a day of firsts

Our day of "firsts" started off with Barrett eating cereal for the first time!  This past week he's been eating more and more, one night even getting up twice to eat 7 ounces at each waking.  He's growing out of his 9 month clothing, so I figured that even if he was a few weeks shy of 4 months, we'd go ahead and start him on cereal.  

Barrett actually liked it!  I imagine it doesn't taste much different than his formula since it's rice cereal.  Britton was all excited, asking if she could feed him and being downright surprised when I said yes!  She did a great job, and got a lot of the cereal in his mouth.  Good thing since I forgot to buy any bibs!

Then after the cereal excitement, Britton and I headed out for her first movie theater experience!  Britton asked me last week if we could go to the movie theater, and I figured four years old is old enough to go to the theater.  Unfortunately, this summer has been lacking in awesome blockbusters, so I decided on "Planes" (it was either that or "Monsters University" and we've not seen the first Monsters movie).  

Yes, I'm the mom taking pictures of my kid in front of the sign.  And the giant display in front of concessions!

Popcorn and lemonade in hand, we got into the theater and found some seats.  When the movie started Britton told me the movie was too loud and covered her ears.  Whenever she'd grab a hand of popcorn she'd remove one hand from her ear but leave the other up!  Twenty minutes before the movie ended, Britton decided she was done and wanted to go home.  She wasn't overly into the movie (admittedly, it lacked the pizazz you expect from Disney) and was tired of the deafening volume.  I asked her if she was sure and she was so we left.  But she left with a smile and pride at having just been to her first movie in the theater!  She informed me on the way home that next time we go to the theater she wants to see "Snow White" - um, I'll try to work that one out for you, Britton!

styling

I've got a few clothing rules for Britton.  I've always detested glitter in any form on her clothes, mainly because it gets on everything else in the laundry.  And I won't let her wear a two-piece bathing suit or shoes with a heel or clothing with words across the butt because I'm not sexualizing a four-year-old.  One of my hard and fast rules used to be "no pajamas out of the house."  It's a downward spiral to sweat pants or slippers as shoes and maybe it's not fair to stereotype but the weirdest Wal-Mart customers are always in pajamas.  

But then it turns out that my daughter runs to get into pajamas anytime she wants to "relax" and "wind down" from her apparently stressful days of playing and napping.  And sometimes we go to the playground after dinner and she's slipped into her "something more comfortable" and it seems ridiculous for her to change back into her school clothes for a 30 minute trip to the park.

And then Britton takes this relaxed attitude towards attire to a whole new level.  She found some goofy sunglasses and put them on the unwitting baby when I wasn't looking.  And dang it all if my pajama-clothed daughter and sunglass-rocking son aren't the best dressed kids on the block!

the big red dog comes to town

Let me tell you - Britton loves Clifford the Big Red Dog books.  We've been known to take out ten or so Clifford books from the library at one time.  So you can imagine how excited Britton has been about Clifford the Big Red Dog coming to visit her school for storytime.  Of course, the school wanted the kids to get jazzed up, so they kept bringing it up to them every day for the last three months it seems.  And that just fueled Britton's anticipation into a frenzy.  We showed up early so as to get decent parking, all the while Britton trying to put together that we were at school on a "home day" (Saturday).  We checked in and found out we were in group 1!  

All the kids were hyped up.  I noticed that Britton's teacher was sitting up front in a strange outfit, and she promptly introduced herself as "Emily Elizabeth."  Ummm, that might work with the other kids, but Britton knows this is her teacher and not Emily Elizabeth and she's not buying it.  They brought Clifford in and Britton was so excited to see him!  But then Clifford left after a few short minutes and "Emily Elizabeth" read the books.  I don't know why I thought Clifford would read the books (how can a furry read through that costume anyways?) but Britton didn't seem to notice.  Clifford was available for pictures afterwards, but Britton doesn't like getting too close to big costume animals so she refused to go in to the room with Clifford in there.  Instead, we went outside and bought way too many books from the book fair!

Clifford and "Emily Elizabeth"

And the bouncy house, always the bouncy house for Britton.  She found her favorite teacher there, and they jumped until Britton was the last kid standing.

