and then there were four…

Olivia is turning into quite the comedian. She’s currently teaching us that Knock Knock jokes DO have a place in the comedy portfolio.

But only if you haven’t hit puberty yet.

A typical Olivia Knock Knock may go something like this:
Olivia: “Knock Knock!”
Me: “Who’s there?”
Olivia: “Boo”
Me: “Boo Who?”
Olivia: “Don’t cry, it’s only a joke, Boo Hoo is dancing on the ‘ponte’.”

Don’t ask what “ponte” means because I have no idea. Olivia likes to insert made-up words into her every day conversations, either when she doesn’t know the answer to something or maybe doesn’t quite understand the word that is supposed to be used.

We actually do try to get her to explain what these made up words mean, but we usually get a round-about answer “Oh, ponte means when you are going to dance you have to do it on the ponte.”

It makes me worry that she may have a career in politics in her future.

We always follow up with “Do you mean, PARTY?” (or any other word that is remotely in the same general-sounding area). Every blue moon she is actually trying to say a real word that she just can’t pronounce. More often than not she will repeat the word we just said, enunciating perfectly, and say “Party? NO PONTE.”

This drives me a little insane, because I just want to know what goes on in her brain and how she creates these words, how they come about. I’m fascinated with her vocabulary and am always trying to teach her new words. She’s very good about asking us “What does *insert new word here* mean?”

The other thing she does with lots of frequency is say “I like to do it because it is what I like to do.” or some variation on the theme.

Thanks to Fancy Nancy she sometimes goes around saying “Ponte is a fancy word for ponte!”

She’s often funniest when she doesn’t even mean to be (which is always the way, right?).

The other day we were waiting in the car for Bill to return from the store.
“Mama, will you draw me a car seat?” Olivia handed me her “Grandpa Toy” (The Magna Doodle that her Grandpa bought her when Sophia was born) and I went about trying to draw a car seat.
After I was done, I handed it back to her.
“Here you go baby. Do you think it looks like a car seat?”
Admittedly, I’m not the best Magna Doodle artist, (okay, I am not the best ARTIST) but it didn’t look too bad.
Olivia studied it and looked at me.
“Do you WANT it to be a car seat?”

She’s clever, that one.

Remember those seagulls in Finding Nemo? The ones that said: “Mine…Mine…Mine…MineMineMineMineMine”?? whenever they saw something they wanted to eat?

Sophia, had she been born before the movie came out, would have been my first guess for their inspiration. Unless it is a standard practice for children her age. In that case, Olivia is the weird one.

Either way you look at it, ONE of my kids is going to end up being the abnormal one, in this situation.

Whenever Sophia sees someone eating something, or hears a crinkle of paper, something switches in her brain. It doesn’t matter if I JUST took her out of her high chair after her own meal, she stops what she is doing, and RUNS to whomever has food, even if it means dropping a toy she is playing with,tripping on toys, books, and/or blankets–she loses any decorum she has ever learned in her short 14 months of life and just lets go in this loud voice:

“Bite? Bite? Bite?”

If we ignore her, it only gets worse: “Baaahhhhhiiiiittttteeee?? BiteBiteBiteBiteBite???”

We then look at her and say, “Is that how you ask for something?” and she looks up at us, pleading with everything she’s got in her and says:

“Peeeeeeeaaasssss Bite?”

She adds a dramatic sigh or will throw herself at us for extra emphasis, so really, how can you say no to that much cuteness (and drama queendom)? We often tell her no–which, obviously means she somehow finds her manners without us having to prompt her, but being that we are the (responsible) parents, we STILL have to say no.

She’ll thank me one day, right?

Bedtime battles are still waging in our house.

Last night was especially tough, Olivia just wouldn’t stay in bed, and after two hours of telling her to go back to bed and explaining she needed energy so she could have fun tomorrow, I thought she had settled down for the night. She HAD to be tired, both girls had taken extremely short naps, as they had both kept each other up and wouldn’t (or couldn’t?) sleep earlier in the day.

Sophia had gone down without incident earlier in the night, (7p.m.) so when 10:30-11p.m. rolled around and I heard her screaming in her crib I was alarmed, to say the least.

I run into the bedroom and see Sophia standing up in her crib crying. Next to her was Olivia, looking as if she had gotten caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

“Olivia, what in the WORLD are you doing in sister’s crib? You woke her up!!!” I scoop Olivia out of the crib and she runs into the living room. I focus my energy on Sophia, who is sobbing from being jolted awake by someone jumping into her bed. I pray she didn’t get landed on or kicked in the head in the process. I rock her back and forth, pacing the floor. Bill is in the living room talking to Olivia. Sophia calms down and I put her back into bed, only to have her start whimpering, but I know she is only trying to get herself back to sleep.

