Halloween 2010

Just as I was getting back into my “blog groove” life sped up!  Last Sunday night my uncle passed away and of course, it changed the plans of the week.  Mom headed to SC to go be with her sister.  On Wednesday, Carolyn and I headed to the funeral and left Lj with her Daddy.  Although, it’s always hard to lose a family member, we all felt peace knowing that my uncle is in a better place and will no longer live his life in pain. We enjoyed seeing extended family but it was such a long day!  I hope to go back soon for a family reunion and bring Lexi and Geoff with me.

On Thursday, I was able to leave work around lunch and go to Lexi’s school for their costume parade.  Lexi was a bit overwhelmed with all the activity.  They had carnival games, a pizza party and then the costume parade.

Lexi and her friend Rachel

When I got back to school Ms. Lissa had a gift bag for Lj so when I got home and gave it to her, she was in heaven!  Sara had come over to take care of Lexi while I finished work so the boys were here playing with her.  They enjoyed it too!

Thanks! Ms. Lissa!

Sara took care of Lj for us Thursday afternoon and Friday.  Lexi was thrilled because she brought along her newest member of their family, Gracie.  Lexi would like a Gracie of her own but oh, well.

Friday afternoon after I got home, we dressed the kids up in their costumes and headed downtown for the Scarecrow and Beggars Stroll.  It was really nice.  The downtown businesses were giving out candy and they had all kinds of activities for the kids.  We even watched one of the local bank employees perform Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” in the street.  They decorated pumpkins too!  Brennen sure does not like scary costumes but he didn’t mind picking up a few props.

These three were NOT much interested in allowing photo opts! Brennen would not wear his transformer mask and CE wouldn’t wear his gorilla top.

After we left downtown, we headed to our church Fall Festival.  (which is just down the street) Our church goes all out every year.  They had games, bouncy house and slide, free hot dogs, chili, drinks, funnel cakes, cotton candy, and tons of games. 

Lj and Daddy collapsed soon after we got back home.

On Saturday, we took Lj to the County Fall Festival.  It was huge!  Totally crowded and totally overwhelming!  Lexi didn’t smile not once.  She just took in the crowds.  The only thing she did was get her face painted like a kitty-kat.  Brennen rode the horses but CE only sat on it and then wanted right off.  We didn’t stay that long because she was so overwhelmed.

 

Later in the day after much needed naps, we carved our pumpkin just in time for trick-or-treating.  We had to pull out Lj’s Cinderella dress for trick-or-treating because the hem of the Snow White one is coming un-sewn. We played around out front and then walked down the street pushing Lj on her tricycle.  She had no problems going to the doors but would not say “trick-or-treat” no matter what we said.  Nor would she say “thank-you”.  She wanted to but was acting shy!

 

 

Too bad I didn’t get another picture of Lexi passed out on her Daddy’s lap again on the couch.

 We were going to go back to the pumpkin farm today with Sara and the boys but with my week being so busy, I just couldn’t find the energy.  I think Lj has had plenty of stimulation this week!  So we had a quiet day at home.  I love this time of year!  There is so many fun things to do and we find ourselves looking for festivals to go to.  We’ll see what is next!

POTTY TRAINING UPDATE:

Potty training is going great!  She rarely pees in her pull-up and tells us when she needs to go potty.  She hasn’t mastered the poopy part but she is trying.  The first time she went poopy in the potty she freaked out and cried like crazy.  It really bothered me but after a day or so, she was okay again. It’s hard to believe that just last weekend, we were potty training her and now she is almost complete.  She even has been waking us up at night if she is wet.  I can’t wait for Mom to see how much she has changed in the week she has been away! We even had our first public restroom potty visit today.  She did awesome!  We took her back to the China Buffet Restaurant for supper tonight.  She ate better than she has in a very long time.  I think I’m going to have to learn to make lo Mein.  She also fell in love with snow crab legs!  We are very proud of our sweet little Lexi!

