Parenting Check in April 25

[karlamo]

Hi Parents. It's Monday, you know the drill

QOTW:  Mother's Day, what's on the agenda?  Gift ideas?

[kh826]

William is 22 months (will be 23 months next week), and Lucie will be 3 months tomorrow!

William is now speaking in full sentences 90% of the time, and it is awesome. I love having conversations with him. I love that he can tell us his feelings. I love that we get to know what he is thinking. And he is so funny! He also tends to put us in our place pretty often... last night I was trying to rush him up the stairs to bed because he was being a slow poke, and he turns around and says to me "I'm tryin, Mama, ok?" This kid!

Last night while I was making him dinner, he took every fork out of the silverware drawer and put them on the floor. Then he said "I put ALL the forks on the floor. Mama NOT happy. HAHAHA" -- seriously, kid?

He has also started to be really bothered by poop in his diaper. I think we will start potty training as soon as we move to the new house. This weekend he sat in his highchair at breakfast and started yelling "I go poop in diaper. Poop in diaper in chair. Oh no. Get down, now! Poop in diaper!" .... He totally freaked out to the point where we needed to pause breakfast and change him and then go back to the table to finish breakfast.

We have been struggling with him taking a really long time to fall asleep in his crib at night, and then he has been waking up early in the morning and playing in his crib. We have not changed his routine at all, and have been allowing him playtime in his crib hoping this would just be a phase and he would return to his usual sleep schedule. He doesn't cry or fuss and he doesn't try to get out of the crib, so we didn't see a downside in allowing him some time to try to regulate himself in terms of sleep. But now he is getting MEGA cranky in the late morning before lunch and nap because he is so tired. Not sure what to do about it to help him fall asleep better at night and stay asleep longer in the morning. His bedtime at night is 7pm and some nights he plays or just talks to himself in his crib until 8:30-9pm until he finally falls asleep. In the morning, he used to sleep until at least 7:30am (sometimes later), but the last couple of weeks he has been waking up sometimes as early as 6am and playing or talking to himself. Sometimes he falls back asleep if we leave him, but a lot of times lately he does not and then he is a mess by 11:30am.
Nothing has changed -- sound machine, dark curtains, etc. all the same.
J thinks we should start putting him to bed earlier than 7pm, but I feel like he will just play in his crib for longer before falling asleep, and I will miss that time with him during the week (I don't get home until about 5:30pm Mon-Fri).
Any expert advise on this one?

Lucie is doing well with her harness. I think we have all adjusted to life with it, and things have gotten easier. I think a lot of last week's issues were an emotional response to the darn thing, and that has mostly worn off. We ordered her a whole bunch of new onesies and matching leg warmers since we cannot wear any of her pants or one-piece PJs or rompers at this point. We also got her a bumbo seat and cut the sides off and DIYed it with some cute duct tape so that she has a little seat that she can sit in with the harness and be upright. It's pretty cute, and she seems to like it. She has also been doing pretty well with head control, so I am proud of her. It is hard work for her, but she has definitely made real progress.
She slept through the night last night with the harness on for the first time. Yay!!!
I also feel like she is starting to fill out/chunk up a little bit, which is cute. She has been on the average side (50th % of so) for weight, but she is off the charts for height, so she looks really long and skinny. She is starting to get some leg rolls now and her face is filling out a little. I think it makes her look a little bit more like William too.

Oh, William now refers to himself in the 3rd person as "Willnun" -- it's pretty hysterical. "Willnun and Wucie do it together!" is one of his favorite things to say. He is pretty obsessed with her.

Last night I asked William if he wanted us to have another baby or if he just wanted it to be him and Lucie. He responded with "Nother baby in the new house. Yeah, Mama!" HAHA... I asked if it should be a boy baby or a girl baby and he said "Willnun need a brudder." Seriously!

In other news he can't seem to get the concept of catching a ball or jumping up and down with both feet off the ground. I have been trying to work on both with him, but he just doesn't have a lot of interest. He is soooo much like me in that regard. I was the kind that would site quietly and read books for hours and hated sports and didn't like outside play if it would make me dirty. I wasn't a super girly girl, but I just liked more "thinking" activities and I just didn't like dirt. He is very much like that also. He loves books and puzzles and he talks like a 3 yr old, but try to get the kid to do anything involving coordination and he is just NOT into it.

OK, I think that's all I've got for the moment...

QOTW: Thanks for reminding me, karlamo! I am planning to make a photobook on Shutterfly for J from the kids, and I need to get on that so that I don't have to pay for rushed shipping. I am not sure what else I will get her. Probably nothing big since we are buying a new house and lots of new furniture and décor to go in it. We don't yet have plans for Mother's Day, but we usually do brunch with J's mom. I need to ask J about this also so that we can make plans...

