Holiday Fun

Yesterday the girls and I went to the Eiteljorg Museum, here in town, to see their Jingle Rails exhibit.  The Eiteljorg is a Native American and Western .. something museum, and this exhibit is super cool.  It's 1200 feet of train track and they go up over head and from Indianapolis to .. the West (I should work in Marketing, ha!) so you see renderings of Indianapolis, downtown, the State Fairgrounds, and then, like, pueblos in Arizona, and New Mexico.  I will make a link so in case anyone wanted more information about it, they could get some actual information and not the bumbling that I am doing here.  Here.  Anyway, it is super cool and of course the girls had little to no appreciation for it.  I took Veronica to the Eiteljorg last year and she remembered the super fun stuff downstairs at the museum where you can go in a stagecoach, get dressed up like a cowboy, shop in a Chinese shop, etc., so we whipped through the Jingle Rails so we could go down there and it was fun.

The day before yesterday I took them to the Children's Museum, which was fun but hard, like every other damned thing.  Felicity's skirt fell off her as she walked into the museum, so I had to buy her some too-large and too-expensive pants, and she didn't want me to ride with her on the Carousel, but you *have* to ride with your three year old, so I had to stand two horses behind her, with some other family, who thought I was crazy.

People are nuts.  Here it is, the Christmas season, and I am smack dab in the middle of the Friendly Hoosier State and I swear to God, not one person looked me in the eye yesterday.  I would have loved to have shared that Felicity wanted me to stay back, I thought it was funny, but nobody would make eye contact with me!  I didn't want to be their best friend (GOD KNOWS) but I just wanted to speak to someone, what the hell?  After we got off the Carousel, Felicity was eating all this fake food at the fake ice cream shop, and this mom and I commiserated about how gross that was and how dumb it is to do, but I think that is the only person I talked to all day.

Anyway, we have been trying to have Christmas Break Fun but it's challenging because everyone keeps getting sick.  Felicity was sick early last week and she has actually been okay ever since but God knows how long she will stay that way, because since she's been sick, and missed her last two damned days of preschool before her two week break, Maria was sick, Veronica was sick, Anthony was sick, then Maria was sick AGAIN and Veronica woke up sick this morning, so who the hell knows what will happen.  So far, so good, with Felicity.

She is still impossible to take anywhere.  I mean, I have to take her everywhere because she wants to go but she still, like, refuses to leave her damned shoes on.  Yesterday I was talking to my friend Adam when we were at the Eiteljorg, I had placed myself so I could see all three girls, and I looked over in the shop they have set up, where they sell like dry goods and also Chinese slipper and there on the shelf were Felicity's shoes, ha!  Right now she is standing in front of me, mad and crying, because she has one arm out of her nightgown but she still wants to wear her nightgown.  Or something.  She is infuriating, she never seems to know what the hell she wants but she is very serious about it, whatever it is.  But she's so cute and when she was sick, no matter how she felt, when I said "how are you feeling?", she'd say "bettah".  I hope she has a Merry Christmas and I hope that 2015 is her best year yet.  For all of our sakes, ha!

Almost Christmas

A few weeks ago, when the girls had off from school the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, I took them all three bowling with another friend of mine and her charge, who is 12, and a friend of hers who brought his two kids, who were like eight and six.  We all had a really good time, Felicity "bowled", where you put the ball up on a ramp, for most of the first game (we played two) and then she got really over it, but she spent the rest of the time looking at this Christmas tree that was set up in the bowling alley.  She was so intrigued by it, she just kept walking around and around it, she was so into it.  I wondered aloud what she was doing and my friend Jill pointed out that she probably didn't really remember the tree from last year, which is true!  Lord, it is so complicated, I feel like every day I'm going to lose my mind with this kid and she will never remember it!  She probably won't even remember standing there looking at the tree for so long, but she is clearly really happy in the moment, so is that good?  Does that matter?  I do not even know.

We are home now, on Friday afternoon.  She and I went to ballet this morning, after a two week break.  A two week break, I found out this morning, was way too long, no one could even remember what to do in the recital and Felicity especially wanted nothing to do with it.  She was upset that I was there, it got her all messed up and she ended up barely doing anything but whatever.  She is only three, it's no big deal.  Then we went to Chic Fil A and met Jill and her nephew Max, who is just her age, a few months older, but he is completely potty trained, which is a whole nother thing for us.

