Carrots & Sum up

Amelia tried carrots for the first time on 10/8/09! I think she really liked them!

For right now, carrots is one I'm choosing to buy. We'll see if I find the motivation to figure this one out.

Smiley baby before!
First taste - I think this look is more about the camera and less about the carrots.
A biiiiiiiiiiggg bite!

A little messy face...
Plotting to get the spoon from Mama
Look at those cheeks!

William always demands we take his picture too....He is pretty cute, even if he needs a haircut!

We had a busy weekend. Grandpa Kevin and Grandma Kim rolled in Thursday evening to spend the weekend with us. We're always glad for their company - and help around the house. They were supposed to arrive after bedtime...or so we thought!

No, they didn't get in early! Amelia was up way past her bedtime!
Amelia didn't want to miss a thing! I tried to put her down a few times and she was not having any of it. She was up late - we think she wanted to say hi to Grandma and Grandpa!

Amelia showing off her daredevil pulling up skills on the tippy laundry baskets

Friday morning brought one very happy big boy when he realized Grandpa and Grandma were at our house! It was cold and rainy, so we decided to check out the St Louis Science Center. I thought it would be a great time to go because it was a week day in the fall. No problem, right? I should have known better. Field trip Friday was in full swing. Luckily, most of the thousands of students running around were really aware of William and made sure he had an opportunity to explore the exhibits as well. I think he was pretty overwhelmed by the crowds, but we still had a pretty good time. I think this will be more fun in another few years when he is just a little bigger (and NOT on a Friday)*.

A highlight was getting to scoop with the digger
He loved the new (I think) smaller arch blocks to build with. I think we built this 3-4 times before we convinced him it was someone else's turn to play.
The finished product - open your eyes Mama!
Not sure that face is better Mama
Oh NO! Tipping over the arch was super fun!

We watched and rewatched this video over and over again
We also liked the electric harp with laser beam strings

Although the hopscotch rules were beyond him, the cool sounds that came when you jumped on the numbers were very, very fun. Four days later he is still talking about the noisy jumping game.

Friday afternoon we realized Amelia had tooth #3 pushing through on the top right side. Fussy mystery solved!



*For those of you interested, there is a toddler Discovery Room available. But, it requires tickets ($3/person) and the next opening was in the afternoon. We decided not to wait for this, but it is a pretty neat area.


Carrots
Grandpa & Grandma
Tooth #3
Science center

6 Month Photos, Etc

We got Amelia's 6 month pictures done last week. Here are a peek at some of our favorites:















Updates all around!

AMELIA

Said "Mama" for the first time on 10/6/09! We were tucking William in for the night and she was babbling away as we sang when out popped "Mama!" So exciting! So exciting she hasn't done it since. Amelia is making huge headway on the crawling and does hands and knees crawling about 50% of the time. She is one determined little girl - she practices and practices until she is just exhausted. Then, she gets in her crib and keeps on practicing! She's also been a little more crabby lately. I'm not sure if it is due to learning a new skill (crawling) or a new tooth working it's way in. No way to know for sure!



WILLIAM

William's foot appears to be healed as he isn't favoring it anymore. What a relief! Early last week he was still not putting his full weight on the foot and really wasn't himself. However, he had made such improvement that we decided to wait a little longer before taking him in for the XRays. Although I hate for my baby to be hurting in anyway, it has had some unexpected side effects....

Potty training! I can't believe it is finally happening. We've been working on it for about 2 weeks now and we are seeing some really exciting progress! The first few days were so frustrating with a lot of accidents. I think about day 3 is when I started figuring out his potty patterns (when he would need to go). It turns out he can hold it a lot longer than I thought he would be able to. Every day after that second day has shown steady improvement on both of our parts. Today he had two accidents and hit the potty successfully 6 (SIX!) times. It really feels like it is coming together so quickly after trying for so long to get started. We still have some work to do as he can't (won't?) tell me he has to go until he is actually going and we're not having any luck with the poop. I'm hoping these other pieces will come together like the rest has. Here are the factors I think that helped us the most so I can refer back to when we need to do this with Amelia:

1. A foot injury made it difficult to get around for a few days which meant if I put him on the potty he had to stay because it hurt to get off. Did I use this to my advantage? Oh yes I did!

2. Cars pull ups. Personally not a fan of the pull ups, but I had a coupon and they were on sale. I figured William might like the Cars design better than the pink Dora ones (who knew they had both pink and blue pull ups? I thought they would be neutral colors, like diapers.) he refuses to wear. William LOVED them and wanted to wear them right away. We call them underwear and had a big talk about keeping Lightening (the car) dry. I wasn't sure how well this would work because William hasn't actually seen Cars (its it rated PG). But, for the most part it is working!

