God made everything

I cherish my grocery time with Sydney - she is always full of questions and it is a great bonding time for us. Yesterday our conversation went something like this:

S: Mom, did God make everything?
M: Yes, he did.
S: Did he make flowers and birds?
M: That's right.
S: (with lots of astonishment and big wide eyes) Did he even make Wal-Mart?

Lessons we've learned

Lesson #1
You don't need snow or even cold weather to wear everything you own that is meant for winter - just strip down to your undies and hula skirt and they'll feel just fine.

Lesson #2

Dogs will only put up with so much dancing.

All day on Wednesday Sydney carried Grizzly around. Grizzly didn't object, but I can't say she liked it either. She tolerated it and even let Sydney lead her around on a leash most of the day. Wednesday night we were watching our DVR'd episode of American Idol and Sydney decided that Grizzly should dance with her. As you can see, she put up with it for a while. Sydney thought it was hilarious, but then Grizzly got tired of being dragged around by her front paws and started gently gnawing on Sydney's hands to make her let go. After much prompting from her Dad, Sydney finally let go. Then Grizzly jumped in my lap and Sydney thought putting her in the laundry basket would be a better idea. So, she chased the poor dog who again jumped back into my lap. She kept tugging at her and finally, after about 15 minutes of torture, Grizzly nipped her. Sydney cried for 10 minutes although there wasn't even a mark. I'd like to say she learned her lesson, but today she's been chasing Grizzly with the laundry basket again.

Weewo and Stitch and Grasshead Progress

Sydney's favorite movie lately has been Lilo and Stitch (weewo and Stitch as it is more commonly known in our house.) She loves when they hula in the beginning and has decided that this skirt from her dress up trunk looks like a hula skirt. So, she wears it everytime she watches the movie. She has memorized the entire dance and I'm pretty sure the entire dialouge in the movie. David and I are both ready for a new favorite.

Also, a little over a week later, here is Sydney's grasshead. On Sunday she decided a haircut and I'd have to say that I agree. She loves watching things grow! This month at school they are learning about the parts of a flower and how they grow from seeds. We constantly get to here about how flowers come from seeds. There is nothing like a 3 year old to teach you everything you need to know about flowers.

Pokey Earrings...a success!

After a lot of phone calls, we ended up getting Sydney's ears pierced at Claire's. Sydney kept saying, "I'm so excited" so the girl doing the piercing finally asked if it was Sydney's idea to get her ears pierced. I assured her it was. We'd tried to talk to about how it was going to hurt, but just for a second like a shot does. She was ok with that and perched herself up in the chair. I had told her earlier that I didn't want her to cry (not that I really expected her not to - I just didn't want a big scene, if possible, from my little drama queen.) There was a girl who was about ten or eleven who went first and she was kind of a wimp about it. Thankfully Sydney didn't watch her. When it was Sydney's turn she got a little nervous, grasped onto the chair and smiled. I was squeezing David's hand really hard because I was so nervous - I remember how those things hurt! So, they counted, clicked (both at the same time) and Sydney's eyes got huge. She just sat there with a shocked look on her face, tears welling up in her eyes. The bottom lip started quivering and that was all this Momma could take. I told her it was ok and then the tears came full force. She cried and cried and everyone around her was telling her how good she did. She probably held the tears off for a total of 30 seconds - even I was impressed. I held her and tried to get her to look at them in the mirror, but she wasn't interested. Mean time, there were some older women in the store looking at me like I was the worst mom ever forcing my child to have her ears pierced. I wanted to kick them in the shin and tell them to get over it because this little girl had been BEGGING to get them done for months and it wasn't my idea. Thankfully I kept the pregnancy hormones in check and didn't cause a scene. After about five minutes of crying and burying her face in my shoulder, Sydney was all about showing everyone just how great her new "pokey earrings" looked. So, for the last several days she keeps pulling her hair up as she walks into a room so everyone can see how beautiful she looks. She almost made me go back in at my OB's office because she forgot to show Dr. Seale. I assured her we'd be back next week and she could show her then.

Speaking of the baby, everything looks good. She has definitely dropped but isn't completely engaged yet, so we might make it until May 2. Unless I have more contractions I'm done with internals - thank goodness for that. So we sit and wait and I drive my husband crazy with all of the cloth diapers talk. I actually found a place in Fayetteville that carries them called Terra Tots, so I have been talking to the owner there. She is a wealth of information and I'm leaning more and more towards the cloth. Her prices seem to be in-line with everything I've found on-line, so I think we'll probably buy them from her if we go that way. She has a starter package for $60 including tax that looks better than any I've found on-line. David says he doesn't care either way and that it is my decision, but I want him on board with whatever way we go. He really wants me to do the 21 day trial first, but it is only $30 less than just buying them and in the end you end up without diapers. Ahh...all of the decisions that come with a baby. I'm so anxious for her to just get here!

