Listening

Whoever said that the twos were terrible had not got to the threes. Let's just say that age 3 to 4 is tough. I think I've complained, I mean, mentioned about this before. Lately, our problem has been listening. Stella, can you please sit in your chair at dinner (her record lately has been 3 minutes. ugh). Stella, it's time for a bath, can you come up with Mommy? Stella, it's not time to jump on your bed; you need to get your underwear and pajamas on. Stella, it's time to go potty before bed. I feel like all we're doing with her lately is harping on her, but it seems that we have to say things 3..4...7... times before she does anything.

So the other night, we were calmly piled in our bed, reading books before bedtime. It had just been a tiring evening of getting her to eat dinner, sharing toys with her sister (don't even get me started on that. Poor Louisa is lucky sometimes if she gets a rattle to play with), and the bathtime routine. Steve started to tell her about Santa. Stella's pretty interested in Santa this year. In fact, the day after Thanksgiving, she told me very seriously, "Mommy, I believe it's almost Christmastime!" We don't even have a TV, but man, advance Christmas commercialism has even got her too.

So, Steve said, you know who only gets presents at Christmas?
"Me?"
No, Stella, only girls and boys that are behaving good. Listening at school to their teachers, listening to their parents, doing the things that they ask when they ask them.
"Oh."
So Stella, if you'd like Santa to come this year and give you presents, then you need to start listening to your parents. We need to see your good behavior so we can tell Santa that you deserve presents.

(beat)

"Okay, I will happily start listening tomorrow."

Steve and I did all we could do not to burst out laughing.

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In other news, Louisa has started army crawling. And finding all the minuscule minutia on the floor. Like tiny pieces of fluff from Scupper's stuffed animals. Like a piece of a tennis ball. Like a flake of oatmeal. Really? All of these things on our off-white carpet? Seems that besides vacuuming twice a week, we'll need to get down on the floor with our eagle eyes and be careful. It's amazing how soon we forget about the whole baby-proofing the house.
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A few weeks ago we escaped 30 minutes out to the desert to Red Rock Canyon. While still a pile of sand and rock (as is most of Las Vegas, plus tacky hotels and concrete), the warmth of the sun, the openess of the sky, and the brisk air was refreshing. Stella did the whole hike herself (new sneakers are awesome motivators) and enjoyed watching the climbers traversing the rocks.

my sweet little one

How is it that the poor second child doesn't get enough blog time like her big sister? I fear this might always be the case with the most chill one of our bunch. She's been the most calm part of our family since she breezed her way into this world. She never really cries, and when she does, you know that she needs something really bad. Otherwise, it's the occasional fuss. It has been a joy to watch her come into her own in the last few months. It's as if after six month, babies find a personality, or maybe it's that we finally find their personality that they have already always had. Louisa may be easy going, but she is determined. In the past two weeks, she's learned to army-crawl. And her ability to zero-in on something she wants has never been more clear. That speck of dirt across the floor? I want it. and bam. She's there. That toy that is completely out of reach? Got it. Those carrots? No thank you, I'm done with you shoving them in my face and they are now splattered across the tray and then the floor.

Yet all of this determination is done with such joy, such verve, that it's hard to be frustrated. She cackled last night in our tug of war over the warm washcloth that I was trying to use to wipe away those carrots. Cackled with joy - calculated joy, I feel, but none the less, happiness. In the middle of the night last night, she was fussing, and when I came in, her face lit up in the night-lighted darkness, and a giggle issued from her mouth. Oh good! Mommy's here! Awesome! It was hard to be frustrated that she was up, as usual, at 2:45am.

Unlike her sister was at this age, Louisa babbles constantly. Certainly, she has to keep up with Stella's talking and singing, and the "ba-ba-ba-ma-da" comes out of her mouth a lot. In fact, yesterday in the car ride home, Stella yelled at one point, "Louisa stop it!! I don't want to listen to you anymore!" ha. Taste of your own medicine, my dear. I don't think we'll ever have to worry about Louisa talking late.

Experiencing this baby, this time around, has been so much sweeter, in some ways. Steve and I keep trying to remember whether we felt so loopy around Stella, so in love. And of course, I'm sure we were. But we were also neurotic, and scared, and confused, and un-sure parents. While we fawned over our first born (and certainly still do) I feel in some ways wonderfully blessed to experience babyhood again, from a more learned, more relaxed perspective. Louisa, my love, you are a joy.

best things this week

listening to Snow White in the car:

the witch says to the huntsman, "Now take her out to the woods, and kill her!"

Stella says, "Oh, that is going to hurt her feelings..."

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my mom visiting for a week to help with the girls while I was at a conference. best mom ever. best husband ever for handling the girls and mother in law.

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watching Stella and Louisa laugh together at the dinner table, sitting next to each other in matching chairs, albeit that Louisa's has a cushion and a tray.

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hearing Louisa BELLY LAUGH at Stella playing peek-a-boo with her over the lip of the tub. seriously, BELLY LAUGH.

