Natalese 2.3

"That's a loud hickolay!" Natalie gleefully exclaimed one day as Rob hoisted her into the air from where we were sitting on the couch. She has said "hickolay" one or two more times, always in the context of horsing around, and we haven't been able to parse it yet. It's her word. I can only guess it has something to do with fun.

She's off and talking in sentences these days, and her cute little toddlerisms are fading fast, so I'd better write a few more down:

Phrases we hear all the time:

"No my blankie/sippy cup/dolly!"... etc. This means "don't touch my..." and she's usually saying it to Rachel, whether or not Rachel has even noticed the item in question.

"Mommy/Daddy do it!" (I don't want to/can't do it, I want you to do it for me)

"Openin it!"
"Runninin!" (-in seems to be her command suffix. This means, "Run, Mommy!", when I'm pushing the jogging stroller.)

"I need my Piper!" (her best friend)

"Mommy got purple toes!" (Mommy has purple toenails.)

"I'm okay," when she falls down and doesn't get upset.

"I'm scared!!!" when she is scared, pretty often this week for some reason.

Some unique ones:

"Mommy get down me, please!" (phrasal verbs are tough, obviously)

"I an elephant!" She said this she held a foam letter I in her mouth, pretending it was a trunk. I thought it was very imaginative.

She's even deeper into pretend play now, acting like an ant, fox, doggie, or pretending to ride a giraffe or monkey (riding on the 30-pack of toilet paper). She still babies her stuffed animals and dolls and even blankets. She says "You okay, baby? Sorry 'bout that!" if one of her toys falls down.

I think I've said it before, but it bears repeating: I love this age! I'll take the whining, tantrums and other frustrations, because the cool parts are so incredibly cool.

5 Minute Update

Rachel is crawling and saying "Mama!"

Natalie is much happier and getting over the bout of heightened anxiety that Mother's Day Out brought on. She has a new haircut and looks so grown up, it's a little bittersweet.

My in-laws are in town. They are staying at the hotel at the top of the street, and walking down to visit during the days. Rob can't take a day off at the new job yet, so it's mostly just them and me and the girls.

Things were really, really hard for a while, most of September, but seem to be easier lately. The cooler weather is a huge help.

And we got a new car! How could I forget to mention that?

I have to admit, it's getting better

Today I'm enjoying a rare and wonderful 3-hour Rachel nap. 3 hours and counting, I should say. Wow! Natalie never napped like that. (Mommy! Don't compare your kids! Oops.)

Natalie is napping, too, and I just realized I have neglected my blog of late. It's been because life is that stinkin' busy. Things got really, really hard for a while. I got pretty depressed. I got to a breaking point, where I was saying things like, "I hate my life" to my husband as he was getting ready for work one morning and the girls were both crying. I finally cried, and cried every day for a couple of days.

Then I officially pulled Natalie out of Mother's Day Out and hired my mom to come over a couple days a week. So far we are still only beginning that transition, but Natalie already knows and loves my mom, so that helps a lot. I think the challenge there is going to be my mom's availability, but I'm starting to feel better even about handling the girls all week, every week, by myself. Even if I have to do it 11+ hours a day.

Natalie is still getting over this spike of separation anxiety that school and daddy's new job brought on. At the lowest point she would burst into tears if I so much as left the room. I finally made myself compromise on the TV thing--she gets to watch TV if I have to be alone in the other room with Rachel (to nurse or help her down for a nap.) TV is Cinderella (still mixed feelings about it, but she's already seen it so many times, I figure the damage is done) or one show a day on Nick Jr, now that we got cable back. We got a land line, too.

Rob and I are going to start the search for a second car in earnest soon. We'll be looking at SUV's and minivans. I don't know what we'll do with the girls while we test drive. Can we get away with bringing them? Can we get away with leaving them with my parents for a few hours? We shall see.

Anyway, we're two weeks out of the last day Natalie went to school, and I'm finally feeling better about the whole situation.

We also had a little bit of rain, two days in a row, and clouds for several days, which brightened my mood considerably. I think I have some sort of reverse seasonal affective disorder. The kind that's only possible when it's this hot and dry for this long. My soul needed rain and clouds.

My dear brother Geoff came over and spent his Friday morning with us last week. He talked to me a little about his meditation practice, and it sounds like something I would benefit from greatly. Now to decide when I'm going to get around to it...

Anyhow, I've got my older child back (mostly), the weather's turning nicer, the money's coming in and my youngest is sleeping a little better. So I'm sleeping better. Life is good again.

Upside-down girl

So, about 2-1/2 weeks ago, Rob started a new job. Almost two weeks ago, Natalie started Mother's Day Out on Tuesday and Thursday mornings, 9:30 - 1:30. It has been a heck of a transition for our little family.

Rob's old job was in the Riata complex, only a couple of miles from our house. He biked to work practically every day, and it worked well. They were very accommodating of our family's needs, and even allowed him to work reduced office hours from the time Rachel was born until she was three months old. He worked the rest of the hours from home, after the girls went to sleep at night. Pretty nice, huh? The schedule he left was M-F, 7-4, basically.

The new job is better for him in many ways, but the commute is a killer, at least for me--he's now gone from 6:30-5:30. Eleven hours without Daddy, every day. He does a combination of bike and bus, but there's really no way to make the commute faster than 1-1/2 hours each way unless we buy a second car. My driving him to work isn't practical anymore--who wants to be stuck on a round-trip cross-town rush hour commute with two babies in the car?

Thankfully, the weather finally cooled off from the 110's to the lower 90's this past weekend. Yeah, there have been wildfires, too. Scary and tragic. So many people have lost so much. I cried watching the news. My parents in Dripping Springs had to evacuate to our house when the Pedernales One fire got to be 3 miles away and the wind pointed it toward their subdivision. Fortunately firefighters got the upper hand on it and my parents were able to return home within a few hours.

So, Natalie started MDO last week. Tuesday went great, no tears until I picked her up, and the teacher said Natalie was happy all day until another little girl accidentally stepped on her foot. But it was past her normal naptime, and I expected some fussiness. She fell asleep in the car. I transferred her to bed when we got home, and she slept 2 hours.

Thursday went horribly. Rachel and Natalie both woke up at 4:30AM and didn't nap at all before we got to school to drop Natalie off. Natalie started saying, "I don't like it. I don't want to go," as we got to the outside doors. Inside she burst into tears and I had to force myself to leave her while she was still crying hard. I felt like a terrible mother. Even worse: at 11:00AM after I got home, it dawned on me I'd left the cellphone in the car. My heart sank as I picked it up and checked voicemail. Her teacher had called at 10:30, thirty minutes prior, for me to come get her. She was beside herself when I finally came and picked her up. The rest of the day didn't get any better. By the end of it, I was a mess myself.

