First night: Went down without a peep and stayed asleep until I woke her up at 7:15am to get ready for daycare. Wohoo! She's always gone to bed pretty well so I'm interested to see if this continues or she finally realizes she can get out of bed and roam around.
I'm not looking forward to naps this weekend though. Ugh!
Oh dear crib, I thought you'd be able to contain my child just a little bit longer. But instead you allowed her to learn how to lift herself up and over the edge. And somehow gracefully land on her feet with out even a tear. or a thud. and thankfully not a broken arm. So beacuse you let me down, I had to do what I was hoping I could put off for maybe another 6 months to a year. I converted her crib to a toddler bed. And you made me cry. I just wasn't ready. So thanks. Thanks for giving up on your job a little to early.
Sincerely, "toddler mom" :tear:
Her new bed.
And because she will no longer be contained in her crib. I installed her furniture straps this weekend.
And the gate to keep her in her room. So she doesn't greet me at my door when I get up in the morning. Like she did this morning. Which made me pee a little.
I've been working with my camera lately. Getting ready for Christmas day. As you'll see, Daisy has been my practice "person". I have a feeling getting Courtney to sit still long enough to get a good picture is going to be rough. She recently has no interest in looking at the camera. I'm hoping to take her out to a local park this weekend in her Christmas dress that she hasn't worn yet to get some 18 month/Christmas pictures. Oh yeah, and Santa is coming down our street tomorrow to collect toys for "Toys for Tots". So we will be doing that as well.
Courtney's handprint tree thanks to Pinterest.
Our mantle with our stockings.
"Elfie" in Courtney's stocking. Stockings are from Pottery Barn.
The doctor told me to keep her on whole milk and a high calorie diet because she is a "string bean". I never thought being above average in weight would be considered skinny but she is quite tall so that makes up for it.
She also got prescribed some Miralax because she's been having some pooping issues. That seems to have cleared up though.
Oh yeah, and she got three shots. :(
She is talking up a storm. She surprises us everyday. Just yesterday when I picked her up at daycare she grabbed the zipper on my sweatshirt and said "zipper". She handed me a DVD the other day and said "movie". She also finds trash and throws it away.
And I swear last night during bath time she said "A, B, C."
We purchased Courtney a Princess potty from Target about a month or so ago. We set it up in the guest bathroom and were just hoping to get her used to the potty and what you use it for. A few weeks in, one morning I asked her if she wanted to go pee pee on the potty. She said yes and I followed her to the bathroom. I got her all set up on the potty and after a minute or so I hear this music playing. It took me a minute to realize that she was peeing. No her pee doesn't make music, but her potty does when she goes. I was so proud. This has only happened one time so far.
I've been bringing her into the bathroom with me so she understands that we go in the potty too. Now she is obsessed with sitting on the big potty. Luckily her Princess potty has a seat that comes off and hooks onto the big potty.
We aren't expecting any miracles here, but we thought it wouldn't hurt to get her used to the potty early. Her new daycare is wonderful and has said to just let them know when we want her to start working with her on the potty at daycare. Isn't that great?
We headed out to the local pumpkin patch on Sunday after nap. It wasn't the original patch we wanted to go to (that one is only open Thursday - Saturday). The patch was a huge disappointment to Mike and I. The selection of pumpkins on the vine were sad. The munchkin was in love with the apple trees. She had a blast and that is all that matters.
We want to give a shout out to Grammy for the adorable pumpkin patch dress she made. And we can't wait to see her adorable Halloween costume. Stay tuned for that. Squeee!
I've taken a bit of a blog break. I felt like I may have been putting too much of our day to day out on the interwebs and I just felt like some of the stuff I discussed may need to stay more close to home. So I took a step back and it has felt great. But, my daughter is growing yo! BIG. She's 16 months now. I know, right?
So here is what my little muffin is up to these days.
- Talking. Mo (more), pesh (please), ya you (love you), appu (apple), ball, yesh (yes), up, no (that one is fun ::rolls eyes::), nih nih (night night), bye bye. That's all the new ones I can think of.
- She started a new daycare and is so happy. (so are we!)
- Um, is my kid blonde? (see below)
- Working on using utensils with meals.
- 24 pounds
With her cousin Lily (3 months)
From Left: Heidi, Lily, Courtney, Clare and Stella.
I hope that the days come easy and the moments pass slow, And each road leads you where you want to go, And if you're faced with a choice, and you have to choose, I hope you choose the one that means the most to you. And if one door opens to another door closed, I hope you keep on walkin' till you find the window, If it's cold outside, show the world the warmth of your smile,
But more than anything, more than anything, My wish, for you, is that this life becomes all that you want it to, Your dreams stay big, and your worries stay small, You never need to carry more than you can hold, And while you're out there getting where you're getting to, I hope you know somebody loves you, and wants the same things too, Yeah, this, is my wish.
I hope you never look back, but ya never forget, All the ones who love you, in the place you left, I hope you always forgive, and you never regret, And you help somebody every chance you get, Oh, you find God's grace, in every mistake, And you always give more than you take.
But more than anything, yeah, and more than anything, My wish, for you, is that this life becomes all that you want it to, Your dreams stay big, and your worries stay small, You never need to carry more than you can hold, And while you're out there getting where you're getting to, I hope you know somebody loves you, and wants the same things too, Yeah, this, is my wish.
My wish, for you, is that this life becomes all that you want it to, Your dreams stay big, and your worries stay small, You never need to carry more than you can hold, And while you're out there getting where you're getting to, I hope you know somebody loves you, and wants the same things too, Yeah, this, is my wish.
This is my wish I hope you know somebody loves you May all your dreams stay big
Sweet baby Jesus in heaven. I HATE confrontation. Like HATE it. Most people know this. I am always afraid to hurt someones feelings. There was once a time when I was served raw chicken at a restaurant and I think I might have apologized for sending it back. True story.
