Thirty-Two Months Old

Thirty-two months old sounds awfully close to thirty-six months old - hard to believe I'll soon have a three-year-old on my hands!



The world is a big, fun place for Pearl right now! She loves pushing the little toddler-size shopping carts at the local natural foods coop, but is understanding and willing to ride in the cart when I need to get more than a few items. She enjoys walking to the park that is a few blocks away from this new house, though she hates the wind, and being winter there's a lot of cold gusts blowing. Every ride in the car is a study and report of traffic lights and vehicles, every visit with family a delight that should never end, every trip to the library a procession of wonderful books to read - still Pearl's favorite thing to do.



Her play is both more imaginative and more imitative. She feeds and bathes her toys and dolls, and acts out situations she remembers from stories and videos and real life. The corners of the piece of bread she's eating become kangaroos, and she hops them around her plate. I do not tell her not to play with her food.

Pearl enjoys working in the kitchen with me and playing alongside as I cook. This month she's been very into playing with jars and lids of various sizes, and shaking out spices at my direction. One of her aunts got us some kits of growing herbs indoors and Pearl helped me plant the seeds and check for sprouts every day. She was very excited to see the seedlings and prompts me to 'check the plants' each morning.

We set out a bird feeder this month too, and after telling her that we'd have to wait for the birds to find it, she was thrilled when they did and enjoys watching them when they visit it.



Because of the dry winter air, I've been putting lotion on Pearl's skin after she bathes. In doing so we have discovered that her toes are very ticklish, or, as she says, "Your toes are so tickly!" She will grab them herself then chortle and shriek.



Throughout the month, she has been roughly alternating between days where she takes a long nap in the afternoon and goes to bed late, and days where she is up from 8 until 8 with no nap. She went through a similar pattern when she switched from two naps to one, so I suspect that her napping days are coming to an end for real.

However, her father and I have noticed that she sleeps a lot more solidly through the night when she does have a nap, so in order to get her to bed at a reasonable time I've been waking her after a while. I would've tried this sooner, but she used to be a crying, whiny mess if I didn't let her nap as long as she wanted. She is far more receptive me waking her up lately though, so it is working out okay.

Something amazing happened this month concerning bedtime - two nights in a row, after I nursed her I told her to stay in her bed and go to sleep while I went in to the living room, and that I'd come to bed soon - and she did! Of course the third night this was a no-go as she was coming down with a cold, and then she was sick, and then I got sick... but it was still amazing. I always knew the day would come when I would be able to say "Goodnight," and leave the room and she'd fall asleep on her own, but I guess you can never really know how such an event will go down until it happens.

Thirty-One Months Old

Pearl has been very physically active this month. She runs faster and steadier, and bravely jumps from one piece of furniture to another. Her jumping on the bed approaches acrobatics and all this combined with hard floors in the new house has led to several bumps and bruises.

She's also sustained several scratches from pushing our cats to their limit - but it is nice to see her with other people's kitties as she tries to be very gentle and nice with them.



She enjoys doing some household chores like putting the dishes away and sorting laundry. I can get her to help me pick up her toys if I entice her with a game of counting them as she puts them back in their place.

Pottying is great - I can only think of one time in the past few weeks that she's peed in her pants at home, I'm sure she's had wet diapers out and about but we've been taking the potty along with us to places and have had success getting her to go at other people's houses, so that is pretty neat! Still working on pooping...

Christmas with Pearl was a lot of fun this year as this is the first time she's gotten the whole presents thing. I didn't have a whole lot of seasonal spirit going on this year and didn't do much beyond hanging the stockings, buying a bouquet of local evergreens, and taking Pearl to see the lights on the town square - along with buying some nice presents for her and Mr. Peach, and sewing/embroidering a Christmas dress for Pearl and cooking glorious mountains of fudge and toffee for all our loved ones.



I told her all about presents as she went with us to buy and then wrap a gift for her cousin the day before Christmas Eve, and she found it very exciting and just couldn't wait so she got started with her cousin's present! We explained again that that one wasn't for her, but that she would get to open some presents very soon. She kept saying, "There will be presents for me, too!"



