Pregnancy Update

On Wednesday I'll be at 37 weeks. I can't believe that No. 2 is almost here. By the way, that is this baby's in utero name - No. 2. Many of you have asked about the pregnancy, so here is the scoop. This pregnancy has been easier than the last one. I am weighing in 10+ pounds less than I was with Daniel at the same point. The reduced weight gain has helped me to be more comfortable. Generally, I'm feeling fine. My hands and feet are super swollen which stinks. They have been swollen for a while and seem to be getting worse. Writing with a pen hurts these days. Just like the last pregnancy, I'm eating Maalox tablets like breathmints. I guess that's what happens when a baby is smooshing your insides. This baby has been more active than Daniel was. Maybe it is the reduced padding. You can really see this baby move sometimes.

Matt and I keep discussing how we feel somewhat unprepared for this baby. Matt keeps saying that we have not done anything to prepare for this baby. I told him that putting up the Christmas decorations was preparing for the baby :) In all seriousness, we have not done much to prepare for the baby's arrival, but I've done a few things. Matt was suprised to find out that there are clothes in the baby's closet and diapers, too. It is nice that we have most everything from the first time around. The biggest thing we are missing right now is a crib. Daniel's initial fascination with the big boy bed wore off, and he sleeps in the crib again. We are going to be borrowing a crib for a little while until Daniel makes the transition. I don't have the heart to force him into the big boy bed at 20 months.

So we will see what the doctor says on Wednesday, but I think the baby won't come for a couple weeks yet. I'm at a pretty similar stage to where I was with Daniel at this point, and he waited until 1 day before his due date to come.

Wearing mittens is a must for banana consumption

So how did we end up in a situation like this?

Well, I'll tell you. So yesterday after feeding Daniel dinner I was sitting in the kitchen, and Daniel came up to me with his hat and wanted to put it on. Then he came up with the gloves and wanted to put them on as well. Hat and gloves are not really necessary for our house, we do use the heat, but there was nothing particularly wrong with him wearing them either. Then Daniel insisted on climbing up on the stool and was begging to eat a banana from the fruit bowl. At first I kind of resisted letting him eat more since he had already eaten a good dinner, but then I reconsidered. He was probably hungry, and he did eat a good dinner, so I let him eat the banana with the gloves and hat on. He ate almost half of the banana and then shared a few bites with Matt and I. Matt totally cracked up when he walked in the kitchen and saw Daniel doing this. We are slowly but surely learning to go with the toddler flow.

Toddlerhood

We are in the full throes of toddlerhood at the Lee house. Every day I find myself wondering if Matt and I are doing the 'right' things as parents. Luckily Daniel is a fairly happy, curious, and fun kid, but all that curiousity does not come without a need for direction. We have also entered the stage where Daniel really wants to do things like adults. For instance, he would really like to be able to put his shoes and socks on without help. Unfortunately maneuvering his foot into his sock is not something he will master for a long time. This leads to much frusteration.

Another recent development is that Daniel likes to remove the tops to his sippy cups. On one hand, he can manage to drink more than half of whatever is in the cup without spilling or getting distracted. The problem is that the last third usually ends up getting dumped in his lap or on his tray. Not really fun for Mom. This top issue has resulted in more than one meal getting cut short.

Here is a cute picture from Daniel's daycare's Thanksgiving celebration. He really enjoyed showing 'Gamma' (Matt's Mom) all of his friends cubbies and naming all of the people who they belonged to.

A Few Pictures

Last weekend we headed to Waukesha for our godson Jack's baptism.

Here is a picture of Daniel with his bat. He loves the bat. Unfortunately, it has to have frequent time outs since he can't keep from hitting Mommy with it. And to add to the equation, he got a hockey stick yesterday.

Daniel and Lola in the wagon for Halloween.

The trick-or-treaters leaving our house.

Daniel with his buddies Elisabeth and Christopher from across the street.

When Daddy Watches Daniel

Matt is very willing and very good at watching Daniel, but the events never come without a story. I had a meeting at work on Wednesday evening, so Matt go to pick up Daniel and do dinner. I made it home just before bedtime. Well, when I arrived at home I noticed that the changing pad was on the kitchen table. Since it usually resides in the upstairs bathroom I suspected that something was up. My suspicion was that it had to do with messy diapers. Well, I asked Matt why the changing pad was downstairs he said that he would have to give me the whole story after we put Daniel down. I'm thinking, what happened? Matt and Daniel both seemed in rather good spirits, so what could have happened?

So here goes the story. Matt gave Daniel some Cheerios while preparing his dinner. At some point he turned around because Daniel was saying, "Nose, nose, nose, ouch, ouch." Daniel had pushed a Cheerio up his nose a little bit. Matt thought that he needed a tool to help extract the Cheerio, so he dashed upstairs to get the tweezers. By the time he got back down Daniel had shoved the Cheerio much further into his nose and the tweezers were not going to work anymore. Matt, doing what any good parent would, started calling people for suggestions. The first was to go to urgent care. He did not want to do that, so he called the doctor across the street who had a suggestion. Lay Daniel down, plug one side of his nose, blow in his mouth, and duck from the Cheerio flying out of his nose. Thankfully the doctors suggestion worked. Unfortunatelly, the Cheerio hit Matt and fell on Daniel's mouth. Then he ate it :) What a kid!

Games and Daylight Savings Time

Daniel and I started playing a simple game yesterday. Now keep in mind that he is 19 months old when I describe the game. It goes something like this: I sit on the floor in the living room with my legs outstreched. He runs to the other side of the room. I count to three and open my legs. He runs into my arms and screams with glee. We then repeat this for about 20 minutes. I did not realize what a hit this game was until he asked to play the game again tonight. He said, "Game!" and motioned toward the living room. When I acknowledged his request and said we could play he started trying to jump and made a bunch of excited noises. He is getting really close to jumping, but can't quite get his feet off the ground enough. He puts so much energy into jumping that often he ends up falling down. We are still trying to get the momentum going in the up direction. Maybe we will have to get some of the game on video.

Daylight savings time is a special treat for parents of toddlers. Unfortunately, toddlers don't understand the numbers on the clock. Over the past week, we had been moving Daniel's schedule back since he was waking up at 4:45 am! We had shifted things enough that he was waking up closer to 6 am. That is until the clocks arbitrarily switched on Sunday. Now we get to go through the whole process again. I feel like we are doing sleep training for an infant again. Thankfully, he seems to be fairly receptive to our efforts. Now if I could only get my body to allow me to sleep until 6 am without waking up in anticipation for him to wake up, I'll be happy.