I go to face my soon-to-be 3 year old.

“Olivia. Do you know you could hurt your sister very badly if you climb into her crib while she is sleeping?”

Olivia looks at me really solemnly and shakes her head.

“You could. We’ve told you before not to climb into her crib, but ESPECIALLY when sister is sleeping, because you wake her up, but you could also hurt her badly to where she has to go to the hospital.”

“I’m sorry mama.”

I’m slightly stressed because Sophia is still intermittently sobbing–but we decided our best course of action would be to let her get herself back to sleep, so I am forcing myself to stay out of her room, against my instinct.

Bill tells Olivia that she has to go to bed, and because she woke Sophia up, she will just have to listen to her cry. I am in our bedroom, and I hear Olivia whimper a little bit and balk at going to bed. My heart melts when Bill asks her what’s wrong and she can’t quite tell him.

“She needs a hug from her mama.” I say as I take her into my arms.

She falls into my arms and cries softly, but I reassure her that she’s still my girl and I love her so much. She looks at me and gives me her best “brave” face that she attempts when she wants to stop crying.

“I have an idea of what we can do tomorrow, mama.” she says.

“I’ll listen to all of your ideas tomorrow morning baby, right now you should go to bed and think about all the fun things that you want to do after you get some rest.” I hug her one last time and she goes to bed for the night.

At this point, Sophia is still softly whimpering. After 30 minutes, the cries get louder and louder. They get to the point where we are worried she will wake Olivia, who is, by this point, asleep. I go into the bedroom and get her to walk around and comfort her. She is comforted and quiet, until I try to put her back down for the night. Her screams cause me to wince in pain and I pick her up again, taking her into the hallway, where Bill is waiting for me.

“Maybe if you nurse her it will calm her down.” he suggests.

For those of you playing along at home, I am weaning Sophia. She only gets to nurse at night, before bed. My milk supply is minimal. But, I’m tired and I figure I’ll try anything at this point. She latches on and nurses for 20 minutes, eyes wide open. “This is not going to work” I think to myself as I pull her off. I’m going to have to put her back to bed and let her work it out for herself.

Bill and I contemplate letting her sleep with us. And we would have jumped at the chance, because it’s cozy, but, since she was about 9 months old or so, it has never worked to bring her back into our bed for sleep. She wiggles, sits up, wants to play, tries to climb off of the bed. We know how it will end, and we decide to cut our losses and listen to the cries. It can’t last that long, right? It’s obvious she’s tired, she keeps rubbing her eyes.

We put her down at midnight. By 12:30 I’m looking at Bill, asking him if I should go get her.

“It’s too late, if you go get her, the cycle will just continue.”

I’m exhausted, she’s exhausted. Her cries are ones of exhaustion, not pain, so I try to sleep. It’s not a constant cry, it’s one of those cries where you think “oh, finally, she’s gotten to sleep” only to have her whimper and start all over again. I think I finally fell asleep by 1:30.

I woke up this morning, bleary eyed and not ready to start the day. Olivia was up by 7 a.m., wanting to start the day. Where she finds the energy, I’ll never know. We placated her by allowing her to choose a movie to watch in bed while I was able to continue dozing and Bill got ready for work.

“What time did Soph finally stop crying?” I ask him.

“Uh, probably around 2 or so.” he says.

I was anticipating her sleeping in–maybe till 9 or so.

No such luck. She was up before 8.

Maybe they’ll nap decently today and I’ll be able to rest.

At least today is Friday. I get two days of all-day co-parenting.

I started collecting Disney movies long before children were a part of my radar. I had a nice collection started when I finally got pregnant, and the need to collect the movies for my children went into hyperdrive.

However, now that my daughter is of an age where she is interested in watching the movies, I have come to realize that the vast amount of current media available to my child has made her disinterested in certain movies of the past.

After rewatching some of them, I can’t say that I am disappointed.

Olivia loves the Pixar movies (who can blame her?) I am fighting my urge to take her to see Toy Story 1 & 2 in the theater in 3-D (limited 2-week engagement) even though they are her favorite movies and we watch them at least twice a week. We will be taking her to see Toy Story 3 next summer, but both Bill and I are unsure if she would be able to sit in a theater for the entire movie at this point in her life.

It seems that the older the movie, the less inclined she is to sit through it. Lady and the Tramp got 20 minutes from her, The Fox and the Hound, did worse, only clocking 10 minutes of uninterrupted viewing before she wanted to play with toys “at the same time.” She loves Robin Hood and The Jungle Book, but I am unsure as to how I feel regarding the latter, considering King Louie was listed as one of the top 9 racist Disney characters. (also: I’m having a slight geek-crush on Cracked. Humorous, but well-researched stuff. Swoon.). Sleeping Beauty has been watched, but not with her undivided attention.

