Eric's back

So, Eric has been back for 3 days, and life hasn't been the same! Eric came back on the red-eye Monday, when he finally woke up on Tuesday this was the scene at our house.

I am pretty sure that this scene could have lasted all day, it was seriously was 20-30min. Gwen just walked up to Eric put her arms up and that was all she wrote. Gwen has been much happier since Eric came back, not that I noticed that she was sad, you can just tell the difference.

While Eric was gone, a girlfriend from the exercise group and I went to dinner because both of our hubbies were out of town. I must say, I am not one for going out to dinner anymore. When I was single and dating I would eat out all the time, but once I got married and started cooking for Eric and myself, I just realized that I would prefer to stay home and cook my own dinner, most of the time. This is not to say I never like to go out to eat, I would say I could go quite a long time without eating out. It has also become much more of a challenge to eat out with Gwen and I can't really enjoy myself and I become exhausted. Gwen doesn't really eat anything so I have to bring food for her from home and then I have to pray she doesn't randomly start squealing, like she did Monday night. The 2 girls were crazed. Gwen was pretty good in the beginning sat there quietly, my girlfriends daughter, could not sit still. I am so glad that it wasn't busy.

I think that is enough for now.

Weekend update

Well, you guessed it will be another 2 weeks without my camera. Blasted camera! I asked the guy how many times I have to bring this thing in before I get a new camera and he said 4 times! So this is time number 2. He informed me that just having them look at it should fix the problem, sorry if I don't believe you guy, since they couldn't fix it the last time...call me cynical. I sadly don't have much faith in the system...I have been jaded.
I think Gwen and I survived the weekend pretty well with out Daddy, we are sad, but hopefully we will have a chance to spend time with him tomorrow. I think Gwen is sleeping through the night, at least I am no longer waking up. She doesn't wake up a happy baby though, maybe she is starving, I don't know and she wakes up at 6:30. UGH, kid didn't you get the memo, there will be no waking up before 7am! I guess I should go to bed earlier, but now that I have all this scrapbook stuff out I have been distracted by finally finishing our Honeymoon album. I have all the pictures in place, but I never really wrote out info on any of the pages. So, I have been doing that. I have finished composing what I am going to put in the book, now all I have to do is transpose the info. Go me! Then, I can get Gwen's album started. One project at a time, my creative juices can only handle that much.
Today, I also started a new thing with Gwen, trying for the 1 nap. We got home from SS at around 11am so I feed her lunch and put her down for her nap around 12. She was exhausted! She is still asleep, hopefully she will start doing the 1 afternoon nap which would make our lives easier, ok only my life easier, but should be worth something, right?
Yesterday, the godfather came over to distract Gwen, she played with him for probably an hour. When it was time to go to bed she started to head up the stairs and I asked her if she would like to give him a hug. She went back down the step and walked right up to him and gave him a hug. That is the first time she has ever done anything on cue...it is cute behavior like that that melts your heart!

Saturday check-in

Today the most exciting thing around here is this. Life is all about who you know, isn't it?
Last night the scrapbooking was a success! I of course didn't get anything done, but we ladies had a good time. I guess I should clarify, I got some stuff done, but I never actually put anything in a book. I think I can start that today. I have had some problems locating some pictures and that has made me pretty upset. I can't find any of the pictures from my baby shower. I know that I used to have them. I have searched both laptops and the external hard drive, but to no avail. I also have not been able to locate the pictures from my 30th birthday celebration with Jess. Such a pain! After I finish this post I am going to get started on the scrapbooking, the problem with creating these albums is that sometimes it is hard to get started, the vision is not always there and I need a vision before I get started for sure! I have so much stuff, "accessories", it is overwhelming, but last night was good for me to go through my stuff and organize. I think I finally have the vision, I have a couple more pictures to print out and then we can get this show on the road.
Gwen woke up twice last night, once because the girls were so loud...they wanted to go up and comfort her, which was actually good for me, because then I was like, nope she'll live! Then she woke up around the time they left, which was the same time she woke up the night before. We all agreed that I was doing the best thing for Gwen in the long run, even if it is heart wrenching! Gwen woke up this morning at 6ish. I have decided that 6 is too early and I didn't go get her right away. This morning we get up and went for a walk (the 1 mi loop) and I let her stop and play at the playground that she loves...man she knows when we are getting close to it she perks right up and starts pointing. We came home and I let her play around the house, around 10:15 she tries to open the gate at the foot of the stairs, then put her arms up for me to carry her, I thought she was looking for Eric, but nope she walked around to my side of the bed and held her hands up and started to fuss, so I put her down for a nap and she is still sleeping. It is nice that even though I don't always know what she wants, I can seem to stumble into it! I would imagine she is pretty exhausted with all that crying and waking up early. Hopefully she will take 2 naps today, I am going to need one this afternoon! I think we will have to move to the 1 nap thing after we get that sleeping through the night thing down.
Have a great weekend!