She refuses and I mean refuses to potty train.  This week she has started to - well, say she's naked, which she is a lot, she will have to go, I will SEE her realize she has to go and she storms over to me and says I NEED A DIAPER!  I say, you don't need a diaper, you need to sit on the potty, let's sit on the potty and Go!, come on, it will be great!  And she freaks out and screams and cries and eventually I'm afraid she's going to lose her mind so I put a diaper on it and she fills it right up with pee.  It is beyond infuriating.  I am so, so sick of telling people what to do with their waste and having them DISAGREE with me!  I'm 46!, I want to tell her, I know what you should be doing!  Mike says that it will get better, he says she is doing all the steps except, you know, actually going on the potty, and he's right but ugh.  As I said, infuriating.

She likes to stick her fingers in my mouth and count my teeth.  She likes to make shapes with her hands and make me guess what they are.  Today I guess "rectangle" and she told me with a withering stare, "no!  oval!".  Right now she can't find a drumstick and she wants one so I have to go but that's your update.  She is fine.  Adorable.  Infuriating.  Won't remember a bit of it.

Better

Well, she is better but she still has a runny nose.  Just this morning she said to me, "I have a cold.  I HAVE A COLD!".  She is mad about it, too.  She had off on Tuesday of this week, just to torture me, because Monday was the last day of Maria and Veronica's fall break, although they claimed at her preschool it was for parent/teacher conferences.  Her conference went okay, there were all three of her teachers there, she is fine, she can try to cry for stuff that she wants but it doesn't get her anywhere so she moves on.  She loves the writing center, they said.

But it was a pain.  We had to go to preschool to go to the conference but we weren't going for the day so it was confusing for her.  We went to Marta's after so she could stay there for a while so I could go into school and volunteer, and then we had lunch there so that was nice.  We went to the library this week, to ballet.  Ballet started its second session and she did well, it was nice for her to seem like she remembered something.

We went out for Halloween, she was Olaf and she was adorable but it was an extremely terrible Halloween, weather wise.  Felicity wanted to walk and she was kind of poofy for the stroller anyway but she was SO SLOW and Maria and Veronica wanted to go faster so they could keep warm, ugh, it was wretched.  Mike had to come and get us eventually.

She has off for the whole week of Thanksgiving which seriously makes me want to cry but what can you do.  Hopefully next year she will be in preschool where the girls go to school and they can all be on the same calendar.  If it seems like I am always waiting for time to pass and things to get better, it's because I am.

Here's a cute picture of terrifying Felicity and Olaf/Felicity

Poor Felicity

Poor Felicity has another ear infection.  I told my sister that today and she said well now I feel bad for thinking she was being such a jerk the other day!  But the thing is, she WAS being a jerk.  She had a fever on Thursday and threw up first thing in the morning but she seemed better later and definitely better by Friday, when she went to her ballet recital.  I didn't go, Mike took her, because I took Maria and Veronica to see Sleeping Beauty and I didn't think she would be into it.

Anyway, then yesterday she yelled at me, MY MOUTH HURTS and I was like did you bite your tongue?  She was eating strawberries and she kept saying OW! OW! OW! but it wasn't until alter that I thought holy crap I bet her throat hurts!  She doesn't know from THROAT and MOUTH, ugh, poor baby.  I swear no one else has ever been sick like this before, I bet none of them have ever had a sore throat.  The NP at the clinic today said how big her tonsils were and I do not even want to think about that, so I'm not going to.

So she has been having a rough few days and she woke up first this morning, out in the hall, saying Mommy?  Mommy?  She is so funny, she just stays stock still, doesn't even come bashing in the room like Maria or Veronica would.  She fell asleep so hard today after we went to this Trunk or Treat at the church that houses her preschool, but just for a while and then she was much more pleasant.  She freaked out today, she tried to take some candy from another trick or treater.  It was confusing, people were giving her candy out of baskets and this girl was standing there with candy in a basket, and she just didn't get it.  So when the girl took her candy back, Felicity screamed and screamed and screamed and cried and it got better but man.  She gets so mad so fast and I am always so close to the end of my rope, ugh.  But overall, you know, she did great, she wore her Olaf costume and she was nice and said TRICK OR TREAT! to everyone, I am hopeful she will have a good week.  As usual.  Here's a cute picture:

Resentment

I don't know how to not resent the jerk who stayed up all night crying and who is now super tired and crabby and is screaming and screaming in the other room because I shook her chocolate milk.  She just came in here and is yelling "I want to shake the milk!".  It would be funny if it weren't so desperate.  She didn't go to sleep until almost 9:00 last night, after I moved Maria and Veronica out of their own room so they weren't kept up by her screaming.  Then she was up at 12, 2:20 and 5:50 for the day.  I was up with her all those times and now I'm supposed to take this person to ballet at 10:30 and then to lunch to meet some friends.  And THEN I am supposed to go to work!  Is this a joke?  I always think.  Surely this is a joke, right?  This couldn't really be happening to me, I can't really be 46 (and a half!) years old and sitting on a couch with some YAHOO yelling about shaking the milk to me.  Can I?  Is this really happening?  Every day I think there is no way I can keep doing this and some day it's going to be true.

