Stephanie meets Clementine

Fair warning:  While this blog is usually all Stephanie all the time, I will take a few minutes to talk all about me AND introduce a new, and likely recurring, character...
New baby had been measuring very small towards the end of the pregnancy, and, while it may seem slightly counter-intuitive, this, among a couple of other reasons, landed me a date with an induction early this week.  While I was concerned about the interventions that sometimes come with inductions, I was happy that I could easily plan for Stephanie's care and that I would be in the hospital for delivery, because I honestly wasn't sure we would make it when I was in labor the first time, and they say the second one is faster than the first.  The plan for Steph was that Kevin would hang with her at the library and parks near the hospital until delivery seemed imminent, at which point Mary would meet them at the hospital and Kevin could join me.  In the meantime, I had our doula with me, and I felt like that properly supplied my need for a support system during labor.  Well, as should have been expected, things progressed rapidly and the doula took the initiative to change our plans, and had Mary go immediately to the library and trade cars with Kevin to send him directly to the hospital.  Rightly so, as baby was born within 5 minutes of his arrival.  While I refuse to acknowledge the term "easy" to describe my labors with both kids, as there is nothing easy about going from zero to baby in less than two hours (my doctor, on the other hand, described it as frightening, which I think is a good description).  I looked a little worse for the wear in photos immediately after, but appear nicely recovered in photos several hours later.
Mary gave us a few hours to recover and then brought Stephanie to the hospital to meet our newest character in the family, Gwendolyn, weighing in only one ounce more than Stephanie (and I pulled some pics from the archive for comparison purposes).  My research about introducing a new baby said that I should not be holding new baby upon seeing my older child, because she would mostly only want to see me and might rush to hug me.  This was not at all true for us.  She wasn't all that excited to see me... after all, we had been apart for less time than a normal daycare day, and she had an awesome morning with Kevin and awesome afternoon with Mary.  Nor was she terribly interested in the baby.  She did look at her, ask to see her hands and feet, and then requested that Mary play Curious George on her phone.  When she came back to visit that night, she was actually very excited to see her sister.  She wanted to hold her, and at one point demanded to Kevin, "Move Clementine closer so that I can see her". We assured her that "Clementine" could be her special sister name, but we were fairly committed to some version of Gwen.  By far, my favorite moment was when Stephanie asked to take a picture of her family, and got several good shots of Kevin, Gwen, me and "Gwen's big brother" Buzzy Bee.
We are all home now, and I enjoyed my quiet recovery in the hospital getting to know Gwen, and Kevin enjoyed his stint as a stay at home Dad.  Stephanie is doing great with her sister.  She wants to show her things and let her join in the games.  Gwen is at least as interested and good at games as Buzzy Bee!

Last days pregnant with Steph

and a few days before I had Gwen

Baby Gwen

Baby Steph

Photo by Mary right after we introduced Steph and Gwen

Stephanie's family!

Easter Weekend

By Easter weekend, we knew for sure that new baby would arrive, ready or not, the following week, so we tried to have one more fun and active weekend.  Lawrence had an Earth Day parade, which Steph and I went to after her dance class.  Then there were Earth Day activities at the park, but the only one we saw were the bouncy houses and bouncy obstacle courses (as large houses being pumped up with huge air pumps are very Earth friendly and certainly don't waste absurd amounts of our precious energy resources).  Regardless, for the reasonable price of $5, your child could bounce all day.  Since bouncing around is pretty much what Stephanie does all day most days, I knew she would get some serious bounce for our bucks!  There was a rope climbing portion of the obstacle course, and Stephanie scaled it better and faster than many of the other children (we have always thought she was part monkey...).  It was a highly unregulated bounce experience, and kids were just piled in there, which would generally be concerning, but Stephanie really just had a blast and moved through it all so quickly that it didn't seem to matter how many kids there were.  In fact, when the line for the rope climb was too long, she took to just scaling the wall without the rope (so apparently she is also part Spiderman)!

Sunday, of course, was Easter.  We went to morning church, which had a small Easter Egg hunt afterwards.  Then home for lunch and nap, during which time the Easter Bunny set up an elaborate egg hunt with picture clues.  After "nap", which of course she didn't sleep after being told about the Easter Bunny's imminent arrival, she did her egg hunt.  She was unimpressed with the Easter basket at the end, as she just wanted more clues to follow and was disappointed that the hunt was over.  Just a note on the outfit she wore to church... This was the outfit we negotiated for.  We wanted her to wear a dress, and she wanted to wear pajamas with her bathing suit cover-up on top.  We got the dress with the promise that she could wear and bring any accessories she wanted... She took full advantage of this offer, and we ended up barely being able to see the dress.