I made an effort not to go overboard with presents and thought I did quite well but between what everyone else got her, she was tired of opening presents on Christmas morning and refused to open the last two we'd gotten her, so she opened those at Grandma's later on. For a few days afterwards, she said, "Merry Christmas!" a lot and enjoyed playing with boxes as if opening presents.

One of the gifts we got her was a boxed set of classic Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne. It is one book broken up into little books by chapter. They are a bit much for her at this point but she sure loves taking them out of their box and putting them back in, quoting their titles, lining them up, etc.



Pearl still loves to read! She recites entire books, and every morning after we get out of bed (at the blissful time of around 8! I used to think she'd never sleep that late.) she sits in the big chair or on the couch with a quilt and a big stack of books while I wake up and start fixing our breakfast.




She is nursing less these days, and I say that with great relief. She's down to about three times a day, more if she's bored. Going to sleep and waking up still always include milkies and that's okay for now. She's eating a lot and must be growing like a weed - her arms and legs recently shot out of all her clothes and now we're buying (& soon making!) her some new 3t clothes.

She is generally easy going and cheerful, though there have definitely been some very two-and-a-half moments here and there. Even so I am so often amazed at how well she handles things, how quickly she learns, and in general how bright and beautiful she is.

I Hope Your Holidays Were *This* Merry!

Pearl, chasing quite merrily after her cousin on Christmas Eve:

Two and a Half Years Old

What a wild month! It started out with Halloween. I made her a Totoro costume that she wore to a special Halloween storytime our library held for preschoolers filled spooky stories and songs and ending with a parade through the library that kind of dissolved into her squeaking and chasing her cousin around.



On Halloween night she and I stayed home and carved a pumpkin. Pearl has kind of a thing for pumpkins and before we started drawing and slicing its face she kept hugging and saying, "Pearl loves this pumpkin!" She enjoyed scooping out the seeds and tasting the pumpkin, and especially taking off its lid and replacing it over and over again, and had fun seeing its glowing face. She helped me hand candy out to trick-or-treaters but sobbed when they left, wanting to run off with them.



She is singing again! She started for the first time many months ago, but hasn't been doing so for a while. Lately she has been like a little songbird in the house and in the car, and it is very sweet.

She likes to share. She will readily give her Daddy and I toys as well as playmates, and also will distribute toys between the kitties.



She has learned how to use the mouse! She knows how to get back to my desktop if the computer goes to sleep and logs us off, how to click through my flickr photostream, and how to restart her favorite Father Goose song in WinAmp. Her geeky parents could not be more proud.

It was so awful to see her sick with a stomach bug. The third day she was sick she slept and slept and I was so worried about her. I felt that it was a healing, recovering sort of napping but I couldn't help but be afraid that she wasn't getting better. It was so wonderful to see her chipper, happy, and wanting to eat the next day. I've been trying to gradually (read: lazily) work our way towards weaning but I am very glad I was able to provide her with such a comfort as she was ill, as well as liquid nourishment that was easy on her tummy.



Her last baby tooth broke through on the fourth of November and has been terrorizing the household since with all the grumpiness and sleeplessness it has been causing.

Between the new molar, the sickness, Thanksgiving, and the move, it has been a heck of a month and Pearl is just now bouncing back to herself.

Twenty-Nine Months Old

Miss Pearl is another month older! Another season has drawn to a close, and I have wistfully packed away another batch of outgrown clothes. When did she get so big?



She is so smart and funny and sweet. She is counting for real now - not always 100% correctly, but we can tell she's associating the numbers with the actual amount of things. She'll empty the contents of the coffee table drawer and say, "Four brushes, and one card!"



Her pronoun usage is improving in that she now usually replies with "I" when addressed as "you" rather than just responding to the pronoun in kind. It's amazing, how she just picks it all up. It's a complex thing to learn though and she's still working on it - one day she crawled into the space between my legs where I was standing and said, "Mama is a house!" As I was somewhat surprised at being proclaimed thus, I didn't play along but said, "No I'm not!" to which Pearl replied, matter-of-factly, "Yes, she is."

