First I should say thank you to all of you who have found us important enough to continue reading about :) Hopefully I can manage to keep you somewhat entertained! I have to admit, I am pretty excited about the new blog and I have a lot of fun creating it. This time around it will be more so about us a family rather than just focusing on Olena, sorry! I welcome all comments and believe me I will appreciate and feedback or advice, especially those things concerning parenting! I am always up for new ideas.
Anyhow to bring you up to date, 2008 has been pretty busy so far. We have finally had some down time the past few days and I have been beside myself with boredom - not really! but the fact that I haven't had too much to do has lead me to sit on my butt that last few days, and in turn, it landed my lazy fanny in the chiropractor's office this morning. My hips and lower back were killing me. I felt like a million dollars after my adjustment, but then I sat here at the computer finishing up the blog and now I am suffering again, idiot!
Olena has started a dance class for toddlers. I pray she catches on after a few days because the poor girl was clueless. She has been in gymnastics since about August and I figured a change would be good. I enrolled her in "bounce and jive", a dance class for 3-5 year olds. She is one of the youngest and of course the smallest in the class. She did manage to pay attention and listen to the instructor, but she made no effort to try the moves. I'll be patient, I'm sure she'll catch on quick.
Potty training has finally taken a turn for the better. We went out today for a few hours and for the first time I did not put a pull up on. She told me twice she had to go potty. We have even jumped the hurdle of going #2 on the toilet now too, which has made daddy very happy :) It never failed, whenever I had to run some errands and she stayed with Jason she would poop in her underwear, and that is something he has a very hard time dealing with! Needless to say I am very happy about this improvement. She has been very very stubborn about this whole potty training ordeal.
Behavior has been a bit of an issue lately too, but different this time. We are not dealing with a brat but a scared, can't be alone, insecure, whiny toddler. For whatever reason she has developed a fear of every car that drives by our house. She will scream in terror whenever she hears it. Why?? I have no clue. We can go out in public, go on a walk, be at someone else's house and she doesn't even bat an eye. But at home, in the middle of the day and the middle of the night. It is driving me CRAZY. I have seriously been tempted to go outside and put a sign in the my yard..."please drive 5 miles per hour by our home" I have tried to baby her for it, ignoring it, acting completely normal and saying "no big deal it is just driving by", I have sat her down and have talked about, left the door and windows open so she can see it...EVERY THING it is a hopeless cause. I guess I just have to wait it out, or buy her some earmuffs! lol!!
She is also going through the mommy stage! Mommy can't even leave the room without her whining for me. At night it is the worse, she has a pretty set schedule especially when it comes to bed time. She has been sleeping in a full size bed for about 6 months now, no problems until about 2 weeks ago. We would tuck her in, and leave the room and she was fine. Now she cries for almost an hour before going to sleep and she wakes up for at least 2 hours each night because a car will wake her up and then she doesn't want to go back to bed. I thought maybe she just wasn't tired so I tried a week without naps but that was way too hard. She would crash around 5-6:00 each night where ever she was! if I woke her up, OMG - what a crab, but if I let her sleep, going to bed was just that much harder. So we gave up on that idea pretty quick. It has been just plain loony around here. These are all traits that she has never shown before so we are just taking it day by day and trying different things until something works.
Her speech has improved a lot over the past couples of weeks too. Her words are much clearer and she is starting to use more complete sentences. She has also seemed to develop a little sarcasm as well. She can be a little smarty pants when she wants to be. The best thing of all is her honesty! The girl cannot tell a lie. If she is doing something wrong she will either come and get us and take us to see what she is doing or she will call us into the room where she is while she is committing the "crime". It is hilarious. Toycha teases her all the time because no matter what I ask she will always tell me the truth. Lets pray she keeps that trait :)
We have are starting to do some work on the house now, which is long over due. We did a lot of cosmetic work when we first moved in, and since then we have focused on the outside. We have painted inside but that is about it. We need to freshen up a few things, replace some molding, and paint a few more rooms. I would also LOVE to redo my kitchen cabinets and lay a ceramic tile floor. We'll also be tearing out our living room carpet and finishing the wood floor that is underneath. Between the kid and all of the animals I steam clean like a normal person would vacuum. It is just too much! Thank you adoption tax credit!! hopefully we'll be able to get some of this stuff completed after we do the taxes. We did just do some painting Olena's room and it looks awesome so I now have the home repair bug and want to keep moving forward. The hubby takes a bit more motivation so wish me luck!
Speaking of hubby, he is behind me snoring up a storm in his recliner so I guess I should go tuck him into bed. Good night!
