Friday, December 25, 2009

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Our Christmas Card Photo:
Perfectly Content with a Hula Hoop and a Tea Set from Santa:


Our Little Elf Sadie Looking Quite Grown Up:

Super Cheesy Mama & Sadie Smushed Faces Happy Picture:

Saturday, December 19, 2009

Light a candle.



On December 19, 2007, Jennifer and Graham Gibbs Bankston tragically passed away.
Jenny suffered silently with postpartum depression but her symptoms could have been detected and treated. Jenny's Light was created by her family to be a source of information, hope and inspiration. We strive to stop this type of tragedy from happening to others. The mission of Jenny's Light is to improve and save lives by increasing awareness of all perinatal mood disorders including postpartum depression.


Light a candle.
Hug your loved ones.
Call a friend you're thinking about.

If you know any new mothers, ask them how they are doing.
Really ask. And then listen.
Offer and give a little support if you can. Perhaps you can spare an hour to sit with the baby so that mom can take a shower or a nap. Bring a meal? Do an errand for her? Even a small gesture could make a huge difference.
Especially this time of year.

Rest in peace, Jenny and Graham. You're in my thoughts.






Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Catch Up

Okay, now that little Ruby is home-sweet-home in Montana, I can refocus. (I was *really* preoccupied with that little one's situation!)

Thanksgiving in MA was wonderful. I am one of those rare, lucky individuals whose got mutual adoration with the in-laws going on. Seriously. Lucky. We stayed for 8 nights and really enjoyed ourselves the whole time.
Nana had art projects for Sadie:

Uncle Justin and Daddy got to reminisce with 30+ year old toys (Legos, Matchbox cars and marbles):

Sadie fell in love with a bunch of her second cousins:

We even got to see some sheep at Nana and Papa's friends' house:

We returned on December 1st and had to kick it into high gear for Christmas prep. We have a cute little tree which Sadie adores:

We've introduced the whole "Santa" thing as well as the concept of Baby Jesus. Funny story - my mom was with me when I had a chance to talk to Sadie about Christmas being Baby Jesus' birthday. I said something like "his mama is Mary, and she had a little boy." Sadie just looked at me and then cocked her head to the side and said, "No, mama. Mary had a little lamb."

She's loving the lights, decorations, trees, music, etc. this year. It's fun to watch. This will be a memorable holiday for us with her.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

distracted

I sat down to update my blog (I've neglected it so!) this morning but got sidetracked catching up on a few of my favorite blogs that I read.
Turns out one of the gals in Montana that I follow has been going through hell with her new baby. I'm feeling for her and her family big time.
So, I'll have to attempt an update later.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

snuggle-icious

A request I've been getting from Sadie a lot lately is, "Can we have a little snuggle?"

Music to my ears.

I try to drop anything I'm doing and indulge her (and myself), because I know this time is fleeting. Sometimes it's just a few seconds, but other times, like this morning - it was the better part of half an hour that she just wanted to be held on the couch, wrapped in her "cozy" blanket, with a few of her stuffed animal friends. Heaven. She didn't talk much, but she let out several deep sighs and she looked straight into my eyes and grinned a bunch of times too. I smoothed her hair and kissed her head over and over and over. I was so glad that we didn't need to be anywhere.
I don't know why she needed such an extended snuggle today, but I was more than happy to partake. I hope with all of my might that moments like those get cemented somewhere deep within her little psyche so that she will always, always know how loved and cherished she is. I feel confident that I'll never forget how this love feels, but what if she does?

This brings me to my musings about how little time we have together - just the two of us & Daddy - before Bun arrives in the Spring. I know there is plenty of potential to over-think and over-analyze the situation. I also know there are numerous books on the topic of how to handle the introduction of a new sibling to a toddler. I haven't gone there yet. I'm just trying to hold onto the way things are, while consistently reminding her about the baby in a positive, excited way. So far, she seems genuinely happy about becoming a big sister. She says matter-of-factly, "it's a girl baby, Mama" no matter how many times I tell her "well, it could be a boy baby in there. We don't know yet - it will be a surprise for us." She usually continues by saying "I will hold her in my lap, and look at her." Really cute. Lately she's been seeing things in stores and saying "oh! the baby will like this! Shall we get it for a present for her?" It all seems a little too good to be true. I'll take it for now, but as Andrew says, "It's really sweet, but let's hope she still feels that way when she has to deal with a new baby 24/7."

