Stuff Tucker Says

Tucker FOR SURE says the following:

BATH! (sounds like BAH!) but it is FOR SURE bath. He loves bath time. Tonight he stood up to pee with one hand against the wall of the tub and then squatted down to doo doo in the water. He shakes after he poops. Always has. I had never dealt with a floating turd before. I screamed and made Tyler come and dig it out. I am SOOOO happy Madeline refused a bath with her brother tonight. I cannot even imagine the freak out a floating turd would have elicited from miss priss.

Thank you (tah too) He said it yesterday after Madeline agreed to share her afternoon Starbucks cookie with him. Every day we go for coffee and a cookie and I am sure that every day for a year he has thought, "Well #*%@!!!, when am I gonna get MY cookie?" I am very proud that he said thank you.

Duck (DUK) he has said it a couple of times when we look at his board book.

Bye (BY!) Real short and sweet. No "bye bye." Thursday I waved at a friend leaving MDO and Tucker spontaneously waved hysterically, said "BY!" and blew a kiss. SO FLIPPIN SWEET!

Gi Gi He loves his GiGi. My grandmother. They have always been best friends. She wants to eat him up.

Da Da- DUH! He loves his Dad most of all.

He will say Mama (MMMMah MMMMah) if I am not getting the food on his tray fast enough or if I have my back to him. That's about it.

Baby (Baay beee) this is my favorite. Any baby anywhere. His reflection in anything. A picture of a baby in a store. So sweet.

He still barks any time he hears a dog bark. I think he calls the dog baybe too. Or puppy. I can't decide what it sounds like.

That's all I can think of for now.

Let's go Krogering

My husband is a GENIUS!

When he got home this evening I declared that I was not going to cook dinner. Fridays are home days (no MDO) and this week has been hectic. I was tired. I felt guilty when Tyler was silent after my declaration and I said- well, I guess I could go to the grocery store...

He said he wanted to go because the deli case at our Kroger has "some really good lookin' meats." I told him that he didn't get to leave us again, that either I got to go to the grocery store by myself or we load up the kids and all go...so off we went. We told Madeline that tonight was "pick whatever you want for dinner night." She wanted chicken noodle soup and pudding.

The kids were tired- we had gone on a long walk to Daddy's office and back around 3 and they were grumpy. Tucker wanted nothing to do with being held and Madeline wanted nothing to do with riding in the cart. SO, in comes Mr. Brilliant...

I turn around from the deli case and see Tucker pushing the big grocery cart up the isle. Little Tucker holding on to the bar on the shelf area below the baby seat LOVING pushing the cart around. We put Madeline in the cart for a minute- she thought it was funny that Tucker could push her and we shopped the whole store that way! Tucker pushing (with help from Tyler or I). I mean, what a great idea! Why hadn't I ever thought of that?!

It has to be so frustrating for Tucker to want to walk but be too scared to just go on his own yet. He loves his push behind walkers. He got to walk, stick close to us, get a little exercise, and got soooo many smiles in the store. It was the cutest thing ever.

Tucker's first day of school

Our Mother's Day Out begins accepting babies when they are 12 months old. Tucker turned 1 on Tuesday the 16th and Wednesday he began Mother's Day Out.

I had been nervous and sad about it...I LOVE our church and our Mother's Day Out program but Madeline didn't start MDO until she was 18 months old and was just so much bigger than Tucker is now...she could talk and walk and didn't take a bottle or a morning nap...Tucker just still seems like such a baby to me. I wasn't ready to let him go. But, the real estate market is picking up and lately Tucker had been going to the office with me A LOT. Being at the office isn't much fun for him and one of my very best friends is teaching the one year old class at MDO so I figured he would have a better time there.

This morning I took Madeline to her class first. I took Tucker into his class and sat him at the little table (one of those cute tables with little seats built in). Amber (his teacher, my friend) gave him a graham cracker and I gave him his new big boy sippy cup. He was just sitting in that seat like a big boy swinging his feet and had the biggest smile on his face! I visited with Amber for a while and then kept trying to get a reaction from Tucker saying "BYE" over and over and trying to get him to kiss me but all I got was a head butt from him- letting me kiss him like he was an embarrassed 8 year old boy!

Amber texted me throughout the day saying that he had a great time at the gym with the rest of the kids and then called me during her lunch break. She said that Tucker was hilarious. There is another little boy Tucker's age in the class and she said that Tucker kept offering this baby a bite of his cracker and then yanking it away and laughing! Teasing him over and over! Then evidently she just laid him down and he went right to sleep!

When I picked him up he was content but happy to see me. He kissed me over and over and hugged me tight. It was so great to see him with a smile on his face and know he loved it so much.

Here are some pics from school. These are from his first Valentine's party. I walked in and he had pink icing running down his chin. He was drinking a juice box! He is such a big boy at school.

Madeline gets to see Tucker most days when he is coming back from the gym and she is going in. She likes for me to get her first and then her brother. She has been THE BEST lately. I am really looking forward to this spring and summer.

My baby is 1!

I said it at Tucker's party and I'll say it again...

It takes a lot of people, a lot of love, and a lot of support to get a baby to its first birthday. At least, it does for me and my kids...

I made countless phone calls to friends for support and encouragement. I know there were some days that I got to shower only because they were here watching my baby. Meals I devoured after friends were kind enough to bring them to me...All of these gestures of love and support were and are greatly appreciated. Thank you all for getting me and my baby to this milestone.

I always have felt like everyone should be running around giving each other high fives and hugs at a child's first birthday party. Saying, "WE MADE IT!"

So, high five. We made it. I love my family (including my wonderful group of friends who I am blessed enough to consider family as well).