Basically, the older movies just don’t have the same kid appeal as the newer ones do. At least, not in my house.

Although, let’s look at it realistically. Do I really want my kids to watch movies that have: parents dying, evil witches picking on (and poisoning with intent to murder) young teenage girls, drunk animals, cats who sing of killing and dismembering fish, villains who wear the skinned carcasses of the animals the movie is about…I could go on, but I’m sure you see my point.

That said, have you ever read any of the original fairy tales? Pretty fucked up stuff–very dark, so I suppose Disney’s attempt at sanitizing them is as good as they can get without totally destroying the story completely. Though I could do without the racism and sexism. Are you listening Disney?

I can’t protect them from the world. I can’t make it less ugly for them, but…maybe it’s not such a bad thing that we watch more Elmo than “Classic” Disney films.

Olivia: “Sophia, don’t you do that!”
Sophia: (Puzzled, Incoherent babble)
Olivia: “If you do that again, NO BOO-BOOS for you!” (Boo-Boos are what they call my breasts in regards to nursing)

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O: (while wagging her finger at me): “If you keep acting like a baby, I’m going to treat you like one!”

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O: (Putting a bag on her shoulder and grabbing her shoes): “Okay mama, I have to go now, I’ll see you later.”
N: “Where are you going?”
O: (Clearly exasperated at my question) “I’m going to work! I’ve got work to do mama!”

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Time: 7 p.m. Mama and Daddy are getting Sophia ready for bed, trying to tackle a monster poop she’s bestowed upon us. Olivia is in the living room, reading her books. The phone rings.

N: (Struggling with a wiggly Sophia) “Do you want to go get that?”
B: (Wrapping up a poopy diaper) “Nah, if it is important, they’ll leave a message or call back.”

Suddenly, the ringing stops. We hear Olivia talking.

O: “Hello?” “No, they are in there fixing Sophia.” (Turns out it was a wrong number, but it was the first time she took it upon herself to answer the phone).

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Before tucking her in, we tell Olivia to stay in bed and she will get to play with her leapfrog word builder the next day, and she can have a strawberry bar for breakfast. An hour into bedtime we hear our doorknob wiggle and she appears at the side of our bed.

O: “Hi! I’ve got an idea. If I get out of bed ONE MORE TIME I don’t get to play with my leapfrog or have a strawberry bar in the morning.”
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Babies are gifted with a hypersensitive radar that detects anytime something they shouldn’t touch is left unattended and within their reach. In our house, it usually involves something electronic. My laptop sustains the most abuse, although the 360, cable box, and cell phones (among other things) see their fair share too.

It doesn’t even have to be unattended for Sophia to seek out my laptop. As we speak, her tiny, chubby hand is sneaking around the screen to tap tap tap on my keys, as I move them away and try to divert her attention, her other hand reaches up and pulls the power cord out.  Luckily her attention was just diverted and she toddled off to her room to wreak havoc on her sister. (Update: she just came toddling out with Olivia’s pink V-tech laptop, that she may or may not have yoinked from Olivia’s hands. Update to the Update: She did indeed yoink it from Olivia, but Olivia said she no longer wanted to play with it, so all is well).

If I step away from my laptop, she can’t get to it fast enough. The mouse gets slobbered on, keys tapped, power button gets pushed (and repushed…and then pushed again for good measure). For her final act of desecration, she will push the screen shut and try to sit on top.

She’s also called lots of people with my cell phone, leaving cryptic, babble messages that often make my childless friends wonder if I have gone off the deep end and live my life in a drunken stupor. The TV gets turned off more than I care to admit, and if I find the person who invented the V-tech’s little monkey mascot who SCREECHES when the laptop’s volume control is pushed, and continues SCREECHING until you choose your volume level, I may wind up in prison doing 25 to life.

So electronics MUST be evil, because Sophia is on a mission to destroy them all.

Right after her first birthday, Sophia was moved into Olivia’s room, thereby making it “their” room. She transitioned almost seamlessly, and it has been amazing to have our room back for the past two months.

Right before this blessed event occurred, Olivia started a very normal, but very annoying childhood rite of passage: getting up out of bed 100 times before she finally falls asleep for the night.

Before they shared a room, it was fine, we would gently escort her back to her room at first, telling her it was bedtime. After a few nights of this, we were more stern, and often she would go back to her room in LOUD protest, with a few (LOUD) tears until she finally would settle down for sleep. This all changed once Sophia moved into her room.

