Toddler woes...

So I thought I'd put in a quick update on my toddler while both, YES BOTH, kids are napping. Don't feel too special that you are getting this precious time. I already drank an uninterrupted cup of CAFFEINATED coffee and read a few chapters of my book. (Living the cross centered life- HIGHLY recommend)

My kids have been doing great for the last few weeks, aside from the normal kid hiccups that come no matter what. We were in a groove. Blakey was sleeping consistently- never as much as we'd like, but we've gotten over that. Henry was starting to nap longer. Blakely was eating. Etc. Then Stephens parents came to visit this past weekend. It was a lot of fun. Out of nowhere Blakely decides she is over the whole going to bed peacefully thing. I mean, for a solid 6-7 months we did nothing but tell her it was time for bed, walk her in, sing her a few songs and we were out and so was she. And I mean OUT OF NOWHERE the demon child emerged. I'm talking standing, screaming, DEATH screaming (if you know what I mean?!) jumping, banging her head and hands on the wall and crib, throwing herself down, etc. Scary stuff. She was also getting ip early (even for her...4o'clock hour..) and flipping out when Stephen wouldn't get her up. Yesterday she got up at 4:45, Stephen told her she couldn't get up, so she screamed a bit, then sat there until 5:30. She is so stubborn. We were at a total loss of what to do. We tried spanking, ignoring, consoling, pleading, bribing, and nothing was working. Several times she fell asleep sitting up and luckily eventually fell over. It was so miserable that i am really surprised it was only like 4-5 days of it, cause it feels like it was going on for months. Anyway...yesterday I decided to reason with her. Blakely always turns out to be smarter and get a lot more than I give her credit for (and I give her a lot of credit). So I laid her down like usual, and on cue as soon as I closed the door she was up and screaming. So I went straight back in and decided I was going to talk to her like she was 15 instead of 2. So anyway I was like,
"what in the world is wrong with you?" Silence and staring. "Why are you crying and screaming? Are you hurt? Dying? Another type of emergency I am unaware of (paraphrased obv...)" blank stares. "You have GOT to quit this. You are taking a nap no matter what kind of fit you throw, so you may as well lay down and quit crying. Talk to your animals, sing, do whatever you have to do, but I know you can be a big girl and go to sleep without a fit because you've done it hundreds of times before. So I'm going to leave now and you need to get it together and chill."

Something clicked for her and she went to sleep. I discussed it with her again before bed and told her she could be a big girl again. She threw her fit like normal, but I got in there before she could even launch her baby across the room (which generally happens within the first 20 seconds...) and reasoned with her exactly the same as I'd done for her nap. And finally, today, she went down and I didn't even have to go in once. We are praying that her little phase is over.

She is still getting up entirely too early. (We get excited if she sleeps past 5:30) and she is really testing her limits. Some days we feel like we don't have to discipline her at all, and other days we wonder what we are doing wrong cause she spends most of the day in time out and gets multiple spankings. But I am trusting God that he is developing a heart for him in her, and that one day we won't HAVE to discipline her. She sure is strong willed.

We started doing family memory verse together last week. We decided that we only wanted positive associations with God's word so if she didn't want to do it, we would never make her. She NEVER wanted to go over it with us, so me and Stephen would just say it out loud one phrase at a time. Then one day we were saying it and she said the whole thing. She is so smart and I am so convinced that she hears EVERYTHING we say. Our verse was: "Give thanks to The Lord, for he is good. His love endures forever." Psalm 136:1. I don't want scripture to ever feel like a drudgery to her, but why not take advantage of a toddlers incredible ability to memorize things and help her hide God's word in her heart before it is filled with other things. Not to mention it keeps me accountable to memorize God's word. And if my 2 year old can memorize a verse in a week, I ought to be able to as well.

I have many more things to update about with Blakely but it will have to wait! Here are some pictures of my sweetie!

8 months

I know I skipped 7 months and am super late for this one, but rather than try to play catch-up I am just calling it a loss and moving on to month 8! I didn't even realize he was 8 months old for several days, when someone asked me how old he was and I said "almost 8 months" and I thought....I've bed saying almost 8 months for a really long time. Turns out he had been 8 months already. Oops.

