Amy

Lexi is walking probably 50-75% of the time. It’s amazing how fast she has taken it up. She wants down in stores and outside to walk all the time now. It does make things more difficult but it will be great before long.

Emma is really enjoying school. It has really made it so much easier for nursery at church. She tells me even before we go now that she’s not going to cry. It has made life so much easier in that regard.

Lexi is trying to say all done. I’ve taught her all gone in sign language so she knows when the food is all gone. Otherwise, she gets quite tempermental about it.

We are going to MD this weekend to see my cousin get married. Scott unfortunately can not go. My parents and sister and me and the girls are all riding in our van. I’m not sure I’m really looking forward to it. However, I have to admit it will be nice not to have Scott’s impatience with us. But, I will miss is authority, decision-making skills and ability to handle problems in general. Plus, he won’t be driving :). Oh yeah, and I’ll miss him too. hehe. I know the girls will miss him for sure. This will be the first time Lexi has been without him for any stretch of time.

Everything seems to be going so quickly lately. Lexi tries to walk almost everywhere she goes. She made it 14 steps this past Sunday. She hasn’t gotten more than 5 or 6 this week though. Have I mentioned she moved to formula a few weeks back? I still nurse her in the early morning, but that’s it. She does really well on it and it is very freeing for me. She is getting really, really attached to her blankie, She will fight you for it!

I was teasing Emma about something I said I was teasing her and she says My Pappy teases me like that. It was cute. I love when she says “my” Pappy. Today she was looking at our family pictures and she was pointing to MIL and she says MawMaw calls my angel and MawMaw calls me sunshine. It was adorable because MawMaw sings You Are My Sunshine to her. It was almost a teary moment. I hope I remember to tell her when I talk to her next.

So yesterday or the day before I decided Emma just needed to be potty trained. So I started putting panties on her. And today, she told me twice that she had to go on her own and ran to the potty with me. And she went!! I was SO excited. She did poop in her panties but that’s bound to happen at first. I hope with the weekend coming since she isn’t going to be at home as much that she’ll continue it. I don’t know why I must overthink this so much. But I am SO TIRED OF WIPING POOP. I remember another blogger who said almost those same words a year or so ago and I am confident that her little girl is not in a pull-up anymore. I know it will come but I am ready! Really, it’s amazing how much she has improved even just by making her wear the panties. I sort of got the clue that she could handle it when the other day she was getting ready to go (I could tell) and she asked me whether she had panties or a pullup on. Uh yeah, if you can wait for me to answer that question, you can run to the potty before you do it.

So Scott put mulch down where we had the rocks in the yard and it looks SO good. I love it. Then, we bought a metal bench from Home Depot and put it on the front porch. But then because of the railing, you couldn’t see out since it’s such a small porch so I barely mentioned taking out the railing to Scott and not more than 20 minutes later, he had the jigsaw out and cut it out. We are going to wrap some 1×4″s around the posts to make them more substantial. So then D’s friend A came over to show us a design for the yard. She is going to NC State next year to get her master’s in landscape design. She talked to us about some things but didn’t have her drawings. She is supposed to be emailing me the drawings. I can’t wait to see them. She sounded like she had some really good ideas.

Today my grandmother turned 70. I called her today. I think she was pretty surprised. She didn’t send me or my sister a birthday card this year. It was very unusual. When my mom asked her about it, she basically said she thought she deserved a card from us. Uh, yeah. Let’s be 2. When I found that out, I already had some pictures for her in an envelope to send. So I think I got back on the good side with her. I think my sister doesn’t care if she does or not. She already has said she doesn’t support her relationship with her boyfriend and I think this is just one more thing on her list about her. It’s too bad.

Lexi is getting big so fast. Tonight she took 5 steps toward me while Mom and Dad watched on. It was kind of that running, I can’t believe I’m not falling type of walk but still, it counts. She is really coming out of her shell. She claps. She waved good-bye for the first time to Candie on Wednesday. She turns her hand back and forth. She has started shake her head no vigorously when she is done eating and doesn’t want anymore. She says no-no, ma-ma and da-da. She is really easy going. If she is fussing, she is either hungry or tired or just wants held, usually later in the day.

