Funny stuff Paige says...

Paige and I made smoothies the other day. She was in an independent play sort of mood, and wandered off into the living room after I handed her the smoothie.

Paige: Can I have one of those things to put my drink on (coaster), I want to look at a fishing magazine.

Apparently the McLaren fishing gene skips a generation.

The Kindergarten experience...

June 1 was Paige's kindergarten orientation. It was more an orientation for the parents actually, but the kids were welcome to come to see the school at the same time. There were various sessions in the 4 or 5 Kindergarten rooms, as well as the library. We were split into groups in the gym and then led as groups through the various sessions. In most of the groups, the kids either sat on carpets, or worked on activities, such as cutting paper, making a craft, stacking blocks, etc. while the parents were told different information in each session. We learned what type of backpack to buy for school, information on the 2 "nutrition breaks" (gone is lunch in the middle of the day), what entails the typical Kindergarten day, drop off and pick up routines, information about staggered entry (they start off kindergarten by going for an hour with just the teacher, then another full morning with just 5 kids, then with 10 kids, until working up to the first full day on September 16), etc. Of course we will be told most of this information later in the summer before school starts, but it was nice to get an idea of what to expect. Not to mention, we now have an idea of things we need to buy over the summer before school starts. They really stressed how independent the kids have to be, which I knew, but they also gave some great tips which I will definitely do, such as making sure that Paige can do up her new school backpack, open her lunch containers, and zip up her coat. I'll make sure these things are possible before we even buy these items. Paige certainly benefited from getting in the school and seeing that the classrooms looked fun and that there were a lot of other little kids her age that would be going there. She had only seen the super big kids going in there before. Recently she had started to say she didn't want to go to school, so I think this helped to calm her fears.

Rose's new moves.

For the past few weeks Rose has been doing some extreme head nodding. If you ask her anything in question format she will nod her head in agreement. "Do you want a snack?" big head nod. "Do you want to go to the park?" big head nod. So cute. A lot of times I think she actually understands what we're asking.

She has also made up a word. If she wants something, usually a snack, she often says "may-MEE, may-MEE!" and points. She was doing this at the grocery store this morning quite desperately and pointing to my purse where the tupperware of arrowroot cookies were. Her tiny little mouth looks so cute saying this, I can barely stand it. It has turned into quite the habit though, arrowroot cookies at the grocery store. One day I didn't bring a snack as I was planning on giving her one at home, but when she saw me put some arrowroots in the cart she was freaking out and having a temper tantrum until I cracked open the box and gave her some. I have never had to crack open a box at the store pre-purchase before, with the exception of water a couple of times when Paige was "Super thirsty" and couldn't wait till home.

Speaking of tantrums, Rose has started to have tantrums where she throws herself on the floor and kicks her legs if you take something away from her. I don't remember Paige doing this till much older. I wonder if Rose will be more dramatic, being the younger sibling. She has started the whole arching the back refusing to go in the car seat thing, as well as getting upset when we drop Paige off at her class--she wants to go in too. I think Rose is ready to go to a program with me where she can interact with other 1 year olds. When Paige starts school in September I will take Rose to some of the programs I did when Paige was a toddler. At this point Paige had take a million swimming lessons, and a bunch of other stuff. It just doesn't work out the same way with 2 kids around, that's for sure. On the same token, Paige wants to take gymnastics, but I can't chase Rose around for an hour in the gym while Paige does her class.

She has started to develop a sense of humour too. For instance, she has on a few occasions pretended to give someone something and then whiped it away at the last second and walked away smirking, coming back again and again repeating her fake out.

I wonder when she'll talk more? I have a feeling she'll discover a bunch of new words all at once. The one said most often is "hi". She can say daddy and mommy, but they are said rarely.

Swinging

May long weekend

Next year I will remember that the May Long weekend up north=bugs. Black flies and mosquitoes. In my head I envisioned sitting on the dock, splashing in the lake, boat rides, paddle boating, walks, wagon rides, campfires, etc. We were, instead, quite stuck inside as a venture into the outdoors meant many bites. I attempted to go out twice with Paige and Rose and they were covered in bugs. We had to stick indoors most of the time. On Saturday we had to get some groceries (Maura and I), so we took the girls and stopped at the park in town which was away from any lakes and therefore bug-free. Oh, we also had a campfire that ended with Maura burning her hand on her S'more, and Paige screaming in terror from a few too many bugs in the face.

Luckily we have quite a few indoor crafts and games to stay busy. Also, Mary Jo gave Paige an early birthday present of a cupcake board game, and cupcake decorating items: an apron, cupcake mix, and cupcake liners and decorations.

The cottage indoor swing.

Testing out one of Paige and Mary Jo's cupcakes.

Decided to play a little peek-a-boo

Brushing teeth, big girl style.

Bug burqa.

Both girls were desperate to go outside. At least Paige understood that it wasn't the best idea unless clothed in the bug burqa. Rose on the other hand would walk over to the patio door and bang on it and cry.