"Reading" her new books and munching on goldfish

Memaw was visiting this weekend, so she got to hear all about Clifford and the bouncy house and her new books while Britton helped make gumbo.  Side note - in one of her princess books, Tiana talks about making gumbo.  I told Britton that Memaw knows how to make gumbo and Britton never let it go.  First thing she asked Memaw, "Can we make gumbo?"

This is the first time this child has taken a nap at home since Christmas.  We wore her out this weekend!

contact [paper] high

See that kitchen cabinet below?  The dishwasher is housed directly underneath of it, which makes unloading so much fun.  Ugh.  I unload onto the counter, then I have to hold the cabinet doors open to put the dishes away because the doors won't stay open.  Well, I was putting dishes away when the door decided to just come off in my hand.  No surprise since the doors, and hinges, are over 22 years old.

I presented the hubs with three options:

1.  Replace all the upper kitchen cabinets with new IKEA cabinets and replace the doors of the below cabinets.  Not surprisingly, this was the most expensive option, and perhaps a slight over-reaction to one kitchen cabinet door hinge giving out.  Just saying.

2.  Replace the hinge and wait for it to happen again.  Because it will.

3.  Take the other door off too, making it easier to actually use the cabinet.  

#3 won, hands down.  But I couldn't just leave it as-is because it was looking like a cabinet that just never got doors installed.  I considered painting it, but knew that when we go to sell in a couple of years we will end up putting the doors back on and then I've either got to repaint or explain why one cabinet is painted.  Then it hit me - contact paper!  I checked online, and apparently contact paper is making a comeback.  Awesome.  I happen to go to Target on my lunch break and checked to see if they carry it, and snagged two rolls.  One roll is a turquoise scroll design (I liked better) and the other was a green and turquoise damask (the hubs' favorite).  My choice won because I was doing the work.

See that bubble?  When the contact paper goes over a screwhead it doesn't want to lay down flat.  No problem.  The installation isn't perfect - there are wrinkles and bubbles but it's a cabinet so it's fine.

Ignore my crowded countertops, please

But I still had that other roll left, and I'm not apt to return a $6 roll of contact paper if it involves a special trip to Target.  So I got it in my head that the bookcases needed a sprucing up.

The green isn't bright, so it kind of hangs out in the background.   It doesn't compete against the many many many colors on the bookcase, so I've decided I really like it!  And it was a good excuse to give the bookcases a good dusting.  Now if only I could get inspired to do such things when we're actually putting the furniture together, I'd save myself a lot of work!

I know my bookcases are loaded to the hilt, but I'm a bit obsessed with books and picture frames

i got learned about photography

I have a bad habit of not fully learning my stuff's abilities.  Admittedly, I'm not great with technology, so I usually leave it up to the hubs to learn the computer ins and outs, how the router works, how to set the thermostat, and the like.  It's not that I can't learn it, it's just that I don't have much of an interest in those things.  But some things that are more complicated than the average kitchen appliance I do bother to learn - my sewing machine, the baby's video monitor, and the awesome Canon Rebel camera the hubs got me for Christmas a year and a half ago.  Problem is, I learned how to use the camera "sort of" - enough to take tons of pictures and have a couple turn out well.  But I never got down to the nitty gritty of everything included in that camera bag.  And today I did.

I was looking at a Pinterest fail blog, where people submit pictures of their Pinterest attempts and how awful the results end up being.  Pretty funny stuff, especially for a Friday where I'm not getting any work done anyways.  And one "fail" was the spinning kid picture, where you have to set the camera's self-timer AND hold the camera around your neck with a camera strap, since you're supposed to be holding the kid's hands with yours.  I never put the camera strap on my camera.  Ever.  So when Britton, Barrett, and I were hanging out outside and she was totally in to me taking pictures, I ran upstairs to dig out my camera strap.  Ten attempts later, we got this:

                           

Fueled by success, I grabbed my "big lens."  It was a bonus addition to the camera package the hubs got me, and I've sadly never used it. I don't know how to use it and I don't know what difference it makes.  Turns out, it makes a difference.  The pictures are clearer, the detail is better, and I can actually see Britton's eye color in my pictures now!  Recently I was lamenting that the best pictures I seemed to take are taken on my phone and edited with a free app.  That's sad, especially when I have a great camera that isn't taking the same quality of pictures because I was too lazy to play around with its settings or even read the manual.  No more.  These pictures prove to me that it's time to stop being so lazy and learn the hard things in life.  It's worth it!