Her Sunday finest

One of the clues in the eggs.  I think the Easter bunny really outdid himself!  And as a special favor to us, he hid the clues such that it maximized her running around the yard, just to get a bit more time out of the hunt and burn off a bit more energy.

Stephanie's Colorful Breakfast

One of our favorite quick but warm breakfasts is 9 grain cereal.  Cook it up in a little bit of milk, add raisins or brown sugar (or, better yet, both), and it is a very satisfying breakfast that everyone enjoys.  Kevin made it this morning, and I noticed that it appeared to contain quinoa, not a grain I was used to seeing in my 9 grain cereal, so I asked him about it.  He said, "Oh, I decided to make 10 grain cereal this morning."  Stephanie piped up, "It's 9 green cereal, that's why I got my green spoon!".  Kevin and I then got to have one of those parent moments where we just looked at each to acknowledge the comedy of the situation.  Perhaps this explains why Stephanie is such a fan of the cereal... and all along, I thought it might be the brown sugar and raisins!

 

Our Tiny Hip Hopper

This morning marked Stephanie's first dance class.  I signed her up for tiny hip hoppers, mostly because there was no break-dancing class, which would really have been better suited for her style of dance.  I am really pleased that she is finally at an age that we get to do things like this and she was really excited about it, talking about it all week.  We have a really extensive Parks and Rec system that offers lots of classes and you get to invest in them with minimal time and expense to see how you like them (and that is how I know I can't zumba [why, oh why did I think I could?] , and why I am willing to try a 3 year old in dance classes).

  I was all set for her first dance class... bought her the required tennis shoes this week (she has worn boots all winter), video camera charged with space on the memory card, camera charged, ready to post my first video to the blog ever.  I had a vision of the outfit she might wear for the first class.  I typically let her wear whatever she wants, and occasionally try to find a way to get her in what I want, and I will say that I did put up more resistance than usual to her particular outfit choice, but she was very insistent that it was a good dance class outfit.  Frog pajama top, way too small giraffe pajama bottoms (but don't worry, she can just pull the socks up to keep her ankles covered, as I was told after pointing out the giraffe pant length issue), and a "dress".  This particular dress is a terry cloth bathing suit cover, which in no way matched either pajama piece.  And off we went to dance class.   

We arrived just as the teacher was coming out into the stairwell/hall of the "studio" to tell us parents the guidelines.  The first of which was no parents allowed in the studio.  My anxiety rocketed, as I had assured her that I would be at her class, and now I was certain she would NOT go in with out without me... she objected strongly when I insisted that Buzzy Bee could not come to class.  She won't even sit with the other children at the weekly library story time we go to, instead always choosing to sit in my lap.  She is actually generally very independent, but seems to be fairly shy about situations that involve new people and new experiences.  To make matters worse, she had also been quizzing me about whether or not her best buddy from school would be there, and I had told her, no, she probably would not know anyone, but that she could make new friends, so she was fully aware that she did not know the teachers or any of the other kids.  They eventually do a roll call, and she has to walk up the stairs to join the other kids.  Instead, she clings to my hand and I walk up the stairs with her to get her to go, and I am sure this is going to end badly.  They open the doors and the teacher starts to escort the kids in, and she just lets go of my hand and walks right in without me. At this point, I realize that I, too, must suffer from separation anxiety, as I had to stop myself from calling to her and asking her if she is sure that she is okay with out me.  I just bite my tongue and let her go.  It is pretty similar to how I feel about daycare... If she cries and screams when I leave, I just want her to give it a rest, but if she happily marches off to play with her friends, I sort of miss a bit of mama drama, so I can never win!  During her class, I could see her in the mirror through the window, and she had a great time.  For the record, she was the first one out the door looking for Mommy!  She got a sticker for being a "great dancer" and was thrilled to tell me about the class. I am so glad this worked out for her!  And, while there is no video to post today, the last day of class is "Parent Observation Day", and I fully intend on videoing heavily!  And won't it be fun to see what she wears?  

