April Showers Bring...Part 1

by Tricia

After months and months of nothing but rain, we have finally had a few days of sunshine around here. Just a few, though. In addition to our normal activities, we travelled to the coast for a weekend with my family, spent a day at the Chinese Gardens, celebrated Easter, and visited the Tulip Farm. There are so many pictures that we thought we would split the rest of the month's pictures into two posts and share just the pictures with a few comments.

Madelyn is ready for Easter with Duck. Duck seems to go everywhere with us lately, and it is hard to have bedtime without him. You will often find Duck wearing Madelyn's hair clips.

Digging in the sand at Netarts (Oregon coast). Madelyn has grown up so much since our first visit to the coast when she hardly knew what to do with the sand and almost blew over in the wind.

The leader of the pack.

Enjoying life outside after months of rain and runny noses.

Thinking that parasailing looks like a pretty cool thing. Madelyn did call it a balloon, though.

Happy family.

Making cookies with Nana. (Don't worry – the adults put the cookies in the oven.)

Decorating Easter eggs. FYI – Madelyn used a spoon – still not into getting her fingers messy.

Getting ready for the circle song in Toddler Tunes class. We now sing the songs from that class at every opportunity. Mommy and Daddy wake up with them going through their heads. Daddy's current 3 am song: “Wake me, shake me, don't let me sleep too late!” Mama's song: “Why oh why oh why, are the birdies in the sky? Up so high, in the sky, why oh why oh why?”

Showing Mama how to use all of the musical instruments. The drums are a favorite. Madelyn is learning that practically anything at home can be a drum! The drum song? “We play and we play and we play and we stop!” (Sometimes its hard to remember the stopping part though, and sometimes we get so distracted by watching the other toddlers that we stop when we are still supposed to be playing.)

Touring the Portland Chinese Gardens.

Checking on Baby Amelie, who joined us (along with her parents) for a tour of the garden. The highlight of Madelyn's trip to the Gardens was Amelie. She was the talk of our house for days afterward!

Having the run of the place.

Checking to make sure Baby Amelie could see out of her hat.

Princess Madelyn getting a ride from Daddy. (She didn't want the stroller, so we used it to carry coats. Yup, we are pushovers on some things.)

Hi, Daddy.

One small step for man . . . one giant leap for Madelyn.

Family picture (Sorry, Daddy needed his sunglasses).

Finishing the day off with a big bowl of noodles – Madelyn's request before she even saw the menu pictures.

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Yeah, Happy

by Tricia

Last month, I wrote about trying to teach Madelyn the difference between "happy" and "sad" after she tore up one of her Dr. Seuss books.  Another torn Dr. Seuss book recently provided a new chance for an education on the difference:

I know, I know.  You are wondering how we didn't learn our lesson with the first book.  Well - take a look at the picture - this one is a board book!  We naively assumed that board books were "toddler safe."  As Madelyn so aptly demonstrated, however, you can apparently peel the pictures off the boards.  This time, Madelyn understood that we were "sad," and there were some tears as she tried to make things "happy" again.  We told her that the book would have to take a rest for a while Mommy and Daddy figured out if they could fix it.  Is anyone out there good with puzzles and tape?  This one is going to take some time to put back together.

It just melts my heart, though, to hear Madelyn start vocalizing how she is feeling about things.  I can't wait to hear more about her feelings and emotions - she is so observant and I know there is a lot racing through her mind at all times.  One of the best examples of her sharing her feelings happened a few weeks ago when her friends Jaili and Evie came over to play.  It was way past Madelyn's typical bedtime when we called it a night, but the girls were having so much fun that we frankly didn't care about bedtime.  This video demonstrates just HOW much fun was being had:

Madelyn was absolutely rummy at the end of the night as we tried to get her upstairs and into her pajamas.  But, as we were headed up the stairs, she suddenly turned around to face us with a huge smile and said, "Happy!"  We asked her if she was happy because she had fun with her friends and she affirmed, "Yeah, happy," then returned to her dream-like state and promptly went to sleep when we laid her down.  I will forever carry that moment in my heart as it was so absolutely sincere and sweet.