Well, I've hit another bump in the "time to get real and rip someone a new one".
Ready for this? Courtney has been bit SEVEN times since starting her daycare. That is in less then 2 months. She usually receives one bite a week. Except for the day she had 3 bites in one day.
After the three bites in one day I talked to the Director and warned her we would take Courtney out if the problem wasn't resolved. After talking with her and realizing that it is the age we decided to give it another try. And not less then a week later, another bite. And then another.
This is just ridiculous. Since nothing is being done to keep hannibal away from my child, we have found a new home daycare that we are excited about. She has September to make it through and then we are done.
From August 21 through September 24, Mike and I are the same age. Every year. Then, he gets older. hehe. But I love an older man. And a man in uniform for that matter. :)
I just turned 28 on Sunday. Is it weird that at times I still feel like I'm 21. Not the imaturity but just that I'm have no idea where the years 23 through 27 went? Like, I don't remember really doing anything when I was 24. or even 25 for that matter. It's just blank. I guess that is what working does to you. Before kids, you just work and play sometimes. And the years just keep going by. Until you realize "how in the hell can I be nearing 30? I swear I just graduated college." And then you get the e-mail reminder of your 10 year high school reunion this month.
Where does the time go? What do you have to show for those years between high school graduation in June 2001 until today? Because you know everyone at the reunion is going to be trying to one up the other. I wont be attending the reunion. I live two states away. I wish I was though. Because I'm nosey. And sometimes I think people are full of shit on Facebook and that is all I have in ways of "keeping in touch" with some of them.
Weird how once Courtney was born I could probably tell you something that happened in my life every month in the last 14 months. Like on my 27th birthday we had planned to go out and grab a nice lunch but I ended up with my first clogged duct from nursing and it hurt so bad that I needed to stay home and massage my boob and feed Courtney every hour to get it to go away. Being a moms makes you stop and smell the roses again. Because you want to experience firsts through your childs eyes. It is truly amazing how life changes once you become a parent.
So cheers to being 28. Not yet 29 and two years from the dirty thirty!
Courtney has this amazing teething necklace. It's made from baltic amber and is supposed to be a natural pain reliever when worn near the sight of pain. Some people wear baltic amber bracelets for arthritis and such. Interested? Check out www.inspiredbyfinn.com for more information.
Well, a few weeks back I received a call from Courtney's daycare to let me know that the public health nurse wont allow Courtney to wear her necklace at daycare anymore because it is dangerous. Dangerous because the other kids are becoming interested in it and started pulling on it. Understandable. So we take it off when she goes to daycare - 5 DAYS A WEEK.
So, of course when she gets home I forget to put it back on. And have forgotten a lot recently. And top it off with the fact that our Pedi asked me to not let her sleep in it.
Well, my poor baby girl whose been sleeping through the night since she was 7 months, has been getting up 3-4 times at night crying in pain. Usually I can let her cry and she'll go back to sleep. Not this time. She gets so worked up that by the time she's lying back down, she's sniffling in her sleep. :(
She is working on her first molars right now. The top two seem to be through. One of the bottoms is working its way out right now and I can feel that the other bottom first molar is on its way.
Against the Pedis recommendation, we've been having her sleep in her necklace in hopes she'll get some relief. Any other recommendations for teething relief for my sweet baby girl?
My friend Ashley over at Snuggled in Love started a service of making blankets "for snuggling" people going through a hard time or who were in need of some extra love.
I wanted to help. I was given the task of making a blanket for a sweet preemie baby girl named Ella. She was a whole 9 weeks early. I'm sure she is getting plenty of love from her mommy and daddy. But Snuggled in Love wanted to give her a little something for fighting strong.
Courtney helped me pick out the fabric:
Finished blanket:
Not crafty? Neither am I. Thankfully knot blankets are very forgiving. If your interested in helping, you can like Snuggled in Love on Facebook or contact Ashley through her blog.
When you live just a 40 minute drive from Canada, you must bust out your passport and take a drive, or a ferry, or whatever option you have. Yesterday we decided to take aday trip to Vancouver, BC for the afternoon. And I was finally able to try Canada's finest culinary dish. Let me introduce you to poutine.
This my friends is french fries with gravy, bacon and cheese. I'm sure it didn't hurt that I was starving when we got there. But YUM!
Since our relocation to another city in Washington state, and paying yet another homeowners mortgage, we've really been going back and forth on whether we should have purchased our first home instead of deciding to rent again. It's a really hard decision to make for a military family. We never really know just how long we'll be here. Our location now is supposed to be for three years, but if Mike advances before three years then they could move us again.
But then we think that in two or three years we could have earned some equity and possibly have some rental income coming in when we do move again.
Then you have to think about a down payment. Ugh! The down payment that would most likely wipe out our savings and you don't want to do that. But on the otherhand, that is what we are saving for and as it sits right now we are just wasting our own money renting. It's a hard pill to swallow.
Being married for 5 years and having a beautiful daughter, we feel like the next step is to own a home. It makes us so very excited to think about that possibility, but we're locked into this place until May '12. We have some time to decide what is the best option for us and put some more money away into savings.
But in the meantime, googling homes for sale where we are now is so exciting. And the prices for homes here compared to the prices of homes in Los Angeles makes you kind of feel like it's do-able.
Current Location: 3 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms 2200 square feet $275,000 ain't it gorgeous?
Where we want to buy in California (where both our families live): 3 bedrooms, 1 3/4 bathrooms 1300 square feet $405,900 all I see is mo money, mo money, mo money!
I don't know what the future holds for us as homeowners, but I hope that one day we can own our "dream" home wherever that may be.
