake up anymore at all.

We are getting very good reports from daycare the past 3 days that she's taking longer naps and eating more at lunch! Hooray!

Kaylee had a fun night last night, I had to work late so we met at Rosedale and had dinner at Panera (her favorite, bagels and apples). She was in love with the little girls next to our table and made eyes at them the whole meal. When they left, she asked "Where'd they go?" She was so excited to put on a show for those around her, she danced near our table and jumped (with one foot off the ground only - still can't master jumping yet) and then straight onto her fanny followed with a giant laugh. And then we went to the play area and she played for a long time. Then back home to take a bath and go to bed. Very nice night.

Crying it out!

Well, we finally decided we had exhausted all our resources, including ourselves and were ready to do the cry-it-out with Kaylee. This past month her routine has resorted to crazy waking, staying up for 2 hours or more. She wants to play and be with us. We discussed how upset Kaylee gets when we transfer her and put her down at night with her doctor, and she said even if she throws up, it’s still okay to do and she was very encouraging for us to do it. She said consistency is extremely important and once we do it we can’t go back. She said we need to do it now, that it will only get even more difficult as we go on especially when she gets transferred to her own crib – then she will always be depending on us and coming in our room.

Eric and I deliberated a lot on how to approach it, what our “rules” would be and when to do it. Our doctor said that the longest a baby ever cried was 13 days and knowing Kaylee’s temperament (how stubborn we know she is) I thought that could be us. So, we decided to not wait until we get closer to the weekend. It was a difficult decision but we tried everything else. So, last night when she woke up at midnight we let her cry 10 minutes, we comforted for 5, she cried 10, she threw up, we cleaned her up and comforted and then put her back in and she cried another couple mins. Eric said maybe I should sit next to her, when I did she looked at me, said “Okay” and then sat down in the crib. I said “Nite-nite, honey” and she sat there for a few minutes, then she laid down and in another few minutes I heard her breathing deep. Not bad – close to 30-40 minute effort as opposed to our nightly 2 hour efforts lately.

She woke up one other time, but whined a little and went back to sleep. I had to wake her up this morning to take her to day care, and she had had a bloody nose and we don’t know when it happened. It was dry so I guess she had it when she woke up that other time. I felt very bad for her for everything, very guilty and like a bad mom. I just have to lean on the doctor’s words and take stock in that Kaylee has had a number of rules put into place for her lately that have gone over very well and have been a success. So when we need to call the shots we have a good track record so far. I have to take stock in that what’s hard today will be easier tomorrow and especially when we are all sleeping through the night a couple weeks from now. We have to be strong, and the doctor put it to me in a way I could handle saying “this is what’s good for Kaylee – she needs the sleep, she needs the life skill of self-soothing for sleep.”

All in all, I guess I was anticipating there would even be more loud, violent, longer crying than there was. At times she would try to use her words to get our attention, saying, “Boogie… Boogie” over and over again (boogers) or “Blanky….Blanky” or “Daddy….Daddy.” We were impressed with this instead of the crying and would pop in to say something briefly to her when she did this to encourage her calm behavior – but we quickly realized this didn’t help things and popping in made her even more mad. So we stopped that quickly. The good news is she is trying to self-soothe a bit already. Wish us luck on this journey. It is hard one but I think we will all be better having gone through it.

Typically during transitions like this Kaylee can be kind of hard on me, getting mad at me and favoring her Daddy. She will kind of ignore me, that’s her punishment. I guess I can just be glad she had a father who’s so fun/supportive/available. She’ll come around – she has those other times. No one has to be concerned about her expressing herself – that child has quite the perserverance, personality and strength of character!

I am also hoping that this story may be helpful to another parent. We tried this half-heartedly with Kaylee a couple other times earlier and if I could go back and do it right, I would. The kids get way more insistent, loud-crying and more powerful screaming! Just nip it in the bud and find the strength if you can - hindsight is 20-20. Follow along with our journey, I'll post on what happens as we go ...

Disciplining a toddler

Kaylee is getting good at following one-step commands. She can respond to a request to “help look for your shoes” and “pick something up.” She cannot yet follow two step commands and gets lost. You could try, “Pick it up and put it on the table” but it would be better to just point to the item and say, “put it on the table” and it just may get done! J

She often says “Keep up” when picking up things, but I figured out that she is trying to say “clean up” since she’s always stacking and organizing things when she’s doing it. We sing the clean-up song together whenever we pick up. It’s a song we learned from our niece.

“Clean up, clean up, everybody clean up,
Clean up, Clean up, everybody, everywhere.
Clean up, clean up, everybody clean up
Clean up, clean up, everybody do your share.”

Simple but effective. She remembers it and participates as someone her age is able (minimally). She does want to be part of everything so much though. I work to involve her in even boring things like emptying the dishwasher or doing the laundry. She likes to help put away the silverware and the washcloths. It’s cute to see her enjoy helping out. She is scared of our Room-ba (vacuum) and wants up in our arms if that’s going. When it goes back to it’s base, she watches with a wary eye and then says “Nite, nite, room –room.”

She loves to push buttons (no not just my buttons). She loves to help put up the garage door opener and to turn off light switches when we leave the room.

Life is certainly different with a toddler. You are “on” all the time, chasing them, following them with your eye, to make sure they’re not getting themselves into trouble. They don’t quite have sense yet. She’s finally stopped falling down so much so that’s a good thing. Also along with the toddler comes the striving for independence …which comes with the tantrums, fits and the need for discipline. Recently I’ve felt the need to lay down the rules for Kaylee and not accept certain behavior. Those changes have in general been:
1) No bottle or snacks before dinner. And voila, SHE DOES EAT!
2) No dawdling, or one minute warning, before leaving daycare. (cute note about leaving daycare yesterday. I said, "Kaylee do you want some water?" and she said "No, dinner." And lo and behind, as soon as I sat her down in her booster she was snarfing all her dinner up as fast as can be!)
3) Only nurse once a day, trying to move to morning to limit separation-related issues at night-time
4) No carrying around in the store, only in cart. No running or getting down in store. Kissing/hugging okay when she IS behaving well. Distractions and snacks used to try to make it through. If tantrums are thrown, so be it.