This Tuesday I had to drop my sister-in-law, Jane, off at the airport, after a wonderful long weekend visit. I had to drop Natalie at school first, then drop off Jane. Natalie started crying as we got out of the car. I had brought her a little too early, which made for a longer, tougher goodbye. She was sobbing and screaming when I left. I almost went back to pick her up and never bring her to MDO again. But I didn't want to make a decision like that in the heat of an emotional moment.

Other moms have told me it takes a month, or 6-7 visits, for a child Natalie's age to acclimate to a new school. This feels pretty awful. I feel like I am being cruel and abandoning her. But I'm trying to stick it out, hoping she will actually like school and enjoy her friends and activities there. I'm giving it a month, I tell myself.

This morning, Thursday, went a little better. I started mentioning school in the morning before we left, and at first I thought I had made a big mistake. Natalie's lips started to quiver and tears came to her eyes. She asked me to carry her. She wanted to sit with me as I fed Rachel pureed pears for breakfast. As I pulled out her lunchbox, new backpack and drink cup, she kept saying things like, "I want to go read books! I want to go night-night!" Anything but go to school. Once, she said, "I don't like her." She got sad and got over it a couple of times. I made her the scrambled eggs she said she was suddenly hungry for. She played with them. I started to unbuckle her booster seat and get her down to put her in the car, and her tears started welling up again. "It's okay to be sad," I said, and hugged her close. She cried a little bit, hugged some more, then we went to the car. I asked her if she wanted her sunglasses, thinking maybe it might help if she wanted to hide behind them. She did.

It was about 9:27 when I left. School is 5 minutes away, and it takes us a few minutes to get out of the car, so I knew we would be a few minutes late.

We made our way slowly to the classroom. Her teacher and aide greeted her cheerfully and I put her things in her cubby. She said, "Mommy!" and I sat down next to her to give her a goodbye hug and kiss.

I expected the crying and screaming again, but it was only the trembling lip and downcast eyes this time. I hope and pray this means it is getting a little easier for her.

Update: Minutes after I posted this, I got a call from the school director, asking me to come pick up Natalie. The teacher suggested that I expect a call from her early in the day if Natalie's upset again next week. We talked about experimenting with early pick-ups for a while. Poor Natalie!

A good day in the life

If you were to drop in and watch a day in my life right now, it would probably go something like this:

5:30 AM: Give up on trying to get restless Rachel to go back to sleep, turn on the lamp and start returning coos and saying "ba ba ba!" back to her cute, smiley, wide-awake face.

5:45 AM: Greet Natalie and put her up on the bed with Rachel and me. Mosy into the kitchen when the girls seem ready and my shorts are on.

6:00 AM: Make a pot of coffee. Get Natalie's and my scrambled eggs cooked and on the kitchen table. Sometimes there's bacon, cut up fruit, or toast on the side, sometimes not.

6:45 AM: Kiss Rob goodbye as he heads to his bicycle to commute to work. Talk with Natalie about Daddy going to work on his bicycle. (I think she might think he works at a bike repair shop, and not know that he's actually a programmer.)

7:30 AM: Once diapers have been changed, new outfits are on, girls are fed, snacks and drinks are packaged and toys/quilt are loaded, we head over to the neighborhood park, a quarter mile away. We tried a double stroller a few times, but Rachel consistently hated it, so Rachel's in the Ergo on my chest while I push Natalie in the Jeep "jogging" stroller (it doesn't really count as a jogging stroller, says Rob, but it's easier to manage than a typical walking stroller.)

Sometimes we meet friends at the park. I send out a text to one or more of my mom friends in the 'hood.

We play for about an hour, which may involve swinging, sliding, climbing the ladder, drawing with chalk or making handprints from pre-existing chalk drawings, shoveling the recycled-tire playground gravel, going on nature walks, kicking a ball, etc. Rachel hangs out in the Ergo and often nurses or naps right there on my chest, even in the heat. I try to stay in the shade as much as I can. When Rachel wants out of the Ergo, I put the quilt down and let her sit or roll around and enjoy nature and sometimes a toy or two. Natalie always wants a snack and a drink at the park, so snacktime eats up some of our park time, too.

9:00AM: Diapers wet, kids tired, we pack it in and head back home. Occasionally Natalie is upset leaving the park, but usually she's quite ready to go when we go. If she doesn't seem ready when I am, I give her five more minutes, on a timer (thanks, iPhone!)

Once home, we change diapers again, eat again if needed, cool off and play for a few minutes, then embark on the outing of the day, sometimes a play date, more often a trip to HEB to buy groceries. Natalie looks forward to some trail mix ("nuts and raisins!") or a bolillo roll, or a free balloon or sticker. The shopping list is usually short--we go to the grocery store or Target probably five days a week. We wave to the guy at the sushi bar who recognizes us every time. How inefficient, right? But shorter trips make for happier kids (and mom) in this family, and we always need something and I need an excuse to get out of the house every day. Rob and I have made our peace with this reality.

If I'm lucky, Natalie or both girls will fall asleep on the way home.

One of the best things about having kids so close in age is that they both still take naps, often with some overlap. This is precious downtime for me. I think lately they've had overlapping naps about 4 out of 5 days of the week. Weekends are a different animal entirely--I'll cover that in a separate post. When only one girl is awake, I try to really engage with her, even if I'm darting in and out of a household task to do it. With Natalie I read books, have tickle fights, play with Play Doh, talk, sing and involve her in cleaning tasks to the extent that I can. With Rachel, I sit on the floor and hand her toys while she sits or rolls or schooches around, pre-crawling. I plop her in the high chair with a toy and talk and sing to her while I do dishes or whatever. I have extended nursing sessions with Rachel to make up for the lost time when Natalie's awake.

During naps, while I should be sleeping, I catch up on laundry, pick up toys and such, write blog posts... whatever time allows. Usually the cloth diapers are involved in some way, since those pretty much have to be washed, hung to dry, assembled and replenished in the girls' rooms daily. Good thing they dry so fast in this heat. We have a backup stash of disposables for the days when we're out of the house for a long time or I couldn't get the stash clean in time for the next change. Still, I think we are saving money with cloth, and there's something therapeutic about washing them. It's a simple repetition, conducive to meditation.

