The Nitty Gritty

This weekend we went to my grandparents' cabin with our friends, the Eaves. We have been feeling slightly claustrophobic in our house/Utah this winter so we thought it would be fun to go to another house/still in Utah to play. We had a great time!The three hour drive went okay. Savannah didn't get the memo about eating before and was quite hungry about half way there. (Thank you Subway in Brigham City for putting up with our mess.) After about an hour and a half Abbie was ready to be there and kept asking every 10 seconds where the cabin was. For the last few minutes Russ told Abbie he would count until we got to the cabin. This was surprisingly distracting and fun for Abbie, who, whenever Russ stopped, would ask him to keep going. 246, 247, 248..... (I was not allowed to help out. Apparently my counting skills are not up to par.) Russ will not be volunteering this service again. I think an investment in a portable DVD will be in order soon.


At the cabin we had a ball. The girls went sledding. Abbie loved it, and especially loved watching daddy run down the hill to come and get her. Over and over and over.


Russ and our friend Jeff took the four wheelers out for a few hours, and later they took the girls who had a blast. I had thought Abbie would have been more cautious with the four wheelers but she didn't seem to mind the dark and the cold. I had a great time visiting with my friend Bonnie and playing with the kids. Bonnie and I even made it out on the four wheelers which was impressive considering she is seven months pregnant.

We played ping pong. Threw eggs (plastic) down from the balcony, and had an air-hockey tournament. And after the kids were in bed laughed hysterically at Jack Black in Nacho Libre --which Russ and Jeff proceeded to quote (or in Russ's case pose) for the next few days. (I wish I had a better picture.)



Unfortunately, Savannah didn't have as much fun as the rest of our family. She did not like the kid backpack and screamed shortly after getting in. But that is very possibly due to her refusal to take naps or sleep at night. She woke up every half hour from 2:00 - 4:30 one night.. On Sunday her nose started running like a faucet so I think she was getting my cold from last week. Poor girl.

Hopefully now we can survive the rest of winter!

Random Thoughts Sunday

My optimism at having Savannah sleep better at night was unfortunately unfounded....Bummer.

I have been quite sick the last couple of days. Fever, chills, and lots of Kleenex. Being a sick mom is truly miserable. Thankfully my parents took the girls on Friday so I could have at least one full day to rest. I am so grateful that my parents were nearby to help me out. I know many of you don't have that luxury and I don't take it lightly.


Abbie has found a wonderful pass time this week. Washing the dishes! She will spend almost an hour quietly (yeah!) cleaning all of her plastic dishes. I make sure the water is barely a trickle --yes I am aware that I live in a desert -- and let her have at it. I have worried that even this is slightly wasteful, but when I think of the added cost to the health care system my mental breakdown would be, the cost is well worth the benefit.

Savannah has progressed amazingly with her crawling efforts. She is one motivated girl that does not like to be left out of the fun! She can now move her hands while she is crawling rather than just the feet/flop technique of earlier days. I have to admit that while I know of the chaos that a mobile baby is sure to cause it is so fun to see her get excited about being able to get around and know that she isn't content to just sit but likes to get involved in the action!

One thought regarding Valentines Day. We hadn't planned on doing a lot for Valentines (order dinner to go and watch a movie on the couch) which is good because the pile of Kleenex next to me on the couch while we watched the movie grew by the minute. But I do want to say, I am grateful to be married to such a loving man. While we like to have fun and celebrate together we know that our relationship is beyond the need to prove that love on any single day. It is a wonderful place to be.

(Warning to sensitive readers: The following section contains discussions between Abbie and her parents regarding potty training. If you are easily offended by "potty talk"-- don't have kids, or continue reading.)
So potty training has been progressing nicely (Thank Heavens!!!) now as Abbie sits on the potty we have discussions I never imagined hearing or being thrilled about hearing.

"I have lots of pee pees in my bum!"

"Did you hear my poops? It was a big one. I have another one coming. There was another one. I have three poops. I have ten poops. I have lots and lots and lots of poops!"

" I kept Elmo (on her panties) dry. He is just a little wet."

Random Thoughts Saturday

So after a week of potty training we are doing......dare I say it......good. It appears that Abbie has bought into the concept and for the most part tries to get herself to the bathroom. I am insanely grateful. I realize that by posting this I make the mistake of jinxing myself and her deciding that she is done trying tomorrow with Sunday...three hours of church....going back to 10 wet pants a day. But since I made such a big deal about it before I figured all you adoring fans would want to know the status. (Just kidding I'm always surprised anyone reads my blog.)