These changes have been brought on by a number of embarrassing moments, lessons learned and tantrums thrown. I have seen some success in these changes for sure, albeit a bit of being mad at Mama has occurred, but that’s part of being a parent I guess. It’s not just going to be her calling the shots. We’re the parent and she’s the child after all.

p.s. We had another terrible sleep night last night even while trying to repeat our success from yesterday – so who knows??? “Cry-it-out” here we come??? After 20 months of not sleeping well, we all need a change. Wish there was a better solution but I feel we’ve exhausted all our resources…

Update

New phrases from Kaylee:
“Bye Bye Daddy, I love you”
“Momma, Come on”
“I’m tired”
“Momma, play with ball.”
“Down. Toys”
“Time for baf time”
“I’m happy”
“Baby clap” (with baby doll)
“Thirsty” (trying but not said quite right)
“Chocolate” (she was being a stinker and picking out just the chocolate chips from her banana bread – but can’t say she’s not just like her Momma in this respect)
“Hi Jactis (Jackson), good boy!”
“Move Jactis”
And on and on

Kaylee has been having bad night for about the last 3 weeks. She wakes up violently crying from no crying to crying loud/hysterical. So, we got a little worried. We started her on some gas drops Saturday night and the violent crying stopped. She still woke up. But then last night – Hallelujah!- she finally slept through the night! She had a late night snack, bath time, bottle and gas drops and then slept from 8:30-7! No waking at all – not even any whining! First time in a long time (months)! Yes! We will attempt to repeat the experience as closely as possible to get her to keep it up! Wish us luck!

Kaylee is eating so much better – she’s trying things – she’s even trying to use her spoon (“poon-s”) and fork. It’s funny to watch sometimes. She takes the corn puts it with her hand on the spoon and then into the mouth, and then other times she does it correctly. Sometimes, she’s just like “screw it” and grabs a huge handful and crams it in her mouth (which I delight in since seeing her cram any food whatsoever in her mouth still amazes me). I’m hoping we will see her fatten up soon!

Kaylee did receive a flu shot the other day. Our clinics haven’t had the flu shot or the H1N1 in the last two month every time I’ve called after we received the ok from the second allergist. So, took her to MVNA (Minnesota visiting nurses agency) the other day, paid the $25 for the shot. We (I mean I) was nervous about the shot and a reaction, but there was none – yea! She just got a big frowny face as the shot was administered and then as soon as the nurse gave her a sticker – all was well. Now back in 4-6 weeks for the booster! And still searching for the H1N1 shot…

My Mom told me a funny story today about when she was babysitting Kaylee. My Mom had Laringitis and was trying to talk with Kaylee, and ask her to say different words to her. My mom said “Kaylee can you say Zebra.” And Kaylee mimicking my Mom’s deep voice from the Laringitis, lowered her voice a few octaves and said “Zebra.” My Mom and Dad roared with laughter over it, exacerbating the tole on my Mom’s vocal cords so that my Mom wasn’t able to tell me the funny story until a couple days later.

Kaylee sang along with Old MacDonald Had a Farm with the “E-I-E-I-O.”

She also enjoyed so much her “tubby time is so much fun” book with Ernie that she said “Beddy-Bye” over and over again after her bath last night. She would regularly become confused about the order of how to say it so she would attempt…”bu bu bye Beddy-Bye ba ba deddy di byeddy beddy bye”

Whenever Kaylee sees a goose she says “Honk, honk.”

We played with Play-doh last night and she loved taking it in and out of the containers especially, not what I expected. I thought she would like the rolling, making snakes and pounding it. She couldn’t at first get the Play-doh out and was becoming very frustrated with putting it in and not getting it out. So I rolled small little balls for her to transfer to the containers, and that kept her busy for ½ hour or so. So would then close the container, with the lid upside down and then start all over again with the process. She was very careful not to drop any on the floor so that Jackson (our dog) wouldn’t get it. Very unlike her, since we always have food on the floor under her highchair. No sacrificing the play-doh!

More Halloween Photos of Our Bee-autiful Girl

Kaylee is saying so much more and a couple examples are:

Kaylee likes to run around the dinner table or loop around the kitchen (don't all kids?) She wanted her Daddy to move his chair so she could get by so she said, "Beep, Beep." Then he didn't hear her so she said, "Move Daddy!" and then once he moved she looked back at him, batted her eyes and then said, "Sorry Kaylee." We think she was saying he should say sorry to her for not moving. Then she proceeded to run around the table each time she passed us, saying "I got you!"

She had fun yesterday playing with her Aunt and Uncle. They played inside a train coboose at a local coffee shop and on the little kiddie table. She took cars to race them across the table surface, saying "ready, set....go!" And laughing so hard whenever her Uncle would echo something she said.

Also, Sat. Kaylee started dancing to music. All the sudden what came to my mind was to sing, "Shake, shake shake...shake shake shake....shake your booty." Then I said, "Opps, that's probably something you shouldn't be saying!" She then proceeded to say "booty, Booty." Then I said "Did she just say booty?" and she says back, "Did I just say booty?"

Kaylee sayings

Kaylee is talking up a storm and some of her favorite things to say are things that assert her newfound desire for independence like,:
"Don't, Mama"
"Stop-it!"

