I Hep, Momma

I've been meaning to write this down for awhile, but keep forgetting, so I'm doing it now while I'm thinking of it. I can no longer eat my lunch at work without cracking a big grin when I take my sandwich out.
I almost always take my lunch to work, and many times it includes the classic peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Teagan now insists on "hepping" me make my sandwich each morning. This means she sits on my lap, arranges my bread so that the pieces are side by side and not stacked, and then rests her hand on mine as I scoop out the peanut butter and jelly. If I drop some jelly (which I do quite frequently since this is me we're talking about), she chimes in with that preschool sound of "Awwwww...", which translates to "You're in trouble!" In trouble with whom, I'm not completely sure. But once I clean up the jelly and we cut the sandwich in half, she'll say "I ont some". She'll then take one bite, and carefully place the two halves in the sandwich container to pack up in my lunch. So each day I pull out my sandwich and see that adorable little half-moon-shaped bite, I have to smile.

Goggy Poo Poo

We've had some issues lately with various neighborhood dogs not obeying the pooper scooper law. Therefore we have some additions to our front lawn. Teagan noticed one of these additions and asked "What dat, Momma?" So I explained that it was doggy poo poo and it was yucky, so we don't touch it.
Thankfully she hasn't tried to touch it but she has taken quite an interest in it. Every morning we walk out of the house and she says "Momma, where goggy poo poo? Wanna see it." The other day she chanted "goggy poo poo" the whole time we walked to the car and I buckled her in. As I drove off she yelled "Bye goggy poo poo!"
I hope this phase passes quickly.
I also added a new video in the upper right corner of the page. Teagan is singing two of her favorite songs.

Mission Successful

This weekend we got a new toddler bed for Teagan. She hasn't really given us any indication that she was ready for the switch, but she naps on a cot at daycare so we decided to give it a shot before she starts trying to climb out of her crib. In the past she has been very flexible and easygoing when it comes to change. This proved no different. In fact, she couldn't wait to go to sleep in it. We started our normal routine of two books and four songs in the rocking chair before bedtime. We got through two short books and one and a half songs before she said "Momma, bed."
I think Rog and I checked on her four or five times before we went to sleep but she slept through the night without any problems. The first real test will probably be naptime when we have her during the day over the weekend. We'll see how that goes!

What Is This Thing Called Fear?

Fear does not seem to be a concept that Teagan understands. Yesterday we took her to Monkey Joe's for the second time. For those of you that have not been there, they have an area geared more towards toddlers. Teagan spent some time there, but was more interested in hanging with the big kids. We pretty much let her have a shot at anything she wanted to try. Knowing that by letting her play on the bigger pieces, I was forfeiting my right to be an overprotective parent, I watched nervously while giants jumped and climbed around my little girl as she struggled to maintain footing or pull herself up ladders so she could go down the big slide. She held her own and showed serious determination. She conquered all but two of the inflatables and had a fabulous time in the process. She even got to spend some time with her buddy Sadie.

The toddler area, where she should have spent the bulk of her time:


Moving on to bigger and more exciting things:



And finally, the one she attempted but didn't quite conquer. Maybe next time!

Gotta Write This Down

Teagan is talking so much, and I don't want to forget any of the things she's saying! I know most of this stuff she's picking up at daycare, some of it good, some of it bad. But all of it's pretty hilarious.
-She calls us "guys" now. "Hey guys, look..."
-This morning I sneezed and she said "Bess you mommy". (My heart melted!)
-We taught her to sing Happy Birthday to Chappy because his birthday was last Saturday. She now seems to think that Chappy's name is just part of the song, and instead of her notes getting higher, her voice just gets louder with each "verse". The verses are short, they go, "Hap Birt Day Dap-py". That's it.
-Lately she sings "Where is Thumbkin" with all of the hand motions,
but at the end, where the words are "Run Away, Run Away", she demonically growls, "Go Away!!"
-She loves "Ring Around the Rosie". She calls it "Ashes" and she cracks up every time we all fall down.
-At the end of each book, instead of "The End" she says "Amen".

A couple of pictures to post as well. The first is winding down at bedtime with Elmo and her "Oball", and the second is her reaction when she saw Grandma and Grandpa Farmer's car pull up in front of the house. She was pretty excited to see them!

Welcome Home, Momma!

Last week I was called out of town for a work trip to Baltimore. While I miss the family during work trips, I always enjoy the food, the travel, and the break in the mundane work week.
The trip went very smoothly and I had a good time. However, Thursday could have gone a bit smoother. It started off normally, but when we arrived at the airport for our flights home, we got word of the unsettling plane crash that had just happened. I'm not a very nervous flier. My palms tend to sweat on takeoff and landing, and I find myself looking around for reactions when we hit turbulence in the air, but overall, I'm pretty calm during flights. I found solace in the unlikely probability of two crashes in one day as well as the news that no one was severely injured or killed in this plane crash. So while my stomach twisted a bit at this news, I didn't run screaming from the airport.
I had an uneventful flight home, though I was a bit miffed when I arrived in St. Louis and found it colder than Baltimore. But I was happy to walk in the door to my house around 9pm. Rog and I talked for some time and then I checked on Teagan and lamented the fact that I wouldn't get to spend time with her until the next morning. Silly me.
Around 11:30, when I was halfway between consciousness and unconsciousness, I heard a strange sound over the monitor and then Teagan started crying harder than I've ever heard her cry. I jumped up and ran into her room to find that she'd gotten sick and was in total panic because she didn't understand what was going on. So while trying to console her, I ran a bath and stripped her down. She eventually calmed down but I was a little shaken because this experience was new to me. By the end of the night, though, I had become a pro! Long story short, Rog and I ended up having to give Teagan three baths and do four loads of laundry after 11pm. When it seemed that her stomach had finally settled, we laid down on her bedroom floor and tried to get some sleep. I fell asleep around 5 and was able to sleep until 7. Needless to say, I paid for it throughout the weekend. The next day Teagan woke up, and other than a bit of crabbiness due to lack of sleep, she acted like everything was normal. I don't know what that was, but I did not like it!

I'm Sorry, What??

So, in the midst of this economic crisis I find myself frequently perusing the internet for various coupons, giveaways, sales, etc. I ran across some news today on one of these sites that has literally left me shaking my head in disbelief. This is the first that I've heard of it and I'm passing on this information through the blog so that if anything can be done, here is a portion of my effort. Apparently in an act aimed at preventing lead poisoning, someone has decided that it would be a good idea to ban buying, selling and DONATING secondhand unless these secondhand items have been tested for lead and phthalates. Let's just take a moment to think about the consequences of this law. It means that massive amounts of clothing and toys will be considered hazardous regardless of whether they contain lead until they are proven that they don't. Because of the expense of testing, I think we can safely assume that most of these items will end up in a landfill instead of being available to families that can't afford to pay full price or families that can't afford to pay anything at all.
I have very little information so far on this law that is to go in effect on February 10, but I am going to find out more. Click on this link to read one of the articles. More information can be found on www.babycheapskate.com.