what 3-year-old C said to me today

This morning after my husband left to take First Girl and Second Girl to school, I closed the door, turned to Third Girl, and said like I do nearly every week day, "It's [C] and Mommy time!"

C said, "Yayyyyy!"

me: Do you love C and Mommy time?

C (smiling): Yes! You're so adorable. I just want to eat you.

Yep, we are so happy when we're together. I was away in another room to make this blog post, but actually played a video from facebook first, and then I could hear her crying. She wanted me to sit and watch Signing Time with her. I did, arms around her the whole time. It felt so good.

how I started 2015

It's past my bedtime, on the first day of the year. I am frustrated that I was trying to cut or undo something and the whole draft I'd written a few hours ago disappeared! Well, I'll start over. :0)

My friend Shelly, whose kids I babysit twice a week, had a fun New Year's Eve party with healthy food. The five of us went, so my husband was able to meet the others that I had met at a potluck back in August (he worked that Saturday). I didn't already know Amy and Nate, though. All five families including us brought our kids, who played on scooters and decorated hats while most of the adults played Five Crowns.

What I really want to write about was the great things about this January 1st. Right at midnight we were home in bed and had a quick kiss, then for fifteen minutes we continued what we were each doing. He watched videos on the iPad, and I finished reading my book: Christmas Jars by Jason F. Wright.

Soon after I woke up I was kind of depressed for a minute about the way I feel in the morning and all the time. Chronic pain. I didn't cry and snowball it like I did yesterday, though. It's so good that D and I have each other. We've talked about what we want to do this year and it will be good. For example, we are determined to pay off our debt. Anyway, knowing it's now 2015, I remembered that I had thought that in 2014 I would get rid of my constant headache. I did try more than a few different tests and treatments and stuff throughout the year but I need to be patient with what I'm currently doing (my doctor prescribed myofasical release, the medication gabapentin, and flonase (I don't think the last two are doing anything for me, at least not yet)). And I am going to keep searching, too. Neil Nathan, M.D.'s book Healing Is Possible: New Hope for Chronic Fatigue, Fibromyalgia, Persistent Pain, and Other Chronic Illnesses is giving me some things to think about.

A little bit after that, I played my piano for the first time this year. I chose Worthy Is The Lamb That Was Slain / Amen from Handel's Messiah. I bought my copy of the book while in college, for a performance with hundreds of other people; I will never forget that experience!

A few days ago was also really nice, when I played the piano to wake up our kids. That day it was the suite from Forrest Gump. Many years ago I had to tape the spine of this sheet music to hold it together. I played it in a talent show when I was in junior high.

Let's see . . . also, I let the girls watch Netflix a lot today while D was working. I watched some of my own as I cleaned the kitchen and stuff (using the iPad while they had the TV on). The show I'm binge watching is Gilmore Girls. I never saw any of it until the middle of December. 

In the morning I pondered and wrote down some things I need to do (some of them are resolutions) and had some good gospel study time. I worked out, took a long shower, and eventually we accomplished our chore checklist.

Oh! Third Girl made me laugh harder than I had in a long time. She can be pretty funny, but doesn't do this kind of thing as much when she's away from home. You won't fully appreciate it because you can't hear her tone, and I don't remember it all, but that's okay. I was with her as she sat on the potty. It was bedtime, when we always make her go, and I said that I wanted to hear her pee. Then we talked about something else, or I kissed her knees. Then suddenly she said in her voice that's higher than her normal voice, "You hear someping?" And I thought she meant her peeing, but she quickly says, "Butterflies?" As if they even make a sound! Oh, man, it was hilarious.

"I'm just vehwee busy"

I walked toward the living room tonight and saw C sitting in this box. I absolutely HAD to take a picture and write down what she said.

"I'm just vehwee busy."

"You're very busy?"

"Yeah. I'm vehwee tired."

