60 Day Recap

Ever the spend thrift, hubby decided that we would forgo internet and cable for the 3 months that we lived in Mandan. Personally I think the stress of selling our first home caused him to go temporarily insane, because seriously, who goes without the internet these days. Little did he realize the impact this would have on my blogging life.  With only 2 of the previous million faithful followers left (shout out Shannon and Kara!) I have a brief recap of some of the main events in the lives of the Livesay family from August through December.

1. For Sale! Sold? Gulp…. In August Travis decided that we should put our house on the market to “see what happens”. With housing interest rates at the lowest point in history we would try to sell the house and if it didn’t sell by the end of October we would just try again next summer. We had a market analysis completed, agreed on a selling price, signed our names on the dotted line and sat back to see what happened. Our house was listed for sale on a Wednesday in early September and we got our first offer Friday morning. We signed on the dotted line the next day. Our first family home was only to be ours for about 45 more days.
2. To split or not to split.With our first family home sold and winter fast approaching the race was on to decide on a house plan and break ground on our next house. We chose a split entry layout that was slightly larger than our first home, with 3 bedrooms on the main level, and we lived happily ever after. HA! We should be so lucky as to have nothing go amiss on our decision. Long story short: even though our lot was designed for a walk out ranch style house, we chose a split level to save some money. Unfortunately we found out that our lot may not be stable enough to support that style of house and were faced with some choices. We chose to be safe and change our house plan, which led to a whirl wind couple of weeks in which we had to re-analyze our budget, choose a ranch style house, wait for plans to be re-drawn, have the ground re-staked and get the tractors digging in order to get foundation poured before the ground froze. It may be a miracle, but despite all the changes and delays we were able to get back on track for a February 1, 2011 closing date. 
3.  Tick or Tee. Kyle’s first trick-or-treating foray was a huge success. Despite scattered snow piles here and there, the weather was beautiful and we didn’t need to cover up his super cute giraffe costume with a winter coat, bonus! Grannie, Auntie Jess and Brina all joined us and we walked around Nana and Poppa’s neighborhood. Brina taught Kyle the ropes, and even though Kyle was timid at first, he soon found his groove once he realized that people would give him candy……just for being cute and saying “tick or tee”. After we had knocked on the 150,000^th house, Ky got a little distracted and our progressed slowed to a crawl as he decided that walking through every little pile of snow he could find.
4. No Mandan, GO HOME! The first couple of weeks in the Mandan House were tough on Kyle. Almost every night ended with him in tears, crying to “go home”. Eventually bedtime got easier, but he never called the house in Mandan “home”. Since we were going to be moving into our new house so quickly we decided to call this the Mandan House. One evening as we were heading to Mandan on the interstate Kyle asked “Mama, wheh ah we?” in his sweet little boy voice. “We’re going to the Mandan House, Ky” I told him. “No Mandan, GO HOME!” he roared in a voice that I would describe as decidedly monster-like.  
5. A million miles in 3 months. Shortly before we moved to Mandan I had accepted a temporary position providing OT services to a couple of school in South Dakota. Twice a week I left the house shortly after 6 a.m. in order to make the 2 ½ - 3 ½ hour drive to a couple of small town schools. By small towns I mean the type of little communities where people watched my unfamiliar suspiciously as I drove through town on roads that have no street signs. I passed herds of buffalo and decided that the universal sign for “no hunting” was for farmers and ranchers to hang old tires on their fence posts. 
6.  You expect ME to eat THAT?  Emily’s first experience with solid food came on Thanksgiving. While the rest of the family enjoyed their big plates of delicious food, I sat Emmie in the bumbo chair, fastened a cute bib around her neck and presented the spoonful of very festive apple, squash and cranberry puree. While the first taste seemed to be a hit, I soon realized that this may not be any easier than it had been with Kyle. Pure disdain was the look I received from that point on whenever I attempted to feed Miss Em any baby food. We took a baby food hiatus for about 2 ½ months.
7. Inch Worm Style. Kyle never really crawled, he did a funky version of a commando crawl that made him look like one of those freaky characters from the remakes of Chinese horror movies. You know the ones, the ghostly looking woman who drags her body across the floor with jerky, spider like movements of her arms? Oh yeah. Emily’s style of choice? The inch worm. It begins with her planting her hands on the floor. Slowly she gets her butt up in the air until her hands slide out in front of her and ends with a face plant. So far no rug burn.
8. 8.      Family Pictures. I’ve never been a huge fan of the studio portrait where everyone is posed with the fake Christmas tree back drop. I had wanted to find an amateur photographer to take some candid family shots, however, procrastination brought me to the point of desperation as I felt the need to get a photo Christmas card sent out again this year. We were the first appointment of the day, and arrived before the photographer at one of the department stores in the mall. She eventually got us in the studio and arranged us. She was so enamoured with Kyle and Emily that she really didn’t pay much attention to old mom and dad. Needless to say the first round of pictures didn’t impress me. What impressed me even less was her reaction when I asked her to take some more shots. By this time both kids were over stimulated and in tears, but we tried one more time. She asked another photographer to come help get the kids to smile. Since this second photographer was well over 6 feet tall and standing behind the first photographer as she shot pictures we had ton of pictures with the kids looking up at the ceiling. In the end we were able to get a couple of suitable pictures taken. We are now taking recommendations for amateur photographers!
   9.       More Tissmiss, mama! As we pulled out all of the strings of Christmas lights and ornaments in preparation of putting up our Christmas tree I remembered this time last year, when Kyle was about 18 months old. His car seat sat in the middle of the back seat so he had a good view out the front window. Whenever we drove past Christmas lights he would point and grunt “oo, oo,ooo,ooooo”.  This year when he sees the lights he says “wow!” and “oh my doodness, poody”, and “more Tissmiss, Mama!” 
   10. The Year of Thomas. Our house has been over run by Thomas the Train ~ pajamas, play tent, books, movies, games, train sets ~ you name it, we now own it. Ky would live in his Thomas pj’s if I let him.
   