One of my best friends, M, admitted to me once that she cried earnestly the night before her second son was born because she was overcome with emotion about how this was going to change her relationship forever between her and her first son. Admittedly, M is one of my "mom guru" friends whose every word about motherhood is like gold to me, but I remember thinking how interesting this particular admission was and how undoubtedly true it must be for many moms. And yet I don't think I'd ever heard anyone say it before.

Until today.
I came across an article in my online subscription to Mothering magazine entitled "And Baby Makes Four". I thought I'd mostly heard it all, and it basically always boiled down to one point: you don't know how you're going to love another child as much as #1, but somehow in that magical mother way, you just do.

While I believe that, I also know that the adjustment is real, and it is a big change for all involved, no matter how you slice it. Here's one nugget that I'd like to share from the article, written by Natalia Swenson Parker of Ellensburg, WA.
  • I don't think there's enough good literature that effectively addresses how difficult it is to lose the dyadic relationship between a mother and her firstborn. It's painful-for both of you-to lose the exclusivity that, up until now, has been a hallmark of your entire time together. Feeling sad about this loss is normal, and doesn't mean that you love your second child any less than you love your first. Grief over the loss of the past is to be expected and permitted at such a time of major adjustment.
Amen, sister. I know I'm headed for these feelings in a major way - technically, I'm already feeling them! So, I'm glad to have this logic implanted early.
It may sound ludicrous to many that the mother of a newborn baby might need to grieve anything, but if you ask me, it's just one more real example of how complex of a life change motherhood is, and how important it is to allow new moms to have their feelings - whatever they may be - instead of expecting them to be full of nothing but ethereal, unwavering bliss.

For now, I am going to focus on savoring my one-on-one time with Sadie. Soaking up this snuggling phase she's into right now is just about perfect.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

The end of an era...

Tonight I sent an email to my 3 siblings that has left me a little sad. I made something official that-although we are all in agreement on-feels like a surrender of sorts.

We will not be throwing our annual Saunders Christmas Party this year.

We've been co-hosting this event with the support and generous hospitality of our parents for 15 years. Well, this would have been the 15th year, anyway.

There are a handful of reasons why it doesn't make sense for us to have it anymore - one of them being the fact that Joanne will still be in New Zealand next month. In fact, she likely won't be home until next Fall, but that's a whole 'nother bag of beans.
It's actually been a bit of a feat to pull off for the last few years, and Jill has been wanting to throw in the towel on it for some time. She's graciously gone along with it and helped in every aspect, though, for which I am grateful. John's familial obligations have dwarfed his involvement in party prep for a few years now, but he's always come through (with coolers, driveway lighting, extra bins for trash & recycling, and usually way too much beer & alcohol) on the morning of the party.

Between the four of us, our guest list has swelled into the triple digits and at this point, the guests' ages span four generations.
I have looked forward to seeing familiar faces each year, and I am almost positive that I've met someone new every year, too. Last year we raised our glasses to toast the engagement of a couple who met at our Christmas party only a couple of years before.

We've popped bottles of champagne and had Beirut tournaments.
We've run out of food & ordered pizzas.
We've had fires in the fireplace and put floating candles in the pool.
We've served Skippy and Puppy Chow.
I've worn heels some years and slippers other years.
Each year we collected donations for Sacred Heart Services.

I guess I could go on and on. I just wanted to acknowledge the end of an era of sorts. It had to happen sometime, I suppose, and life will go on just fine. But, I'll miss it.

And we never got around to executing Joanne's idea of wearing really bad Christmas sweaters!

