Future Baker

Kate is very into helping out around the kitchen.  If I forget to bring her stool into the kitchen so that she can stand on it and see everything I do, she will stand by my feet screaming "watch mommy, watch mommy!"  She also likes to stand by the sink when I wash dishes or load the dishwasher.  She's quite the little helper.  This morning I had to bake a cake to take to church tonight.  While I was getting all of the ingredients out for the cake, I thought she might like to make a cake of her own, since she has her own kitchen and all.  I gave her some flour and water in one of her bowls because I remember my mom doing that for me when I was little and I loved it.  Well, apparently I was a little bit older when I did it because I always knew it was just for play.  This is what I saw when I turned around to see what Kate was doing

She had stirred her flour and water together, spilled most of it, eaten some of it, and was scooping it up off of the floor back into the bowl.  I went to check on her because I kept hearing her say, "yuck, yuck, yuck."  I think I would have the same reaction if I had just eaten flour mixed with water.  It was pretty hilarious and really hard to clean up, but I think that most of the best things in life are pretty hard to clean up!  I certainly did not clean it up right away, we played with it for about the next hour, making it into shapes and other fun things.  I did, however, put a stop to eating it, I had to draw the line somewhere!
Please ignore the fact that Kate's hair has not been brushed, she's still in her pajamas (despite it being almost lunch time), and she doesn't have on any pants (she thinks this is one of the best things about potty training).

~Molly

Word-full Wednesday

I have a fun story for my blog today.  I woke up this morning and noticed that when I brushed my teeth my water pressure was very low.  I called Brandon at work, and he said he hadn't noticed it being low when he took a shower earlier.  So I called our water supplier, and they sent a technician to our house to check things out.  He only looks at the meter for a few minutes, then inspects the area around it, and says that our pipe has busted.  This is lovely news to start my day.  Now I've been on the phone with countless plumbers, and hopefully someone will come to the house this afternoon to fix it (fingers crossed), and I hope it doesn't deplete our entire savings...yikes!

As if this weren't enough, Monday night when Brandon was on his way home from a Knights of Columbus meeting, he swerved in order to avoid hitting a dog.  We don't live in town, and our roads are really really dark, but I was still glad to hear that he missed the dog, of course.  The next day when he was driving to work, he noticed that his "low tire" warning came on in his car.  He stopped later in the afternoon, and had to get a new tire because he ran over a sharp metal object, and we think he did this on our road!  

It seems like since we've moved into this house we've had one bad thing after another happen!  I feel like we live in Amityville....except not quite as scary (most days).  

Well, now that I've bummed myself out with this post, I'll say that everything else is going really well.  Kate's growing and thriving.  She's become quite the puzzle expert.  She loves putting puzzles together, so I bought a few harder ones (jigsaw) at the store just to see if she liked them.  I figured if they frustrated her too much, I'd just put them away for later.  It turns out that she loves them!  I think every little kid is good at different things, and I have finally found a hidden talent.  Here's a picture of Kate and her new favorite hobby.

Rant!

Why do people wear really strong perfume to workout?  I totally let that ruin my night last night, geez.  Hopefully today's run will be better.

Kate's Two!!

Today is Kate's second birthday, I still remember how naive I was two years ago!  I'll never forget one of Kate's early doctor's appointments (either 2 weeks or 6 weeks), I walked in and said "she doesn't sleep, is that normal?"  The doctor laughed, he asked me if I read books about babies while I was pregnant.  I told him that I read books about being pregnant while I was pregnant, not books about babies!  Man was I unprepared!  Anyway, I think Kate's a pretty happy, well adjusted kiddo, and we couldn't love our two-year-old anymore than we do.

So far, I think Kate has enjoyed her second birthday.  We've been practicing blowing out candles for her party tomorrow, and she's prepared to say "thank you" to all of her guests.  I made her favorite breakfast, blueberry muffins (which she calls "blue muffs"), and she preceded to eat them for breakfast and lunch.  I told her that birthday girls can do anything :-).  She did have a doctors appointment this morning, which made for a no-so-fun birthday present.  She got two shots, but got over them quickly.  She also helped me make her cakes and frosting for her party, she loved to pour the sugar (minus the first time, when she accidentally poured it backwards over her head) and stir.  Here are some pictures from her big day!  Enjoy.

 pretending to put on my chapstick!

 showing off her chapstick

  Drinking the leftover buttermilk.  Don't ask, she could drink buttermilk all day, it's her beverage of choice....strange girl!