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Don’t Open The Door! (or Madelyn After Dark)

by Troy

First off, don’t worry, I haven’t accidentally posted a horror movie post on our family blog, but the phrase “don’t open the door” is something that has come to typify part of Madelyn’s new nighttime ritual. Since during the weekdays I mostly only see Madelyn in the evenings,  it’s her bedtime procedure that I’m most involved in.  Parts of this routine, including the whole door opening issue, have begun changing in the last few weeks, so I thought I’d give an example of how it typically goes, some of the learning experiences for both Madelyn and myself, as well as just giving you a chance to enjoy hearing about how stinking cute she can be (and laugh at me while you’re at it):

1. After dinner is done, “we” pick up “our” toys downstairs (Tricia has more patience with Madelyn on this, waiting for her to actually do a majority of the work, while I tend to hand her one thing to put away while at the same time putting away four or five other things on my own).
2. Next, it’s an airplane ride up the stairs and to the bathtub. We turn the water on to fill up the tub and then run into her room to get her pajamas and diaper for the post-bath process. 
   
   For a few days last week, Madelyn didn’t follow me in to get her pajamas and while I was out of the bathroom, she decided to play with the tub faucet, turning the water alllll the way to ultra-hot.  The first time she did this, I put my hand in and surprised myself by being scalded, so we had a talk about how that hurts and how we don’t want to do that (you’ll notice these “talks” are a recurring theme here).  The next night, the same thing happens and we have the same conversation (though I didn’t scald myself this time). 
   
   A couple nights later, I’m talking to Tricia while the tub is filling and I go back in to the bathroom and set Madelyn in it, to which her eyes widen in horror and she yells at me “hothothothothot,” at which point I notice the lever is turned all the way to hot.  I quickly removed her from the tub then tried to have the conversation about how we can get hurt when we mess with things we aren’t supposed to, but she was to busy blaming me, yelling “Daddy!!” and wanting Tricia to hold her.
   
   She hasn’t messed with the hot water since then ;)
3. Bath time is the most random part of the night.  Sometimes Madelyn wants to play a lot -- which lately includes getting on her belly and swimming/blowing bubbles, stomping around to splash, or having me create a whirlpool a splash her.  Other times, she is ready to get out and go play elsewhere.
4. Madelyn has learned that after you get out of the hot bath into the cold air, you shiver and chatter your teeth, which she seems to make a good production of. I dry her off and, if I’m lucky, she’ll lay right down for a diaper, though sometimes she would rather run in and nakedly surprise mama in the office :) With a process that involves diaper cream, diaper, body lotion, lip massage, face lotion, pajamas, and sleeper, it isn’t any wonder that she sometimes doesn’t want to do it all and tries to escape us to go play. But if we make a game of the process and sing or make silly sounds, she’s usually more than willing to go along with us easily.
5. Next comes 15 or 30 minutes of play time, typically either having Tricia read her a book, playing her computer games, or jumping/playing “night-night” in our bed. 
   
   If we are in our bed, then she must have control of a) the lights (we are told “light on” or “light off”) b) the doors (typically she must go and close them all), c) who sleeps on which pillow (I am always yelled at if I dare lay on mama’s side of the bed), and d) if the radio is on or off (she has our alarm clock entirely figured out).
6. After this it’s time for “good nights.”  Tricia and Madelyn go to the laundry room and look out the window out the front of the house and say goodnight to the various cars, trees, rocks, garbage cans, people, house fixtures, and celestial bodies. Then, when leaving the laundry room, they say good night to all of the people in the framed pictures in the hallway (essentially saying good night to daddy, mama, and Madelyn about 12 times).
7. Meanwhile, I’m waiting for Madelyn in her room and Tricia hands her over to me and she gives mama her kiss good night, closes the door almost all the way, only to open it again, peek her head through the crack, and give mama another kiss, before finally closing the door completely and exclaiming to me “mama,” just to make sure I know who it was we just said good night to (this whole ritual has been fairly consistent for several months now).
8. Then, it’s time for us to read a story. We sit in her chair and read one book -- if she has requested something or brought something in with her, we read that, otherwise I try to mix things up so we don’t read the same thing every night. As of late, we MUST recline the rocking chair while we read and she MUST sit on my left (which is funny -- because with Tricia she seems to almost always request to sit on her right).
9. When the book is done, she will without fail request that she take the book to bed with her.  After the whole book ripping fiasco that Tricia outlined a while back, we have a “board book only” rule for the bed. So I simply tell her that this is a “special” book that has to stay in the hallway and she will typically nod once and say “yeah,” try to grab it to take it to bed, I’ll reiterate that it’s “special” and she’ll be fine with that and go into bed, where her board books are waiting.
   