She says all manner of amusing thing... a favorite of mine this month has been hearing her say, "My face is grumpy!" after meals (having heard me tell her that her face is grubby many a time!).

And when sitting at a stoplight I pointed out a fire engine across the way, she regarded it a moment before solemnly declaring, "It's beautiful!" And it was, really, all bright and sparkling in the clear October sunshine. She loves seeing trains and bulldozers and airplanes and fire engines and especially buses.



One afternoon our little family of three was at the park and Pearl was walking between her daddy and I, holding our hands and was saying that she was holding mama's hand and daddy's hand and I told her that we were all holding hands together. Then she brought her hands together so that ours were together, too! It was a sweet moment.

It's been a rough month in that it's been just one affliction after another... new top molar, a cold, a relapse, more teething, high fevers... We're all pretty worn out and out of sorts.



Even with all that unpleasantness, pottying is still going extremely well! She's progressed to saying that she needs to go, she's even doing well at pulling her pants up and down, which for some reason seems to me like a very cute, grown-up sort of thing for her to be doing!

She is certainly getting big.

Projects Completed: Kimono & Corduroys

I finished this outfit and photographed it a few weeks ago:



Though I am love Asian-inspired things and the floral fabric print (which is appropriately from Japan), I'm not crazy about this top. Maybe it's a tad too big for Pearl, or maybe the fabric is just too stiff... I just don't love it.



And the pants.... oh, those pants! I got them done, seams finished, hemmed perfectly... and I was trimming the seams down with my rotary cutter I got a bit cocky and careless and sliced right through the pants leg. I literally cried, as I didn't have enough corduroy left to make another, and, being somewhat poor, can't just rush out and buy more. So I had to undo the him, the inner leg seam, patch the slices and add side pockets to cover the damage, reseam, rehem, etc. They're done now though, so, hooray.

Twenty-Eight Months Old

This is Pearl, twenty-eight months old:



Pearl is not at a stage where she enjoys really helping me bake, and vice versa. She loves standing on the step stool and scooping and dumping ingredients, stirring them together, and talking with me about what's going on. She even likes to help with the clean up!



For the past few weeks she has being using the potty at a rate as high as 100% some days! She doesn't usually ask to go, however - but when I set her on the potty she goes! It's all just working suddenly. I am enjoying the relative freedom from diapers and hoping it lasts.

With me taking belly dancing classes she has been getting more solo time with her Daddy and that has been fun for both of them. She has also picked up some of my moves after watching me practice and it is perhaps the cutest thing ever.



She is getting better about verbalizing her wants and needs, which is good. When she is hungry, she says, "What would you like best to eat?" (a spin on a line from a poem) and takes off for the fridge. It is nice not having to guess so much.

This month she started refusing to ride in shopping carts at stores - oh, the horror! All is well until I have her feet almost throw the holes and she bucks about and starts fussing. Thankfully, a quick talk about how she can only walk in the store if it's a quick trip or if Daddy is there to help, and so please sit in the cart, works. I did not expect it to... but she is more reasonable these days than I give her credit for I guess. These shifts away from babyhood throw me sometimes.



She is a very social creature lately. She loves when children we meet at the playground will play with her. It is sweet to see her become excited at mention of plans made with friends and families, and the affection she shows them when together.

Her appetite has exploded this months and I have been astonished at how much she can put away at one sitting!



We have been so busy these past few months that I haven't been getting these monthly updates done quite on time, but I am making sure that I do. I want to at least have record of what little I manage to remember by the end of the month... it's sad, how quickly memory fades.

Happiness

First of the Autumn Sewing

I started on sewing some clothes for early Autumn a few weeks ago, looking forward to the change of seasons.

And now cooler weather has arrived: clear bright days mixed in with cool rainy ones, and nights that are already chilly.

