More Adventures in Pictures

Well, that title is probably misleading.  Because life hasn't really been all that adventurous lately.

Transitioning to a toddler bed has not been easy.  Like I said, I have a whole blog post about transitioning roaming around in my head.  And I want to get it written out...  But there are about 50 other things competing for my time.  And the other things are winning.  But yeah...  The toddler bed thing has been a challenge.  And we've had a sleep-deprived family multiple nights in a row.  I am currently crossing my fingers, eyes, toes, and anything else crossable that we are getting out of the woods on this one. 

But here are a few pictures just for an update. 

This little one loves to run and play hide and seek.  She also has a new obsession with running around in just a diaper.  This particular evening, I decided I wasn't going to waste a disposable diaper for 2 hours of use, so I put her in a cloth one instead.

And she just looks so stinkin' cute in these cloth diapers that I had to snap a picture.  But this kid doesn't sit still for anything!  She's always on the run ;).

And this is me at 29 weeks (yesterday).  It had been a rough night Monday night with the toddler bed adventure, and I think it shows all over my face -- my lack of sleep, etc.  Also, Lynnaea has had another cold, so that hasn't helped matters much.  But thankfully the cold is on its way out, so hopefully things will improve on all fronts!

Not Enough Time in the Day!

Somehow, every day, I find I have more things I want to do (or have to do) than I have time to do them in!  And things fall to the way-side.  Crazy how that works!  It probably doesn't help that I took a nap with my munchkin today.  We are transitioning her to the toddler bed (so that she doesn't feel like she gets pushed out by Baby when it's time for Baby to start sleeping in the crib...) and it's kind of a rough thing right now.  In fact, I have a whole blog post I penned in my head at 3:00 in the morning a couple nights ago while I was trying to get my baby girl back to sleep.  It seems I do my best thinking and "writing" at 3 in the morning...  when I don't write it down.

I may try to recapture it all in typing someday soon.  I'd like to.  But I'll refer to the above statement about not enough time and leave it at that ;).

That said, I will post a couple pictures. 

She has loved playing in boxes.  So we now keep a couple in box form (rather than flat) just for her playing pleasure.  She has also decided that little doggie is hers.  He was once mine -- some 30 years ago.  I'm glad to pass him on to my sweet girl.

Another box picture.  To remind us in the years ahead that Lynnaea was a daring child.  This box was sitting on other empty boxes.  Not the most steady of situations.  But she was determined to climb into it.  And she succeeded.  She has also decided she likes to run around the house without pants on.  Which is only okay if we are watching her.  Because she's also been known to take off her own diaper on the sly when no one is around.  Then streak through the house.  Which wouldn't be such a big deal... if she was potty trained ;).

Because we always do selfies, my Lynnaea and I.  This was Sunday evening.  She was saying "cheese!" along with me. 

And this was today.  28 weeks.  Officially in the 3rd trimester.  Do I look tired in that picture?  I was.  I always am.  Maybe it's the low iron, which I found out I have from my blood draw last week.  I'm taking an iron supplement now, but I think it's a little crazy to take something like 350% of the recommended daily amount of iron.  So I'm only doing that every other day.  But maybe I should do it daily?  I don't know. 

The good news from the blood draw is that I don't have gestational diabetes!  I'm always sweating that one, because I am sure I deserve to have it...  I crave nothing but junk when I'm pregnant (mostly chocolate) and have little to no will-power.  Sigh. 

In other news:  Lynnaea's hand is much better -- we haven't even needed to put on band aids!  She was a trooper.  She'll still show it to you if you ask about her owie.  She'll also give it kisses every now and again when she notices it.  Can I just say I have an amazingly sweet and precious little girl?  She truly is a joy.

"Oh Barnacles!"

Okay, so I've never been a particularly huge fan of Spongebob Squarepants.  I mean, there has always been something disturbing to me about a cartoon in which Mr. Crab lives in Bikini Bottoms.  I'm just sayin'. 

But I've recently discovered how oh-so-appropriate that line from said cartoon: "Oh barnacles!" can be.  Unfortunately.

So Saturday was another beautiful day here in Western Washington.  Seriously gorgeous.  Sure, a little on the chilly side.  But beautiful and sunny.  Cloudless sky.  Jeremy was not scheduled to work the weekend, and I felt like we should get out and do something fun.  Something different.  And so we did.

We went to the store to buy a Discover Pass (required for parking in State Parks now -- but we figure this has it's benefits, since fewer people want to pay for said pass and therefore the beautiful park is not crowded).  We also got picnic stuff.  We stopped at Lowe's for Jeremy to grab some stuff.  And then we headed to the State Park. 

Lynnaea had a blast.  (Well, at least at first).  We started out playing at the playground area.  She threw little rocks, rode the teeter totter and her first big girl swing.  She went down the straight slide.  She even had the guts to climb the ladder for the slide by herself with neither me nor Jeremy nearby.  Which sort of gave me a heart attack and I made Jeremy go over and stand near her. 

This was her first time going up the ladder -- and it was a supervised climb.

Here she is reaching the top and getting ready to go down the slide (Jeremy climbed up behind her and got her seated for the slide).  I never did get a picture of her sliding down, because I was always waiting at the bottom.

Traipsing around in the gravel, which she also enjoyed throwing and putting in the swings ;).

It was nice in the sunshine, because it wasn't too chilly.

Here she is getting ready to put rocks in the swing.  We had to convince her to teeter-totter.

But once she'd tried it, she loved it!