Happy Third Birthday!

Happy birthday to Felicity!  This is her last day of Fall Break and she has not slept in one single day, even though sometimes when she is in preschool, I have to go wake her up for her 8:45 departure.  Last night I was complaining about something she did and this girl I work with said, so basically what you are saying is that you shouldn't have had a fourth kid.  I was completely dumbfounded, um, no!, that is not what I'm saying!  I'm saying sometimes she drives me crazy, and especially this week when we have had so much time together, from an early morning until she goes to bed.  I think maybe YOU are basically saying I shouldn't have had a fourth child, I thought but did not say.

Anyway, ::claps hands briskly::, back to Felicity.  Today we gave her her presents from us (Mike got her an adorable counting puzzle with animals, one elephant, two deer, etc., and I got her four new board books that she can have as her very own) and we are going to go to ballet later.  Then I am somehow going to pick up pizza and salad and cupcakes and bring them to Marta's and we are having a lunchtime pizza party.  I'm working tonight but Mike is going to take them for Happy Meals and then they'll have cake and ice cream later.  I feel bad that I'm working but I just took off for the Parents Night Out and I am taking off for Halloween, so separate parties it is!

I am excited about Felicity's fourth year.  I hope that she gets toilet trained, she'll start at preschool at the girls' school next fall, who knows what else is in store for her!  It's very exciting, anyway, right?  Even if it's annoying and crazy making and all the other bad stuff, it's all the good and great stuff, too, parenthood.  So God Bless Felicity and happy birthday to her!

Almost Three

What kind of week did Felicity have, I was thinking today?  The same as last week, pretty much!  Sh was funny tonight before bed, she was tired but didn't want to end it.  Again?, she asked when I read her HER book, a cute story about fingers and toes and eyes and your nose.  I read it one more time and I stood up and the end and ran out when I was done and she must have gone to sleep because they are all quiet.

She had a great week at school, as usual, I took her to the library on Thursday and on Friday we went to ballet, so it was a normal week.  On Saturday, though, the girls went to a birthday party and Anthony went to Great Times with Christina and so Mike and I took Felicity by herself to La Hacienda, a mexican place by us.  It is prettily decorated, lots of bright colors, and she likes the quesadillas, it went well.  These bros came in, a birthday party for one of them, and my LORD they were so loud!  So loud and so obnoxious and it felt to me very plainly like so long ago that I was their age.  But anyway, she and we had a good time and then we went to CVS and Costco with her and it was pretty easy.  This funny thing happened, though.  We were at Costco and I was afraid I lost my keys and before we could form a plan for finding them, I realized they were in my hand.  I think somehow because I only had one child with me I was all messed up, ha!  The things you get used to.  Anyway, here's a cute picture:

Ballet

Felicity started ballet on Friday!  She is so cute, she was kind of the worst one there but it wasn't a big contest.  She is the youngest, probably, as you are supposed to be three and she won't be three for a month, so I don't feel too bad.  Veronica started in January when she was going to be five in May, so she was younger but she and Felicity are, ahem, different personality types, so Felicity was a little bad.  There is a new teacher, of course, and I don't envy her coming in to a new position where the person who had the last position was so well loved, but she seemed fine.  After class I said I hope Felicity did okay and that she could come back, and the teacher said "I have lots of experience with little girls, we will be fine!", so that was good.

She had a rough week, she is still on antibiotics, but it's been okay.  Yesterday Anthony woke her up in the morning and boy oh BOY was she grumpy in the afternoon.  My sister Laura was here and we couldn't get over how bad she was.  Chocolate milk in my water bottle!, she kept screaming and I tried for a long time to tell her no, we have milk in a cup, water in a water bottle, but I thought she'd explode from anger so I just gave her the milk and she fell asleep about two seconds later.  You should have seen her face, drinking that milk.  She was furiously sucking on the bottle but getting no joy from it, dirty looking me the whole time.  Then she woke up kind of roughly but honestly by Sunday afternoon, we just all try and push through.  She was pretty good in church, she is getting better all the time.  She's ridiculous, of course, Veronica and I went to the bathroom and she came and there was fan there and she refused to leave it.  WINDY!, she was yelling, so I sent Veronica back and stayed with her for a minute so she could enjoy the breeze.

