Blogging and brushing

I have successfully convinced my sister to join the blogging world. Yay! Read about her life here at www.mytwopercent.com. She actually does stuff, like goes to concerts, so it may be more interesting than mine. But if you don’t return to mine you’ll never know why I was cleaning poop off my bathroom floor two nights ago. Can you really go to bed tonight without finding out what that’s all about? Back to that later though. I just want to mention that there is a story behind her twopercent web address also. If you’re like me, you’ll see it then think, “Oh good, someone else messes up their cliches too.” Just ask Steve about the time I told him something threw me for a stump. But she actually did it on purpose. And you’ll read why when you look at her blog.

If I’m rambling it’s because I just had this awesome, icy java chip coffee/ice concoction from the coffee shop down the street. It was heavenly. I am off the doubleshots by the way. But I’m not sure this is better.

Anyway, when my neighbor asked me the other night if I brushed Ella’s teeth everynight, I kinda laughed and said “no. Do you?” Meaning with her twin boys. She said every night, even though it is not fun. Until now, as Ella’s teeth sporadically came in, I’ve been using this “teeth and gum” cleansing gel and only sometimes. You’re not supposed to use toothpaste on babies. It came with a little rubber finger thing and I put some gel on it and used to rub her gums and teeth. As she got a little older I got her a toothbrush and because I thought if nothing else it would be good practice. So, I would let her rub it around in her mouth as she watched me brush mine. But now, especially since it’s been brought to my attention, I totally feel like slacker mom because Ella has gotten so many new teeth in the last few months and I haven’t really started to brush them. Am I a total slacker mom? Have I doomed Ella to having plaque and cavaties already? I don’t know and from what I can tell on the Internet, they say that as soon as the molars appear use a brush, before that just use a wet washcloth in their mouth. Ella just got her molars, so maybe we’re OK.

Anyway, I bought some toothpaste, which they make without flouride for toddlers, and new brushes for her to use. It’s been going OK. I brush mine as she pushes her brush around her mouth, then I help her. If I keep opening my mouth, she mimics me and lets me brush her teeth a little. It also helps if I give her a toothbrush and let her brush my teeth at the same time. That’s only fair right?

Anyway, toothbrushing usually follows bathtime and on this particular night, I was letting Ella go au natural because of the diaper rash she had over the weekend. So, we were brushing away and suddenly I heard a little splat. I looked down and sure enough, she had gone potty on the floor. And as I was processing how gross it was to be standing next to a pile of poo while brushing our teeth, she stepped in it. Uugh. Some help from Steve, another rinse in the tub and a load of laundry later, we were cleaned up and good.

So there you have it. And now I’m reading that I need to brush her teeth twice a day. That’s going to be fun to squeeze in at 6 a.m. Oh well. As long as she has a diaper on, it can’t be that bad.

Her father’s daughter

Ella has recently begun to LOVE eating cereal. Not only in the morning, but immediately after lunch she goes looking for it and at night she loves to share a bowl with daddy. So this morning, she was in her highchair eating cereal like it was a competitive sport and it occurred to me how much she’s like her dad.

Not only is she tan with light brown hair (have you seen me?) but now she’s inherited his love of cereal. I have caught my husband numerous times throughout our married life eating cereal out of the largest bowl in the house. Sometimes it’s my biggest tupperware, sometimes it’s my mixing bowl and occassionally it’s our large popcorn bowl. When he eats cereal, my husband does not mess around. And it’s never for breakfast. To him it’s the perfect dinner.

This reminded me once when when I was whisking a fussy Ella from the bath off to bedtime, Steve gave her a wet willy. If you don’t have an older brother maybe you don’t know that a wet willy is when someone sticks a wet finger in your ear. It feels totally repulsive and just writing about it is giving me shivers. It’s the sorta thing my husband lives for. It’s in the same category as splashing water at an unsuspecting soul or depantsing someone. More of my husband’s favorite hobbies. Anyway, when he did this to fussy little Ella I though, “Oh boy, is he going to be sorry.” But as soon as he did it she lit up a little and just giggled. I was so relieved and I thought, “She really gets him.” And I was so happy that not only would Steve have someone that would appreciate his sense of humor but also because maybe from now on I won’t get depantsed while I’m trying to cook dinner.

Cereal anyone?

Tiny bully

Saturday was a blur of housecleaning and party preparation for my SIL’s belated birthday party. We grilled burgers and hot dogs and hung outside and in – it was really hot out.

Unfortunately Ella’s bullying behavior carried on at the party. Since the fourth she’s really gotten into grabbing kids faces, pushing them and last night she even pulled London’s hair and I’m pretty sure she was going in for a bite at one point. We feel so bad for the other kid when she does that! And I don’t want to be a parent that lets her kid get away with everything. The problem is we think she’s too young to get discipline. We’ve thought about time-outs but we really just don’t think she would relate that punishment to the behavior. I’m starting to want to try it though, this “phase” is getting too long.

I don’t know why it’s happening either. I’ve never seen any kids treat her like this and she’ll do it when completely unprovoked. She’ll just go right up to a kid and push or poke. She’s so sweet otherwise. We had the best day all day. She gives me no problems with eating and sleeping and she’ll even follow most directions I give her. I feel like we need to nip it in the bud but I’m just not sure what to do. I guess I’ll look on my pal the Internet and see if I can find some advice.

Anyway, she’s taking a nice little morning nap for me and I’m trying to wake up with my second cup of coffee. I’m still so happy to be home from our trip that I’m just loving being here. I am hoping to talk hubby into going with us to the chalk walk in Fort Wayne later though. We’ll see if I can get him out of bed. I woke up this morning to find he had finished cleaning the kitchen, without even being asked. Man, is it my birthday or what? What an awesome surprise. So if he doesn’t want to go to Chalk Walk I don’t think I’ll bug him about it.

OK, still doing laundry …

So cute, but watch out!

Catching up

Thank the lord, it’s Saturday. After sleeping in to the humanly hour of 7:20 (normally it’s 5:30 on work days, remember?) I pulled my tiny boss out of her crib and set out on our typical day. Breakfast first. She ate in her highchair as I cleaned the kitchen at last.

I am so behind at home. Besides being gone a week I’ve been suffering from a vacation hangover. I got really used to sleeping until 8 a.m., not having much to do all day, even taking naps on some days. Now back to reality it seems there is so much to do on a real day. And each day this week it has been harder than the last to pull myself out of bed.

Remnants of our vacation can be seen all over the house too. Blankets we took on our trip, more laundry to do … it just seems like there’s stuff everywhere that needs tended to. But every night this week I was just too tired to get to it.

I’m on my way to conquering it this morning. Already today, I’ve put a lot of stuff away, cleaned the kitchen, sorted through a mound of paperwork. And it feels like huge weights are being lifted off my shoulders. Man, I hate clutter.

On that note, I must return to my mission: there’s laundry to be folded.