Toddler Playdates

I downloaded the pics off my cell phone today, so I can finally post, yay! (Side note: as it turns out, my cell phone takes nicer pictures than my old point 'n shoot. Senpai has a DSLR, which I'm sure would take infinitely better photos than both aforementioned devices, but I always have my cell phone in my pocket, DSLR.. not so much. Sprint Galaxy S for the win!)


I finally get to touch on a topic I had wanted to mention before: friends. R has friends. It's actually stressful for little toddler friends to play together at this age; they don't know how to do it yet. One kid takes the toy the other kid was playing with, then that kid retaliates by hitting and screaming. That same scenario plays out over and over again with the roles constantly shifting and changing, so no one kid can by any means be called innocent. But these are lessons that have to be learned. One day, both kids will know how to take turns, ask if they may play with a certain toy, and cooperatively play together. That's when the Mommies will be able to sit back with our coffees, chat, and relax. For now, we wear referee hats, call time outs, and negotiate terms for peaceful play. I so look forward to the future in this department. ^_^


R has had several playdates recently. The first-- I had mentioned before-- was when R wouldn't nap one day, and my wonderful friend Natalie brought her son over to play. (Though I usually don't mention names here, I will use Natalie's because I want to direct your attention to her lovely blog, NatoBottoArt: Creations from the Heart. She does a lot of stream of consciousness writing as she works through her creative process. Definitely check it out!) She mentions her son's name on her blog (and I've mentioned R's name here, too, but I still don't think I'm entirely ready to just dish it out every post), but here, I will call him I* (The asterisk is so you know I'm not referring to myself). Now that we've gotten that straightened out, back to the playdate...


R, Natalie, and I*. R had not been interested in her Wheelie Tiger for a long time until I* came along and started to ride it. All of a sudden, she likes her Wheelie Tiger again.

I love this picture! I* is a multifaceted boy, dishing out free hugs one second, and then finding new uses for xylophone mallets the next. ^_^ Here is one such hug. R has this look like, "What is he doing?" Haha, I could get really creative with the captions for this! How about, "Not cool, man. Not cool." Anyone else have a caption for this picture they want to share?


Next, she went to a Potty Party. One lady from the Mom's Group I'm a member of posted a Potty Party on the calendar. I just had to check it out! It was a small group of three mother/daughter pairs including the hosts. I'm pulling a lot of what I said in the opening paragraph from this get together, because we three moms kept trying to share potty and parenting tips amongst ourselves, but not one of us could finish a thought without breaking up a toddler fight. Though the potty aspect of the party was downplayed, it was still a fun playdate for everyone involved.

This is the only pic I took, and it was at the end of the party. All three girls were given favor bags and tiaras for being potty princesses. R had decided she didn't want to sit with the other girls right as I was snapping the shot. Oh well. At least she wore her crown. :-)


The last playdate was with R's friend, A. I've been taking R to Barnes & Noble Storytime ever since she turned one year old. I can't remember if A had been there right from the start, but pretty early on in our Storytime career, A's mom started talking to me and the little girls hit it off. I'll go more in depth into their relationship in another post (with adorable pics of them holding hands, aww!), but for now I'll focus on the playdate. Unfortunately, I only took one pic of this event, too, and it was when both girls' faces were hidden, sigh.



A's mom and I had been planning this playdate for awhile. We finally got our acts together last week. This playdate was the most low-key of them all because R was too busy climbing on me to mind what toys A was finding to play with. Except for when we went upstairs to show R's room to A and her mom. A wanted to push the buttons on R's musical nightlight, but R would not allow it. As the nightlight is actually a base to a baby mobile, I need to somehow wean R off of it before her baby sister comes! This playdate ended with lunch at a yummy Mexican restaurant. Heehee, I could use more playdates like this one. ;-)

Tantrum

Both yesterday and today involved morning trips into the city.

As the city that has been labeled as having the highest crime rates in 2006 and 2010 (it's currently at #3. Whew, what a relief! Haha, no), St. Louis is a place I am happy to live 20 minutes away from. I get to go to the nice malls, see the concerts and theater shows, eat at the fine restaurants, and then turn around and drive back home to my safer suburb. There is a problem, however, when it comes to transporting an almost two-year-old home from STL just before nap time.

