Happy Halloween!

Today has been a great day. I am exhausted right now but it's a good kind of exhaustion from being busy all day with Halloween activities. My friend Jessica invited Sydney and I to a potluck lunch at her home. The kids were dressed up in their costumes and the moms brought delicious food. I made my favorite butternut squash soup. It cooks in the slow cooker so I was up at 6:30 preparing it in time for the potluck. Pearl made crab rangoon that was so delicious I couldn't believe it didn't come from a restaurant. It was just great to chat, laugh and bond with a great group of ladies. We didn't leave until 2:00, well past Sydney's nap time. She had fun playing with Katie's Barbie dolls...who knew?
Since Sydney went down for nap so late, 2:30, I let her sleep until 5:00. Then we got ready for trick or treating. She was a black cat this year complete with whiskers painted on her face. She tried to touch her face afterwards but after a couple of "NO NO's!" from her mom she decided to leave her whiskers alone. Our first stop was at my next door neighbor Angi's house where she got a 3 Musketeers bite size candy. From there we went house to house getting lollipops, Milky Ways, a bat ring, lifesavers, etc. Sydney did such a good job holding her Elmo candy bucket and waiting for her candy (or sometimes reaching for candy herself when prompted) and moving on to the next house. She kept up the whole 30 minutes we were out and quickly said "no" when we offered to help carry her bucket. She didn't say trick or treat but she'd say thank you as she walked away. I was taking pictures of her as we were walking. To get her to look at the camera I said "Sydney what does the A say?" Well from that moment on she was belting, yes belting the ABC's up and down the street. No shyness, didn't matter who walked by, and you even heard comments like "is she singing her ABC's"? She got many compliments as people saw a little black cat with an Elmo bucket approaching their door.
We trick or treated about 15 houses on our side then walked over to the next street where there was one house we'd been watching the last month grow and grow with Halloween decorations. The house had a cemetary, a witch hanging from the second floor, blow up monsters, you name it. When we got there we saw that lots of families had the same idea because there was a traffic jam on the sidewalk. What I had thought was one house's decorations was acutally two duplexes joining forces for the ultimate halloween experience. We got candy from the first house and the man told us to walk on the yard and follow the orange lights through three blow up fun houses. So we did, it was pretty neat, and came out to the other duplex where a witch waited with a piece of candy for Sydney. I don't remember decorations like this when I was little! My friends Kate and Crystal live on this side too so we made a stop at their homes. Sydney and Leila got their picture taken together (too cute!) and then we made our way back home. We had dinner, passed out candy, and then sat on the carpet with Sydney and enjoyed our candy. Sydney had a mini Hershey bar, a marshmallow ghost and some smarties candies.
Today is the last day of October and I realize that this has been a very busy month for us. I'm learning to be the mom who plans birthday parties, makes a meal for a potluck and plans out my daughter's costume from the pointed ears to the bushy velcro tail...And this is only the start! Happy Halloween!

A clean bill of health...

Today Sydney had her two year checkup. As we walked into the clinic, I was glad we hadn't been here since her last checkup six months ago. Last winter we were going there several times a week when Sydney had MRSA on her finger. Not a pleasant time...but today Sydney was happy and healthy. Andrew met us at the entrance (a perk of shore duty is your husband can sneak away from work pretty easily unlike on a boat) and said the power was out base wide. This included the clinic so we walked over to the receptionist and she said we could sit and wait until the power came back or reschedule. We said reschedule. On our way out I was reminded by my toddler that I had promised her the raisins she saw me put in her diaper bag on the way out the door. I don't mind Sydney eating in the car, but with the raisins I worry she might choke and I can't reach her. So we sat down in the waiting area as Sydney ate, plus that gave us a little more time with Andrew before he headed back to the office. Two minutes later the power came back on and we went back to the pediatric office to check in. We waited another 20 minutes for the receptionist's computer to boot up and check us in before we were called.