Tis The Season

I love a good Christmas party, and this is definitely the season for them!  Saturday we had a play-group Christmas party, Monday we had a library craft Christmas party, and today we had a different play-group Christmas party.  I still haven't had my fill, there are more to come!

Last year, Kate's first Christmas, I never took her to sit on Santa's lap.  I know, I know, I'm a horrible mother!  However, I always see kids and babies screaming and crying when they see Santa.  I can remember being afraid of Santa when I was little, he just seemed so much less scary on TV than in real life.  So I figured that I'd introduce Kate to Santa when she was old enough to either walk up to him, or run back to me, her choice.  At our Christmas party on Saturday, Santa came without any of the parents knowing, so I figured that I might as well see how Kate reacted.  All of the other kids ran to their parents in fear, and Kate walked right up to Santa and started petting his beard (really strange, I know).  She also gave him her goldfish crackers, which is pretty much her most prized possession, so she must have thought pretty highly of him.  I think the whole not forcing Santa thing worked, so everyone will be happy to know that from now on, Kate will have her picture taken with Santa.  I have a couple of cute pictures of her on his lap, but I left my camera in Brandon's car, so I will post them later.  Until then, here is a picture of all the kids at the party that I received via email.  Enjoy!  (Kate's in the middle, in case ya didn't know)

This Potty-Training Thing....

....is quite humorous.  I swore up and down that Kate would not have her own size potty chair, she would magically go in the big one right away.  Boy was I wrong.  She's pretty terrified of the big toilet, so we scratched that idea right away.  I bought a chair that is her size, and some training panties.  Every time we're just hanging out at home, I don't put a diaper on her anymore, she gets to wear big-girl panties, and she loves it.  There is just one big problem, she won't do anything while she's wearing them!  She'll strut around the house (and I do mean strut, apparently she thinks the big-girl panties are quite a fashion statement), and she'll sit on her Kate-size potty, but she won't "go" unless she's wearing a diaper.  And let me tell you, she goes as SOON as we put the diaper on her.  Yesterday I think she held it for about 5 hours.  I can't even hold it for 5 hours!  Plus, now she's doing this thing where she walks around the house and sits on anything that is the same height as her potty chair, and she pretends to "go" on it.  I walked in her room a few minutes ago and she was sitting on a pile of books grunting.  I have to try SO hard not to laugh because it's pretty much the funniest thing I've ever seen.
I've read many books on this subject and most of them say to wait until your child is ready for toilet training.  If you try to do it before they're ready, you're going to create more problems for yourself and the child.  Right now, I'm pretty okay with just having fun and laughing while she learns how to be a big girl.  Why rush things? I figure that she'll be able to go in a big potty by the time she's 30, at least I hope.  In the meantime, I'm just going to enjoy my "free" entertainment!
~Molly

P.S. I detest the words potty, toilet, and panties.  I much prefer restroom, bathroom, and underwear.  For the sake of this post, I used the words I don't like knowing that they are a little more appropriate for potty-training.

For Sale....again

That's right, we're moving...again. We moved out of town to get away from noise, hustle and bustle, traffic, and for Brandon to be a little bit closer to his job than our previous house. Now we're trying to get away again. This time, we're trying to get away from the rattlesnakes, the two roads that intersect near our house with heavy traffic (people who drive in the country drive FAST), and having to drive forever to get anywhere.It might sound petty, but I believe that this girl

should get to play outside.  Most of my memories from childhood were spent outside, and I want the same for Kate.  Every time we go outside, she wants to run straight for the mailbox, never mind that the mailbox is located on a street that 70 mph is considered slow!  We cannot take our eyes off of her for one second outside because of the many dangers lurking in our area.  I also think that these dogs

need a place to run until they crash, which is most definitely their nature!  We have killed over 10 rattlesnakes since we've lived here (plus our cat killed one), and this city girl has had enough!  Sadie and Scout have both gotten bit, and poor Sadie was bit again just a few weeks ago.  We lost one cat to a rattlesnake early in the summer, and another one of our cats was recently bit, but we never found the snake.  All of this, not to mention that this girl (never mind that I chose an old picture of myself with a nice tan)

really wants a place to run that is not always a treadmill!  I have no safe place to run at my own house.  Maybe some people don't understand why we want to move again, but I really feel as if we have a few reasons to justify our decision.  A nice neighborhood with other running, playing, dirty-faced kids and other people walking their dogs in the evenings sounds heavenly to me.  I couldn't care less about granite and nice tile, just give me some peace of mind!!
~Molly