I’m a fairly patient momma, but the past couple of days, I’ve raised my voice. Even as I’m doing it, I think, “this isn’t helping,” but at the moment, I’m not sure what would. Reasoning with a two and a half year old is… Interesting. Yesterday, after running around the Children’s Museum for the last 15 minutes, refusing to do anything I asked and doing everything I said NO! to, I picked Lily up kicking and screaming, stuffed her in the stroller, and high-tailed it outta there. On the walk, I started with, “Momma is really upset with you. I’m sad and mad and upset. I don’t like what you did, and it made me angry.” I was speaking sternly and Lily just had this vague look on her face like, yeah, yeah, yeah, whatevs. Finally, I stopped walking, crouched in front of the stroller and asked a series of questions. “Should you wait for Momma or can you leave and run to the next room?” “Wait.” “How did it make Momma feel when you left her?” “Sad.” “When Momma says, STOP shaking the tree, what should you do?” “Stop.”
We apologized to each other and hugged, and then we were good, but man, was I ticked walking out of there. I don’t usually get ticked like that.
And then today. Lily tried to pour water over her sister, and then a little later, she jumped near her head. I go a little nuts when I think she’s going to hurt Lu. “Time out, now,” I said, through clenched teeth. I pick her up and sit her next to the wall. She fiddles with the baseboard for a minute, and then she looks over at me with a smile and says, “say sorry now?” Completely unaffected.
But then there’s last night. We’re all walking back to the house after Lu announced she was done with all that running nonsense, and Lily got out of the stroller to walk Oscar. It was seriously the cutest thing ever, and Joshua and I were looking at each other and laughing quietly to ourselves. Oscar’s gate is more of a run for Lily, so she’s running to keep up with him and shouting orders the whole time. “No Oscar! This way! Not safe! Stop!” After running almost a full half mile, Joshua and I were nearly in tears laughing.
“Lily, look at you run! I’m so impressed! You’re legs must be really strong,” I say. Lily glances over her shoulder, “Daddy run in mountains. Lily someday.” And then, if that didn’t just melt us, she says, “Bear Hunt!” “Are you gonna catch a big one?” we ask. “Beautiful day!” Lily responds, “not scared!”
Or today, we’re walking back to the train, and Lily says, “Eat banana on train? Go home, snuggle?”
And “hot potato! Lily sweating!”
Most of the time, I just want to scoop her up and tell her that she’s one of the best things that’s ever happened to me.
This one is four months old today. Her personality has really begun emerging this past month, and I’m constantly in awe of her size. How did she get so big? Now when I nurse her, she sits in my lap. She loves being supported while she stands, and half the time when she’s laying on her back she’s flexing her abs and curling in, trying to sit up. Her neck is super strong these days, and it makes things so much easier. I can carry her with one hand or hands free with a carrier.
She’s been grabbing for toys and chewing on everything in sight, but I’ve yet to see a tooth. Within the past week and a half, she’s really begun laughing, and of course, it’s her daddy that’s the best at getting her to giggle. Lily makes her laugh, too. Oh and yesterday when I was recounting the story of our dramatic exit from the Children’s Museum and mimicking my stern voice for Joshua’s benefit. She thought that was hysterical, too.
Unfortunately, we’re struggling a bit on the sleeping front. While I’m fairly certain that Lu slept straight through her first three months of life, she’s been making up for it in the past couple of weeks. She still sleeps through the night, but then she’s championed the 15 minute snooze during the day. And let me tell you. I am not a fan of the four to five 15 minute snooze schedule. In my humble opinion, she should be banging out three hour+ naps. For Lily, nursing worked. Whenever she seemed sleepy, I would nurse her and she would fall asleep, and then I could get some s*** done. Not so much with Lu.
Anyway, I better not complain too much, because hey, a babe that sleeps through the night on her first night home from the hospital is a precious unicorn.