I'm by no means an expert, and I really need to take a course that teaches me how to take pictures on manual, but this is a start.  I can't wait to take more pictures and see what develops (bad pun intended)!

to the dentist ( i can't think of anything snappy)

Yesterday Britton had her bi-annual (is that twice a year? I can never remember) dentist visit, and this girl was excited. I totally get it. I love going to the dentist too, though not nearly as much as I used to love going to the dentist when it cost me nothing and I never had cavities. Ahhh, those were the days. Anywho, I have infected Britton with my dentist-clean-smooth-teeth love, and she's hooked. Which is a good thing because did you know that teeth are the only part of the body that can't repair itself? It's amazing the things the hubs tells me when I'm actually listening. I figure that Britton needs to learn early that you either take good care of your teeth or you end up with those funny plastic teeth in a water glass on your nightstand.

Note to self: Britton does not like the strawberry-flavored polisher. Poor thing started gagging and almost called the whole thing off right there. But I got her to reconsider her flavor choice and she went with mint. The hygienist wasn't so sure ("Does she really like mint? Does she know what it is?"), but I assured her that Britton loves those swirly peppermint candies so she probably would like mint. And she did.

As a reward for being so good and not trying to bite the hygienist (apparently it's quite a common phenomenom), Britton got to pick out some stickers and a couple of presents from the treasure chest. The treasure chest! She was intrigued to no end. Britton went with a brightly-colored pencil, no surprise there, and then picked out what I thought were tiny stickers. But why were there only two in the pack? Wait a second! They were those sticker earrings! And I had tons of them as a kid because my mom would not let Jessica and I get our ears pierced until we were ten years old. They stick everywhere but your ears. Not ten seconds after I snapped this picture to show Britton, that earring was missing. Luckily, the sticker earrings didn't bring up any discussion about "real" earrings because no, my four-year-old is not getting her ears pierced, just no.

And if you're wondering, yes, she got to keep the snazzy star sunglasses. Bonus!

oh, how i loathe you, sleep fairy

About a month or so ago, Britton got into one of her phases where she didn't want to stay in bed.  She didn't want to get into bed with us, she didn't want to play, she just kept getting out of bed for no reason.  Almost always in the middle of the night.  So I came up with the idea of a sleep fairy that leaves you treats for staying in bed.  I had it all planned out.  I'd get one of those dollar birdhouses from Joanns, decorate it with moons and glitter (side note:  A coworker referred to glitter as "the herpes of the craft world" this week.  Yes, absolutely, yes) and leave it outside her door.  If she stayed in bed all night, the sleep fairy would leave a nickel or a Starburst, or whatever the hubs and I could scrounge up that Britton wouldn't instantly recognize as coming out of her stash of stuff.  I understand that there is a subset of parents who think bribing their kids to behave is horrendous.  I'm not in that group.

But then I had to go snooping around the internet, and discovered that someone had already thought up a sleep fairy and had written a book.  A book!  What a great idea!  I checked out the Amazon reviews, and everyone loved this book.  It apparently has worked wonders for all children who won't stay in their beds.  I checked my local Barnes and Noble, and as with any book I really want, they didn't have it.  So I ordered the book and waited, so excited that a solution was in our midst, even if I was secretly disappointed I wasn't going to get to glitter up a birdhouse.

The book arrived, and I made the fatal mistake.  I did not read the book before I showed it to Britton, made up an entire backstory about the sleep fairy (she's the tooth fairy's sister, apparently), and talked it up like it was going out of style.  I should have read the book.  Because what happened next was the kid ponzi scheme of endless treat-giving that turns into a major pain in the arse.