The nurse checked Sydney's vitals, height and weight, she's 34 inches tall and 23.6 lbs (including Zoe). Yes Zoe came for support and now that Sydney is two years old we didn't have to strip her down and put her on the cold baby scale. She stayed dressed and had Zoe in her arms. The nurse said Zoe wouldn't tip the scale much. This was also the first time the nurse could check her temp. without me holding her. She freaked out a little bit when it was time to check her heartbeat but Zoe went first and Sydney saw it was OK. The doctor noticed her spurt in height and said a weight spurt may come too, but not to worry since weight gain slows down after the first year, which it did in Sydney's case. She was also due for her second Hep A shot. Thank goodness she only needed one shot this time. She cried pretty hard and held on tight to Zoe. She won't need any more until her boosters when she's four and she won't need a checkup until she's three. That's the good news. The sad news is that my favorite pediatrician Dr. Powell is no longer at the clinic. I didn't get a letter from Tricare saying we would have a new PCM but I couldn't make an appt. with him, I had to make it with a new doctor, Dr. Wilkinson, who has Dr. Powell's old exam room. Dr. Wilkinson is friendly but I didn't find him to be as resourceful as Dr. Powell. If Sydney is healthy this year we won't be returning to the clinic before we move so in the end it doesn't matter. The Navy moves everyone around, including Sydney's pediatricians.

For dinner tonight I kept it super simple...frozen breaded fish, corn on the cob and rice. Sydney does not like meat or chicken much but she does like fish because she has an easier time chewing it. She'll eat fresh fillets that I get at the commissary but I had not yet given her frozen fish. She doesn't like breaded chicken so I thought she wouldn't care for breaded fish. Well it took a few minutes of inspecting it, trying to brush the breaded layer off (what is that on my fish?) and fussing that the crumbs were on her hands. But once we passed that (and finished two cobs of corn and rice) she decided to take a bite. She liked it. She ate about half of her fish which for Sydney is really good. She eats all of her fruits/veggies and pasta/rice but she ranks her food and will only want to eat the favorite of the day...but tonight she tried everything! We will definitely have this meal again soon!

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun!

Today is the first day in a couple of weeks that I did not have any birthday planning, suitcase packing, unpacking or company planning to do. Nope, just a quiet day for Sydney and I to just spend together. As we ate breakfast I asked Sydney "What should we do today?" "Should we go to the Children's Museum...or the aquarium?" She smiled at me and as she did I thought we should instead just have fun day at home. We started off by reading her favorite book for fall "Clifford's First Autumn". Her favorite part is when Clifford finds a football at a park where kids are playing. He tugs on the football string and runs it in for a touchdown. We found our football and passed it back and forth. I ran to the TV room and put my hands up saying "touchdown!" Then Sydney took the football and ran to the living room and called "touchdown!"
Next we played at the table with a mixture of corn starch and water. This mixture is sooo much fun because the corn starch feels hard when you pick it up, but immediately it slowly runs out of your fingers. I used one of her green bins and added pegs from her peg board set and animals. Sydney liked digging and picking up globs of starch and watching it run out of her hands onto the animals. When it was time to clean up we went to the bathroom sink where she was shocked to see splashes of cornstarch all over her face. Then was gave the animals and pegs a bath in the sink so they could be clean too.
Then it was snack time so we opened up a box of Madeleine cookies that Andrew's mom got us from Stop and Shop. We LOVE madeleine cookies! As Sydney ate her snack I started peeling the apples we picked at the orchard to make applesauce. I gave Sydney a whole peeled apple. She took a bite and said "Mmm, I like it!" She thought the best part was getting to eat such a big apple all by herself. It was funny to hear the munch munch sounds as she ate. The apples cooked all day in the slow cooker and we had some with our dinner. It was the first thing Sydney tried as she had been waiting for and talking about the applesauce all day. I was glad she liked it. I thought it was very sweet, almost too sweet. The recipe called brown sugar and pumpkin pie spice, yet it was SWEET. I had to add cinnamon of course, to make it official applesauce.
So as the apples cooked away and the house started to smell really good, Sydney was singing songs from her dance class. I went to iTunes and downloaded "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" from the Tokens, you know the "Wimoweh" song. It's one of the songs Ms. Joy plays during class so I thought Sydney would enjoy hearing it at home. We played the song for almost an hour as Sydney lead the march around the kitchen, living room, dining room. She gave me maracas and used a yellow plastic toy peg as her microphone and marched saying "bounce, bounce, bounce...". Then she wanted me to sing with her so she took the maracas, gave me a microphone and said "your microphone..." waiting for me to hold it ready to sing. We didn't do anything else...we didn't even get dressed! In the afternoon Andrew was home and he continued the parade, ate our home made applesauce and got to hear all about our just for girls day.