We've been considering how to handle this, I've been saying "Don't is not a nice thing to say. Be a nice girl." Sometimes the "Don't Mama" comes with a hit as well and then she gets a little talking to. We are contemplating how to go about doing time-outs. We'll have to find the best place to put her for them. Seems like she's ready for this.

Having said this, Kaylee is still so fun. As her language skills develop, it's so funny to hear the things that come out of her mouth. Yesterday, Eric was telling her not to eat "ishies" off the floor. Then she sat on his lap, observing him eating, and said "Daddy, don't eat ishies!" When she does something fun or is making a joke, laughing she stops, sighs and says, "Oh, Funny!"

Kaylee seems to have quite the memory. She has said "5,6,7,8,9, 10!" This amazed us. I worked with her on counting in a book and it was obvious it was only memorization, because she pointed to the fish in the book counting, "4...6."

Yesterday at daycare must have been someone's birthday because this morning she was singing "Happy You." It sounded like the tune but all she had down was the "Happy you" part. She has been telling us lately when she is happy. She says "Oh Happy." "Kaylee happy!" It's so sweet!

Kaylee knows so many body parts, possibly all that we've focused efforts on teaching her. Now in addition to the obvious ones she knows, head, arm, leg, knee, neck, chin, teeth, and lips. I'm trying to teach her tummy - she points to her chest. Close... I'm currently working on teaching her hungry and thirsty. She can say the words and now I'm trying to teach her how to use them.

Her teacher said that yesterday at daycare she said "Shush" to someone and Kaylee was saying "Shush" for quite a while afterwards.

We've had a very bad sleeping week, with lots of waking. Kind of surprising because last week she slept through the night several times. Maybe it's because she's feeling better? Or maybe she gets more tired out on the weekends? Not sure. I can't seem to muster the strength, heart or willpower needed for the cry-it-out method. And now she's so used to having her crying responded to that if you don't, her crying becomes incredibly voilent-sounding. Obviously I wait a few minutes always to see if she'll fall back asleep or not, and only respond to the ones when she's fully awake and crying loud. Not sure how we can get more sleep but am open to ideas.

On a positive note! It's almost the weekend. As Kaylee has pointed out, "Pumpkin went nite-nite" and it's almost time for Thanksgiving soon! Take care all.

Bumblebee!

We're all getting better.

Well, Halloween weekend was not all that much fun at our house. We tried, but sicknesses were getting us down. Kaylee was sick with the stomach flu on Thursday and Friday, and Eric was a bit sick along with her. She was throwing up and had a high fever and it was miserable. Especially the nights and the high-pitched screaming/crying caused us to call the nurse’s line a couple times. I did take her in to the doctor, and they said if a cough didn’t develop within 24 hours after the sickness that it wasn’t H1N1. The doctor said sometimes the H1N1 can come with vomiting in someone her age, but she never did develop that cough in the 24 hour period. On Saturday she appeared to be doing much better, the time between Tylenol doses increased and she was happy again. She enjoyed as much as she could Halloween with Daddy, while on the other hand I was miserable. I came down with a terrible cold/cough/fever. I got the point I wasn’t taking care of Kaylee anymore, or playing with her, just sitting in bed shivering. But thankfully, after some rest Saturday and some TLC and help from Eric, I felt much better on Sunday.

We tried to make Halloween special for Kaylee. She loved looking outside and seeing the neighbors blow-up pumpkin with ghosts coming out of it. Eric taught her to say, "Pumpking - A boo!" which she says all the time. She doesn't understand why it's gone now and looks for it all the time. I told her the pumpkin time of year is over, that the pumpkin went bye-bye and nite-nite. She still insists, "Pumpkin? A-boo?" We bought a pumpkin and carved it. I put it out in the backyard where nobody could vandalize it (this happened in the neighborhood I grew up in) and as if our weekend wasn't bad enough, the dogs ate it! So we had to go out to Target and get ourselves a fake pumpkin to at least have something at our door for trick-or-treaters.

Kaylee enjoyed answering the doorbell to trick-or-treaters. She refused putting on her costume, so with as little energy that we had we weren’t fighting her. She asked each time after kids left our door, for “more” along with the sign for more. It was adorable. She wasn’t scared by their costumes, she’s not aware enough of those things yet to be scared. She learned the word “kids” and asked for “more kids” along with the sign as the night went on. She didn’t try any candy since she isn’t old enough for that yet, or interested in it yet. On Sunday, we asked her if she wanted to be a bumblebee now and she agreed. We dressed her up and snapped a few photos which we will post here when I get my hands on the camera card.

Kaylee has developed a cough after I got the cough. She is on Ibuprofen for some pain she seems to have with teething and possible body aches. But she is playful, not napping as much, sleeping again in her crib on her own, and generally seems alright. On Monday, I asked her if she wanted to go to Daycare and see her friends and she told me “yes” very excitedly. So I didn’t feel too bad about bringing her back in. We’ll be keeping an eye on her cough this week.

Along with talking and communicating comes the time when your child inevitably says something that’s not so sweet to you. The other day I was singing a song to Kaylee and she had a weird look on her face so I asked her what’s wrong. She said “You should stop it.” I felt so bad but could only laugh as I’m sure that’s the first of many requests she’ll have for us to not do or say things she doesn’t enjoy. C’est la vie. I’ll sing to her another day.

On the cute side, Kaylee hugs us regulary saying “Hug.” She also loves to touch my hair and her own hair, also pulling it from time to time.

Kaylee’s new favorite thing to say is “Yep.” She answers a lot of questions with “Yep!” It is so nice to hear her answer a question with an affirmation rather than a negative. I know now when she does want something to eat, or she can say “Yep” to something and “No” to another food. Very nice. Things are starting to feel more conversational – we are communicating! J She also can say “Yea and Yes”. Her and her Dad have been exchanging “Yep”s in a game they have, where Daddy says Yep very silly and she says it’s “funny.” She said “funny” about things a lot yesterday.

