Almost Four

Sunday was Gracie's birthday party. It's been under discussion for the last 10 months. She was very specific in her wishes.

One, a princess cake:

These cakes are how you know I love my children. A weekend of test cake making and then a full Friday/Saturday combo of baking and decorating went into this beast.

Two, a pinata:

Carefully selected with the inspection given to dozens before this unicorn was chosen. On the way home from the store, she hugged it and whispered how it was beautiful, but she was going to whack it with a stick and it wasn't personal.

Three, the ability to dress up:

So do you see what Sugar and Spice in all their Princess Glory are holding in this picture? Yep, the head of the unicorn. There is a whole series of photos where they entertained themselves by pummeling the broken paper-mache carcass.

The irony of it though? Grace was REALLY upset when I through the bits into the dumpster.

The best part of the party for me? A concentrated mass of mom's from her new school telling me how sweet, well mannered and kind she is.

The Potty Trained Princess

Lately, Grace’s whole world has revolved around princesses.

In her world, princesses are the ultimate super hero. They dance and twirl and fly, always help those in need. Oh, and the best thing about being a princess? The clothes.

A few months ago, I found a cache of princess dresses and they became out potty training prizes. You peed in the potty? Pick a prize! What will it be? A dress, a wand, some sparkly shoes??

I don’t know if the dresses have really had anything to do with it (she had announced to me that she would no longer need diapers when she went to her new school ages ago), but Grace has been potty-trained for 2 full weeks now.

The feat required one more dress, the one dress that is missing from her extensive collection. The Princess and the Frog Tiana costume. And through the wonder that is the internet, we were gifted* a dress for her final reward from Wholesale Halloween Costumes.

It fit the bill perfectly. Twirly, girly and sparkly. It was everything I had hoped for and more than what Grace expected. She celebrated by watching the movie while wearing the costume.

And then, sly as a fox, edged over to ask what else she could to do earn more princess costumes.

Just keep smiling like this kiddo.

* Wholesalehalloweencostumes.com sent us the Princess and The Frog Tiana dress in exchange for the inclusion of the links you see above. Thank you!

Happy Feet

I have a dent in my forehead.

It's only noticeable when I raise my eyebrows, and if I'm raising my eyebrows at you there is probably too much going on to notice an imperfection in my scull. I received it as a consolidation prize for walking / falling into the corner of the dishwasher when I was 3 years old. Shortly after that incident my mom signed me up for dance classes.

I will admit those classes served me well. I am a klutz to the extreme. I tend to look down when I'm walking to avoid tripping. The 10 years of tap-jazz-ballet-pointe, has spared me from a lot of injury that could have been much, much worse.

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Case in point:

Clare's new hobby is throwing my cookbooks on the floor.

I will admit they are very colorful, ideally located at toddler height and ripe for tossing, so I can't really blame her. On Sunday night, I didn't immediately clean up her thrown book pile. I let it sit until after dinner. Grace was playing on the floor and I was carrying Clare down the single step to our slightly sunken family room. The books lay in our path just on the other side of that step. I was looking down at them. Grace called my name, and suddenly I was no longer looking down at them.

And I stepped on a banana peel book. One foot in motion on the sunken, wooden floored book and one foot stationary on the tile above. While holding a writhing 20lb child.

Was my thunk loud? Yes.
Am I injured? Yes.
Did I have enough grace not to drop the baby? YES!

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And that, combined with her incessent begging lately, is the reason why Gracie will also be starting to dance classes on Tuesday.

The class is 20 minutes of tap, followed by 20 minutes of ballet, followed by 15 minutes of creative movement where I assume they just let the kids run around in circles and do the alligator on the floor. Her shoes came yesterday. A full test run was required.

Fully outfitted in tights, leotard and ballet slippers, she jumped into her daddy's arms for an impromptu Swan Lake-esque lift.

She then asked me how she actually does ballet, and I showed my little girl how to put her arms and feet into first and second position, complete with pliés.

Ahhhhh.

OK, maybe her enrollment in these classes are as much for me as they are her.

Versus

Once your kid comes, people seem to move onto a slightly new topic to thrust their opinions upon you. I know it is just idle chatter, but I still find myself biting my tongue because any correction on my part always falls upon deaf ears.