2PM: When both girls are up, we do lunch. Natalie gets chicken, pasta shells and broccoli, or hard boiled eggs, applesauce and rice, or something along those lines, and a cup of water or decaf iced tea. Rachel gets pureed pear, apple, banana, sweet potato or squash. I haven't been as disciplined about slowly introducing foods with Rache. Fortunately, she hasn't reacted uncomfortably to anything since we started solids for real, maybe two weeks ago.

4:00PM: Daddy, aka Rob, gets home and greets the girls, who are usually both up and playing and/or eating or getting fussy by then. Daddy takes over for a while, because he misses the girls and because by then I really need a break. I get caught up on housework, get started on cooking dinner, work on the odd Sudoku, read or go out by myself.

Sometimes Rob will take Natalie out to Balcones District Park to go to the public pool while I hang back at the house with Rachel.

At 7PM, ideally, things are starting to wind down. Dinner is at least started, if not over. A little more playtime, perhaps some outside on the deck time while I hang up diapers and/or water the thirsty grass and crape myrtles.

7:40PM: I start Natalie's bath. Rob takes over with Rachel, if he wasn't with her already, and attempts to get her to sleep--rocking her, bouncing with her on the exercise ball, or pacing with her in one of our carriers.

8:00PM: I turn Natalie, bathed, diapered and dressed in PJ's, over to Rob for the night. If Rachel is still awake, I take over, with pretty much the same arsenal of sleep inducers, plus nursing.

Our bedtimes were creeping into the 9:30-10PM range, and the girls were sleeping until 6:30 or 7, but the bedtime was just too late for Rob and me. This earlier schedule seems to be working better.

I use the term schedule somewhat loosely--we have a routine we try to follow, vaguely, most of the time.

When Rachel finally goes to sleep, Rob or I put her in the pack-and-play bassinet to sleep, if she's not already snuggled next to me for the night. We're working on the transition from bed to bassinet. Once Rachel is out, I'm usually going to bed soon after--it's the longest opportunity I'll have all night.

Rachel wakes up 4-5 times to nurse on a good night, then goes back to sleep as soon as she's done. It's usually no big deal for me. I have adjusted to waking up and going back to sleep pretty quickly. If I have too much caffeine too late in the day, I'm in trouble; otherwise, unless Rachel is having trouble sleeping, we're both fine.

Sometimes Natalie sleeps through the night. I'm guessing this happens about once a week. More often, she wakes up once or twice for water and a back rub or blankets. Rob is always on duty. This has been the case since I was pregnant with Rachel, and for the most part it has worked well.

So there you have it--a typical weekday, during the summer, for me and my 6-month-old and 2-year-old daughters. My "inbox" is never empty, so to speak--there are always tasks left undone. But if I'm lucky, when the day ends the girls are happy and peacefully sleeping, and I'm not overly exhausted. Or if I am, it's just in time to go to bed.

Day trip

Today was a brave new adventure. The girls and I headed off in grandma's minivan to New Braunfels (an hour south of Austin) with Beth and Piper to visit the McKenna Children's Museum.

In spite of some teething-associated fussiness on Piper's part, and a restaurant meltdown on Natalie's, I think the girls had a great time. They seemed to enjoy each other's company (and lots of snacks, toys and books--thanks Beth!) on the trip down. Rachel was asleep for most of both legs of the trip. On the way back there was a little bit of overtired toddler fussiness, both both toddlers did finally drift off to dreamland.

The museum itself was pretty fabulous, for the most part. At $7.50 per person over 12 months old, it was a little on the pricey end, but well worth it for an occasional day trip. The girls enjoyed having the run of a mock grocery store, ambulance, hospital, science lab, train table, bat cave (including batwing capes--see photos), aquarium, campground, ranch house, newspaper building, bank, rocket ship, mission control and a dark quiet room with interactive art projected on two walls. Their energy fizzled out before we had a chance to experience the art room (paint!) or outdoor water play area, both of which probably would have necessitated another change of clothes anyway.

The exhibits were very toddler-friendly, but also interesting enough to engage, educate and entertain older kids.

My only complaint was that the museum restaurant was poorly laid out (drinks were blocked by the cashier line, for example) and not kid-friendly.

Still, it was a great first roadtrip with friends. We might try Dallas or even Oklahoma City next time--as luck would have it, Beth and I both spent some of our formative years in OKC. Her parents still live just outside of the city. There are some high school friends I could look up and visit. And there's always McGehee's Catfish and Arbuckle Wilderness on the way up.

Bon appetit!

So, after a false start, I am starting solids with Rachel for real this time (I think.) Rachel has been jealously eyeing and screeching over our food since she was about 4 months old, presumably when she first got an inkling of what we were doing and how much we were enjoying it. Having a two-year-old sister eat in front of her probably makes her want it even more.

I started out giving her licks and sips of this and that: soup, fruit, whatever seemed fairly innocuous in tiny amounts. It just made her food lust stronger, so at just over 5 months I mashed up a banana for her, which I was feeding to her when this photo was taken. She loved every minute of it, but didn't eat all that much before she was so ravenously hungry she wanted to skip straight to breastmilk (as far as I could tell; she nursed vigorously when I gave her the opportunity.)

Unfortunately, her next dirty diaper had chunks of undigested banana in it. She seemed pretty uncomfortable leading up to that diaper, so I thought I had better wait a few weeks.

In the interim, Rob gave her a gingerbread cookie (!), which she devoured in crumbly, messy bliss, but which also gave her gas and a hurty belly.

Now, roughly two weeks after the banana incident, I bought some organic baby food at HEB, the stuff we used to give to Natalie when we could afford it. I came out with 3 single packs each of butternut squash, sweet potato, roasted apple and roasted pear, figuring I'd try to be quasi-scientific about looking for allergies and such by introducing one food at a time for a couple of days.

Today she ate the butternut squash. More accurately, she ate 1/5 of the butternut squash, and watched Natalie polish off the rest. She was definitely interested in eating it, but I cut her off when she started gagging as she tried to swallow the last few bites. I use the term "bites" loosely--they are more like tiny sips at this age. I give her a spoon to hold whenever I feed her, a trick I learned with Natalie. So far, so good. Lots of fun, relatively little mess.

Natalie has never been picky about what she eats, only how she eats. As in virtually all other aspects of her care, she wants to be in charge as much as possible. Lately, her big thing is "dipping sauce". She wants a sauce (ketchup, salad dressing, tartar sauce, marinara, yogurt) to be served on the side of whatever main course she is eating (say, green beans, chicken, fish sticks or scrambled eggs). She will dip the weirdest combinations and love it. I've seen her eat ketchup-dipped green beans and yogurt-dipped bacon on multiple occasions.

