Time to Share the Spotlight

It is safe to say that Amelia's world is going to be turned upside down in March. Since she is going to have to learn how to share the spotlight I thought a blog posting not (directly) about her would be a good place to start.

So far this pregnancy has gone very smoothly and like with Amelia I find that when I get good sleep, eat well and exercise I feel pretty darn good. We know how blessed we are and really hope things stay this smooth! I think I'm on the path to a healthy, active pregnancy except for my excessive sweet tooth. Seriously, I must get it under control. Cupcakes leftover from a condo building party, donuts in the office, a trip to the cafe for an afternoon sugar cookie, leftover Halloween candy are examples of how I can always seem to find my next fix. If I keep this up I will (a) put the baby at risk for diabetes, (b) have to deliver a 10lb baby, (c) complain a lot after the baby is born about all the weight I have to lose and (d) get bad news during my next trip to the dentist. Why of course the weight has to come as a healthy baby and mom are the #1 priority however I don't believe a daily dose of sugar has been proven to aid in fetal or maternal health. My new yoga DVD came yesterday, I did one of the sessions this morning and I have limited myself to one sweet during the week and one on the weekend. Now let’s see if I can stick to my plan! Mark has been put in charge of my sugar control and getting me up in the mornings to workout. Wish him luck, especially with the morning wake up calls.

As with Amelia we are saving the boy/girl surprise until he/she arrives. Below are some pictures of Amelia's spotlight stealer, toy thief and (on occasion, maybe?) best friend.

p.s. Anyone else heard the new-ish Annie Lennox song, "Universal Child?" Yep heard it while doing this blog. I cried and most definitely blame hormones....

Quack Quack

I would say that Amelia's first trick-or-treating experience was a success. The block around the corner from us is infamous for their all out Halloween decorations so Amelia and her Crayons (next door neighbors William & Henry) had to check it out. Amelia had no clue what was going on but she was loving getting to play with henrywilliam, making duck sounds and saying "trick-or-treat." She had yet to learn what candy was so she really didn't know how good her life was about to get.

She thought the pre trick-or-treating pretzels were pretty cool and took some coercing to get up on her little feet and get moving. Have I ever told you all the we have a VERY pokey toddler? She was happy sitting on the sidewalk in front of our home and couldn't figure out why her type A mom was so insistent that she get up and get going....

At the first stop she scored some M&M's and boy the pretzels were old news after that. I'm not even sure she has really had candy before but the girl would not take a step until she had a M&M in her mouth. And so began her love affair with candy. She still hadn't caught on that if she kept walking she would get more candy but she didn't want to lose sight of henrywilliam so she kept moving.

Turns out that even our pokey little girl could really get moving quickly once she learned that at EVERY set of stairs another piece of candy was waiting for her. After a couple blocks mom and dad were old news and we probably could have gone home for all she cared. Luckily we followed our neighbors advice and took our three little ones out super early as sure enough the block got PACKED. Amelia was stuffed with candy, had a full pumpkin and it had gotten cold so our little girl was happy to get a daddy ride the rest of the way home. I was happy that she wasn't still running down the PACKED sidewalk getting plowed over by the "big" trick-or-treaters who had long forgotten manners.

It is safe to say that Amelia officially knows what candy is as the last word she said tonight before I put her in her crib was, "chocolate" OR so I thought it was until she proclaimed, "pick boogers Mama."

Artist in Training

Amelia had her first "school events" when her daycare hosted their fall art fair last Friday. Growing up in Lawrence I was spoiled with having all four of my grandparents within a half an hour drive. Merrill and I don't have childhood event memories without the attendance of of two parents and four grandparents. Amelia got to have two of her grandparents at her first event. I'm pretty sure the only reason that she didn't have all four was that the other two don't live nearby. I have a feeling that all four grandparents will log their share of hours at school plays and after school activities.The proud grandparents and their artist!The school keep all the projects covered so they are a surprise for the parents on the night of the event. In addition to all of the kiddo's masterpieces the teachers did a "project." Each student was photographed and then participated in a question and answer session. Apparently Amelia wasn't in the mood to smile but she did a good job practicing poses for her Senior pictures. I'm sure with the toddlers they had to get creative with "their" answers.

