New March Pictures

These aren't in chronological order, so start with the bottom and work up.
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Playground - A couple of Firsts

Yesterday we went to the playground at the Center school and had a great time. We went down the spiral slide - all by ourselves! and the other big slide - first with mommy, then alone. Shara went on the swings too, even though they weren't the baby bucket ones but the big girl swings. Daddy held on tight to her jacket as mommy took pictures and tried not to panic.

After playing we went to lunch. Shara didn't want to get in the car to go to lunch and wanted to go inside the school to eat. I think I confused her because I told her she would go to this school when she got to be a really big girl and she thought school = eat lunch inside? I don't really know but Alan was able to wrestle her in her seat and with the help of Giraffe, we went to eat at Frank's in Stoughton. We were originally going to go to Big Frogs, but didn't know if she'd sit long enough to be served and Franks is counter service. It worked out fine. By the time we got to the restaurant she was good to go and probably would have sat to be served, but we had a good time and she had lots of fries and a little bit of chicken and not much of anything healthy.

We went back home for a nap and after that we had a little picnic snack on the floor while watching Madagascar. I thought it was a little violent, though she wasn't paying that much attention after a while. She filled up on banana, chocolate bunnies and some spoonfulls of soy butter, so didn't eat much of her supper - curried salmon, couscous and green beans. She did eat a lot of beans and ended up flinging (splashing) her couscous, which is really hard to clean up since it's sticky and small. Shara won't be having couscous for a while, since more often than not it ends up being "splashed". I did have her sit while I finished eating and she wasn't too happy, but I didn't want her to throw her food and go, just because she was done sitting still. She was fine and settled down quickly.

The day before we had gone to the Ames Free Library and got some books. We met Madeline, Sue, and Joan. Shara had fun playing with the legos. She really like the Some Babies book and we've read it several times already. This may be one we'll have to add to our collection.

The Power of Language

We've all been in a great mood now that Shara is understanding so much and we're able to understand her, and she knows it. The other night Shara & Daddy had a night together while mom went galavanting around Boston with a bunch of librarians and knitters. They had a good time. She went to sleep a little early and didn't appear to miss mommy at all.

Not too many specific events have happened in the past couple of weeks. A couple cute and notable things:
MegaBlocks - Shara plays with these by picking out the like colors and stacking them together. Home Taggie (book) - not the huge favorite it used to be. Has been replaced by regular/school taggie & giraffe (baff)
Food - eats almost anything you put in front of her but is very definite about not wanting something. That extends to clothes, activities, songs, etc. She's good about trying new foods and knows hot - likes Frank's hot sauce but not Trader Joe's Punjab Eggplant. It was a milk emergency when she gave that a try.
Baths - I think it's a matter of control. She happily puts her face in the water to try and blow bubbles, and pours water over her head, but cries when I do it to rinse her hair, but not always, so it's also mood related. Doesn't really matter because they're so so much better than they used to be.
Bubbles - the bubble song is a nightly occurance and usually signifys the end of dinner, or at least Shara being done in the dining room. She'll continue to eat after we roll her into the kitchen to get her pre-wash before using the big girl sink. Also common to hear is the bumblebee song.
Happy Meal - had her first at school yesterday (chicken nuggets & fries) as a prize for her class in winning the penny race. I heard she enjoyed it a lot.
Stairs/Steps - we don't have good practicing steps for shara at home, but I saw her on the school playground yesterday and she was walking up and down, both forward & backward. These are the little steps up to the slide, but I was impressed.
Talking - what isn't she saying? She tries to say everything and she's really putting words together great! Today she took her shoes over to the garbage and before I could freak out about her throwing her shoes away, she started shaking them out because sandbox shoe shake trash. Don't know about you, but I got all that pretty clearly. Twice we caught her singing, possibly in her sleep, Happy Birthday Jador. She was really excited about going to Jador's birthday party last weekend.

She had a good time at the party. It took her a little while to warm up to so many strange faces, but once she did, she was fine. She had a very late night. Alan had us park in the street so we wouldn't get backed in by someone, and it turns out we were the last to leave!

This weekend we're going to see if Shara would enjoy watching Madagascar. I have no idea if it will be too much or she just won't be interested, but she did like catching glimses of Pooh last Sunday.

Superconference 2006

Shara had her second plane ride and did great. No poops on the plane, so mommy was relieved. We got to the airport - with 2 stops for diaper change (both false alarms), on time and basically got to the gate then on to the plane with no waiting. It wasn't a close call, just well timed. When we got to Atlanta we had lunch from Great wraps. Shara ate strawberries (from home) in ketchup and also a bunch of french fries. Good lunch but that was all she wanted! She had a decent breakfast and snacked all the way to Atlanta. After lunch we walked around a little, did a diaper change, played in "playground" area, which charged her up good!

and then got on the plane to Nashville. The ride was only an hour and Shara was asleep before take-off. She woke when I picked her up to get off the plane. When Alan was getting our bags, she had fun looking at a tiny dog a lady was holding. We got our tickets for the bus to the hotel and Shara had her first bus ride and loved it. They even had a tv for her to watch. She was in heaven!

