Little baby news

I never really thought of myself as someone who has pregnancy-related cravings. When I was pregnant with Amelia I would occasionally crave fruit-flavored drinks and candies, but that's about it.

Since becoming pregnant I've had a hard time tolerating some of the things I used to enjoy, like sweet desserts and, oddly enough, water. I used to drink water with lunch and dinner most days. Now every time I used to drink water I'm substituting tea or lemonade (both of which contain a lot of water).

Last night I went to the fridge only to discover that we were completely out of lemonade. No lemonade, no pink lemonade, no limeade, nothing. I felt almost panicky, "What will I drink now?" Luckily, Mike and I found some lemonade, with real lemon juice, in the complex vending machine. We now have limeade in the fridge and concentrated lemonade in the freezer, so it's all good. So, if I come by to visit any time soon, keep some real lemonade on hand for baby and me.

Yesterday, while writing my earlier blog entry, I am reasonably certain I felt the baby move for the first time. There was a little thump on the left side of my abdomen, followed by another thump, and then another. At this stage it will probably still be uncommon to feel movement, but it's comforting when you can feel that the baby is there.

Lisa

Amelia, who loves re-locating piles of rocks, seems a bit daunted by the task before her. 

The big softy

As you know, Amelia really likes balloons. She played with the Trader Joe's balloon we got her at the market until it shrunk down to nothing. Then, a couple of nights after Mike had quietly disposed of the balloon, Amelia saw a picture of balloons in one of her books and began asking, "Where balloon?" I told her, "I don't know, I think the balloon is gone," and this made her really sad. She started crying because she missed her balloon, so I made up my mind to buy her a new one the following day.

When Michael saw that I had bought her a new balloon he accused me of being a big softy; but Amelia loves her new balloon. My only concern in buying it was that, since I bought the balloon at the grocery store, she might want a balloon every time we went to market together. But a balloon is only a dollar and comparing that to my typical cappucchino/tea habit (dependent on the weather and my mood) it seems an inexpensive treat.

Yesterday, the weather was warmer than it had been. Amelia wanted to go outside and play so I got her dressed and we stepped outside at 11:30. I had forgotten to wear a watch, but I was hoping to eat lunch, put on make-up and make an appointment on campus at one. I guess I wasn't counting on Amelia's desire to go "walking." We went all over and around the farthest reaches of our apartment complex. At some point I actually started to hear my belly growl, so I knew it was time for lunch. I told Amelia, "Mommy's hungry, let's go inside." She'd start heading toward home saying, "Hungry, hungry" but then quickly get side tracked by a stick or pile of rocks and have to be re-reminded that we were headed home. When we finally entered our apartment it was 12:50. So much for my appointment! Still, I'm glad Amelia likes playing outdoors and since the cold weather is returning to Indiana this weekend, we have to get out now while we can.

Lisa

Amelia loves her new red balloon. 

Amelia treasures her new "ding." 

My ding-a-ling, my ding-a-ling...

The weather warmed up quite a bit today, and with the housekeeper coming it seemed a very good time for Amelia and I to get out of the house. (Amelia often follows right behind any straightening up that takes place and creates a mess.) I decided, ahead of time, that since I was in a good mood and in no hurry to go anywhere I would bring Amelia with me to Hobby Lobby and let her wander through the store (under constant supervision, of course).

Walking out the front door, Amelia took mommy's hand and started heading toward the car. However, once Amelia realized we were headed to the car (about 3/4 of the way down the sidewalk) she spun around like a dancer and tried to get me to follow her in the opposite direction. Again, I was not in a big hurry, so I let her walk where she wanted to go.

Amelia took two laps around a portion of our apartment complex that takes her by a neat hill, piles of rocks, the laundry facility and the mailbox. After her second lap she asked to be picked up. I thought this would be a good time to put her in the car. Apparently I was wrong. She cried and fussed, so we took another lap around the complex. After that she settled down and we headed off to Hobby Lobby.

Amelia loves the hobby store. Everything there is so colorful and fun. She stopped by all of the silk flowers on display, inhaled deeply through her nose and said softly, "It's nice." She then found some ceramic piggy banks that she adored (I thought they were really cute myself). It was nearly impossible for me to actually grab the small items I went to the store to get (paintbrushes for Amelia and yarn for me) but eventually we were headed toward the exit.

Just as in any adventure film our final challenges were the greatest. First Amelia found two full racks of greeting cards. Of course, she grabbed handfuls of cute cards and dumped them on the floor. I scooped them up and tried to put them back properly just as I had done with skeins of fuzzy yarn and neon-colored glitter glue moments earlier.