First I made Pearl this tiered skirt out of a dark red floral fine wale corduroy that I found on clearance at Hobby Lobby for $2 a yard - can't beat that!

Then I made her an autumn-hued patchwork twirly skirt - same way I made this dress a few months ago. It's made from bold & bright cotton prints with a few patches of soft brown corduroy from an old skirt of mine thrown in.



I used the same fabrics on the owl applique I put on an organic cotton tee (I used the corduroy on his wings and head, and he has two big wooden button eyes). It was my first time to do applique and I am quite proud of how it turned out. And Pearl loves it!

And I am proud to announce that I made something wearable for myself! It is a tiered skirt made from brown, fine wale corduroy. I followed a tutorial I found online and have since lost that conveniently fit my own measurements, plus a few little embellishments like the extra ruffle at the bottom.



You can't tell from these photos, or in some lights, but I totally goofed up and put a few pieces of the skirt together with the nap going in the opposite directions... but by the time I realized this, the dress had already been topstitched and the seams finished, so I said, oh well!





More Autumn projects to show coming up, as I finish them!

Twenty-Seven Months Old

Pearl is twenty-seven months old now and cute as can be! We've been having lots of fun lately.



She is playing with her toys in new ways, putting various dolls and animals through many of the things she herself does each day, and describes it all as she makes it happen: "Baby is sleeping!" "Pig is drinking; the pig is so thirsty!" and so on.

Pearl enjoys watching nature videos and has picked up a few quotes that she likes. It amuses me greatly to hear her announce as she descends from wherever she is perched, "It's safe to come down and gather food."



She had her first bad stomach bug during the first half of this month... a fever and runny nose, accompanied by diarrhea. We almost took her to see a doctor after a week of it, but the research I'd done and my instincts told me it wasn't anything to be worried about and I'm glad we didn't, because it cleared up in a few more days. Still, it was less than fun for all involved.

After a nice stretch of easy bedtimes and restful naps, getting her to sleep is taking a lot of time and effort again... Always, the ups and downs. She has upper molars coming in now, which has something to do with it I'm sure.

She still feels the urge to lash out when she is angry or upset (so different from her mama, who tends to hold her hurts close - Pearl's way is healthier, no doubt.) but has learned to refrain from hitting for the most part; she instead swings her arms at her sides and mutters, "No hitting," or sometimes, "So angry." There's been some headbutting and biting too, but we're dealing with it and trying to help her find alternate ways of expressing her negative emotions.

She likes to "do faces": I'll say, "Show me your x face," and she'll make the appropriate face . Interestingly, her responses to being asked to show happy expressions tend to include bouncing up and down, and interpretations of negative emotions include leaning back and sticking her big belly out.

This month I went out by myself after putting Pearl to sleep for the night. I went to a party and had a wonderful time, but had to come back to a very upset baby and a very unsettled Daddy. I hadn't really prepared her in any way because I didn't think she'd wake before I returned - so of course she did, and was extremely unhappy that I wasn't there. She went right back to sleep as I nursed her and didn't show any signs of having suffered from it the next day or afterwards, so hopefully it wasn't too traumatic.



It was so nice to get out and have some grown-up fun by myself; it makes being at home with the most beautiful and amazing thing at the world even more wonderful.

Heavenly Blue

Back in the springtime, I planted many morning glory and moonflower seeds along the chain link fences on each side of our yard in the hope that they would flourish and block out the view of the neighbor's junk with something prettier, and provide a little more privacy.

What the blackberry frost didn't kill, the well-meaning elderly lady next door finished off with a liberal spraying of RoundUp intended for poison ivy. Still, a few of each species survived and we've been enjoying them for the past week or two. Pearl likes to walk out there with me to touch and gaze at and sniff them... today I sent her over there to look at them on her own as I hung laundry to dry on far side of the yard only to have her erupt into tears, running back to me saying, "There's a BUG in the flower!" And indeed, there was a bee, and alas, she only tolerates bugs when she is in the best of moods.

