Adventures in La La Land

1. This week, Lucy and I worked on letter E. We made an envelope E  and an eyeball e:  Lucy did not want her picture taken while she was making it: 2. Lena woke up with a nasty cold on Wednesday. Throughout the night on Tuesday I noticed her snorting and choking a lot, and when I got her out of bed Wednesday morning I realized why. She was so stuffed up and gagging on her snot. Plus her eyes were a watery mess. Poor baby. I became pretty adept with the nasal aspirator this week! Fortunately, she reacted to her sickness by sleeping a ton, and got over it very quickly. She's still a little snotty, but for the most part, she's healthy again. 3. I think I got a form of her cold in my eye on Thursday. It was totally bloodshot and hurt like the dickens. I told Justin I felt like there was a piece of glass lodged under my eyelid scratching my eyeball! Fortunately, I saved the eye drops the doctor gave me last time I got pink eye, used those for a couple days, and it seems to...

We drove down to Rockford today for Lena's scheduled weight check. It has been exactly a month since we were there last. The nurse took us back to the room, told me to strip Lena down and asked, "Now why are you here?" I told her the PA was concerned that Lena didn't gain enough weight between her 1 and 2 month appointments. The nurse responded, "She sure doesn't look underweight to me!" Lena weighed in at 11 lbs, 2 oz. today - up 17 ounces from last time. Over a pound. I did a little happy dance and we went on our merry way. (We weren't even scheduled to see the doctor - it was strictly a weight check.) I just got a call from a different nurse saying the PA went over Lena's stats and wants me to start her on formula because she's not gaining sufficiently. Are you kidding me?!?! I'm really not liking this PA and wish our own stinkin' doctor would come back from maternity leave! I asked what percentile Lena's at and the nurse s...

I took these pictures in a hurry, couldn't figure out the lighting, and intended to re-do them today, but Lena woke up with a cold and is too miserable for a photo shoot. Point being: I didn't get any smiling pics this month. Sad. Anyway, aside from the recent cold, Miss Lena is doing well. I will regret writing this, but she seems to be outgrowing the colic. She's been much better the past couple of weeks. She still has her moments of screaming, but they're few and far between. Whew! Her routine is pretty much the same as last month: She usually wakes up between 7 and 7:30, is still nursing every 2 hours (if she's awake - I don't wake her up!), is awake for about an hour at a time before she's ready for another nap, and naps anywhere from 1-4 hours. (In the swing) She's still doing one long stretch at night - usually around 6 hours - and then is up every 2-3 hours after that. She nurses quickly and goes back to sleep. (Still sleeping in the Roc...

I take zero credit for this idea. It is purely inspired by notimeforflashcards.com (specifically this post). But here is our interpretation of it: We started by taping 2 pieces of construction paper together. Lucy loves to tape. Then I drew a big "E" outline so she knew where to put the glue. Finally, we glued the envelopes in place. I wrote an uppercase E on the top and bottom envelopes and a lowercase e in the middle. I found some pre-cut construction paper squares from a project we had done a long time ago and wrote E's on them.  Then Lucy put the big E's in the uppercase E envelopes and the little e's in the lowercase e envelope. (Whew! Follow that?) Please excuse the Elmo pajamas that are 2 sizes too small. Finally, we broke out the paints. The original project on notimeforflashcards.com said to decorate the envelopes with markers, but Lucy would have none of that. She doesn't think a project is complete unless it is painted. Haha. ...

1. This week we worked on the letter "D." I didn't really like the lesson in the curriculum I usually follow, so we just did our own thing. On Monday, we made paper donuts , decorated them, and turned them into lowercase "d's." Later on in the week we talked about D avid and Goliath and did a coloring page. And of course we had to get some actual donuts to snack on, too! 2. I woke up Monday feeling kind of nauseous and weird. I'd had a clogged milk duct for a few days, so when I spiked a fever and started getting the chills and body aches, I looked up the symptoms of mastitis online. From kellymom.com: Typical mastitis symptoms include a fever of 101.3°F (38.5°C) or greater, chills, flu-like aching, malaise and systemic illness. I have heard such horror stories of mastitis, that even though I wasn't in agonizing pain yet, I decided to call the doctor and see what he thought. Of course, it was after hours, and I got the mean doctor. He sa...

