complicated

i managed to get photos off my memory card by putting it directly in the computer. who knew you could do that?!?! good thing young tech savvy aunt baylee is here....

but now i have to go through a whole rigmarole to upload photos. hmmm...i'm sure i'll get it figured out one of these days...but at least i don't have to buy a new camera!! yaaaayyy + insert luci golf clap here...i'll try to get that on video...it's hilarious!!

needy Pea as of late. up, up, up is requested often these days...

she loves her some "toe-pay-toe" (aka mr. potato head & his spud friends ms. carrot & mr. corn)

results of the second hair cut...just trying to prevent the mullet...

who doesn't need a sun hat, alligators, and "ein-nine" (aka disney's little einsteins) all before 7a?

more to come...

alive & well

we are alive & well...I swear!! My not-nearly-old-enough-to-be-broken camera will no longer upload its photos when I plug it into my usb port. boo. and I haven't had/taken the time to figure out what is going on/fix it. or get a new one. which is NOT in my budget so let's hope it doesn't come to that...

we're starting our second week of lovely very welcome visitors...Grandma Pierse came last week followed by our friends the Determans, and now Aunt Baylee is here. yaaaay!!!

so those are my excuses for being behind on blogging....and i'm stickin to them!

cuhcake

Somehow since the Valentine's Day party our girl has become OBSESSED with cuhcakes (aka cupcakes). She has a little toy ice cream cone that she calls cuhcake. A few weeks ago I bought a Valentines Day Funfetti cake mix for $.49 after Valentine's Day...she found it in the pantry & carried the box around for days. And randomly enough, we checked out a book from the library last week that had a picture of cuhcakes. All week she walked around with her plastic ice cream cone saying cuhcake, playing with the cake mix box, and finding the borrowed book & opening it right to the cuhcake page. So when I told her it was her friend Margeaux's birthday and we could have cuhcakes she clapped her hands and said, "YAAAYYYY". The celebration started with a cuhcake at playgroup and continued later that day with a Mama/Lil Girls Night Out (aka dads are working ;) at Rico's where she had just a few teaspoons of whip cream that Margeaux shared with her. Then Margeaux's REAL party was on Sunday at Gymboree...Luci was thrilled to know she could expect another cuhcake. But Margeaux got her cuhcake first (cuz it was her birthday and all) and Luce LOST IT. Nobody could tell what she was so upset about (maybe the adorable party hat was uncomfortable?), but I am pretty sure it was all concern over not getting a cuhcake. Poor thing...it was not my proudest parenting moment.

In addition to being not so great for a growing tot, she broke out with a terrible diaper rash after the first cuhcake...that just got worse & worse...to the point that here we are a week later, and she still has it. Poor lil thing. I'm looking into some good-for-you muffin type recipes I can make & bring to such events for her going forward. Ugh. I was hoping she'd have her dad's take-it-or-leave-it attitude toward sweets. Nope...this is all mama. Sorry Luce.

table & chairs

beloved "Bea" getting some "baa" time...

one happy camper...

Bea always needs to sit up, and unfortunately, doesn't sit on her own much to Luci's frustration...she asks for "a-help peeeaazz" about 1000 times a day...always requesting Bea sit up in a chair, on the trike, on the zebra, on the airplane...you get the idea...

I made a trip into Houston this weekend to IKEA...the plan was to buy a little table & chairs set for Luci. I did find plenty to buy, although not a table & chairs set! Upon seeing them I decided the tables were no match for our adventurous tot...I imagined them tipped over in seconds! I did however find some adorable chairs that stack and match her playroom....so I bought those, and decided to go with an idea I had some time back to re-purpose a table that we used in our condo in Chicago. We brought it down here with us but hadn't used it...and we have two sets of legs for it (counter height and table height), so we felt okay about cutting one of those two sets down to Luci height (22.5 inches in case you wondered ;). Luci seems pleased as punch!

Special thanks to Guh & Guh Pierse for providing said table & two sets of legs years ago, and for the saw that enabled Dad (special thanks to him, too) to cut the legs!

19 months

Sweet baby is doing much better with anger now that her beloved 'baaaa' is back. She's using lots of one word phrases and will even repeat some often heard 2 or 3 word phrases...including 'chiyyouhh' (chilly out) and 'iuhnoooo' (I don't know). She is VERY interested in the alphabet all of the sudden with P & W being her two favs. She also enjoys the J and the C. She recognizes the P on a STOP sign and the W on all of the storm drain man hole covers. She does a great job stopping before we cross the street, and overall is a great listener!

beat up

Luckily said wounds haven't dampened her spirit!! Here she is 'clipping, clopping' to a Raffi tune...