   Now, this has become a bit of an issue lately as she is managing to quite easily destroy her board books as well. So, for the past week or so, with each of those she rips we discuss taking care of our books and that the books she has defaced have to “rest” for a bit to get better (I guess we’ll try to tape them up). Much to my surprise she has handled this well, repeating to me “no ripping books” and then being very understanding when I take them out of the room. Of course, as I’ll point out in a bit, repeating what I say and following through on it aren’t quite going hand in hand yet.
10. As she scurries to her bed, I arrange her stuffed animals for her along one side of the bed (last night there were 10 of them in there), she then sits at the front-left corner of the bed (she will not lay down to go to sleep), I drape her blanket over her legs, then her pillow goes on her lap, and then her books go on the pillow (so she can read to all of her friends).
    
    In the past, this would be the end of things, as I’d give her a kiss good night, turn out the lights, and leave, but the past couple of weeks have introduced a new twist on things. Again, as Tricia mentioned in a previous post, now Madelyn can quite easily open her door. When this first started I would have a nightly discussion with her about staying in bed and not opening the door. We even came up with a reward system for her, but we quickly realized that it wasn’t getting through to her, so we decided it would be easiest to just put a gate up in front of her door so that at least she can’t roam free around the house. While this bugged her at first, she’s quickly gotten used to it.
    
    The whole thing has obviously got through to her to a point, because for the past few nights, after I tuck her in and tell her I love her, she looks at me and says “don’t open door,” “daddy open door,” “stay in bed,” and “gate.”  And each night I smile at her, tell her how proud I am for listening to me and remembering what I say, turn off her light, walk to the door, close it, and as I’m putting up the gate, I hear footsteps, the doorknob turns, and a little head pokes out at me, staring right at me.  I ask her if we are supposed to open the door and she says “no” and runs back to her bed.  I walk down the hallway, only for her to open her door 10 seconds later.
    
    At this point, if she sees me, she slams the door shut and runs to her bed in a most un-stealthy manner. If she doesn’t see me, then she stands by her gate and reels off what to us seem like non-sequiturs, but what to her must obviously make sense.
    
    We’ve taken video of this whole process, but our camera doesn’t have night vision on it, so all it is is darkness with Madelyn’s voice coming out of it. It’s just a short video  where she talks about eggs, mommy, daddy and getting out of her room, before giving up and going back to bed.
    
    
    
    There’s another video that goes on longer (but that I’m not posting at this time since I don’t have it edited) that is more typical of how it’s been the last few nights -- it’s her first 30 minutes in bed and you hear her get out of bed, run to the door, open it, attempt to read her book in the limited hallway light (you hear her talking about “ducks” and “quack,” which is in one of her books), and then shut the door, repeat about 15 times. Sadly, the end result of this night, when after an hour she was still opening and closing her door and not going to sleep, was to put her in her pack and play so she would actually go to sleep. It seems we have a 2-year old who can’t yet control her impulses, which, now that I think about it, is something I can totally relate to :)

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An Afternoon With Madelyn, Part 2

by Troy

(All posts in this series -- Introduction, Part 1, Part 2)

After playing in the playroom, Madelyn decided she then wanted to venture into Tricia’s and my bedroom.  This begin with nothing more than simply wanting to play “night night” and pretending to sleep on mama’s side of the bed.  “Pretending” is the operative word here, as Madelyn can lay still in our bed for about 10 seconds before becoming too antsy and needing to either get our attention again or else run off to do something else.

In this case, the idea she had was to run off and do something else.  She told me “Back, daddy, back” and gave me her universal hand signal for “I’ll be right back” and then off she went…

So, I decided to turn the video camera on and record whatever book or stuffed animal she would decide to bring in.  I’m glad I did, because she had an even bigger surprise for me up her sleeve:

Yes, she decided it was time to bring her rocking horse in from the playroom to mommy and daddy’s bedroom.  Apparently all that dragging made her too tired to use it, as she quickly went into the bathroom and grabbed her stool to help herself climb up on the bed (and the horsey sat in our bedroom for at least a month after this, occasionally being ridden at the most random of moments when she noticed it was there). 