It is the comparisons. The versus of my children. Physical and emotional- looks, demeanor, appetite, sleep. I know it is go to talk of second children. I find myself talking about it constantly. So here it is, once and for all..... Gracie vs Clare.

~~~Grace @ 8 weeks old ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Clare @ 8 weeks old~~~

Face- MINE. I don't care what you people say. These girls look like me. Sure, they have Matt's mouth, but the major features (face, nose and eye shapes) are all mine. The picture of Clare isn't as dead on, but they have the same shaped face with a pointy little chin, same soon to be bushy eyebrows and same nose- despite my inutero claim that Clare was sporting Matt's profile. They do however both sport Matt's mouth- which is a blessing because I have always lamented my lack of upper lip. You will definitely know they are sisters.
This is where their similarities end though.

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Eyes- Matt and I are both hazel. His are a 50/50 green/gold combination while mine are 80/20 green/brown (they also still change intensity of the green depending on my mood).

*Gracie's eyes have been a deep chocolate brown, with little flecks of green starting to show.

* Clare has bucked both of us and has my dad's blue/grey eyes dead on. They are eerily beautiful.

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Hair-

*Grace was born a little cue ball. She always had just enough hair to let us know she would be Matt's shade of blonde, and this summer she is sporting the beautiful bleach blonde highlights of his Nordic heritage in its full glory.

*Clare this time opted for Matt's dad's shade of brunette (blonde based) as opposed to my dark (red based) shade.

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Sleep- Polar opposites.

*Grace still only rarely sleeps through the night. She needs one of us, preferably Matt, to stay by her side while she falls asleep.

*Clare is out by 8:45 (at the latest) and can snooze, unassisted, for 11 hr stretches easy. Although to accomplish this, she eats for 3 hrs straight before going to bed.

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Food-

*Grace was a battle to breastfeed. The first 6 weeks for such a challenge, but I was so dedicated to the idea of giving her breast milk. I have no idea why it didn't dawn on me to just pump and bottle feed her- chalk it up to inexperience. By the 3 month mark she was starting to get formula supplements and by 7 months she refused breast milk all together.

*Clare is a champ. Hours into this world and she was drinking in the easy, carefree manor I thought the process would be the first time around. At 3 months she has still never had formula. I wonder if I will be able to make it to the 1 yr mark with her...

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Mmmmm .... my babies. So different and so alike at the same time. I keep holding my breath in anticipation for Clare to be able to play with her big sister. I wonder if it will be as beautiful of a sight as I imagine in my head.

StoryTellers

It’s funny how we, as adults, get to move in and out of the realms of childhood imagination.

Over the last few months, Grace’s ability to pretend and imagine has blossomed. We have a play routine now on our drives home. First we talk about birds, which usually involves us shouting ‘WOODPECKER!’ at each other for 10 minutes and then delves into a conversation where I am expected to name every kind of bird I can think of and she decides who gets what bird.

Blue Jay- Daddy’s bird
Chickadee- Clare’s bird
Sparrow- Ricky’s bird
Cardinal- My bird
Pigeon- Her bird
Penguin- Daddy’s bird
Flamingo- Her bird
Eagle- My bird
Hawk- Clare’s bird
Raven- Her bird
Oriole- Daddy’s bird
Robin- Her bird
Seagull- Clare’s bird
WOODPECKER! – Her bird

And then she takes it all back.
‘Mama, I don’t want to share. All the birds in the world are mine, ok?’

Next we move onto monsters.
They are pink and purple and yellow and blue and every imaginable shade of the rainbow with polka-dots and glitter sparkles. They seem to live in the trees of the wooded roadside we pass driving home. They are easily deterred from coming into the car by singing The Monster Boogie and if they do penetrate the force field of our voices, they are plucked out the air and eaten. I tend to think Grace leaves holes in her force field to allow for the monster snacks, as they apparently taste like taffy and cotton candy.

There are dozens of other games, but these are the top two lately and occupy us for the majority of our 45 minute drive home. Yesterday, I was unknowingly pulled into another imagination.

I go to the daycare to see Clare during my lunch break, sneaking in and out without notice most days. This time I was pummeled with questions from the older children in the center.

‘Gracie’s mommy! Gracie’s mommy! You’re Clare’s mommy too, right?’
Ummm…. Yeah….?
‘S says that Clare is a boy’s name! Tell him it ISN’T a boys’ name because it is Gracie’s sisters name and Gracie’s sister is a GIRL!’
