If the hat fits...

So a chill swept through Southern Illinois this week. We actually had to pull out sweaters and find a hat and mittens for Calla. I refused to be the mom who sends her child to day care completely unprepared for outside play, forcing her to be clothed in the left-behind winter garb (ick.). Wednesday morning found Calla in a new down jacket, mittens and a hooded sweatshirt because I couldn't find a hat that would fit. She was well prepared for all the chilly day could bring. Good mom. Of course, that's why Wednesday afternoon turned out to be nice and sunny. Oh well, it will get chilly soon.

And when it does, now she'll have a nice warm hat to wear. At my baby shower, nearly a year and a half ago, Jessica (sister to me, Aunt Jess to Calla) gave me/Calla the first hat she had knit, and I've now dug it out of our cavernous storage area. Back in the day, we all laughed (gently, I'm sure) at how comically big it was. Good thing, because it now fits Calla's big noggin like a...well, a nicely knit glove. Calla thought so, too, and here she is showing it off.



Otherwise, we're all doing well here and enjoying the very sunny past few days. Since this is our first home in an actual neighborhood, we're anticipating some real life trick-or-treaters tomorrow night. To prepare, Calla and I hung orange lights on our outside front trellis and Joe hung some little illuminated ghosts. That adds to the eerily glowing skeleton skull and hands coming out of our front flower garden. Classy. Impressing the neighbors, I'm sure. Calla pronounced it "pretty" - it's really the only visual adjective she has, so not exactly high standards.

Tomorrow we're going back to day care for the toddler Halloween party and then home to NOT dip into the candy bowl until we turn off our festive lights tomorrow night. I ate nearly a whole bag of candy corn on Monday and ended up with a horrid post-sugar coma headache, so you'd think I'd learned a lesson. Except I do it every Halloween, so I guess not so much.

Happy Halloween to you all, and best wishes for good candy management and self-control.

Busy weekend

For a weekend without any plans, we managed to fill it up somehow. Saturday started off with a trip to a nearby village to start Calla's passport process. That's right, in 8 to 10 weeks, she'll be able to flee the country at a moment's notice. Always nice to have that option. In the meantime, we'll stay under the radar a little while longer.

After we returned home, Calla donned her butterfly costume and we headed to the local strip mall nearby for their pre-halloween festival. Candy walk (somehow, mom and dad ended up with all the candy (mostly mom) - funny how that works) with the local merchants, hay rides (we skipped) and then a row full of those inflatable bouncy things. My idea was just to walk around, but Calla saw all those kids having fun and wanted in. I looked for the one that seemed the most toddler friendly and then sat her in the doorway, thinking she'd be too freaked out by the bouncy mayhem. I mean, she's scared of the vacuum cleaner, and this bouncy thing is much louder and crazier. But no, she's fearless. Even though she can't actually jump herself, she was perfectly happy to sit on the side and let herself get bounced away. Eventually, she tried to walk around, but that was less successful an endeavor. At some point, she bounced herself back toward the entrance and I grabbed her, lest I was forced to bounce in myself and rescue her.

No pics of the bouncy house adventure, mostly because a) Joe had the camera and was too busy chatting up a colleague and missed it all; but also b) even if I had the camera, I was too focused on gripping the outside netting in terror and trying to scoot aside all overly aggressive bouncy 5-year olds.

Mama and the butterfly. I think she eventually figured out what this costume thing was about. I predict more requests to wear the costume this week - so more picture opportunities.


And yesterday, we carved a pumpkin, which Calla actually enjoyed. It was mostly Joe, of course, but Calla did take her turn in sticking her hands in the mess. And then she tried to eat the raw pumpkin. Better than the wood chips at the park, I guess.




