Put to Shame by a Two-Year-Old

Claire's very specific breakfast request this morning:



What I ate for breakfast:



I should really take a lesson or two from my baby!

Costumes!

I think Claire has found her favorite celebration. I mean, a day where you can dress up like a cat and walk around getting free candy from almost anyone you meet? Really? Perfect.

We went to our church's Fall Festival. There were games-a-plenty with candy to boot. Claire was too young for the games, though she tried several. The adults leading the games were kind and offered her candy for her feeble attempts. At one point, she was DETERMINED to complete a particular game and was having trouble with it. She just didn't want to leave the game and the line of waiting kids was backing up. The kind man who was in charge of that game sweetly held out a small candy bar for Claire. She IMMEDIATELY dropped the ball and ran to the man to get the candy. While it accomplished the goal of getting her away from the game, it was a bit scary to realize how Claire will run to any stranger who is waving a candy bar. Made me contemplate the benefits of a kid leash.

So here are a few pics. A fun time was had by all!

A Preview

I made the girls' Halloween costumes last night. Don't be too impressed. It was actually more assembly than creation. Claire wanted to be a cat so I bought the black leotard, leggings, some fuzzy ears and a boa (for the tail). Since Claire was a cat, I decided that it only made sense to have Sarah be a mouse. So again, more assembly. Take a grey (or is it gray. I never can remember) shirt/pants/socks combo with some cute mouse ears/tail. Oh, and don't forget to bond a cute pink oval to the shirt for the mouse tummy and voila!

I was going to wait to post any pictures until Saturday, but we had our playgroup costume party today and I caught a funny pic of the girls. Sarah looks like she is ready to kill somebody. (big surprise)

When I showed this picture to my mom, she said, "I'd look that way too if I were a mouse being held by a cat." Good one, Mom.

So I'll post more pictures on Saturday. I am going to see if Claire will let me draw whiskers and a triangle nose on her face. But I am not holding my breath.

Be Impressed, Be VERY Impressed

Sigh. I am e.x.h.a.u.s.t.e.d. Michael headed to Alaska Sunday morning for a week long business trip so I have been juggling the girls on my own. I wonder if there is any reason that a stay-at-home-mom would need to travel on business. Hmmmmm . . . . . sure would be nice.

So here at the end of another exhausting (yet fulfilling) day, I will ramble for a bit on a train of thought I had earlier.

Is it truly possible to be a GREAT housekeeper at the same time that you are a GREAT mommy? I am having trouble being both at the same time. I often find that one or the other is lacking. Which means that I never get to fully enjoy the one that is excelling.

Let me see if I can explain a little more clearly.

There are days when I feel like a GREAT mommy. I have engaged my kids in active play for almost the entire day. The TV played a very minimal role and we laughed, played outside, read books and just plain enjoyed each other's company. Sounds like a great day, right? Right. Until I look around at my house and see the chaos that was created by all that fun. Oh my. We're not just talking about a few toys strewn about. Oh no. We're talking dirty dishes filling the sink and spilling over onto the counter tops. A table that is caked with spilled cottage cheese and juice. Floors that are too filthy for any 9-month-old to roll upon and stacks upon stacks of unfolded laundry. I cannot rest in a house that looks like this so instead of enjoying the time I had with my babies, I instead have an overwhelming sense of guilt as I see the end of the day coming. I feel like I need to apologize and explain to the world that I really DID accomplish something with my day even though you can't tell it by the house.

Then come the GREAT housekeeper days. The laundry is folded and put away. The floors have been swept AND mopped. Ahhhh. Dishes are clean, counters cleared. The place fairly sparkles. I can look around my house with great pride. That is, until I realize that the exchange for all this sparkle is two babies who have been glued to the TV for a majority of the day. Ouch. Punch-in-the-gut.

Now I realize fully that the correct choice is to have a great mommy day. The kids are more important than a clean house. I agree completely. But it doesn't keep me from feeling guilty and stressed when the house is a mess. I know I will only have the kids at this particular age for a very short time and I need to take full advantage of it. I have my entire life to live in a clean house. I get it. I really do. But I can't help wishing I could have it both ways.