Today when I brought her to daycare I was very concerned to only see 2 other kids left in her room. I guess either they’ve come down with the flu or are being safe-guarded by their parents from the daycare environment. Yesterday and today are the first times I’ve felt unsure about leaving her at daycare. It didn’t feel like a kind thing to do, but she’s not sick yet and she could get it anytime and anywhere and we need to save our PTO for that time. We can’t be preventative with her care and shield her from the world, and keep our careers safe.

Today when we left the house Kaylee told her Daddy, “I love you.” And then when I said it to her as I dropped her off, she said it again. That was so exciting to hear! I’ve heard it once a long time ago so this is the first time I heard her do it again.

Last night Kaylee had a fit about not being able to play with her straps in the booster seat because she should be strapped in (and she wants to practice with them open and that’s not safe). So, after a lot of crying, kicking and refusing dinner, we had to remove the booster seat from the kitchen. It is on a hiatus until we can reintroduce her to it. We’ve been looking around our house for buckles she can play with and she happily played with a camera bag of mine for a long time, with intermittent yelling, screeching for help out of frustration.

Kaylee loves to make a “tower” out of her blocks. She talks about “towers.” She can make very high ones and is learning on a new toy we got her the other day for 18 months up. She is doing simple puzzles now and can say “puzzle”. She plays with an animal one, a “kaylee” rainbow one and a vehicles one. She can sometimes get all the pieces in – it’s on again off again with that skill. Sometimes she pushes down on the puzzle opening with all her might wanting to force it and mutters to herself “PUSH!”

Kaylee is starting to get close to reaching door knobs. Not sure what’s going to happen with that so we’ll keep an eye out. She can now reach to the edge of countertops so we have to watch knives, cooking, etc.
Kaylee has started to enjoy eating apples. Nice, healthy and seasonal addition to her diet! Yum! Cross your fingers for Kaylee that an apple (or a few bites of it) a day will keep the doctor away!

When I dropped Kaylee off for daycare today, they said 2 kids in her classroom have come down with the H1N1. I guess she was exposed on Thursday when she was there, and she hasn’t come down with it yet. So – if she doesn’t get it today or tomorrow, she didn’t get it this time. Anyways, cross your fingers! I have been continuing to nurse her about once a day in case she were to come down with it, that will probably be all she’ll do is nurse. Also I can continue to offer her some antibodies of mine to fend off this thing, since my immune system is more mature. Wouldn’t ya know it, her room is the only one with it in the daycare!

Kaylee has begun making sentences now regularly. It surprises me though when something pops out of her mouth,
Where did Grandma go?
I got it!
My baby.
Me blanket
Eic, Daddy – Come on!
Rico, Jackson, Hi Jackson good dog.
Mommy sorry
Bless you
Wait
Beep, beep (for excuse me)
Beetle
Ant
Spider
Boat
Train
When putting on shoes, once one is done, she offers you “the other.”
Push
Open the door
Mom I poop
Stinky Diaper, ick
Cindy
Chuck
Yummy…more.

Kaylee had a lot of fun with her Grandparents who visited from NM this weekend. It was really busy, she got to put on shows for them. They were a very receptive audience! :) She stayed home all day with her Grandma on Friday and she did great! Kaylee tried new foods this weekend, she tried some soy cheese. We made her a special little lasagna out of cupcake tins, and she asked for more. (She ate 3!) We also have had success with the soy ice cream. She says, "nummy!"

"Ready... Go!"

Kaylee has been saying things from time-to-time that we haven’t taught her, it always takes us aback and we wonder where she learned the word. The other day I was leaving the house to take her to daycare, and had a coffee mug. She pointed at the mug and said, “Coffee!” Must be someone at daycare carries one around just like it!

Kaylee says “beep, beep” for “excuse me.” She also says “ready… go!” and then runs quickly across the room while putting on a show for her family. Eric taught her this one, and it’s really adorable.

Kaylee looks at our calendar in the kitchen made by Aunt Steph. She points out her cousins “Ellie” and “Frisco” and then “Kaylee” rubbing/patting her belly as if to say “that’s me!” One of her favorite words lately is “sorry” she says it sometimes after she hits us and then “sorry,” and a kiss (she also says “hug) while hugging, and sometimes she says it when she hasn’t done a thing wrong. I say “You didn’t do anything wrong, don’t be sorry, little one!”

Yesterday she had so much fun playing with her monkey and saying “Monkies Jumping on the Bed.” She loved the part where you say “No more monkies…” and chimed in singing those words with us.

apple orchard and fall cleaning

We took Kaylee to the apple orchard this weekend. She had lots of fun – but I’ll say that it was way harder than last year when she was 6 month old! She wants to walk, run, be independent. The toddlers are hard to keep a hold of and control of when they want their way – she screams and cries, twisting and turning to get away. Totally normal part of development – just makes it harder to go out with her. It was nice to have the family there to help out – everyone took turns holding her since I get tired after a while. Nearly 25 pounds, up a hill, twisting and turning and you get spent easily! Anyways, we got some good photos that I should post here soon! She fell in love with the tractor, just another moving thing to add to her repertoire of words she loves to say! It was so cute, she waited in line to sit on it and loved the steering wheel. We took some photos and there was a long line of other kids waiting to get on, so she cried in protest when we took her off. But from the ground, she was very interested in continuing to watch the other kids try it out. She said many times that day “dar-dar,” or tractor. On the way to daycare today, she pointed to a four-wheeler at a construction site and said “Dar-dar!”

