Master of Manipulation

Reagan has long known how to work it to get out of trouble or to get what she wants. I have to admit to having been duped by a two year old many times. Here are some of her more recent attempts:

Last night in the car she got a package of fruit snacks. She was supposed to have shared with Bailey but scarfed them all down before she even handed the first one to her. When I heard Bailey mad, I told Reagan, "Reagan, give Bailey a fruit snack." Reagan said, "They are all gone." I shot her an evil eye. Then the dialog continues:

Reagan: I didn't give Bailey any fruit snack.
Me: I know
Reagan: Mom, I didn't give Bailey any fruit snack.
Me: Ok.
Reagan: Can you give me some fruit snack so I can give some to Bailey?
Me: Think I'm going to fall for that trick a fifth time?

Earlier in the week when Bill told Reagan to give Bailey a fruit snack, Reagan took the whole pack and shoved all of them in her mouth at once. She had fruit snacks falling out of her mouth while she said, "they are all gone" and holds up the empty package.

Then, this morning, Reagan acted out and I put her into timeout. She walked into the corner and stood there for about two seconds then turned around:

Reagan: I'm sorry momma (she starts to walk away to go play)
Me: Thank you for your apology, but you are still in timeout
Reagan: (fussing as she goes back into the corner, pause, pause, turns around)
Reagan: Momma, I need to come tell you something
Me: You can tell me when you are done with timeout. Turn around.
Reagan: Momma, may I come tell you something?
Me: What do you need to tell me?
Reagan: I need to tell you I'm sorry
Me: Ok, thank you
Reagan: May I go play now?
Me: No, you are still in timeout

I hope Bailey doesn't learn all of these tricks this early.

Out of the Mouths of Babes

I got this meme from Facebook but wanted to include it here...

This is probably meant for children a little older, but I asked these questions of my daughter Reagan, who is 2. She gave some interesting responses...

1. What is something mom always says to you?
princess

2. What makes mom happy?
when i smile

3. What makes mom sad?
mommy is sick

4. How does your mom make you laugh?
funny

5. What was your mom like as a child?
mommy's not a baby! bailey is a baby and i'm a big girl!

6. How old is your mom?
ummmm....2. no. i'm 2 and you're 5 and bailey is 1. daddy is 10.

7. How tall is your mom?
6

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
mermaid! (yeah, I don't know what that is either)

9. What does your mom do when you're not around?
bailey

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
huh?

11. What is your mom really good at?
i hear a birdie in a tree

12. What is your mom not very good at?
sick

13. What does your mom do for a job?
computer

14.What is your mom's favorite food?
celery (I hate celery, where did that come from?)

15.What makes you proud of your mom?
happy

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
tinkerbell

17. What do you and your mom do together?
happy yoga

18. How are you and your mom the same?
two eyes

19. How are you and your mom different?
ummmm.....

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
big hug and a little hug

21. What does your mom like most about your dad?
happy

22. Where is your mom's favorite place to go?
ummm...in a castle. and target. can we go to the grocery store and get a cookie?

Confession

Saturday afternoon Bill came down with the chills and then went downhill from there. Sunday was his turn to sleep in, so about 12:30pm I went to check on him. He was laying in bed surfing on the laptop. He said he felt just terrible and just wanted to lay in bed all day. Instead of laying in bed I strongly coerced him into getting up and doing a couple of errands with me and the girls. This is despite him saying he thought he had the flu.

I should say, I didn't doubt that Bill was as sick as he said he was. But in all honesty, I thought he was being a a bit of a big baby. Despite being sick, I thought he should still be well enough to be able to go with me on a couple of really small trips. Suck it up buttercup! I go do things when I'm sick too!

Fast forward to Monday, and Karma comes back and hits me in the butt, HARD. Bill is not 100%, but feeling much, much better. After doing a great workout, jogging/walking 3 miles, I was feeling great. But then, just a few hours later and I got the chills. I finally jumped in the shower as an attempt to warm up.