Eventually we started hiking down the trail to the water.  We took our bag of picnic stuff with us.  She wasn't as sure about the uneven, unpaved road, so she liked holding hands.  Until she got braver.  Then she wanted to do it on her own.  Little miss independent.

Unfortunately I didn't take any other pictures.  But here's how the rest of the story went: 

We ate our lunch.  We wrapped my sweater around Lynnaea while we ate, since we were in the shade and it was colder there and she was an ice cube.  She hated being wrapped in my sweater (I'd left her jacket in the car like a dodo...).  But we made her tolerate it.  Then we went out on the dock.  We showed her the water.  The tide was out, so we went down under the dock on the beach and let her grab sand.  And then, after we'd been down there all of 3 minutes, she ran away from Jeremy, tripped, and landed on a barnacle.  And sliced the base of her right palm open. 

Oh my gosh.  Blood.  So. much. blood.  It was awful.  She cried worse than I've ever heard her cry.  I held her hand to my sweater (which by this point was back on me, since we were in the sunshine).  I didn't care how much blood got on it.  In fact, I didn't even think about that.  I wanted to get as much blood off her hand as possible so I could see the wound.  But the blood kept seeping out.  Jeremy took all the stuff and hauled buggy up to the van (a very steep incline which he practically ran up).  I took her to the little bathroom (that lacks soap) and washed her hand off as best as I could.  She really didn't like that, though.  But she had calmed down quite a bit by then and was just looking at it and touching it with her other hand.  Which I discouraged, as I was trying to minimize germs.  We got some toilet paper and I held it to her wound as much as she'd let me.  And that thing just kept on bleeding.  Jeremy pulled up and we loaded her up.  She started crying again, because I drove home and Jeremy sat in the back.  And, being that she was so exhausted and now traumatized, she wanted to sleep.  And she sucks her thumb.  On her right hand.  Which we couldn't allow her to do with it dripping blood everywhere.  So Jeremy wrapped her hand with his sweater and held it.  She finally fell asleep as we sang to her I am a Child of God.  She got about a 10 or 15 minute nap on the way home.  And then we had to wake her up when we got her inside so we could clean her wound. 

Oh so sad.  We washed with soap and water.  It had stopped bleeding during the drive, but started again while we doctored it.  However, we were able to get a better look at it, and it wasn't super deep.  Long-ish (especially on a toddler hand).  But not deep.  We dumped hydrogen peroxide on it -- and she just kept crying.  We put antibiotic ointment on it and a band-aid and paper tape wrapped around so she wouldn't mess with the band-aid.  She wasn't thrilled.  But we managed to get her into her pajamas and I just held her until she calmed down.  And then we gave her a million treats.  Is this parental guilt, or what? 

So far, so good.  We've been praying that there would be no infection.  We clean it and re-dress it every day.  It's looking not-so-bad, and I finally snapped a picture tonight after her bath.

"Oh barnacles" is right, Spongebob.  My baby's first major wound, and it was thanks to a barnacle.  Not my favorite first in the whole wide world.  But I guess this is a welcome to toddler-hood for me!

And just a note:  she has been the biggest trooper ever since.  She doesn't cry when we clean it and re-wrap it.  She watches intently and wants to touch it.  But she lets us do what we need to, and she doesn't cry.  I think she's amazing!

Sunshine Week

Well, while many other areas of the Country were having crummy weather (though many in Alabama welcome the snow as they almost never have it), we have enjoyed a full week of sunshine!  It's been wonderful!  So here's a recap of some of our week in pictures.  At least the part of the week that I actually documented by taking pictures ;).

Monday, Jeremy (who is on swing shift this month) took Lynnaea to a nearby park.  We walked there.

She was waving at her shadow.

She explored the park slide, etc.  And enjoyed herself.  Until a minor tragedy occurred on the big twisty slide.  She doesn't understand the importance of leaning back while sliding, so when her foot snagged on the slide, she went toppling forward into the side of the slide at a turn and scraped her eyelid.  And then she was seriously done and ready to go home.  Poor thing.  She recovered about 5 minutes later on our walk home.

This was the little slide.

This was the first (successful) trip down the big twisty slide.

Me at 26 weeks.

My cute little bug.  She's getting so big!

She almost never sleeps on her back.  So when she does, I know she was tuckered out!  We need to move her into a toddler bed one of these days -- soon.  But there's a part of me that just wants to put it off.  Mostly because she sleeps better (and usually longer) in the crib. 

Bedtime routine takes on all sorts of adventures.  Sometimes we brush our teeth with fire hats on (yes, Mommy needs one too...).  Sometimes we brush and floss bunny's teeth too (her little stuffed rabbit).  Sometimes we wipe the mirror with water and then dry it with the hand towel.  And sometimes we lick the mirror...  (And by we in most of those cases, I mean Lynnaea ;)).  It's true:  motherhood is an adventure and a surprise.  You just never know what's in store!  But I think it's pretty darn cute, these little things my sweet girl likes to do while she gets ready for bed.  She has really taken to nurturing her bunny and flamingo.  She will rock them and give them kisses and include them in her play time.  She also includes them in clean-up time.  She is amazing.  She also knows how to blow kisses now and will say "I you too" when you say "I love you!"  Or if you ask her to say I love you to someone else (like Grandma). 

Anyway, today we took an hour walk around our neighborhood.  She picked some flowers.  Picked up and threw rocks.  She's not a prissy little thing.  But she is a nurturing sweetheart.  It's been a joy to watch her little personality blossom and take shape.