Next up was the video monitor -- she quickly learned how to turn it on and off and also seemed quite interested in how it she can see her bed in it.  Luckily for me, there aren’t too many thing to mess with on the monitor, because Madelyn (as I assume many other kids are as well) is fantastic at pushing random buttons on electronic equipment and somehow managing to create odd settings on them.  The worst case here was adjusting the sensitivity of the monitor and turning the light on the camera, both of which I was quickly able to change when she tired of playing with it and moved on to the next thing.

At this time I’d now like to point out that Madelyn has quite an impressive glistening sheet of drool encasing her t-shirt.

We finish up this portion of the series with one of my favorite things Madelyn does, which is use my earbuds to “listen” to the radio with me.  Quick side story first -- I haven’t been quite as big a fan of her being enamored with my earbuds lately, as she’s taken to popping the plastic pieces that fit in the ear off of them, which will really suck the one time she loses one and I have to go buy replacements.  Moral of the story is I should probably put these somewhere she can’t get to them, but then I figure I wouldn’t be able to get to them easily.  Shouldn’t she just listen to me and not pop those off to help with my convenience :)

So in addition to liking the earbuds, Madelyn also quite quickly learned the on/off buttons on our alarm clock radio.  Since these pictures and this video were taken, the typical scenario is her “nudging” (or you could say demanding) me to take one earbud in my ear, put the other in her ear, and then she turns on the radio and we bob our heads and dance, and then she turns it off and we freeze.  This repeats for quite a while, with her being sure to say “on” and “off” whenever she presses the button on the radio (as you’ll see her also doing in the video below).

Here, I decided to be the DJ and turned the radio on and off for her, while she danced on the bed.  I probably am tempting fate by letting her treat my nice noise-cancelling earbuds as toys (especially when I have the free ones that came with my ipod sitting around somewhere), aren’t I?

Next up -- jumping…lots and lots of jumping.

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An Afternoon With Madelyn, Part 1

by Troy

(All posts in this series -- Introduction, Part 1, Part 2)

As promised well over a month ago, here is part one of the many part series on "An Afternoon With Madelyn.” Of course, the material I had for this is now about two months old and it seems that Madelyn has grown up and changed so much in that short time. Still, these videos, pictures, and stories still point towards her personality and how much fun it is to hang out with her, so it would be a shame to let them go to waste by not posting them…

So with Madelyn and I all by ourselves, I thought a good first thing to do would be to go to her playroom and start by coloring/drawing.  She would request a specific coloring book, flip through a few pages of it, click her marker lids on and off, and then request a different coloring book.  In the span of about 10 minutes we went through just about every coloring and sticker book she had, with the end result being a bunch of stickers on her hands and my feet.

Soon after this, Madelyn decided it was time to do some dancing.  So she played all the songs on her musical chair and danced around the room.  The chair’s batteries are nearly dead, so every song plays just a little bit slower (two months later and I still haven’t replaced those batteries :P), but that doesn’t seem to deter her from marching to the beat.

Next on the agenda, nothing more than playing peek-a-boo by opening and shutting the door. This probably lasted longer than the coloring and dancing did, consisting of opening the door, saying goodbye, leaving the room and shutting the door, running down the hall, coming back to say hello, rinse and repeat. Little did I know that by encouraging this I was likely leading to our whole staying in bed conundrum in the coming weeks :)

Finally, I decided to just film her in her natural habitat. So, I let her loose and here are the results…

Some things that are obvious from this video:

• This seems like decent proof that Madelyn has a much shorter attention span when playing with me than she does playing with Tricia.
• When Madelyn doesn’t want you to put your arm somewhere or requires you to sit somewhere, she lets you know.
• 2-year old kids have no idea the pain they can cause by pushing down with all their force on certain areas of your body when you aren’t paying attention :P
• Madelyn’s never-ending supply of drool is a trademark, but did you know that her snot is just about equally never-ending?

Next up -- some silliness with Madelyn’s horsey and listening to the radio.

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