   
   So there you have it. These were the days of our lives before I decided to keep a journal that I could post onto my blog once Travis’s sanity our internet was restored. I back dated these entries, so if you care to you can go back to January 3^rd and catch up!

Finally Home!

We made it! We have successfully moved for the 2^nd time in three months. We spent the past weekend moving and unpacking everything that could fit into boxes, and the movers brought over all of our furniture this morning. Considering that the actual temp today was -13 (without wind chill), the $205.50 moving fee plus $60 tip was more than worth it!

One of the down sides to having Travis home all weekend to do the unpacking while I worked was his discovery of the stash of kids clothes that I have accumulated since Emily was born. To hear him tell the story you would think that I need rehab or something. He actually accused me of having a spending problem, however, he has no idea how much money I have actually saved him!

At first glance this picture may make you shake your head and find yourself agreeing with Travis, but since this is America I am innocent until proven guilty. I pride myself in being a bargain shopper when it comes to clothes for the itty bitties . If you just so happen to be strolling through Herberger’s, Old Navy, or Kohl’s at the right time you yourself might just be amazed at the deals you can find on their clearance racks, especially at the end of the season switcheroo time. My mother-in-law has contributed her fair share to the stash as well. I will confess that on occasion some delightful little full price outfit will be just too precious to walk away from and I will sneak it in the cart, but really this happens less than 3% of the time, I swear.

Another thing to consider is that the top rack is filled with clothes from 12 months – 2T for Emily, and the bottom rack has clothes for Kyle that he will wear over the course of the next year. So judge me as you see fit, but keep in mind that I have clearance sales written on my calendar and I am willing to share this info with those that are sympathetic to my cause. For the rest of you remember that I can block you from ever reading this blog again....

Potty debacle

Shortly before Emily was born I bought Kyle one of those cute little potty chairs that converts into a step stool once kids begin using the regular toilet. After I found that a Styrofoam eating monster had bitten a chunk out of the foam cushion I decided maybe one of those seats that you set onto the regular toilet seat might discourage further PICA like behavior.  He used to use it every once in a while, but lately any time I try to coax him to try and use the potty like a big boy he acts like the stupid things burns his bottom, crying and screaming “No No No, I don’t want it!” My bag of tricks was quickly becoming useless as one by one they well, became useless. It was time to break out the big guns, a.k.a the “Big Boy Box”.

This morning after I changed his diaper and he got dressed I showed him the Big Boy Box, which is filled with little goodies to entice him to use the potty, things like snack packs of cookies and graham crackers, some match box cars, and a fake snake and spider. Not quite sure how his little 2 ½ year old mind would understand a token reward system, I decided to ease him into it with some immediate gratification so I told him that if he peed in the potty and not in his diaper he could have some of the cookies and if he pooped in the potty that he could pick one of the cars. He immediately ran to the bathroom, stripped off his pants and diaper and tried to pee. He eventually managed to squeeze out a couple of drops, proclaiming “Yay Dyle, I did it!” as he ran to the kitchen to point at the BBB which I had placed on top of a cupboard. You can imagine the site of the half naked little man excited jumping up and down, chanting “tookies, tookies, tookies.” Being a mama of my word, I handed him a couple of the cookies and gave him a high five for being a big boy, and then sat down to play with Emily. 

