Two Guys, Two Girls and a Pup

First, please note the title change of the blog! Yeah, not very original — someday, maybe 3 or 4 years from now, I will have enough time to work on it properly.

This post is all about Meredith and the awesome job she did at the dentist yesterday. It was official family dentist day, including Nate, who made the trip with the rest of us, even though he has no teeth and barely has any idea what his gums are for. Meredith’s last trip to the dentist was pretty much a non-event — she was content to watch us get our teeth cleaned, but didn’t want to let the dentist look at her teeth or clean them.

Well! What a difference 6 months makes! Our big girl watched me get my teeth cleaned (while Dad quieted down fussy Nate), reorganized the toothpaste stash :\ and played with their display electric toothbrush. She was still scared to sit in the chair by herself because the hygenist wanted to recline it all the way, but she sat in my lap and laid down on my chest so that she could have her teeth not only examined BUT cleaned, too! She balked at having the water sprayed in her mouth, but more because of the mouth vacuum-sucker thing than anything, I think. So she submitted to having her teeth wiped off with a piece of cloth. All in all, head and shoulders above how she did the last time, and the dentist is very pleased with her teeth. (AND says that they’re nicely spaced in her mouth — we may luck out and not need braces for her. Cross your fingers!)

Next up: first haircut!

Nothing much going on. Just growing a baby. But big news regarding our firstborn — today was our first official detectable potty use! Just before bathtime, I decided to ask Meredith if she wanted to sit on her potty and she plopped herself down. The bath water was running at the time (which might have helped things along) so I didn’t hear it, but as soon as she stood up, there it was! Good job, little girl! (Of course, she went to her room for jammies and immediately piddled on the floor as well — one step forward, two steps back… :>)

Hey, remember when we had a blog? *sigh* It probably seems like nothing is happening, which is partially true, and partially completely wrong. Of course, lots of stuff is happening, but all in the context of a normal day, which makes it seem like not worth blogging about, really.

Meredith cracks us up daily with her developing personality. Thursday, when Billi, the nurse who gives me my weekly “butt shot” (as M calls it) visited, Meredith decided to play nurse assistant. She stood and watched Billi and Daddy get the shot ready, then, afterward, got out Billi’s stethoscope for listening to the baby for her, including pulling out the earphones and the tube of ointment she uses. Then she helped me get a Kleenex to clean up the ointment (getting one for herself, of course, so that she could clean her own belly. CLEANING. Still a favorite activity.)

Tonight we introduced her to the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer TV special via my DVD. She was very aware of Rudolph (or as she calls him, Rudolph Brightnose) from our trip to the mall and seeing Santa and his reindeer. So she’s been walking around all week talking about Rudolph. We watched Rudolph while I made dinner and when it was done, she went BALLISTIC when he wasn’t on screen anymore. Wailing and gnashing of teeth. (Of course, that couldn’t have anything to do with the fact that she was worn out and tired from Christmas shopping all day with Daddy, could it? Naaaah. :>) I have a feeling we’ll be watching Rudolph quite a bit from now on…

And, on the other side, of course, we have Numero Dos coming along nicely. Kevin’s kid seems determined to make sure I don’t forget it’s still in there, kicking up a storm every chance it gets. Although I’m not looking very pregnant, I’m FEELING more and more pregnant — I think I’m just displacing all my internal organs instead of growing a stomach. Even at that, the pants are definitely getting tight — I’m wearing them unbuttoned more often than not these days. Fortunately, sitting at a desk all day affords me that luxury. :>

So apologies for the absence — we’re here, just working on keeping up with everything else first… :}

Tomorrow, assuming our final meetings go well, we’ll wrap up arrangements for a new nanny for Meredith and a new family to share that nanny with. Although we are sad to see Esme go, she is moving on to make a better life for herself and her fiance — can’t fault her for wanting bigger and better things than chasing after Meredith. (Although what could be better?? :>)

Our new nanny’s name is Shelly — she’s a mother 5 times over(!) and a grandmother to 2, so I have to expect that she’s pretty much seen and done it ALL. Certainly more than two little ones can throw at her. Meredith’s new partner-in-crime is named Hank, a little blond cutie whose mom and dad, Saffa and Tim, are very enthusiastic and VERY organized and together. I have every confidence if they say something is so, it’s so. And they have nothing but GREAT things to say about Shelly, so I know that Meredith will be in good hands.

So that’s a load off our minds that we’ll have childcare for Meredith taken care of soon. (I was going to say that we’ll have a replacement for Esme, but we’ll never be able to REPLACE Esme!!) All this means that we’re going to hold off placing Meredith in the daycare up the street for another year or so, but as long as she’s having fun and getting plenty of social interaction with others (which it sounds like she’ll get, plus more if and when we place her in a few little activity classes here and there), there’s plenty of time to get her into a structured program. We’re not worried about it.

Think good thoughts for having everything buttoned up by the end of the week!

Well, we finally got around to visiting a dentist for the first time since moving (I KNOW.) I like her — her name is Dr. Fukuda and her office was very friendly and fun — she must be a UW alum, because every exam room was FULL of memorabilia!

We all walked up to 82nd street to get to my appointment at 8am (Daddy had to carry Meredith on his shoulders the last few blocks because Miss M. was having fun dawdling and carrying Baby…) Meredith found a naked Barbie doll in the toy box (”NA-KED! NA-KED!”) that she wanted to bring in with her. We all went into the exam room together so that Meredith could see what was happening, because it would be HER turn next. The exam went really well — got X-rays done, got the cleaning (AHHH — feels so good) and then it was Meredith’s turn. She had been doing well up until that point and didn’t seem to be nervous or anything, but once we actually got her in the chair, she didn’t want to let the hygienist clean her teeth at all. (Although she was very good about opening her mouth so that the dentist could see how many teeth she has and how Momma brushes her teeth.) Everyone was very nice and understanding and said that it was perfectly normal at this age — they don’t push anything so that the little ones will have only good experiences at the dentist. Meredith still got to pick a goodie from the treasure chest — a little green frog. So maybe next time we’ll actually get a cleaning in — in March!