Airplanes and Aggressiveness?

For the last few weeks Lexi has been obsessed with making an airplane out of Legos.  She builds them at Mom and Dad’s and then pretends to fly them but when the pieces break apart she gets frustrated.  So today, since she is on DAY 4 of doing great at potty training, I decided to take her to Wal-Mart to buy her one.  We found one AND we found a much cooler Snow White costume (the other one was just $3 less and was already falling apart after just trying it on plus it fit perfectly which meant not much wear) than the one we have and we bought it.  We also bought a pack of “Princess” underwear because she tells us regularly that she is a princess. (not our doing for sure!) Of course, the new dress is a bit too big but it is way cuter and will last longer. And of course, she will NOT smile! (this dress is a 4t on a barely 2t!)

When we got home, Carolyn and Brittney were here waiting on us.  Lexi was so excited to go pee for them when we came inside.  It is amazing to think that just 4 days ago, she had NO interest in it!  Brittney and Lexi played so good and we all ended up eating dinner together.  Brittney even gave Lexi a bath but then suddenly Lexi “broke bad” and threw her airplane at Brittney hitting her in the funny bone. We all know that this is not funny but funny at the same time.  Our concern was teaching her that throwing was not nice and unacceptable.  Geoff put her in time out (yes, fighting back his laughter much to my dismay!) and once he went back to talk to her told her to apologize to Britt.  She had nothing to do with apologizing.  We have not seen this side of her.  In fact, he put back in time out and told her she would have to go to bed if she did not apologize.  Nothing.  So to bed she went.  I went in there a little while later to talk to her about it and she told me she wanted to apologize but when we came back out it was as if the “cat got her tongue”.  She never would apologize and we put her back to bed.  I guess this is part of the stubborn side of Lj.  I don’t mind her playing with boy toys but I don’t want her to become an aggressive little girl.  I guess it’s lesson time.
On a more serious note, my Uncle passed away last night.  Our family is mourning his passing but know deep in our hearts that he is in a better place.  His funeral will be on Wednesday in South Carolina.  Carolyn and I will be making it in a day trip and Geoff is going to take the day off to be a stay at home Dad.  Please pray that our family will heal from the loss of my uncle, especially my sweet Aunt.  She is one of the strongest women I have ever known and this has been hard on her.  I pray for peace for her and our family. 

By Golly, I think she has got it!!

I think we have it!!!  This morning, by the time I got up Lexi had gone to the potty twice!  So I decided to drag out a Reward Chart that I had bought a few months back.  We altered it and put two stickers by week one for Friday and then three stickers for week two.  And began to add stickers for today.  We couldn’t believe how excited she got over putting her stickers on and she kept asking us all day to go to the potty.  If she couldn’t go she would say, “I’ll try again later”.  Every time she went, she ran to show us her pee and then flushed it and would say “I want to do it again and again and again!”  Then she would head to the sticker chart and put it on.  All in all today she got 12 stickers!! We finally just let her put them anywhere she wanted them.  We even got brave and took her to the grocery store in pull-ups.  She went potty before we left and then again when we got her home.   I really think she has it now!  We’ll have to work on getting the poopy in the potty next!  We are sooooo proud of her.  I never in a million years thought we could make this much progress in 3 days!

Salad anyone??

Like Mommy like Daughter?  After a few months of trying to figure out what Lj will eat at school, we found her preference… salad.  Like Mommy.  Mommy has been on a diet since August and eats a LOT of salad with Krafts’ Roasted Red Pepper Italian with Parmesan dressing (very low fat and delish!).  I usually put on some shredded cheese and bacon bits and our GIRL just loves it!  So at least twice a week we send her with salad for lunch.   I hope she will take on her Daddy’s meal choices soon because it is Mommy that needs to eat to lose weight, not Lexi!  I have to admit, it is fun to see her take on my traits.  Just this morning,  I was drinking a bottle of water and rested it on my shoulder as I sat in the chair with her.  I looked down to find her resting her miniature bottle of water on HER shoulder. It was too funny!

