30 months & 29 weeks

Lucy turned 2 1/2 on Wednesday. After dropping Matt at the airport, we went shopping, She needed new shoes for spring and summer, and we found what we needed second-hand. I was particularly excited about the white sandals I got her because I bid on that exact design on Ebay last year and lost and was kind of sad about it. So getting them for $5 this year was a big win. I also got her a few summer dresses. Lucy is a pretty patient shopper. We take turns doing things we want/need to do. I get to look at the size 8 shoes, and then she gets to play in the toy section. Then I get to look at the 2T and 3T pajamas, and then she gets to play in the playhouse that's for sale. We keep alternating. I do have to strap her down in a cart or stroller during my turns, but she doesn't fuss much because we've established that she will get a turn to get out and run and play. She made friends at various stops and got to play with other kids. One 4-year-old little boy played in the playhouse with her for about half an hour. They were having the best time pretending to be parents to her baby doll. She called the boy "Baby Daddy," and they cooked for the baby, bathed the baby, put the baby to bed, rocked the baby in a cradle, and then put their hands on the blade of a noisy toy table saw. You know, normal new parent stuff. :)

Matt goes to this conference in Florida every year, so this is the third time in Lucy's life that we've dropped him at the airport and then picked him up a few days later. But this year she understands things better. She refused to hug him at the airport because she doesn't like goodbyes. And she cried a little when he walked away, which made me cry a little, too. She talked about him all day while we were shopping and called for him when we got into the car. But when we came home without him to a dark and empty house, it really hit her. She started crying and saying "Me daddy gone." So I cried too while I tried to comfort her. She got upset again the next day when she opened the chest where he keeps his shoes and couldn't find his shoes that she likes to try on. Not only was daddy gone, but he took his (her/their) shoes with him. She thinks he's still at the airport since that's where we left him and where we'll pick him up again. We've skyped with him every day. She hasn't cried or gotten upset since the shoe incident. Yesterday, however, she kept talking about daddy on a plane and crashing, which I found disturbing. I kept telling her that wasn't going to happen. Eventually, she said "Daddy, oink-oink plane crash." That is a reference to Shaun the Sheep. The pigs fly a plane and crash it. That's her knowledge of planes for the most part. She probably also thinks that inflatable wading pools and hot air balloons ("hot balloons") always pop because that's what they did on Shaun the Sheep. The pigs were unharmed, so she doesn't expect Daddy to be hurt by a crashing plane. It's just that crashing is what planes do in her mind.

Lucy is so adept at narrating Shaun the Sheep episodes now that we now know that she has them all memorized. She will tell us what is going to happen before it happens. She's seen A LOT of Shaun the Sheep, but she still requests it every day. Recently, she's been into the new episode with sheep and llamas, which Amazon produced last fall. She doesn't seem to understand that llamas are not sheep. She calls them "mama sheep." They are woolly, and mama sounds like llama. It's fun to find out how she sees the world now that she can say more. It helps to have watched Shaun the Sheep and Curious George with her to make sense of what she says sometimes. And sometimes we're still baffled by what she says.

One of our favorite recent Lucy stories which I haven't shared yet was when she yelled "Daddy beat me" during church a few weeks ago. I got some funny looks from the people around me, and I just shrugged. She had run toward the piano during service (apparently her desire to minister through music became too much for her to contain), and Matt went after her and picked her up before she got to the piano. She has said something like "mama beat me" to me before, and I was perplexed. I've never struck her except to kill mosquitoes that land on her. I've never threatened to beat her. She doesn't watch much television except for public television (Sesame Street, Curious George, etc.) and Shaun the Sheep, which has no dialogue. I couldn't think of anywhere that she would have heard the word "beat" in a non-culinary context. A few days later, Matt figured out what she was saying when she came to him, put her arms up, and said "Daddy, beat me." She was asking to be picked up. Her pronunciation is sometimes a bit off. P's become B's. Vowels aren't right. K's become T's. When you make all of those changes, "pick" becomes "beat." We repeat what she says back to her so that she can hear what it should sound like, but so far the only change she's made is to add "up" to the end. So now she says "Daddy beat me up." So much better.

Lucy can be difficult at times--she still pinches me, she sometimes refuses to cooperate or comply, she throws things for the fun of it--but she is often delightful. On Thursday she decided she needed to feed her doll a bottle while we drove to Wal-Mart, and she fed the baby the whole way there, which was actually a long time for her to focus on one activity. As I was pulling into a parking place, I heard her whispering "So firsty. So firsty," as she gave her baby more milk. I had never heard her say thirsty before. In fact, we know that she doesn't understand the word hungry, but apparently she understands thirsty.