At any rate, it was a good start to the season. We at least managed to drop off a few things we needed for the summer, and figure out what we need for next time. Also, we realized that it helps to have a night light in our room at night...if the room is pitch black Rose freaks out in the night. Also, we discovered that Rose doesn't sleep nearly as well at the cottage as at home. On the same note, 3 nights of horrible sleep at the cottage don't translate to horrible habits back home--she began to sleep through the night again as soon as we returned home. Phew!

Artwork

Paige is constantly drawing pictures lately. Usually she makes them as "presents" for us. They often involve pictures of our family at Disney World. Today we drew princesses. This is Paige's art station with her picture of Ariel in the works.

Paige is laughing here as she thinks it looks like Ariel has a moustache in her picture.

The finished product with "skin colour"

My princesses on the other hand look like they are in drag. Blogger put the photo in this orientation no matter what I did. The top one is Rapunzel. The middle is apparently an elderly Snow White, and the bottom one is Sleeping Beauty with the smokey eye look.

I am constantly finding little cut out bits of paper with people drawn on them. She draws them while I make meals.

Mother's day cake...

The Baskin Robbins cake we brought to dinner for Mother's day.

Finally warming up...

Sleep.

A friend of mine hired a sleep doula. Basically, someone to help her transition her 6 month old to sleeping through the night, and sleeping in his own crib. Three days in, she had accomplished both goals. The doula put her through a program that involved a few things such as a noise machine, a small ammount of "crying it out", and not feeding him in the night anymore, and teaching him to fall asleep without feeding as an association. While Rose's sleeps weren't horiffic, it made me think. If she woke up in the night, she definitely needed feeding to fall back to sleep. Also, she was more awake in the evenings when i was putting her to sleep, and she required a lot of rocking until I could successfully put her in her crib for the night. While I am not a fan of any cry it out methods, I decided to adopt some of these ideas into our routine. Of course, the sleep doula is a hired professional, and her methods are a lot more detailed, but I wanted to use the basic premise of her ideas.

So one night Mike was away, and it seemed like a good night to at least start something. I figured it might be easy for me to try a new program by myself. As I usually do when I am alone with the girls, I popped a show in the DVD player for Paige as I went off to put Rose to sleep. I fed her as usual, and she did not fall asleep. I tried to put her in her crib but she cried and I took her out of the crib and sat with her. Tried to put her back in again. Cried. Now if Mike was home, I would have sat with her for a long time as he would be putting Paige to bed anyway. But with him gone I couldn't just leave Paige out there forever. I decided this was the first step in the process. I put her in her crib and said good night and walked away. She cried and cried, but only for 5 minutes and then fell asleep. Then she slept all night long. The next night, I stuck to the plan and she cried when I left the room, but only for about 3 minutes. Each night I have put her in her crib fairly awake and the crying went down to 30 seconds, 5 seconds, and now none.

Another thing we have implemented is letting her cry a bit if she wakes up in the night. Sometimes she will fall asleep on her on. Other times she needs a diaper change, which is fine by me. She has also gotten 2 molars in the past 2 weeks, which have definitely impacted her wake ups. For now, if she wakes up in the night at a reasonable hour, I am still feeding her back to sleep. I figured the teething was irritating her and didn't want to take that away just yet. That'll be the next step though--dropping night feedings.

I also did buy a white noise machine. We always had a fan in her room to drown out some noise, but the sleep doula says only a whie noise machine, apparently. I'm not sure it makes much difference then the fan, but will be portable to the cottage and Edmonton as well.

So that's where we're at. She can cozy up in her crib on her own and fall asleep. She can also wake up in the night and find her soother and fall asleep on her own. Wet diapers and teething still seem to wake her up, and she still does like that feeding if she has fully woken up. But...in the past 18 days (because i have been keeping track!) she has slept through the night 9 days.
It seems like the days are in clusters...like 3 bad teething nights she woke up, and then started sleeping through for a few days, and then up for a couple of nights. But this is amazing! And the nights she's waking up it's only once. And she has stopped waking up on and off between 10 and 12.

I can't believe just letting her cry for 5 minutes one time basically solved most of our problems. I never would have let her cry for half an hour, so thank goodness this worked.

The other amazing thing is that Paige sleeps through the night every night now too, and she totally didn't before. No more peeing in the night. No more demands for water at 3:00am. She just sleeps. Ah bliss...

Zoo day

In lieu of a Mother's Day outing, Mike took the day off on Friday and we went to the zoo with less of a crowd. We left late enough in the morning that Rose could take a nap in the car on the way.

Paige was happy to see this new attraction at the zoo. She didn't know it was new though since she hadn't been to this zoo in a couple of years and doesn't remember her last visit.

For ride # 1 she chose the jaguar.



For ride #2 she chose the spinning snake basket. Notice both rides are with daddy as these rides make me feel ill!
We came to the zoo with Tyson a few years ago, and we like to recreate a picture we took of him every time we go to the zoo.

Rose's favourite things were the fish and the baboons:

Looking at the elephants. Paige liked everything she saw, she says. Her favourite was the Komodo Dragon apparently, as she loves all things dragon.

Eating a super crumbly snack:

Recreating an old picture. Click here to view it.

We were so tired from all of the walking around that Paige, Rose, and I fell asleep in the car on the way home.