Thursday, November 12, 2009

where's my baby belly?


um....yeah. I'm over 5 months pregnant now and I still only have my little, mushy post Sadie belly that I lovingly refer to as my "buddha".
I'm one of those women who loved being pregnant and looked forward to doing it again. I was thrilled to continually hear the conventional wisdom that "you pop out immediately when you get pregnant a second time". I couldn't wait.
Well...
WHERE'S MY BELLY?!
I even went and bought one of those dippy shirts that says "expecting". I'm glad there weren't any "I'm not fat. I'm pregnant." ones (which I have always detested) because I can't be totally sure that wouldn't have bought one of those, too!
I know, I know - I'm saving lots of money on maternity clothes and I should enjoying this time and be glad that I'm not enormous and uncomfortable, blah blah.
But I want my baby belly! I want it. There, that's all.
Okay, I'm done whining.

Friday, November 6, 2009

some shots from our Halloween 2009

Our Jack O'Lanterns

Sadie at a Halloween Event


Sadie Trick or Treating; pretending to be scared


Our costume for my cousin's engagement party

get it?


The Happy Couple - Medusa and Santa!


a pre-Halloween trip to the ER

Sadie got mysteriously sick last Friday. It started with her losing her lunch (in the car, which was pretty horrendous) and I figured she'd just eaten something that didn't agree with her. So I didn't think too much of it when I gave her some water while we were waiting for Andrew's car to get detailed and she threw that up with the rest of lunch. I thought, "okay, that's the rest of it; I'll let her rest and give her some Pedialyte when we get home."
Well, less than an hour after that, when the car was done, she threw up again. At this point, there was nothing left in her stomach, but I covered the backseat with plastic anyway and had to pull over twice on the way home to wipe her mouth & brow and promise her we'd be home soon and that she'd be okay.
I decided to keep a log of how often she was throwing up and quickly realized we had a problem on our hands. She started throwing up every 15 minutes like clockwork and was clearly exhausted, frustrated, and generally miserable. I know that dehydration is a huge worry for little ones, so I called the advice nurse to ask when I could start giving her sips of Pedialyte. After hearing all of my responses to the litany of questions they ask, she wanted to get the doctor's opinion and the consensus was that we were to bring her to the ER. I certainly wasn't going to argue with her, but it did seem a little extreme, since her one and only symptom was vomiting. She had no fever, no diarrhea, no rash, she was not limp, listless, non-responsive or blue in the face. (Mind you, I was glad to answer "no" to all of these things, but I was thinking "jeez, lady - I'd be at the ER already if she was floppy and discolored!!!")
Anyway, it was clear that she was indeed dehydrated and would likely need an IV for fluids. We left for the hospital the minute Andrew got home from work and were processed very quickly. Meanwhile, poor Sadie was still on her 15 minute regimen. Awful.
The nurse failed an IV on one hand, so he had to do the other side, which sucked but Sadie was very brave. We distracted her as best we could and then she said "ow! ow! ow! ow! ow! ow! OW!" and cried a little while he jabbed the needle into her vein and squeezed her arm to take blood samples and taped the splint on, etc. She never pulled away or screamed or thrashed or anything. Talk about trust. Amazing.
When the doctor finally made his appearance, his best guess at a diagnosis was that it was intussusception, and immediately ordered a fluoroscopy enema procedure to get x-rays of her intestines. So, she had to endure that. Thank God Andrew was with us, because I couldn't stay with her for that-since pregnancy and radiation don't mix. Once again, she handled it amazingly well. The radiologist was floored. She told us that whenever she gets these cases and hears that the patient is 2 or 3 years old, she just cringes because she knows what's coming. She says she has a quick meeting with the parents to let them know what they're in for (screaming, the child having to be held down, etc.) We had nothing like that. Sadie squirmed (of course) at first and then when they filled her with the fluid, she said "take it out, take it out, take it out!" but she didn't need to be held down or anything. She did throw up again during the procedure, so the doc ordered some anti-nausea medication for her IV.
Once that kicked in, we finally were able to give her a few sips of Pedialyte every 5 minutes. Poor thing was completely parched. She'd been asking us for water for almost 5 hours at this point! Thankfully, she kept that down, but the doctor was only cautiously optimistic. The anti-nausea medication he gave her was very strong, so he wasn't surprised that she wasn't throwing up the Pedialyte. He released us on the condition that if she threw up once the medication wore off, that we'd bring her straight back in. He was baffled that the test results/x-rays of her belly came back negative. He said her symptom(s) were completely consistent with an intussusception diagnosis. He told us he was surprised but relieved, as it's a pretty serious condition which very frequently requires surgery. He apologized for not having an answer for us, but honestly, we didn't care - as long as she was feeling better! In fact, once the Pedialyte hit her system, she perked up considerably. She even started goofing around, making a "scared Halloween face". I happened to have my camera in my bag, so we got these shots:




Crazy kid. She's such a nut.
She slept the whole night through and had low energy & appetite for 48 more hours, but by Monday night she was 100% back to normal.
1st ER trip down! YES!

Monday, October 26, 2009

Just your average Sunday night dinner...

Every Sunday I look forward to a home cooked meal - and not my own! Our entire family has a standing invitation to come for a weekly dinner at my parents' house (mom just needs a headcount on Saturday or by Sunday morning) and I try never to miss it. It's a great way for us to get together and catch up for a few hours. We have laughs and serious talks. Sometimes we talk about the weather and we generally avoid politics. We share, we listen, we wonder and we muse together. I absolutely love that Sadie gets this fundamental exposure to family communion - not to mention table manners & amazing food!

My mother has always been an incredible cook. My dad teases her that more often than not, if someone likes something she's made, "they'd better enjoy it because they'll never have it again." This is because she rarely makes the same thing twice. She's the type of cook who will experiment by swapping ingredients or adding her own touch to things that sound good to her.

There are always at least 3 courses (appetizer, main dish and dessert) and she covers all food groups, using fresh, healthy ingredients. My dad has a well stocked wine cellar and is wonderfully generous with us, so we get the additional bonus of having an excellent bottle of wine or two with dinner.

Here's where you might get the wrong idea if you don't know me and my family. We aren't the "dress-for-dinner, crystal, silverware and cloth napkin" type of diners - in fact, in the summer, we frequently use paper plates and sit outside still wrapped from the waist down in towels with damp bathing suits and bare feet. My dad is quite skilled on the BBQ, and we are frequently treated to delights like tiger prawns, cedar-plank salmon, grilled veggies from the garden, lamb, and custom sausages made from the returns from my dad's hunting trips, etc. as well as rotisserie chicken, grass-fed beef burgers, and more standard BBQ chicken, ribs, and the like.
My mom is also really inventive with salads, so we get delicious concoctions with all sorts of vegetables, fruits, lettuces, nuts, cheeses and dressings all of the time.
In addition to being an excellent cook, my mom is also an incredibly savvy grocery shopper (a skill I wish to God could be hereditary) so she'll bust out things like Alaskan King crab legs "because they were on sale" at some grocery store or another. Incidentally, my sister Jill has totally picked up this skill and usually finds coupons and sales which inform her meal choices. I need to get on that train.

I love our family tradition of Sunday Night Dinner. We are so spoiled. Over the years I've come to appreciate how much love and effort goes into these meals and I'm so grateful for the time we spend around the dinner table together. My parents are also wonderful hosts, so I've enjoyed inviting friends to our Sunday night dinners and will continue to do so. I keep swearing that "one day" when we have a house and a reasonable kitchen, I will return the favor whenever possible.

Anyway, I am definitely starting to ramble here, but this week's dinner inspired me to jump up and take pictures before we dug in to eat. Here's what we had:
baked acorn squash with some brown sugar butter drizzle
insanely moist corn bread
grilled pork tenderloin
fresh veggie salad with edamame, tomato, red onion, and corn
fruit salad with orange, pineapple, pear and pomegranate seeds
and pecan cups for dessert

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Goodbye Shaggy Town

This little haircut was SO overdue!