Our Luce is a little beat up. It started on my watch...her little hand got all scraped up at the park. Then on Dad's watch she fell in 'the woods' area of the park on a stick...that really scraped up her ear. And now she has a little bruise/scrape on her neck...and we have no idea where it came from!

Luckily she has her dad's pain tolerance and has endured the clean up of said wounds like a champ.

alligators

watching...you guessed it! CHOO!!!a lil dirty...

borrowing Clara's adorable rain boots! (taken by Amanda with her iPhone)another iPhone shot...

Luci is now the proud (albeit still skeptical) wearer of her very own Crocs. Or alligators, as she calls them.

This week after an AM rain Luci was VERY intrigued by a large puddle covering the mulch under a big kid toy at the park. She promptly just walked right in it & started walking around & around in ankle deep water....all while donning her long pants, socks, and Stride Rite shoes (aka not inexpensive OR rain shoes). It gave me some serious anxiety, but luckily my much wiser mama friend Amanda was there to point out that everything can be washed...the pants (she sat down to splash at one point), the socks, the shoes, the girl...and she's right! But because she's such a good friend she went home to get Clara's rain boots for Luci to borrow...and I of course thought this was a perfect solution but Luce was not a big fan of the rain boots. She might have her dad's adventurous wonder, but the kiddo does not like to be uncomfortable...and that is ALL ME. She didn't like her little feet being wet in shoes & socks, and was totally not having her bare feet touch the mulch!! Cracked me up!!

Next time she wants to head out in the rain we'll have proper foot wear...alligators, of course!

best.deal.EVER.

headboard...

footboard...

detailing up close...the mirror that attaches to the dresser...
the dresser...

the nightstand...

the trundle...

This weekend we scored the best.deal.EVER. Garage sales aren't allowed here in fancy fancy planned community land. Instead we have something even better...woodlandsonline.com....a local craigslist of sorts. I regularly garage sale shop from the comfort of my sofa with the TV on...it is fantastic...we've scored all sorts of gently loved items...but this weekend we scored BIG.

Luci now has big girl bedroom furniture!! Sure, she doesn't need it yet, but who are we to turn down quality furniture for a low price? In truth I had been coveting a big girl bed (aka...a regular twin) from the pbteen lilac collection for her...literally for months...(since sweet Clara got her big girl bed). All the while knowing full well that purchasing such furniture would be an absolutely ludicrous decision for our family. So what is a mama to do? Regularly peruse wooodlandsonline.com for said furniture, of course! I've been perusing for MONTHS. And Friday something similar-enough caught my eye. A white twin sleigh bed. I emailed the lister hoping I was the first to respond...quality items like this at a reasonable price don't last more than a few hours...and more than once my friends & I have lost something we have been promised. So I was DELIGHTED when she said she'd hold the furniture for us until Sunday night when Clay would be home to check it out with me. All weekend I kept checking my email thinking she'd write and say that someone else could come earlier to see it & it was gone. But nope, it was ours.

We got there & she casually mentioned that she had forgotten that the dresser had a large mirror, and that there was also a trundle bed. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? So for $450 Luci now has a gently loved big girl bedroom set that retailed for over $2200 at The Dump (they have fancy furniture that has been liquidated from expensive furniture stores) three years ago. Sure, there are spots where the furniture has been loved not-so-gently, but for $450 we'll sand it down & re-paint the whole set if it bothers us too much!

For now the dresser & nightstand are in her room, and when she starts climbing out of her crib (my guess is 2-6 months from now) we'll transition with the trundle bed & mesh railings, and then move to the full-on twin a bit later. For now they'll remain in storage. WOOHOO!

Happy Valentine's Day!

At the park this morning, playing peek-a-boo. Also at the park this morning...we sit at this table & bang on it. Sounds like fun, right?

Very closely checking out her photo Valentine's Day card from her Guh's...

She looks SO much like photos I've seen of my mom as tot in this picture.

Super cool shades...all over the house...but never outside!?!?

Correspondence with our pedi proved VERY insightful. He asked a seemingly benign question...any changes in the house?

