Not quite ready.
Child proofing in the nursery has been complete for a few days now; the “big girl bed” is ready. We ask her each night, “Do you want to sleep in this bed tonight?” So far, the answer has been a consistent no, so she’s still in the crib. There’s no rush.
Just in case you were wondering.
A typical ride home from day care:
“What does a cow say?” —— “MOO!”
“What does a cat say?” —— “meOW”
“What does a doggy say?” —— “wuff wuff”
“What does a duck say?” —— “eeyack”
“What does a snake say?” —— “Ssssss”
“…” (watching traffic) —— “eee FROW, mommy”
“Oh, right, sorry. What does a frog say?” —— “Ribbet ribbet”
Are YOU wearing a hat?
Don’t you think you SHOULD be?
Since she’s so into hats lately, we went to Goodwill today and scored a felt hat and a sombrero.
Summer is here.
And with summer come lazy afternoons at the pool.
A few things she’s learning lately:
We’re in complete sentence territory, definitely, with possessives and conjunctions and so forth. And of course, new vocabulary every day. She’s surprised me lately with “crayon” and “apple,” among others.
We got some blocks at IKEA last week, all different shapes and colors. So I’ve been working with her on learning those; I think she’s much better at shapes than colors so far. Like, if I ask her to find me a blue triangle, she’ll show me first a red triangle, then a green one, and then if I show her something else that’s blue, she’ll find the blue triangle.
“Hey Elizabeth, what does a cow say?” “Moo!” “What does a cat say?” “miOW!” “And what does a dog say?” “Wuff.” We’re working on “duck”, but the q is giving her a little trouble.
Every time we pass the downstairs apartment, she’ll say “babee” — they have about an 8 or 9 month old. So we played with her baby doll a bit last night.
She can blow soap bubbles. Very important skill.
Seriously, the cuteness.
I can’t take it.
Father’s Day hat photo.
Chris is out of town again at another film festival. Yep, he went to Vegas over Father’s Day weekend.
We’re missing him, but just doing our thing. I had class today, so we had a sitter over. Apparently they had a little picnic lunch outside on the grass, went for a stroller ride, played in the water tub on the patio, read books, and colored. It was a full day.
When I got home, she was sporting her pink cowgirl boots.
She wanted to play with my green hat (”Mommy hat”), but wouldn’t leave it on for longer than a micro-second. Until I asked her to please let me take a picture to send to Daddy; then she put it on and left it there. So, Christopher, Happy Father’s Day. This photo is Elizabeth’s gift to you. Dig her hat.
After that, we went to vote (tiny little run-off from the municipal election). She totally charmed the poll workers by thanking them very sweetly for the animal cracker they gave her. She also pushed the big red “cast ballot” button for me, earning her “I voted” sticker for real this time.
Then some time-killing and diaper / clothing purchasing at Target, dinner at our favorite Chinese place, home and to bed. So far she seems to be sleeping peacefully; it’s possible she was worn out.
Now I just have to figure out what to do with her tomorrow.
Also, her “school pictures” came back yesterday, and will be send out to family soon, I promise.
Change=scary.
One of these days Christopher and I will learn to take things slow with Elizabeth.
We went to IKEA on Saturday, just to have an outing. By the time we left, Elizabeth had a new “big kid” bed. We opted for just a toddler size mattress on the floor, but got cute bedding and so on. She’s not sleeping in it yet, although she seems to kind of want to. But first we’ve got some additional baby proofing to do, if she’s to be left alone in there with freedom to walk around. We started on that yesterday.
But you know, changing things around in a kid’s room is fraught with emotional peril. She was actually pretty good while we worked in there yesterday morning. But then came lunch, and nap time, and she woke up from her nap to a half hour of just inconsolable crying. It’d break your heart. She’s fine, but was touchy all afternoon.
So like sensible parents, we took it easy and let her adjust. Oh, wait, no, we packed her up in the car to drive to Crawford, Texas.
See, there’s a great new documentary out, on the town and how it was affected by the coming of George W. Bush, and the filmmaker arranged a screening on the town’s football field. I expected Elizabeth would either sleep in her stroller all through the movie, or wail like a banshee through it all. Instead, she stayed wide awake, climbing in and out of her stroller and onto and off of our laps all through, but perfectly well behaved. Who knew?
Movie and Q & A wrapped up about 10:30. I put her in her car seat, handed her Elmo and Doll, and the kid was fast asleep before we were out of the parking lot. Poor girl. She woke up, sort of, when I carried her up our stairs 90 minutes later, but just smiled as I put her in pajamas and brushed her teeth, and then slept straight through until morning.
So we’re totally going to pay for that tonight, right?
Changes.
Miss Elizabeth’s bedtime has officially been moved up to 7:30. She’d been getting crankier and more creative in avoiding going to bed at 6:30 for a couple of weeks. 7:30 seems to make everyone happy. We get more relaxed time with her in the evening, without being all rush rush rush from the moment we come in the door until she gets to bed. And, we get to sit down and have dinner together now, which takes additional planning but is really kind of nice.
We’ll be adding potty training to her routine as soon as we get our act together. She’s ready. She’s fascinated by the whole toilet scene, and she consistently tells us when she needs a change (what she says is something like “effooo,” but it gets the point across, and she’ll answer yes or no to “do you need a diaper change?”).
We’re still debating when to move her to a big girl bed. The major hurdle is that we’d have to do some additional child-proofing in her room if she’s to be able to walk around free and unsupervised, and well, time is an issue.
In vocabulary news, I’m afraid the word “My” has been indelibly added before every noun. Even when it’s not accurate. “Milk” and “book” are favorites lately, although they seem to be morphing into the German “MilCH” and “BuCH.” Her ‘Ugly Doll,’ formerly called “Melmo,” is now “Doll.” She knows the word “bag,” although attempts to convince her to put all her accoutrements (”my jackie [jacket], my Elmo, my Doll, my bubble [cup]…”) into one have been so far unsuccessful. She still signs “all done,” “down,” and “please,” but now will say them too. And lately she’ll walk over to the computer desk and ask nicely to watch ” ‘ideo please.”
Busy weekend.
That was a full three days. Let’s see:
Saturday we went to the Snake Farm in New Braunfels, TX. Don’t be alarmed at the name; while they do have a lot of snakes, they also have goats, llamas, zebras, hyenas, etc., plus peacocks, chickens, and one large turkey roaming around loose. Basically, it’s a perfect toddler sized zoo. We topped off that day by riding the train around Landa Park. Landa Park is also in New Braunfels, which is something like 70-90 minutes drive away. But we’ll be back; it looks like a heck of a park with a swimming hole and all kinds of fun.
Sunday morning the girl and I went to church, and afterwards enjoyed a well-earned nap, followed by a trip to the always exciting Target. That evening I snuck out to a movie, leaving Chris to get Elizabeth to bed. So naturally, they went to a party. (Some friends were at a work related party at our complex’s pool/clubhouse.) And, they had a caricature done!
Yesterday (Monday) we had lunch at the downtown Whole Foods, and stops by fabulous locations like Daddy’s Office (she practiced her jumping, and got spun around by dizzy parents) and The Storage Unit (where she helped us shift heavy boxes). Then she and I went swimming (she’s getting really brave about it) and had a nice bath afterwards to warm up.
Eureka! Brushing teeth.
When watching this video, Elizabeth will allow me to brush her teeth without complaint. And people say television is worthless.