What sick kids do on snow days...

My little Muffin Head

Saturday was the annual Daddy Daughter Dance. My muffin had been wearing her dress every day for a month prior and had torn a little piece of the overlay. Mom (my Mom, I don't sew) fixed it up for her and after a busy birthday party afternoon we went right home and started getting ready for the "ball." I piled her hair on top of her head and then curled it. Madeline has the softest corn silk hair. It is silk. It is the hair I always wished I had. It doesn't hold curl. But it straightened out and shined up like the gold the Miller's daughter had Rumpelstiltskin spin and it looked beautiful. Aunt Sandra gave her a real "diamond" tiara for Christmas and we put it in her hair as well. She wore a little blush on her cheeks and baby pink shimmer on her eyes and a little lip gloss. She was precious.

Off we went to a sweet pre party given by a friend. Madeline was so excited to go and was skipping her way up the walk way when she fell. I watched her face slide down the concrete. It was so painful. I scooped her up and held her while she screamed and tried to think of what to do...how to react. I wanted to cry. I just held her and tried to get her calmed down. I asked her if we should go home and get her cleaned up. I could see the blood on her knee through her white dress and her little lip was busted. Her forehead was scraped and her chin but she insisted on going in.

After a snack , juice box, and band-aid she felt a little better. Her prince called and said that he was ready to take her to the ball but he had no idea what had happened. Madeline and I loaded up and headed home for her Daddy to take her to the dance but by the time we got home she was crying that her knee hurt too bad to go. Tyler talked her in to going for some cookies and punch (if he carried her) and she agreed.

From what I hear they had a great time. Madeline played with balloons and did the chicken dance and then spilled a mouth full of red punch down the front of her white dress. Her Daddy brought her home and when I asked her if she had a great time she said, "Yes, but Mommy, look at what I did to my dress..." I told her it was okay that we might be able to fix it and I gave her a hug.

I got soooo sick that night and so the next day we thought it would be best to send Madeline to Mom and Dad's so that Tyler could keep Tucker away from me in the hopes that maybe the kids wouldn't get sick but Madeline ended up with an entirely different virus. She has had a fever and a cough and I am desperate to get outside and build a snowman!!! My tummy is better now and I think she has been fever free for 24 hours so maybe tomorrow will be the day.

I think it was about this time last year when I wrote about my Muffin Head and how her life was about to change so much. It did. A lot. So did mine. Madeline has grown so much. In that moment on Saturday when she fell in her perfect little dress with her perfect little shoes she got up and dusted herself off and went to the ball with a busted knee and lip and a hole the size of a baseball in her little white tights. She had a bloody hurt knee and (thank goodness) a pink band-aid that matched her dress and I was the one who wanted to cry. I wished afterward that I could have been quick and thought of a way to make her laugh about the whole thing but I couldn't. I just wanted to hold her forever. I so wanted her night to be perfect but the thing that occurred to me is that she had no expectations. She just decided to have fun. I am so proud of her. What a Princess.

Removed Post

I removed the post about Madeline and her conflict at school because I was writing about another person's child in relation to mine. I will not write about anyone else's child anymore because that child's mother is probably trying as hard as I am to be a good mom, get through the day with a 3 or 4 year old, and teach her child to be kind.

Every Morning

Every morning Madeline comes into our room, to my side of the bed, and says, "Mommy, could you make me hot chocolate milk that is not to hot with bunny chocolate and a 'syruped' waffle?" And I do.

I love the specific request. The 'bunny chocolate' part is because she wants nesquick instead of carnation instant breakfast (its name is vitamin milk). She gets the instant breakfast but she doesn't know it. And the 'syruped' waffle. Sounds so formal. Hilarious.

Somebody loves Mommy's spaghetti!!!

Holding a sleeping baby

I feel this sense of time slipping away lately. It is February. Tucker will be 1 in a few days and Madeline will be 4 a few days after that.

I just put Tucker down for his morning nap- I can make him take one nap a day but it is a short one and he still does better with two naps. He takes a bottle before any rest time, sometimes I still nurse him if he acts like he would prefer that. He took a bottle today and was falling asleep in my arms. I took the bottle out of his mouth and he promptly replaced it with his first two fingers on his left hand (that stink) and went to sleep while I was holding him.

It was heaven. I held him for a few minutes before I put him in his crib and watched him sleep. Normally I would try to get him in his crib while he is still awake so he can "self sooth" which he has really gotten good at doing but lately I feel like I just don't care. I want time back. I want every day back that I wished that he would take a nap or go to sleep by himself. I want months and months back of not holding him for hours every time he slept so that I could get laundry done or make dinner.

I have worked so hard over the last year to get things back to normal- our normal routines etc. only to learn that normal is something completely different after the second child comes. But really, there is no "normal" for baby's first year. It's just about baby. Maybe we should decide that for one year the laundry doesn't get done. Meals will be take out only. The house can be messy. Right now my house is pretty clean, laundry is waiting to be put away (like ALWAYS) and I will make a grocery list in a few minutes and go to the store. But who cares. I would let all of that fall away for one more year of Tucker small enough to still fit in my lap. Madeline too. I'd be home every day all day in my pj's stinking like Tucker's fingers and holding my sleeping babies with a big smile on my face.

Finally a little snow- and ice

We had a fun snow day (after Daddy got to come home). Here are some pictures from the weekend...

Tucker sits like this in his Daddy's lap ALL THE TIME. I couldn't keep him still if I tied him to my lap. Tyler is such a calm guy. I bet Tucker feels that and enjoys hanging out with someone so laid back. I do too.