Whether or not Olivia understands that we are now unable to allow her to return to her room screaming or crying, I do not know, but we have taken to bribery to keep her in bed and it works some of the time, and we have noticed a slight decrease in her out-of-bed visits. On some nights, she won’t get up at all, which means she wins the honor of playing with her leapfrog word builder that “lives” on the refrigerator. It is a special treat for her, because she is allowed in the kitchen, beyond the baby gate to play, uninterrupted by her sister.

There are nights when she gets up, Bill will escort her back to bed, only to have her jump up and follow him back out. THIS drives us crazy, but we know that she is figuring things out and trying to see what she can and can’t get away with. Often we will look at her and just point towards her bedroom and she will wordlessly go back to bed. This makes me feel really guilty, because she’s just so darn cute and sweet.

Saturday night she had been in her bed all night, not a peep from her. Bill and I were in bed, catching up on Season 2 of Mad Men (it goes without saying that this show is amazing), when we heard our door rattle. Olivia walks in, looking like she just woke up. It was not her normal “getting out of bed before falling asleep” routine.

“What’s wrong Liv?” we asked her.

“Mama, Daddy, I’m all stickery!”

“You’re what?” Bill and I looked at each other, unsure of what we were hearing.

“Stickery.”

I got out of bed and walked over to her, and sure enough she was covered in stickers. From head to toe.

“Oh baby, were you playing with your stickers before bed and forgot to take them off?” I tried to stifle my laughter.

“Yeah, but I got the ones off of my eyes.”

At that, Bill and I could hold the laughter no longer.

As I de-stickered her, we explained that stickers shouldn’t go on her mucus membranes, and then explained what her mucus membranes were.

She went back to sleep and the next day she had only a vague recollection of the incident as she happily played with her leapfrog word builder.

Sophia has quite the impressive vocabulary for a 14 month old. She is well versed in saying “Please (insert some variation of the word for what she wants here)” and then “Thank You” once she has received it. She will answer “yes” and/or “no” when asked questions, usually understanding what is being asked of her (simple things, like “Do you want to eat/nap/go outside/play/be changed/etc.” She knows that a cow says MOOO, a cat says “Mao” (not Meow, Mao–like the Chairman), a dog says “wuuff wuuff”, and dinosaurs say (or said) “RAAAARRR”.

Last night, at the dinner table, near the end of our meal, Olivia asked: “are we going to take a bath after dinner??”

As soon as that word is uttered in our house, Sophia’s mouth explodes in a barrage of “bahhhttthhh…bahhhttthhh….bahhhttthhh” while doing the sign for bath, grinning and bouncing up and down. EVERY TIME the word is uttered. To say she loves a bath is an understatement.

“Yes baby, Daddy is going to give you a bath after we finish our dinner.”

“No…Mama”  Sophia said.

“No baby, Daddy is going to give you a bath.”

“NO. Mama” She was more forceful this time.

“No. DADDY is going to give you a bath. Mama is going to clean the kitchen.” I explain. (aside: this is not because I believe it is my job to clean the kitchen, it is because I like to give Bill quality time with his girls, and the bath is a good way to do it.)

Sophia looks at me for a minute. She looks at Bill.

“Moo.”

“Moo? Do you want a cow to give you a bath?” I say, jokingly.

“YEAHHHHHHH!” She starts grinning and clapping her hands.

Olivia finds this hilarious. “Cows can’t give baths!”

“I suppose they can’t, can you imagine?” We we were all laughing at the idea of a cow giving a bath.

But, now that I think about it, it isn’t too outrageous. After all, if cows can type, who’s to say they can’t give baths?

I am currently on a mission. A mission to recycle the hell out of every piece of trash that I can. Not only is it good for the environment, it’s good for our family’s bottom line.

According to our city’s website, “For most residents, the 64-gallon containers are just right.”  But!  “Residents who use the 35-gallon refuse container can pay a reduced refuse rate.”

When we moved in, there was a 35 gallon trashcan here. Do you KNOW how expensive it is to have a 64 gallon trash can versus a 35 gallon? Of course not…why would you? I live here. Not you (well, not most of you). The city charges us $13.88 a month for the 35 gallon trashcan. The 64 gallon is $25 and some change (I can’t remember exactly because I had a minor coronary episode when he said the price). I just died a little on the inside when I realized that our small family had just slightly more trash a week than the 35 gallon would hold, so I had to “upgrade”.

Luckily we are not charged for green waste or recyclables, so I have made it my new goal to fill those up instead. I WILL call them back after I start my hardcore recycling project and after we have enough space in the big bin to warrant stepping back down. That’s a little more than $300 a year…for fucking TRASH. It’s bad enough we have to pay$166.56 a year for trash, but paying almost double that hurts my insides. That’s money I could be spending on blow and hookers. Er…for the kids, yeah, for the kids.*

*For the love of all things holy. I am kidding. I do not engage in the purchase or enjoyment of either blow or hookers.