Mama got one too; but who wants to see pictures of that? ;)

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

getting back on the Spanish train


The Silicon Valley is a major melting pot of cultures. In our city alone, I consistently hear English, French, German, Russian and Spanish being spoken. It's been bugging me that I don't have another language to speak with Sadie. We had early and very exciting success with sign language with her, which was awesome. But that pretty much came to a screeching halt once she started speaking in 2 and 3 word "sentences" at about 16 months.
Andrew learned French in school and I learned Spanish. Unfortunately, we both have gotten terribly rusty, primarily due to lack of use. Andrew has picked up (and retained) a lot of Spanish words and phrases merely by living here for over a decade now, and I know he'd like to get better at it.
So, I have decided I'm going to make a serious effort to dust off my second language skills and get back on the Spanish speaking train. I may or may not be able to teach it to Sadie, but I know I will enjoy having my conversational skills back. I figure we have 2 things going for us. First, we enjoy being able to speak another language and second, we both seem to have a propensity for it.

Over the weekend we bought strawberries from a Mexican man who was selling them in our neighborhood and it was fun to talk to him. I have always enjoyed surprising native speakers with a decent exchange - especially looking as gringa as I do. This man was impressed with my pronunciation and once I told him that I am 25% Mexican, he said that my heritage explained it.

I have dozens of relatives in Mexico, as my maternal grandfather was from Delicias, Chihuahua. Recently I've been having instant message conversations with one of my second cousins who is 5 years my senior. It is so fun to chat with him because we just correct each other's grammar with no judgement whatsoever. It's an added bonus to be doing it over the computer, because I'm a visual learner, so seeing the words spelled out will help me remember them. I hope.
I'm going to borrow a book from a friend who teaches high school Spanish and I'm going to hit up my local bilingual aunt - who teaches Spanish at the middle school level - for ideas. I don't think I'll join a conversation group or take a course at a nearby community college yet, but those both seem like logical progressions from this point. I also intend to talk to my friend and fellow blogger C who took a class with her husband after being inspired by how beautifully their daughter was absorbing the language via her adoring Spanish-speaking caretakers.

Anyway, I hope I can stick with this plan. Espero que si.

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

so what do I really want?

The other night I had one of my recurring dreams about being friends with Courtney Cox and Jennifer Aniston. God, that's painfully embarrassing to admit, but I'm going somewhere with this, I promise. At least I think I am...

So, I love being a stay at home mama, but I have some serious mental demons about what others think about my choice to be a wife and mom instead of pursuing any type of career. My generation of women is supposed to be "doing it all" because our moms (and in some cases, our grandmothers) forged the path for us to have all the opportunities that we have today. I have a handful of friends who are working mothers and I both readily and humbly admit that I seriously don't know how they do it. Their schedules truly boggle my mind. I know that if I were juggling a career and my family, I'd manage. I do know that. But let me tell you - my days are full. And that's without clients or meetings or conference calls or research or classes to teach.
I cringe when someone asks me "so what have you been up to lately?" because I don't have a snappy, cogent response laden with exciting tidbits from the workplace. I'd love to be able to say, "oh, I just got back from a conference in Paris" or "I just wrapped production on a national commercial" or "I'm working with a new client on their marketing strategy" or "I am about to submit my dissertation" or "I'm writing a grant proposal" or...(you get the idea.)
More often than not, I'm with Sadie when this query arises and I find myself self consciously gesturing towards her and mumbling something like, "well, you're looking at it..." and then promptly changing the subject. I hate that I carry some weird sort of guilt or shame about "just" being a stay-at-home mom.