So we left Daddy to do his appointment at 9am (which also went fine — a couple of spots to watch, but no cavities!) and we walked home to meet up with Esme at 10am. A big day full of new experiences!

That about sums it up, right there! Our little monkey is now officially the big “2″! We’ve been reading “The Old Lady Who Swallowed A Fly” with Meredith, and she calls it the “old lady” book. So when I asked her, “Meredith, how old are you?”, she responded with “old lady!” Yes, you are an old lady!

We had a small party Saturday for Meredith with Esme and Luis and Michelle, Adam and Cate. (We had hoped to have Tyra, Matt and Aurora, too, but they had a wedding to attend. Booo!) There were little finger snacks and a really yummy chocolate monkey cake, courtesy of Daddy! (Not made with real monkeys.)

So many pretty clothes and fun toys from everyone in the family! Thank you to everyone for the presents and the birthday wishes to make Meredith’s day extra-special! Another year begins…here we go for the big “3″!

I thought I remembered writing a blog at some point… Sorry for the lack of updates — things get busy and then get away from us, as usual. We girls have said goodbye to Kevin again for over a week this time, so we are trying to keep ourselves amused. (For Meredith, this mostly means dragging me around the backyard by the hand. :>) We can tell that Daddy is still on Meredith’s mind, though — the very first words out of her mouth this morning were “Daddy go?” Yes, Daddy went to Australia…

New little things here and there: Meredith is starting to read along with us when we sit down with her favorite books at night. Well, she’s still not very patient about the books and flips forward many pages while we’re trying to read. But when we reach a spot she likes, she’ll say the words with us! She’s also becoming a champion puzzle-solver — where just a couple of months ago, she couldn’t even match one shape, she can now get them all pretty much on the first try, and quickly! She also goes gangbusters on her shape sorter. She’s starting to get the idea about singing — she often wants Kevin and me to sing for her (especially “Tingle-bye” — Twinkle Twinkle Little Star). While we’re reading her Mother Goose book (which has lots of nursery rhymes and songs), she’ll talk her little Meredith language but do it in a sing-songy way that’s obviously meant to be a song of some sort. Hopefully she’ll be able to carry a tune better than her daddy. ;>

Otherwise, not much new here. After more than a year of looking, I finally found a replacement for my old office chair, which is now sitting at my desk. It’s black leather and looks very similar to the (fake) Eames chair in our front room. And the best part? NO CASTERS. So now anyone who sits at my desk doesn’t go rolling toward the front window as soon as they sit down…

So the girls are counting the days until Kevin gets home safe and sound — I know that, halfway around the world, he’s doing the same. Maybe if we’re lucky, he’ll log in and post an update if he gets bored…

It’s official: Meredith is now sleeping (probably — it’s quiet anyway) in her new rail-free non-crib big-girl bed. She’s been having a blast all evening climbing in and out of it all by herself! The past few nights we’ve been shutting her door (which we never have before) in order to prepare for tonight, so that she wouldn’t be roaming all over the house in the middle of the night. She’s been crying less and less since we’ve been doing it — tonight, success! No tears at all. We’ll see how the night goes, but from here on out, it’s a whole new world…

(Pictures of the new bed soon!)

Kevin’s post about Corduroy reminds that part of the fun part about watching someone learn how to talk is the oddities she gets WRONG as much as how fast she gets things right. So far, we have things like “seegert” for “music” (no idea where this comes from), “Coy-ya-ya-ya” for “Corduroy”, “duhbeese” for grapes/cherries/strawberries (it’s actually how she was saying “strawberries” and now it’s for every fruit), “baydie” for “baby”…it requires some concentration once in awhile to figure out what she’s actually saying, but it’s fun to see how her brain is working…

First of all — congratulations to Christi and Nick, who finally made it official and got engaged during their camping trip this week!!

We took Meredith for her first visit to the wading pool at Greenlake Park this afternoon; she finally got to wear her Little Swimmers diapers after all this time (we were a little worried they wouldn’t fit anymore, but no problem.) They’re actually pull-ups, so she got a little taste of big-girl-style pants. We put her in a little sunsuit, her hat and her flip-flops, slathered her up with sunscreen and headed off.

There really weren’t as many people there as I had expected for being a beautiful warm sunny day — not a cloud in the sky! There were lots of kids, true, but definitely lots of room to move and splash around. Meredith was very hesitant about stepping into the water, despite the fact that we do it in the bathroom at home. So we walked around to the other end where there’s a gentle ramp into the water. We walked around holding her hand for awhile until she got used to it, and then she was good to go! By the end of the day, she was even running around a little, splashing around and pouring water on herself! We were all pretty soaked by the time we had to get out so they could put some chemicals in the pool, but it had been about 1 1/2 hours — a good long time. Meredith walked around waving and meeting new people and learning how to share toys with others. (A good skill that she can help Kevin with. ;>)

There was much sadness and tears when we had to leave, but I think that was partly hungriness, too — she chowed down on some grapes while we sat and dried off in the sun. Then off to home to have some dinner and crash (Meredith was doing the thousand-yard stare already at 7pm…)

Pictures as soon as I can sit down and pull them off the camera!