Pumpkin Carving

Tonight we carved a couple of pumpkins from our pumpkin family. We've been collecting them all month, first with a small one from the grocery that Sydney could pick up and carry around easily, then a bigger one (still on the small side) for Sydney to compare with her first pumpkin. She's really into labeling things big and little, naming the two Elmo's in her crib, "Big Elmo and Elmo" and so forth. Then this weekend we went pumpkin picking and picked up three more pumpkins, two medium and one large, and tonight we carved the large one and a medium one. Sydney wasn't too interested at first as Andrew cut the top off but when we showed her the inside she stared at it like "What is all that???" Not being afraid to get dirty she jumped right in and helped scoop out the seeds and flesh. The process took a little longer than her attention span but she was not ready to get down from her chair. So I gave her pieces of the pumpkin as Andrew was carving it out. Once he was done she stared at it wide-eyed. I said "can you say Jack-O-Latern" she paused, thought about it and said "pumpkin!". As we cleaned and carved the second pumpkin she was much more interested since she was now an expert. Andrew carved the first pumpkin with triangle eyes and nose. He did a really good job. I carved the second pumpkin. The triangle eyes and nose are usually my choice but I didn't want to take Andrew's idea so I tried to copy a Jack-O-Lantern picture from the pumpkin carving tool set. Andrew said it looks cool. At least now we have Jack-O-Lanterns!

Pumpkin and Apple Picking!

Andrew's parents are visiting for Sydney's birthday, but their visit wouldn't be complete without a trip to the pumpkin patch. Last year we went pumpkin picking together a couple days before Sydney's birthday so this year we continued our tradition and went to Holmberg Orchards. The pumpkins were already picked and piled together. Sydney quickly went over to pick out the ones she wanted. I was surprised at the size of the pumpkins she could lift. She picked two medium sized pumpkins and was about to pick more when we showed her the group of large pumpkins. She went over, found a big pumpkin she liked...and sat on it! She seemed content sitting on a big orange pumpkin and looking around at all the people picking their pumpkins. We picked out a large pumpkin, Sydney's two medium pumpkins, and butternut squash to make soup. Next we made our way over to the apple trees and picked Rome apples. The apples were huge. Sydney pulled a few off the trees. It was cute to see her use both hands and all her might to get the apples. A couple times she made a frown as she tugged. We'll use the apples for Applesauce, Apple Cake and of course apple snacking! Peggy picked apples for an Oatmeal Caramel Apple cake...I can't wait to try it. She's also made fudge and cinnamon rolls...our favorites. Sydney was so tired from her big morning she fell asleep right away at nap time.

Welcome Baby Dona!

Our close friends, Chuck and Sandy Choi, welcomed their baby girl yesterday, Dona Claire Choi. She was born at 12:57 am and yes she shares her birthday with Sydney, Oct. 23! We went to visit them at the hospital today and let me tell you their baby girl is sooooo precious! She was sleeping when first visited but she slowly tried to open one eye and and the other. Sydney wasn't able to meet Dona because the hospital wouldn't allow children under 12 to visit. So she stayed in the waiting room as Bob, Peggy and Andrew took turns meeting baby Dona. I would be heartbroken to not have Sydney come meet her new baby brother/sister or just not even be able to see Sydney for 2-3 days as we welcomed a new addition. Hopefully when that day comes the hospital we are at is more lenient. Chuck was disappointed too, hoping we could sneak Sydney in since their room was right by the entrance. Oh well, Sydney and Dona will get to meet soon enough. We are already planning joint birthday parties!
Seeing Dona brought back a lot of memories of Sydney as a newborn. Although it's quite different now since I haven't just given birth! I am ready for a second baby and I really want Sydney to have a sibling, but it's not in my hands, it's in God's hands so "God, I am ready for baby number two!" Andrew and I are both ready and planning now but it hasn't happened yet. I'm not anxious yet since I had wanted the second baby to come sometime between Sydney's 2nd and 3rd birthday. With Sydney it took no time at all! We've already been blessed with the sweetest, happiest, most beautiful little girl I wonder how it will be the next time. No matter what Sydney will make a great big sister.