She knows very well how to use a spoon and fork, but it's hard to predict whether or not she'll be in the mood to use them with a given food. We don't push it that hard; we draw the line at letting her throw and smear food all over the place--that ends the meal--but if she wants to eat scrambled eggs with her hands, by all means. We do remind her that she has utensils and can use them.

"Show Rachel" has been a big phrase in our house lately. "Show Rachel how you eat cereal with a spoon!" often results in at least one perfect spoon-to-mouth bite.

Of course it's still far to early to tell what kind of eater Rachel will be, except to say that she's approaching it with gusto so far.

Eating is kind of a big deal in my side of the family. My dad's side is Cajun, and he's quite the chef. We had fabulous dinners growing up. His forte (no surprise) is Cajun and French cuisine, but he tackles other cultural cuisines quite eloquently. My mom is also an excellent cook, self-taught, having to live with my dad's constructive, if sometimes back-handed and sharp, criticism.

I once went on a vegetarian kick in college. Wow, I knew my parents would make fun of me for it. I didn't know they would take it so personally, as an affront to the values I grew up with. They seemed to get over it by the time I gave it up and returned to meat-eating.

Introducing my children to the delights of gumbo and jambalaya is a rite of passage in this family. Natalie loves both dishes. I remember letting her sip gumbo broth as tiny thing, older than six months but not by much. I hope Rachel is equally enthusiastic. By all indications, she will be.

Birthday overkill

Today was Natalie's 2nd birthday party. I'm sad to say I spent around $500 on it, invited lots of friends (too many for our small house), and instead of being joyful and fun, it was stressful. I pretty much hated every minute of it, hated myself for not anticipating the problems, for spending too much money, for overwhelming my two-year-old. She was in tears as I tried to get her to open presents. I had to just give up.

I hope my friends will forgive me for being a lousy party planner. I hope I can forgive myself.

Rob tells me people had fun, even Natalie. I take his word for it.

Sometimes my confidence as a mom gets shaken, and this is one of those times. No more parties, at least no more big parties, in this house. Martha Stewart I am not.

It's just pee.

Envisioning the family I would raise, I didn't realize how often that phrase would come up. Often enough, in fact, that my near-2-year old, Natalie, says it every day now, too. If it's not poop or vomit or something equally foul, it's probably just pee, and we and our belongings have been peed on enough now that we just don't care that much. Just wipe it up, throw it in the wash, etc.

Natalie drinks a LOT of liquids, for which I'm grateful; she's in good health and I never worry about her getting dehydrated, even when she's sick. But we use cloth diapers, oh, probably 75% of the time, not all of which are that great at keeping the pee from leaking out. In fairness, I'm probably not changing diapers as often as I should, now that I have two sets to change.

Even with disposable diapers, even overnight disposables, Natalie's pee makes it to the bedsheet at least 4 days a week, either in the morning or after nap. Rachel has been peeing the bed lately, too. So I'm doing even more laundry. It's a good thing I can find a way to enjoy folding clothes and hanging wet diapers on the back porch. (Note: Benefit of a drought in TX, those diapers dry really fast, maybe even faster than in the dryer.)

A friend mentioned the pee-in-the-tub phenomenon in her blogtoday. I don't worry about my kids drinking peed-in tub or pool water anymore. It's sterile, right? There's probably enough chlorine, etc, in the pool water to kill it anyway. I'm actually more concerned about their drinking that much chlorine. But not that concerned. So far, their little bodies are pretty good at determining when they need to spit up.

Oh, and it'll probably get worse before it gets better. We haven't started potty training yet. Dun dun dun...

Amigos y amigas

 

Natalie and Piper, enjoying some popsicles at Piper's house after a hot and cramped (but fun!) Art Day in the Park with the Biscuit Brothers. Rob says they look like the Comedy and Tragedy drama masks in this photo.

People often ask me how I handle having two little kids, babies really, so close in age. If it weren't for good mama friends, I don't know how I would. We spend the morning hanging out with a mama and toddler at least once during the week, sometimes two or three times, basically as many playdates as I can schedule. Outside of the precious few minutes I get to spend with my husband now and then, and weekend trips to my parents' place in Dripping Springs, playdates are my only source of adult interaction.

Even when the playdates are chaotic, which is always a possibility with toddlers and a baby, they're therapy for me. Just talking to another mom (and sometimes dad) is reassuring and refreshing, knowing they're going through similar things with their kids.

They're even more important for Natalie, I think. She has never been in any type of daycare or Mother's Day Out program, and she's only been in nurseries a handful of times, and never with any predictable caregivers or friends in class. That will change when she starts MDO two days a week at Covenant UMC in September. But she has good friends already that she has come to know through regular playdates. Lately she talks about her friends when they're not around. When she goes to the park she asks for Lyla. When we're getting in the car she often asks for Piper. If I mention that we're going to Adriana's house, she won't stop talking about "Yana" until we get there. She knows Owen is our neighbor and asks about him when we're going to the pool.

In planning Natalie's 2nd birthday I'm delighted to reflect on how many friendships she has with little girls and boys close to her age, and how those are extensions of treasured friendships I have with the parents. Not surprisingly, most of the guests are parents and kids. There are some important significant others who are not themselves parents. I'll devote another post to these special folks one day soon.

I'm grateful for the friendships that have carried us through the joys and trials of these early days.

TV, or not TV?

So, since Natalie was born, I've been hesitant about letting her watch TV. Lucky for me she doesn't seem to have any great inclination to watch, until recently anyway.

I turned on PBS a few times between when Natalie was, say, 10 months old and 18 months old. I didn't really dig the programming, not even Sesame Street, which I remember having enjoyed somewhat as a kid. I let her watch Clifford, which seemed a little more playful and less preachy or teachy than some of the other shows. Natalie never really got interested to the point where she'd ask me to turn it on, or ask for a particular show. She'd watch a few minutes, if that, then wander off to do something else.

Some of our well-meaning relatives sent us a Baby Einstein video, Baby Mozart or something like that. I remembered that a friends' mom had said it captivated her daughter and she could actually get a few minutes to herself when she put it on. Half hoping for the same magic, I popped it into the DVD player. Nah, not interesting enough for Natters, who was probably 15 months old at the time. Might've worked on a younger baby.

Nurtureshock discusses Baby Einstein and how there's little to no evidence to support their claims to build brighter babies. Several other books, including Bright from the Start warn that TV for infants and toddlers may actually hinder neural development. The American Academy of Pediatrics advises against TV for kids under 2.