Ummm…. Yeah….?
Of course it is a girls name! S, you are full of hooey!
**To which S grinned, bashfully looked down at the ground digging his Crocs into the dirt.**

I had no idea what on Earth they were talking about and why Clare was involved, but forgot all about the conversation moments later.

I love moving in and out of the realms of childhood imagination…. And sometimes, unbeknownst to at the time, become part of the story.

Pink Enough?

Gracie's shoe chronicle continues. This time it's a little different though.

Her McKenna's are still around, but getting short in the toe, while these new hot pink Sabrina's seem to flop at the back of her heel. But now she has choices in the morning, and her world has become all about having choices. Unfortunately, sometime the choice is to wear one old shoe and one new shoe. I've been trying to relax about a lot of things lately, but two completely different shoes just aren't going to fly.

I'm just glad she doesn't realize there are gold glitter shoes from Halloween and sandals for the summer hidden in her closet right now....

The Verdict Is...

Yesterday was the day. The 20 week ultrasound came and went like a flash. Never has 45 minutes gone by so quickly.

The parts are all in place. The spine is a beautiful curve. The face is a perfect profile. Shots of legs and arms and hands were had. And then the ultrasound declared the shape we had been waiting for, the glimpse of gender.

We should have recognized it right away. We've seen those three lines before. Our version number two (V2) is another perfect, beautiful girl.

Team Spirit

This past weekend Gracie wore her Bears jersey for the first time in ages. She was so proud to match her daddy and was overjoyed with our rendering of the Chicago Bears fight song, despite their loss in the end.

That morning during our weekly trip to the grocery store, the Sunday football jerseys were abound. I don’t think she quite understood that they stood for allegiance to different cities and teams, but she did know they weren’t like her navy and orange jersey and spent a good chunk of her time giving other shoppers the hairy eye.

Every time we saw a different jersey she would slap her belly and declare, Mama. I wear ‘Cago Beers. Yes love, yes you are. At home, the trend continued. Every half an hour heard a same declaration of, Mama, I wear ‘Cago Beers. When Gracie went to bed that night, I confiscated the jersey with all her other dirty clothes to run through the washer. It was air dried and put away for another day.

It seems another day is already upon us. Yesterday morning, out of the blue, she demanded to wear ‘Cago Beers to school. I am told by many sources that she once again spend the day slapping her belly and telling everyone who would listen (and some that could care less) that she is wearing her ‘Cago Beers. I warned the teachers at pick up that I had a feeling they would be seeing a lot of the jersey.

Despite this warning, I myself was unprepared for this morning. My child no longer wants variety in her wardrobe. She no longer wants dresses and feminine ruffles. She only want the Bears jersey, which by the way, was still unwashed this morning, covered with a days worth of food smears and snot, and therefore un-wearable.

*Enter the meltdown*

I know, I should have just put in on her, but it had ketchup smeared on the front. I know I should have just put it on her, but she didn’t want to put on a long sleeve shirt underneath to battle the December weather. I know, I should have just put it on her, but I’d she already had a super soft light blue fleece jumper dress laid out for today’s wardrobe damnit and if I have to wrestle her like an alligator to force clothes on the body she is wearing what I want her to!

So tonight, and every night in the foreseeable future, the jersey is going in the washing machine. Someone needs to explain to this child that I don’t do mid-week laundry though. And if you’re looking for a Christmas present for Gracie, more jerseys might come in handy, 3T please.

Ho-panes, Hot-cop-ers and Other Assorted Transportation

We are going back to Chicago this weekend. First flight out on Saturday, first flight back on Monday morning. Easy breezy. Each side of the family gets 24 hours and then we are back to Maryland.

The trips are stressful. They take planning and scheduling and diplomacy to a degree where we are usually tired before we even step foot into the airport. As much as Matt and I love our families, trips back are just one more reminder that Chicago isn’t home anymore and that we are 600 miles away from the comforts of our infrastructure.

I may get caught up in the details of the trip, but Gracie, her focus and excitement is on something else completely.

Ho-panes.

Despite her proclivity towards jewels, Gracie is developing some tomboy-ish tendencies too.

The dump truck and fire engine is a thing of wonder. Yes, the two have little in common, but still, every dump truck gets a squeal of delight despite the smells oozing from it; and she seems to think every fire truck was created just for her enjoyment and is mourned with tears and exclamations of 'MY FIRE TRUCK!' when they hurry past.