I cannot tell you how quickly I went downhill from there. Yesterday, I was so sick that I needed to go to the doctor and had to have Bill drive me. Today, my bronchitis symptoms are much better but the flu is hitting me so hard I can hardly move.

And what have I learned from all of this?
1) Bill really is a tough guy. The next time he says he's sick, I'm just going to close off the door for quarantine purposes and let him emerge when he's well.

2) Payback is a beyatch. Not only am I sicker and for longer, I get to have the kids all by myself tonight as Bill needs to be gone.


Karma is laughing furiously at me right now. And somewhere under Bill's outward sympathy for me is the smuggest expression of "I told you so" one has ever sported.

Nightime Attire

This is what you get when you let a two year old pick out her own pajamas and dress herself for bed. The photo is missing the red, blue and green knee socks she paired with the ensemble but I think it captured the mittens and panties on the outside of the pj's nicely. I think she's just missing a cape to complete the look. What do you think?

Posing on International Day

This week has been International Week at school. They study different cultures, they get special snacks from countries all over the world, they do a potluck dinner of international foods, and on Friday, they have international dress day.

Reagan's classroom had Italy. That was a bit challenging to find something specific to Italy. But then I had an idea to dress her as a Gondolier. I think we got pretty close with what we could find to work with.

Bailey's Chinese dress is a special dress. I bought it in Hong Kong for my niece many years ago. She was just a year and a half old had been crowned Baby Miss Macon. I brought back that dress and she wore it in the Macon Cherry Blossom parade. That niece is now ten.

Bailey's shoes were a gift from my mom. When I was pregnant with Reagan, I was working in NYC. My little brother was singing right across the street from where I worked at none other than Carnegie Hall. So my mom and Bill joined me in NYC so that they could attend my brother's concert. My mom made a trip to Chinatown and came back with the shoes. I don't know that she remembered we still had the Chinese dress, but the shoes matched perfectly. Reagan wore that outfit at about a year and now Bailey gets to wear it too.

Reagan was pretty excited to wear her costume today. You'll see she was quite the poser. Especially when we got to the steps. She would lay on a step and say, "take a picture of me now" and then she'd hop up and say, "hmm, let me try this..." or "how about I go here" and try a totally different pose. She even intentionally winked in one pose. She'd always want to see what the picture looked like after I took it so she knew how to adjust the next pose.

Bailey proved to be difficult to photograph this time as she just discovered that she could see herself on the back of the camera too. So she just kept coming at me and wanting to see the pictures on the camera.

So here are the girls, striking a pose, working it for the camera.

Bailey getting mad because I wouldn't let her have the camera...

Bailey looking wide eyed and innocent after being busted for trying to strangle Reagan with her hat cord...

Reagan in her first of many poses...

Here's looking at you kid. Perfecting "the wink"...

Bailey's wondering what is with all the posing...

Reagan kept jumping in front of the camera when I tried to take a picture of just Bailey...

It was Roseola after all

Yep. Both girls had rashes today and no fevers. Reagan's was much milder. Of course she also had Roseola when she was nine months old so I was surprised she got it at all.

Fevers

Bailey came down with a fever on Saturday of 103.5. It wouldn't be the first time she's had a fever that high, but it's the first time she didn't want to play and cried even when held. She was absolutely miserable.

Bill took her to the Urgent Care (because I'm too much of a wimp). They checked her ears, they listed to her chest, everything was fine. They swabbed her nose for flu, negative. Drew blood for tests, negative. Drew a catatheter for tests, negative. The prognosis: a virus.

So we had one sick miserable little baby and then Reagan came down with a high fever too. We were giving them both Tylenol and Ibuprofen around the clock. I had to write it all down to remember who took what and when.

Reagan seemed to recover pretty quickly. She was a little grumpy, but otherwise fine. Bailey took a lot longer. We sent them both to school today since Reagan's was gone and Bailey's was under 100. They said Bailey was still a little clingy and fussy. I won't be half surprised if tomorrow her fever is gone and a rash is there instead. The classic Roseola case. We'll see though.