Okay, so parking your baby or toddler in front of the TV every day for children's programming is probably a bad idea; lots of overstimulating colors, sounds and ads, ads, ads. But I'm hoping occasional viewings of ad-free documentaries aren't too terrible. Because, as it turns out, Natalieloves them.

"Planet Earth" and "Babies" are the two documentaries she has seen. Neither was made for kids. We have to skip parts of both that we fear might be too violent and scary. She doesn't need to see a shark devour a sweet, lovable dolphin. Nor does she need to get any ideas from an older brother smacking his baby brother with a scarf. Sure, these probably aren't the first or worst images that come to mind with the word
"violence". There's plenty of bad stuff in pretty much all TV formats, yes, including kids' programming. But we're in dicey territory letting her watch TV at all.

We have a running dialogue with Natalie about what happens to all four babies throughout "Babies", her current favorite. "She's with her Daddy. Daddy's giving her a bottle", "he stepped on the goat", etc. It might be a stretch to claim that watching it has taught her anything--I think she had this vocabulary anyway--but I hope it's at least somewhat innocuous. Because it's nice to have a calm, engaged Natalie for a few minutes while I type a blog post, get the dishes done, or fold some laundry. Or change Rachel's diaper.

Oh, and I don't let Natalie watch TV every day. Sometimes we go a week or two without any TV at all. Rob and I don't watch TV, and we don't keep it on in the background.

That will change with the arrival of football season. Having grown up with three brothers and no sisters, and in a sports-watching family, football on TV is familiar and comforting to me. It's a rite of autumn that I treasure, and so does my husband. Natalie might have seen more football than anything else on TV in her lifetime--she's been alive through two football seasons so far. She was saying "football!" this past season, so she is definitely somewhat familiar with it already. Granted, we'd probably all be better off if we were outside playing football during those hours. But it's something of a family tradition that we treasure, so it's here to stay, vice or no.

Natalese

Every day Natalie's speech gets clearer and more sophisticated. It has reached the point where I'd better jot down some of her toddlerisms before they're gone and forgotten.

"Lello"		Yellow
"Killerpiller" (formerly "Coddiedater")		Caterpillar
"MEElk"		Milk
"No Mommy sing."		Don't sing, Mommy.

Off the top of my head, I can't remember more examples right now, but as I stumble on them I'll try to remember to add them to this post.

Mid-week slump

Happy Hump Day, everybody. Although I know it hasn't been an especially hard week, for some reason I'm feeling more burned out than usual.

Rachel is now five months old. She is newly able to sit without support for a few minutes, which is exciting, but I think perhaps it's making her impatient for more mobility. She can lean pretty far forward before she slumps off to the side and quickly gets upset. She still seems to be teething a bit, no teeth yet of course. She's taking a long time to get to sleep at night, but fortunately doesn't stay awake any longer than it takes to feed during the night. Last night I think she actually spaced out her wakings/feedings to maybe every 2-1/2 hours instead of 1-1/2 to 2. I don't know because I don't have a clock in the room at the moment. She even slept in until 7:45 when Natalie woke her up. In spite of this, I still felt very groggy upon getting up for the day.

My lower back is very sore lately, as is my left hip flexor and knee. I hope I'm not headed toward round #2 of post-baby sciatica. At least if I am, it has taken longer to develop this time, and I'll know what to do to tame it. Methylprednisone was what finally knocked it out last time, after months and months of chiro and PT. Sometimes Western medicine is necessary.

So I love Natalie to pieces, she is a great kid and fascinatingly cute and precocious, but boy is she challenging sometimes! Lately she's been intentionally slapping Rob and me, and hitting us with toys and other objects. She occasionally goes after Rachel, but fortunately that's pretty rare. I try to calmly and patiently stop the aggression (grab the hand, toy, etc) and get down at eye level with her to verbally remind her "no hitting", but I'm losing my patience lately. I get frustrated and yell, which is totally ineffective, and if anything, only makes both of us more upset. I haven't ever hit her back, but I am tempted sometimes. I draw the line at punishing her physically. I've read plenty about discipline that says that spanking and such is misguided and ineffective at best, and at worst it stresses the child and leads to increased aggression all around.

All punishment is misguided, says Unconditional Parenting. I need to re-read it, because I'm not sure what to do to help Natalie and us get at whatever it is that's causing the hitting. Part of it is her desire for more attention, but with Rachel here, it's always a challenge to give Natalie as much as she wants and needs. Some of this is probably just a question of time, and nothing we do will make a difference, we just have to get through it. But I never like that answer--I don't like being totally out of control.

Natalie also reflexively says "No!" to every request now. I'm thinking I might try some reverse psychology for a while. The Love and Logic parenting folks emphasize giving a choice between two options whenever possible. It seems to work well for Natalie when she's in a good mood anyway (not overstimulated, tired, hungry, etc.) But yes or no questions almost always produce a no. Sometimes she even says no to something she obviously wants, like a bottle of (coconut) milk.

The days are long, but the years are short, the saying goes. The days are definitely long!

My parents came over this past Sunday to watch the girls while Rob and I slipped out to the Alamo Drafthouse to see Horrible Bosses. This is the second "date" (sans kids) we've had since Rachel was born. It was great, but over way too soon! Logistically, though, it doesn't make sense to leave Rachel for longer than that. She has to eat too often, and neither Natalie nor Rachel will stay happy without Rob or me around for very long. It's not easy to get even two hours carved out for us to be a couple.

We tell ourselves we will look back and laugh, and I'm sure we will. But oh, for a solid night of sleep, more than one glass of wine, and an uninterrupted conversation!

Playing around

Outside

One of the best things about being a stay-at-home-mom is getting to be outside with my kids every day. Even now, with triple-digit temps every afternoon for months, we can get out early in the morning or after 7PM or so, and it's quite bearable, even enjoyable. Besides, if Natalie is cooped up inside all day, there's hell to pay! Good thing that's exceedingly rare here in Central Texas.

Over the weekend, Rob and I took the girls for a walk in a nearby neighborhood, not ours, for a change of pace. We were also eyeing xeriscapes to get ideas for our own yard. We parked near the entrance to a small wooded area and made a short walk around the neighborhood before we ventured into the woods.

I forget how refreshing it is to walk in the woods. I forget that I believe it's absolutely essential, like a vitamin for your soul. Thoreau was definitely on to something.

