Dual cuties

Photo credits to Elizabeth - thank-you Elizabeth!

Don't call me baby... anymore

Yesterday, I was doing a few chores in the kitchen while Rebecca coloured in the living room, and Lucy napped in her crib. All of the sudden, I heard Rebecca singing. It was the same line over and over. As I approached, I realized she was singing "Don't call me baby - anymore!" from the Kreesha Turner song "Don't call me baby". It really cracked me up. Now, whenever we're in the car and the song comes on the radio, I turn it up for her. She really seems to love it. She has subsequently picked up the lines "Don't call my number/Don't call me over". It's good to hear her expand her musical preferences beyond train songs.

4 months and 10 days: Lucy's first tooth!

Lucy has cut her first tooth! It is one of the bottom front teeth. Yesterday she was exceptionally out of sorts, and made random cries of pain. Thank goodness for the Tempra. Today, I could feel the sharp top of the tooth, which has erupted from the gum by a few millimeters.
Unfortunately, while the stages before the tooth emerges seem to be more painful, the appearance of this tooth is not granting Lucy any respite, since the adjacent tooth is almost out as well.
Hopefully Lucy will get a break before the top ones - there is no sign of them yet, but if she's anything like Becca (which the early teething seems to indicate), it won't be long.

Singing sensation with powers of retention

Rebecca can sing a Disney princess medley with the best of them, and has actually begun to sing in tune most of the time. What really surprised me was that although music class ended more than a month ago, this evening, while I was changing her diaper, she began to sing all the songs from a typical class - in the order that they occur! That is to say - she started with the greeting song, and was singing the names of the other children in the class. Wow. I was really shocked.
Scary wondering: Does she really remember all the things I say and do, even when she appears to be ignoring me?!?! What about that time last week when I cursed another driver through my open window? (He cut me off when I had the right of way - he was at a stop sign, and I was in the stream of traffic, so I honked my horn, and then he gave me the finger, so I called him an a**hole ). And yes, the girls were with me (which is part of the reason I was so ticked off by his actions).

Things that make Lucy laugh

Things that make Lucy laugh:
- Being tickled in the ribs
- The Down by the banks of the hanky panky song (with gestures)
- Zerberts
- When Mommy's bangs brush over her face

All Greg's girls and Greg's feet

I should probably retire my t-shirt - it's from a Taekwon-do competition 5 years ago.
Anyhow, if I wear a nasty t-shirt with holes around the house, I guarantee that barf-queen Lucy will not throw-up on me. If I wear anything remotely presentable, it's like asking for a spit-up shower.
As you can see from this picture, Lucy is extremely interested in Rebecca and everything Rebecca does. The reverse is not really true. Rebecca likes to do her own thing, and while she is intrigued by Lucy, she isn't riveted by her.

4 months and 8 days: Lucy rolls over back to front!

My flyboy was off to the airport, and thus, I found myself once again the master of bedtime. I had come to the story part of Rebecca's nighttime ritual, when Lucy began to wail. I pondered the merits of intervention - often Lucy will resettle herself, and it is very disruptive to Rebecca to splinter her nighttime routine. However, after a few minutes of wait and see, the wailing increased and it became obvious that I needed to do something. I apologized to Rebecca, promised an extra story (or two) as a reward for her patience, and I went to check on Lucy. Lucy was on her belly in her crib, with one leg through the rails. No wonder she was annoyed! But hooray - Lucy rolled over! Unfortunately, she still has to learn rolling front to back, so I may need to make periodic rescues of this kind. This particular milestone grants me a measure of relief because I no longer feel as though she can really get stuck.

HUMMUS AND PITA!!!! WAAAAAAH!!!

I consider Becca to be (usually) an excellent eater. She eats a wide variety of meats, dairy products, fruit, vegetables, and starchy foods. Lately her willingness to try new things has evaporated, but given her range of food favourites, I have not been overly concerned.
Except... lately she has become too fond of hummus and pita.
This might not seem like a bad thing to most people, after all - this is fairly healthy fare. However, imagine living with someone who wants to eat pita and hummus every day at every meal (sometimes to the exclusion of other things). Imagine a toddler with wicked garlic breath and a crown.
It's 7:45 AM, and someone is wailing at you... she is wailing for HUMMUS AND PITA!!! Explaining that it is not a breakfast food doesn't really cut it.
The picture associated with this post shows Rebecca preparing to eat some hummus and pita. We used to let her dip her own pieces of pita into the humus container but we had to stop for a few reasons:
1 - Sometimes she would lick the hummus off her pita and redip it
2 - If she thought we weren't watching, she would use an available utensil (or failing that - her finger), to avail herself of hummus (sans pita!).

Hand over Lucy!

Rebecca has recently developed an interest in holding Lucy in her lap. She announces her desire to do so via one of three extremely direct statements:
1) Hand over Lucy!
2) Take Lucy!
3) Hold Lucy!