Note to anyone that has not yet potty trained. In addition to all of the supplies the books will tell you to buy, include the following:

1 - Bottle of heavy duty lotion. The number of times you wash your hands will increase exponentially and they will get very very dry.
2 - Bottle of Tylonal if you are doing the cold turkey hang around the house method. Trust me you'll need it.
3 - If you have a tendency to drink you might want to stock up. I'm not advocating this behavior but you will be stuck inside with small children who will have no interest in what you are trying to accomplish, appear to care and then not care at all, and every few hours will make large and disgusting messes for you to clean up on a daily basis. So well....do what you have to do. If you don't drink, I can personally vouch for large amounts of chocolate being a helpful coping mechanism.


Savannah has started blowing bubbles through her lips to let us know she is happy/content. Imagine the sound you make as a child to imitate a car engine and you have it about right. It is hilarious and very cute.

We went to the zoo today. I think I enjoy the animals as much as my kids.

As you know we've had issues with Savannah sleeping well at night. Back in October she decided she didn't want to take a bottle of pumped milk. Several weeks later we realized that we could syringe milk into her mouth and the problem would be solved. Over the next several months in order to help her sleep better we had been giving her extra milk on top of nursing to no avail. Then last week Russ said that on the nights when she just had formula it seemed to be worse. It took me a week and several really bad nights to realize he was right and that it had probably been going on for months. So with one trip to the store to get a different formula she is doing much better at night. She still wakes up once but compared to what we had been dealing with before, I'm in heaven.

I realize this is often a child-centric blog, but hey so is my life.


Okay there hasn't been much else random this week as potty training has pretty much consumed us.. I know you are terribly dissappointed.

Crazy 8's

I don't think I've ever done a tag before, but since we are potty quarantined I thought I would try it.

8 FAVORITE SHOWS
1. The Office
2. Gilmore Girls (Yes I know it is in reruns, but the writing is brilliant.)
3. Anything on the Food Network
4. The Biggest Loser (I know lame.)
5.I'm with Allie don't really watch much T.V.
6.
7.
8.

8 THINGS I DID YESTERDAY
1. Started potty training.
2. Cried
3. Invited people over for dinner (Yes, on the day I started potty training. What was I thinking? That is why I cried.)
4. Cleaned 10 peed in pants.
5. Watch as Russ was home for 20 minutes and got Abbie to pee in the toilet. (Something I'd been unsuccessful with all day.)
6. Did laundry.
7. Played Rage with someone who had actually heard of the game and was raised on it like we were.
8. Actually got a meaningful scripture study.

8 THINGS I LOOK FORWARD TO
1. Going to Alaska with my family
2. Going to England with Russ's family
3. Summer weather
4. The end of this semester
5. Having Abbie potty trained
6. Having Savannah sleep through the night
7. Going up to Bear Lake in a few weeks
8. Bedtime


8 FAVORITE RESTAURANTS (not in any order)
1. Marrakesh
2. Cedars of Lebanon
3. Cucina Toscana
4. Cafe Molise
5. Settebello
6. Al Forno's
7. Zupas
8. Anywhere I'm not cooking or cleaning up

8 THINGS ON MY WISHLIST
1. A house with a yard in a good school's boundary
2. Abbie to be potty trained
3. Savannah to sleep through the night
4. That Russ's job was 8-5 rather than 9-6
5. That I had a clue what I was doing in potty training
6. More time to read
7. Time to fix dinner
8. Time to spend with Russ


I tag anyone who wants to !

Random Thoughts Sunday

I have been skiing my whole life. Yet still when I stand at the top of a steep hill, I pause. If I pause too long I start to get nervous. The longer I pause the more nervous I become. The hill seems to become steeper and my nerve becomes weaker. This is how I feel about potty training. We start tomorrow and I am scared. Is it because I've been avoiding it for months now? Or are my fears justified?We will see. Well.. I will see because I have no plans to leave our house to come see any of you for a little while. It isn't personal, it is paranoia.
Yesterday we went up to Mountain Dell to go sledding. It was beautiful. The sky was clear. It was quite warm and Mountain Dell is a great place to take a two year old because the hills are really quite gradual. And long. Quite long. Too long to realistically expect a two-year old in boots to climb the entire way back up herself, much less bring a tube with her. Russ and I took turns carrying her/pushing the tube back up the hill. Picture yourself on a StairMaster carrying 25 pounds (Yes, yes only 25 pounds, but still). Abbie had a blast.

Just now Savannah guzzled two whole ounces from the sippy cup... Hallelujah!! (As you see from the picture the solid foods are also going quite well.)

Savannah can now get herself up on her knees and thrust herself forward onto her face. When she gets up she is so proud of herself she makes this laughing/grunting like a pig sound that is just h She doesn't quite have the balance yet to move her hands for crawling but it isn't for want of effort.

