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Thursday, November 01, 2007

Happy Halloween

HAPPY HALLOWEEN to everyone. I hope you all had a great, fun, and safe night. I have a lot to report and as always, I am way behind. The story of my life, being way behind. As far as Halloween, Lucy wore her flamingo and helped pass out candy at my mom's house. No trick or treating this year. She is sick, AGAIN, and has been for a whole week. She is on antibiotics, but we have seen little to no improvement. Horrible congestion again, coughing til you puke, again, etc. HORRIBLE! To make things worse, Justin is really sick, too. Please pray with me that they both get better soon.

In other Lucy news, she now has 4 molars and the 4th top front tooth came through. She has 12 teeth. Still drooling, so I am sure more are coming. Ugh. She still chatters all of the time. No new words that I can think of right now. We have a new morning ritual and Lucy cracks me up every morning now. She drinks her milk right when she wakes up. Usually in our bed and then we turn on a kids channel while we all wake up a bit. If we don't get the TV on soon enough, she starts looking everywhere for the remote and when she spots it, she frantically points at it and makes this funny noise. She doesn't really like TV that much, she gets bored quickly, which is good. It is just a sweet morning time thing where she will cuddle and be still with us, which never happens again throughout the day. She is too busy.

Anyone have any advice on how to get her off of the bottle with her milk? She uses a sippy cup fine for water or juice, but when I put milk in it she refuses it profusely. She still takes three bottles of milk a day. One first thing in the morning, one as she goes down for her nap, and one when she goes to bed at night. She is 15 months old today, and I am not worried yet about still being on the bottle, but I am not sure how to get her to ever switch. She still really needs her milk, since she gets hardly any other protein, so we will stick with the bottles. I would love any advice from anyone with a similar experience.

I have taken Lucy with me to get a pedicure several times now. It is amazing to me, but she sits really still in my laps and eats the snack that I bring her. The salon is staffed by wonderful Vietnamese people who LOVE Lucy. When they see us coming in the parking lot I can hear them all shreking inside, "HUONG, HUONG!!! Yeah Huong!" They call her by her Vietnamese name and talk to her in Vietnamese the whole time. I love hearing them talk to her. It is so cute. Recently they have decided that they want to hold her. Lucy has pretty major stranger anxiety. She rarely lets someone she doesn't know well hold her. So, when they asked if they could hold her, I said that I doubted she would let them. Boy was I wrong. She let two of the girls pick her up and they held her for about 15 minutes. Then she wanted back with me. She was sitting on my lap and one them tried to get her again. She started crying, so the lady left her. Then one of the men who works there said that all baby girls love him and that he wanted to try and hold her. She went to him! I really could not believe that she would let any of them even touch her. They are so sweet with her and even told me that they could see my behaviors in the way that she acts. I loved that. I never think that she is paying attention, but today she pulled a nail file out of the drawer in the bathroom and acted like she was filing her toe nails. How funny is that?

And finally, Lucy has always hated when I held another baby. She is super protective of her momma and lets everyone know that I am not supposed to hold anyone but her. She has taken that to another level. She now does not like to share me with animals either. I was holding a friend's puppy the other day and she insisted her dad put her down, she marched over to me, and she tried to push the puppy out of my arms. Some day she is going to have a rude awakening when a sibling comes along. We will be working on this now. I am also working on her playing and acting a little more gentle and kind - to both people and animals. She is rough with the dogs, so we are working on petting them softly. She has hit on several occasions, so we are also working on being kind with people as well. I can't believe that she knows how to hit. I am really working hard to stop this and she is learning. She knows it is wrong and when I say to be gentle, she will touch me softly and sweetly. She is going to be such a handful. The other night in the bathtub she was doing something that she was not supposed to be doing - I don't even remember what it was now. I asked her to please stop and she looked at me right in the eye and did it again, without taking her eyes off of mine. We then had a stare down for about a minute. I was not going to look away and neither was she. Then all of the sudden she started dying laughing. I could not help myself but laugh. I tried so hard not to, but I couldn't help it. I will say it again, she is going to be quite the little toot. Hopefully we get this under control soon. She is so sweet most of the time, but I see a side that makes me really terrified of the teenage years occasionally! I am sure my parents are thinking, "Pay backs are hell!"

Here are some adorable pictures of the flamingo and from the beautiful fall day today. Enjoy!!

The flamingo can even play the piano.

Where are the trick or treaters?

Lucy hiding with my mom's fake ghost kids. Aren't those so cute? My mom has the best holiday decorations.


Anyone need a ride?


Putting some gas in the car.


13 comments:

Anonymous said...