Naturally, I do what I can to encourage her while ensuring that Lucy's safety is the top priority. After about two seconds of holding Lucy, Rebecca has had enough, and insists I remove the baby.
Becca has also begun to wonder and care if Lucy is absent (for example, if Lucy is at a doctor's appointment). While jealousy is still apparent, it is clear that Lucy has been incorporated into Becca's vision of he world and her concept of family. Whenever Rebecca plays with her toys and designates a Mommy, Daddy, and Becca, there is also a Lucy. It makes me happy.

What Rebecca says when she's stuck

So, there's been a toddler phrase that has been mystifying mommy and I.  When Rebecca feels trapped, or is being held and wants free, she'll say a phrase which starts out mostly nonsensical and ends with some identifiable words.  It's always made up of the same words, sometimes in slightly different orders, so we know she's trying to say something particular.

It goes something like:

"Oh bee see cry oh no oh please oh please I'm stuck oh no oh no help me."

Imagine that incredibly quickly:

"OhbeeseecryohnoohnopleaseohpleaseI'mstuckohnoohnohelpme"

There was something about a bear in there as well, last time she said it.

It's so funny, but still a little perplexing.  I have no idea what "Oh Bee See Cry" is.

Lucy 4 month appointment

Lucy turned 4 months old yesterday! Aaaah!!! How can so much time pass by so quickly?!?!
We took her to the GP for her 4 month checkup and vaccination today. Lucy now weighs about 15 and a half pounds, and is 65 cm long. She is therefore in the 90th percentile in terms of height and weight for her age. Apparently, it is good that these things are proportional. She was quite vocal about her dislike of the shots - and while I was able to soothe her immediately, she went into a second round of wailing shortly thereafter which may have simply been the result of being tired. At any rate, while she seems to be generally more sensitive to pain than Rebecca, I was pleased that Lucy did not give me the same look of betrayal and accusation that Rebecca used to give me during her initial vaccinations. Of course, Lucy did manage to vomit in my hair, on my neck, and down my shirt during our visit to the doctor's. In addition, she peed all over the outside of a fresh diaper and I had to be given one of the ones kicking around the office which seems to have originated in the 80s (based on the size, materials, and shape). I'm not complaining, but it is funny/interesting to see how diaper technology has changed.
Lucy's height means that she is 1cm from the limit on her infant car seat, so we will have to switch her to a toddler seat before the next appointment. I will be happy to say goodbye to the heavy infant car seat which is so awkward to carry and weighs a thousand pounds.

Scary toddler development

We bought Rebecca a new Disney Princess puzzle. This one was 48 pieces, and in less than a week, she mastered it. I am so impressed with her problem solving/logic skills. That a generally completely irrational person can look at a puzzle piece depicting abstract gold doodahs and deduce that it is Jasmine's crown amazes me. The image you see is not the puzzle picture (which I couldn't find), but merely an indication of how the princess puzzle is made harder by having all the characters dressed in more elaborate bejewelled golden versions of their normal "costumes". Apart from this, Rebecca continues to expand her mastery of spoken language. She has been eliminating many of her former baby words (we miss some of them!), and constructing more complex sentences. She uses possessive pronouns properly too. Her alphabet and number recognition (visual recognition that is), is going well, although she has trouble on occasion when she is required to distinguish between letters that are close to up-down mirror images of each other (such as M and W, and A and V). She is also confused by number zero and letter O. I am slowly gearing up for Potty Training Weeken with Becca. She seems to be both physically and mentally/emotionally ready for training and is keen. I had been waiting for jealousy/regression issues related to Lucy to subside to a more manageable level, and I had also been waiting for Rebecca to give some indication that she dislikes a wet or dirty diaper. The latter was a long time in coming, but the repeated used of "feel cold" Pull-ups seems to have helped. Now, I just have to pick a weekend. Yikes.
Rebecca is very sweet with Lucy these days. She likes to hold her and greet her, kiss her and talk to her. I am pleased by these developments. Of course, there are still bad days. Lucy is in the midst of some pretty painful and disruptive teething, and a major growth spurt, so she requires a lot of attention these days. Rebecca will sometimes walk up to a wall, bang her head against it (just once, thank god - not like before), and then fake cry for attention. It is extremely frustrating.
Rebecca has decided that Music=Catch that Train (by the awesome Dan Zanes). Nothing else is music to her. In the car - Catch that train! In the house - Catch that train! And of course, she knows the words, and makes up dance moves. I think my favourite part is when she sings "I don't want your millions mister". Nothing like a toddler singing about the Labour movement.

Even though there are times where I have dinosaur stickers stuck to my feet, vomit in my hair, no sense of the day of the week, and two little people expressing their disatisfacton with the standard of care they are receiving, I still feel very lucky, privileged, and happy to be the Mommy of Rebecca and Lucy. At 4am when someone crawls into my bed and puts a sippy cup under my back and a skanky blanket in my face, but hugs me like there's no tomorrow, I feel as though I have it so good, I shouldn't even express it out loud for fear that something will take it all away.

Ready to Roll

Lucy is getting closer and closer to rolling over. When I retrieve her from her crib in the morning, she has relocated herself to a different position. This morning she had reversed head and feet. She also turns onto her side, so rolling isn't too far away. All she needs now is the ability to arch her head back.