Fortunately, it's not just the woods. Being outside anywhere in nature makes me feel like all is essentially right with the world, in a way that I can't tap into indoors. Our little human drama is just that, little, in the grand scheme of things. I can't feel that here, thinking about it at my computer. Not looking out a window. You have to be there, outside, surrounded by it, to feel it.

We spent a good part of this morning on our back deck, as we often do if we aren't over at Schroeter Park on the playground. Natalie played with a simple teddy bear, changing its diaper, making it fly like a butterfly, sending it down the slide of the dry kiddie pool. Rachel fussed until I put her in the Ergo carrier, then she settled and quickly fell asleep. I hand-watered a bit of the yard missed by the sprinkler yesterday, then assembled and folded cloth diapers fresh from the laundry. It was simple, but wonderful, to be outside doing ordinary things with my two daughters. It was warm, to be sure, but we have a fan and a roof on the deck, and with the morning breeze it's not bad at all.

Now I'm enjoying some quiet time while the girls both nap. Yes! It happens! Not every day, but it does happen. And it's so nice when it does.

Anyway, I'm a big believer in "outside". It does wonders for the girls' disposition, and for mine. So lucky are we to live in a city of parks, where it is temperate almost all year.

Baby book? What baby book?

So I haven't exactly fulfilled my commitment to blogging about our daily lives as a family of four. Here we are almost five months after Rachel was born. Natalie is turning two years old at the end of this month. I kept hoping to get back to this blog, but I think I was overwhelmed by my sense of shame at not having gotten to it right after Rachel was born. That and, I've been soooo busy. Busy like I didn't realize I could be before Rachel arrived.

Things are good. Rachel's birth story is in the previous post. I hope to get around to telling you about the months I've neglected to write about so far, but not tonight. I have 20 minutes, so here's where we are today:

RACHEL: 4 months, 3 weeks old (or so). She still has most of the full head of black hair she was born with, only now it's thinning in the back and more of a dark brown color. She has startled-looking round blue eyes, a tiny cute nose, gargantuan cheeks and an anime mouth - ah-ooo-ah! Either her mouth is wide open or tightly pursed.

She's sleeping about like Natalie did at this age--one long stretch, maybe 4 hours, followed by wakings every 1-1/2 hours or so. This time it's much easier because I can make myself go to bed when she does, and she sleeps with me in the bed, so she doesn't ever have to cry to wake me up. So I get woken up frequently for quick feedings, but then she drifts off again quickly, so I can, too.

Rachel naps much better than Natalie did, usually. She'll often overlap naps with Natalie (great for me!) Some days she'll take 30 minute naps. Other days she'll take up to a 3- or 4-hour nap. I'm sure part of the inconsistency is because she's at the mercy of everyone else's schedule, but I try to let her nap as much as I can. Being a second child, she doesn't get a noise- and light-free environment, or one-on-one attention until she's fast asleep. Makes me wonder if I needed to put so much effort into getting Natalie to nap as a baby, but what's done is done.

Rachel is still exclusively breastfed, but she is so jealous of the food we eat that I don't think I'll be able to hold her off the full six months to introduce baby food. She squawks impatiently every time she sees us eat.

Rache is cute and playful. Uncle Brian nicknamed her "Sug", and it fits. She started laughing almost as soon as she started smiling, at around 3-1/2 weeks, and she laughs and smiles a lot. These days she's interacting with Natalie more and more, which is such a delight. She can roll over both ways, though she usually rolls back-to-tummy, gets stuck, and squawks or cries to be picked up.

NATALIE: Natalie is almost two, and is still cuter all the time. People often ask me how she reacted to getting a sister at such a tender age--19 months. She has always been affectionate and playful towards Rachel, but there have been several tough moments in which she wanted my attention, or Rob's, and couldn't get it right away. I'm sure it hasn't been easy for her, but overall I think she's handling it beautifully. She has had the occasional unconsolable crying fit (tantrum? not sure whether to call it that). She wakes up with night terrors once in a while. Rob and I pretty much acknowledge what's going on and try to validate it, i.e. "I see that you're upset/angry/scared. That's okay. I'm here if you need me." And we wait it out until she's ready for physical contact (being hugged/carried). Often taking her outside on the back porch and pacing with her, humming, seems to help.

Natalie is extraordinarily verbal. She is already speaking in sentences, and very clearly. I lament that we haven't been able to record her more--she stops what she's doing as soon as she realizes we are trying to take a picture or video. Her "baby talk" days are quickly going away. Just today at HEB she said, "I lost the list," and sure enough, the shopping list was on the floor behind us. She recently learned how to say "I want/need", so we're hearing that a lot lately. She has a huge vocabulary and parrots things back to us, sometimes days after we said them, with eerie accuracy. She sings all the time, and lately makes up her own songs to familiar melodies, stringing together pieces of songs and books she's memorized, and phrases she hears all the time. She recently learned all the basic color words. She still says things like "wed" and "geen" for red and green, but it's very clear what she's trying to say.

She is terrified of men with facial hair, so we've had some unfortunate run-ins with her friends' daddies and grandpas. Otherwise, she's very sociable.

Rachel's Birth Story

Better late than never, right? Here's Rachel's birth story, from back when I wrote it up for my Yoga Mama friends:

I've been meaning to write Rachel's birth story, as it was both a happy ending and a new beginning for our little family. Feel free to skip to Rachel's story if you don't have time to read the background on Natalie's birth (or already know the story).

Natalie's Birth Story

I have to start by backing up to Natalie's birth, back in July 2009. I wanted a natural childbirth and thought I would get one. My OB (Stephanie McNelis) at St David's NAMC was casual about this point, but said "yeah, you can pretty much have whatever birth you want." Not knowing much more than that, I took her at her word. Then I went overdue.

The pressure to induce started a few days before my due date, when my cervix still hadn't dilated at all. She encouraged me to set up an induction for 7/25, 3 days after my due date. I gave her a tentative "yes", then went home to read up on inductions a bit. I found a general consensus that inductions were a little risky and not recommended unless medically necessary. At my next appointment, I asked why induction would be necessary. My OB warned me that the longer I went overdue without going into labor, the greater my risk would be of ending up with a C-section, because the baby would have a meconium bowel movement in the womb. While this might have been true in an absolute sense, it completely omitted the fact that inductions themselves double a mother's C-section risk. My husband and I told her we wanted to push the induction date out anyway, to give Natalie a few more days to get here on her own. Irritated, the OB told us that she could schedule it for 7/28 but that it was the last day she would be available to deliver the baby (perhaps because she had a vacation planned or something--she didn't explain further.) We reluctantly agreed to 7/28.