Today she is at school, Mike dropped her off and he said she didn't even pretend to say goodbye, just ran in the room and didn't look back.  I told Mike we are lucky, she has never had one hard time about me leaving her. She goes there three days a week, Thursdays we can go to the library and Friday she has ballet so hopefully we will have a good fall and winter, keeping nice and busy.  Here's a cute picture:

Sickness

Poor Felicity is sick.  She has an ear infection in one ear for sure and maybe in the other, and she probably has pneumonia!  Ugh, she had a cough on Friday night and she woke up around 1:00 crying so Mike gave her some ibuprofen and sent her back to bed but she woke up around 3:00 FOR THE DAY and tortured him all night.  When she woke up at 3:00, she woke up Veronica, who got super scared and sad (she is sensitive during the day and it takes on really insane levels in the middle of the night) so I took her into our room.  Felicity fell asleep around 5:30 until 6:30 and that was in for the day.  We were all so tired and sick on Saturday but there was nothing that could be done - Anthony had plans with his respite girl and Maria and Veronica had a birthday party, I had friends in town for the Notre Dame/Purdue game, so we just pressed on.

Saturday night I had to work, we were busy and I had another friend in town who I was waiting on, a group of 15 or so friends, and while I was waiting on them, Mike called and said that Anthony was having a seizure, so I wrapped it up and ran home so he could take him to the ER. I cleaned up Anthony's room (he had been sick to his stomach, too) and did laundry and as soon as I finished, Felicity woke up crying.  I moved her to my room, where she slept for a little bit but she was soon wide awake and crazy, so we went downstairs.  Mike and Anthony had been admitted, so it was just us until she finally fell asleep around 6:00, then the girls woke up at 7:00.

I took them all to the Take Care Clinic at the Walgreens, where the woman felt like she had an ear infection and said that her oxygen ... intake?  Whatever, how much she was getting was 97% and she would probably benefit from a nebulizer treatment but they didn't have a pediatric sized one.  So we went from there to another urgent care, one I had called to see if they had a kids' sized one and they said they did.  We saw a doctor there who said she did have an ear infection and probably pneumonia but he didn't see a reason to confirm it with a chest xray, since the treatment for both things were the same, anti-biotics.  So we went home and started medicating her and she's better.

Ay yi yi, it is always something with these people!  Mike was up all night with her Friday and I was Saturday and last night, THANK GOD, she slept all night.  I am hoping we are over the hump with her and that everyone has a good week. It's so awful to be sick, I know, but it is also awful to be the sick one's mother.  It's so terrible to not sleep and then you have to just - keep doing everything you are supposed to do.  My friend who was visiting came over yesterday and I had a card party that I was invited to sub in, everyone still has to have dinner and do homework and man - all I can say is that I was so glad to see bedtime come last night.  Here's to a better week!

Almost three

Felicity is almost three and she is super, super cute lately.  When she wants ice cream, she says she wants to go to the Ice Cream Station.  She calls applesauce applesop.  This morning I made her some toast and put butter on it and she came over and stuck her finger in it and said YUCK, I do not like peanut butter, Mommy!  I said it's not peanut butter, it's just butter and she said OKAY and ate it.  She cracks me up.

She is driving Maria crazy at night.  On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday she goes to preschool and she takes a nap and then she is wide awake at night, while Maria and Veronica do not nap or even rest, so they are ready to go to sleep and Felicity is roaming the room, bugging them.  She used to bug Veronica but now she is bugging Maria and that stinks for ME because now Maria is bugging ME about it!  Two nights ago, we said Maria could sleep in Felicity's old room, in my parents' bed, and now she wants to sleep in there every night.  But Veronica doesn't want to be stuck in their room without Maria and so she is miserable.  Last night, Felicity was bugging and bugging Maria but Veronica had fallen asleep, so I let Maria sleep in the other room.  There are three beds in their room, a bunk bed and then a single twin bed and guess where Felicity wants to sleep?  That's right.  In the top bunk - a place to where she can climb UP but not DOWN.  It's all very annoying and it makes me hate the night time but I remember from Veronica being this age that it won't last forever.

Felicity is now the age that Maria was when we moved into this house, which just seems crazy, right?  She is not doing that great with the potty, and by that I mean she is just not doing anything.  I'm sure something will click, I just hope it's soon.  She is doing very, very well everywhere else, she marches right into preschool, she is playing with other kids, Anthony isn't bugging her as much.  So things are good, even if she is kind of annoying.

