overheard

Mom: Elise, your hair looks so pretty!
Elise: You hair not look pretty, Nonny (Mommy).

*****

Jr Primary has been really rough and crazy the last few weeks, and today my plans weren't working. I was flustered and ad-libbing when this happened.

Sis. Casaday: We've been singing a lot of Christmas songs. Why do we even care about Christmas?
Unidentified child: Presents!

*****

One of Elise's new favorite words is "actually." (It's funny and sometimes scary to see what Brian and I must say a lot based on what words and phrases she starts saying. We're not sure where she picked up "oh gosh" though.)
Elise (on potty): Need toilet paper.
Mom: Did you pee in the potty?
Elise: Um, actually, I didn't.

*****

Mom: Elise, take one more big drink before we go upstairs.

Elise: *gulp* One. *gulp* Two. *gulp* Three. *gulp* Four!

*****

Other favorite phrases are "not really" and "a little ____." For example...

Mom: Elise, did you poop?

Elise: Um, not really.

Elise (looking at plate of food): It's hot.
Dad: Is it?
Elise: Um, no, a little warm.

life with a toddler

We taught Elise about the "got your nose" game a while back, but she has started to take it a step further. It's not uncommon for her to walk up to me and say, "Mommy, I hungry. I eat you nose?" She then grabs my nose and mimes putting it in her mouth.

With that in mind, this conversation happened...
E: Mommy, I eat Au-ee [Audrey's] nose?
*grab's A's nose and "eats" it*
Me: Oh, no! Now Audrey has no nose! What is she going to do?
E: Um, get new nose?
Me (chuckling): Where is she going to get a new nose?
E: Um, store?

*****

I sat down and took a few bites of cereal one morning.
E: I eat Mommy's cereal?
*I try to give her one bite*
E: No! I want bowl!
*E grabs the bowl and drags it down the table to her seat, then eats the entire bowl*

helper

Elise has been a great helper since Audrey was born. She's so proud of being "Mama's big helper." I suspect that somehow led to this conversation:

Elise: Where Daddy go?
Mama: He went in the bathroom.
E: Daddy go pee?
M: Yeah, I think he probably is.
E: I help Daddy go pee?

little singer

I was doing something in the kitchen the other day when Brian came in and asked if I had seen what Elise was doing. Here's the video I took:

I didn't catch it in this one, but she had been putting the little book (a coupon book we got in the mail) in the door track and acting like she was playing the piano. She'd flip pages every once in a while and continue singing and "playing." We think she's adorable. :)

overheard

Not long ago, we had the sliding glass door to our patio open. At some point, Brian looked up and freaked out.
Brian: There's a cat in our house!!
(Our neighbors have an outdoor cat that must have found its way onto our patio.)

*****

Brian (fending for himself for dinner): Where would I find a large bag of [food storage] rice?
Amy: Umm, in the bathroom...

overheard (Primary edition)

When we sing the Hello Song to visitors, I often ask them if they know how to say "hello" in a different language to spice it up a little.
Amy: Do you know any other languages?
Visitor (4 years old?): Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.
I had no idea how to respond to that, so we sang, "Twinkle, twinkle...we welcome you today!"

*****

Back in December, I had my sub teach the kids a little about musical notation (staccato vs. legato, pp vs. ff, fermata). It provides an easy way to repeat songs without the kids getting bored, so I used it again with Sr Primary a few weeks ago.
Amy: Do you remember what legato means?
Excited kid in back of room (I still have no idea who): Silently!

****

At the beginning of the year, I found a cute idea to help the new Sunbeams remember to stay in their seats. I put little paper eggs on their seats and told them they needed to keep the eggs warm so they could see what they were helping to hatch by the end of Sharing Time. If they did pretty well, I had little papers to hand out that said "I hatched a ______ by being reverent in Primary" (the blank had a picture of whatever bird or animal they hatched that week. The first week, I handed out the papers and heard a very excited little girl exclaim, "I hatched a chicken!"

*****

When I started teaching Children All Over the World, I wanted to emphasize the ways to say "thank you" in other languages first. To get the kids excited about it...
Amy: Do you know any other languages?
J (4): Dutch!
(His Mom, the newly-called 2nd counselor, burst out laughing and explained that he says that all the time at home, even though he doesn't speak a word.)