After the outing, I took another risk and took her out to lunch. She was a very good girl and colored in the coloring book for the first half hour. She got fussy when the food came and didn’t want to eat, she wanted to escape and roam the restaurant. I was so happy my Mom brought some cars along that captivated her attention for the rest of the visit. Grandma saved the day!

Yesterday we did some fall cleaning. My Dad installed child safety locks on all the drawers that I had emptied because I’m feeling like I want the storage back. We put everything back in it’s place. Kaylee was very unhappy to have her drawer taken away and is still getting used to it. She doesn’t like not being able to explore so easily so we may have to bring in some new distractions for her to bridge this adjustment. She was very good during the cleaning, not requiring too much attention and not being naughty. Couldn’t have asked for more! Thanks to my parents for helping! Our house has seemed like it’s overflowing with things, so it was good to cull through some things.

She says “grandpa” now. To both Grandpa’s of course. Eric’s Dad is in town and was very happy to be referred to as “grandpa” instead of “grandma” this time! J Kaylee put on such a good show for her Grandparents, running back and forth in the living room taking risky turns and spinning. She showed them how she likes to take her monkey and tuck him in with his “blankie” (a washcloth). She rubs his belly, telling him “shh-shh” “nite-nite” the way we do when we put her to bed. She loves carrying her baby and blanket all around the house. She even asks if she can have a blankie with her at the kitchen table and sometimes we do, because generally after she gets it, she starts to eat. She doesn’t realize that the baby’s head should be out so it can breathe, she coves the whole baby and the whole monkey. “shh-shhh” whap-whap-whap on their bellies. It’s so cute that she’s playing Mom.

She is still calling Eric and I by our first names really regularly. Eric and I are wondering if we need to start calling each other “mom” and “dad” but this seems a real weird thing to start doing with each other. So each time she says our names, we respond but correct with a gentle, “I’m Mom” or “I’m your Dad.”

New words

Pumpkin (this is her new favorite thing to point out on car rides)
Penguin
Pencil
Marker
Spoons
Fork (‘cept it was more like pork)
Bumblebee (before just bumbee)
Bath
Nite-Nite (saying for a while now)
Tired
Blanket (saying for a month now) “blankie” too
Toot-Toot (for her train)
She can sing the words to the song “Feelin’ hot, hot, hot” It’s on her kids CD and has a lot of “La, la, la, la bada bumbum bumbum” very easy for her to sing – super cute! She also tries to sing to doing the “bunny hop” – she’s semi-successful at this.
Helga (her daycare person)
Fish (asking for goldfish crackers) and talking about fish in Eric’s aquarium (saying for a while now)
Mouth (did I say that yet?)
Eric (did I say that yet?) It sounds monosyllabic like, “Eic!”
Ewww!

Kaylee has been a bit confused in the past about object permanence. She knows her Daddy sits at his computer desk downstairs alot, and when going down the stairs even if he was right next to her, she look through the window to his computer station saying "Daddy! Daddy!" I would say, "No Daddy's right there, Daddy isn't in two places at the same time." She recently seems to have figured it out and doesn't look for Daddy downstairs when she's just seen Daddy upstairs a moment before.

Eric has a gift for feeding Kaylee. I learned he can do it no problem, and she is more likely to eat when he feeds her when I'm not there. When I'm there, she just thinks she's going to get milk and gets so focused on that. Hopefully this will help us feed her more consistently.

New words:
Boy
Play
Toys (did I list this before?)
Stairs
Outside
Banana (not just "nana" anymore)
Cheerios
Cactus (sort of how she's been saying Jackson lately) (she seems to be understanding now they are two dogs each with their own name, but still calls Jackson Rico sometimes anyway)

Kaylee has become a little attached to us lately. She doesn't want to let go when we bring her to daycare -but doesn't cry either. Yesterday when Eric took her over to play with the neighbors she didn't want to share him and his attention. She was sitting on his lap, and whenever the neighbor girl would talk to him she would tell her, "No!" and cuddle into him.

Another thing we've been experiencing is that Kaylee is well-behaved at daycare and seems to come home and then throw all her fits. I've read this is normal and actually a good sign - she has trust in us to take out her frustrations of the day when she is in her most safe environment. So last night her two fits were that 1) we took away the heels of mine she was trying to wear around the house and 2) we put a sticker onto a paper and then it wouldn't unstick! Those darn stickers - they are tricky!!!

Last night we went over to some friends house and watched the game (this means of course I didn't actually watch it - I am no sports fan.) There were kids everywhere and Kaylee was fascinated but couldn't get in with their play because they were just too old and she's not ready for hide-and-seek. She did sit down with them during coloring time and colored a very good little scribble. She also used their etch-a-sketch and was so excited to try it out that she looked up at me every few minutes and said "Hi!"........ "Hi!" very happily during her scribble session.

She loved seeing their dog and petted it saying "good dog" "hi dog" pointing to it looking at me, saying "mom, doggie!" Very sweet.

She was very perplexed when we left and I got lost. She knew I was lost. She got a little worried. Then her tension went away when I found my way to the highway and she relaxed and fell asleep. I didn't know she was so in tune to what's around her but I guess I'm not surprised.

Kaylee was sick home from daycare yesterday but is feeling better today. She had a stomach thing. Today I brought her in and totally forgot that it was picture day. But she still looked cute minus the snot draining out all the time from her nose. They'll wash her up first before the photo. I've learned you just can't keep up with the runny nose. It's just a fact of life a little snot will get on her face, hand, sleeve you can't really fight it. Hope they turn out nice! I would love to have a real good head shot of her at 18 months. Hope she smiles for the photo!