Cottage Roses Twirly Patchwork Dress

I completed a project this week - a dress for Pearl (because I really just haven't sewn her enough dresses for her this Spring & Summer... I can't help myself, I enjoy it so much!) inspired by and made using this tutorial.







I fell in love with a line of fabric Hancock Fabrics carried over the summer called "Cottage Roses", assorted florals and coordinating material in cream and pink and blue and green. I bought some of the pink and blue to make Pearl a birthday dress with because she has always been a rosy little thing who looks good in those colors. I picked up some more pinks and greens to make her this patchwork dress and added in what was left of the birthday dress prints.

I managed to sew this dress without having to rip endless seams and make tons of revisions like I did the birthday dress. It was the first dress I attempted to make up without a pattern or tutorial, just drawing from my limited experience and patterns I already had I made a lot of mistakes along the way - it took me four tries to work out a bodice that fit - and the end product, while pretty, doesn't hang very well. The bodice actually does. It's the skirt I take issue with.

Anyway, I got the bodice on the patchwork skirt right the first time with no problems and only had to go back and redo one thing - I originally had a shorter row of patchwork right beneath the bodice but it wasn't gathered and the rest of the tiers are and it really bothered me so I took it out. Also, it is really hard to tie knots on the the shoulders of a two-year-old, but it won't come off or go on while tied!

Twenty-Five Months Old

Pearl is twenty-five months old now and I am happy to say that this month has been a lot easier than the last. She even gave up on shrieking to convey her displeasure at things... for a few weeks. She has resumed that practice over the past few days, unfortunately.



She has also been somewhat violent in her anger lately, wanting to hit me or sometimes she'll slap at her face. I wasn't really prepared for that, I just tell her not to hit Mama and tell her to whack the couch or the pillow instead. She complies and it seems to work well as a way to vent her irritation.

She is really beginning to assert her independence lately, too - I am hearing more and more "I awwna do it!" So, yes, she is very much a toddler.



She has been a lot more active physically in general lately, and I am glad as she has sometimes been 'behind' in this respect... at least compared to her same-age cousin. I shouldn't compare them but it's really hard not to. Anyway, she can now jump! And she loves to run - a few nights ago we took her to the park for a walk as it was nearing bedtime and I sensed she still had energy to burn. Instead of walking a third of the loop then asking to "Carry you", she ran a good 3/4 of the whole trail! Mr. Peach and I were so amazed. She repeated the performance again last night, saying, "So fast!" as she went.



She and I took a trip to an artsy place nearby this month where glass bluebirds are made and the grounds are decorated with all sorts of sculptures of fantastical creatures and other fun things. She enjoyed it even more than the first time we took her there - one year ago, coincidentally enough. Along with the statues there are all sorts of fountains there and playing in water is one of her favorite things to do right now!



The statues there must have made a big impression on her. A few days later her father brought some cinnamon rolls home for breakfast and as we were eating them I told her what they were called. She nodded and said, "Cinnamon trolls!"

And then a few days ago we were in the bedroom and she told me that she heard a loud noise. I said, "I think that was a big truck driving by." Pearl paused for a moment, then she replied, "Maybe it was a dragon!"

I love hearing what she has to say, witnessing these early verbal expressions of what is going on in her mind.



In the car, I look in the mirror at her watching the world roll by and I think, "There is nothing like her on this Earth." I love her so much!

Two Years Old

And just like that, my little baby is two years old.

It doesn't seem possible, thinking back on the tiny, soft little creature of rosy skin and dark silky hair and otherworldly eyes, that Pearl and that newborn could be the same person. She has grown and changed so much in the span of two too-short years.

I've been thinking a lot lately of all that she has learned just since her last birthday. All the words that have made the journey from ear to mind to lips, the sentences she has learned to construct, the connections she has made. Letters and phonics and numbers and shapes. Singing, and altering lyrics expressively. Using a spoon. Putting on her shoes. Discovering the delight that is chocolate, and the scent of roses. A smile now full of teeth, and hair that hangs past her shoulders, curling at the ends. Walking well, then climbing and running and somersaults, and all the funny little walks she has done along the way - sideways, backwards on her heels, her tiptoes, bowlegged, a monster walk... Learning to tell daffodil from daisy and dandelion. Coming to love all those grandparents and aunts and uncles.