Thursday, April 18, 2013 7:30  Lena  wakes up. I turn on the TV in anticipation of Lucy waking up and start nursing  Lena . 7:43 Lucy climbs into my bed. 7:58 Change  Lena ’s diaper and notice she soaked through her clothes. 8:00 Pick out some clean clothes for  Lena . 8:01 Lucy throws a fit that she wanted to pick  Lena ’s outfit. 8:03 Help Lucy pick a new outfit for  Lena . Get  Lena  dressed. 8:05 Snuggle with  Lena . 8:08 Put on bra, grab some clean undies for Lucy. 8:09 Lucy cries that she wanted to pick out her own undies. Let her pick her own undies. 8:10 Start down the stairs. Lucy cries that she wants me to hold her hand down the stairs. 8:11 Put Lucy’s undies on. Put  Lena  in bouncer. 8:12 Help Lucy make a waffle. 8:17 Lucy cries that I got the waffle out of the toaster when she wanted to do it. 8:18 Lucy spills her gummy vitamins all over the floor. I pick them up. 8:20 I start to pe...

Lucy and I made donut d's today. First, we cut out the circle shapes. I have a circle cutter in my scrapbooking supplies, but you could just trace around a cup or something. Then we cut "sprinkles" out of construction paper, and glued them on our donuts. Finished donuts: She found my scrapbooking stickers and wanted to put those on too. Finally, I cut out some straight lines and showed her how to assemble the donuts into d's! I think tomorrow we might take a field trip . . . to the donut shop. ;-)

1. I forgot to mention one of the new recipes I tried last week. It was so amazing, I'd be doing you all a serious disservice by not sharing it:  Reese's Peanut Butter Pie . Picture from couponcousins.net I have been seriously obsessed with Reese's peanut butter cups lately. I actually bought 2 bags of pb cups when I went shopping for ingredients - one for the pie, and one to eat while I made the pie. Hahaha. 2. We were really busy this week, so we didn't do much for the letter C - only what I've already written on facebook. On Monday, we read the story of Joseph, then made a Joseph puppet out of a lunch sack wearing a coat of many colors. Lucy loves any excuse to paint and play with googly eyes. :-) Then we made cookies and listened to the Cookie Monster song "C is for cookie." Lucy was afraid of Cookie Monster's gravelly voice. Haha. During her ER debacle yesterday, I wondered for a minute if we'd be learning "C is for cast." ...

Last night, Lucy was sitting on the floor after her bath and Justin pulled her up by her hands into a standing position. She immediately started screaming bloody murder. At first, we thought she was just being a whiner, but as the night went on and the crying didn't let up, we realized there was probably really something wrong. She kept saying her elbow hurt, and refused to bend or move it. We put her to bed with an ice pack and a dose of Tylenol, hoping she'd feel better in the morning. No such luck. She cried all night. I ended up laying on the floor of her room in the middle of the night for a while. At one point, she wanted me to read to her, but it was 2:00 am and I didn't want to turn the lights on and wake her up more than necessary. So I quoted "Goodnight Moon" from memory. Haha. It seemed to satisfy her! This morning, I carefully slid her into her carseat, dropped Lena off at Niki's, and took Lucy down to the children's ER. When I describe...

1. This week, we worked on letter B. The butterfly craft is something I made up with Chase and Lyla years ago. The bee craft came from notimeforflashcards.com .  I came across this free preschool curriculum online this week. I totally love it! It's based on the letter of the week theme I've already been doing, but includes a Bible story, and activities for every day.  The lesson that goes with B is Jesus in the b oat. I told Lucy the story of Jesus and his disciples caught in a storm. I explained that Jesus made the storm stop by shouting "Storm, stop!" (Complete with sticking our hand out like the "Swiper, no swiping" motion on Dora. Haha.) I told Lucy that Jesus had the power to stop the storm because he is the b oss of the weather. Haha. Hence the little catch phrase below. Lucy decorated the plate (I drew the windows), taped on the popsicle stick, cut out the triangle flag, and glued it on.  2. I tried out a few new recipes this week. T...