Thankfully, we have whole milk to make up for her lack of eating anything but salad!

Potty-Progress!

What a weekend!  We still have one day left but the past two days have been eventful to say the least.   This week, we (Mom and me) began to try a bit harder with Lj at potty training.  On Friday, Mom put her in pull-ups after school and when I got there she was having her afternoon snack sitting on the potty.  I took her home in pull-ups and continued it.  She was happy to wear the pull-up as long as she could wear a dress.  I told her that she could wear a dress as long as she wore the pull-ups.  I’ve heard of people getting kids to use the potty to keep from soiling their underpants but never one for wearing a dress.  By the end of the evening, she had gone potty twice in the potty.  She, of course, fussed about the pull-ups but by the end of the night was very proud of herself!  We had planned to go back to the pumpkin farm but decided to stay home and have some potty-training boot camp.

So how did it go… this morning, Geoff got her up and she told him she needed to potty even though she had already gone.  She had to wear a dress and was happy to potty train as long as she could wear the dress.  We went through 3 pull-ups by nap time and when she got up from her nap we put her in training pants.  She tried really hard but got distracted “crafting” with me and had an accident.  She cried so hard that my heart ached for her.  We assured her that she would make mistakes and that we were NOT mad at her.  After this traumatizing experience, we put her back in pull-ups.  I was about to give up later in the afternoon when she began to cut up and say “I don’t want to wear my pull-ups!  I want a diaper!”.  I made her sit on the potty and suddenly she said, “you hear that???”.  Sure enough, she was going pee-pee!  She got up so excited and couldn’t wait to empty the potty!  Less than 45 minutes later, she went outside to “help” her daddy grill and then came running in saying “I need to go potty!”.  I helped her sit down and she immediately began to pee.  She again said, “you hear that!”.  We praised her and she said, “I want to do it again, and again, and again!”. 

So at bedtime tonight, Geoff told her it was time for one more potty visit and that we would be putting a diaper on her.  She sat down and immediately went potty!  So we have went from 2 times to 3 times.   We are hoping for 4 tomorrow!  We have talked to her about wearing pull-ups at preschool next week and she says she wants to.  I think at this point, we have to continue the process no matter what. 

During the day today I pulled her hair up in a pony tail and she wanted to wear a hair bow that I bought her last weekend.  It IS very outrageous but she loves it!  We ended up playing catch me in a photo if you can.  I tried to get some cute photos but this was the best I could get…

Bunny and Ears??

Yesterday we came home after work/school/shopping and began our evening.  I had some change in my pocket along with a lot of change on the counter so I got Lexi’s bunny out for her to feed.  She had lots of fun feeding her bunny and then was extra excited when Aunt Carolyn showed up to give her even more money for her bunny.

Then last night after going to bed, she awoke crying after I had gone to bed and her Daddy had stayed up late studying.  He tried everything he knew to get her back to sleep to no avail.  Finally, he put her down and went to bed.  Not long afterward she came to the door and I woke up to see her standing in our bedroom door and scooped her up and put her in bed with us.  She finally slept but when the alarm sounded this morning, I was in no way ready to go off to work and leave her.  So I called and took a sick day.  I made an appointment with her dr. and before we had to leave Lj and I just laid around being lazy and cuddling.  While I was getting ready to leave she fell asleep on the couch. 

Well, once we got to the pediatrician’s office, things got worse.  Although Lj had no temp, she did still have mucus and drainage from three weeks ago.  She also still had a cough.  So after examining her, the dr. said that her ears were so full of ear wax that she could not see to determine if her ears were still infected.  This is a common thing with Asians.  Their ear wax is different than Americans.  Ours is more waxy and theirs is more dry and “sand-like”.  They flushed Lj’s ears but nothing helped.  The thing that struck me the most was that it really hurt her.  It hurt to have her ears prodded.  And she began to cling to me just as she did on the very first day we met her.  She was suddenly my “koala bear” again.  Not crying out in huge loud screaming cries but silent big tear drops escaping from her eyes.  I couldn’t help but have flash backs to the day in China when they gave her 5 immunizations and had about 6 different doctors examine her.  Who knows she may have had the same flashbacks.  But I do know that my instinct was nothing but to comfort her and let her know how much I loved her. 