Finally past the cards and heading out I thought we were home free until Amelia saw two "legitimate" customers testing wind chimes. Oh boy did Amelia get excited! She rushed over to play with the "dings" herself, eventually getting one in each hand (this, at least, gave me an opportunity to put back an ugly plastic dog she had been holding since we entered). I decided that we could use a small wind chime so I thought I would buy one of the $2.99 "made in China" chimes she had in her hand. In order to put one back I had to literally pry it out of her fingers. Amelia thinks everything should come in twos, after all.

When we got home, Amelia took four more laps around the complex with her new "ding" in hand. During the first trip she slipped and fell in a patch of mud, but this did not discourage her from her walk. After going around and around the building we went inside for a snack. Amelia was so tired from all of her walking adventures that she fell asleep in the car on the way to pick up daddy.

Tomorrow, I hear, is supposed to be even warmer than today (mid-40's). I'm sure she'll be out and about again...I just hope she doesn't get mad when she sees her ding hanging out of reach under our porch overhang.

Lisa

Ta-dah! Another Amelia masterpiece. 

First request of the day.

When Amelia wakes up in the morning her first request is often for "juice." Sometimes she wants breakfast right away and says, "eat" first thing in the morning. Well, this morning her first request was "painting."

Daddy told me this as he carried her downstairs. I wasn't sure he was serious, but Amelia made it clear that what she really wanted this morning was to paint. After I set her up with some iron-fortified juice I got her paints and construction paper "canvas" ready. She had a nice time painting for a while, but then decided she was hungry after all.

I think she was remembering how much fun she had painting last night...as the photo record will attest.

Lisa

Things are topsy-turvy in Amelia's household. 

Hardware Wars

Amelia has some new favorite phrases. One thing that she loves to repeat over and over again is, "Hi!" She says, "Hi!" to mommy and daddy throughout the day, but at least as often she also greets the characters on her DVD's. For example, the first time Tigger appears in Winnie the Pooh Amelia will beam and wave saying, "Hi!" It's very cute.

She's also picked up the habit of saying, "Second" whenever she wants mommy to pick her up. I'm sure that sounds odd, but she got it from mommy. Almost every time she's in the kitchen and wants to be picked up mommy's in the middle of cooking or preparing snacks or juice for Amelia. So whenever she would ask to be picked up my response would be, "Just a second, sweetheart." I guess she has decided that a second has already elapsed every time she's bouncing at my knee saying, "Second...second."

We had an exciting adventure in the kitchen tonight. I had just finished browning some stew meat on the stove and decided the burner was too hot to rest the pan on while I mucked about for spices and tomato juice. So, I moved the pan to the back burner, which was completely off and cool at the time.

Now this morning, when Mike had reached for a fallen piece of potato near that same burner (again, in the off position) he had been shocked. When I sat my metal pan on the burner a spark of light appeared that caught me completely by surprise.

Needless to say, I decided to completely avoid my right back burner after this incident and returned my stew to simmer on it's original hot front burner. I waited for the stew to boil...Nothing was happening. I turned the burner up, still nothing.

Well, apparently the entire stove has shorted out. Oven doesn't work either. Luckily, Michael saved the day by finding a microwave stew recipe on line. I never use the microwave to actually cook a meal, but the stew turned out all right.

Tomorrow morning I will obviously have to call maintenance. The stove was a little old and dicey before...Maybe we'll get a new stove out of this. Until then, I guess it's toaster over / microwave meals for us.

Lisa

Amelia's face reflects her love for a new found treat: blue raspberry lollipops. (She also found, after tripping and falling, that sticky blue faces attract and hold dirt.) 

Too cool for words! 

Make 'em laugh

Today, as I was coming home from giving yet another blood sample, the "check oil" light came on on my dashboard. Well, it was time to get the oil changed anyway, and I had a few minutes before Amelia's nap time, so I turned around and headed back to Jiffy Lube (where I'm affectionately known as "Michael").

Apparently everyone else in Bloomington had the same idea at the same time because their cars were all lined up waiting for oil changes when I arrived. I brought Amelia into the waiting room and she wandered back and forth in the small room while I drank my Starbuck's cappuccino.

After a bit Amelia decided she wanted to sit on mommy's lap. She leaned forward and opened her mouth as if to say, "May I have some cappuccino?" I told her what it was and that she probably wouldn't like it, but she insisted and since it was decaf. I figured it wouldn't hurt to let her have a taste.

Well everyone in the room got a good laugh after Amelia took a sip of my cappuccino and clearly stated, "Mmm, it's good." She had another three or four sips before I finished it off and declared that it was, "All gone."

You never know with this girl. She won't drink chocolate milk but enjoys cappuccino and mocha. In the morning, when I have a cup of decaf. tea to settle my stomach Amelia's right there to dip the tea spoon in the tea, put it in her mouth and proclaim, "It's good."

