Carolyn

Happy Snowy Valentine’s Day!

Sarah Carolyn, General

What do you do when you’re snowed in (sort of) on Valentine’s Day?

Make heart-shaped cookies with pink frosting and lots of sprinkles, of course! (Preferably while still in your pajamas. Because why bother getting dressed on a snow day?)

Carrie has become a fabulous cookie maker. Look:
She rolled out the dough…

20070214_cookie_rolling.jpg

And cut out the hearts…
20070214_cookie_cutting.jpg

Drizzled the frosting…
20070214_cookie_drizzling.jpg

And sprinkled the sprinkles…
20070214_cookie_sprinkling.jpg

Carrie seems to subscribe to the “less is more” philosophy when it comes to frosting, which I’m not sure I agree with. ;)

valentines_cookies.jpg

When it came right down to picking a cookie to eat, though, she picked the one with the thickest frosting and the most sprinkles. Of course!

First Snowman

Sarah Firsts, Project Spectrum 2.0

Carrie made her first snowman today. She was thrilled. We’ve read books about snowmen, but she wasn’t so much into playing in the snow last year, and we’ve only had snow a few times when it wasn’t too cold this year. Today, though, was perfect snowman-making weather – I imagine the next time we drive around the neighborhood there will be several snowmen hanging around.

20070202_snowman.jpg

I took this picture as she was hugging the snowman and saying “I love you, snowman!” I think we’ll be paying daily visits to our snowman until he melts.

(Oh, and since the snowman is white with a blue hat, he fits nicely in with the colors for Project Spectrum!)

Funny Toddler Sayings

Sarah Carolyn

The latest funny things Carrie says:

In response to my suggestion that she help me fold laundry in the living room (to get her out of Denis’ hair while he used the steam cleaner in the family room): “Oh! Laundry in the living room? That’d be great!”

“Mommy, blank me up!” is how she asks to be tucked in.

“I blow it off” is what she says when something is too hot and she’s going to blow on it to cool it off.

And, heaven forbid anyone ask her what she had for breakfast, because I’m sure “raisin opium” would warrant a call to CPS. I liked it better when she mispronounced oatmeal as “opamee”!

Twenty-Seven Months Old!

Sarah Monthly Updates

Dear Carolyn,

I can’t believe how much you’ve changed this month. You’ve started actually singing – maybe not recognizable tunes, but you’re no longer simply reciting the words to songs. You’re sleeping in your toddler bed all the time now, in fact we took your crib down a couple of weeks ago. You can draw people and carrots (don’t ask me why you like to draw carrots, I have no idea), and circles, triangles, and sometimes even squares. I gave you an open cup to drink from the other day, expecting to have to mop up a puddle of water, and you drank the whole thing without spilling a drop. And you’re starting to insist on wearing panties around the house instead of diapers – granted, you’re not quite making it to the potty most of the time, but you’re really trying to get the hang of it all.

20061225_rocking_horse.jpg

You’ve also become…willful is the wrong word, but it’s the best I can come up with. We play chase every day while I try to wrestle you into whatever clothes you’ve picked out. You run away after every meal before I can wash your sticky hands. You’ve discovered that if you wedge yourself into a small enough space, I can’t actually get you out against your will. We’ve been discussing cooperation. Often. And how only little girls who cooperate get to watch Elmo’s Potty Time DVD. I never thought I’d resort to bribery, but I think you’d do almost anything if it meant watching your beloved furry red monster sing about using the potty.
20070104_sliding.jpg

You adore playing in the snow that we’ve finally gotten – although I think you were pretty happy to be using the slide just a week or two ago. You spend hours playing with lacing beads and your kitchen. And just today you spent the entire morning playing with a box big enough for you to lay down in and close the top – first it was a boat, then a car, and at some point you dragged your Elmo chair in there and had a tea party with your babies. I thought you liked your playsilks before, but this month you’ve started using them to be a superhero, a baby bird, and a teacher (you put it on like a cape, only in front of you, and say you’re a teacher). You’ve got a wonderful imagination. Thank you for sharing it with me.

Love, Mommy

Preschool, and a People

Sarah Milestones


What does this look like to you? According to Carrie, it’s “a people!” She told me what she was drawing: “eyes, a nose, a mouth…legs, feet, shoes…arms and hands!” This is the first time I’ve ever seen her draw something more than a basic shape and have it look like what she said she was drawing. I had to take a picture, since it’s not likely we’ll be keeping this piece of paper, but when she becomes a famous artist someday she might want to see her first real drawing.

Coincidentally, we signed her up for preschool today. She’ll be going two mornings a week starting next fall. We had to write a brief description of Carrie on the registration form. How do you sum up a child in two lines? We wrote something silly about how she loves dogs, and books, and books about dogs. And that she’s active and loves to play with puzzles and baby dolls. But we probably should have written something about how self-confident and independent she is, and that she’s caring and polite and adorable and a stinker. Oh, well, they’ll find out soon enough, right? And we have our next big challenge: she needs to be potty trained by the time school starts!

Noting the Lasts

Sarah Milestones

Every first is celebrated in a child’s life. First time sleeping through the night, first steps, first words. Carrie slept in her “big girl bed” for the first time sometime last month. But she slept in her crib for the very last time last Wednesday afternoon.

We took the crib down yesterday. Her room looks so very different, and based on the trouble she’s had falling asleep since I think it will take her some time to get used to it too.