Q :Who should be the next Mayor of Chicago?

A: DADA!!!!

Q: What is something round?

A: ball

Q (to teacher): What will Amelia be doing in 5 years?

A: Being the sweetest girl in her first grade class

Oh, teachers know what to say to make parents proud! Amelia showing JuJu one of her masterpieces. What was Amelia's favorite part of the show? The bags of popcorn!

Happy (belated) Birthday Mark!

Fall in our household begins with celebrating Mark's (and Tom's) September 28th birthday.

We took advantage of the cool weather and hit the road to the country for apple picking. It didn't take long for Amelia to get the hang of, "rip apples off tree." She rather enjoyed it.
A pumpkin for our pumpkin!This was when she was happily playing in the toddler play area. Next came a temper tantrum when mom and dad took her away from toy tractors and petting zoo.

She also got her first taste of apple donuts. Not that we were counting but we did eat a 1/2 dozen by ourselves. As Mark pointed out getting six was only a dollar more than getting three so clearly it made sense to get six. Clearly.....

Our little chef was a great help baking dad's birthday cake. She is still demanding, "finger, cake!" Our naked chef impatiently waiting for the finished product. For those that don't know, the only cake Mark will accept for his birthday is angle food cake with no topping. I don't get it either but it is his birthday wish so I gladly spend all the hard energy baking an out of the box angle food cake. Adding water is hard. When we gave Amelia her slice she looked up at us really confused and asked, "icing?" Looks like someone else isn't totally on board with dad's idea of a birthday cake.

As Mark and his dad share a birthday their birthday celebration isn't complete without a Tom/Mark celebration. Why of course Mark and Tom's birthday dinner would take place at a pizza place. Barnaby's is a long time Lang Family tradition. Girls, eating French fries at a pizza place? I don't think either of your dad's raised you to do such a thing.....

Mommy Time!

After I got back from my work retreat and settled back in at home it was Mark's turn to head out of town. With Mark going to DC for five days for work Amelia and I were looking forward to some girl time. I had visions of chick music, popcorn for dinner and not getting a stern eye from Mark when I went to sleep with Amelia tucked in next to me.

The flu virus had other plans. We made it almost two years as parents not knowing what it was like to have a pretty sick kiddo but we sure learned this week! Our girl's week together was going along just fine until the drive home from work/daycare on Monday. She was being unusually fussy and saying, "mama mama." Yikes, you can figure out what came next but in case you can't it involved a very dirty toddler, car seat and car. It took until Friday morning for her to be "sick" free. Fortunately Mark's parents came up one day to play the roles of nurses and Mark flew in late Thursday night so he got in on the last day (I don't think I've ever been that happy to see my husband). Needless to say it was a very long week of constantly worrying about Amelia, seeing her sad little face, doing lots of laundry, scrubbing car seats, cleaning the floors and sleepless nights. It was so sad to see our sweet, active toddler so down and out.

Miss. Independent sure wanted Mama this week so we got to spend a lot of time snuggling in bed and on the couch together. If she wasn't getting sick or her Mama wasn't forcing liquids in her Amelia pretty much wanted to sleep and sleep she did. For some reason she HAD to take this particular book to bed with her for her nap. Looks like she takes after her dad and didn't make it too far before falling asleep.By Thursday she had a pretty good case of cabin fever but whenever I tried to take her anywhere she got sick so we just hung at home. She tried to show me that she was well enough to go for a walk by putting her shoes on, grabbing her Pedialyte and demanding, "no sick, Mama walk." Apparantly she doesn't think getting dressed is a prerequiste for taking a walk.

She hasn't gotten sick since Friday, her appetite is back, she is babbling our ears off again and we made a successful trip to the park this morning so I think we are well on our way to recovery!

