Tantrums and Trickery

Sounds like a forgotten Jane Austen novel, doesn't it? I know this is a lot of pictures but this is the only photo album I'm keeping up.

I feel like I've really surrendered to my "stay at home mom" identity. I'll even go so far as to say that when we were in Ohio a couple of weeks ago, we rented a minivan and I liked it. There have been some pivotal moments in my journey. A couple of weeks ago I was watching "Super Manny" on a Friday night. FYI, it's Super Nanny with some dude filling in for the nanny. Anyway, they were working with a dad whose anger with his oldest daughter was out of control. He yelled at her all the time and it made me so sad. I definitely don't yell at Jill like that, but that silly show put in my face how ineffective it is to yell at all. Since then I have had two perfect weeks of no yelling at home. Yay me! Sometimes I've had to pray to God to help me, but now when Jill is testing me I repeat my mantra, "She's just two. I'm the adult and I get to choose how to react to this." The results have been comical.

You know how in baseball they talk about a finesse pitcher? It's a guy like Schilling who doesn't have a lot of power anymore but can put the ball where he wants it and choose a series of pitches that confuse the batter and get him out. Well, I've realized that dealing with a two year old is a finesse operation as well. For example I'll say, "Jill are you ready to take a bath?" Jill answers, "NO, I DON'T WANT TO TAKE MY BATH! I WANT TO PLAY!" I say, "Really? We'll put bubbles in the tub and you can put your guys (Sesame St squeeze toys) in there." Jill answers with heightened hysteria, shaking her head and kicking her feet, "NO, I DON'T WANT TO TAKE MY BATH!" I say, "You don't want to take a bath. That's OK. Do you want Mommy to give you a bath, or Daddy to give you a bath?" "I WANT MOMMY TO GIVE ME A BATH!" Then I say, "Great! Let's go!" and she takes the bath. Another example, when I want to brush her hair, Jill sometimes protests, "Nooooo! I don't want to brush my hair!" I say, "OK. Do you want one ponytail or two ponytails?" "I want two ponytails!" "OK. Great!"

It's hilarious and all about giving her choices that I'm happy with either way. It takes some mental gymnastics sometimes to come up with the choices but Bryan, my mom, and I are all on board and we congratulate each other when we come up with something creative. Anyway, without the yelling, I feel like my relationship with Jill is getting so much better. She's definitely a mommy's girl right now. She says, "Mommy, can you play with me please?" all day long in the sweetest voice. Yesterday I woke to her at my bedside with two books, "Mommy, are you awake? Can you read these to me please?"

Jill and Peter are starting to play together a little bit which is so much fun to watch. Previously, Jill would only talk about Peter ("I think he's hungry/sleepy/etc.") but never to him. One day last week I had Peter in my arms when I went to get Jill up from her nap. I placed him in the crib with her and she read him a book. She said, "Peter, this is fun!" He loves to watch her play. When he is sitting in his swing or car seat and she comes to rock him he gives her huge smiles. Here's another picture of Peter pushed by Jill in the swing. The poor guy is always in a pink bib. We haven't gotten around to buying enough boy bibs and he throws up and drools on them constantly.

Peter turned four months old last week and he is so cute, I can't stand it. He is very verbal. He squeals, laughs, and says, "Mamamama!" I know it doesn't mean "Mumma," but I still love it. Peter also loves to stand in our laps. He rolled over three times in a row one day a couple of weeks ago, but won't do it anymore. But after all of that good stuff I have to say he is killing us with his early wake ups. He has been waking up at 5:00AM and we haven't found the right approach to fixing that yet. I think he has some bad habits because he was colicky as a newborn (colicky babies usually don't grow into great sleepers on their own) and we respond to him very quickly at night because we're afraid of waking Jill. We'll do sleep training in a month if his habits don't improve sooner. I think I've gotten soft since sleep training Jill. I don't want to hear Peter cry! :( For now, he is effectively sleep training us. We've been going to bed earlier and earlier (9:30PM) to try to recover some Z's.

I also have a new found respect for how long a cold can last in a family of four. We've been a little sick for weeks. First we got chest colds in series and then we got head colds with sore throats. I think we are over it now, but it has been pretty gross. When Jill needs me to clean up her nose she says, "Mummy, I think my nose is a little crummy. I need it sparkling." I have no idea where she got that terminology but it is so funny.

We had another great Thanksgiving at Becky and Yaka's house. The food was awesome and so was the company. Peter sat on Bryan's lap during the meal and watched us eat while making chewing motions with his jaw. That guy is so interested in food! Jill spent most of the day shut up in Jacqui and Anna's room where they played rock band with feather boas, a keyboard, and guitar. She sat at the cool table with Nana and her cousins for dinner and there was nowhere else she would have rather been!

Oh, and I almost forgot the shots of Jill's first real haircut. She was really brave!