Belated pictures

So, tonight is the big scrapbooking night. I think that we have 9 ladies coming over. I have heard that some of them are not necessarily going to be scrapbooking, but putting pictures in the baby books or albums. I think that will work out, because those of us that are actually scrapbooking will need a LOT of room. Even if I don't get a lot done, hopefully just the act of having the book out while Eric is gone will allow me to get some good work done over the next couple of days.

Last night Gwen cried for about 45min and then woke up for the day at 6:30. She is down for her nap now. We can only hope that tonight she will take less time to get herself to sleep, I am exhausted myself! It usually takes Gwen less than 15 min to get herself to sleep for a nap or when she goes down for the night, I just hope one day soon she will be able to stay asleep at night.

So here are the pictures Mom is probably dying for you to see. Do you wonder how such a nice person could have such a mean daughter as I am, with holding pictures of Mom and Gwen! I know this might not be the best picture, but I think it is cute.

Gwen just walked right up to Mom and put her arms up and you know Grandma couldn't resist.
Gwen enjoying her Great-Grandma's recipe for a chocolate bar.
The 3 generations of us.

I think that is all for now, I am going to get back to organizing my pictures before the girls get here and while Gwen is sleeping.

Top of the evening to you!

Ok, so I am still busy, but not too busy to pick up the camera from BBY! It appears to be in working order. I am hoping the camera is fixed, I am also hoping that I have 2 fully working batteries, so I can always have a charged battery waiting patiently to be used. (As I have said before a girl can dream!) I am anticipating a long night tonight and tomorrow night, tomorrow, because the girls are coming over and tonight because we are starting to work on Gwen sleeping through the night. Most of you might be wondering why I am doing this while Eric is not at home. Gwen waking up in the middle of the night also wakes up Eric and since he has to work I usually jump up and get her so as not to disturb his sleep (if I let her cry it out). Not to say Gwen not sleeping through the night is all his fault, I am to blame also, I jump up and haven't really focused on getting her to sleep through the night, I have so much to work on with my strong willed child, but I am now committed to getting her to sleep. We will see how this works. She is waking up around 3am, I am not sure she is actually hungry, 3am is when I used to get up with her while was pregnant, when she became more active and I realized I had to pee. I still in the back of my mind worry about the hunger thing, I probably always will because of that blasted Dr and my food issues. Sorry kid!

Anyhoo, onto the pictures from today, yes that is right, I am uploading current pictures, don't get used to it! This outfit I have her in was also seen in this series. It is funny to think she is wearing the same thing that she was wearing last March considering how fast she was going through clothes in the beginning. Technically the outfit is a 6-12mon, if the weather hadn't been so crappy I probably wouldn't have dressed her in this at all. Today will be the last time she wears it, I noticed that when she walked around the pants were a little too short, but she is still a cutie! She was really hamming it up for the camera today as you see in this picture.

And this picture! What a crazy kid. She is finally starting to show interest in using this walker as a scooter, of course that doesn't mean she actually knows how to scoot herself forward, but she likes to sit on it and play with the attachments!
Mom, this picture is for you. When Mom was here we played a game, Mom would put Gwen's chew toy in the 'trunk', Gwen would obsessively pull it out, and hand the toy to me, and I would hand the toy to Mom and the game would start over. Have I ever mentioned that my child might have a little of the OCD? Well, I guess if she does she comes by it honestly!