(I can sometimes relate. Not only was my husband gone with the Army for 2.5 weeks, but the temp job I was able to do forced me to stay up past 2 a.m. Saturday when he was at drill. And we are moving this month! We found an amazing deal on a condo to rent. It's exciting, but thinking about the packing we will do makes me tired. There are some other really good things and changes happening in our family and our families, too (no, I am not pregnant). I'm happy. "Come what may, and love it.")

C at 15-23 months old

I shared a video of her last summer, but it's been longer since I wrote an update on C, also known online as Third Girl. Even then it wasn't current. This post has been a draft for a long time. I kept changing the title of it because another month had passed so her age was different. :-) I've kind of missed blogging about our children and sharing some of our many pictures and videos.

This affectionate little girl is . . . 

Walking! This is a major accomplishment so I'm putting it first. C spent months cruising or walking as she held someone's hands (and still bum-scooting to go where she wanted). Then she was walking around -- not just cruising -- since a Sunday in July about a week before turning 19 months. Before that she would do maybe seven steps toward a chair or something, but since that Sunday she was great at walking and almost never fell down. She was so cute when she and I looked at each other while she walked, and she grinned because I was so proud of her. I cancelled her eye appointment that was for that week. (Our family doctor had thought maybe her weird right eye -- not quite a "lazy eye" -- was making walking hard. We did see the eye doctor first in May 2013, then again in November. He said it's getting better and we should just see him again a year later.)

walking away from Mommy

Growing. At her 18-month appointment she weighed 18 pounds and a few ounces, which put her in the 3rd percentile, and was 28 inches tall. At 23 months she weighed 20.5 pounds.

Her sixth tooth came in on June 8th (17.5 months) and her tenth tooth came in around 21 months old.

Talking. When it was general conference weekend in October I wrote down some words I knew she could say. She was just over 21 months old. It was about 70 words.

Here are the photos of her on her 15-month day in March 2013:

 

 
16 months:

 

 

18 months: 

19 months:

20 months (I liked so many of these!):

 

 

 

I will add the 17- and 21- to 23-month-day pictures later. We got a new desktop computer with our tax return money. We haven't sorted and organized our many photos properly yet. I just want this published now. Darn laundry and dishes need me again . . . We are thankful for this sweet soul every day!

rainbow jeans from Nana

A few weeks ago, I had to take photos of C in the cute jeans that her Nana gave to her (for either her birthday or Christmas; I don't remember). They have a warm, purple layer inside the denim, and rainbows on the back pockets. I also really like this striped hoodie sweater that we had kept after First Girl wore it. I don't know if Second Girl ever wore it. Since she was born during summer instead of winter it might not have fit at the right time.

 

 

 

video: toddler walking with a shopping cart

Today's goal is to put away lots of clean laundry. Believe it or not, I do have stuff I want to blog about. For now, enjoy this video I made last week. Everyone in the store thought C was so cute. She totally is.

C's fourteenth month

C turned fourteen months old a little over a month ago (February). At this point she was standing and furniture-walking a lot more, but she was kind of between being a baby and being a toddler. No teeth, which is fine with me. She usually nursed four times a day.  Maybe once a day I help her drink a few sips of water or non-dairy milk from a regular cup. She couldn't figure out how to make anything come out of a sippy cup.

During her fourteenth month she tasted these new foods: oranges, ground flax seeds, purple cabbage, edamame (she had had soy products before, though), Enfagrow (just twice -- I think it was the cause of a diaper rash, and rather than this dairy/oil/sugar drink to help her gain weight, I increased the amount of avocado, nuts and seeds I fed her), almond butter, chicken (she rarely has it), celery, and beets.

Oh, speaking of Enfagrow, that is what the pediatrician gave me during the (expensive) weight and height check on February 8th. This was almost six weeks after the twelve month appointment when C was 1st percentile for weight. On February 8th she had gained some weight, but not as much as they would have liked her to. I plan to look at our kids' charts from the doctor to compare our girls to each other, but more importantly I want to see where they are and have been on the WHO charts for breastfed children.