Introducing Baby Marshmallow Clementine

New Baby on the way has stimulated lots of entertaining conversation with Stephanie.  Oh, and if you didn't know about New Baby, surprise!
First off, we elected to not find out the gender, mostly because we enjoy the surprise, partly because it makes everyone else a little nuts, thus increasing the fun in the announcement after birth.  Since we don't know if it is a boy or a girl, we don't spend much time talking to Stephanie about having a brother or a sister, but more about getting a new baby.  But, of course, the terms brother and sister come up sometimes, and we tell her we don't know if it will be a brother or a sister, we have to wait to find out.  Stephanie originally would tell people, "I might be a little sister or a little brother, we have to wait and see", at which point, I would remind her that she was for sure the big sister, and she might get a little sister or a little brother", and then she would proceed to repeat her original statement.  She finally got it straight when Alaina was here, probably because Alaina kept telling her that she was the big sister.  Next comes naming the baby.  Kevin and I have always favored Sean for a boy, and she picked up on that right away.  After that, it has been all fair game in terms of middle boy names and girl names.  Some of her recommendations thus far:  Sean Clementine (Clementine was [accidentally] suggested as a baby name based on her love for the fruit), in response to, "What if it's a girl?", she suggested Lady Sean Clementine.  She has also recommended Marshmallow Clementine (I guess if one favorite food is good, two favorite foods is better), which I guess could be a gender neutral name, based on Sean Clementine for a boy.  So far, she has mostly rejected our girl names, and I fear her disappointment when we come home without Clementine.  There have been a few decisions that I refuse to have dictated by a three year old, including paint colors for rooms, which pants match which shirt (I do that badly on my own, thank you very much) and definitely New Baby names.  Now that I think about it, maybe we should stick to "New Baby", a la MWC's "New Hall" and wait to name "New Baby" in honor of an outstanding contributor to our family... which apparently worked out for them:  http://students.umw.edu/residencelife/arrington/.  In the meantime, Stephanie can seek out benefactors with the name of "Clementine".

For a long time ago

I would like to interrupt the still unfinished Christmas Series of Posts to post about my new favorite expression that Stephanie has been using for several months.  I fear that if I don't post it now, she will stop using it and it will be lost with time.
She has mixed the expressions "for a long time" and "a long time ago" to create the Steph's-pression "for a long time ago", as in "Daddy hasn't taken me to the pool for a long time ago" or "We haven't played the Scooby Doo game for a long time ago".  Against my typical policy, I occasionally use the expression as well, mostly because I'm not quite ready for her to unlearn this one.  There have been a few Steph's-pressions that we have held onto as a family, "blue-cycling" being a notable one.  "Blue-cycling" is her description of our household recycling efforts, which are always placed in a blue bucket, and now the term is a standard household word.  It seems possible that "for a long time ago" might also stick, at least for a while.  

Christmas and the days just preceeding

We had just about a week at Mom and Dad's after the birthday party, mostly spent just hanging around.  We stayed down on the river, and Mom had fully decorated for Christmas.  Mom had found some gardens in Richmond that had a special Christmas lighting display, so we loaded up the mini-van (Mom, Dad, Jared, Stephanie, Kevin and me) and headed to that.  It was super cool, and I was super glad at this point that Kevin had come to Virginia, as he toted Stephanie around on his shoulders the whole time, making her experience there far more fun than I would have managed alone.  They had a story time for kids, and Santa in residence (whom Stephanie wanted to see, but not really talk to or even get all that close to).  The gardens were pretty spectacular, I only wish we had gotten there in the daylight (we didn't head down until after Stephanie's nap) to see it all.  As it was, we got a good (cold) walk around the property to see the lights and got to visit the library on site for the story time and see the plants and trains in the Conservatory.  

Stephanie was NOT interested in having her image captured that evening

Bird of Paradise plant

The library had these really cool little terrariums on display.

We also got to eat at a favorite BBQ place in Richmond that night, which is a bonus to any family adventure.  Christmas followed a few days later, and Mom made sure that there was no shortage of gifts, so many in fact, that we had to leave some behind to play with the next time we visit.  We also got to spend Christmas (and a good bit of time before Christmas) with Tonya and Jared, which is an added bonus, as Tonya works a lot.  We ended up also visiting my Aunt and Uncle and cousin and wife and their two year old daughter, which I never seem to find time to do on my regular trips home.  

Additionally, Mom made a big deal over the special forks and spoons she had for Stephanie to use at her house and then gifted us a set.  We desperately needed new silverware for her to love, as her favorite set was my college set, and we were limping along with two or three forks and spoons each, and were getting very tired of washing silverware for every meal.  Sure, maybe they have Christmas trees on them, but her favorite cup and plate are from Halloween, so at least we are branching out.  

Good thing we drove, but we would need a bigger car for all of this...

It was nice enough a few days to get some outdoor time.

Took a few days, but Granddidy eventually became popular, and as a reward, got to enjoy some time watching Dora the Explorer.

Good news folks... Only one, maybe two, blog posts about our Christmas trip left!  I won't get to it today, but, spoiler alert, it will be about getting back across the country with Alaina in tow in a four door sedan PACKED, while stopping in several cities to see what adventures we could find.