Possessed toys and other ramblings

At some point I will get around to posting the few pictures that I have of Gwen from Mom's visit. Probably sometime while Eric is gone. Eric is upstairs packing now for his trip and Gwen is sleeping. The house isn't a total wreck, but after Gwen's afternoon play session, the living room could use some work. Gwen is starting to get more intelligent in a way that people can see. (I mean we have always known that she is bright beyond her years!) But, now she is starting to Mooooo when you ask her what sound a cow makes (it sounds more like Mmmmm, but I'll take it!) If I ask her what sound a snake makes, after I prompt her she will Sssss. So cute. She also knows when we say outside she will walk to the baby gate that leads to the front door and try with all her might to open it...hopefully she won't get the thumb dexterity/strength to open the gate, she understands where the handle is and tries to pull up! Gwen is finally starting to get a sense of things "belonging"; she will put her little basketballs in the hoop and then clap for herself. She also today was trying to figure out how to put the stars back on the stacker. It was cute to watch. She did it once on accident and then I think became addicted to figuring it out. Unfortunately with the short attention span she only spent a couple minutes on the toy before the pull of the Elmo toy got to her. The toy she used to be afraid of, now she LOVES! The toy is possessed sometimes it but randomly starts making noise, I usually hear it when I am upstairs trying to calm Gwen down to go for a nap or bed. Gwen now stands at the toy and hits all the buttons and sounds like a DJ. Sometime after I get my camera back we will get a video, because it is hilarious, but could drive you a little crazy. I saw on the web that my camera is on its way back to the store, no word whether or not it was fixed! I hope for my 2 readers that it has been fixed...I know you want more pics and videos!
Oh and by the way we now have 2 white spots in our gums, 1 of her 1 yr molars is on its way! Hopefully eating and sleeping will be much improved when this is over, a girl can dream, but I won't get my hopes up!

Busy bee

We have been very busy here lately, sorry for the lack of posts. That darn Mom of mine is taking up all my time! (oh, my mistake, I thought she was reading over my shoulder, but she is not!) What I meant to say, is that my darn kid is taking up all my time, ok that is not really true either, Gwen has been spending quality time with Grandma and I have been hanging out, sometimes with Eric sometimes scurrying around the house or whatnot, not a whole lot of time on the computer. We currently have no digital cameras working well, so for the next couple weeks (hopefully less than 2 weeks) we will have pictures posting again! Gwen has been very fussy and not sleeping well the last couple of days, we found out why today, her bottom right 1st year molar popped up in 1 place, UGH! Only 3 more points to go and maybe she will start sleeping again. I don't know if any of the other molars have been coming in she is currently not along fingers in her mouth...for my personal safety I don't often offer my fingers for the task, I volunteer Eric's! We have had a nice week with Mom, I do all the cooking, Mom does all the cleaning, a nice arrangement for sure! We (Eric and I) have had a chance to go out without the baby, nice! But, Mom leaves tomorrow and Eric leaves Thurs. I will be insane by Fri. Eric doesn't come back until early Tues morning, they've scheduled him for a breakfast and a dinner that day. The major problem is that I scheduled a Mom's Night Out at my house on Friday, we're scheduled to do scrapbooking, which means I have to have a clean house by Friday, which shouldn't be too bad, I just need to get all of Gwen's crap, I mean toys, off the floor and out of the 2nd level. I guess that is enough of an update for now, Mom's flight is early tomorrow, ok, not that early, but we have to be up early to get her to the airport. Have a great day!

Frustrations

We are still having camera problems; I went to the store on Monday because my camera wouldn't work on Sun and wouldn't you know it, while I was watching my child in line the camera fell out of my diaper bag and started working! BLAST IT! So today when I turned it on to take pictures of course it did not work...mind you I turned it on once when we got home and it did work. Eric took it to the store tonight and we have been informed that in 2 weeks we should be getting our camera back! TWO WEEKS! Ok, so we have another digital camera at home, but it is not near as cool or as functional, it has a battery that doesn't hold a charge for very long either. UGH! So pictures might be slow on this website for a while. I hope you can tolerate that. The only shining spot is that my Mom is coming with her digital camera so we can use that for the next week.
So, besides that what has been going on here you ask? We had a busy 'fun family' weekend before my Mom get here, just kidding. We can still have fun family time with my Mom. The nice thing will be that since Eric is no longer in school we can take Grandma up on the offer to leave the house, without the kid! AH! But, I digress, we went to a kids concert Sat night with a couple families from my exercise group, Gwen ran around and had a good time, and the music wasn't terrible. The guy had converted songs we knew into kids songs, so it wasn't mushy crap!
Sunday we went to the Aquarium in Baltimore Gwen took a nap, it was dark and noisy. We got there around lunch time, had lunch, Gwen played in the cars and then we toured the aquarium. Several things had changed and at the aquarium is when my camera decided to poop out! We took a collegue of Eric's who was visiting from England. Eric made fun of me for calling the line a queue, but whatever. I've read Harry Potter and some English books, I know what it means and use it sometimes.
So I know in the previous picture it looks like Gwen is smoking, but she is not! It is a pretzel that Daddy gave her.