I guess this is funny to everyone except Michael, who I'm sure is imagining a household with two expensive coffee drinkers in it. While other preschoolers will be begging for McDonald's, Amelia will be bouncing and saying, "Starbuck's, Starbuck's...okay!"

Lisa

Mommy and Amelia share an ear of corn. (She was sitting on mommy's lap and when I tried to eat the corn, she just joined right in!) 

Old news

Things just aren't the same after a drill weekend. All the things I plan to do keep getting postponed over and over again. When you have had no weekend, it tends to sap your energy. (At least I finally updated the web page.)

But I wanted to tell you some of the things I learned last Friday, during my visit to the doctor. First of all, I know some of you are curious about the new baby and how he or she is doing. That's difficult for me to know when I can't feel the baby move, yet. Heck, even when I started to feel Amelia move every day she didn't move (or I didn't notice her moving) I was certain something was wrong. I feel fine, so I usually assume the little one is doing just fine. I'm sure I'll be feeling movement very soon (I first felt Amelia move, for certain, around week 17). Until then my favorite part of every appointment is when they place the dopplar on my belly and I get to listen to the baby's heartbeat. On Friday it was steady and strong. I'm sure everything is going just fine.

Friday I also got to drink that nasty glucose drink they give pregnant women so that they can determine whether or not we have gestational diabetes (tastes almost like that cheep orange drink you get at Safeway in the gallon jugs). They administered this test early, since I have had it in the past. The results were due back on Monday. I have spoken to the office since then and it seems that no news is good news. Of course, I will be taking the test AGAIN at some point because, again, I had gestational diabetes with Amelia.

While waiting to see the doctor last week I used my time constructively and read some class material on first language acquisition. Now, some of you may remember taking an on-line quiz a few weeks ago on childhood development. Remember when the quiz told us that the average two-year-old knows 50 words? Didn't that seem a little low? When Amelia is already using words like cantaloupe, giraffe and elbow, I know she MUST already have a vocabulary of more than fifty words. Anyway, according to my class materials for my language acquisition course the average two-year-old knows 400 words. That makes a lot more sense.

I also read something that, once again, reinforces to me that Amelia is a very bright little girl. According to the text, "During Stage II [approximately 2.5 to 3 years old]...children usually cannot count, although they are sometimes taught to hold up two or three fingers, to indicate their age."

Yeah. I guess all of you know that Amelia can count to 13. She's just a sharp cookie, I guess.

Lisa

Busted! 

Weekend Stories

Lisa was away for reserve duty this past weekend, so it was just Amelia and me for a couple of days. Unfortunately, it was cold an snowy, so we couldn't get into too much trouble.

One fun thing I did on Saturday was to break out the old electronic "Classic Football 2" handheld football game to get into the Super Bowl spirit. You know, the old Mattel green football game that has annoyed countless parents (and spouses)? Well, I sat on the floor and started playing this thing (WITH sound, an uncommon treat) and Amelia came over to see what the commotion was about. She said something like, "Whatcha doing, Daddy?" so I tried to explain all the sounds and lights to her. She was fascinated, but kept repeating over and over, "Whatcha doing Daddy? WHATCHA DOING DADDY!" She also decided that whatever it was, it looked like fun, so of course Amelia got a turn playing with the "lights." And wouldn't you know, she was dodging defenders, throwing touchdowns, and the like! (Not really - although she did throw an interception once.) Eventually she got tired of it and left it on the floor. Fortunately it automatically shuts down after awhile - wouldn't want the batteries to run out on THAT game!

Sunday was, of course, the Super Bowl. We don't have TV set up but I had the internet radio going for the pre-game. I fixed Amelia and I some snacks - I made Amelia a little salad with tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, and organic wheat crackers. After pouring the contents of the bowl and tossing it aside, she picked out the crackers and wouldn't eat anything else, despite my best efforts. Okay.

About an hour later she decided she was hungry (gee, I wonder why). She is getting better at communicating what she wants. In this case, I could tell she was hungry because she was repeating over and over, "Crackers - chocolate - cookies! CRACKERS - CHOCOLATE - COOKIES!" After a few times, she bounced up and down to the words - it became a little Amelia menu dance. "Crackers, chocolate, cookies" - the staples of any nutritious toddler diet. Fortunately, I was in a position to negotiate, given Amelia's hungry state. I offered some Gerber red beans and rice and she took the deal.

Then, the Super Bowl. All I can say is thank goodness for the absurdly long halftime show. This allowed plenty of time for Amelia's bath and bedtime routine, and I didn't miss a play. I have to admit I dug out the old Rod Woodson Steelers jersey from about a decade ago for this game. Congrats to the World Champion Pittsburgh Steelers!