On Sunday, we went to see my niece Moira play soccer, which is something the girls really like to do, so I took Felicity.  She was the worst one there, she kept messing with the one net and getting her feet stuck, but she wasn't terrible.  My brother and sister in law were there and introduced me to their friends, the parents of Moira's good friend.  Anyway, the dad told me that for him and his (measly) two kids, three was MUCH worse than two.  I wanted to say are you kidding me?  Are you so compelled to be a bossy know it all that you are going to tell me, the mother of FOUR kids, about two or three and how the threes can be TERRIBLE?  I mean, I've heard that!  But I didn't say anything, I just said that my kids are pretty rough babies and for me, they just get better as they get older.  And then I silently said, so shut it, ha!

Here's a cute picture of Felicity in the bathtub.  She never wants to get out and last night she was putting bubbles all over her face and yelling at me to BLOW THEM UP!   BLOW THEM UP, MOMMY!

September Update

Felicity has started school and it makes me wish she went every damned day of the week, including Saturday and Sunday!  My friend Hannah was saying the other day how happy she was that her son was a fall birthday so she could get an extra year with him and - I mean, I don't even understand that sentence.  I am really, really, REALLY looking forward to her going to school every day.  She likes it better, I like it better, WIN WIN!  But it's okay, I guess.

She goes to school on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday from 9-2 and she loves it.  I am lucky, on the first day some kids were crying and crying and there went Felicity, right into the room, never looking back.  Our van was in the shop today so Mike took her to school for the first time and he texted me that she "barely said goodbye".  Ha!

On Thursdays and Fridays, we are home together, just us.  Last week Marta and I and our youngests went to the park and tried to take a walk but it was a big fat fail.  If it's not one complaining or grousing, it's the other.

She drives me crazy but she is so adorable.  Just now we are all sitting around watching The Wiggles and she is dancing, she's really good!  She talks so well, such great and long sentences.  She's a little hard to understand but overall I think she is a genius.  Here is just one picture of her because I can't figure out why, but it won't let me post more than one.

P.S. we are getting nowhere with the potty.  NOWHERE.

July

I'm sitting around with Felicity, we just got back from a walk.  We went two miles in 39 minutes, which is not great but we stop a lot.  She turns around, she leans out, she wants her shoes off, she drops her crackers/water bottle/shoes, she wants to get down, etc.  I thought maybe she'd fall asleep because she was up early (6:52) and she has a wicked summer cold but alas, she did not.  Now she is sitting on my hip and we are watching some Peppa Pig, which is one of her favorite things lately.

Other favorite things of Felicity's, here at two years and nine months old:

• having her back or belly scratched
• short books, Opposites by Sandra Boynton, this cute book my cousin Lisa sent where you count things on the farm, look at colors of the farm, talk about opposites on the farm (if opposite seems like a theme, it is, as it OPPOSITIONAL)
• swimming, or playing at the pool anyway
• swinging on the pink swing, which is the baby swing, then the blue swing, which is Anthony's swing, and then jumping on the tramplopline, and she does all three for about two minutes at a time in a kind of circuit.  
• wearing dresses
• going to "Miss Judy's House", which is what she calls her preschool.  She has been going on Wednesdays to their little Simply Summer program, just from 9-1 and she loves it.  I can't wait for her to go back this fall, really the end of August.  She loves being there and I love her to be there too.  Or anywhere that is not right up under my arm.  

Three for Thursday

Let's see.  What is Felicity up to this week?  She is two years and eight months old, closer to three than two.  She is not even remotely interested in toilet training, so much so that I have been kind of laying off talking about it because she gets so mad when I bring it up.  No!. she yells when I innocently ask if she'd like to sit on the potty, or if she thinks she might EVER want to sit on the potty.  She'll do it someday, I'm guessing.

Today I took Maria and Veronica to swim lessons and they were taking off their dresses, under which they had on their suits, and poor Felicity started to take off her clothes too.  After just a little bit of talking, we went to the play area, where she played with this super nice five year old girl and then hell descended upon us in the form of 20 kids from the Child Watch, oh, it was crazy!  There were two childwatch workers there, and the one was really good, or trying to be, telling the big kids to look out for the little kids, but it was rough.  THEN some 11 or 12 year old girl climbed over Felicity to sit on this big block, one that you can climb in, one that is specifically for little kids and is in fact in the little kid area of the play room.  I said, could you let her play in there, she's only two.  Then the girl gave me a hard look, and swung one leg over, still sitting on the block.  So I stood up and said, that's good, but I'm going to need you to get all the way off the block.  Are you kidding me?, I always think.  The Child Watch lady said how sorry she was but I don't expect her to discipline some kid in Child Watch, I felt fine about doing it myself.  But honestly - the way that kids are (I hate to say this because it sounds like an old lady thing to say) today is awful - AWFUL.  It never would have occurred to me to behave like that around an adult when I was that kid's age or even now!  I wouldn't have taken a TOY from a BABY but you know why?  Because I was raised right.  I can't believe that people are so surprised that everyone is so jerky, but they also allow their kids to talk to adults with no respect at all.  Also, I read an article that my friend Gael wrote about Last Day of School Traditions and what are you doing with you kids to celebrate them on their last day of school and I think really?  REALLY?  We have a big parade in town because Maria got from Kindergarten to first grade?  That is the least that is expected from her!  I don't understand anyone or anything and I feel like an alien all the time.