New post:

Mirror

Tree

Me book

Me shoe

Mine

Hi Grandma

Hello Kitty, Hi Mia

Kaylee, me baby

Light

Cup

Spoons (pronounced oddly like poonsee)

Frisco (She says Rico-so)

Ellie

Oh and we all know she can say Ronan I never did mention how much she liked meeting her second cousin - saying his name over and over again all the way home. She feel asleep in the car and then woke up with saying his name and then plopped back asleep on a shoulder during transfer from the car - absolutely adorable how amazed and in love with another baby she was!

Yesterday she had a big day with playing with her 2 auties and uncle. She loved seeing them and there was a lot of showing off. She woke up to seeing K/M in the kitchen having dinner, after coming to snuggling with Daddy, she got up excitedly doing loop after loop around the kitchen and living room. She loved the attention! She showed Aunt B. how she walks around the house with her bowl on her head. Aunt B. gave Kaylee her cell phone and Kaylee promply began her jargoning conversations saying "hello" into her phone and slobbering onto it much to her horror.

Kaylee played with Play-doh with Grandma D. for the first time today. She loved using the play scissors, stamper and hammer that she had to go with it. She was very excited about Play-doh and it looks like we'll have to start doing that activity at home soon too! She squealed, smiled and looked very excited during the whole thing. It made me aware of how used to the process of doing an art project she is. She knows she should get her sleeves rolled up, she even seemed to know how to use a scissors. Sometimes when she knows things I haven't taught her it makes me realize just how much I am away from her and I feel a little sad - but then I wouldn't want her to not learn while I'm away from her, very obviously! She's got an artistic side for sure!

My last post was a little fast - I didn't mention how much it pleased Kaylee to get all those 5 objects named correctly. It was so cute to she her feel so accomplished. She put her hands together and sort of gave herself a hug, with a huge smile across her face. I think that was what REALLY made me excited about the experience. It's very promising that Kaylee likes to please others so much and be a "good girl." It should help us with some of these lessons we're trying to instill in her during her terrible two tantrum sessions.

Every dinner this past week has been very stressful because we are trying to teach her she needs to sit at the table with us while we eat. I make a good meal and everybody sits down, and she cries and cries; an angry cry the entire meal until we're finished. She barely takes a bit of food that's prepared for her. But we are trying to teach her eating happens at the same time everyday, and we don't graze on our food around the house. So it's important I'm hoping soon she will capitulate, calm down and eat her dinner. Plus sometime a baby's got to eat.

Kaylee likes a couple new foods. She likes sausages and bagels. She doesn't really eat the potstickers anymore so we are on a "break" from that food.

On the daycare front, her teacher was pretty nice when I met her - I only met her briefly. She is only in from 9-1 so it makes meeting her a challenge. She said Kaylee is a very good baby, good easy kid to take care of." She said things are going smoothly and there's no problem she can see with the transition which I was very glad to hear!

Well today was a big day! I met Kaylee's teacher today and I took her to the doctor for her 18 month well-child appt. When we got there, they were confused they were like, "so what's wrong with her?..." I guess they hadn't seen any "well" children yet that day - just a lot of sick kids. Kaylee is 23 lbs 0 oz. When they doctor started to get concerned over the drop from last visit, I explained that Kaylee had a bug about a week ago that kept her from eating much and that is why I suspected the weight loss. I explained she hadn't been well for long - and now she has a cold - yikes! anyways, I had questions about what to do because I want Kaylee to have a flu shot and they say no due to her egg allergy (the allergist says no). The pediatrician is referring us to another allergist for a second opinion because she feels the restrictions on Kaylee are a bit much, like not being able to eat egg. I had already set up an appt to have her tested on her arm for the egg allergy and then if she passed, the doctor would administer a test shot of 10% of the vaccine. The doctor thought this was a slow process and said I might be better off with the other referral. She said she for sure won't be getting the H1N1 vaccinne if she's allergic. She said the fact that Kaylee received a shot of the MMR with no reaction before we knew about ht allergy was promising.

We have been giving Kaylee a bit of egg in Ramen noodles with a facial reaction - red dots all around her lower face. We figure we monitor it carefully and our doctor likes the protein and fat it gives Kaylee. She is on my case again about Kaylee waking up at night, and says we need to continue working on it for the health of our family. She said we need to teach Kaylee how to better fall asleep on her own and that the milk and rocking are preventing her from doing that. I agree, partially...we've tried the militant crying-it-out a couple of times and it doesn't go well. It is traumatic for everyone. I've also tried the slow-separation while awake technique with some success but lets face it - I'm tired at the end of the day and just want to put her to sleep and relax myself! Anyways, we'll work on it with her. She also wants me to stop giving her a bottle in the morning. She says Kaylee doesn't need it and needs her breakfast more. She also wants her in a booster seat. Demanding!!! We'll try these things out and see what works.

One the positive front, she said Kaylee is well above average in her speaking abilities and was shocked when she had stacked all the blocks (in the test) and then knocked the block over onto the floor and said, "where'd it go?" The doctor looked up at me and said "did I hear what I just heard!" I told her Kaylee can say over 100 words for sure. She tested Kaylee's understanding of language with some pictures of a dog, a cat, a bird, a "daddy" and a horse. Kaylee got all of them correct. She looks so proud of herself, and I was so proud of her!

There were some tears during the appt because it happened during her nap time and that wasn't so good but overall it was a pretty good visit, minus the nagging from the doc, and there were no shots! Yay!

New words:

Heart

Tree

Circle

Star

Others...got to go baby crying!

Share!

Kaylee is learning how to be authoritative. She recently passed me a toy and when I was going to accept it from her, she pulled it back and said “No share!” She’s got it a little mixed up – share means everyone else shares with her. In the same play session, I was playing around with her tickling her and stuff, she said to me “No bite!” It must be something they hear as a warning at daycare that she picked up.