Hmmm...changes...not permanent changes, per se. But disruption? Where do I start? I decided it really all started with our Christmas travels. Two weeks of traveling with a very anxious Mama. I'm not a good traveler to begin with, and all I could think about was making it to my 8 week appointment so I could see that baby & its heart beat. We were home one day & then took away the baaa (paci). Next day we find out our baby is really babies, but that they are not well babies. Mama starts to lose it a bit. We are blessed with many family & friends who stay with us and support us (thank you family & friends...I have a post composed in my head thanking you...just isn't out yet). Mama basically gets through the next few weeks, but certainly doesn't win any awards for grieving with grace. Dad is home for longer periods & gone for longer periods than usual. The home/gone adjustment is hard for all of us, and is directly related to the length of the trip. In short? It has been a difficult few months and this family needs to give itself a break.

Pedi recommended giving Luci back her baa. It is her security blanket...and obviously (why didn't I see it before?) she's lost some sense of security over the last two months...and when she needed her blanket most, we took it away. Of course hindsight is 20/20. Had we known what we'd go through with the pregnancy we probably would have made a different decision, but once we had started down the path it seemed like failure to go back. But of course the head butting, banging, hitting, kicking & biting (there has been some of each over the last few weeks) all started when we got back from Christmas travels and took away the baa and Mom & Dad started to behave in a way far from usual. For now it seems she just might need that extra bit of security it provides. Clay & I hope to distract her from it when she doesn't need it, but we agree it was a bit too much to ask of a one year old all at once. Another thing that sold us on the fact that this was the right move? Her desire to stay in her crib for over 4 hours just to have baa time yesterday. So for now, the baa is back.

Of course this is not to say we'll stop disciplining. Hitting, kicking & biting are now an automatic one minute time-out...no warning (which I've already explained & implemented this morning). She's generally a VERY good listener & really responds well to expectations & consequences, so I think as long as we stay consistent the behavior will stop as quickly as it started. The head banging will result in us holding her with her back to our face - no eye contact and only a short 'no'. It seems to be an attention getting behavior so we need to stop rewarding it with our attention. Instead we'll focus on being present with her & giving her the right kind of engaged attention she deserves.

rough day

Enjoying a cupcake at Eleanor & Caroline's Valentine's Day Party!! Luci & sweet Eleanor. Who Luci was not so sweet to this morning...we're sorry Eleanor.

Anybody have a cube climber they want to donate to our backyard? I think it could provide hours of fun!!

Love this shot. She looks worried, but really she just isn't happy about the camera. I swear the beads were not choking her...I actually did that on purpose so she wouldn't trip on them while on the cube climber...it didn't look this worrisome at the time.

**thanks Leigh for the photos!! ;)

Luce & I are having a rough day today. We woke up to the news of the CAL crash in NY...it was operated by Colgan Air...Clay's previous employer. It seems he didn't know any of the crew. My prayers and thoughts are with the crew & passengers & families. Every crash hits closer to home than I'd like it to...and this one had that extra little connection. I'm a natural born worrier...so much so that it seems all of my energy these days is spent trying not to worry...I'm working so hard to hand things over to God. I'll keep working, but boy am I exhausted.

And I think maybe my emotional exhaustion with all that has gone on over the last month is affecting my sweet Luci. Her emotion of choice seems to be anger/frustration. After a lovely morning at home including a Luci head butt to my lower lip (and a subsequent bloody lip), we went to playgroup where she hit multiple friends on multiple occasions in less than 20 minutes. Needless to say we left playgroup early.

Her head butting/banging is reaching new levels. She now has a constant bruise in the middle of her forehead. I emailed our pedi this morning to ask if he had any suggestions for me regarding her physical expression of anger...both to herself, to Clay & me, and now to her friends. I try to give her words, but she seems to want to physically feel rather than verbally express. She's always been physical so maybe I shouldn't be surprised, but regardless it is troubling me. Anybody have any good books they want to recommend on toddler behavior &/or discipline?

**UPDATE: Luci spent the afternoon in her crib...from 1p to 5:10p!! She went in at 1p for nap time...fell asleep around 2p (based on her talking), woke up around 4:10p but had no desire to leave her crib & therefore her precious baa. I finally had to go in & get her!

photos & unrelated thoughts...

Can you guess what she's doing? She happens to be lounging in her dad's favorite TV watching spot...

And this comes from Mom, of course. My cutest shoes & our 'park bag'.

"Cheese!!"

My other cutest pair of shoes...it's a good look, don't you think? Classic black & white.