It's Monday morning now, and I'm finishing up my coffee and the crossword puzzle (4 letter word for advantage?). Calla's at school (Puka) and Joe's at work. I have some work to do today too - started working for my former consulting firm doing nonprofit executive search work. It's not much, but it's paying for childcare... sort of. We're hoping that with time, this becomes a more financially viable endeavor. For now, I'm enjoying the change of pace twice a week. The black-capped chickadees found our feeder this weekend and I see a new bird out there now, too. If only they'd tell the hummingbirds about that feeder. So anyway, a quiet day in our little nest here in southern Illinois. Hope your week starts off well, too...

End of a busy week

I'm glad it's Friday - although as a work-at-home/at-home mom, Saturday's not a whole lot different than Friday. The big difference, of course, is that Joe's at home, which at the end of this week will be wonderful.

Yesterday was a little rough. Cold and rainy all day - the kind of cold where you just want to wrap up in a blanket, make some tea and read a book. Got the blanket, got the tea, got the book (The Good Thief, by Hannah T...? A new book, reviewed well, but I'm not yet convinced) - but Calla doesn't yet know the blanket-tea-book joy and really not so interested in napping all day. We're both suffering from minor yet still annoying colds and without the option of walking to the park to keep us both sane, we were climbing the walls. It got so bad, that in the morning, I broke my no TV rule and we actually watched about 15 minutes of Sesame Street. It was a blissful 15 minutes, watching Elmo learn all about feet. And then in the afternoon, with my parenting standards blasted anyway, we went to McDonalds to enjoy cookies and the indoor playground. Even so, by the time Joe got home, we were both ready for a distraction.

Today is better - we had playgroup in the morning and the sun is out so we might be able to go to the park after some post-nap errands. For now, I'm enjoying the quiet. The house is a mess and I have clothes to fold. But dinner's all made and today is Friday, so I'm going to curl up with a blanket and a book, even for just a few minutes.

Hope everyone has a good weekend!

First day of school!

First day at the new day care is over... I'm sure Calla was a little nervous since she woke us up twice during the night. Or maybe it was because she was wound up from being up late at a church dinner the night before. It's a toss-up. Anyway, I think things went well. Joe took her in the morning, since he still hasn't recovered from the hysterics the very, very first day of day care in Oak Park. 10-week old Calla was fine. I was a wreck.

But today was a little different... she fed herself lunch (ravioli - how did they know she loved pasta?!), slept by herself in a cot at naptime, and was running around in the playground when I went to pick her up. They reported that the slide was a big hit. Well, yeah. When I asked Calla if she liked sliding today, she just smiled and said "Weeeeeee" (you know, as in that universal sound you make when going down a slide).


Here's an Aunt Jeri photo from our family outing at Giant City State Park last week. Look closely. Yes, those are baked beans on her forehead. Yes, her mother let her go around all day like that. Still not winning best mother of the year.

Small Town Tales #2 (or is it #3?)

Phone rings just now. "Hello, is this the lady with the goats for sale?"

It took surprisingly long to convince the caller that indeed, I had no goats for sale, nor have I ever had goats for sale. Nor do I plan on selling any goats in the near or long-term future.

Must admit - I never had this conversation with random callers in Oak Park.

Our nearly exceptional child (part 2)

Just re-read my post from earlier today (see below). Lest I sound ungrateful for having such a wonderfully healthy and happy child, let me assure you: we have no mandatory visits scheduled with the Jackson County remedial walking backwards specialist. Nor has DCFS been called because of the lack of upright stairs ascending/descending. Doc says Calla is right on target. She's 31.5 inches long, not quite 24 lbs, and very healthy. Molars are coming in, which probably accounts for some occasional crankiness and a few night wake-ups these past couple weeks.

So all's well. But if you hear about a remedial learning-to-eat-with-a-spoon specialist, let me know. We may be interested in that service.

Our exceptional child

Every parent thinks his/her child is exceptional, right? Well, Joe and I do too, except in this case, we happen to be right. Calla's attention to detail (she gets the green plastic circle in the right hole almost every time) and her quickly growing language skills must mean she's just terribly bright - so much so that I've pondered calling the local early ed school to see if they have gifted and talented programs in pre-k, and if not, to suggest they have three years to prepare one.