*****

I was using some pictures from the Gospel Art Kit (thanks, Mom!!) to teach Follow the Prophet. Holding up a picture of Adam and Eve walking through the Garden of Eden, I asked if anyone knew who it was. The kids (Jr) were, not surprisingly, having trouble identifying them. Suddenly, a younger kid raised his hand.
R (4): It's Adam and Eve!
R's dad (looking at R's mom - they teach another class): Did you teach him that? I didn't!

body parts

We've been working with Elise on learning various body parts, and she's getting pretty decent with some of them (there are still a lot she doesn't know consistently). One of the ones she picked up recently was "hair."

Last night, I was reading some books to her. I noticed in the the middle of one of the books, But Not the Hippopotamus, she started putting her hands on top of her head. I was trying to figure out why and just assumed she was being silly. Then I realized it was around the time I said, "while the moose and the bear and the goose and the hare are doing their best to keep up with the rest." Hare? Hair? Sounds the same to our cute little girl. ;)

P.S. I love that book. And almost anything else by Sandra Boynton.

overheard

Brian was trying to map out a running trail the other day by looking at Google maps.

B: There's this river. There might be a trail by it. Or homeless people.

*****

Elise loves to babble now and frequently wakes me up in the morning by talking. One morning, Brian had brought her into our bedroom so I could feed her in bed, and she was happily babbling when she was done. It was mostly "ba ba, ma ma" which sometimes turned into "ba ma." At one point, she threw an "o" in front and very clearly said "O-ba-ma." I had to run and tell Brian, because clearly we have some very serious teaching to do. ;)

*****

And now, for fun, a picture of Elise napping in her car seat after church (taken 10/20/13).

I Have Become THAT Woman

I couldn't believe the words I heard myself say this morning.

I went up to Rancho Bernardo to drop off our security deposit (that's a story for another post), and the two people helping me at the property management company got me talking about kid-related things. Of course they thought Elise was adorable. :) Anyway, the guy (Jay) mentioned that they don't have a lot of people bring their kids in, but one time he was afraid a lady was going to have her baby right there. She was due that week and they had come in to sign their lease, but she had to stop and sit down because of contractions. Jay said he was freaking out and asked if he could get her anything - water, a chair, etc. At that point, something from my birthing class came back to me, and it slipped out my mouth before I could filter it.

I said something like this:

"You know, water is a good thing in that situation. The uterus is a muscle, so if it's dehydrated, it can become stressed and start contracting..."

Can you say awkward? Yup, that's me.

Dastardly Faces

Sometimes we play with the baby, but luckily the baby just plays along.

noises

'Lise-y Bean started experimenting with her voice on Sunday. She was making these adorable and sometimes hilarious noises, and when I would react/laugh, she would flash these huge grins. We tried to get pictures, but she pretty much stopped doing it when we pulled out the camera. However, she has continued her vocal explorations periodically the last 2 days. (I'm kind of sad Brian is out of town - in San Antonio for a conference - because he loved it on Sunday and it has gotten even cuter since then.) I tried, mostly unsuccessfully, to get video of it today. Our cameras don't take wonderful video, but here's the best one I could get (sorry about the background buzzing, I think there's something wrong with the mic):

I don't know how to edit video, or I would have cut out the parts when she's not doing anything. It's not that long, so deal with it. ;) 

She's actually napping on me as I write this. She has started smiling in her sleep more frequently, and a few minutes ago she accidentally woke herself up briefly because she was laughing. I'm debating about putting her down for the night right now vs. waking her up in an hour or so to feed her one last time. And yes, she's basically sleeping through the night now (at least, on most nights). The other night, I fed her at 10 and put her down (slightly awake but happy) right after. She fell asleep on her own and didn't wake up again until 6:30 - although I woke up twice before that because my body was wondering why she wasn't up. ;)

Happy Earth Day!

Dear Mom and Dad,

I know it's your anniversary, so I decided to give you the best gift I could think of - a good night's sleep.

Love,
Elise

Yup, she slept pretty well on Sunday night and only got up to eat around 2:15, 6:30, and 10. I thought it was a great anniversary present from our sweet little 'Lise-y-bean. (That's what I call her - pronounced "lease-ee-bean" - but I still haven't figured out a good way to spell it.)

On a funny note, E was rooting on Brian a little tonight. I wasn't able to feed her right away, and for some reason, Brian thought she might like to try latching on his nose. (I'm still laughing really hard as I write this.) Sure enough, when held up to his nose, she chomped right down. It was very unsatisfying, I'm sure. She even tried sucking on it for probably 10 seconds but then got frustrated and gave up. His reaction ("Gross, baby!") was hilarious considering it was his idea. I guess it's because he's actually tried it before (??), but she never actually latched on and tried sucking.

silly baby

My mom and I thought it was hilarious when E spit up and pooped on Brian as well as losing her umbilical cord - we laughed pretty hard. I shouldn't have been so quick to laugh because I changed her later and had almost the same thing happen. Ok, she only pooped on me, but it was quite similar to what happened to Brian. I guess we both fail the Diapering Skills Test.