Anyhow to bring you up to date, 2008 has been pretty busy so far. We have finally had some down time the past few days and I have been beside myself with boredom - not really! but the fact that I haven't had too much to do has lead me to sit on my butt that last few days, and in turn, it landed my lazy fanny in the chiropractor's office this morning. My hips and lower back were killing me. I felt like a million dollars after my adjustment, but then I sat here at the computer finishing up the blog and now I am suffering again, idiot!
Olena has started a dance class for toddlers. I pray she catches on after a few days because the poor girl was clueless. She has been in gymnastics since about August and I figured a change would be good. I enrolled her in "bounce and jive", a dance class for 3-5 year olds. She is one of the youngest and of course the smallest in the class. She did manage to pay attention and listen to the instructor, but she made no effort to try the moves. I'll be patient, I'm sure she'll catch on quick.
Potty training has finally taken a turn for the better. We went out today for a few hours and for the first time I did not put a pull up on. She told me twice she had to go potty. We have even jumped the hurdle of going #2 on the toilet now too, which has made daddy very happy :) It never failed, whenever I had to run some errands and she stayed with Jason she would poop in her underwear, and that is something he has a very hard time dealing with! Needless to say I am very happy about this improvement. She has been very very stubborn about this whole potty training ordeal.
Behavior has been a bit of an issue lately too, but different this time. We are not dealing with a brat but a scared, can't be alone, insecure, whiny toddler. For whatever reason she has developed a fear of every car that drives by our house. She will scream in terror whenever she hears it. Why?? I have no clue. We can go out in public, go on a walk, be at someone else's house and she doesn't even bat an eye. But at home, in the middle of the day and the middle of the night. It is driving me CRAZY. I have seriously been tempted to go outside and put a sign in the my yard..."please drive 5 miles per hour by our home" I have tried to baby her for it, ignoring it, acting completely normal and saying "no big deal it is just driving by", I have sat her down and have talked about, left the door and windows open so she can see it...EVERY THING it is a hopeless cause. I guess I just have to wait it out, or buy her some earmuffs! lol!!
She is also going through the mommy stage! Mommy can't even leave the room without her whining for me. At night it is the worse, she has a pretty set schedule especially when it comes to bed time. She has been sleeping in a full size bed for about 6 months now, no problems until about 2 weeks ago. We would tuck her in, and leave the room and she was fine. Now she cries for almost an hour before going to sleep and she wakes up for at least 2 hours each night because a car will wake her up and then she doesn't want to go back to bed. I thought maybe she just wasn't tired so I tried a week without naps but that was way too hard. She would crash around 5-6:00 each night where ever she was! if I woke her up, OMG - what a crab, but if I let her sleep, going to bed was just that much harder. So we gave up on that idea pretty quick. It has been just plain loony around here. These are all traits that she has never shown before so we are just taking it day by day and trying different things until something works.
Her speech has improved a lot over the past couples of weeks too. Her words are much clearer and she is starting to use more complete sentences. She has also seemed to develop a little sarcasm as well. She can be a little smarty pants when she wants to be. The best thing of all is her honesty! The girl cannot tell a lie. If she is doing something wrong she will either come and get us and take us to see what she is doing or she will call us into the room where she is while she is committing the "crime". It is hilarious. Toycha teases her all the time because no matter what I ask she will always tell me the truth. Lets pray she keeps that trait :)
We have are starting to do some work on the house now, which is long over due. We did a lot of cosmetic work when we first moved in, and since then we have focused on the outside. We have painted inside but that is about it. We need to freshen up a few things, replace some molding, and paint a few more rooms. I would also LOVE to redo my kitchen cabinets and lay a ceramic tile floor. We'll also be tearing out our living room carpet and finishing the wood floor that is underneath. Between the kid and all of the animals I steam clean like a normal person would vacuum. It is just too much! Thank you adoption tax credit!! hopefully we'll be able to get some of this stuff completed after we do the taxes. We did just do some painting Olena's room and it looks awesome so I now have the home repair bug and want to keep moving forward. The hubby takes a bit more motivation so wish me luck!
Speaking of hubby, he is behind me snoring up a storm in his recliner so I guess I should go tuck him into bed. Good night!
Comments
Did anyone mention to Lana that a car could run over her if she got in the road in front of your house? That might be causing the fear. I wish she would send some of that over here to Lyra. She want's to go in the road so badly she can taste it. She has had enough swats to stay out of it but I am always expecting the desire to ride her bike in the road (like the brothers do) to outweigh the fear of a swat...