We have the exact morning routine - I get Taylor out of bed, put her in bed with us and she drinks her "muck" as she calls it and watches Mr Rogers. It's our only snuggle time all day too. She had the same adversion to milk out of a cup - but also wouldn't take it out of a bottle since she didn't have any experience with one so what worked for us might not work for you. First we got those sippy cups by Nuby - they have them at Walmart - they have the silicon type sippy spouts so the texture is more like a bottle although the shape is like a sippy cup lid. Then we've also done two different things - Stephen used to put a little bit of pink milk mix - whatever that stuff is - in there. Just a dash. I wasn't crazy about it because of the sugar but it did work. It made the flavor exciting enough to drink it. Then we switched and started putting a thing of YoBaby - that whole milk yougart in the cup of milk. She isn't much of an eater so she needed the nutrients of the "smoothie" concoction. We'd mix one up the night before and stumble to the fridge in the morning when she woke up at 5:30 and got in bed with us.

Hope this helps! Cracks me up that she's turning to be such a headstrong little girl. Sounds very familiar.

Mrs.B said...

I will say a prayer that Lucy and Justin get well soon. Love the pictures as always!!

Anonymous said...

I will pray that Lucy and Justin get well soon!

She is so cute and it sounds like she has an amazing mind of her own :) I cannot wait until I have that experience :)

LaLa said...

Hey...I was going to suggest what Liz said...I got Annslee those at Walmart..the bottom is a sippy but with a nipple..then gradually you use the other sippy style top it comes with. Annslee STILL at 3 insists I heat up her morning and evening milk and sometimes she wants in my lap to be held and fed her milk in her sippy cup. Yeah, way too old for it but I don't care. I missed the first 13 months of her life so if she needs this still then so be it. Just do what you feel is right and you will be : )

Love her costume..I hope she feels better soon. Your mom does have cool decorations...

Kristin said...

I just got goosebumps reading about the Vietnamese women just loving Lucy to pieces. That is such a sweet blessing and a reminder to her of a part of her heritage.
As always, she is so cute in every single picture!!!

Christi Crow said...

What a cute costume! I hope you guys had an amazing Halloween!

Stepping on Legos said...

Yay - I love your big updates! Does Lucy love her cozy coupe? I'm thinking of getting Addy one for Christmas but am not sure she'll use it? I love the pedicure experience - Addy would LOVE that. I'm not surprised Addy goes to them - I bet they have a natural comfort level that I grew to love in Vietnam. I don't have much advice for you on the milk. I will say that we give Addy milk in a sippee cup during the day but she does still like her bottle time during the night and sometimes naps. Many kids are still nursing for comfort at this age so I woudln't really worry about it. I figure Addy will drop them when she no longer needs them. I really only have issues with kids who carry bottles (full of juice - ew) everywhere they go all day! I figure a little comfort at sleep time is perfect!

I am so sad that she (and J) are sick AGAIN! That really blows :-(

Jen said...

I think adding cuddle time with the sippy cup is great advice--and I wouldn't worry about the "attitude". Being a toddler is all about testing boundaries and they are WAAAY more physical at this age because they can't always use their words.

You are doing the right thing by letting her know what is not acceptable and then showing the right behavior.

She looks adorable in her costume and I love the little fall outfit!

Nancy said...

Hope the little flamingo is feeling better soon!! The pics are super cute - as always! :)

Anonymous said...

That's too funny Kelly. Jackson has been "testing" a lot more lately too. I see some terrible two's in our futures;)
No advice on the bottles with milk - we're in the same boat with 3-4 per day. We're in no hurry to break that though. Jackson doesn't let us feed him at the table anymore; he wants to do it all himself. If we even attempt to feed him, he'll spit it out, pick it up, and eat it from his own hands only. So the bottle is our only remaining opportunity for him to lay in our arms, look up at us, and be dependent on mommy and daddy for feeding. I like it for the bonding. I know at some point we'll transition away from it, but probably not for another few months.
I'm expecting him to revert a bit too when Shane comes home and Belly Baby joins the world. I'm sure he'll be 2 years old and nursing, in fact! Talk about regressing, but oh well!
So sorry Justin AND Lucy are sick. I hope they both have a quick recovery. I also hope, for your sake, your hubby isn't as big a baby as mine when he's sick!!
Lucy looked absolutely PRECIOUS, again, as a flamingo. Cutest darn bird I've ever seen!

Susan said...

Boy, I'm so sorry to hear that Lucy and Justin are sick! I hope they get to feeling better quickly.

I'm in the same boat with Petunia about using the sippy cup. I don't want to push too hard for her to get off the bottle, but I know it has to happen before long -- at least at daycare. The weird thing is that she'd rather drink out of a regular cup, but she can't hold it without spilling it. She also does well with a straw, but that's just for water and juice apparently. When it comes to her milk, she thinks it needs to come from her bottle for some reason.

Your little flamingo is too cute for words. Also, I LOVE your mom's ghost kids. How cute are they?!

Sherri said...

I am so sorry that Lucy and Justin are sick! I am saying a prayer for them right now! For a sick girl she looks amazingly adorable in her costume. Grace loves the Nuby sippies from Walmart. The ones that are a cup with no handles. They have a nipple like straw and the cup slide closes over the nipple/spout. She immediately got rid of the bottle with no fuss when I bought them. Tell Lucy and Justin that I hope they are both well soon.

junglemama said...

She loves that car, doesn't she? Your daughter is adorable.