My Little Sydney

Sydney is officially 2 years old today and I officially do not have a baby anymore. I could deny it before...saying to myself she's walking but she's not yet talking or she's walking and talking but she's still under 2 years. Well now she is all of those things and I do not have a baby in my house anymore. I'm am sad but I am also excited in getting to know Sydney in this new way. She is not the little girl she was a year ago or even six months ago. And I can see she is learning about me in new ways too.

Sydney had her birthday party this morning. It was so much fun! My friends Cathy, Mary, Laura and her husband "Q", and their children came to celebrate. The kids and Sydney play so well together on play dates I knew today would be no different. Andrew's parents are in town celebrating and they hit it off so well with everyone too. Sydney loved being sung "Happy Birthday" to again and tonight when Andrew put her to bed he said she sang "Happy To You Sydney" and pretended to blow out candles. Guess she's got the whole birthday thing down. We opened her presents in the evening. We had planned on opening presents after nap time, but Sydney's nap was a little later and we made a trip to ToysRUs afterwards so Andrew's parents could get their gifts. They flew in from Arizona so it worked out better to get presents here than bring them along or ship them. They got her a baby stroller and a baby high chair. She loves them so much! They will be the first thing she goes to tomorrow morning. Andrew and I got her a tricycle with a pole in the back for us to push and steer her around. We walked with Grandpa and Hazel to the mailbox and pushed Sydney along in her trike. It was freezing outside but Sydney didn't care. She has a tricycle! And next will be a bike with training wheels and then the training wheels will come off and...well you get the picture. But tonight she is 2 years old and she is sleeping in her room with her Zoe doll and Elmo and tonight she is my little Sydney.

Our Weekend in Maryland

We had such a blast seeing family and celebrating Sydney's birthday. The trip started off with a stop at my cousin Raj's house. He was at work but Conchin was home with my nieces and nephews. Andrew got a grand tour of their home (it's sooo beautiful) and Hazel got to stretch her legs from the trip and play fetch with the kids. They (with Sydney) played on their neighbors swing set. Sydney's favorite part of the set was the little rock wall. As she would climb up, Ryan and Raina would wait for her at the top and help her up. Aaron gave her his toy car to roll down the slide. She giggled each time the car flew off and landed in the grass. It was sad to say goodbye but we would see them the next day for Sydney's party on Saturday. It turned out to be a great success! I was so great to see everyone and I was so excited Sydney got to play with her cousins. Living so far away it's so important for me that she feels close to everyone. My cousin Deepa and her family gave Sydney a Winnie the Pooh ride on car. She LOVED it sooo much. The kids played with her as she rode it around and then she gave everyone else a turn. She loved being sung "Happy Birthday" so much that that night when she should have been asleep she was sing "1, 2, 3 Happy to youuuuuu".
The party at my Mom's place went really well too. I was going to make another Elmo cake, but it's a lot of work and their just wasn't enough time to bake, cool and decorate it before our friends arrived. It was so great to see Alison again and Melvin looked the same! We chatted nonstop and Sydney loved being sung to again. She got Talking Elmo from my sister, a shake and rattle Elmo doll and outfits from Alison, a Curious George doll from my brother and a Teddy Ruxpin doll from my Mom. I loved Teddy Ruxpin growing up so this gift was especially sentimental. We play it at night when Sydney is in bed. She loves listening to him and knows to undo his shirt and find the green button to make him talk. It's always sad to leave everyone and drive so far away. I just have one more party left, one more Elmo cake and this time we'll get to give Sydney our presents. I can't believe my baby is turning two!

Happy Fall Natalie!

