a glimpse at our superbowl sunday

Wake up, breakfast, shower, get dressed.

Go to Binyons, wait in line for 40 minutes until it was our turn.

Pick up our contacts, order Tylor's glasses.

Go to Fred Meyer, eat lunch, buy groceries. I buy a $10 purse.

Back to Binyons to pick up Tylor's new glasses.

Emmalee falls asleep in the van, we drive home.

She sleeps another hour in her toddler bed.

I check email. Tylor's plays his computer games.

She falls out of her toddler bed and cries.

Tylor's Dad comes over to have a beer, some shots, and watch the game.

Emmalee is excited to open the front door and see Grandpa.

They visit and play while I play with Photoshop.

I cook dinner (wontons and jasmine rice with yoshidas sauce).

We eat and watch The Soup.

Emmalee gets a bath, gets pajamas on and get in her toddler bed.

We read her a book and kiss her goodnight.

Tylor has pie and ice cream with his Dad while I post blogs.

His Dad leaves and he goes to bed. I'm on my way.

We really never did watch the game.

MAKING A COMEBACK

I finally had some spare time. I broke out my camera today after a two week dry spell. These were taken when Emmalee woke up from nap (fell out of the toddler bed again), and cuddled with Daddy on his only day off.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Here are some photos of Emmalee enjoying her new favorite snack. I gave in and bought her some Carebear fruit snacks. Can you believe Walmart and Target actually devote an entire isle to these articially flavored jellies chock-full of sugar? Well, of course she loves them, and who could blame her?

The Many Faces of Emmers

These really showcase her excema. :-(

It's gotten worse ever since Christmas...

What a TYRANT!

ty*rant: a toddler who exercises power in a harsh, cruel manner. Difficult to bear.

Ick! She's hit the terrible two's and we are not liking it! I spend all day cleaning up after her. Not just because she's a typical child who isn't keen on picking up after herself, but because she's in this phase of dumping and throwing everything in sight! I'm ready to throw everything in this house in a locked closet so she can stop throwing things around. It seems like she has way too much control over herself and her environment, but there's not much I can do about that. I don't have a crib to constrain her in anymore.

It's awful! Especially the food-throwing. We've tried everything. She has no reaction to any form of punishment. She refuses to clean up. On a rare occasion, she will accept my bribe of cleaning up for a piece of candy (Pez), or watch Elmo on TV. I hope this passes soon.

The Toddler Bed

During nap time yesterday, all was quiet, I thought Emmalee was sleeping and suddenly... THUMP! 'WAAHHH!' Emmalee climbed out of her crib and fell to the floor! This was the first time. She wasn't much of a climber until recently, but I seriously thought we had another month of two before needing to convert the bed. She's fine though, she has a red mark on her forehead but that's it. So last night when Tylor came home I had him get straight to work converting the crib into a toddler bed. I was scared at first, thinking this is just going to be more on my plate to deal with, supposing she will constantly be climbing right out of bed to play or come out of her room and look for us. But so far so good! She continues to surprise me! However, she fell out of her bed at some point last night, she slept through it, and rolled underneath the twin sized bed in her room. When she woke up this morning, Tylor found her stuck under the twin size bed crying. So I rearranged her room a bit today, and have laid a couple of blankets on the floor right in front of her toddler bed so if she falls off, she will still have a comfortable place to sleep, and nothing around her to bump into or get stuck under.

Today, I was surprised again. She stayed in her toddler bed at nap time. Until she woke up, that is. She woke up, opened her bedroom door, came to the stairs and called for me. No crying or anything, in fact, she seemed a bit proud of herself. She said something about 'getting out of bed'. We're hoping she'll do the same thing tomorrow morning, just wake up and climb into bed with us. We'll make sure the gate is locked so she doesn't tumble downstairs for a bowl of cereal.


Off the topic.. I have an update regarding our preschool situation. The director told me that I had to make a choice between working there FULL-time, or having my hours cut in half. I gladly accepted my hours being cut. So now we just go in Monday through Friday from 3 to 6pm. I think this will be a good balance for Emmalee, for our household, for my marriage and for my sanity. I truly don't believe it is the right place for Emmalee to be for long periods of time. Perhaps if there were less kids in her class I would feel more comfortable, but I think she deserves more than being one out of a class of 16 toddlers. :-( There's no feasible way she could be getting the one-on-one attention she needs. The teachers don't have enough time to build a very responsive, nurturing relationship with each child with such a high number of children. She still sees them as being 'strangers' and I think it will take more time for her to get to know them. A good thing; towards the end of our three hours, if she gets sad, they bring her over to my classroom, and I love that! So I will just have to find some other creative way to make up for the lost income.

One Week Later (preschool update)

So it looks like we've developed a new routine, and I can't say I like it too much. My biggest problem is that we don't get home until 6:15 every night. Then Dad comes home about 7:15 and then Emmalee has to get in the bath by 7:30. Where did all our time together go? I hate it! I don't even have time to cook dinner much less eat dinner, and feed Emmalee too? And when am I supposed to clean the house? It's awful, and it's stressful but luckily it is my biggest complaint with life right now.

Emmalee seems to be doing just fine at school, she never cries when we arrive or when I leave her, she says 'bye, Mom!' I try not to swing by her class too much, I don't want her to see me and interrupt her day, but when I do peek at her she is exploring, playing with the kids, and shrieking with excitement. They assist her in potty-training there too. She has stayed there through two nap times so far and they have both gone well. The teachers say she doesn't cry, and usually falls asleep on her own without someone patting her back. She is really excited to have her special 'butterfly blanket' at school now, so I think that helps.

Emmalee has definitely been more cuddly since she started school! I can understand if she misses us nowadays, I think every other night, I break down crying because I miss her so much. I am not used to spending this much time away from my little best friend. You should see her reaction when I pick her up from school each evening. She sees me, her bottom lip quivers, her eyes fill with tears, she smiles and says "Mama!". Then she runs and hugs me and cries. Then as I hold her and hug her, she puts her hands on my face, stares into my eyes and says 'oh, Mama' and cries and hugs me harder. It is so sweet yet breaks my heart at the same time. Anytime I see her playing she's never sad or crying, so I don't think she is unhappy there. We just have this emotional reunion everytime I come back for her.

As for me, I love what I do for the most part. I'm the afternoon teacher of the preschool class (5-6 year olds). I really don't have much experience with kids this old, but I am loving it. The oldest i've worked with is usually 3 or 4 year olds. These kids are fun and spunky and cooperative, and the morning teacher tells me they really like me. It's pretty neat! However, this week i've been spending time teaching a different class (the preschool 3-4 year old class) while their teacher is on vacation. I miss my older kids!

There is definitely some awful sicknesses going around. I thought it was just me and Emmalee earlier in the week but when I got to school Tuesday, I heard that 2 children are in the hospital with pneumonia, there's also bronchitis and stomach flu all going around. Emmalee has had a low-grade fever the last 3 evenings and now has developed a cough to add onto the congestion but she has a good energy level, so I think we are on our way to health!

I miss having time to use my camera!!