So imagine my surprise when we went to Calla's new doctor and the nurse took us through the 15 -month developmental milestones. "Can she walk backwards?" "Can she walk up and down stairs?" "Can she dress or undress herself?" Whaat? First of all, I'm not confident I can walk backwards all that adeptly. Secondly, I've been fairly strict that she's NOT to try climbing up and down steps except on her tummy or bottom. I thought this was what good parents did. And let me tell you, dressing in the morning and undressing at night is exasperating enough (Calla would prefer to be naked if she had the choice) - I'm going to let Calla try her hand at those tasks? We'd never get out the door in the morning.

I was able to say proudly that Calla indeed had a vocabulary of at least six words, although I was disappointed that there wasn't extra credit given for having a vocabulary of about two to three times that. And she can kinda feed herself with a spoon, if we understand "feeding" to mean "lifting the spoon in the general direction of her mouth." And perhaps I stretched the truth on the question "Can she help around the house? Pick up her toys, maybe?" Sure, Calla can definitely pick up her toys. Sometimes they even go in the right place. And sometimes she throws my cell phone in the hamper and her sippy cup in the garbage.

Of course, the instant we got home, Calla stripped off her sweater and threw it at my feet, as if to flaunt her unknown-to-me undressing skills. I resisted calling the nurse back to update her records.

We're recovering from an onslaught of family. Joe's folks left Monday morning, and Joe's sister Jeri and her family left Sunday morning. So now we're doing the laundry and cleaning we did before they came, just without all the anticipation of visitors. Much more fun on the pre-visit side. So many photos to post, but perhaps these will suffice for now...

A new doll from Grandma Cheatwood. We call her "Baby" and she gets dragged around by her head and occasionally gets hugged. I'm not hiring Calla out for babysitting quite yet.



Calla and her cousin Joshua. She completely fell in love with Josh and was the first person to whom she handed a book and waited expectantly for him to figure out he was supposed to offer her a lap seat. Josh was a great sport and we're hoping to get together with him and his family more often now that we're just a teensy bit closer.

Calla starts full-day day care twice a week next week. We had a short introduction this morning and I predict it will all go well. She loved being around all those kids and they even have their own playground just for the toddlers. We're doing more short sessions this week so that Monday's transition should go smoothly and tear-free. And hopefully, Calla will be fine, too.

Grandma Anna visits!

I'm writing this Saturday evening, before Cub game #3 when life is still filled with hope and optimism. We shall see how long that lasts.

Grandma (Sime) visited this week. It's hard for me to give her that name since Grandma Sime is an entirely different person to me. Perhaps we'll have to call her Abuela in honor of her expatriot status. Regardless, it was a wonderful five days and not only because Mom put in some back-breaking wor in our jungled mess of landscaping. She was a ruthless pruner, causing Joe to go out today and buy a chipper. Really, he was just looking for an excuse to buy one more power gadget. Our compost pile will be so happy.

And to make the visit even sweeter, I won a three-way cribbage game and a scrabble game... it so rarely happens that I beat Joe in both, and this time I had a witness!

Calla's new word this week are water ("waaa") and "woof" (as in the sound Chloe makes). Today, she signed and said something fairly close to "book," which isn't surprising given how much she likes us to read to her.

Of course, we couldn't let Grandma go without several visits to our favorite park...

Going down the big slide all by herself... where did my baby go?

Playing peek-a-boo in the tunnel at the park's play gym.

Reading a book - Chloe had to be in on the fun, although I'm not sure she gets the joke.

Grandma and Grandpa Cheatwood arrive this coming Wednesday and Aunt Jeri, Uncle Russell and cousin Josh arrive on Friday for a short visit. So much fun to have such a wonderful family!

OK... 45 more minutes of hope and optimism. Here's to hoping for the best in spite of common sense...