Admittedly, the book didn't work the entire first week.  Every night Britton would request that we read it, then promptly forget that by getting up she would not get a treat under her pillow.  And that's where our issue lay - you have to sneak into the kid's room and put a treat under the pillow, and you can't do anything else, say - a glittered birdhouse, because the book specifically says that the sleep fairy puts the treat UNDER YOUR PILLOW.

Every mom is rolling her eyes right now.  Yes, yes.  You're also all asking the same question  - when exactly is a kid considered to have "stayed in bed all night"?  Do I put the treat under her pillow at 11:00 pm before I go to sleep, just so she can discover it at 2:00 am?  Do I wait until I wake in the morning, and risk Britton getting up early, finding nothing under her pillow, and call fraud on the whole thing?  I figured that if Britton ever got to the point of staying in bed all night, I'd sneak into her room when the baby got up for his 3:30 am feeding and be done with it.

And then the clincher - it didn't much matter what time I put the treat under her pillow because she never made it to staying in bed all night.  There were many nights that she only got up once and it broke my heart for her to check under her pillow and find nothing.  There were times she got up because she needed a tissue or wanted to go to the bathroom, and the litany of exceptions to staying in bed just grew into a confusing list.  No wonder Britton was confused - the sleep fairy would still come if you got up for a good reason (had a bad dream) but not for getting up just because.  Ya'll know where this is going - anytime Britton got up, she also came armed with a "good" reason, true or not.  And honestly, once she had gotten up and knew the sleep fairy wasn't coming, there wasn't much incentive left for her to not get up six more times.

I had it.  I was mad at myself for even starting it.  But how to bow out gracefully?  In the end, I told Britton that because she was older now, she didn't need the sleep fairy.  She is old enough to keep herself in bed.  So I had her dictate a letter to the sleep fairy, that we stuck under her pillow, letting the sleep fairy know that she could go help other kids because Britton was older and didn't need her anymore.  And I (I mean, the sleep fairy) wrote a card to Britton telling her how proud she was of her staying in bed, and how she would visit Britton in her dreams.  Then I left the card under her pillow for her to discover the next morning.

In hindsight, I should have just ridden it out.  Like all phases, this too would pass in time.  And it did - she stayed in bed all night last night.  And most nights she only gets up once.  Of course, now she's as well-versed in the tooth fairy (thank you Berenstain Bears books) as she was in the sleep fairy, and has decided that her teeth feel loose.  Doesn't matter that they aren't.  I fear I may end up loathing the tooth fairy as much as I loathe her sister the sleep fairy!

happy 7th birthday Sadie!

Sometimes I forget Sadie's "puppyhood." I'm reminded when my sister tells me about her puppy chewing things up (I still have the Kate Spade wallet with little puppy Sadie chew marks) or her puppy not sleeping (Sadie would never nap when I needed one, and this was before children, so I really had no idea what going without sleep was all about).

It doesn't feel like seven years. We got her not two months after getting married, not one week after buying our first house. I guess she completed our idea of what married people looked like; they apparently have a dog and a mortgage! We couldn't agree on a breed - the hubs wanted a rat terrier and I wanted a golden retriever, each of us making the argument for the breed we each grew up with and never knew anything different. We compromised on a medium-sized dog that was good with kids and calm and that equation came to a Boston Terrier. And Sadie Barkington Bogle, born August 12, 2006, in Canal Fulton, Ohio or at least somewhere near it, fit the bill and that was it. We had planned on buying two girls, but there was only one girl and one boy left, and the girl was ours. She rode home in my lap for the entire trip. I held her as nervously as I would hold a newborn Britton three years later.

Good with kids? Heck yes. This dog does not bite (due to awesome training by the hubs when we were young and had the time for such things!), and she has put up with Britton way more than Britton has put up with Sadie. Who cares that Sadie refuses to walk halfway through a neighborhood walk and has to be carried when my kid can put stickers on Sadie and she won't run away? Sadie has never forgiven me for having kids and taking away her "only child" status, and we have the poop stains outside each nursery to prove it. But over time, she has begrudgingly softened up to these little creatures that want only her.