Grass Head

Today Sydney and I made her long awaited "grass head." This is a craft my home school class did the other day and I brought home the extras for her to make one. It is basically a chia-pet and quite cute when it finally grows. Sydney decided she wanted to make hers to a football player. I drew the number for her and then she drew the clothes. I think she did a pretty good job - she is getting better and better at drawing things. Especially things with a permanent marker on my bathroom wall, but that is another story. Currently there is a frog drawn with a dry erase marker on my bathroom mirror which by me is an ok art space, dry erase being the key. My favorite part of the frog is the tounge which she drew by sticking hers out so she could see what it looked like. It was really cute.

I've been up since 5 a.m. which I hate, but there was no point in just laying there. So far I've gotten some laundry done and had a chance for more research on cloth diapers. I think I might be crazy, but I think it is what we're going to do part-time at least. I'm not sure we could do them at school and I definitely think I don't want to do them when out and about. I've found a couple of places on-line that allow you to do a trial version. One site is only $10 for 21 days if you decide you don't like them, so I think we may start out with that. Cloth will be a big investment to make if we decide not to do it so I want to make sure that is really what we want to do. I'm amazed at how different cloth diapers are than what I thought they'd be. There are so many options that I've felt a little overwhelmed doing all of the research, but I think I've finally got my feet on the ground. Plus, I don't think it will gross me out as much as I originally thought, especially after potty training. I don't think it is something I would have been brave enough to try with my first, but after all of the poop and pee associated with potty training, what is a little more?

Also on the agenda for today are Sydney's swim lessons. She has had a break since before Christmas and is dying to go back to the Jones Center. She has big plans about going under, we'll see if she sticks to them. Today is also the day she has been working really hard for - POKEY EARRINGS! She has been begging for several months now and David was a little reluctant to let her get them. But, after lots of Sydney persuasion she talked him into getting them. David told her she could get them IF she was good and had no time-outs at school for all of March. She did get it pushed back a week for a "not listening" incident and I can't say she has been the most well behaved child ever, but she has improved and has worked really hard. We've talked about how it will hurt, but only for a second. She isn't thrilled about that part, but she still wants to get them so wish us luck. We'll see what she picks out and how it goes!

Maternity Pics

Here are a few maternity pictures we took tonight. I didn't realize I looked so tired, but so goes life.

You're driving me nuts, kid.

Ok, so the title of this post is a direct quote from Sydney. I was walking around picking things up and she said, "Mom, you're driving me nuts, kid." I think I'm getting on her nerves because I'm going crazy sitting around all of the time via David's orders. And speaking of Miss Cuteness herself, here she is watching Super Why this morning.

So, with part of my new found lazy-time, I've gotten some sewing projects done. The first one I finished is a quilt for Elle. I made Sydney a Razorback blanket when she was born, so I didn't figure I could skip out on that this time. My biggest concern when I started having contractions was that I hadn't finised it. So, it was the first thing I finished. It is far from perfect, but most of my projects are.

The next item of panic was a gift from Elle to Sydney. In our sibling class they suggested bringing a gift from the baby to the big sister for her to "give" her when they meet the first time as a way to make things easier on the older sibling. I decided I wanted Sydney to get a Big Sister shirt, but couldn't find any on-line that I really liked. Plus, they were all about $20 each and kind of corny. I checked on ebay and found these iron-on transfers. They are supposed to be heavier duty than the ones you can print at home. We'll see, but I think they are because they were heavier in weight. So, for $15 including shipping and the shirts I got one for Sydney and for Elle. I added some ribbon and here is the outcome:

If you can't read it they said "Big Sister" and then Sydney across the bottom and "Lil Sister" and Elle across the bottom. Sorry, but with two girls I can't resist the occasional matching shirt thing. While finishing Elle's shirt, my sewing machine messed up again. It is the same problem I had with it last time, so we'll be making a trip to Springdale this morning to drop it off at the Sears repair center. I think this part has a two year warranty, I'm crossing my fingers. But, it looks like my sewing projects are on hold. I guess it is back to scrapbooking if the weather stays nice. David moved my things out to the garage and set me up a crafting area where I can leave my mess out in the random nook in our garage. Sydney will like that because then she'll finally be able to play with the sidewalk chalk we bought last week (it has been cold and/or rainy every day since.)

And, because I think it is cute, here is Elle's coming home outfit. The skirt is a 0-3, but it looks huge compared to the other things. We'll see if it fits or not. I'm dying to see how big she is when she gets here. According to my e-mails she should be finished growing height wise now and is just fattening up, although she should be around 5.5 lbs. Sydney was 8.2 at 38 weeks, so I guess we'll just wait and see.