Taking care of baby

We are very excited to say that we are expecting our second baby in early September! I just had my 12 week appointment last week and things seem to be going well. I saw the baby touching it's face and flip over on the ultrasound. I saw the profile, the beating heart and the already-pouching little belly. I can't wait to give Kaylee a sibling. As readers know, we have been ready to have another for quite a while and are so happy to be expecting! I didn't have any trouble in my first trimester - I didn't have morning sickness. I did have an increased appetite (esp. for protein (mexican and english muffins with cream cheese have been favorites!)), increased fatigue esp. at the end of the day, and some insomnia. At the doctor's appointment after the ultrasound, I heard the heartbeat steady and sure. It's an amazing thin! The midwife was saying stuff to me, like "aww, little baby" and I was thinking "quiet, I want to just listen!" We've known that things are going well since the 6 week ultrasound where they told us the baby was not ectopic and saw it's heartbeat at that time. But it's always good to get past the first trimester! I am already getting big though my weight gain is normal. I already in my opinion look well into the fourth month - making it a bit awkward that I haven't told mgmt at work yet. I will tell them this week though.

Kaylee has been making me feel very hopeful for a good transition with a new baby with her sweet play with her baby doll. She takes it and puts it to bed, rocking it and saying "Don't cry." She swirls her hand over it's head saying "Shhh." She always puts it to bed face-down and with a blanket over. She likes to ask for a diaper to put on the baby. She does put the diaper over her shoulders however! :) She isn't perfect though and did smack her baby on the face many times yesterday with a spoon, just to hear the sound it made. She's not even 2, how much can you expect? :)

Kaylee did well at swim class, but was the only kid who didn't get passed off the diving board to the teacher (w/ the life jacket on). As we were approaching the diving board, she kept saying "No,no, no" and shaking her head. I didn't want to make her and to traumatize her. So I passed her to the teacher from the side in the deep end. She almost cried over just that little. So I'm glad I didn't push her to go on the diving board. She almost blew bubbles in the water. She would blow, and get her chin in. So close!

Kaylee named her lamb stuffed animal "Pinkie Pie." It's the first time she's named something. It is the name of the pretty pony in a book my Mom gave her. It's pretty cute - she's into carrying her teddy bear, pinkie pie and baby around and tucking them all in for bed.

Kaylee might know a few colors. This weekend she opened a book and said correctly the majority of the pages. She didn't get red and blue. She got yellow, pink, black, brown, green and purple. I'm not positive that she just hasn't memorized the order of the book. She has also similarly memorized the book about opposites and reads it to herself, "Left, right. Up, down. Empty, full." So cute!

After the last post, I should let you know her diaper rash looks good and that all she's has this week is a runny nose - which seems to be a fact of life these days so no big deal.

Kaylee was babysat by my sister and her hubby yesterday. They made paper animals and put them in houses and colored together. Kaylee watched some Olympics with them (and with us) and loved hearing the beep, beep, beep before the skiiers take off down the hill. When skiiers would fall, she would get very upset asking if they were okay and if they had owwies. We would tell her they are okay and then she'd smile, nod and say, "fell down but now ALL BETTER!" Hope you all are feeling well and that you had a good weekend.

Happy Valentines Everyone!

Kaylee ate to her heart’s content at a Valentine’s breakfast my parents put together Saturday. She ate (we think) a total of 5 eggs! She also enjoyed a lot of orange juice and sausages, and then as if her tummy wasn’t full enough she ate some chocolate and cake! Then at dinner, Kaylee had her first pizza with cheese on it for Valentine’s day. And – it was a heart-shaped pizza too! She did very well with it and enjoyed it – especially the sausage.

At daycare for Valentine's day, she did receive a Valentine from each child. She loved the stickers especially. She put them all over her hands, and arms. And this weekend I was unsticking them from the floor and tables.

Kaylee’s had a hard week again – she has had terrible constipation with a bad diaper rash – we are working on getting her better. She seems to be improving. It’s just one thing after another this month – we need some time off from illnesses! We felt so sorry for her – she cried very hard during diaper changes and called out for her favorite people to come to the rescue. It was so sad! Yesterday was much improved and hopefully today will be too. Poor thing!

Kaylee’s swim class is going very well. She does do things at her pace and not necessarily when the teacher asks but for the most part, I think she did almost everything. Her first reaction to being in the water was as I was lowering her down, “No, no, no, no, no!” But then after getting her used to the water, she floated on her back and her tummy and kicked in both positions. She told me she likes swimming on her tummy better. She rolled from front to back and back to front. She won’t put her mouth in the water to blow bubbles – but she did get her face wet in order to reach a ball under the water. She wouldn’t do the arm movements asked of her. She loves the water toys, sitting on the raft and being thrown in the air at the end of “motor boat, motor boat go so fast!” Next week the teacher said that they would have the kids practice wearing life jackets in the water and passing the child from parent to teacher from the diving board. I’m not sure about the diving board part!!! Yikes! It seems like the most productive part of it has simply been exposure and fun times in the water. It helps very much that Kayla and Kayla’s mom are part of the class. At times, she’ll see Kayla doing something she’s scared to try and then decide she can do it too or at least, she tends to lighten up about it. I didn’t realize how long it takes to get a toddler out of a swimsuit and out of the locker room! Wow!

I guess I didn’t write about it – Kaylee went to the Carnival at daycare. It was so fun to see the difference in how she acted towards things compared to when she was 8-9 months old last year. Kaylee would not eat the dinner they had because she was way too excited! She was not into some of the games and loved others. She loved face-painting, ring toss (but actually she’s been taught “no throwing” and she actually just walked them over J ), the bowling and she loved the jumpy. They organized for a group of little ones to go at the same time and Kaylee went in, only because she saw Kayla in there. She was so happy to be in there and quickly began bouncing and practicing keeping her balance. Another girl bumped into to her and knocked her down. She sat down and stared at the other girl, glaring…then went out through the entry to her Daddy. She wasn’t interested in the fish pond, or boat thing like I thought she would be. But the thing she enjoyed the most was running around with a balloon in her hand, with other toddlers in the gym. That kept her busy the majority of the evening. It is very clear to us how much her teachers enjoy her, one even showed Kaylee off to her family.

Okay...just to clarify, I do not believe the Kaylee is a prodigy...Her grandpa called up asking for a video of her skipping, which is cute. He said that it's very unusual for someone at her age to skip. I never really thought about the distinction but she's not really skipping, you know using both feet. What she's really doing is galloping, a skip using just one foot forward. It's really cute to see her do!

Also, the times that she says long sentences are few and far between. I just get so excited when she comes out with one I can't help but feel so proud and amazed! She's doing a great job communicating for her age, but for the most part she still does it with one or two word phrases. She is not all-out conversational, though sometimes there's a dialogue of back and forth between us.

Kaylee can sing or tries to sing several songs now:
Mary had a Little Lamb
Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star
ABC's
Jingle Bells

In many cases with songs, she will very effectively hum out the tune of the melody for even more than listed above. Sometimes when I'm playing the radio in my car, I look back and she's rocking out: smiling, bobbing her head and shaking her shoulders.

Kaylee tried yogurt this week, she seems to be getting over her texture issues. She said, "Yummy! Ice cream!"