My sister-in-law, Natalie, is in Indonesia right now teaching science courses to high school students at an American school. Recently she asked us to send her pictures of Fall since there are no seasons where she is (it's just very hot and humid). So Andrew, Sydney, Hazel and I went on a walk around the neighborhood and took pictures of the trees changing colors. Sydney is into collecting outdoor items (see first blog) so in her wagon we added leaves for her to look at while we walked around. It really was amazing to stop and look at all of the trees I usually just drive by everyday. The leaves were brightly glowing reds, oranges and yellows. Natalie, I hope the pictures feel like the real thing! We miss you lots!



We are also getting ready for our trip to MD tomorrow. We are celebrating Sydney's 2nd birthday with my family. On Saturday we'll celebrate at my Dad's house with Sydney's cousins, aunts and uncles and then Sunday we'll celebrate with my Mom, sister, brother and a couple of close friends. One is my good friend Alison who was my mentor when I taught Kindergarten in Prince George's Co. The other is one of my brother's best friends from high school, Melvin. We haven't seen him in a decade! I am very excited about seeing everyone again. We were debating leaving in the morning after Sydney's dance class just because she LOVES singing the songs from class. We all have the "Shake About" song stuck in our heads. But we'll leave before her class so we can make it to my cousin Raj's house and spend time with my nieces and nephews. They live about an hour and a half from my Mom's house making it the perfect stop to take a break before finishing our trip.

Elmo....meet Hazel.

So with this entry is supposed to be a picture of my beautiful Elmo cake that I worked on last night. But it's not here, why? You should ask my dog Hazel that question. Yep, when Sydney and I were out yesterday having dinner with Andrew because he had duty, Hazel decided that Elmo looked pretty yummy and ate HALF of the cake. Now the first thought that comes to mind is why didn't I put the cake out of her reach? Well because Hazel never eats off the table, even when I'm not home. The difference was that I didn't give her dinner before I went to see Andrew so she was hungry and that cake looked darn good. Ahhhhhhhhh. Then my frustration over the cake quickly turned to fear that Hazel would get sick and vomit all over the carpet. Luckily she did just fine. I did give her her own dinner which she ate as fast as normal. The funny part is she is a very dainty eater. The half of the cake that was left was completely intact and there weren't any crumbs anywhere. At least I finished the cake so I was able to practice Elmo's face. I need to buy pre-tinted icing (red and black) because those two colors you cannot tint without it horribly staining your teeth and tongue. I had to ask my neighbor and cake expert Crystal what to do about that. Other colors work fine, but to avoid having pink and gray icing you have to put in so much coloring that it doesn't work when you are planning on eating it. But now I have an answer so it looks like everything will work out! I am very excited about baking this cake for Sydney's birthday. It is sooooo good and it'll look like Elmo too!

Look Who's Talking...

Normally when Sydney talks it’s two to four word phrases that she uses repeatedly to talk to us…like “Here you go Mama” when she wants to give me something or “Dada/Mama sit” when she wants us to sit with her or she wants to sit on our laps. Today she started putting sentences left and right. I was reading books with her before her nap when she gave me another book to read. It was a picture book and she opened the last page saying “Can you read, can you read?” I said “Yes I can read this book to you” and pointed to the apple on the page. I said “what’s this” and she replied “No turn the page, turn the page” and flipped to the beginning of the book. Time out. Where are all of these words coming from??? At dinner she loved her chicken and dumplings so much she was licking the plate…that’s nothing new…but when I helped her scoop her food together she pointed to the grains of rice saying “And that one, and that one, and that one”. Hearing her darling little voice in a new way is like a breath of fresh air. I can’t explain it any other way. It’s a new way to interact with someone I love so much and I just want to hear more. Tonight we sang the Leapfrog ABC song “The A says ‘a’, every letter makes a sound…” and she went all the way to the letter U when she lost interest. That is amazing. It is exciting for me to teach her what I’ve been teaching my toddler/preschool kids for so long. I can’t wait for everyone to see her this week as we celebrate her 2nd birthday!