Innumerable instances of change. Endless evidence of growth. A thousand memories precious like jewels. I wish they would stay as bright and clear forever as they are now - already, too much of her babyhood seems so far away.



However, some parts of babyhood are still very present in this twenty-fourth month. She still nurses a lot, day and night. Despite a recent long run of success with using the potty, and the purchasing of underwear (which, I must note, she got irritated at me about when she very first wore them because I chose to put the flower pair on her rather than the ones with the heart on them) we've taken a few step backwards and she's still in diapers... when she's not in underwear or just plain naked. That's how it goes, I guess.

Pearl got her own bed for the first time since the last time she slept in the seldom-used mini cosleeper this month, a little twin sized platform bed placed between the wall and our bed. My birthday was the day it arrived and Pearl was quite excited about her own bed! We set it up that day and that was the first night she slept in it, and she seemed oh so far away from me. Some nights she's done fine sleeping over there, but some nights not. With all the different variables that can effect her behavior both asleep and awake, it's really hard to tell how big an impact sleeping more than six inches away from me is having on her. I've pulled her into our bed when she wakes sometimes, and I've tried sleeping with her in her bed too. The sleeping arrangement varies a lot and I'm not sure anyone's quality of rest has improved but the extra room is certainly nice.

Napping has been a trial this month. She stopped falling asleep easily by laying down in bed to nurse a few months ago, and resisted rocking and singing as well. Pearl very much still needs a nap during the day, otherwise she will fall asleep at dinnertime, and I definitely need her to take a nap! So I resorted to driving her around, which isn't something I want to do with gas at $3.25 a gallon or higher, but it works like a charm. A fifteen minute round trips makes her conk right out and she rarely stirs while being transferred from car seat to bed. I've got a few perfect routes picked out. Now that I am getting her to nap this way, though, I'm worried she's utterly dependent on it and I'll be driving her around until she stops napping someday...



Another new thing this month: Pearl has become what I call a screecher creature, meaning that whenever she is tired or angry or frustrated or bored she tends to shriek like a banshee, sometimes just yelling but sometimes with tears as well. It's pretty hard on the ears.

She says lots of cute things all the time and I wish I could recall more of them. A few I have jotted down to remember are how she pronounces bicycle - "cybikle" and how one day when she had the hiccups, after each one she would say, "I find the hiccups!" That was too cute. She also tends to use the things we say to and ask her to express herself - "Are you okay?" she says when she falls down, and "What's buggin' you?" when she's uncomfortable or annoyed. "What's the matter?" when she's crying, et cetera.

She had a lot of fun at the birthday party we held here for her and her same-aged cousin. I was kind of volunteered to play hostess this year, which was okay with me but still not what I would have preferred. It was a huge amount of stress and I'm still recovering from it. But Pearl enjoyed herself immensely, playing with the other tots and spending the evening with so many people who love her. She liked opening the presents and she got some good ones, and she liked us singing the birthday song and doing the cupcakes-and-candles thing.

On her birthday itself we kept it pretty quiet - went to the park and played, gave her the big present we got her (an adjustable easel), and had one of her favorite suppers (breakfast for dinner - she loves grits). And then we did cupcakes and candles and singing happy birthday again, and she had (somewhat unwillingly, I might add) her first taste of ice cream. I found some goat's milk ice cream* at my local natural foods store and thought it would be nice to splurge on it for my dairy-sensitive sweetie pie's birthday. Once I got it in her mouth, she enjoyed it a lot.



And so, Pearl is now two years old!


*For those who are curious, it did possess the creaminess that soy and rice ice creams lack, but it also had that goat flavor - tasted like sweet, chocolately goat cheese. Not entirely unpleasant, but a bit disconcerting.