Finally, I just have to explain this picture. Savannah uses rolling as her current mode of transportation until her crawl becomes a little more efficient. She rolled right into Abbie's backpack and somehow put it on herself as she rolled again. I think she laughed because we were all so impressed with it.

Random Thoughts Monday

We got Abbie a big girl bed about a month before Christmas. She has yet to figure out that she can get out of it herself. While this is somewhat annoying in the morning when she could get herself up and out, I am not going to enlighten her.

I have decided that I am not above bribing in my household. For every bathroom I clean I get a cookie. For every load of laundry I fold I get to watch my show on t.v. For every time I clean up the kitchen I get to read for 10 minutes. (Yeah right.. if that were the case I would be reading all day.) I figure that if I don't reward my efforts no one will.

This week I called a cease fire. I was hoping to get Savannah to sleep until 4:30 until she woke up for her night time feeding. But after three solid weeks of listening to her cry for several hours each night I have agreed to a compromise of 3:30 - one hour later than she had been waking up and one hour earlier than I wanted her up. That does give her eight and a half hours of sleep before I feed her. I am trying to convince myself first that 8 hours is still good and second that she will need her strong will to overcome the challenges that life presents, and not focus on the fact that my six month old is beating me. Hey, it is all I have...

Savannah has got some killer hair. I have know idea where the reddish hints came from but I sure think she is lucky to have them. Other Savannah updates....she will now take a sippy cup about half of the time. Between that and adding solid foods I am getting a little bit of time to myself. Ha! who am I kidding, but I am able to teach my class without stressing that she is screaming for Russ for four hours.


The other day Abbie said, "Mom you are nice to me..", after I had helped her stop screaming bloody murder(waking up Savannah early from a nap) while I was on the phone with the car mechanic because she had spilled cereal all down the front of herself and I didn't loose my cool. I don't think I can afford the reward I deserve for that.


No I have not started potty training. This is how I figure it. This month I battle Savannah in sleeping, next month I focus on Abbie and potty training. March, I'm sure will be a resurgence of a battle with Savannah with my goal of getting her to sleep through the night. April.....well we'll see.

A Joke

In this political climate it is very daring to make political jokes. Everyone thinks that you are not just joking but making a statement either approving or disapproving of a political leader, policy or practice. I think that we've all gotten a little too sensitive. So I don't really care if you think I am making a statement or not or what statement you think I'm saying. I just thought this was funny.


How many Harvard Law Review Editors does it take to say the Oath of Office?




Apparently more than two.

Ka-Chow!

Last night Russ had the girls while I was in class. Abbie decided she wanted to watch Cars, so every two minutes she asked. "Daddy can we watch Cars." After some time he - quite sick of saying "No" - told her to stop asking.
Then she suggested they start a game of Simon says. Abbie was Simon.

"Simon says put your hands on your head."


"Simon says turn around."


"Simon says lets watch Cars!"



She looks so innocent.

******


Savannah has inherited her sister's penchant for trickery. Just as I was about to announce that she would sleep until 4:30 in the morning. She has spent the last two nights screaming from 3:30 on. Yeah.

Potty Training 101...HELP

Don't think from the title that we have actually started potty training. Oh no that would be way too daring for the likes of a baby like me. I do however want to pick the brains of all of you mothers out there that have been through this rite of passage (Is it as much a rite of motherhood as toddlerhood?) So what worked? What didn't? I just purchased a kiddie seat for the toilet, a step stool (Abbie is a tiny thing.) stickers, underwear, and prize candy. I don't know how to start, or where to go from here, or what to do. HELP?!?!?




**Yes this is a ploy to put off the actual potty training until all of your wonderful advice comes in.

My New Toy

I have a new toy that I have spent hours of time that I don't have playing with. First let me say I know NOTHING about Photoshop. Being married to Russ has made me turn into a helpless/brainless and weak woman when it comes to all things photo-tweaking (and bicycle-tire-changing but that is another story.) Frankly it has just made me lazy. Russ is a wiz at Photoshop and can fix/alter/tweak photos really quickly. So why bother going through a teadious process of learning a program when I have an in house expert with an artistic eye? Until today.

The Pioneer Woman is one of the blogs I check regularly. And as an amatuer photographer she is amazing. This week she put two sets of about eight "actions" for photoshop available for free download on her blog. An action is a program that allows you to perform a series of steps with the click of a button (Similar to a macro if you know what those are.) You are all probably very familiar with actions but I as a Photoshop novice (pre-novice) had no idea. So these actions have allowed me a clueless lazy photographer to do some pretty cool stuff with pictures. Of course if I really knew what I was doing I could do even more (so don't worry all you Photoshop wizzes I am not cramping your style.) But if you are like me and quite lazy with the program -- this is super cool.