She also has been telling the dogs “No!” She said “No Rico! No Rico! No bark!” Even when they aren’t barking or doing anything wrong. We tell her they are not barking and they are okay as they are. :)

Tomorrow she will be starting in her new room with her new teacher. I hope she doesn’t miss her friends too much. She’s been visiting the new room a lot and they say she’s doing well. Although yesterday when we left daycare she cried for a few minutes saying goodbye to Kayla. She cried “Kayla, Kayla, Kayla!” Fortunately Kayla turns 18 months a week or two after Kaylee so it won’t be long…

Little green handed babe

Kaylee and Eric have both been a bit under the weather. Kaylee is not eating very much - mostly her bottle, and crackers for the past few days. She's been going to bed early and then getting up a bit more at night as well.

Found a cute Halloween costume for Kaylee this weekend. The costume needed to not require her to wear anything on her head - she won't wear hats. She's going to be a bumblebee! It's kind of a leotard thing with fuzzy surface and big fat belly in the middle portion. I got her some gold shoes to go with that she loves a lot. We had a little shoe parade yesterday - trying on all her shoes. She has a bit of a fascination - hope this isn't going to be an issue someday... :)

Eric bought Kaylee a cute new coloring book this weekend. It is a marker that colors on paper and reveals bright tones underneath. There's black paper/marker version that comes with. I'm going to call Crayola to complain because even though the markers are washable the paper is not and the black paper came off on her hands, even though I was wiping during the process. Even after 2 baths and numerous handwashings, her palms are green!

New words:
hat
body
ishy
icky
yucky
elbow
wet
cold
Krissy
pretzel
yummy (had been saying Nummy)
bumbee (this is what she's going to be for Halloween! A bumblebee!)
truck
yellow bus
mommy's button
belly button
honk
goose
vroom

Doing lots of new things

Kaylee has had fun recently with mixing colors with bathtub paints. She smooths the colors all over saying “color, color” then she splashes joyfully as she finishes her masterpiece.

Kaylee seems to have learned a motion for “wheels on the bus go ‘round and ‘round.” When we pointed out the neighbor girls and their bus, she says “bus” and then rotates her arms around in a circular motion. Then we caught on and started singing “wheels on the bus” song to her, meanwhile she happily accompanied the song with the arm motions.

Kaylee sang some new words for “twinkle, twinkle little star.” She said “ How I wonder” and “Up above” – the first couple words to each new verse. She sang them with me, in harmony! She has a beautiful, sweet sounding little voice!

She paraded around the house the other day with a bowl on her head, pushing her walker proudly in front of her. She loved this novel idea and reaction it got out of us. She also has been trying real hard to put on her sunglasses. She puts them on upside-down and raises her head up in order to try to balance them on her face. She wants to use my toothbrush each morning and not hers and cries when she doesn’t get her way. She also prefers to use big forks instead of forks made for a toddler in order to be a “big girl.”

She loves to practice the opening any doors – esp. the sliding door out to the backyard. She says “door”. She goes to the other side of the door, closing herself in the room and says “bye” to us. Then she cries for help when she can’t get out a moment later.

I got a report from a teacher at daycare on her behavior the other day. She said she was trying to get Kaylee from climbing up on a chair and had told her to get down twice. Kaylee cried because she didn't want to be told no. The teacher was leaving the rooms and was shocked when Kaylee pointed over to her, smirking and saying "Ha, Ha, Ha." She can be a bit of a stinker. She is very stubborn at times.

Kaylee has accidentally hurt me a few times, jumping up into my face or by unexpectedly putting her finger up my nose way too hard. She feels sorry after she hurts us, and comes over to see how you are doing, offering a kiss to consol you. She also uses this as a method to get out of trouble. She knows if she does something wrong, a way to get you away off track is to lean in, kiss you and offer a real sweet smile. Very clever! It is working well on us! We try not to let her get away with things too much – we also have to teach her how to behave as well!

New words:
Stinky
Bus
Down
Squirrel
Paint
Dance
Door

New words:

Jump

Twinkle Twinkle then humming the rest of the notes

Mommy's nose

I'm gonna get you (in a chasing around the house game)

Sprinkle on me (while powder for diaper) this one surprised us!

Kaylee has been doing great. Eric and I got a date this last weekend and it was so enjoyable. We did things we can't do when Kaylee's with us like take a long walk (because as I mentioned earlier she wants to walk by herself now) and then we went out and enjoyed a pizza (because she's allergic we avoid this more than before she was born)

Gotta go. I'm being called. Take care.

Calm weekend

New words / phrases (yes this is the first couple weeks she's strung words together!):

Yikes

Juice

Cool

Stroller

Rain

Whoa (she's been saying this for a while but now says it on her own when she sees the cats at my parents house)

Honey

Batu (she tried to repeat Batulism when we were talking about whether she can eat honey yet - a bit too ambitious :) )

Daddy's shoes

Listen to music

and many more but can't remember them all....

Kaylee is so cute when we go over to people's houses. We were at Matt/Krissy's house last night and she just put on a show for them. I don't think if I could tell her how I want her to behave and have her follow my instructions, that she could possibly be any better behaved. Basically I'm trying to say that she is a dream to take care of. She's funny, almost always in a good mood, she goes with the flow and isn't afraid of things easily. She's pleasant when she first wakes up from a nap, even. Not to say she isn't normal, she throws tantrums and I've had my "Oh my gosh, let's just get out of here" embarrassing moments in public with her. She still doesn't sleep through the night and doesn't eat unless it's on her terms. But I don't think Eric and I could have ever dreamt of or could have prayed for a better baby. Okay, enough gushing. I just had to get it out there...