I had today off for President's Day and so Bill took it off too. Since we were able to send both the girls to school, we got a great day of doing some shopping, going out to eat, seeing a movie. It felt like one of those weekends before we had kids. I wish we had family around so we could get a few more days like that once in a while. It was quite fun and relaxing.

Miss Bailey

Let me update you on Miss Bailey. She quietly turned one on Christmas Eve. There wasn't the pomp and circumstance or the party of 50 people like we had at Reagan's first birthday. We unceremoniously drove most of the day to Florida for Christmas. She never even got a first birthday cake. I feel a bit guilty about that and vow to make sure she always gets a proper birthday every other year.

When Bailey turned one, it seems like overnight the lights went on in her head. She took her first steps Christmas Day and immediately started babbling more, imitating more, and just wanting to be more involved in what we are doing.

Bailey's walking started out like a crab walk. She'd only walk sideways. After a week or so of that, she changed to the zombie walk. She'd slowly totter down the trek with her hands straight out. If she wasn't always giggling her butt off, I'd imagine her walking thinking, "brains, I want brains" in true zombie fashion.

Six weeks later, and Bailey is completely changed. She still has a bit of the zombie walk, but now she attempts to run, especially after successfully snatching a toy or food from Reagan or some poor unsuspecting baby at daycare. You'd never know Reagan has 1.5 years on her. Bailey doesn't let it deter her in the least. The other day she snatched Reagan's burrito right off her plate and was scarfing it down (with her only two teeth) as quickly as she could while trying to make a clean getaway. If Reagan is in "her" chair, Bailey pushes her right out of it. She has every bit of fiestiness as Reagan and has become quite ornery. She has discovered the classic games such as "let-me-climb-up-the-stairs-as-fast-as-I-can-and-see-how-far-I-make-it-before-Mom-catches-me" or "look!-I-can-stand-on-a-table!"

No matter what she gets into or cooks up, she continues to do it with a smile on her face and a laugh in her heart. She truly brings us great joy. Reagan truly loves her and gets just as excited as we do when Bailey does something new. Reagan has actually done a better job than us at trying to teach Bailey sign language. By one year, Reagan knew over 100 signs. By 14 months she was combining them to form "sentences." Reagan has retained most of that knowledge and it's really cool to see her "talking" to Bailey with sign language. Bailey only does a few signs, but we see her trying more and more every day. She understands a lot more than she communicates as she has become quite vigorous in her head shaking "yes" or "no" to respond to our questions.

Both girls are just amazing to us. They are so very different from each other yet we love them both with all our heart. I look back and can't believe I cried tears of sorrow and frustration when I found out I was pregnant with Bailey. She was truly meant to be in our lives when she was and I can't imagine our lives without her.

Out of the baby years...now on to more toddler years!

(I have a bunch of pictures to add to this post but I'm not on the right computer. Rather than wait, I'm posting now and will add the pictures later. Don't forget to come back and check them out. As many have pointed out, she's grown to be quite the big girl practically overnight. I have some cute pics to share.)

We Bought What?

Let me share with you what can happen when you let a two-year old walk with you in a Target instead of putting her in the buggy. Here is a picture of some of the things we purchased earlier this week.

The punchline is neither Bill nor I actually knowingly bought any of these products. Bill usually handles the credit card transaction while I unload the buggy. This time it was the other way around. Bill tossed everything in the cart up on the belt, assuming I had a perfectly good reason why I wanted two types of acne medicine (neither of us have acne), a black eyeliner (I use brown), and my favorite--makeup for women of color. Let's face it, even on my tannest day, I can't use makeup intended for black women.

I caught Reagan putting in one of the Noxemas at one point and pulled it back out of the cart. She protested and said, "but Mom, you NEED it." Gee thanks for that. I pulled it back out, but the sneaky little bugger put it back in again when neither of us was looking.

Unfortunately, the receipt is tossed and since Target's return policy sucks, we now have a few items we can donate to the local women's shelter.

Oh, and this is also exactly how I ended up with six boxes of Weight Watchers Calzones on Saturday.


Some recent random pics, just because...