(The first picture is the original, the rest are the ones that I tweaked with the click of a button.) I haven't used all of the actions she has just the ones that worked for these pictures.

The same is true for this series of Savannah. The first is the original picture, the rest me - a Photoshop baby - made. I'm not in love with all of them but it has provided hours of entertainment. Oh...don't worry of course my house was spotless first, I had exercised, prepared for my class, read scriptures, played constructive and educational games with my girls individually and together, made a fabulous dinner, meditated about my future goals and ambitious, washed and folded all of the laundry in the house before spending time on this........of course that is what I did. :)

A Line in the Sand

It is 3:37 a.m. I have been up for one hour and seven minutes. Why? Because last night I drew a line in the sand. I am now refusing to nurse Savannah before 4:30 a.m. She is almost six months old and I am exhausted. She has regularly been waking up at 2:30, 4:30 and 6:30 for as long as I can remember, which considering my sleep deprived state might not be very far back. So here I sit listening to her cry hoping praying that she will fall asleep any minute. Abbie thankfully sleeps though the whole ordeal without a peep. I've turned on the bathroom fan in our bedroom to block the noise for Russ (He has his first lecture for the design class he is teaching tomorrow at 7:15 so he needs his rest. Yup I really pick great timing to make my stands with my kids.) Yet here I sit.

Yes, I could be in bed in the white-noise-blocked room sleeping away. After all I am just letting her cry. But some how if she is going to cry I need to hear it, in my mind showing I care by co-suffering with her, or listen just in case something happens (like a meteor flies into her room and the white noise from my bathroom would block the sound of the impact). I would feel guilty sleeping away while she screamed. Or maybe I would feel rested. Aahh, rested! What does that feel like?

Wait I think she stopped.




Maybe.



Nope. Oh, wait....nope.

(I just went in and reswaddled her.)




3:49. I think it is quiet. Please...




I'm going to bed.

4:07a.m. - Awake again. I mean she is awake again. I never made it to sleep. It is a sick thing with my body that I can be so physically exhausted and then have such a difficult time falling asleep. I just gave her Tylenol in case there really is pain.

4:09 Quiet Again...... Nope.

I can't think of anything else to say. Maybe I'll post a picture.

Yeah that is about accurate.


(It is now 8:16 and I will confess I finally fed Savannah at 4:16. I figured it was close enough to 4:30 to meet my original goal. Only after I finished did I realize I might have just trained her to cry for two hours every night before I will feed her......)

(Sort of) Random Thoughts Saturday

We've have been wonderfully busy the last three weeks and thus the dearth of posts (not that you are keeping track.) We have had family in town constantly - first Russ's mom and then my brother and sister-in-law all braving the horrible storms from Portland to make it down. It has been SO much fun to have them all around and we will all miss them terribly. So this is sort of random and also a recap of our Christmas.

We spent Christmas Eve with my family taking the girls sledding then having our traditional dinner of chicken cordon bleu and artichokes followed by the candle lighting ceremony of saying what we are grateful for. Then presents....of course.

Christmas day was spent mostly at home helping Abbie get over the shock of no nap and a late bed time from the day before and a plethora (relatively speaking) of presents. It was nice to celebrate the day with just our little family. We also learned that it is possible to build a tower of legos from the coffee table to the ceiling. On a related note, Russ turned eight just for the morning.

It is a testimony of love for my daughters that they got four toys among them that sing loud obnoxious songs periodically. Or it is a testimony to my severely diminished mental state? Take your pick.

I saw the movie Twilight with my sister-in-law Allison. I thought they did a great job portraying the book quite accurately and I enjoyed the movie. However, I was more than slightly disconcerted/embarrassed/appalled at the group of 30-something women who started whistling when Edward a (17 year old boy) appeared on screen. I don't understand the obsession and frankly I'm grateful.


Having family, new cousins for your kids, and get-togethers is one of the highlights of the holidays. Having non-napping, late-bedded, kids is not.

I was sorting clothes from my long overdue laundry pile the other day. We sort our clothes into whites, darks, towels/sheets and pinks. Yup pinks..it in theory is the lights pile but with two girls I might as well have spilled Pepto Bismal over the pile for the number of other colors that are in it. I try to fight this trend. I search long and hard to buy non-pink clothes for the girls to wear but somehow, between showers, Christmas, birthdays, and grandmas I have come to accept this reality. Who am I to stop a rising tide?

For those of you who this means anything to...today I forced Russ to eat some steamed broccoli with cheese he said..and I quote..."It's not that bad.." Maybe 2009 will be a better year after all.