I follow a few blogs by women I do not know and will likely never meet. They are either total strangers or 2 or 3 times removed (friend of friend of friend). With noteworthy consistency, their posts about motherhood/womanhood totally bowl me over and this one is the most recent example of what I'm talking about.
I copied that link and sent an email to a few close mom friends of mine, asking them to read it when they got a chance. Part of what I wrote was this:
It honestly makes me want to move to Montana (or somewhere far, far away from Silicon Valley), grow a garden, learn to sew, somehow have a cool/funky part time job that I love, and...be a better mom and wife in that natural, earthy, simple back-to-basics way.
I sit in our cluttered little apartment and feel sometimes like I'm doing it all wrong.
Let me be clear - I KNOW I'M NOT. I know I'm doing great and that Sadie is loved and cherished and fed healthy food and gets out to play plenty, etc. but something about this kind of life makes me a little bit crazy with a strange type of envy that I can't quite explain.
It's not a negative envy like I used to have of the pretty/popular girls in junior high... it's an inspirational envy. A motivational envy.
But it's also an envy that leaves me feeling a little paralyzed.
It makes me ask The Big Questions like "What am I doing with my life? Really?" "How can I improve it so that I feel more successful as a mom, wife and woman?" and the big one: "What Do I Want?"


So there it is:
What. Do. I. Want?
Why is that the hardest flipping question to answer? It seriously sends me spinning. I get completely tangled in what-if land when I even casually start to ponder things like going back to school or trying to break into a field in which I have sincere interest. Hell, I can't even narrow down what I'd go back to school for, let alone whether I could hack it while trying to be a good wife and mom at the same time.
*sigh*
Most people who know me well just assume I'll do something with my Theater training. I tried teaching and it wasn't a good fit. I don't know if I have the drive and initiative to attempt running theater camps or workshops (wonderful and logical suggestions I've received more than once from trustworthy, thoughtful sources).
I suppose for now I need to just try harder to feel comfortable in the wife/mother skin that I'm in and make sure to nourish myself as well. Having gotten back onstage twice this calendar year was really good for me and I should not forget that. If I'm forced to admit what my dream job would be, I have to say that it remains the same: Actress. I used to say "famous actress" but for several years now it's been "really talented actress". (Oh, and "who is well paid and gets lots of work" would be nice, too). For better or worse, though, I have absolutely zero interest in moving to L.A. to "make a go of it." At least not in the foreseeable future.
I suppose for now I'll just have to keep dreaming that Jen, Courtney and I get together for girls' lunches to talk about what our next project will be...

Sunday, October 4, 2009

pre Halloween



My favorite holiday is Halloween. I try to find several fun things to do each year to celebrate this whimsical holiday and I'm delighted that Sadie is old enough to partake in the fun now.

First up: cookie decorating with friends!
I spent way too much time looking up cut-out cookie and icing recipes online and then a little too much money on supplies, but we had a marvelous time, so it was well worth it. Plus, I have extras, so we can do this a few more times with more friends. Yay!
oh, the possibilities!

the girls

hard at work

Sadie's "Monster"piece

a tray full of fun!

Doesn't this get you in the mood for a little Halloween mayhem of your own?

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Leather Sneakers and Warm Chocolate Cake



How did we spell
"Happy Third Anniversary?"
D-a-t-e N-i-g-h-t!
Huge thanks once again to our friends Angela and Gernot for entertaining Sadie at their house while we went out for dinner.
  • Oven Roasted Moroccan Spiced Prawns with Scallions and Lemon
  • A shared flight of red wines by the glass from the Rhone region
  • Pepper Crusted Prime Rib with Mashed Potatoes, Bacon, Spinach and Red Wine Sauce
  • Oven Roasted Pork Loin with Creamy Polenta and Olive Tapenade Vinaigrette
  • Warm Chocolate Cake with Mocha Chip Gelato
I'm not sure if my favorite thing was the warm chocolate cake or the the fact that I found the perfect 3rd anniversary present for my hard-to-buy-for honey:

(leather sneakers!)