Maybe 10 minutes later I realized that my house was unnaturally quite and called for Kyle. A slightly muffled “what” floated down the hall from the direction of the bathroom, where I found Kyle sitting on the toilet, trying to earn some more tookies. “Can’t get it” he grunted when I asked him what he was doing. I helped him get redressed and told him it was ok, and that he could try again later. The next couple hours where like a bad imitation of a scene from the movie “Groundhog’s Day” with Bill Murray.  As I followed the little Mister into the bathroom for the 209^th time in 30 minutes, I think he decided that maybe if he had some privacy while he was in the bathroom that he might have some more success, and so he began slamming the door in my face, and yelling “No Mama”. On second thought, maybe potty training is over rated.

Apples and Pumpkins

While I am not huge on making New Year’s resolutions, apparently my baby girl is. On Thanksgiving we gave Emmie her first taste of solid food ~ a festive blend of apples, cranberries and squash. It did not go over so well. The next food was peas. Again, she was not impressed. In all of the wisdom gained from months of trying every type of baby food available when Kyle was a baby, I decided to save a lot of money  time and put Emily on a baby food hiatus until January. So with half-hearted hope, I decided to give it another try. And honestly,  after 8 months of being on a liquid diet, who can blame a girl for wanting some real food? Apples and pumpkin was the ticket, and we went from this:

 to this:

This time around peas were also a success, with Kristen reporting that Emily ate them like a champ. Spinach and Potatoes were not quite as well liked. I have found ways to sneak spinach into Kyle’s blueberry muffins, and since I consider myself to be an equal opportunity food deceptor, I found a way to fool Emmie into eating it as well. First I scoop the spinach onto the spoon, and then cover it with a scoop of carrots. Instead of me having to pry her mouth open, or trick her into smiling or laughing so I can quickly slip the spoon into her mouth, Emily saw the orange carrots on her spoon and willing opened wide. And so the life long skill of trickery has begun.

A Sad Day

Today we said good-bye to Pampers Swaddlers . There is something so precious about these soft little baby scented dipes that I just couldn’t make myself say goodbye until now. The move from Swaddlers to Cruisers should be made into a developmental milestone. It marks the transition between helpless-little-precious babies to on-the-move-gonna-eat-everything-I-can-fit-into-my-mouth babies. Heavy sigh RIP Swaddlers.

Waking up on the wrong "side" of the bed

Kyle has been able to crawl out of his crib for quite a while now. The discovery of this ability combined with the uncanny ability to push mama's buttons (inherited from his ever loving daddy) made for very difficult nap and bed time transitions for a couple of weeks. Instead of going quietly to his room when it was time for nigh-night and reading in his crib until he was sleepy, a vicious cycle of mam-puts-ky-in-crib-ky-crawls-out began. For the most part we have broken this cycle, however every once in a while we will be awakened in the middle of the night by the sudden bright light glowing from the television set that is accompanied by the invasion of a warm little toddler body into our bed.

Our little monkey does continue to make rapid succession escape attempts on occasion, but mama has figured out a way to foil the little devil. As the mother of a toddler, I reserve the right to keep some of my methods secret, however this particular method may or may not involve the use of grip and twist door nob covers placed temporarily on the inside of un-named bedroom doors.

A few times in the past week Travis and I have had to employ my top secret method of keeping Kyle from escaping from his room during nap time. To our amusement we discovered Kyle had decided to try out some new sleeping arrangements.

and best of all.......

Kyle has also defined a whole new meaning to the term "waking up on the wrong side of the bed":

is it just me or does it sound like Kyle has a choice word for his mama around 1:30 and 1:32??

Absolutely amazing

 A couple of weeks ago our friend Kaiya came to visit. Even though she is only about 2 weeks older than Emmie, we were so impressed with Miss Kaiya's amazing head control that we drug the secret out of her mommy. "She sits in her bumbo all the time!" exclaimed Nikki (brilliant OT extraordinaire if I must say). Ingenious idea. I have been scared to let Emmie have much floor time consider her brother's penchant for being overly affectionate with his baby sidder (sister) whenever Mama's attention is elsewhere, so the bumbo just might be the perfect solution. Enter Bumbo

As you can see, we need more practice! Hang in there Emmie, it will get easier!

Ahh, so much better!

Two weeks ago little Miss Em really struggled to hold her little head up during tummy time, but with skills gained with the help of the magical Bumbo (and a little coaching from Ky) drum roll please....

"Like dis, Ahmie"

Something happens to a woman when she becomes a mother. Even the quietest, most introverted mama suddenly becomes a blabber mouth when it comes to her children. And, like most Mamas that I know, I feel that my children are absolutely amazing and I delight in sharing every little achievement they make. And so I bring you Emmie's newest accomplishment, rolling over!

Absolutely Amazing!