Celebrating Birthdays

Today Sydney had two firsts…her first birthday party for a friend, Leila, and her first time at Chuck E Cheese. Leila, two years old, and her sister Gabrielle, four years old are our neighbors and this week they are both celebrating their birthdays. Their Mom, my friend, Crystal made the most beautiful Cinderella cake (Applesauce Cake) and had Cinderella standing on another cake (Chocolate). The chocolate cake was the foundation and had green icing on top for the grass along with pumpkins and flowers made of gum paste. Crystal you are amazing! Everyone had a great time. Sydney loved trying out all of the games. The cars and the Whack-A-Mole game were her favorites (just check out the pictures next to this entry). She sat with the kids at the party table for lunch and watched the characters perform their show. I gave her a slice of pizza to eat but at first she pushed it away, too interested in what everyone else was doing. So Andrew and I stayed back to snap pictures and chat with parents and then Sydney finally decided that slice of pizza was quite appetizing. She finished it then leaned forward to help herself to another slice from the tray. She had the chocolate part of the cake and enjoyed it too. In just about a week I will be doing all of these things for Sydney. Working on all of the preparations keeps my mind off of the fact my baby is no longer a baby. Last year when she turned one year she started walking the next day. This birthday she is talking, singing, running, the list goes on…As sad as it is so see her grow so fast, it’s just a joy to be a part of it.

Columbus Day Weekend

This has been a GREAT weekend because my brother, Philippe, is visiting us. Every time he visits we spend hours up late playing Nintendo games—Mario Kart, Mario Party, and now Wii Fit-- and everytime my stomach aches from I laugh myself to tears. Even Andrew is in rare form as we play race after race trying to knock each other down to get first place. I don’t know how Sydney doesn’t wake up, but I’m glad she doesn’t. Yesterday we went to the Groton Fall Festival. It was ok. There weren’t any booths that we found interesting enough to stop at, but I did get Sydney two cloth placemants-- Sesame Street and Winnie the Pooh. I have several plastic placemats already but she likes to flip the mats over during dinner. My hope was that the cloth mats would be harder to turn over plus there aren’t any designs on the back—so far so good. We also went to ToysRUs to get Sydney a tricycle for her birthday. She enjoyed sitting on different trikes while we picked out the one we wanted. Philippe also found a power wheels type car that has a long handle in the back you can use to push a kid around in while they pretend to drive. Sydney loved it of course and was pushed by all of us around the aisles, but we’ll stick with a tricycle. While we were there I also found a table a nice large table from Step2 that was big enough to put her crayons, papers, and stickers on with chairs low enough that Sydney could get in and out without tipping the chair over or falling out. It was on clearance, $10 which made it even better. But to top it off another customer had extra 20% off coupons that she was trying to get rid of! So altogether our trip to ToysRUs was a very good one. My only disappointment of the day came when baking my practice Elmo cake for Sydney’s birthday. The cake itself, Applesauce Spice Cake, was delicious, but when I flipped the cake over to take it out of the Elmo pan, his face stuck to the mold. I knew I should have used butter or shortening to grease the pan with the flour, but the mold directions said to use cooking spray and flour. Sydney tasted the cake and really liked it so I have that going for me. I’ll make another cake this week since I have to work on icing in Elmo’s face. I’ll share that cake with my neighbors so we’re not eating nothing but cake!

Welcome!

Hello and welcome to my first blog! I've wanted to start a blog for while except that I do not like to keep journals. I love to read them but I hate to take the time to write them. The flip side is I love to scrapbook and share pictures online, especially since having Sydney. So I will attempt use this blog to share stories, stay in touch and keep my sanity by venting out crazy moments of my day. Hopefully those moments will be few and far between! Right now I am so happy Fall is here! It is my FAVORITE time of year. I love watching the leaves change color and now I have Sydney to go on walks with and collect every leaf, rock, stick and acorn we see…seriously… I bring a lunch bag to hold everything…including our pockets. We’ve been keeping busy with playdates and with Sydney’s Toddler Dance class on Friday mornings. Sydney has gotten used to the idea of watching her teacher, Miss Joy, tell the class what to do. Week one was a different picture as she was learning this concept. She would say “No!” when I would try to help her tap her wooden sticks to the music or would try to wriggle away when we’d hold hands and tip toe to music. Now, week four, she knows when it’s time to hold hands and likes to clap with the class at the end of each song. And when it's time to tap her wooden sticks she watches Miss Joy and copies her movements. She also knows Miss Joy hands out stickers at the end of class and is quick to walk over to wait with her hand out--I think she’s getting the hang of it.