The induction itself was rough, but not the end of the world as far as I was concerned. Labor lasted 14 hours, and 8 hours into it, on 16 units of Pitocin, having not slept in the past 30 hours or eaten in the past 18, I consented to the epidural. I got it an hour later, but it wore off four times. In the meantime, Natalie's heartrate dropped a few times, possibly because of the epidural. I was 9.5 cm dilated when the OB came in and told me I would have to have a C-section if there were any more decels in the next 20 minutes. For those 20 minutes, I breathed very deeply, concentrated intently on the heartrate monitor, and prayed constantly. Fortunately there were no more decels, and then I was ready to push. 30 minutes later, Natalie was born.

I could get over all that, but then Natalie was snatched from my arms right as I was trying to latch her on to breastfeed for the first time. What ensued was a week-long stay in the NICU, while my husband and I camped out at the hospital. One by one, fears about Natalie's well being were dispelled, only to be replaced by new fears or hurdles she/we had to clear before we could take her home. First it was the fast breathing, then a distended belly, which led to 48 hours of IV antibiotics and 4 x-rays. Then they had to see that her digestive system worked properly. I insisted on breastfeeding, which was monumentally difficult with the stress, the pressure of a critical audience watching, the parameters she and I were expected to meet on the hospital's schedule, and the constant pressure to give her formula. We finally had to give her formula because breastfeeding was going so badly she was starving, but I insisted on trying to breastfeed to start each feeding anyway. Most frustratingly, we couldn't get anyone to explain to us what risk(s) the hospital actually feared for Natalie's well-being and why she needed to be in the NICU, hooked up to tubes and monitors, unable to feed or bond normally.

So it took us a week to clear all the hurdles, and we were even told "your baby belongs to the NICU" by one of the NICU nurses, after we asked for the 100th time when they would let us take our baby home.

All this being said, a few of the nurses in both L&D and the NICU were wonderful, constructive and compassionate; unfortunately after their shifts ended, we met disgruntled nurses who, probably under plenty of stress caring for other (truly sick) NICU babies, didn't appreciate us and the demands we made on their time and patience.

After that first week, all of us were miserable and I felt I had failed Natalie as a mother in many different ways. It took a long time to get over this feeling, as we suffered through colic, reflux and breastfeeding issues. I think at around 6 months I was finally able to feel a little bit competent as a parent.

Of course, after this experience, I wanted the exact opposite for my next child. No hospital, no unnecessary interventions, ample bonding time, peace and just to be home with him/her as soon as possible. I started researching the possibilities as soon as I could after Natalie was born.

I toured Austin Area Birthing Center (North) with the owner, Jean, who listened to Natalie's birth story and took time and care in answering my questions about my options for natural childbirth there. I loved the facility and my husband was impressed with them, too. We considered home birth, but liked the fact that AABC is super close to where we live, they have several midwives so someone is always available, and all the "mess" of birth would be outside of our home, in a well-equipped, safe and beautiful place. We found out our insurance wouldn't cover it, but even with going self-pay, the total bill (assuming no complications) would be considerably less than what we paid out of pocket for Natalie's birth and hospital stay.

Rachel's Birth Story

I had found out I was Group B Strep positive at my 38-week appointment. The usual protocol for this is IV antibiotics during labor. Aside from the minor concern of this being a bummer for me during labor, I was concerned that antibiotics would wipe out all the beneficial bacteria in my birth canal and breastmilk that my baby would need to build her immune system after birth. I researched the risks of GBS to mom and baby (remote but possibly quite serious--menengitis or sepsis, even in some very rare cases, death), maternal risk factors and the risks of IV antibiotics. I talked to one of the midwives at AABC about alternative treatment, got a second GBS test, and found out that we could forgo the antibiotics in favor of doing a local (vaginal) Hibiclens rinse before any cervical checks, or immediately after the water broke or every 6 hours thereafter. This treatment is common in Europe, apparently. Joan Smith, CNM at AABC, approved this alternative treatment plan.

I had been having Braxton-Hicks contractions on and off for a week. I would wake up at 2AM and have irregular contractions until 5AM. Or I would start having mild contractions at 11AM and it would fizzle out by 2PM. No one had checked my cervix yet, as it isn't AABC's policy to do so before 39 weeks unless there is a medical reason to.

So when contractions started up at 7AM, even though they were a little stronger than before and more regular--every 5 to 7 minutes--I hesitated to start making phone calls. I fed Natalie breakfast and gave her a bath, then started tidying up the house and packing the car, just in case this was the real thing. When a contraction would start, I stopped what I was doing to do Wall Dog, swaying my hips during contractions, or Cat/Cow. I did tell my husband, Rob, to stay home from work just in case this was the real thing. My husband had ordered some St. Augustine sod for the backyard, and the installer arrived at around 9AM.

Contractions continued at the same pace, same 5-7 minute intervals all morning. The grass guy finished up at around 10:30. At 11AM, wham! I had a REALLY hard contraction, followed by two more just as intense, so close together I didn't have a chance to time them. I yelled for Rob to call our doula, Melia Gordon, to meet us at the house, then called our parents to come pick up Natalie, then AABC.

When he got in touch with Joan at AABC, the contractions were 2-1/2 to 3 minutes apart, really really hard labor. She told us she would meet us at the birthing center in 30 minutes. Things were suddenly happening really fast. Melia arrived just in time and she drove me over to AABC. I live literally less than a mile from there, thank God! I had a contraction before walking out to the car, then one in the car, then one in the parking lot.

We got into the Santa Fe Room just in time for me to have another contraction. They couldn't have been more than a minute apart at this point. I tried to breathe and relax through them, which I could only do to a point. I howled and tensed up as each one peaked. "Try not to fight it," said Melia (our doula) and Joan. I tried and was only somewhat successful, but they reassured me this meant things were really far along. I did the Hibiclens rinse on the toilet, one more contraction. Then Joan managed to check me on the bed and said, "There's only a bag of waters holding your baby back, no cervix at all!" Talk about music to my ears!

Rob was waiting at our house with Natalie for my parents to arrive from Dripping Springs. He called Melia just as she was about to call him and tell him to hurry over with Natalie. I tried to hold off on pushing until he got there. Melia and Joan got me on my knees, head-down on the bed, to help slow labor just a bit.