Daddy Time!

I figured it was time for me to step aside from my primary blog-editing duties and actually post for the second time ever. The only reason I don't post more often is that Whitney is so good at it - and, yes, I realize this sounds a lot like Whitney's logic for "letting" me do the dishes.

Anyway, a couple weeks back, Whitney took off for a weekend to attend a work-related retreat so I got Amelia all to myself for a whole weekend. This of course meant I had to figure out things to keep us busy all weekend.

Nothing like drinking and sliding before heading to dinner with daddy. Unfortunately, I do not have pictures of the mess left at our booth for dinner - let's just say it involved lots of mac-n-cheese and water all over the booth.

On Saturday morning, we were lucky that the rained stopped in time for the block party around the corner from us. Amelia got her first up close and personal taste of farm animals, including her very first pony ride. She loved riding "Lightning" around - it was probably a little fast for me as I followed her around holding on to her sweater as you never know when she might decide to hop on off.

The pony ride prompted the need for some more mac-n-cheese (that was the best option) and what block party wouldn't be complete without some balloon animals. In this case, Amelia wanted a giraffe.

After a long nap, we took another trip to the park where Amelia exhibited her new backwards sliding skills.

Finally, on Sunday we headed up to JuJu and Poppy's place for some lunch and the Bears game where Amelia assumed her usual position at the little kitchen and proceeded to remove everything from the cabinets multiple times.

All in all a very fun weekend for the both of us although I know we were very happy to have Mama come home on Monday.

SPOILED!!!

How does Amelia define spoiled? Spending Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday with GranAnn and then spending Thursday and Friday with Poppy and JuJu. She was a lucky girl to spend a full week with grandparents.

Of course the reason we had all the help last week is that starting tomorrow we are making a big change in our household. Sadly it was time for Jenn to head back to school full time so Miss Amelia is starting daycare tomorrow. We had a bit of a gap between Jenn and daycare so the grandparents were happy to help out. We have been so spoiled with having Jenn come to our home and the great care she gave Amelia. There is no doubt that Amelia and I's morning routine will be a bit more involved. It will also be a huge change for me as I am going to have to start driving to work. I'm a CTA kind of girl. I've never really known work life without taking public transportation. I'm sure I will get used to driving and wonder how I used to handle slumming it on the CTA but for now I'm feeling sorry for myself and mourning life as I've known it.

For Mark it will be a welcome change as he won't have to get home as early in the evening thus he won't have to get into work quite as early.

And for Amelia we really do think she will love spending her days with other kiddos. I'm a little anxious about how she will handle naps on cots as she still logs a good 3 - 3 1/2 hour nap each afternoon. Sadly this could mean an earlier bedtime which neither Mark or I are totally excited about. Change is good, right?

So before the big change Amelia spent her week in spoiled grandparent bliss!

GranAnn can't come to Chicago without a bag full of goodies for Amelia. On top of the clothes this trip she brought Amelia her first baby doll. Also in the picture are Bow Bear "Bo" and Louise "Louie" who are never far from her side.
The princess allowed GranAnn to pull her all around the neighborhood.

Amelia was starting to feel the football spirit in anticipation of KU's first game Saturday. Ha, a lot of good that did. Maybe the problem was that the Hughey-Quinn boys were over on Saturday night but decked out in Texas orange instead of crimson and blue.....

Grilled cheese and french fries. My favorite!

Just when Amelia thought she had all the fun she would for the week Poppy and JuJu showed up and even stayed the night! Amelia loved their outing to the Children's Museum.Actually, we can't decide who enjoyed the Children's Museum more Grandpa or Granddaughter?

We didn't get any pictures of the Thursday night concert in Lincoln Square but Amelia showed her grandparents how she rocks out on Thursday nights. One point of her little finger to the gelato store and she had Poppy in there buying her a scoop!

Thank you GranAnn, Poppy and JuJu for helping us out last week. Amelia misses you already!