We got to the hotel and they got a room for us right away. The room is pretty big but we had to send back the first crib - broken wheel and missing bar. The replacement didn't come until evening, basically when we were almost ready to go to sleep and that was after I called again. We had dinner at the food court in the hotel - bbq, and usually shara loves it, but she wouldn't eat the pork and feasted on the cinnamon apples (pie filling, but yes, it was good) and baked beans. I made her cry when I tried to get her to eat the pork. She was looking at the lights on the ceiling and I put the pork in front of her nose and when she looked down, it bumped her nose and she freaked. She was so tired! She slept great the first night, but woke early. She's still on EST. The hour makes a big difference. I'm surprised even how just an hour is effecting me.

The next day was the first daddy & shara day. They had a good breakfast and went looking around the hotel.
Shara was still tired and wanted to be carried all over and daddy did as daddys do and accomodated. I got to see them in the morning for a few minutes - they came to visit me at a break, and Shara met everyone again. The night before she had met Kate H, Debby, and Karen A. Boy did she act up for them! But that's the way she often is with a new situation. Very excited and much her age. Anyway, they came to visit which was nice. We had purchased tickets for the night out in Nashville, but decided it was too much work and Shara was still really tired and sensitive so we went to a pub at the hotel. The waitstaff was great and got us milk from next door, a highchair, etc. Shara was entertaining herself by throwing her drink cup down, throwing anything she could get her hands on basically. She was a handful until the food came. Then she ate and ate - but had a meltdown when she asked for more. She had everything so we couldn't figure out what she wanted. Alan gave her more tartar sauce and that's what she wanted and she was immediately fine. After dinner, when we were cleaning up, we saw Kate H, Susan W and McDreamy Sirsi guy. Good thing everyone has kids, which kept me from being too embarrassed, because as soon as Shara saw Kate she got the devilish look in her eye and threw down her cup again. Kate knew enough to laugh and leave quickly. We went back to the room and Shara ended up sleeping with us for reasons unknown and unimportant.

Tuesday the routine was the same for me, but they went to the mall and saw the fish at the Aquarium restaurant, and the carousel. Shara wanted to go on the carousel but was going to wait because we had plans to go to the Aquarium for dinner with Debby & Steve's family that night.

I was done at 3PM so came back to the room and shara was still having her nap. When she woke we had a fun bath. I let her stay in it for a long time just filling the cups with water. I worked really hard not to direct or say much. She was concentrating and learning whatever she was learning and having a great time. We then got dressed and went to look at the horses. We waved and said hi to them. Then we went back so I could change my shoes and go to the reception I had to go to. Debby & I went to meet Alan & Shara at 6:30 to head over to the mall for dinner. Shara really wanted to go on the carosel but we put her off until after dinner. The restaurant was very cool. The fish and decor really did make me feel like I was in an underwater groto, like Disney's 20,000 leagues under the sea. Shara enjoyed looking at the fish and when we went to take a walk and look closer, after dinner, where she ate a bunch of mac & cheese and broccoli & cauliflower, I read her the sign which said not to touch the glass, and she saw another similar sign and said no touch glass. She then pooped and we did a stand-up diaper change because I didn't want to use the very undersized changing table at the restaurant. She was more than happy with my decision.

The next day was our last and we had the Sirsidynix party at night. The party started at 6:30PM and it was on the Delta Island, Mardi Gras theme. She didn't seem very hungry, probably because it was so late for her. She danced a little by a fountain and Debby gave her several "coins" to throw in. Kate gave her a string of beads which she wore for the night but mostly mommy & daddy carried Shara and we danced together to the very loud music and enjoyed looking at the goofy middle-aged librarians dancing to disco.

We didn't get back to the room until close to 9PM and she went to sleep and we woke the next morning and got packed.

We had breakfast at Rachel's, the buffet, since it was close and we didn't know what the walk across the highway would be like. I wanted to go to the Waffle House, but this was more convenient. We had a variety of breakfast foods, I ate much too much, and then went back upstairs to get our things. We got to the airport with plenty of time and relaxed at the gate. When I went to the bathroom with Shara for a diaper change, she made everyone at the gate laugh by blowing kisses and saying, "bye bye". The plane ride was uneventful. She started to fall asleep and we had to wake her when we got to cincinati. We ate at chick-fil-a. Shara ate almost a whole order of nuggets and lots of lettuce in ketchup. I praised her for asking so nicely, and just silently cringed when she asked for more ketchup by saying, "please" while whipping the ketchup on her shirt with the sign language gesture. We got on the plane home, the longest leg, and she didn't nap at all, but was generally good for the 1 1/2 hour flight. We were all tired when we got home and Alan & I ended up having a sundae supper and Shara had a breakfast supper.

All in all it was a really good compromise. Alan did have fun with Shara and spent some quality time with her. I was able to see her every day and actually saw her more than I would if we had been home and I was working, probably because we had such late nights, relativly speaking.

Bubbe's Sweater

Hi Bubbe. Thank you for the sweater. It's so cute and goes great with my crazy hair!

On a different note, I got bit at school the other day, but it bothered mommy a little more than me. I'm also such a big girl that I took a bath today with no crying at all! I had lots of fun with Bubbles!!!