She falls asleep. Of course. Usually for the last 5 or 10 minutes of the drive. Of course. Then I have to wake her up (no, I will not drive around in circles for an hour because it's lunch time and I want to get out of the car). She gets upset. Of course.

REALLY upset.


Yesterday involved a charming half hour of screaming, body flailing, head banging, punch throwing, and senseless acts of trying to move things that are impossible for a toddler to lift (like the stone-tiled iron coffee table, really?). There was nothing I could do to calm her down, so I just gave her some pillows and let her go to town as I tried to prepare lunch for us. It wasn't until the food was on the table that the last snotty sniffles were snuffed, and the wet, red cheeks started to dry off and regain their usual color. She was gibbering away, happy as a clam, by the time she had finished eating.

Today had the same fun, but also included me setting off our home security alarm (I said our suburb was *safer*, not safe) when I walked in the door, and I had to be on the phone with a security representative all the while R is screaming bloody murder in the background. "Yes, we're all fine and good here, sir, thank you." Sigh.

I wanted today to go better than yesterday, so I tried something different. After hanging up the phone, I held on tightly to the flailing Cupcake and took her upstairs to her room. I set her inside with a pacifier and shut the door. Her screams started to take on a rhythm: loud and quiet, loud and quiet. After three minutes, during a quiet point, I opened the door to check on her. She started right back in with the frustrated cries. I closed the door again and let her be. Five minutes later, I peeked in again, and got the same unhappy reaction; she wanted nothing to do with me. I waited ten minutes before finally opening the door again, and this time was different. She was lying in bed with the covers thrown over her head. When I asked her if she was feeling better, she threw the covers off with a smile, then came over and hugged my legs. Thank you.

She Walks (and Talks)

Thursday.

Last night I watched R walk around most of the house without a push toy. She would start out with uneven steps, get into a good stride, and end with a tumble. Then she'd get back up and do it again. Our baby is finally a toddler.

Watching R grow has included a lot of waiting; she's been behind in most every milestone due to her prematurity. Wait for her to roll, wait for her to sit up, wait up for her to crawl, wait for her to walk. She walks now. Yippeeee! She feels more confident when Mommy or Daddy hold her hand and walk with her, and she still zips around with her push toys, but she takes steps on her own, too. She takes steps on her own. I am so happy. The waiting for her to walk is finally over.

One sign of growth she hasn't made me wait for is speaking sentences. Just a couple of months ago I was worried that she didn't speak too many words, but she knew a key sentence, "What is that/it?" She points and asks what everything is, and she must be cataloging our answers. She won't repeat the word after we say it, but the next time it's relevant, she just may pipe in. Senpai taught her the color red, and she says up and down more frequently. Going back to sentences, every morning I ask her, "Did you sleep well?" Sometimes she'll reply, "yes" or "good." This morning, before I had a chance to ask, she exclaimed, "I didn't sleep well!" I was surprised. Was she trying to parrot my usual question? Is that what I heard her do? But no, she didn't say you, the did had two syllables that ended with n, and she started the sentence with I. More than repeating what she hears me say, she had created her own (correct!) sentence. True to form, R surprises us with first sentences as opposed to first words.

The last way she has grown since last blog post is that Senpai turned her carseat to face forward. We went to the zoo yesterday. R's rear-facing carseat was behind my passenger seat as Senpai drove. I couldn't take a nap. I was super exhausted, having fallen asleep at 2 am the previous night, and I really really wanted to sleep on the drive down to the zoo but it was impossible. The carseat interrupted where the headrest could go, which isn't a problem when you're sitting up, but when you're trying to lay your head back, man, it sucks. And my seat was pushed all the way forward, so there was no room for me to scootch down in the seat because my knees hit the dashboard. I was not a happy passenger. I told Senpai, no more. R faces forward. He changed the carseat in my car as well, and when I drove with R to the craft store today it was odd to look back and see her staring at me. We'll get used to it, though. Aside from the nap frustration yesterday, I've been thinking for awhile that I needed to change her carseat position, as she had gotten too big to easily fit in the space between the carseat and the doorframe in my car. Putting her in the seat involved much contortion on my part. The nap was just the last straw.

I love watching her grow.