We now have 10 more days of antibiotics pretty much due to my observations of her and not the doctors ability to view her ear drum.  We just know that she is not herself and that something is wrong.  I find this especially interesting since I’ve taken her in once before knowing something was going on but told to wait it out and then in just days take her back and have to have the antibiotics. 
Lexi was clingy and needy all evening until Daddy came home.  Then she got a Halloween card from Aunt Kelley and then she was eager to feed her rabbit again and reseal the card to protect it (…yea, from what???? Lexi?  Too funny!)


And of course, without sickness or any other factor, our little Lj still had more energy than both of us put together!

P of the Day

My dear friend Melissa has been after me to get caught up on my Project 365.  It’s a daunting task but I do want to do it.  I’ve got the photos but not the time!  However, I made SURE I got the picture of day today…

We started trying to potty train our little miss again today.  She certainly is a stubborn one! She made it through the day with Mom and never wet her pull up.  When I got there this afternoon, she was sitting on the potty.  After a fruitless wait, we headed home.  Once we got home, we did as we usually do and took Sable outside.  Then I heard her making “noises”.  Sure enough, she “used” the pull-up.  I talked to her about how big girls use the potty and we changed into another pair.  After a little while, she wet that one!  Then I decided that I would put her in training pants so that it would make her uncomfortable if she wet again.  Later on she wet those and I put her on the potty.  In a few minutes we heard “I DID IT!!”.  She did… about a tablespoon full but we celebrated like it was the most awesome thing ever.  The real payoff came during dinner though.  She got up and started to cry (she was wetting her pants) so I sat her on the potty and next thing we knew she had filled it up quite a bit!   Finally!  She was very proud of herself… so here it is the “p” of the day! 

Lj Dancing Debut!

She has no formal training... LOL!  Last week Geoff was flipping through our On Demand Video channels and because Beyonce's song was used in last season's Glee he decided to watch it.  Well, Lj was still up and began to watch and then dance... I had a not so good video camera here and tried to capture it.  Before it was over, she watched AND danced to this video 5 times!  It amazed us as we watched her try to copy the dance moves on screen.  We did for sure learn how much our girl can shake her little boo-ty! I made the mistake of trying to get her to do the "hand move" that Beyonce makes but the glove scared her and now after noticing it she will not dance her song anymore... so this is it folks!  But it is cute! 

Here's take 3...

Lights, Camera, no battery!

 (have no idea where the sound went in this video... I guess that is the result of a 15 second video via a cell phone!)

Today was such a great day! We have been anxiously awaiting Lexi's Preschool Field Trip to the Pumpkin Farm.  They have tons of cool things to do there and we enjoyed it last year so I knew we were in for a treat!  I had Mom and Dad go with us knowing they would love it too.  I prepared so much... new pumpkin shirt, newly made matching bow from Aunt Carolyn, and even charged all THREE of my camera batteries.  So when we get there I pulled out the camera to take a picture of Lexi with Kelsey (a teacher friend's son) I got nothing!  I looked inside and just melted inside!  No battery.  How in the world could I do such a thing!  


We were rescued by Jade's Mom and Dad.  They were prepared with a Flip Video camera and a regular one so we took turns on and off all morning.  I'll probably get some pictures tomorrow from them but for now all I have is a video taken from my cell phone.  


