First Haircut!

In the craziness of Gracie being sick, I totally forgot to blog about her first haircut! We had it done on Nov. 15, because she had these wispy little hairs around her forehead that kept getting in her eyes. We figured it couldn't hurt to shape up all the curls, either. We went to Snip-Its, and had a really good experience with them, despite a rather long wait. They don't take appointments, which I'm not crazy about, but the salon was really cute, with little kid-sized chairs and fun characters. Gracie did fantastic for her haircut. They had some bubbles for her to play with and that was all she needed to keep her distracted. Her hair doesn't look much different, but it curls up more on top of her head now (which is cute but frustrating when it won't lay down).
Here's a few pics of the experience:

Unfamiliar territory

Poor Gracie is sick! She started with mild coughing/stuffiness on Thursday, then by the time we put her in bed on Friday night she had a temp. of 102.4. By Saturday morning, my dear toddler had been replaced with a fireball- 104.3!!!! It was uncomfortable to touch her she was so hot! I called the doc and we took her in that morning. Her flu test was negative, and they drew blood to check her white cell count which was great. So they think she just has a nasty virus and there's not much we can do. I started cycling Tylenol and Motrin today which has helped keep her temp from spiking back up. I'm so hoping she wakes up tomorrow perfectly fine. She really hasn't been in a crappy mood or anything- a little more impatient and clingy, and not eating much, and she has her moments of whiny breakdown, but not too bad. Randy wasn't feeling so hot last night but seems to be ok today, and earlier today I was feeling crummy, but maybe I'm just worn out from worrying about Grace. I sure hope I don't get this crap. At least I'm tracked out this week to take care of her.
Also tonight we were shampooing our carpet in the living room (there were small colonies of nasties living in it!!) and we have a spot where the carpet meets the hardwood where the cats have clawed down to the carpet spikes (we usually keep the spot covered with a rug). Well, I came across the threshold and my feet were wet, and my right foot slipped back onto the carpet and RIGHT into a damn carpet spike! I didn't realize how bad it was cut until I saw I was leaving blood spots on the tile in the kitchen. It probably could've used a stitch or two, but it closed itself up pretty well and didn't bleed too much. It hurt like crazy!!
So, not doing too good around here. At least I got the kitchen cleaned up and the carpet done today. And I'm tracked out so I can't complain too much.

Sorry

I apologize to my few readers that I haven't been posting very often. My computer drives me crazy with its insanely slooooooowww upload times for my large pics, and I'm too lazy to resize them on the OTHER computer that has my resizing program because it takes forever to start up. And I COULD just post a bunch of text, but I know nobody cares what I have to say- you want cute pics, right??
But, I do like to document the goings-on of dear Gracie's life, for posterity's sake. So here goes.
-Singing. This is her newest "thing". She sings the Hot Dog Dance song (hot dog, hot dog, hot diggy dog, and the last 3 words: mouse, club, house!), she sings this funny thing I think she made up, which is more of a rhythm (boopy boopy bap-bap-bap), and today she made up a song about mama-dada. Those were the only words, over and over, but she was definitely singing them. lol!
-I sorry. She likes to apologize to things. If she falls over a toy, she apologizes to the toy (I sorry blocks). If she runs into one of the cats, or the sofa, or the potty, etc., she apologizes to it. Sometimes she apologizes when SHE gets hurt, and sometimes to us. She also says I sorry when one of us sneezes.
-Please. She won't say please. Won't. Makes me mad.
-Eating. She still doesn't eat much half the time. I've just given up. I offer her some food, and she either eats it or doesn't. She never turns down fruit or juice, so she's getting nutrients that way at least.
-ID. She can identify TONS of items in her books. You can ask her to find things, or ask her what something is and have her tell you. Just about any word she knows she can identify.
-Speaking of words... she must know well over a hundred words. At least. She talks NONSTOP, and is staring to link things together. You can see the little schemas in her head expanding as she assimilates and accomodates (thank you, Piaget!). Yesterday she was telling me, in multiple sentences, that she was going to play hockey, with dada, at Jojo's house (our house- she thinks Jonah owns it evidently) on the TV. Too bad there wasn't any hockey on that night.


In other news, I am excited about 2 upcoming events. Marbles Kids Museum is having "A Night with the Elves" in December, and it is dinner, drinks, dessert, REAL SNOW to play in!!!, cookie decorating, pics, and tons of other things for families. It's a fund raiser, and I'm really hoping we can get tickets. A shout-out to Sherry for the info! Also coming in December is Raleigh Winterfest, featuring a natural ice outdoor skating rink on Fayetteville St in downtown Raleigh. So cool! The smallest size skates they have are 9's, but just watch me try to get G into a pair of skates to try out the ice... =)
I have several events to blog and post pics of, Halloween included. I'll do it soon, I promise.