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getting completely soaking wet as the girls take a bath together and Louisa sits in her bath chair splashing Stella full force with her legs, laughing the whole time. I am loving watching the siblings interact. it can only get better... of course, until they are older and then fight incessantly. let's postpone that as long as we can. splashing in the tub might help.

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watching Stella put on a full-fledged dance show on our bed after reading books, while Steve and I practically fall asleep as she sings and dances. It wasn't worth trying to stop her. we just figured she would tire herself out eventually. 8 minutes in to Bob Fosse Presents, Stella stops abruptly, says "i'm tired." goes and pees one last time, and looks at me and says, "Mom, are we singing or what?"

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watching Fox News and Karl Rove look like total idiots as the President is re-elected.

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as you can see, trying to find the joy in the crappiness that is las vegas. I may still have 65 papers to grade this weekend, but who cares? I was up at 5:15am and I'm headed to bed. Shakespeare is going to wait until tomorrow.

anon.

At least they are still "dancers"...

My mom introduced Stella to Disney's The Little Mermaid when we visited this past August. In fact, I believe she made my father save an old tv/VCR combo just so that they could watch the old VHS tape together when she was old enough. "Enough" means that they still had to fast-forward through the Ursula song (because a creepy old octopus that sings in a minor key is still a bit much for a 3 year old), but overall, Stella was enthralled.

On our first trip to the local library here, Stella found the CD section that was stocked with tons of children's music - quite wonderful actually. She found the soundtrack to the Little Mermaid, and so we checked out, only to listen to the same 5 songs (sans Ursula's) on the way to school and the way home --- EVERY DAY. When we finally had to return the CD, Stella found a whole section of Disney CDs entitled "Songs and Stories" and found Cinderella - which of course, she labeled as "Look Mommy, the dancer from my nighttime diapers I used to wear!" These CDs (and we have since checked out Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, and today, picked up Beauty and the Beast and Brave) have 4 songs from the film on them, and a female narrator that "tells" the story from the film, with snippets of the actual movie dialogue thrown in. They are basically story tapes, and conveniently, are about the length of our drive to school, give or take a few minutes.

I have now listened to Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White UMPTEEN times. I rather miss listening to NPR on the way to work in the morning... but as soon as I turn the key in the ignition, I hear from the back seat, "put on Sleeping Beauty Mommy." In one respect, I'm a bit over it. I was and continue to be always wary of the whole Disney Princess phenomenon, and the message that it sends to young girls. Look pretty and the first man you meet will end up being a handsome prince who wants to marry you, no matter what he has to do - battle evil witches, kiss you even though you look dead and have been living with a bunch of dwarves... even Cinderella, who has to put up with a evil stepmother, gets off because of some pretty awesome mice who unlock her attic door. Or, at least, according to Disney.

On the other hand, at 3 1/2, Stella (luckily) isn't really getting the whole "get the prince because you are beautiful" story line. And listening to the tapes over and over again has begun to increase her vocabulary. Yesterday, she told Steve she was going to "swiftly run" through the house. "Swiftly?" I asked. "Yes, swiftly." (I think that's from Sleeping Beauty). She even started a bit of literary analysis this week while listening to Snow White. "Mommy, the evil Queen is a lot like the mean stepmother in Sleeping Beauty." I'm not sure if she meant that the voices sound the same or that the characters are the same, but I'll content myself with the latter. She asked last week why the stepmother was not nice, and I explained about how stories like these needed an evil character or nothing interesting would happen (aka dramatic conflict). Because of these stories, she has also been asking questions like "what is killed?" and "how we die?" which are a bit harder to explain in her terminology, but I've been trying my best.

Another boon, because she has been enthralled with listening to these stories, I decided it was high time we started chapter books at bedtime. We haven't tackled it every night, but I'm happy to say we are half way through Charlotte's Web, and I couldn't be more pleased to move away from short picture books for the time being. Sniffle... she's growing up... sniffle... and at least for now, she still thinks the princesses are "dancers" so we'll keep that up.

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In other news, last night after I put her to bed, I put in the oven a tray of frozen cookies. (I make a full batch when I make the batter, and freeze half in little balls so that we can put a tray in when we're feeling like we need a cookie fix later in the month). After the cookies came out of the oven, I heard her tromping upstairs. Stella? Why are you still up? I had to pee, Mom. -- then she looks me straight in the eye and says in a sneaky lilt to her voice "I smell something yummy!" I had to hide my smile and told her it was a vanilla candle to cover up the fish smell from dinner. "Well, it smells like something else here in my room!"


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Why do I feel like such a supermom when I can take Stella and Louisa places by myself? It is because it feels so exhausting to do that, and when I can accomplish it successfully, I feel like I deserve a pat on the back. I know that's silly, but on Saturday while Steve was at a conference, I took them both to a farm (vegas has farms??) to pick apples (apple orchards? in vegas??) and pumpkins. Picture me. Stella holding my hand. Louisa in a hiking backpack. I have a bag with the camera and a lunch box, a pumpkin, and 8 pounds of apples. No wonder people were looking at me like they felt sorry for me. Of course, then I realized when I got back to the car that we do own a stroller. A good one in fact. One that could have easily navigated the rocky terrain. Idiot.