Although I still don't love the pull ups, I have to say they are working pretty well for right now. We aren't going through that many because he is actually going in the potty most of the time. Today, we used two pull ups so from the cost perspective it isn't the end of the world.

3. Crazy nap schedule. The kids' nap schedule doesn't overlap much at all currently. Which means someone is almost always sleeping. And it isn't me. Amelia is also past where she can sleep well in her car seat while other activities are going on. So because of that, we haven't really been going anywhere during the week. This has resulted in a lot of down time with just William in which to sit (and sit and sit and sit and sit) on the potty.

4. Plastic garage sale toys. This fall, I've picked up some cheap plastic toys at garage sales. These toys can be washed easily when...well, when it gets messy. These toys have to stay in the bathroom and only can played with on the potty. I swap them out every evening so there is always something new to look at/play with as an extra incentive.

5. Visible treats. I keep the potty prizes on a shelf in the bathroom that is out of reach, but definitely within his sight. The first few days a few big prizes lived up on the shelf for him to pick from. Now that we have things more down, there is an assortment of candies and stickers to pick from.

6. Choices: Do you want to sit on mama's potty or the froggy potty? Big potty or little potty? Car pull up or tow truck pull up? Candy reward or sticker? Read a book, sing a song or play with a toy? Letting him make little choices has made it easier for him to pull away from playing and get to the bathroom.

All in all waiting until he was ready has made this easier than I thought. I've also been very entertained by many of our "potty discussions". I don't think I'll be leaving a permanent record of those here. Let's just say William has some questions about the potty business that I've not ever thought about.



Mama on 10.6.09
6 month pics done
crawling! Progress
more teeth?
Potty Training! At Last

Ummm...what do you think you are doing?

Ummm...what do you think you are doing? You are a BABY! You canNOT do things like this!

So happy, so proud.

Banging the table and reaching for William's cup
And again! The very next day.
And again, the following day - this time in order to get herself a toy instead of waiting for me.

Sometime it just takes Mama a long time....

She really is doing THIS all the time. Or trying to.
I heard Amelia awake in her room. When I went to get her, this is what I found. What do you think you are doing?
Normally this is something she would love. Today, she wants to be held (teeth?)
William looking at the mobile.

Sad baby face.

Not what I expected to see here....when I initially walked in, Amelia was handing on the outside edge standing up...and then tipped over.

Finally, some more standing videos with complimentary screeching:

Just like Daddy

John was [trying to] nap on the couch downstairs. William noticed and insisted he needed to be "just like Daddy". Pillows? check. Blanket? check. On couch? check. For a short time, he wrestled with getting the blanket over himself just like John had his. He wouldn't let me help him and finally settled for it like this. Silly boy.

Swing!

This video is from two weekends ago at the park. Amelia loved! swinging!

Sweet Potatoes

Amelia tried sweet potatoes for the first time on 10/4/09! I just knew she was going to love these as they are still one of William's favorite foods:

Sweet potato boy
So Amelia's reaction surprised me. She really wasn't sure about this stuff!
Which means she ends up wearing most of it
I'm hoping it is just the temperature. They were a little on the cooler side, so I'm guessing that might be the problem...I hope.

Down for the count

Everyone but John is currently suffering around here. Nothing major, just normal wear and tear stuff. But, all at the same time gets to be a little overwhelming. Here is the run down:

1. Amelia: got shots on Thursday. Less than average crankiness, less than average napping. More than average amount of crawling and licking banned items (ie: trash cans, her brother's feet).

2. William: was jumping (or something) on Thursday morning and landed funny on his right foot. I didn't actually see what was happening, so I'm not exactly sure. But, he hasn't walked on the foot since it happened. He spent the day Thursday and Friday crawling everywhere and Saturday graduated to limping around putting his weight on the very back of his heel. We saw our doctor on Friday, who felt it was probably just tender or a soft tissue injury. We have instructions to bring him back in on Monday if it isn't better by Monday. We also have instructions to take it easy, use Motrin for pain control and ice the foot if he complains. Easier said that done.

3. Mama: typical Kelly style is suffering from overdoing the running. Both heels are now giving me some trouble - which is frustrating me to no end. We finally find a gym/workout schedule that works for everyone and...now I can't really workout. Someday I will learn moderation and working towards things slowly. For now, I am restricted from running until I am pain free for several days, advised to use ice and Motrin for pain control (per almost dr mom). Again, easier said than done.