I have such mixed feelings about this transition. On the one hand, Carrie is so very proud of the fact that she’s sleeping in a big girl bed. She tells everyone she sees. And that makes me very happy for her. On the other hand, although she’ll always be my baby…she’s not a baby anymore. Not only because she’s sleeping in a bed of course, but that’s one major sign I’ve noticed lately.

It was so much sooner than we’d planned to move her, but she was ready. I’ve shed my tears over taking down the beautiful crib I so lovingly picked out for my cherished baby girl, and we will pack it away for future hopes and dreams. And I hope I never, ever forget how she looked sleeping in the crib with her little bottom stuck up in the air…my baby.

Snap!

Sarah Carolyn, Music

OK, now that I’ve played for 5+ hours of auditions, I have West Side Story music permanently embedded in my brain. (This condition, of course, will last through the end of the show – and probably a bit longer than that – in late April. Sigh.) Can’t you hear it? Snap, snap, snap, snap…

Anyway. Carrie’s been singing a lot lately. (I’m starting to even hope that she might not be tone-deaf, since if I sing along with her she’s starting to try to match pitch.) But she doesn’t quite get all the lyrics right. My two current favorite mangled lyrics are:

“Do, a deer, a e-mail deer” – I guess she’s heard the word “e-mail” a lot more than the word “female”! The scary part is she knows all the words to this song. Too bad it was last year’s musical. Maybe I can teach her the “I feel pretty” song from WSS?
“Where is pumpkin? Where is pumpkin?” – this one’s a little odd, since she does know that the handy-dandy opposable appendage on her hand is called a “thumb”, but she insists that it’s “pumpkin”, not “thumbkin”.

Potty Talk & Lima Beans

Sarah Carolyn

Darn it, I’ve been mentally saving up cute things Carrie has been saying lately, and now that I sat down to blog about them I can’t remember most of them.

One thing that was especially cute was New Year’s Eve: Lisa and Greta and their families came over for the afternoon. Carrie was thrilled to be running around and playing with all the other kids. At one point she asked to sit on the potty, and while I was sitting there with her she asked if we could go downstairs and watch “Sesee Street”. When I replied that she had already watched Sesame Street, and didn’t she want to go play with her friends instead, she said, “yes, watch Sesee Street with my peoples!”

And about that sitting on the potty thing… Carrie has intentionally pooped in the potty twice. I know most kids start out peeing in the potty, but apparently mine just has to do things in her own order. I’m actually not pushing this at all – she asked to sit on the potty both times, told us that she needed to go, and after a bit she went. Whether this turns into full-blown potty-training or not is entirely up to her at this point. She’s asked a few other times and not done anything, but usually it’s because one or another of her friends has just gone and peer pressure seems to work even at this young age.

I also have the weirdest kid ever. Today I convinced her to eat more macaroni and cheese with the promise of more frozen lima beans. I have no idea where her love of frozen lima beans came from, because I can’t stand them – frozen, cooked, or anywhere in between. The ironic thing is that it’s usually the other way around, with parents bribing their kids to eat more veggies by withholding yummy things like mac-o-cheese. (That’s her word for macaroni and cheese. “PBJs and jelly and bread” is how she describes peanut butter & jelly sandwiches.)

Twenty-Six Months Old!

Sarah Monthly Updates

Dear Carolyn,

Today you are 26 months old. It’s also Grandma’s birthday and Christmas Eve, so it’s been a very exciting day.

20061213_big_grin.jpg

This has been the month of songs. You still can’t carry a tune in a bucket, but you know the words to so many new songs. A lot of them are the songs we tossed in a playlist to listen to on our way to visit Nana and Poppy, but others are holiday songs like “Jingle Bells” and “Christmas Bells Are Ringing”. One of your favorite songs to sing is “Where Is Thumbkin?”, but you sing “where is pumpkin” instead.

We’ve started the switch to having you sleep in a toddler bed. It began in a desperate attempt to have a place for you to sleep on our trip – we recently discovered that you are too tall for the pack & play and didn’t want to find out whether you could actually climb out. You loved your inflatable Winnie the Pooh bed so much that when we got home you insisted on sleeping in it still. Luckily, we got our hands on a gently used toddler bed pretty quickly, so you’re switching back and forth between the bed and the crib.

20061216_toddler_bed.jpg

This has been such a fun month of holiday preparations as well – we’ve baked so many cookies, and decorated the house. You’ve really enjoyed all of that, and keep asking to decorate more things. In fact, tomorrow we’ll put the last ornament on your advent tree, and I think you’re going to miss it.
20061223_cookies.jpg

And, the biggest news of all? While we were at our Christmas Eve party this evening, you did your first somersault! You were very, very excited about that. I’m sure skipping, tricycles, and monkey bars aren’t too far behind. In fact, I’m willing to bet that the day you start driving I’m going to wonder how time went so very fast!

Love, Mommy

Crunchy Noodles!

Sarah Carolyn

The other night we had a surprise birthday dinner for my mom at a Chinese restaurant. (Coincidentally, the only food I actually wanted to eat those first couple of months I was pregnant was the chicken & asparagus takeout from this place. Mmmmm.) Carrie insisted on having “chops!” so I rigged up a pair of training chopsticks with an extra ponytail holder I had in my purse. (I need to start carrying rubber bands or buy a pair of these.)

But the funniest moment of the evening was when Carrie let us and the entire restaurant know that, while she does in fact like “noodles” (aka lo mein), she prefers “crunchy noodles!!” – dipped in duck sauce, of course.

20061220_dipping.jpg