"Can I get in the tub?" I managed to ask. They filled the tub for me and I got in. They used Hibiclens in the water, as an extra precaution against GBS. It was slippery in the tub, but the warm water was a very welcome sensation that was part of my slim grip on sanity while laboring so hard. I felt like I couldn't hold the baby back much longer, but I didn't know how much more I could take. Rob arrived and traded places with Melia while she went to the waiting room to help with Natalie. I had already started pushing in the tub. Joan suggested I use this ski rope-looking device--a handle on one end for me to hold with both hands, and another identical handle on the other end that the clinical assistant, Summer, held to counterbalance my pull.

With Joan's guidance, I tucked my chin to my chest and pushed with all my might and concentration. Quickly the baby crowned, still in the bag of waters. In the next push, I felt a little pop and saw a plume of what looked like grapeseed oil trickle under the tub water. "Your water just broke," Joan explained. A few more hard pushes and the head was out, but the shoulders were stuck. "Give me just a little grunty push with the next contraction," Joan advised. I did and it was a relief after the intense effort of the bigger ones. She eased a shoulder out, but we had one more to go. "More grunty pushes," Finally the next shoulder emerged, and the baby slid out. Shaking and euphoric, I leaned back to relax in the tub as Joan carefully laid the baby on my chest. "The cord won't go any further than this yet." I rubbed my new, purple baby with thick, black hair and they gave me receiving blankets and helped to rub and dry her. She was looking around and let out a few little cries, then coughed out some fluid and let out a holler.

We stayed in the tub as it drained and we waited for my placenta. I pushed it out easily and then studied it for a few seconds, as it sat on the floor of the tub. I hadn't seen my placenta when Natalie was born, and thought it looked big and impressive, with so many veins and dark jewel-like hues of red, purple and blue. They scooped it up carefully to take it off for encapsulation.

"So do we know the gender?" Joan asked. In the shock of new birth I had forgotten to check! I picked up a tiny leg and looked--a little vagina. "It's a girl!" I laughed. We hadn't known, but Rob and I had suspected all along that it was a girl.

They clamped the cord once it stopped pulsing and waited for Rob to cut it. They helped me back to the toilet and then to the bed, and handed my me sweet baby. Finally, as she and I were left alone for a brief moment while the tub was cleaned, I cried tears of long-awaited relief and joy. It was the birth I had longed and prayed for, and my baby and I would not be separated. She fussed a lot for about 30-45 minutes while I tried to latch her on to nurse. "She just has a lot to say about that birth," Melia assured me, helping as best she could to get us going. She really helped me stay calm about it and keep trying without overwhelming Rachel. Finally I did get Rachel latched on the right side and she calmed down immediately and suckled ambitiously for a long time.

We had to stay until 6PM to make sure my vitals and Rachel's were okay. We sat in bed and nursed and looked at each other. She spit up a little and dozed off on my shoulder. It was pure bliss.

My mom had gotten lost on the way to the birthing center, but did finally make it and popped in for a minute to meet her new granddaughter, Rachel. Then she scooped up Natalie and took her back to our house so she could meet her new sister before going to my parents' house in Dripping Springs for the night. While they waited for us to come home, my mom cooked us dinner.

We got home right after 6 when dinner was ready, and Natalie was waiting.

"Rachel!" she said. My mom had already taught Natalie her new sister's name.

"Baby!" she continued, reaching in gently to pat Rachel's hair. She offered her a blanket. So touching.

It still amazes me how beautifully things fell into place that day for us. It was a blessing to have such a fast labor, and I'll never forget birthing Rachel holding onto a ski rope in a jacuzzi. It was the exact opposite of Natalie's birth, in all the ways that mattered to us.

We are doing well and I almost feel human again. Rachel sleeps and eats well so far, just a little angel of a baby. Natalie is curious about her sister and is starting to realize she's here to stay. Sometimes she says "Mommy? Daddy?" in a distressed little voice, reminding us of the extra love and assurance she needs right now, and we hug her close. Our little family is growing, and growing up.

2 Weeks?

Here's Natalie protesting my stopping to take a picture of her while we played in the snow yesterday. Other than this moment, she had a great time.

This is the second year in a row we've had a February snow in Austin. I can't remember the last time it snowed before then.

Today is two weeks from my official due date, 2/19, which is a shot in the dark. It's hard not to orient my thinking around that date, though.

I feel best in the morning and worst at night. Every morning I think I can handle this, and every night I wonder. I just get so tired. (Boo-hoo!)

Here's one the photos from our recent family photo session. We didn't get around to making Xmas photos in 2010, and I wanted to capture our family as it is now, before the baby arrives. Enjoy.

Calm Before The Storm

I want to create a blog to document our little growing family, both for our extended family and friends, and as an archive of our family history. I'm not good at keeping up with things like baby books, and I'm afraid the details of my children's earliest days will be lost if I don't jot them down soon.

Our happy little family is currently: Mary (me, Mommy), 30, stay-at-home-mom, my husband Rob (Daddy), 33, programmer, and our daughter Natalie, a week shy of 18 months old. I am about a month away from my due date with our second baby. We decided not to find out the gender this time, so I'll be posting shortly after the birth to let everyone know whether Natalie has a brother or a sister.

Since the beginning, I've felt like it's another girl. So does Rob, lately. I even dreamed about giving birth to another girl. We would be happy with either a girl or a boy. We're just praying for a healthy baby and a smooth delivery.

Natalie has hit her stride with language lately, picking up new words all the time and repeating things she hears from not only Rob and me but other people, TV and the radio. She's great at well-timed repeats of expressions like, "aw, man!"

She also sings "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" (sounds like dee-tu, dee-tu, ditto tar) and the Birthday Song (apee dirtday to you!)

She does the normal toddler things. She runs around the house, pushes her stroller, dances whenever music comes on (even commercials), giggles, makes funny faces, changes emotional states in seconds, delivers mysterious linguistic tirades and generally melts her parents' hearts and tickles our souls on a regular basis.

I look forward to seeing how she copes with the intrusion of a new sibling. She gets along great with other kids, for the most part, but she's never had to share her whole world with someone else. I don't expect it to be easy. I'm hopeful that we'll be able to make the transition as smooth as possible for her.

We plan to keep Natalie in her room, in her bed, and put the new baby in our room in a bassinet or co-sleeper for at least the first four months. Daddy will be on call for Natalie at night; I'll be on call for the newborn. I don't think there's any use in planning further out than that until we meet the new little one and can reevaluate everyone's needs.

I have a tendency to ramble on too long, so I'm going to cut myself off here. Below are a couple of recent photos of Natalie with her parents. The one of me was taken on Christmas Day 2010, when I was at the beginning of my 8th month of pregnancy.