After Wal-Mart we went to lunch at Burger King, the only restaurant in town with a playground. For $4.76 we can get a cheeseburger kids meal, a $1 chicken sandwich, a large Coke Icee to share, a place for Lucy to play for an hour or so and usually some new friends to play with, and a fairly calm meal for me. It is $4.76 well-spent! There was another 4-year-old boy at Burger King that played with her. They called each other "boy" and "girl" and wanted to help each other climb and slide. They were very sweet. Lucy eventually had a melt-down because she's too short to climb in the structure. The last time we were there, she figured out that she could get into the play structure by climbing up the slide, but she can't really go anywhere when she gets inside. Last time that was enough to make her feel like she was participating. This time it was not enough. "Boy" kept climbing to places she couldn't reach. He didn't understand that she wasn't tall enough to follow him. I took her home when it became clear she wasn't having fun anymore because she was obsessed by her inability to climb and follow "boy." She pitched a fit because she didn't want to leave, even though she wasn't having fun anymore. Fortunately, the promise of Curious George fruit snacks made leaving better enough to get her into the car.

We have a new neighbor who will only be living next door for another two weeks, and she has a friendly but large dog named Teagan. Lucy loves Teagan from a distance. She gets sticks for the dog. She found out that the dog likes to eat grass, so she picks grass for the dog and throws it at her. But she doesn't touch Teagan because the dog is as tall as she is and likes to lick faces, which Lucy finds understandably freaky. Today Teagan was blissed out while having her belly rubbed by her owner, so Lucy became brave enough to actually touch the dog. She cautiously touched a paw and eventually the tail. She got scared when the dog started wagging her tail. But then Lucy started imitating the dog wagging her tail and went back to touch the dog's paw and tail again. She's going to be crushed when dog-dog leaves in a couple of weeks.

Lucy has been very into books recently. We read several times a day. Everywhere Babies, The Gruffalo, and the Gossie & Gertie books by Olivier Dunrea are her current favorites. She requests the Gossie & Gertie books by name and can summarize the plots and answer questions about the text and pictures. When she requests Everywhere Babies, it kind of sounds like she's saying "Whoa, baby!" The book rhymes, and she is able to quote parts of it.

This afternoon she started talking about the episode of Peg + Cat (another PBS show) that she saw this morning. They got swallowed by a whale. So I told her the story of Jonah. She loved the part where the whale/fish spits Jonah up. She laughed and laughed. She is understanding stories enough now that I can start telling her Bible stories and expect her to get them on some level. We've tried reading to her from children's Bibles, but those stories are so short and dry and lacking in talking geese that she was never interested. Telling her the stories when she shows interest in something related to them and playing up the fun bits like puking whales seems like it will be much more successful.

Lucy has learned to climb over the baby gate that is supposed to keep her out of the study. I found her in there one day when I couldn't find her anywhere else. We keep her out to protect about 7 bookshelves of books and to protect her from falling shelves should she decide to climb them as she does her kitchen set. Today I found her sitting on top of her kitchen with some of Matt's India stuff, including two daggers, fortunately still in their decorative sheaths. So we got an extra-tall baby gate that doesn't have horizontal bars that would allow her to climb. We've been on a Lucy-proofing kick recently because her skills have improved. Every door now that didn't already have a deadbolt now has a knob cover or a gate hook (like you put on screen doors) to keep her out.


Also on Wednesday, Emmie turned 29 weeks old. There's less to tell about Emmie. She is more active, but I haven't noticed many patterns. She gets active when Lucy is really upset and screaming and crying. I still can't tell whether she's trying to comfort or join the melee. She sometimes moves when I eat. It's possible that she's a fan of peanut butter like Neil was. I'll just have to keep paying attention to see what she responds to.

I got a few things for Emmie while I was shopping. I had finished inventorying the 3-6 month and 6-9 month clothes. We didn't have black pants in either size, so I found those second-hand. Black pants are a wardrobe staple that should allow her to wear most shirts. I'd kind of like to have denim-looking leggings in all sizes, too, but most of the second-hand stores we visit don't carry leggings. We didn't have 6-9 month overalls, so I got those, too. I got her a 6-9 month swimsuit (that matches one that Lucy is currently wearing) and a converter gown in the same size because they are hard to find in that size. I also picked out a outfit for hospital pictures/coming home.

My other purchases were additional panels for the baby cage in our living room and a nursing pillow, the one that was on the registry, because it was half of Amazon's price and I wanted to make sure I had it by the time Emmie arrives. I've adjusted the registry. I'm not planning to buy much more. (Most of my shopping was actually for Lucy.) We really are in good shape stuff-wise, especially for the first few months.

I did find in my inventorying that Emmie will need 6-9 month and 9-12 month clothes for cool/cold weather. Lucy had mostly short sleeve rompers, onesies, and shorts because that was March-September for her. For Emmie it will be November-May, very different weather. She'll need some sleepers, pants, and long sleeve shirts/onesies. She will probably also need 1-2 swimming suits in every size over 12 months. We've been going to the pool so often that Lucy's swimsuits are stretched out (elasticity destroyed by so much chlorine) by the time she outgrows them. Almost all of Lucy's swimsuits are second-hand. I try to make sure that they seem clean and without pilling. I prefer one-piece suits that are easy to put on and take off and that are functional. Straps that don't cross are helpful for getting in and out easily. Big tutus are not good for swimming. Little ruffles or peplums are OK when they aren't swimming well yet. By Lucy's age/skill level, extra fabric is a drag (literally). Hopefully, Emmie likes the water as much as Lucy and I do. We'd be pretty bummed if baby sister didn't let us go swimming every day.