She has impetigo right now. I guess she caught it from Emma from a couple weeks ago. Both her and Emma have had runny noses. Emma has had a bad cough. There’s always something.

Emma seems to really like school. She has cried twice when we’ve picked her up but she claims it is because someone else was crying. She gets excited about going. They have great little activities for them to do. Last week they planted grass and learned how plants grow. We were out watering plants the other night and she said why are we watering the plants. I said because they need it. She said because they need water like we need food? I was like, uh, yeah. She amazes me how much she retains. She doesn’t forget a thing. She makes you repeat it like 5 times sometimes to get it, but then she doesn’t forget.

Scott decided to pull up the rocks yesterday from the front yard so we can put mulch down. Then we decided to get pieces of rock to put around the water fountain we had put in a couple weeks ago. It looks REALLY good. We even had a neighbor stop to say it looked nice.

Last night D & I painted her bedroom. Her girls were staying with her mom and Mom had Emma and Scott kept Lexi. We finished painting quickly in 2 hours. We then went out to eat at Longhorn and then got coffee at Starbucks. It was probably the most relaxing 5 hours I’ve had in quite some time. Even the painting was relaxing. We talked and talked and it was great to catch up with her and get something done without any interruption (as we speak Emma is standing in the chair behind me hugging me, saying Are you typing? uh-huh Why? I want to type! I want to type like you did. I want to type that thing. I want to type, Mommy. I want to type, Mommy. Well, I’m typing, honey. I want to type. See, Mommy, look, my hands are dirty. Then she is making some whirling noise). So, last night relieved me so much, I think the old saying is true that Scott and I need some date nights.

We haven’t had a night out besides one hour at a time to dinner in quite some time. Some days go by now and we barely kiss. We need some quality time out for sure.

So this Katrina situation has been on my mind all week. I haven’t watched really anything else all week. I have cried at the children without food or diapers. It is insane that those poor babies went without anything they needed. The Superdome was ridiculous that it was so out of control. We should have been way more prepared. I’m not sure how, but they’ve got to figure it out. It felt really good when all those troops came in last night and today. I almost cried with relief when I realized they were finally going to be rescued. I as so glad when I-10 was cleared of everyone.

Lexi started saying no-no this past week. Sometimes she points her finger, sometimes not. It’s more like nah-nah or something but she says it just like us. She waves bye-bye but doesn’t say it yet. And she’s clapping. It doesn’t make a lot of sound yet but she thinks it’s good. She is getting better and better and standing up without holding on to stuff and she always looks like she’s ready to take off and she’ll sit down and crawl. It’s to the point where she is almost in a running-crawl. Everyone says she’s getting big all the sudden. I haven’t really been able to tell, but her clothes are getting smaller and she eats like a horse. She ate a banana and meat at 5 and then wanted more food when we ate about 6:15.

Emma stayed at Mom’s last night. She asked for milk so Mom heated it up like she normally likes and Emma says Not bedtime milk, chocolate milk! LOL I have never called her warm milk bedtime milk but she does have it before nap/bedtime.

I have been at the chiropractor several times the past two weeks. He said the curve in my neck was 90% gone and he is trying to correct it. I hope it works. We only have a $1000 limit for chiropractic care, so hopefully it won’t take much longer.

I have been watching So You Think You Can Dance. I didn’t really want J-something to leave this week. I thought his dancing was very original. I really like M-something. What’s her name? Meredith? Melanie? Something. And her friend. Not Chad, the other one. I wish Allan or Snow would go home. Everyone loves Allan but I just don’t think he has enough technique. The two that did the ballroom dancing were really good this week. I can’t remember their names either. Boy, this is exciting. Not much good if I can’t remember who I’m talking about.

I also recently got into Growing Up Gotti. They had a run all afternoon last Saturday and I watched it for 3 hours while I did housework on and off.