We joke that Sadie is exhausted from sleeping so much. Sometimes it seems that all she does is sleep. She burrows in her blankets, seeks out the sun, gets as comfortable as possible for her naps. It is like living with a retiree.

When I was on maternity leave, we went through a weather spell where it was thunderstorming at the same time I had to leave to pick up Britton. Sadie can't stand storms - they leave her panting and shaking and terrified. So I took her with me to pick up Britton. And these couple of days of riding along turned her into my co-pilot who was invited (and after two weeks, frankly expected it as her right) to join me for every car trip. It also served the purpose of guaranteeing that she wasn't peeing on my family room rug - the rug we have replaced three times in a year because she keeps peeing on it. Out of spite. For no reason. As long as she is in the front seat (with her blanket and the seat warmer on high), she's not peeing and pooping in my house. A win-win, really.

Happy 7th birthday, Sadie!

the VT jen quilt

I was going into my last week of maternity leave when I got this message from my friend Jen...

My first instinct was, "Yeah, totally love to except I have no idea how to do curves."  The pattern, the color combo, the vintage quilting - I knew I had to at least try because I was falling in love with this quilt.  So I did.  And then I just jumped right in, sewing for hours every day.  

I admit, I'm a lazy pinner. And this pattern - "Orange Peel" - requires a ton of pinning.  But since it was my first time trying this pattern, I made the blocks big and trimmed them down to size.  The quilt Jen sent me is by Densye Schmidt, and her pattern was for a crib-sized quilt.  I just increased the templates to 121% to end up with a bigger lap-sized quilt.

The original quilt colors were close to Hokie maroon and orange, but not exactly.  Knowing that Jen wanted this to be a Hokie quilt, I brought my Hokie car sticker into Joann and matched the colors exactly.  The names are "Claret Wine" and "Pumpkin" and the lady at the Joann cutting counter complimented me on my "beautiful autumn colors."  Ha!

For the quilting, I copied the Denyse Schmidt quilt, echoing the circles.  In the areas in the middle of the circles I free-motion quilted the diamonds that follow the curves.

I asked Jen what kind of backing she wanted since the original quilt had a hospital-green backing and I figured that wasn't her favorite.  She responded that a Hokie quilt should go all-out, so Hokie orange it was!  And Jen loved the idea of a polka dot.  As luck would have it, Denyse Schmidt designs fabrics for Joann, and this is her polka dot!

I washed it last night, making it all crinkly and cuddly and one of the softest quilts I've ever made.  I may have wrapped myself in it and laid on the couch in a half-comatose state.  But this morning, I wrapped it up and shipped it off to its new home with Jen.  Where it will get loved and used and appreciated.

Ed:   I may have had a hard time with this quilt, and many times may have gotten through it by promising myself it'd be the only time I'd ever do an Orange Peel quilt.  I made the same promises to myself after Britton was born.  But not three years after I had her, we forgot how hard it all was and were planning for a sibling.  It took less time for this!  I'm now contemplating an Orange Peel quilt in Robin's Egg Blue and dark grey.....

Barrett: 3 months old

Barrett started full-time daycare this week, and as I predicted it has been a much easier transition for him than for me!  I find myself just missing him during the day, wondering what he's doing at that time, and wishing I'd get a phone call - in short, it's like I have a crush!  Barrett has just grown into such an easy-going baby that it's not really a "break" to be away from him.  

I don't have official weight and length until his 4 month appointment, but he's easily at least 18 pounds by now.  He is in 9 month clothing and wears size 3 diapers.  He's outgrown every swaddle that is sold in the US, so now we wiggle the new swaddle (says it goes to 20 pounds, but not so much) as low as it will go on his arms (and still serve its purpose).  I added extra fabric to the bottom of his Halo swaddle, but he could still get his long arms under the swaddle portion and was pushing it up around his face.  Seeing that image on the monitor will stop your heart, so we stopped using that swaddle!

Barrett's naps in daycare were barely reaching an hour, which is no bueno in my book.  At home he'll nap 2-3 hours.  We figured that it was the crib that was throwing him off, since at home he's still in his Rock and Play.  Once the daycare started putting him down in the non-moving swing, he settled into longer naps.  As soon as he outgrows his startle reflex, about the end of this month, we will transition him to the crib without his swaddle.

