More indoctrination

Couldn't resist posting this photo. No one will believe me, but it's completely unstaged. Calla sat down in her little chair, picked up some of her favorite reading material, and started reading to her baby. At first, the magazine was upside down, but she actually righted it, which I'm sure proves she'll be a great reader.


Two other recent victories... two honest-to-pete incidents on the tiny pink potty. Wahoo! Both times were more of an accident than anything else, and I think Calla was horrified by what happened, but Joe and I appropriately whooped and hollered. Hopefully, she hasn't been permanently scarred. Last Sunday at church, Calla and I had to scamper out quickly during the sermon because she started to insistently repeat (with an increasing sense of urgency) "wet...wet....wet... WET...WET...WET!" I got the point. The whole congregation got the point.

We're just grateful she doesn't have any other - ahem - diaper vocabulary.

Alien Encounter

Further proof my daughter may indeed be an alien: Afternoon snack today was an embarassment of culinary riches... avocados, a bite of leftover chocolate birthday cake (baked from scratch by Joe), and a tiny preview of dinner - glazed ham. What was on the snack menu that inspired a temper tantrum when gone? Chocolate cake, right? No. Didn't even finish the cake. All she wanted was more ham. More, more, more. At some point I was tempted to say - "No more ham until you finish your cake."

Who is this child?

A Good Saturday

Such a good day. It started well, as weekend mornings often do, with breakfast prepared by Chef Joe. Blueberry buttermilk pancakes. Yum. Then, since I'm still under the weather with, depending on the day, strep throat/flu/sinus infection/or a boring cold, I went back to bed for a nap. It wasn't exactly uninterrupted since Calla visited at least twice, but I still enjoyed the chance to have my eyes closed for at least an hour.

After my nap, Joe went outside to put up his new - get this- bat house and "plant" his morel (mushroom) habitat. Yes, just a few more steps into turning our .8 acres into a true jungle wildlife preserve. Meanwhile, Calla and I stayed inside and tried a new activity - Baking with Mama. We measured out flour, sugar, salt, stirred it all up, mashed a few over-ripe bananas, and stuck it in the oven. Mostly I mixed, mashed, and prepared. Calla had her own little bowl of baking ingredients that she occasionally tasted, drooled into (you would too if you were perpetually teething) and then slowly sifted over Chloe. But it was fun, and I think she actually can link our morning activities with the yummy snack she had in the afternoon. Probably not, but I'll pretend.




After lunch and Calla's nap, we headed to the SIU arena for our second SIU women's basketball game. We tried it once before and it was a rousing success. Calla's fascinated by the crowd (small, so lots of room for a toddler to walk up and down the aisles), the pep band, the cheerleaders, and most of all, the roving Saluki mascot. "Dog...dog....dog" she keeps repeating as soon as she sees the tall, long-eared brown dog (Brown Dawg in Saluki speak). She points to him, waves, and wants to know where the dog is at all times. She's brave, until Dawg gets about 20 feet away. Then she clutches at my neck and repeats "No..no..no..no..no..no." When Dawg gets the approved distance away, Calla's back at her job of Dawg spotter. "Dog? Dog? Dog? Dog?"

We came back home from the game (Salukis won!) and my dinner of chickpea patties with an onion chutney (new recipe, Whole Foods cookbook) actually turned out fairly good.

All in all, a good day for all of us. Here's hoping tomorrow turns out to be as much fun!

Snow Days

So, after shaking our head at all that snow and ice blanketing the upper midwest, it finally hit us here in southern Illinois last week. And it brought everything to a standstill. While we laughed about it, it's true that these communities just aren't prepared to deal with 3 inches of ice topped by 5-6 inches of snow. So we hunkered down and enjoyed our little snow day retreats.

The following pics are from after the first day of mostly sleet and ice. Joe went out and bought a little sled which really traveled well on the ice. We finally found a use for the bear snowsuit given to us by Grandma Cheatwood last year. A little snug, perhaps, but it worked. Calla's requested wearing her "Bee" suit several times since, even on a 45-degree day last weekend.




A new vocabulary milestone: "MINE." Not sure where she picked this one up, but it's always accompanied by clutching some dearly loved item to her chest... babies, books, bathtoys.... tomatoes. Coincidentally, this new word has shown up around the same time as the return of temper tantrums, sometimes as often as three times a day. Lovely. And, of course, it's always my fault... made her come inside when her little hands are freezing. Refused to allow her to eat her weight in wheat thins. Forced her to take her pajamas off before we left the house. You know, typical bad mother stuff.

And a funny habit that's even more pronounced now.... ever since she was a tiny babe, I tried to do baby massage on her, but she'd have none of it. The least I could do was massage a little bit of lotion into her legs. I kept this up and it became more important when she started creeping/crawling and her legs were dry and callousy. Now, it's a vital part of her bedtime routine. She pulls out the boppy pillow (now called her "lotion pillow"), picks out her choice of two baby-friendly lotions, nestles into the boppy and holds aloft her bare leg, ready for her leg massage. I'm guessing my daughter will be a big fan of pedicures in the future.

For now, we're both under the weather. Calla has a cold that's progressed to a cough and general lethargy. Hopefully, the worst has passed. I'm feeling less than 100% now, which is to be expected given my role this past weekend as mucus manager. No big deal. Could be worse. Joe could be sick, too.

Hope you all are healthy, warm and up for the challenge of another six weeks of winter!