Our sweet little man kicked off his 8th month with a new TOOTH! This is huge since B didn't get one until 11 months. This tooth has made (and still seems to be making) its presence known. My little happy guy is pretty grumpy as of late, has trouble getting to sleep, fusses a lot when eating and is drooling like he's our main water supply. Poor guy. And I'm not sure it will end too soon cause tooth #2 is on its way.

So right now I feel like Henry is all out of sorts. But here's the very general run down:

He gets up anywhere from 6 to 7:45. Usually it's closer to 7, but occasionally he will sleep until sometime in the 5 o'clock hour and want to eat and then he thinks the day is starting. (And it is for his sister and dad...but not for him and his mom...) He is nursing every 3-4 hours but is going through an unusually fussy phase (at least I hope it's a phase). He takes anywhere from 1-4 naps a day depending on how quality the naps are and how good I am at staying home for them. He naps in our bed cause its easier for me to keep him down here rather than run up and down the stairs. We do solids in the morning and for supper, and occasionally for lunch but he's just not that into solids. Sometimes he'll eat great for like 5 bites, but he's almost always ticked the whoooole time we feed him. What's up? Anyone have this experience? We've tried rice cereal, oatmeal, cereal, warm, cool, veggies, bananas... He's really not acting like he likes ANYTHING and he gags a lot. We have been consistent for over a month and he just doesn't like mealtime. I am starting to get concerned cause it feels like he should be eating more. Thoughts appreciated!

Anyway, he goes to bed between 6-7 and usually sleeps until close to 4am to eat.

He is starting to move. He can rotate all the way around and COULD move forward if he just realized he could do it. He sometimes accidentally gets across the room. Either by scooting or rolling or both. He is frustrated in life right now cause he has realized that there are things out of his reach. Before he was just content to just sit there...

He is still totally enamored with his sister. Unlike her at this age (and still) he couldn't care less about dogs. It's so funny to me how different they are.

He is sitting up wonderfully now. I will even leave the room and if he falls over its usually on purpose.

He is much better about being in the car. He goes to the church nursery. He will usually happily stay with sitters (even though we can't afford them!)

He loves wrestling, jumping in his jumper, playing with Blakely, kicking his legs, and chewing on things.

He wears 9-12 month clothes, size 3 diapers- but they are close to too small. He weighed 19ish lbs when we went to the doc a few weeks ago.

Although he is going through a bit of a grumpy time, he is still a pretty happy guy, especially if he is getting attention. He LOVES to play. Rolling around on the floor with him, wrestling him on the bed, just sitting and playing with him...he is very easy to entertain.

Ok get ready for picture overload of my handsome little man!,,

Binky fairy

I had read a few blogs of friends that had the binky fairy come visit their daughters. All were just a few months older than Blakely, so it gave me the boost I needed to get going on it. I have literally talked about getting rid of her binky since she was 6months old. I have been convinced for quite some time that she would sleep better without it. However, I was always too afraid to bite the bullet and get rid of it.

I fully expected an all out war with Blakely on it. I just knew there would be a minimum of a few sleepless nights and many more tear filled days and especially naps. I assumed her early waking would go to even earlier for at least a little while until she settled into life without binky. I was so pleasantly surprised to be wrong!

We decided a couple of months ago that we would get through our holiday travels and then get to work on getting rid of the binky. So on our way home from okc last week we started talking about the binky fairy and how she visited big girls and took their binkies to babies that needed them and she replaced it with a fun surprise for them to sleep with instead of the binky. So two days after we got back I ran to target and bought a cabbage patch baby- that ironically came with a bottle and a binky (we disposed of the binky...) and man those dolls are expensive! Stephen and Blakely put her binky under the blanket for the binky fairy to find it and while they were brushing their teeth for bed, the binky fairy had a REALLY hard time getting that silly cabbage patch doll out of the package... After two pairs of scissors and finally a knife, the binky fairy freed the dolly and ran upstairs to replace the binky. :) Blakely was very excited and seemed to understand what was happening. Stephen put her to bed as usual, she asked where her binky was and he reminded her, and we sat on the couch staring at the monitor waiting for the wrath to be unleashed. She cried for about 30 seconds and then was asleep until 3am. Stephen went in and covered her up (she always squirms out of her blankets) and she was back asleep before he left the room and slept until 6:30. What? 6:30? That's right. 6:30. And sweet little Henry was up at 5:45. :) can't catch a break around here!!!