Felicity is so funny - she is a real tough guy about so many things but yesterday we were watching My Little Pony, Veronica's pick, and one of the ponies was having a nightmare about a cougar or something and Felicity freaked out! She ran out of the room screaming!  I assured her it was just pretend, blah blah blah, and she's fine of course but it's just funny what affects people.

Here's some pics!

Joy of Parenting

The other day I saw a picture on Instagram, a blogger I like, who has a baby just a little older than Felicity, was saying how great two is.  How two is her jam.  And other people commented and said oh, them too, wasn't two the BOMB?  DOT COM?  Wasn't it just so great?  And I think - no!  No it is not that great!  And then I think is it me?  It probably is, it probably is just me and my family, because on its face, it should be great. Felicity talks a lot and she is super fun and funny and cute.  Her hair is getting longer and she is the first of my kids to have a little curl to her hair.  She is adorable and funny and smart and, important only to me, seems FINE in the talking/typical behavior department.

But she is also the devil and that is the truth.  She is crazy and here's how.  Yesterday we went upstairs to get ready for church and I held out her cute Easter dress.  I know better than to show her anything involving pants, she only wears dresses.  So I held out this dress and she said, NO!  That is TOO SMALL!  I wanna THISDRESS!  But that dress was Maria's and it was way too big on Maria - it's a size EIGHT!  I said no, Fifi, that is too big, you'll fall down and she said I WANNA WEAR A DRESS!  THAT DRESS!  So I put it on her and she wore it to church, she looked like a lunatic and I'm sure I looked like one too. She was her usual bad self at church, but it was all heightened because she was wearing that ridiculous dress and kept falling down and crying to ME about it.

The thing is, I think she thinks she is Maria's age, I think she really thinks that dress in a 3T would be too small on her, but my question is, then why doesn't she want to go on the toilet like Maria does?  She saves her loudest and most obnoxious NOs for when I innocently ask, do you want to go on the potty?  I mean, she doesn't want to wear clothes or a diaper, and she thinks she's six years old, so wouldn't you naturally think she wants to go to the toilet?  You might think that, but you'd be wrong.

Here's some cute pictures, so we can all forget how crazy she makes a person, and we will all think two is awesome, too, maybe.

Felicity the Fairy

She is something else, right?  This picture was from the other night, we went out, just us girls, to follow Maria around as she knocked on doors to collect money for her Walkathon.  We walked up and down the street and I had a HECK of a time getting them back in the house, but then I told Felicity she could take a bath and have a cupcake and off she went, I snapped this as she was tearing by.

She is really getting fun!  And awful!  She talks a lot, definitely in more sentences and she does this cute thing that Maria used to do.  I say something like, Felicity, do you want to eat some lunch? and she says OKAY!, like it's the best idea she ever heard.  She just now said "I washa hands?".  I said "you want to wash your hands?" and she said "OKAY!".  Ha!

Today is the last day it will be just us until the fall, as it's Veronica's last day of preschool.  We will probably go for a walk, we are going over to a friend of mine's house so I can babysit for a while, maybe I'll mow the lawn.  She is a good little companion.  And that's good, because she hasn't taken a nap in over a year, ha!

Five Things for Friday

I am trying to be better about updating these blogs.  Felicity is two and a half and I still don't have her Weekly Picture thing done for her first year but I'll get there.  In the fall, she will be in preschool three days a week and the other kids will be in school full time, so maybe I'll start it then, ha!

