Chh Chh Chhh Changes.........

Many, many changes have ben happening with our Big Girl Lotus. She is growing by leaps and bounds, I cannot believe she is the little one I held in my arms just yesterday. Ok well maybe not yesterday. But it seems like it. Lotus is between being a big girl and asserting herself and wanting to still be a little toddler. She definitely has her opinions of what she wants to wear, eat, and do (and how quickly she wants to do it). We have our attempts of potty training, there are good days and bad days, along with days of no interest. I know we will get there soon, I am hopeful. Every day I am amazed at the things that she does, whether it is a new word or playing in her kitchen making mommy carrot soup, drawing a complete circle for the first time, to being cute and charming to melt her daddy's heart (and give her anything she wants), to learning her shapes and colors and also a few past presidents I might add (yes I am bragging, I am proud), and seeing her be "mommy" to her babies. I could go on and on, but I will give everyone what they have been waiting for..........some updated photos of Lotus! Be in touch soon!

Night Time Rituals

Since Lotus' arrival home, almost 14 months ago, the night time rituals have changd many times. First when we were home, she needed to be rocked to sleep and woke up frequently. We eventually got to a point where I could lay her down, she would cry for a few minutes and go to sleep herself. She might wake up, which required some soothing. Then came time to move into a toddler bed because her leg got stuck in the crib one day. She accepted the toddler bed pretty well. We went between laying on the floor with her to saying good night and she would stay in bed and fall asleep. If she woke up she would soothe herself back to sleep. It was perfect!

Recently things have changed. She wouldn't stay in bed, so we opted to leave a light on and she went to bed with a book. I could leave the room, all was well. Wasn't waking up too much during the night. Perfect again, so I thought.

Now the tables have turned on Mommy........here is our current ritual;

• Brush teeth and wash hands
• Make sure we have baby and puppy.
• Turn on ipod and fan (these have been constants to drown out house noises)
• Sometime read, sometimes not, depends on Lotus
• Jump in bed, get her to lay down (not always easy, sometimes tears are involved)
• Light is off, lady bug is on with stars on the ceiling
• I lay down next to Lotus on the floor
• Sometimes she wants my hand, sometimes not
• Then Lotus does what I call the Roll Call of everyone she knows(family, friends, animals in her bed, you name it, and sometimes she does this 2-3-4 times)
• The roll call is cute, but gets old, after every name I say they are sleeping and Lotus needs to go to sleep.
• If she keeps talking, I tell her mommy will go in her room if she continues to talk. This works for a few minutes and she needs to talk again. (Was I really hoping she would talk soon?)
• Eventually she falls asleep but so do I
• I wake up and sneak out of the room, do my chores and go to bed
• It's 2 am and Lotus wakes up! She thinks it is morning. Try to convince a 2 yr old it is still the middle of the night. We soothe back to sleep.
• I wake up an hour later and return to my bed.

It seems like a lot. It seems crazy. However, the alternative is we spend 60-90 minutes with her getting out of bed, screaming at her door, me putting her back in bed, her getting upset (sometimes so upset she gets herself sick). If I lay with her, she is usually asleep anywhere from 15-30 mintues.

I am open to any ideas or suggestions, at some point I would like her to go back to going to bed on her own.

Tired Mommy

PS I am working on a Year in Review Post, as I have been busy and have not posted alot of happenings towards the end of the year.

Little Kids Hear All and Repeat Everything!

Lotus has been growing leaps and bounds with her speech, she is talking more and more. Her vocabulary has increased and does so each day. She really surprises me with some of the things she says and understands. Lotus most of the time is the great imitator, she imitates our actions and our words. This is where my story begins.....

As I was making dinner, Lotus was sitting at the table patiently waiting for her food as we were running late. We usually eat around 6 pm and it was already 7:30pm. As I was getting everything together, I realized I was burning the garlic bread. Something I do all too often, as I realized what had happened, I exclaimed, "Darn It!" (change the R to a M). And of course little Miss Lotus was listening and said clear as day, "Darn It!" (again change the R to a M). I was floored! I am pretty good about censoring myself and do not make a habit of cursing, this just slipped out! Kevin heard her and walked away smiling. I tried to not laugh, and told Lotus that mommy said a bad word and she was sorry. She should not repeat that word again.

Funny thing, we work and work on words and phrases. Lotus does well, not always clear, sometimes mumbles. Wouldn't you know it, this time she had no problems at all. She was clear as day and articulated the word with the exact feeling I used. Morale of the story, you just never know when your kids are listening.........just when you think it is safe to talk about Aunt Harriett's funny hat..........think again!

Lotus Visits Santa

Santa Photo Part 1

On Monday night we took Lotus to see Santa, only to find out there was a 2 1/2 hour wait. No kidding! We decided we would attempt to wait and see what happened. At 10:15 we were not paged, but went back to Santa's Chair to see what was happening. Yippee it was almost our turn. Lotus talked about Santa all the time, she knew who he was and looked excited to see him..........so we thought.........

When we got closer to Santa, Lotus completely lost it. And there was NO WAY we were going to get a photo with Santa. The ladies taking the photo wrote on the envelope and said we could come back tomorrow and try right away. As we left, Lotus gave Santa a HUG! Yes a HUG! Go figure.

Santa Photo Part 2

On Tuesday night I packed up the backpack and head to see Santa again with Lotus. She is in a relatively good mood, our chances are good. We get to the mall at 6 pm and wouldn't you know, they are at dinner. I know Santa needs to eat dinner but wouldn't 5 pm make sense when everyone else is eating dinner too? Yet, the mall wants you to shop for an hour while waiting for Santa. Lotus and I grab some food and head back at 7pm. The ladies let us in first, of course there were several people grumbling about us going first, if they only knew about Monday night. As soon as I pushed the stroller up to the camera, Lotus completely loses it again. She screams and cries, you would think she was being tortured. I am sure they heard her at the other end of the mall. We tried talking to Santa, nope not working. We tried to shake his hand, nope not working. Tried to have mommy sit near Santa, nope not working. We took 2 photos and they were horrible! Mommy wanted to try one more time, despite the nasty looks from the others waiting. We did a real quick drop on his lap and this is what we got:


And once the photo was done..........she HUGGED Santa again and said BYYYYEEE! Mommy was very confused.

Last year, we used the Santa photo for our Christmas cards and this year........well you will see in the mail..

Happy Holidays.

Deb, Kevin, and Lotus

Some Other Gotcha Day Celebrations

We stopped by Papa John's pizza that night and picked up a pizza in honor of the dinner we had the first night we spent with Lotus in our hotel room. Instead of going out to dinner that night we ordered Papa John's pizza and ate in our room. This will be a tradition every year until Lotus tells us to stop it is corny. I think we will get her photo by the sign every year too!