It's funny...I've composed many a post in my head since the loss of the babies...but this very composition sort of took me from a to z and now I just don't have the energy to go back through it all again, letter by letter. Yet there are so many things that I feel are worthy of sharing that I'm hoping to have the energy for it some day...to document how staying sane during the week of waiting was the was the first real put up or shut up moment regarding my faith (how blessed to have this be the first real test at age 31!!)...and the way I'm even closer to so many of my amazing friends and family whose support and love for us has made all the difference. Thank you dear loved ones. Your support was and is still felt.

And time is healing, but each day still seems to bring some (often surprising) challenge that takes my mind back to the sad place I am so actively trying to avoid. It seems like 100 years ago that I was pregnant. And some days it seems that it'll be 100 years before Luci might be blessed with a sibling. But the good news is that I've always been great at arguing with myself (just ask my dad), and I never let my thoughts stay in one place or on one side for long. Although all of this arguing with myself / picking myself up all day long is quite emotionally exhausting & draining. But I'll keep at it, because that is what Faithful Blessed Mamas do. And I AM one Faithful Blessed Mama.

busy busy

Getting ready to walk yellow puppy.

Getting her friend 'just so'.

This is how I found her....she knows she's up to no good.

but she's pretty proud of herself!

Well Dad is off with the Navy now and the girl is keeping me BUSY. Before she's even out of her crib she's asking for a 'nack, nack' (snack). Then before I get breakfast on the table she's grabbing the doorknob & requesting a "waah, waah" (walk). I've not been very present with her over the last several weeks with all that has gone on, so it is nice to get some quality time with her. The daily developments are fascinating to watch and I feel so blessed to be able to stay home with her to notice & appreciate each new step.

The latest developments...

Bea. Heaven forbid we leave Bea (her baby doll) anywhere...if we do she goes berserker until we find Bea. Bea HAS to sit in the chair next to her while we eat...although Luce would love to just hold Bea the entire time. Yesterday she threw poor Bea in the mud at the park & then pushed her down into the ground and pushed her (like you would a truck) for a good few feet. Luckily I was able to distract her at bedtime & Bea took a bath in the washing machine last night. She held up remarkably well!

Park. In Luci's head the park is THE place to be these days. We went three times on Saturday, and 2/3 times I had to literally carry her home kicking & screaming. Bea has a blast being thrown down the terror slide (big kid slide) over & over...about 15 times for Luci's one time down the slide.

Walk. About every 15 minutes all day long Luci grabs at the door knob & asks to go for a 'waaah'. She's at the door with some friend situated just so in her little baby doll stroller. And usually she has her shoes on...the wrong feet (she does it by herself now). On Saturday I got seriously geared up for a 3 mile walk around the loop. I got Pandora loaded on my phone...waters for both of us...a super special chocolate chip granola bar snack for Luci...new stickers & some colors....we were SET. I asked her if she wanted to go for a walk...she readily agreed. We went outside. I attemped to put her in the stroller. All h*ll breaks loose. She starts screaming WAAAHHH, WAAAAH, UP, UP (she means down/out). I get her strapped in by using all of my might...explaining she's going to ride & mama will walk...and when we are done we'll go to the park....and she is flinging her head so hard against the back of the stroller that I have no choice but to take her out. And go on her 'walk'. To the park. For the third time that day.

Shoes. The girl found my shoe shelf yesterday in the closet & I couldn't get her out. Her shoes, my shoes, Dad's shoes...95% of the time on the wrong feet.

Oval. She's starting to identify things as ovals! The first time it was pointing to two clouds in her Hail Mary book...she pointed to them & said, "Oval! Oval!". Next it was the bottom of her fancy electric Elmo toothbrush. She might be a genius ;)

Teeth. She's really into brushing her teeth. Not having Mom brush her teeth, but doing it herself. First Mom takes a turn & then Luci takes a turn. We brush about 4 times a day lately.

Climbing. Her climbing is reaching new heights (haha). She now alerts me to when she's climbed somewhere she knows she shouldn't have. For example the other night I was sitting on the sofa wasting time on the Internet, and all of the sudden I hear, "Mama?" and I turn around & she's pushed the bar stool over by the pantry & was sitting on it. And today we were getting the guest room ready for Pax & Jen (woohoo!!) and she climbed on the chair. I told her to sit on her bottom & ran into her room to get something. I heard, "Mama?"...I ran into the guest room & she had made the leap from the chair to the full size bed...and was delightfully walking/jumping around on it.

Chair. She told me yesterday as I was sitting in her rocking chair after a nap, "my chair" and tried to push me aside. I have no idea if she really knows what this means or not, but it sort of cracked me up.