We love it when C will do tricks for us, like putting her arms up. She likes to use her finger to make my lower lip make noise, and she blows to flap her own lips (what do you call that?). Shboogoo helps me out by playing with her, getting a cloth wipe wet in the bathroom sink, or carrying her into another room. It's so fun when our laughing or saying "that's funny" makes her do a little almost fake-sounding "ha ha ha" laugh. One thing I do to play with her is move my forehead from side to side on her belly. She laughs pretty hard at that. Her babbling is fun -- often it's "bob bob." With each of my kids I have joked that she's talking about her boyfriend Bob, not that we even know anyone with that name.

My last post has a few Valentine's Day photos of C, and here are a few others from her fourteenth month.

Sometimes she voluntarily folds her arms for prayers. This was February 18 -- not the first time she did it. It's cuter than the photo can show.

A cute girly outfit. And she randomly puts her hands over her eyes and says a loud "baw!" (her version of "boo!")

Enjoying one of her sisters' Pillow Pet Dream Lites

I don't care that this is upside down. In February I used Swagbucks to help me buy a printed diaper cover (shown below), and I also bought C her first FuzziBunz, to wear at night. RLR is a treatment I used to strip all our cloth diapers of ammonia build up.

Here's the cutie on her 14-month day (as you can see, when she was lying down she was not interested in keeping her legs down):

BYU Spirit shirt ($1.74 at Old Navy!)

"1 is fun" party and C's 13th month

My angel, my cuddle bug, turned 13 months old in January. 

I forgot to mention in my last post that it's adorable when we ask her if she wants more food and she signs "more." My husband helped me capture it (he also made a video, but it's currently upside-down):

She also says something that resembles "hi," and she says "bah" for "bye." She loves peek-a-boo, so she likes to cover her eyes with her hands, then I have just enough time to ask "Where's C?" before she moves her hands and says "beuh" (how do you spell that vowel sound? -- the one in the word "look") and laughs. 

Some other fun pictures from her 13th month:

Papa and Grandma gave the girls these beautiful dresses for Christmas.

We exchanged a different 3-piece outfit for this one with a whale on the bum. The front of the green shirt says "you make me so happy."

Her big sisters put her in this bed.

I was just talking to our oldest about this. I thought she hadn't been around, and C somehow got her own arm all the way out of the sleeve. But Shboogoo "doesn't really know" but thinks that maybe she took C's arm out of the sleeve. :-)

Avocado!

I had to get a picture of her in this cute and comfy light yellow outfit. She actually says "cheese" for the camera (the phone).

We had her birthday party potluck lunch on Saturday, January 19th, in our ward building's Primary room. We had decided at least for this year to not have her party too close to Christmas. The friends who were able to come were Eric and Erica from our ward, and Sam and Katie and their kids. From my family: my mom and brother Mark, my dad, and my sister and her family. From my husband's family: his mom and her mother and foster mother, his aunt M, his dad and youngest sister, and his brother Aaron. I was embarrassed that I was so late by the time I arrived at the party (my husband and his mom decorated, then she came back to get me and the kids). I realized I could have been closer to on time if I'd just waited until we were there to frost the cakes. At least D knew everybody and he welcomed them and let them hang out.

I told my husband that I wanted something to say "1 is fun," and this was perfect!

Her cupcake was from the same batter I used for the made-from-scratch cake. She had no idea that she was supposed to taste it. After a moment I got some of the frosting on my finger and she leaned forward so I could put it in her mouth. Then we laughed when she went right back to my finger for more.

The new foods she ate in her 13th month were:

lemon juice concentrate (in a Beechnut jar), onions, pineapple, coconut milk, ground chia seeds, whole wheat bread (she'd had most of the ingredients in it before), hemp seeds, boiled egg (she only wanted to eat a little of it), turkey, and chocolate cake (sugar was pretty unfamiliar to her and she doesn't have it often; the cocoa powder and cow's milk in the cake were new to her, but the almond milk wasn't).

Waving because Mama waved and said "Hi!"