Gwen is starting to slowly put stuff back, not necessarily with any kind of exciting pattern, but we make a big fuss over her putting stuff away and clap, hoping that she will realize that it is fun to put stuff back, a good theory, no. But as with everything else with Gwen, it is all a control issue, she likes to remind us who is the boss, let me tell you kid, I am bigger than you, so I win!

13 months

Miss Gwen is 13 months! Hard to believe life was like this and this and more importantly that Gwen looked like this! So what is life like with a 13 month-old like Gwen. I realize that she is crazy, like most other babies, but she has some things that make her a challenge for me. I think the 2 most challenging things for me are sleep and food and while I know that everyone has these problems with their children, I don't know how many people have these problems simultaneously or to the extent that we do. Gwen I think at this point, like most other babies is all about control. In the last several days we have gotten her to eat more foods, but only on her terms, she points at our foods and then she tries it, like I said on her terms. Which makes me think the terrible 2s are going to be a LOT of fun around here. I think I am going to start preparing now, she already has 'tantrums' if you don't pick her up if she puts her little arms in the air. I am waiting for her to start stomping her foot and be like, MOM! For now, she just goes to Eric cause she knows Daddy is a sucker! I mean totally wrapped around her finger and I am chopped liver. I knew this day would come, so I have been preparing.
Her latest thing as I have mentioned is pointing. She does it constantly and sometimes with added sound effects, like don't you see what I am pointing too! That is how she ended up with a whole nectarine. The cutest thing though is when she dances. Gwen and I went to visit Erin and her new baby sister, Katie. Jaime and Tim thought Gwen was hilarious, with her squealing and dancing while pointing-moving in such a way that makes her look like a rapper. I have tried to get a video, but she just clams up. Hopefully soon I will get a video...I don't know if it will rival sweeping or emptying the laundry in the cuteness department, but I will have to let you judge for yourself.
Gwen still gets into everything. I no longer can use the facilities by myself, she is ALWAYS with me when I am home alone with her and she is awake. This is a challenge because we haven't put the baby locks up on the cabinets in the bathrooms.
Maybe not the most flattering shot, but what can I do, she is into everything! She still is not into putting anything back, Eric often asks if a bomb went off when he comes home because you can often see a perfect circle where she was sitting while she pulled everything out of her shopping basket (thanks KIKI!) or whatever she decided to empty. I am hoping to one day get her to put stuff back, but I think my Mom tried to do that with me for 17 yrs and I never did, so why would I suspect that Gwen was any different!

I think in general Gwen and I are getting along pretty well, she seems to not be suffering too much in my care, well at least she is not complaining. I know I will look back at this time and think, how peaceful she never talked back! I think most weeks can be summed up by this statement that I stole from a website I read daily.

"You think you’re going to be prepared for the sheer incredibleness of such a moment, but it’s like, someone keeps setting off pipe bombs on your front porch and throwing rocks through your windows, and then one day out of nowhere they show up and mow your lawn. And you’re suddenly glad you didn’t shoot them last week."

Gwen is learning how to hug, she has been doling out hugs to Eric and I pretty regularly and cuddles up to us. The godfather reports while he was playing with her today he got a hug also...YEA Gwen. If she was awake right now and I said that she would clap for herself. It is hard to believe how much she has learned in the last year and how much she will continue to learn.
For now let me post this video of her and Eric, hopefully we will have some great pictures of our first relaxing no pressure/no homework on the horizon family weekend! Are you as excited as I am?

