Bath Time

I just started putting the girls in the tub together within the last few weeks. Rose really loves bath time, but Lacy gets a little nervous because she knows that washing hair is generally a part of the routine. I only make her wash her hair on Saturday nights because I'm not willing to put myself through the torture of washing her hair. She screams literally the whole time it is being washed. Plus, if I insist on washing her hair every time, she'll never take a bath! Rose, on the other hand, couldn't care less about the actual washing part. As long as she gets to splash around the whole time, she's doing GRATE!

New Tooth

Rose got one of her top teeth in over the weekend.  So now we have a grand total of 3 teeth.  I’m expecting the next three to come in within the next month.  This should be a tough few weeks until she has them all in.  I’m not looking forward to it at all.  On the bright side, she seems to be an easier teether than Lacy ever was.  Plus I’m being proactive and dosing her up good with Tylenol before bed. 

 

We also started Rose on table foods.  I tried giving her baby oatmeal and she hated it.  Even when I mixed it with peaches (which she loves), she wouldn’t eat it.  She has a lot of texture issues and will not eat many of the foods we give her.  She will start to gag and often will throw up because of that.  A lovely trait she inherited from her father.  So I concluded that purees must not be her thing.  I was right!  She took to table foods like a champ and regularly eats Cheerios (broken up into small pieces) and little bits of canned fruits. 

 

It sure seems like this little girl of mine is reaching more milestones every day.  I just have to make sure I write them all down so I don’t forget any of them!  I still haven’t bought her a baby book.  Bad mommy!

 

On Friday, Dave and I went to the Bodies exhibit in Seattle.  It was expensive, but really cool to see.  We took Rose but left Lacy at home with Tiffany, a girl from our ward.  She is a really good babysitter, but Lacy wouldn’t go to bed for her at all.  She said, “I’m going to wait for my mommy.”  Little stinker has never been a good sleeper.  We didn’t get home until 11:15, but the bright side of this is, Lacy was asleep within 5 minutes of going to bed.

 

Our friend Tuana is staying with us this week during the week.  She will be staying most work nights at our house while she takes over a department at the USDA in Olympia.  She is still working up north in the Bellingham area as well, so she’s commuting between the two cities.  The commute is a little too long for a regular daily commute so she asked to stay with us.  I’m enjoying the company (especially since Dave is often gone during the week, or at least to bed by 8:30) and the extra set of hands to hold babies while I get dishes or laundry done each night.

 

 

 

Water Heater Woes

The bottom of our water heater rusted out. So that’s why we had a huge mystery wet spot on our carpet. We finally figured out what was wrong yesterday. So Dave took out the old water heater and installed a new one as soon as he figured it out. We also moved all the furniture and anything on the floor of our bedroom and pulled out all the carpet. So now we no longer have pepto pink carpet in our room! We were able to find a good deal on some Berber carpet in a light tan color for our room and our closet. We also moved the water heater to the middle of the closet instead of the corner so we now actually have more usable closet space. We will now be able to put another clothes rod on the other side of the closet so Dave can have his side and I can have mine. Plus the water heater is on a stand so we have 18 inches of free space below the water heater. We may actually end up doing some sort of built in closet configuration as well, with drawers and shelves.

 

We were also looking at buying a new bed or bed frame, until we found out the prices of new beds. Instead Dave will be fixing our bed frame so it can last another year or so. Did you know that a bed will double in weight after 10 years due to the accumulation of dust (which is made of primarily dried skin and hair flakes)? GROSS! I think we will be buying a new bed as soon as we can afford it because our bed is 6 ½ years old and that is really skeeving me out. No wonder it’s been so hard to move lately.

Sorry, Dave, I don't have many new pictures!

Dave's dad, Dave, has requested more photos on our blog! I don't have any from today and I haven't taken any since the sleepyhead photo a few posts back, but here is one I took of my kids a couple weeks ago on their potties. One of my new year's goals is to write an article about EC so I've been taking quite a few pictures of Rose on her potty for my article! I do need to take a bunch more because Rose is so close to crawling now.

Today I took a look at a bunch of literature given to me by my dental office. I was dismayed to read that they recommend weaning no later than 14 months to prevent tooth decay. I don't want to go off on a rant about this here (because, mainly, I'm tired and I need to go to bed) but the information they gave goes against the recommendations of several health organizations. Not to mention that mother's milk does not cause dental caries, and it aids in proper jaw development. I'm gathering up resources right now so I can write them a letter expressing my displeasure in their brochure.

Our floor is soaked. We have a huge wet spot in our bedroom. By huge, I mean the size of our dining room huge. So tomorrow Dave and a bunch of his buddies are going to try to find the source of the leak and fix it. I guess we'll be getting new carpeting and insulation under our house soon, because we may as well replace it if we have to pull it up. *sigh*

Here's a couple of bonus pictures taken by my wonderful personal photographer, Lacy. She took both of these ones! She's sure a busy little girl!

Rose uses sign language!

We have met several milestones in the past few days. So here is a summary of them.

Today I was nursing Rose, and she was biting me to try to get my attention (I am frequently nursing at the keyboard!). We do elimination communication, so I've been showing her the signs for "potty" and "finished." So when I look down at Rose, she has her little fist in the air just like I show her every time she sits down to use the potty. So I take her in to the potty and sit her down, and seconds later we have a poop in there. WOW! I was very impressed with her. She is quite the little communicator, and if I do say so myself, a genius.

She also crawled across the bed Thursday (1-11) night. Of course Dave was the only witness to this feat. But it was actual hands and knees crawling (I guess actually the proper term is "creeping"). She is frequently "combat crawling," which doesn't mean she has found Dave's shotgun. She is crawling using her forearms to propel her body. She started this a couple weeks ago.

Lacy also has slept in a bed by herself two nights this week. This is a miracle! She slept in the "pink bed" over at Grandma's house Wednesday night (we stayed there due to the winter storms and ice that was certain to follow, so my mom could watch the girls so I wouldn't have to risk taking them out to Summit Lake where the roads are incredibly dangerous while icy). I gave her the choice of the big bed or the little pink bed, and she chose the pink bed. She even fell asleep by herself. I checked on her and she had her eyes open for about 30 minutes, but eventually she was asleep in that bed. She fell asleep in it last night, too (we are "borrowing" it from my mom), and she stayed there all night long. She fell asleep in there another night but had a nightmare and came to bed with us. So three nights since Wednesday night falling asleep in her own bed! It's a miracle! We bought a heater for her room so we can get it all ready for her to sleep by herself next winter. It's a little bit of a bittersweet moment for me.

How did I get to be so lucky?

My sweet girls, just a couple of minutes ago...

My Goals for 2007

We've been sick so I haven't had much of a chance to post lately. But I do have some goals for 2007 that I'd like to post.

• Read the New Testiment
• Write an article for Mothering about elimination communication
• Organize my house and throw out junk
• Get started on my food storage and have at least 100 pounds of wheat by the end of the year, and have a place to store it!
• Read more books to my kids-- at least 3 books a day on workdays
  
• Get my hair cut and donate it to Locks of Love
• Don't get pregnant!
• Start a savings account to save for Dave's education
• Pay at least 50% of our debts off this year
• Buy a new (to us) car-- in January!
• (for Dave) collect at least 10 capes to use for Taxidermy school, including two from animals that are harder to get
• Focus on healthier eating by serving two veggies at dinner every day
• Gain some self control and don't eat that fifth cookie

So a baker's dozen, but one of them is a goal for Dave and several of them are going to be a joint effort. I'll check back in a year to see how I did!