Zoo

I have been slack in uploading pics here in the past couple weeks. We went to the NC Zoo several weekends ago and here are some pics:

Willy the Polar Bear

Riding the carousel

Oh CRAP! There's a mountain lion chasing me!!

Heh.

Who's the monkey on whose back??

Just looking.

This may have been her favorite part: riding the big bus back to our parking lot!!

Adios, Wubbies!

Last Thursday I noticed that Gracie had bitten a hole into the paci part of her dog wubby. Lately she's taken the chewing on them, and the doggie had suffered the consequences. So, I figured, it was time to break our child's heart and put an end to the wubby addiction. When Randy got home, we cut the broken part off the dog, and cut the tip off the duck wubby. We wanted her to still have the animal part as her lovies. We left the frog wubby intact, in case of emergency. We put her to bed with just the "broken" wubby that night, and she fell asleep without incident. However... she woke up around 1:00 whimpering, then whining, the full-out broken heart crying. I was going to let her cry and see how long it took, but Randy went upstairs and after a while ended up giving her the intact wubby. Of course she went right back to sleep.
Friday night, same story, except she woke up shortly after midnight and merely whimpered for a few minutes before falling back asleep withOUT the real wubby! Yeah! Last night she spent with Grandma, so I'm not sure how it went. And tonight, she's gone to sleep just fine, so we just have to hope that she makes it through the night and we'll be well on our way to wubby-freedom!
I also recently started rewarding her for going potty with a piece of candy corn. She's finally to the point that she understands rewards, and now all I have to to is ask if she needs to go potty and remind her of the candy and she runs right for it! Twice on Saturday she pottied on public toilets and I didn't even have candy with me. So, improving there, too!
We've been working on manners, too- getting her to say "please". She'll do it sometimes. Still needs some work.
We had our second Little Gym class yesterday- what fun! I really enjoy it and I think she does too.
Not much else going on. We had Caitie's baby shower for soon-to-arrive cousin Wyatt- I made the cake and diaper cake, which both turned out pretty well! I don't feel like I've had a weekend, so I am hating that I have to go back to work tomorrow. =(

The Little Gym

Before we committed to the little soccer class with Gracie, we wanted to give another structured activity a try. Sherry and Olivia had been encouraging us to try the Little Gym, as a little girl at Olivia's daycare has been going and loves it. They offer a free trial class, so that's what we did this morning. Gracie is technically supposed to be in the "beasts" class (over 19 months), but because we wanted her and Olivia together, because G has never done a class of any kind before, and because the Saturday class combines the "beasts" with the "super beasts (up to 3 years old)", we asked if we could do the "birds" class, and they said that was fine. So, Gracie was the little oddball this morning, but we really enjoyed the class and are probably going to commit to this semester (it goes until mid-January).
The instructor told us that it is normal for the kids to want to explore the gym, and that it is fine for them to do so, as it encourages their independence, and that we should let them wander off (with supervision) if they desired. Which, of course, is EXACTLY what G had in mind for much of the class. But, a big part of the class was free exploration, so it was cool. She also told us that kids at Gracie's age are the big ones for wandering, and it is fine. The class focuses on following directions, exploration, music, play and basic tumbling skills. This morning was "backward day", so many the skills we were shown involved going backward (back handsprings on the octagon and backward rolls on the wedge).
Below are some of the pics from today:

Gracie didn't NEED to hold on to the support bars, but it sure was fun!

Olivia practicing her backward roll (with spot).

Gracie's turn


Check out Olivia on the big balance beam!

Little G

On the air track

Air track (inflated)

Waiting for the air track to inflate

Both girls (and us adults) had a good time- I think this will be a good activity to get Gracie exposed to more kids and have a semi-structured activity to do each weekend!

Teacher

I am thrilled to report that I have FINALLY officially obtained the position of TEACHER for Wake County Schools! It's about time, I know. I get to stay in the science lab, so this is pretty much my dream job. The only downside is that I am being booted out of the main building into a "modular unit" (trailer)- they need my room for a new PreK or something. I'm not thrilled about it, but at least I get control over my own heat/AC, so I won't be freezing anymore. I've been working this week to get my room packed up, and I guess I get to go through to process of re-setting up a new room, which is always fun. I will miss all of my shelves and especially my sink/countertop area. I will have my own bathroom, which is nice, but the sink is lacking in function. I'll have to post some pics when I get all set up. Just wanted to share my good news!