[2brides]

I feel like this time of year is on warp speed. Soccer, the kids' birthday, G's school play, etc....

But this weather? AMAZING.

QOTD: It is going to be a joke this year. On Mother's Day, G needs to be at school at 1pm for his 2pm school play. C needs to be across town at 1pm for his soccer game. L is taking G and I am taking C. Maybe we will go to an early brunch or meet up for an early dinner. Historically, we don't do gifts. I did for a few years, and didn't last year because L said not to. Then, I think she was disappointed I didn't get anything/we didn't really celebrate. Honestly, I haven't planned a gift for this year because I have no idea what to get her.

[mahler5]

C is 2.

Yesterday I had to actually wake her up since I had to be at work earlier. I was changing her diaper when she was half asleep and she asked, "baby Ellen coming?"

I was like not now but in a month or so. We've been reading baby books to her a lot lately. We hadn't decided for sure to name her Ellen but L was calling her that a lot and now that is what C calls her. I like the name but am still not certain. L on the other hand is. So I'm a little annoyed she got C to call the baby it it's pretty cute though.

C peed in potty first thing this morning! A lot of times if I don't get in there in time she pees in her diaper. She sometimes wants to and sometimes doesn't.

I have so many errands to do today. I feel like I need to do something fun with C too though.

[sdfonz619]

DD is 7 months and has two more teeth coming in which will bring the grand total, for now, to 6. We lucked out with the first three teeth, but the last one and these two are definitely causing her to be super fussy. Motrin has been a savior and has made sleep much easier so I am so glad we made the switch from Tylenol.

She has started taking an active interest in the details of everything, from clothing to textures and people. Her facial expressions change dependent on how someone is talking to her and she has seemingly started to mimic sounds we make.

Food wise, we are giving her a mixture of purees, mashes and whole food and have recently started incorporating meat. We are finding things she didn't like one way she loves when prepared differently, aside from bananas. She hates those.

While we guessed she would be crawling by now, she hasn't quite mastered this skill. Rolling and inch worming are her preferred methods of transportation these days, and man can she move.

Afm, MW and I are actively planning and preparing to move to Texas and feel like we have a good idea of the area we want to be in. Instead of buying a house right away, we have decided to rent until we know we like where we are and want to be there long term. We are also actively planning DD's 1st bday party which we don't plan on being a huge event but definitely want to make it special.


QOTW: We are going to brunch at a beautiful restaurant on the beach and then plan on making impressions of DD's hands and feet as a keepsake for our first Mother's Day with her. The rest of the day we are leaving open to do whatever we feel like whether it's going to explore the tide pools or head to the local safari park. Present wise, we don't plan on exchanging gifts. Outside of making each other cards, there isn't really anything either of us want or need that will be better than what we plan on doing together to celebrate the day.

[wittyandwaiting]

O is 4 weeks and DS is 755 weeks.

O has been breastfeeding like a champ and at our midwife appointment this week she was 11lbs. 2oz. She's also giving us two pretty decent stretches of sleep most nights! *fingers crossed*

We're getting into a pretty good family routine now and some of the newborn chaos has slowed down.

DS is doing well. He's really struggling with grade 9 math, and it's really bumming him out. He spoke to his teacher and apparently she hasn't been very helpful. In most cases he's great at advocating for himself but since he was so frustrated he asked me if I could send her an email. Since we are looking at tutoring I asked her if she could give me an idea of some of the concepts that he's struggling with so that I can pass that information along to the tutor since she doesn't handle back tests or assignments. It's been 10 days and I haven't had a response from her....I'm super frustrated. I'm also terrible at math by the way.

kh826 DS developed the same sudden aversion to having poop in his diaper and was super easy to toilet train because of it. Essentially, as soon as he realize that there was an option that allowed him to never have poop in his diaper again he was all over it. I hope you have the same kind of success!

QOTW: We have no real plans for Mother's Day yet, and I have no idea what I'm doing for C. It's also our 11 year anniversary so the heat is on!

[kona]

O is 21 months this week.

This is the first week of our new schedule trial. M and I basically tag team caring for O around our work schedules 2 days a week. It's not ideal but we are saving $ on childcare right now.

That new schedule has allowed me to take O to swim lessons again. She moved up a group and was terrified today and wouldn't do anything besides cling to me. I hope she warms up to the class because she can do a lot of things that the class does but just not today. The whole class was only 2 other kids and the moms obviously knew each other. I am so bad in those situations. I feel like it's high school all over again.

I think we are starting to see some fears as well. She's now terrified of big trucks and sometimes school busses. There was a truck behind us in the car yesterday and she was hysterically crying. (she's still rear facing). It broke my heart to hear her so upset. I'm dreading any nighttime fears as she's still not the best sleeper.