And of course I’m watching Miami Ink. They were hilarious this week bowling and translating it into Portugese and Japanese. I was laughing so hard.

Lexi took 2 steps toward me today. The last was sort of a scoot, but two legs moved! I can’t believe it is time for her to start walking already. It seems she just learned to crawl. She is still sleeping until 5-6 in the morning. It has been great not having to get up in the middle of the night. I still would like to sleep to 7, but I don’t push my luck yet.

Emma started preschool this week. She has gone twice and has only cried when I picked her up the first day. The teacher said she only cried when they lined up in the hall and some of the other kids were crying. The first day they made picture frames and today they painted with shaving cream. Yeah, they can leave that there. She seems to enjoy herself and says there is a Mattie Grace in her class which I think is sort of ironic.

I am doing an awful job of keeping up here. Lexi and Emma are growing so fast. Let’s see. Lexi is now 9 months. She was 17.6lbs and 28(?)” at her dr’s appt Friday. She is crawling, cruising and Mom even says she took a step to her today. Finally Mom kept Emma for four nights and I did the 5-10-15 CIO thing with Lexi. Most night Lexi now sleep from about 8:30-5:00 or 6:00am, eats and then is up for the day between 6:30 and 7:00. Last night she got up twice but that is rare. Last Thursday night was the first time I slept 8 hours straight since when I was pregnant. I’m starting to wean Lexi since she’s now sleeping through the night.
Emma starts preschool Monday a week. She’ll go Mon and Wed 9-12. She says silly things like I asked her to talk to Grandma the other day and she said “No, that’s ridiculous!” I could barely make out what she said. Mom sand Do-Re-Me in the car and Emma says, “Grandma, don’t sing that. That’s awful!” oops. She asks why CONSTANTLY. Everything is why. No luck with the potty yet. She has no interest at all with that. She went once two weeks back at church. I can tell when she’s getting ready to #2 and tell her to go potty and she says no. I’m just going to wait until she’s interested.
Saturday is Carla’s wedding. Everyone except Lexi is in it. I’m hoping Emma will handle the flower girl part well. We’ve been practicing and she does well. I’m just afraid she’ll crack when she sees all those people. Maybe she’ll be too short to see them 🙂 At least me, Scott and Scott’s sister will be standing up front.

We went to the beach this past week. It was not much of a vacation for me. Sort of like a sandy, long, hot, difficult, expensive shopping trip. The good news is Emma loved the beach this year. She loved the sand and the water. She even played in the sand, picking it up with her hands and everything. I was amazed at how different she was from last year. She started her “why’s” this week. She would go round and round.
I’m hungry
Why are you hungry?
Because I haven’t eaten
Why haven’t you eaten?
Because I haven’t had any food.
Why haven’t you had food?
Because we haven’t gotten any yet.
Why haven’t we gotten any yet?
Because it wasn’t time to get food.
Why wasn’t it time to get food?
etc. etc.
All week, almost every conversation was like that. And if you asked her to do something “No way!”. I don’t know where she started that at.

Lexi started to let go of things when she is standing up now. Just a few times she has done it and of course fell right down. She was a pill this week though. I think she was teething and we kept her full of medicine but she was still extra clingy to me. She wouldn’t go to sleep well. She was great in the car though. Good thing because we were in it a lot.

We didn’t have any big blow-ups with family members this week but SIL was her normal self and only can stand so much. The bad thing the kids are the ones that normally get the brunt of it. I really wish she would get some help. Anyway, we had a good time with our nephew. He is really turning into someone fun to be around. He does smart off and is pretty spoiled but he’s really funny and a good kid. Emma and Skyler fought a lot. And played a lot. They are a lot like sisters. They do everything together but usually fight the whole time. Usually it is Emma stealing away a toy that Skyler has and Skyler screams to high-heaven about it until she gets it back. They are both good at hitting each other too.

She did it, people. Lexi slept from 8:45pm until 4am. Too bad I didn’t get to sleep until 11:30pm. Whew, I hope this continues.