Sunday, September 27, 2009

Simple stuff

My parents took Sadie for the night last night so that Andrew and I could attend a high school friend of mine's wedding. (I'm sure that sentence is a grammatical nightmare, but I'm moving on.)
It was awesome to get dressed up, go out with my honey,


see old friends,


share the special joy that is in the air at a wedding, and dance until my knees and toes were throbbing.

Even though Sadie is totally content with Grandma & Grandpa, I still always feel the tiniest bit guilty when we go out and have fun without her. She's usually the source of my daily smiles and laughter, but it's good to reconnect with Andrew and have adult conversations for several hours!

We picked her up this morning and she was an absolute ray of sunshine. She had greetings, hugs and kisses for both me and Andrew (she needed a little prompting to give Daddy some love - she's in a bit of a mama's girl phase) and showered us with tons of happy-to-see-you energy.

My dad was watching football and told us that Sadie watched with him for a little bit and then turned to him with a confused look and said, "What are those purple guys doing? They just run and then they fall down!"

I wonder what she'll think when we start her in soccer?

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Counting

"One, two, free, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, 'leven, twelve, firteen, sixteen, nineteen!"

for some reason that really cracked me up just now.

:)

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Just Keep Swimming


We've entered a new phase. Sadie turned 2 and she's changing quite a bit.

She is hung up in this contrary thing where pretty much no matter what we say to her, she insists it's the opposite. I'm talking really mundane things like,
"Mommy, this lion's tail is fluffy."
"Oh, that lion's tail is fluffy? Wow, you're right - it is."
"No, Mommy, it's not."
"It's not? Okay."
"Mommy, it is. It is fluffy."
You get the idea. It's not bratty or sassy - that's the funny part. She's totally sincere and matter-of-fact about whatever it is. Silly. It's taking me too long to learn not to take the bait. Sometimes I can't resist because I just like talking to her, no matter what the exchange is about.

She's getting more and more independent. I admit it kind of blows my mind how independent a 2 year old can be. She wants to climb into her carseat by herself, she loves to open and close doors, she brushes her teeth (even though we still do a follow up), she likes to put the straw into her juice box, etc. This morning she apparently wanted to get out of her crib, so Andrew and I were woken by the sound of a thud followed by crying. She's never done anything like this; she usually wakes peacefully and we'll hear her playing and talking to her "friends" for at least 10 or 15 minutes before she makes any indication of wanting to get out. Even though we asked her what happened and whether she tried to get out of her crib & fell, she wasn't talking. Time for a big girl bed, apparently.

Her attention span has grown - and before you muse at how observant I must be, allow me to fess up - the reason I know this is because all of a sudden she can easily sit through a 2 hour movie. At some point over the last 2 months or so, we put on Finding Nemo for her at Grandma & Grandpa's house and she's hooked. Our neighbors let us borrow one of their daughter's favorites, Madagascar, and she's equally smitten with it as well. I am not surprised; I know plenty of young families whose little ones love animated films. I just want to avoid the pitfall of it becoming a total crutch to put her in front of the TV.
I also am sticking to my guns and avoiding the Disney Princess phenomenon as long as possible. My time may be running out, though. Just last week she was delighted to find that cousin Lucy had left 6 Barbie dolls at Grandma & Grandpa's. When I explained that they were Lucy's and that she'd had to give them back, she balked. I told her we could get a doll like that if she really wanted one because she has some birthday money from GG which was specifically earmarked for such an occasion. I won't deny her if she brings it up again, but I'm also not going to remind her.

Our nighttime ritual of rocking her to Brahm's Lullaby might have numbered days. A couple of times she's opted to stand by herself and rock one of her stuffed animals instead of being in our arms. Ouch.
And today in music class, she was the only kid who didn't get into mommy's lap for the lullaby song. She wanted to stand, listen and look around the room at all of the others. Interesting.

It's amazing to watch her begin her transformation into a little girl. I know there is so much more to come, but I'm happy to take it all in bit by bit and learn how to stand back and let her develop, even if it does tug on the heartstrings a little. Like Dory in Finding Nemo says, I'll "just keep swimming."