Back to Blakely. She asks for it each time she goes to bed, but accepts our response without a fight and then at the worst, talks to herself for 15 minutes and goes to sleep. It was as I suspected all along. She sleeps better and more soundly without it. When she wakes up for a moment she isn't groping around trying to find her binky and she is able to go back to sleep more quickly. At first I wondered if we should have gotten rid of it a long time ago, but like the potty training thing, I really think she was just ready and that's why it happened to be so easy. I also just think we got lucky.

I am still not convinced we are out of the woods. I'm not going to assume the battle is over for at least another few weeks. But until then I am going to celebrate each time she falls asleep without her binky!

Catch up.

I blame my lack of blogging on all our devices. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I don't want to post without pictures and I have pictures on my phone, Stephens phone, our iPad and computer. It's silly, really. I hate the blogger app, but it will just have to do since it is too much trouble to get pictures onto the computer.

A LOT has happened in the last month. some of the highlights:

Someone in our family was sick for at least three weeks. Seriously. I think each of us got a different virus and then we all swapped them. It was pretty miserable. But I think we are all officially completely well.

We quit the bottle for Blakely- I can't remember if I said that in my last post, but she gave it up without a hitch. It took her a while to start drinking milk, and she is pretty partial to chocolate milk (who wouldn't be?)

We celebrated Christmas at our house- it was a lot of fun. We should have spaced Blakely's gifts out cause it was stressful for her to open one and then before really playing with it be asked to open another- I know, what a rough life... :) Henry basically slept through Christmas which was fine cause that was when he was his sickest.

Henry moved to his own room- he sleeps (most of the time) in there. I am still nursing him at night and sometimes I am just too out of it to take him back upstairs.

Blakely is basically potty trained. It was/is a miracle cause it was so easy. She was just ready. We didn't really have to fight her on it, we just sorta did it and she is doing great. She still wears diapers for naps and bedtime. I'll do a more detailed post on this...one day.

We went to okc for our winter conference and Blakely stayed the whole time at my parents house. She did awesome. I took Henry with me to the conference and definitely should have lowered my expectations on how much I was actually going to be a part of. He still naps three times a day and nurses every three hours so that doesn't leave much time for the conference. Oh well, we had a lot of fun anyway!

The binky fairy came to visit us last night. I'll obviously do a more detailed post on this as well...one day. But I am in shock at how well Blakely is doing. She didn't cry for more than a minute or two last night, and Stephen only had to go in once around 3am just to cover her up. I thought for sure we were in for it for her nap today. But she didn't cry at all, she just talked to herself for about 15 minutes before falling asleep. And she went to sleep right away tonight too. She has asked a few times where her binky is, and we just remind her that the binky fairy took it. I'm not getting ahead of myself- I know it could blow up at any second, but SO FAR she is doing incredible!

I guess Blakely was just ready to be a big girl, cause I know I had little to nothing to do with all of it! I don't know if I'm quite ready for her to be a big girl though. :( Next on our list is transitioning her to her big bed. We are going to wait until the binky thing is for sure and hopefully have her in her big bed by February.

In other news, Henry turned into a BOY the last couple of weeks. Obviously he has always been a boy, but its like he turned a corner and all of a sudden is NOT attached to me anymore and is interested in the world. Nursing is no longer a sweet time for us- its meal time and he wants to get in and get out. Its quite hilarious. He is grabbing like crazy, and he is a bit rough- he attacks me and wants to wrestle. It's pretty weird how quickly he's changed and how different he is from Blakely! He is snugly when he's sleepy but now he pretty much just wants to wrestle and play. Stephen is loving it. I love it too, but part of me is a little sad. :)

We are readjusting to normal life with Stephen working all day and trying to keep ourselves busy.

I think it's time to alert the blog world of our future plans. This summer we will go to Kaleo and then will move back to Fayetteville in July/August. Stephen is going to be the campus director at the U of A. Though we will miss KU soooooo much, we are really excited to be back at our alma mater and the place we still sorta feel like is home!