New chores

It has brought to my attention that yesterday's photo of Gwen and Eric didn't give a good enough description. So please refer to yesterday's photo and understand that Eric had that plantain chip in his mouth when his snarky daughter took it right out of his mouth...he described it as 'The lady and the tramp' scene, but whatever.

It has also been brought to my attention that I am not posting as much as I used to. Whether this was meant in jest or as a warning that I needed to start posting more, I don't know. But I have had several reasons for not posting. The last several months I have been a lazy bum. I haven't exactly sat on the couch and ate bon bons, but that could be because we don't have bon bons in the house. I only am a lazy bum when Gwen is napping. I am no longer able to post easily while Gwen is awake...and the lovely husband needs the computer for school work, that will soon be over so maybe I will be able to post more in the evenings. I have previously been able to cover my slacking with the fact that I put Gwen down to sleep when Eric is in class and then I can clean, but that will be the case no longer, Eric will be home every evening. So, I have started to establish some cleaning routines that I can do during Gwen's nap time. I had already established Tues for bathrooms, but I still had 4 other days of the week with vacuuming and other general cleaning items that should have days assigned to them! I also had no camera, and I know that each post unless very brief needs to have some pictures associated with it, or it doesn't really serve the purpose of this website...which is to keep people informed of Gwen's growth, which is hard to see without pictures!

So, on with the pictures...since I am establishing routines for cleaning, it is only natural that my daughter would also like to help...I was thinking she could put her toys back, but apparently she had other ideas...

Babysitting and other stuff!

This is big sister Erin. She is so cute, when I was sitting on the couch she crawled right up and sat next to me. I snapped this picture as she was getting down. Here are the girls together, reaching for some toys.
We had Erin for 24 hours. She was a good baby, mellow compared Gwen. Her sister was born Sun morning, we gave the girls breakfast and Tim called with the good news and came by and picked Erin up. We have been recovering ever since! Eric had his last final tonight (we hope! ;p )
Yesterday Gwen showed Eric something I already knew...
Gwen wants to try everything you are eating. Whether she likes it or not you MUST share with her, she'll do everything in her power to get a taste off of you. This is a good thing, I am striving to eat better, when Gwen is awake. Not everyone understands that lesson. I hope this means Gwen will actually start to like eating food. She kind of liked these homemade plantain chips, or should I say tolerated.

Adventures in Babysitting

So today has been an interesting day, we are babysitting a friend's 14mon daughter while my friend is in labor. They called this morning at about 7:45 saying that she was in labor. My friend has been in and out of the hospital today while we have had her daughter. Her poor daughter misses her parents, but she is still a pretty good kid. She and Gwen are like polar opposites. Erin has been fun to play with, she is not destructive, she hands stuff to you to play with her. So both girls are now sleeping and we just got a call from the Dad that they have finally been admitted and that they are starting the patosin and he'll call me when the new baby arrives. I think Eric & I are going to bed...it has been a long day and it could be a long night, Erin is apparently not sleeping through the night yet. Thank goodness I didn't have twins or accidentally get pregnant at 6 months postpartum!

Gwen and the not so giant nectarine

T! that title was for you; ok, I adjusted it for my purposes! So my sweet baby has a new talent she has demonstrated this week. She feels that she is big enough to handle eating fruit on her own without Mommy cutting up her fruit or peeling it. She actually pushes her thumbs into the fruit and then 'peels' it and then bites into. Here is the proof!

Here is the damage!

Routines

We have crazy things going on at our house. Gwen has been going down for 2 naps! I am not to say how crazy that has made me. It is nice that she is napping for 4 hours, but I can't really go anywhere. That sucks! We need 4 consecutive hours kid. Then I can get work done around the house and take naps and breaks! We are still working on falling asleep on our own. I put her in her crib at 8:17 and at 9:30 I turned on the monitor and she was babbling happily. UM kid, go to sleep! Anyhoo I don't think that the battery is the problem with my camera, if I, I mean Eric, if he hits the camera it will turn back on, my huge problem is that I have some really cool pictures and a video on the camera, but I can't get them off! I did manage to get the previous photo today. My sweeties. The stuff I can't get off the camera will go with this really fun Gwen story. :(