Great Wolf Lodge

At the last minute last week we decided to try to go out of town for the weekend. We weren't sure where to go, but the Outer Banks and Great Wolf Lodge were possibilities. We didn't figure we could get a decent place at the beach, so we looked into the Lodge, talked Grant, Sherry and Olivia into going with us, and made the reservations. We didn't get much of a deal, because of the holiday and it being last minute, but we think it was definitely worth the money! We had a great time. We got a room with 2 queen beds and a small sitting area that had a wall to separate the 2 areas. Sherry made a little fort to separate the pack-n-plays so the kids couldn't see each other:

Here's Olivia playing Peek-a-boo in the curtains (a favorite activity):

The girls hanging out (Gracie is helping Olivia with her shoe):

Hiding behind the curtain was another favorite activity:

Whoa.

We arrived around dinnertime on Saturday, and just kind of hung around in the room then went to eat at the buffet. It was pricey, but the food was good. The service sucked, however. By the end of dinner we had 2 nap-deprived kiddos, and I headed upstairs to put G to be first. The others were soon to follow and Gracie was already asleep. She sleeps like a log, so we got Olivia to bed pretty easily, too. The rest of us stayed up to play Spades until all hours. We only had once incident where G woke up hollering and I thought for SURE she'd never go back to sleep, but she did pretty quickly. She must've been worn out.

The next day we got breakfast at the buffet (we had pre-paid for it, and they ended up giving us 2 days of breakfast accidentally- score!), and Olivia took her morning nap while Randy, G and I hit the arcade. They had a great little arcade and even Gracie enjoyed the little ride-on cars and hitting buttons on some of the games to win tickets.

Once Olivia was up it was time to hit the waterpark. We got the girls suited up with life jackets and they totally enjoyed the water! They had a little toddler area with a couple of slides and sprayers in about a foot or 2 of water. Olivia LOVED the waterslides, and Gracie did at first, then got a little spooked about sitting down at the top. I have a video, but the computer is taking forever to upload, so I'll try again soon. Sherry and I took turns switching off with the Dads to go ride the big rides. The Howling Tornado was great! We also took the girls into the Lazy River and on the big fort.

We ended up with hungry girls about mid-afternoon, so we changed and did a late lunch at a little place next to the Lodge called "Jungle Jim's". The girls took a nice nap then we suited back up for the waterpark again. This time we took the girls on one of the big rides! A family raft ride down a huge tube. We didn't realize that they turned the lights off at night, so it was pretty dark in there. I think they liked it, though.

We finally headed back to the room, stopping for pizza on the way (which took FOREVER!!). We had a nice junk-food dinner and put both girls down to sleep at the same time- and they actually went right to sleep!!! Another evening of Spades (the guys are now even with us girls) ensued.

Monday morning Sherry and I had appointments for a pedicure at the spa, which we thoroughly enjoyed. The guys took the girls for breakfast and then we packed and hit the arcade one more time. Gracie won 25 tickets herself! We ended up with a bunch of tickets and got G a little GWL stuffed wolf as a souveneir, then we finally headed home.

It was a great trip- I would highly recommend the place for families with kids of all ages, and I'm sure we'll go back in a couple years when the girls can do more stuff. They had a great time together, too (you can't beat running up and down the halls, riding on luggage trolleys and the elevator!). Keep an eye for an update to Sherry's blog for more pics.

Kickin' It!

On Saturday, we took Gracie to The Factory to do a trial lesson of the Turf Tikes soccer program. The program is an 8 week session for kids 18-24 months and focuses on following directions (yeah, right!), and basic soccer stuff. It is for parents and kids. Gracie loves to kick a ball around, so we thought she might enjoy it.
She was the only little girl there, and it was evidently the last class of the previous session. Most of the other kids were older (closer to 2) and they seemed to kind of have an idea about what to do. Gracie? Not so much. She was having no part of sitting in the circle, following directions, playing redlight, greenlight or anything else that involved her being told what to do. Now, she wasn't the ONLY kid not doing what everyone else was, but it was obvious that she wanted to do her own thing. She loved kicking around all the soccers balls, and playing in the goal. We did an activity where we built a tower of cones and the ball and she had to kick the ball to knock down the tower- she LOVED that! And was good at it! She also liked the parachute.
We're not sure we're going to enroll her in the class at this point- she's just not ready. But it was fun to see her around other kids and doing something new!

Giggles

Just wanted to share this video of Gracie being attacked by the Tickle Monster. Talk about torture!