Kaylee tried the music class and she did very well, behaving better than she did at 15 months. They said she didn't sit the whole time but attempted to participate and follow instructions. They think she's ready so we are going to enroll her in their weekly class. Oh....my baby's first academic experience! We're so proud!

I went back to 40 hours a week the last couple weeks because things are more busy at work. I am tired and have fallen back on chores, etc. I can't keep up! Maybe with a couple more weeks under my belt I'll get the hang of it! I need to figure out with Eric what we need to do with our schedules so Kaylee isn't in daycare too long each day. Last week she was there an average of 9.5 hours a day or so. A bit much.

She did get bit again at daycare this week. They said her and the other baby were fighting over a wagon when she was bit. I dread that accident report and can't wait till the babies are past this phase. I'm glad they are tracking the incidents so that if there's a repeat offender they can get rid of that baby (at least during their biting phase).

Kaylee is supposed to move up to the next room at 18 months, I plan on stopping in tomorrow and meeting her new teacher. Hopefully the transition will go well, I'll keep you posted. We are very excited to get our daycare fees cut down about $24 a week. This is the first time we catch a break for fees.

This weekend felt a bit more calm than last because we didn't have any plans. I'm trying to get caught up on laundry and chores today.

Last weekend being labor day, we had a lot of family plans. It was fun for us to spend time with Eric's parents while they were in town. We went to a lot of family get-togethers, out to eat (we learned sitting outside with the babe works well), to a picnic and to the park a few times. I have some cute photos of Kaylee to post but need to get them from folks so hopefully they'll be up here soon.

Kaylee has begun not wanting to sit in her stroller when we go on a walk. She wants to walk too. This makes for a very slow pace. At first we tried to hold her hand while in the street. She fussed and cried a lot. So then we made her walk on the inside by the curb and every time a car came we made her hold hands. The first time around the block she cried the whole time we held her hand while there was a car. Then the second time around the block the next day she didn't cry hardly at all at the hand-holding. Her desire for independence is very obvious. I'm thinking it's a good sign for potty-training in a few months! :)

Kaylee Headlines

Kaylee got bit again at daycare yesterday! Eric asked when he picked her up if it’s been the same child biting her. They said that it’s a different child each time. They said kids learn it from each other unfortunately, and usually each try it out at some point. The important part they say is the response and making sure the child knows it’s the wrong behavior. I could still see the bite mark this morning on her arm.

Kaylee is starting to grow out of her 18 month clothes already. She’s starting to look taller and leaner. Her hair is longer too, when it’s wet it falls about 3” past her shoulders, but when dry curls up above her shoulders, still. She is now finally facing forward in both cars, she loves it and gets a charge out of Eric moving the car back and forth, and speeding up quickly (I can’t say I’m a fan, until I look at the look of shear joy on Kaylee’s face). She says “weeeee!”

Kaylee is starting to voice an opinion on which clothes she wears, she tries to take off clothes now. Luckily she hasn’t been too successful with the diaper – that’s the one I don’t want her taking off for obvious reasons. Her favorite thing to take off is her shoes and socks. She’s now consistently missing one shoe when I take her out of her carseat.

Kaylee has now discovered how fun it is to spill water out of her toy scooper in the bathtub. She puts all her toys in there and watches with amazement as they sink to the bottom as she pulls the scooper out of the water. She puts the scooper over her face and tips it toward her and laughs as the water almost splashes her face.

She loves the park so much, when we arrive she runs toward it and squeals the whole way!

New words:
Red
Peach
Bird
Please (she tried to use this last night to get me to give her the salt shaker at the dinner table)
Sauce (she tried to also get me to pass her the soy sauce – of course she didn’t get either one and there were some angry screams.)

Happy 17th month Kaylee!

Kaylee is getting to be so funny! She is all the sudden doing real funny things like she's putting on a show. The other day she walked, marched and strutted back and forth across the room for us for about 30 minutes, all the while jargoning and making lots of noise. She added a new antic to her show every few minutes, marching for a few laps, then walking with her face to the ceiling/hands behind her head, then carrying a ball and so on...She reminds me of Eric when she's doing this because he is so funny. She gets it from him.

In the bath tub last night she was very excitedly telling a story with gesticulations and all. Splashing and squealing - she's so dang cute!

She seems congitively more aware of her surroundings, like I said she's been noticing planes in the air, screaming kids in the neighborhood, barks from distant dogs while inside. She asks me all the time if she can "color." She talks about coloring while she's eating because she can't wait to go back to it. Maybe she's inherited some of her artistic side from my side of the family.

She's been opening her mouth for me to brush her teeth, whereas before she cried the whole time like it was torture.

She will not sit in her highchair and now sits on a phonebook on the chair. She is currently in love with green beans, which we think is pretty awesome. Eric's had a good influence with that and pushing it as a "nummy" vegetable.

New words are becoming too difficult to count. She repeats a lot of words said by those around her now. She has moved onto not just pointing out cars but also "trucks" in the neighborhood though I don't think she necessarily really understand the distinction. She has said Becky, Krissy, Matt, Nina and Rebecca now. She loves to stand by the window and call out "Annnnnnn del, Annnnn...del" to the dog across the street (Angel). It's the cutest!

Kaylee has started throwing objects now and throwing a ball back and forth. She can now stack about 4-5 blocks on top of each other. She's interested in puzzles and plays with them but can't exactly do them yet.

I think that a lot of dance moves have probably been invented as "novel" by babies dancing in front of parents. I think the deep knee squats she's doing remind me of moves I see rappers doing on stage. Also the pant leg halfway up one calf trend reminds me of the haphazard dress of the toddler. She also walks the room in a very funny manner, it resembles a swagger (picture the whole body being moved by the motion of the shoulders) I've seen rappers do as well.