 ***

*E, falling asleep while eating*
Brian: Baby, wake up if you want to play with Daddy.
*E's eyes open suddenly*
Amy: Do you want to play with Daddy?
*E finishes eating and gives Brian a huge grin (which was surprising because she's never given us smiles that big before)*

***

Brian: Baby, I wish I knew what was going on in your head. I don't know what you're thinking about, but since you're my daughter, I'm guessing you're scheming.

baby fun

Brian came back from changing E's diaper, and she immediately began filling the new one.

Brian (to E): Baby, you're making me nervous.
Amy: Why?
Brian: Because she's filling her diaper and laying on me. And she's not wearing clothes, so I have no protection.
Amy: It's a test to see how well you put on her diaper.
Brian: I didn't know it was going to be a test.

About 5 minutes later, E started coughing/choking and spit up on Brian. When he lifted her up so I could wipe him off, I noticed that poop had, indeed, escaped the diaper and made it onto Brian's shirt. Not only that, but she had lost her umbilical cord and it was laying on him (which he also thought was a little gross).

Brian has now been initiated.

real Halloween

Our ward Halloween party was several weeks before Halloween this year. My costume was a little cumbersome, so I decided I wouldn't wear it on the actual holiday. (It would have been nearly impossible to get any work done.) Fortunately, Laura couldn't resist sending me a really cute shirt that I ended up wearing that day instead.

That's right, I have a skeleton baby.

Slightly bigger baby bump! 19 weeks

No, I'm not 9 months pregnant...just really good at sticking out my belly.

overheard

Brian: It's almost your birth month!
Amy: Yup!
Brian: How old are you turning again?
Amy: I'm getting old. 27. Man, I'm old to be having babies. I should have started having kids, like, 10 years ago!
(Yes, sometimes I speak before thinking.)


Amy (to Brian): I have decided the baby feels like a worm [when it moves]. Did you feel your worms when you had them?


Oh, yeah, and the baby is a girl. :) Apparently Brian and I are breaking the mold - all of my siblings had boys first. (Although 3 of Brian's 4 sisters had girls first, so I guess it's not that crazy.)

Halloween

Tonight was our ward Halloween Party. We decided to go with the "bun in the oven" theme, and turned Amy into an oven. I, of course, am the baker.

We were quite satisfied with how the oven turned out, especially considering we started it last night.

makes me laugh

What's wrong with this picture? (You may need to click on it to take a closer look.)

stolen from Ellen's website

Also, I want to buy this book.

overheard

Warning: This could be considered a little inappropriate, but I think it's hilarious. Don't read if you think you might be offended.

Brian has told me this story from his mission before, and I laugh every time I hear it. (You need to know the story in order to have context for our conversation.)

Apparently the zone went out for ice cream after a meeting one day. One elder went up to the woman at the counter and asked, with a broad smile, "Tem sorvete?" (translation: Do you have ice cream?) Unfortunately, although this particular elder had been in the field for about a year, his Portuguese pronunciation was still not very good. The woman, therefore, heard something like, "Tem absorvente?" ("Do you have a tampon?") Hesitantly, she answered, "Sim." ("Yes.") Not realizing what she was thinking, he responded cheerfully, "Dá-me um, por favor." ("Give me one, please.") She slowly reached into her purse, pulled out a tampon, and handed it to him.

Now for our conversation tonight...
Brian *excitedly running into living room*: Comemos absorvente esta noite?
Amy *pausing to think hard*: Tampons! We're not eating tampons!

overheard

Brian: You're cute, and you smell good.
Amy: I'm glad you said that. Because if you told me I was ugly and smelled bad, I would be sad.

I was studying in the library the other day. However, there was a kid at the table next to mine who had several friends with him and was talking fairly loudly. I didn't really get anything done, but I was definitely entertained by some of the things he said.

*working on a physics quiz and apparently really struggling*
"Dude, I don't even know what a 'sellist' is. C-E-L-L-I-S-T. Seelist? Sylist? It's something in a ****ing orchestra."

*to his friend*
"I know what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna turn to drugs. It's the only way, man."

*later, to the same friend*
"You wanna know why my phone's broke (sic)? I threw it as hard as I could against the wall."

Gotta love OSU. :)