We still keep his awake time between naps to no more than 1.5 hours, and watch for sleepy signs.  And lately Barrett has wanted an earlier bedtime, so it's bath at 6:40 pm, then a bottle and bedtime.  In the past two days he has shifted his middle-of-the-night feeding from 3:30 am to 12:30 am.  So he's down by 7:00 pm, up at 12:30 am to eat, then back down until 6:30 am or 7:00 am.  Once he's up in the morning, we just go ahead and get him ready for the day.

Barrett has become very interactive now.  He can belly laugh!  And he loves when I sit him on the couch facing me and I have a very animated conversation with him.  If I roll my "r"s at him, he's smiling up a storm!  And the ladies at daycare report that he loves bubbles and when they read books to him.  He's very chill now, and will lay under the playmat for 20-30 minutes so that I can make dinner and we can eat.

He's a very relaxed baby, and that's partly due to the fact that he has outgrown his gas issues.  We are still doing half Sensitive/half Alimentum, 4 ounces every 2 to 3 hours.  Sometimes before bed he wants up to 6 ounces, especially during a growth spurt.

Falling, falling, someone catch me, falling....

Likes:  "talking" with people, the playmat, music/singing, raspberries on the belly, baths

Dislikes:  being cold, gas bubbles, tummy time

birthday party time!

On Friday night, we went out to Red Robin for Britton's birthday dinner.  We wanted a restaurant that wouldn't take forever to get us food and where they would bring out a sundae and sing "Happy Birthday" to the birthday girl.  Done and done!

Then we went home and opened presents from the family!  Britton got some great gifts, and she loved just tearing into that wrapping paper.

Saturday was the party day.  We went with a rainbow/princess/Strawberry Shortcake modgepodge theme, because Britton kept changing her mind!  I figured we could either do a theme-perfect "Pinterest" party or give Britton the party she really really really wanted, and I went with the latter.   The hubs and I went out Friday night to get "a couple" of balloons, and got up-sold to two dozen balloons, and a giant Strawberry Shortcake balloon and a Disney Princesses balloon!

We woke up Saturday morning to rain.  Of course.  But we decided to trudge on as if the clouds weren't there, and we set up the outdoor activities and party tables.  Luckily, not 10 minutes before the party was set to begin, the rain stopped!  It was a little humid, yes, but at least I wouldn't have 8 kids running around my house.  The biggest hit was the rainbow Whirly lollipops!  The kids were intrigued by the ribbon dot candy, but it was the lollipops they all ran for!

We brought the Radio Flyer pony out, and the kids lined up to ride it.  And there was a constant stream of kids running back and forth between the playset and the bouncy house.  One of Britton's teachers came to the party, and the poor girl was stuck in the bouncy house all morning because the kids would not let her get out!  I admit it, the hubs and I jumped in the bouncy house when all the kids had left.  Sadly, it wore us out in two minutes flat!

The hubs grilled hamburgers and hot dogs for lunch.  Memaw and I made pasta salad, potato salad, deviled eggs, veggies and dip, chips, fruit salad, and cake pops.  The moms went crazy over the cotton candy and the rainbow sherbet punch!  It was fun having some retro throw-back treats that we all remembered but hadn't had in years.

Princess cake and princess cake plates.  Really, the theme boiled down to "saturation of color!"

I've been to a couple of parties recently where the kid didn't open his birthday gifts in front of the guests.  I get it - you don't want all the kids snatching the presents away, or you're worried your kid will be rude and say something about disliking a gift in front of the giver.  But I like to see kids opening the presents I bought them, and I want Britton to know proper etiquette when opening gifts.  So we gathered around, and this girl got some great gifts (and remembered to say thank you to each giver)!

She loved her birthday quilt!  

Yes, she's in a Belle dress.  Britton had 3 costume changes during the party!  It was a great time for all, and the whole party really flew by.  All the kids went home exhausted from the bouncy house and sticky from the cotton candy and lollipops, which I count as a successful party!