Sometimes I get so frustrated that I want to scream out my favorite four letter word. You know the one right? The one four letter word that makes you feel completely better and solves this entire dilemma:

M.A.I.D. There, I said it. Rant complete. And now, I am off to fold laundry before crashing for the evening.

Ta, ta.

Catching Up

Okay, one more post solely dedicated to Sarah before we move into other topics. This post is more for my record keeping than anything else. We went to the doctor this week for Sarah's 9 month check up and she did great! (honestly, I fully expected to come back from the doctor's office with plenty of new blog material, but this time the visit was smooth and painless--a rarity, I assure you.)

So here are the particulars for sweet Sarah Grace at 9 months. She weighs 21 pounds, 12 ounces (90th-97th percentile), she is 29 inches tall (90th percentile) and her head (I know you really care about this part.) was 44 cm (50th-75th percentile).

Now I have to pause here and ask about those silly percentile numbers. How accurate can they REALLY be when they can write "50th to 75th percentile". I mean, seriously. Why don't you just tell me that she is somewhere between 1 and 100? But I digress.

So far, Sarah has no desire to crawl, or even to attempt a crawl. She sits up right nice. And she can roll around the floor from tummy to back quite efficiently. I often come in and find that she has rolled herself all around the floor and is lodged in the corner. (Don't even think that I haven't thought about wrapping her in double sided tape so that she can clean my floors of all debris as she happily rolls to and fro.)

We are trying to start more chunky foods, but Sarah is having NOTHING to do with that. Put a chunk of any kind in her mouth and she immediately gags as if I am trying to do a step test and commences a literal blowing of chunks all over the highchair, mommy, floors and anything else in the vicinity. So for now we are taking things slowly. She'll do all these things in her own timing. And if not, I'll just be the only mommy packing strained peas in my Kindergartener's lunch box. Big whoop, right?

Now on to the cuteness. Since I've been blog-absent for so long, I need to post Sarah's monthly pictures with Max the dog. I'll thank you for not pointing out that Sarah's neglectful mommy didn't start taking these pictures until her 3rd month. I may end up having to photo-shop the stinkin' dog into her newborn, 1st and 2nd month pics so that she won't know. Hee.

I am going to post them all below so that you (really I) can see the changes. But know that the changes are very subtle. I promise I didn't take all the pictures on the same day. This girl just doesn't have any hair. I think the dog is starting to look smaller, but beyond that, to me the pics (especially from 6 months on) don't really look that much different. You be the judge:

3 Months


4 Months


5 Months


6 Months


7 Months


8 Months


9 Months


Catch up complete.

All About My Sarah-Belle

I absolutely love the picture in my previous post (see below). Sarah's face cracks me up. I had so many captions running through my head that I couldn't pin one down, thus the assignment to allow you all to do it for me! Most of you were way sweeter than I would have been. To me, my darling baby looks like she is either fed up with picture time, agitated at being held, or smells something strange. Either way, it was comedy gold for her Mommy!

So, Sarah. I haven't given her nearly enough time on ye old blog, so this post is going to be entirely about her.

This precious blessing is the EASIEST baby on the planet. I'm convinced. (however we all know that the act of putting that in writing means that I will be dealing with a monster baby for the next few days, but oh well.) I really never thought I could end up with a child who was more laid back than Claire. Wrong. This kid hardly ever cries unless she is tired or hungry.

I also never thought I'd be blessed with a baby would would sleep as well as Claire. Wrong. Sarah goes down for the night at 6:30. Most days, she gets up at 7:00 the next morning. CRAZY!

With all this laid-backedness (that's a word right?) comes one little negative. It is like pulling teeth to get Sarah to smile. Most pictures of her look like this:


Note the finger gesture in the last one? Yeah. That's my girl.

Least you think she never smiles, I will post some really cute smiley pics at the end of this post. Because she WILL smile, but only when she feels you deserve it. Only when you have danced around enough, made the right number of razz noises and goofed up your face to just the proper degree will she curl those corners of her mouth up in approval.

Truth? I think you'd all get way more amusement if I would set up the camera and video myself ATTEMPTING to get a smile out of Sarah. (A video, by the way, that will NEVER be posted on this site!)

So enjoy the following smiles, they take a lot of work, but are sooooo worth it!!

You Write The Caption