1. The first thing is the picture above.  She looks so cute, doesn't she?  Her dress is adorable and her hair is starting to get longer and curl nicely.  She was sad because she couldn't go into Veronica's ballet recital, but also maybe sad because she had a double ear infection, which we found out the next day.  She actually did really well in the recital for a while.  Veronica's teacher let her participate and she did really well, but then she couldn't take her turn so out she went, ha!  She has spend her entire life outside of that ballet room, she'll be able to start taking ballet this fall, hard to believe, right?  She'll be three in October, I just bought her a (n adorable) bathing suit and I went ahead and got the 3T because I figured the 2 would be too small.  
2. Her talking is out of control.  Yesterday was our day where it's just the two of us, I started the day taking her to the Minute Clinic and getting antibiotics for her ear infection. She spit that flavored, gross antibiotic all over me and I was mad and yelled.  Then I went in the kitchen to get a paper towel and came back and said I'm sorry Felicity, I shouldn't have yelled at you and she said "that's okay, Mama, that's okay!".  It was kind of patronizing but so cute.  Later I was watching Nashville on the DVR and she came wandering in and said "what are you watching, Mama?".  Full sentences, blah blah blah, talking and talking, it's great.  Mike was saying he thinks Maria talked this much at this age but she just tended to say the same word over and over, like juice, juice, juice, juice, JUICE WANT JUICE! and I feel like these are more grown up type sentences.  
3. She loves preschool so much.  She goes right in the room and gets right to it, washing her hands and then going right to the craft or dress up or whatever.  Her teachers really like her too, I imagine because she is no trouble and she never cries.  She'll go Monday Tuesday and Wednesday in the fall and then after that, Lord knows.  I can't believe she's only going to be three this year, we still have TWO full years after this one before Kindergarten.  
4. I'm worried about her ears, worried that it seems like almost every time she has a cold she gets an ear infection.  Her tubes fell out so maybe she needs new ones?  I hope not, I hope she dries up this summer and gets better.  I hate for her to have three occasions to have surgery before she's three.  
5. She's so tall, by far bigger than the other girls at this age and she is probably twice Veronica's size at the same age.  She insists on kissing everyone good night now, before she goes to bed, it's adorable and messy.  Veronica squints in fear when she comes in with those wet kisses, but we all love her so much we are willing to wipe our mouth when she is done with us, ha!  

Come here

When Felicity wants me to pick her up, she says "C'mere, mama", and kind of wiggles her shoulders, it's so cute.  I was thinking of that and other cute things she says this morning and I want to remember them so I thought I'd write them down on her blog.  The problem is, I'm so old and dotty I can't remember any!  She shouts Hello?  HELLLLLOOOOOO? in the morning when she wants to get up. She adds a "t" to the end of a lot of words.  Like I'll say, I love you! and she says I love yout toot.  Ha!

Her hair is getting - well if I say it's getting long, I am being very very gracious about it, but it does have one nice curl.  She is climbing on everything.  Yesterday my sister came over after we went to see a play together.  I got home and Felicity asked to watch some Mickey Mouse Club so I put it on using On Demand and she was watching it, she was so excited about it!  I went and did something and came back and she had flipped over a box, and used the bathroom stepstool (at first I said stool but I figured bathroom and stool weren't good together in a sentence) to get on the box and then she was trying to ... jump into the television?  She was really mad about it, about her inability to get in there, ha!

She talks so, so much.  Last night she was in the bath, with a giant cup of water.  She went to take a drink of it (ew) and stuck her nose in it, like too far, because the water went up her nose and she was spluttering away.  She said "water, nose, YUCK!".  When she is hungry, she asks for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  It might be just me but she seems to use so many more WORDS than the other kids at this age.

Two and a half - almost

Next month, she will be 2.5 years old, is that crazy?  It seems like the winter has been so long, it's hard for me to believe next month is April, but it is.  It's March 5 already.  Two weeks from today is my birthday.  I'll be 46.  FORTY SIX.  Maybe it is my old age or maybe it's because she is my fourth but I am sick of this!  I am sick of being with such a jerk all day.  I mean, I should pause and say that she is not always a jerk.  She is sometimes super funny and sweet, she is still the cuddliest person I know and she sleeps all night and late.  But she gets mad *this fast* ::snaps fingers:: and she is so loud and screamy when she doesn't get what she wants and it's awful.  She hasn't taken a nap in YEARS, it seems and twelve hours in a row is just too long to spend with someone who can be so rotten.  In her defense, her life sucks, too.  At 8:00 I load her in the car and if it's not one of the days that she has preschool, I drop off Anthony and take her home.  We get home at 9:00 and, let's say it's Wednesday, we stay at home until it's time to take Veronica to ballet.  Then we come home and have lunch or go to Marta's and have lunch and then at 2:45 we get back in the car and go get Maria for 3:15.  Then we come home for about 30 minutes and then we get BACK in the car and go get Anthony.  That's a lot of car time for a two year old, I understand.  But it's a lot of time for a 46 year old too, I tell her!  And I'm not even in a cushy car seat or watching a movie!