The highlight of day was the corn house (that's what we called it anyhow). It was like a little playhouse filled full of corn kind of like one of those ball pits for kids to play in.  Lexi had nothing to do with it until after almost everyone had left but us.  We were going back around and she and I went in and it was at least 30-45 minutes before we came back out.  A little boy from church came over too and Lj and John David played so nicely!  It was so much fun.  I hope to add more pictures later.  


We will be going back if all goes well this weekend. Lexi wants to take Brennen and I WILL remember the battery!!!

Preschool Fun

I never realized how much I would enjoy having Lexi in preschool but I LOVE it!  She is doing so well and learning so much that she just amazes me more and more everyday.  Well, yesterday the Fire Truck came to the school to teach the kids about Fire Safety.  It happened to be my day to bring in snacks so I dove into the Internet looking for the perfect snack.  I ended up combining a few recipes and making these cookies. 

Then I met mom up at the preschool to deliver a book for her teacher about Fire Safety.  While I was there of course, I had to snap a few pictures of Lexi taking her snacks in.

When I picked her up from Mom’s we went home with her wearing her fireman’s hat.  She was so excited about her day.  I love watching her grow and learn!

When we got home she found her cookies from the day before and treated herself to a snack.   

Of course, the “binkie” (as she calls it) is never far away. Tomorrow will be lots of fun too because her class is going to the Pumpkin Patch and I am taking a personal day from work to go with her.

P.S.  I’ve been TOLD by numerous people that I’ve been a slacker blogger and I have to admit that is true.  I will do better. 

Dilemmas

Please disregard the crying child below… this is a standard look when she is being made to do something she does not want to do… like try on jeans for Mommy.

I’ve been going through Lj’s closets and we can mark this moment in time as one when the child actually does need some new clothes.  The stuff from last fall and winter is too small or too short.  These jeans are 12-18 months.  They still fit her waist but the are high-waters. 

This skirt… FINALLY fits!  it’s 12-18 months.  She has several of these that will work but she will have to wear tights or leggings.

These are actually 2T’s that I bought for $3.99 this summer.  They fit!  At least as best I can tell while she fusses and cries to take them off.  The problem is the length.  Mom is going to hem these for us.  We are going to go shopping for her some clothes this weekend.  Hopefully, we’ll find some jeans that have the adjustable waist!

Life with a two year old can be hard sometimes. Lately, she has found her independent, bossy, whiney, demanding side.  It’s amazing the change in her!  Last Saturday, I woke up with a killer sinus attack.  I eventually went back to bed only to be woken up by her fussing.  I got up and found her finishing her lunch.  I put her plate up and a few minutes later she wanted more.  So I got her more, I gave the dog a piece of sandwich meat and she yelled out “MINE”.  I told her it was okay if I gave Sable some and then headed back to the dining room only to be fussed at by her again with “I WANT TO DO IT BY MYSELF!” (she wanted to carry the plate but with a dog in the house that was not possible.) So I asked her sit down and she went to the wrong chair.  A chair that Sable could easily jump on. So I had to “reason” with her to go to the other chair.  She continued fussing and finally I had had enough.  I told her that if she didn’t stop all her fussing I was going to spank her hinny.  Believe it or not she came right back it me with “I WANT DADDY TO SPANK MY HINNY!”.   Ugh!!!!  What child is so controlling that she even tries to dictate who spanks her.  (Not that we spank her often but sometimes, it’s called for.)

We hear “I want to do it by myself” a ga-zillion times a day!  Everything is a battle including like I mentioned above trying on clothes, deciding what to wear to  and of course the one thing that irritates me the most is how much she HATES taking pictures.  And now, the little monster makes faces for the camera.  (like she did yesterday when taking a picture with Mom before church)  Mom and Dad took her to church while we stayed home and had a few hours of quiet non-fussy, demanding fuss.  It was very welcome!

Can the terrible twos pass sooner?  Please??? If they don’t I’ll be posting more pictures like this…

I took this one of her bunny last week when she refused to let me snap a picture.  That didn’t work either.  At least stuffed bunnies don’t try to boss you around.