 Louisa is like, Mom, really? We own a stroller.

 Luckily, Stella was MORE than happy to pick a small pumpkin.

 Such a movie star look.

Pumpkin patch picture fail because of them facing into the direct Vegas sun.

So I redeemed myself when we got home. Headbands compliments of Grandmum and Grandpa. (And they even like wearing them!)

A very merry unbirthday

I think, if I were to look back over the blog posts from sometime in October of last year, I might find a posting about "where has my awesome daughter gone and who replaced her with Zool?" A friend calmly explained last year that 1/2 birthdays are the worst times for kids under five and not to worry - it will get better when she turns 3. Well, here we are again at another 1/2 birthday and Stella has turned in Zool.

Well, not exactly the monster from Ghostbusters but rather an opinionated little snot.
- Mommy, I am NOT eating that dinner. (pushes it away across the table to the point of almost knocking it off)
- Mommy, I don't like that shirt. I am not wearing it. Eewww.
Stella, please put your shoes on. "No." What did you say? "No no no no not ever ever ever for you ever again!!!"

Needless to say, Stella has recently learned about the "uncooperative chair." (We borrowed the phrase from the Kevin Henkes mouse books, and by god, if any of you know them, Stella is Lily. She is. No doubt.)

Steve and I find ourselves looking at her and saying "Excuse me? What did you say?" Somehow, in the course of 4 weeks, she has learned to talk back, but when we tell her that talking back to your parents isn't nice, she doesn't seem to understand the concept of "talking back" and then we have to go into the whole discussion of what that means and by then, the moment's past and she's off doing something else.

The other night, the 'no's" escalated so much that I finally say, Stella, if you can't do something for me, then I'm not going to do anything for you. I'm not going to make your Halloween mermaid costume. As soon as it came out of my mouth, I realized that maybe I had gone too far. Stella looked at me, with a bit of tears welling in her eyes and said "Mommy, you just broke my heart."

Thanks Stella. Way to make a Mommy feel awesome. Damn. She's going to be an actor, I just know it. I think we jinxed ourselves by naming her Stella.

A mom at an indoor playground last week assuaged my fears and told me, it's ok. The day he turned 4, everything got better. Really, the day he turned four. Okay, April 16, 2013 here we come.

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In other news, Louisa magically turned 6 months already. All in one week, she turned 6 months, got an ear infection, started "Stranger danger," started "I only want Mommy," and is teething. Oh, and she refuses to eat solid food. We've tried avocado, sweet potatoes, and carrots. Not interested in anything. Tonight I'm banking on peas, but I have a feeling I'll still be shot down.

Last week we went to Lake Mead for some semblance of "beach time" which we so desperately miss. I was sitting on a beach chair under the awning off the van hanging out with Lulu while Steve splashed in the water with Stella. Louisa was fascinated with my hat and kept trying to take it off my head. When she finally succeeded, she looked at me and laughed the biggest belly laugh ever, like "ha ha Mommy, I won!"

Et tu Louisa? Boy, are we in for it.

To have or have not

So I'm not going to blame Grampy... okay, I'm going to blame Grampy. See, when we were visiting the Delaware grandparents for two weeks following our crazy move to Las Vegas, Grampy thought it was awesome that Stella loved ice cream. In a cone. Preferably from the DQ. We didn't have a DQ in Santa Barbara, much less desserts every night. (We did make our own ice cream, which Stella would enjoy, as well as lemon ice... but besides the general banana bread/muffin thing we do, dessert wasn't a usual occurrence). But Las Vegas has a DQ. Lewes has a DQ. and Grammy and Grampy always had some sort of snack hanging around the house after dinner to enjoy.

Let's just say Stella took a liking to dessert every night.

Let's also say that Mommy and Daddy did not. It's not that we forbid sugar in the house - on the contrary. Friday morning Stella told me at 6am that she wanted scones for breakfast. But dessert every night for a girl that is very affected by sugar? Ugh.

So lately during dinner the usual fight is "if i eat all my dinner, can I have ice cream?" or "After dinner I will still be hungry so I will need ice cream" -- this is usually spouted when her plate is still full of food. Some nights, we give in. Usually those are the nights when she ends up eating most of her dinner, there is minimal whining and crying throughout the day, and we don't even have to ask. Those are the nights that I feel should be rewarded. However, there have been one or two nights when the pleading for ice cream gets so intense (and the food consumption so little) that we put our foot down, to rivers of tears and "I won't ever ever like you again" (the newest phrase).

Last night Stella started whispering. What Stella, I asked? She kept whispering.  What are you saying, I asked again.

"Oh, I'm just whispering that I want ice cream after dinner. If I whisper and you can't hear it, then you can't say no."

Well played.

Almost 6 months

Tutu by Stella.

Tie dye by Mommy.

Cuteness by Louisa.