She is talking a blue streak, full sentences and thoughts and feelings expressed, it is charming.  Not so charming is her new thing about pulling me by the finger to whatever she wants me to do.  She MOOSHES my finger in her hand, ugh, it hurts!  And - she's just so bossy, they are always all bossing me around and I am so over it.  I know that I will feel better when the weather gets better and we can get outside some, and I also know that I shouldn't wait for warm weather to feel better, that I should just DECIDE to be happier, to not let her and them bug me, but it's impossible.

I think she might be ready to toilet train soon.  She keeps telling me before she has to go that she has gone.  I just figured this out today, but that's what she's doing.  Unfortunately, we were at the park today for Veronica's ballet class when she told me she had to poop and I just couldn't sit her on that nasty public toilet.  So we'll start training and maybe she'll be out of diapers and I'll have that to like about her, too.

I want to act like she is my first, and not to be sick of everything, and sometimes I can.  Sometimes we are here on our own and it's just us and we read books, or chit chat while I'm making lunch.  I hope these are the memories she retains, wouldn't it be nice if we could pick?  But we can't, and I'm trying to bear that in mind.  It would be nice if the SNOW would melt and it would warm up, can someone do something about that, Please?

Two Year Checkup

I took Felicity on Monday, PRESIDENTS DAY, for her two year checkup, which I suppose should have taken place in October, but whatever, it's been a long winter/fall/life for us.  She weighed 32 lbs., I think, although I am having a hard time reading her chart.  She was not very good at the doctor, they always have a medical student come in and she really gave him a hard time about letting him look in her ears.  Of course, my pediatrician has been a doctor since God was a boy, and he knows how to just DO it before she even realizes it, but she was rough on that poor student.

She is doing just great, I got her little conference report from preschool and she is just fine.  She is sleeping well and she is not a great eater but she does okay.  She has a real sweet tooth and of course she is into way more stuff than the other kids were at her age, but that is par for the course.  She chews gum like some kind of movie secretary or something, and the girls or Anthony never would have chewed gum at two!  She is v. advanced, ha!, in all the bad ways.

She still says "no way!" a lot for no, it's hilarious.  She was horrible in church today - she is so, so bad in church you'd swear she was a nonbeliever or something!  I know it will get better but when, Lord, when?, I think every week of my life.  At least if the weather ever gets warmer we can take her outside.

She hasn't taken a nap regularly in a long time, but she still naps at school.  Now it's 5:09 on Sunday night and she has been going going all weekend and she is a little nutsy, I can hear it in her tone, it's kind of tremulous.

This is just a short update to say that she is fine, our little Felicity.  I assume she'll be my last baby, since I will be FORTY SIX here in a few week, and I guess I am hyper-aware of that because I feel so sweet about her most of the time.  I tilt my head to the side a lot when I look at her.

What's New

What's new with Felicity?  She is doing just fine, even though we have been trapped in a frozen tundra for what feels like forever.  We had a bad snowstorm right when the kids were supposed to go back to school, the first week of the year, and we have had either snow or sub-zero temperatures since then and I am not exaggerating.  It's killing me.  BUT Felicity is doing okay.  

• She is, not to brag, a star pupil at preschool.  I added in an extra day so she goes on Tuesday and Friday and she loves it.  They ended up being on a LONG break after the holidays and when we went back her poor buddy Charlie had a hard time, he was crying and crying as his dad handed him off.  F's teacher Miss Judy said, show him how it's done Felicity, and she said BYE MAMA BYE! and ran into the room.  She loves it.  
• Her hair is getting a little longer.  She is as cute as a button.  Lately she has been into wearing dresses, which is a pain because Maria and Veronica would only wear dresses too and it's been fun to put someone in pants, which are more weather appropriate here lately anyway.  Notice how I can't stop talking about the weather or its effect on our life?  
• She is talking a mile a minute but she's sort of hard to understand.  She says oh-nag for orange, which always takes me a while.  Sometimes she says gobba goo! and I say gobba goo? and she says OKAY! and I have struck some sort of deal and I don't know what and she gets really mad when I don't follow through on whatever the hell gobba goo means.  But of course I appreciate the talking.  
• She is still in her crib in her own room.  I tried to get her to sleep on the bottom bunk of the girls' bunk beds but she's not having it.  I don't know when that will change, maybe when she outgrows the crib?  And speaking of things I don't know about 
• I don't know when she will be potty trained.  She seems to have no interest.  She won't even be 2.5 until April so it can wait. 
• What else.  It is very hard to think in this barnyard of a house but I know I haven't posted about her in a while, and I wanted to. But I guess we're up to date!