Even better than these two though? Ho-panes and Hot-cop-ers.

(That would read airplanes and helicopters to those who are not 100% versed in Gracie speak.)

We live close enough to BWI Airport that planes are a regular occurrence. Early mornings, with the mass take-offs are particularly delightful to Gracie. I grew up a mild distance from Midway Airport, so the noise of low flying jets rarely attracts my attention. Gracie on the other hand, must spend a good portion of her day with her ho-pane radar up.

And this 48 hour trip to see family, sure she runs through the list of who she will see during those two days:

Mama, where Unkey Jer at? He’s at work. In Chicago.
Mama, we see Unkey Jer when we take ho-pane to Cago? Yes, love, we will see him.

Mama, where Grandpa at? He’s watching TV. In Chicago.
Mama, we see Grandpa when we take ho-pane to Cago? Yes, love, we will see him.

Mama, where PaPa at? He’s at his cabin in Wisconsin.
Mama, we see PaPa when we take ho-pane to Cago? Yes, love, we will see him.

Mama, where Michael at? (The 19 yr old neighbor boy) He’s making sandwiches. (He works at a Panera)
Mama, we no see Michael when we take ho-pane to Cago. Yes, love, Michael has to stay here and make more sandwiches.

So just like her parents, Gracie’s true thrill will come with the end caps of this trip and her real life encounter with her very own ho-pane.

And you can bet that I won’t be discouraging her from laying claim to the aircraft if that is what gets us through 2.5 hours in each direction without tears or temper-tantrums. She will be fine, me on the other hand, I cannot guarantee there will be no tears of exhaustion on my part.

The Big Dot

We are having sleep issues again.

Not me, I could sleep for days right now. Not Matt, for once he seems to be able to make it though the night, although the Nyquil he is taking of his cold could have something to do with that.

So that only leaves one person left. It’s moved beyond occasional and into pattern that she wakes at the stroke of midnight and wants to sleep with one of us.

When we found out I was pregnant we bought a new bedroom set for Gracie so she can have an upgraded big girl room.

This past weekend I bought bedding that she loves. She’s been dragging the comforter all over the first floor and snuggling. She counts the many dots. She exclaims the colors of the rainbow. She demands she is the only one who can touch it, and then quickly retracts her demand with requests to lay on the floor with her.

Given all this, this weekend we start the transition. No, the room isn’t painted to go with the rainbow of dots yet, but yes I think she is ready to move from the crib to a toddler bed.

Wish us luck.

What Little Girls Are Made Of

I’ve always talked about Gracie’s obsession with shoes. I really do think it is a predetermined genetic trait, that matches perfectly with her shade of Matt’s blonde hair and my Irish nose. There was no way to avoid this love, so why not encourage it. That way it is win-win, because everyone who knows me knows my love of shoe shopping.

In the last few months, her love has expanded from her own Pedipeds and pink sparkles (that she refused to wear at Easter but now loves) to my shoes. Particularly these shoes.

She has dozens of other pairs to choose from. She mixes and matches them all with her jewels. I own ballet flats in every shade of the rainbow. Metallic kitten heels. Black peep toe 4 inch slings with butter soft leather. She likes the rough textured canvas and rope wedges though. She shuffles around our second floor with them constantly. She insists I wear them while brushing my teeth. They are located in a different place in our room everyday.

I’ve also been having issues getting Gracie to wake up in the mornings. While her bucking our 6am departure for work/daycare has provided the wonderful side effect of her sleeping in until 7am on the weekends, it has made weekday mornings all the more challenging. She has been expanding her vocabulary greatly though in relation to the morning protests. She now speaks in relatively full sentences to portray her displeasure, "No Mama. Not nice. Still sleeping!" while she tries to smack my hands away.

This past week I’ve started opening her door to let hallway light shine in and turning off her humidifier (aka the background noise) before going downstairs to pack our lunch bags. Usually by the time I come back upstairs she is awake and waiting for me, or at least puts up a lot less fight when I try to pull her away from the beloved pillow.

This morning, she still had her face buried in the pillow when I went back upstairs. I was steeling myself for the kicks and whines when her eyes peeked open through the crib slats and she sat up like a bolt. "Mama. Mama! Soos! Sooooooooossssss!! Pity. Pity soos!" (Translation: ‘Pretty shoes.)

Then I looked down at my feet. I am wearing her wedges and she couldn’t be happier.