Swimming

Here's some video I captured today at the pool of Reese swimming with her life jacket.
Since Aunt Kim was with us, I was able to hop out and shoot the video while knowing that an adult was still within arm's reach of Reese should she go under.

2 Years!

Today is Reese's OFFICIAL birthday! We're now counting the time in yearS--plural, how scary.

This morning we went to the pediatrician for Reese's two year check up. As always, she was wonderfully behaved. I still don't think her doctor can get over how cooperative she is--he comments on it every time. Her measurements show growth from her 18mo check up, and even show higher percentile ranks than I was expecting. She is "officially" 23lbs 9oz (15th%), 33 1/4" (30th%), and her head circumference is 47 cm (60th%). With the exception of her head, she's a little on the petite size, but we're used to that by now. Her size and body type are making clothing issues difficult, though. She outgrows clothing lengthwise, sometimes without ever reaching the minimum weight requirements for them. Fall shopping is going to be interesting.

Overall, the doctor told us everything looked great. We breifly discussed the small wart on one of her fingers, which can be treated with over the counter medication, as well as her on-again-off-again constipation issues. (Apparently her withholding symptoms are common around this age just before potty training really kicks into high gear.)

Before leaving Reese got an immunization. This was possibly the worst shot yet. In the past, she has cried after shots, but is bright eyed and distracted by her reward sticker by the time we walk out of the office. Well...with her growing cognitive abilities also comes added awareness. It was virtually impossible to distract her from the discomfort or memory of the experience this time. Over an hour later, she was still misty eyed and upset. I can tell her leg is sore at the injection site, and I'm still waiting for the fever to kick in...only time will tell.

Since we're not "baby-booking" her milestones and stories, I feel obliged to provide
"An Overview" of Reese at 2:

* Reese loves: pajamas (she'd wear them all day), Sesame Street, jumping (on her trampoline or anywhere else), swimming, dancing, reading, sweets, music, shoes, being outside, and riding escalators.

* Favorites: her favorite color is blue, her favorite breakfast is Daddy's home-made blueberry pancakes, her favorite fruits are blueberries and pineapple, her favorite veggie is raw carrots, and her favorite meal is elusive--sometimes spaghetti, other times quesadillas.There's no contest for favorite toy--Ellie wins by a mile.

* She's such a talker! Around new people she barely utters a word, but otherwise, she's non-stop commentary and observation. It's hard to get a word in edge-wise if Reese is on a roll.

* Milestones from this year: walking, running, jumping, standing on one foot, talking, she knows her name (first and last) and age, knows all basic colors (I'm excluding ones like turquoise and fushia when I say this), can count to 20 but consistently leaves out 5 and 7, knows her basic shapes (circle, triangle, square, heart, diamond, cylinder--but not good about rectangles), has started talking a lot about the seasons and what she wears during summer and winter, can recite the alphabet with help, knows a handful of letters (R, S, and O, in particular), knows all her body parts (sometimes confuses wrists and ankles), and knows many basic animal names and sounds.

The year ahead has some big changes in store for the family, it will be an interesting adventure to see how we all grow and change.

Wet and Wild

Our neighbors, the Markles, have two sons with end of summer birthdays. To celebrate their youngest son's birthday, they rented an inflatable water fun bouncy house. I shudder to calculate how old Ethan is now since I remember his first day of first grade, but he and his "big boy" (as Reese called them) friends enjoyed a day of running, jumping, sliding, and splashing across the street on Saturday.

Rick and Jan were kind enough to invite Reese over to take part in the fun. After nap we showed Reese the set up, but she was hesitant so we went to the pool instead. I think Reese's hesitation was well placed since a half dozen junior high boys were romping around at the time. When we came back from the pool, the party was nearing a close and Reese played on the bouncy house for a short time. The tall slide was out of the question, but she did enjoy running through a tunnel with spray heads showering her from above.


After a few successful runs through the tunnel she decided she'd rather play in the water that was running off from the bouncy house. She poured water in and out of cups until she started shivering and turning a delicate shade of blue--then Mommy announced it was time to leave.

Rick and Jan took some great photos of Reese enjoying the fun and even a short video to capture a few of her runs through the tunnel. Even with the falls captured in the video, she was never scared or deterred.

Look Mommy!

Today, I heard Reese shout, "Look Mommy!" When I turned around, she had stuffed Ellie under her shirt. She said, "Ellie's in my belly!" which made us both giggle--the rhyme was hilarious to Reese who wanted to keep repeating it. When she calmed down, she continued to narrate by telling me that Ellie was in her belly like baby sister was in Mommy's belly...effectively, stuffing a pink stuffed elephant under her shirt gave her bumps in all the right places and now she looked like Mommy.

Birthday Bash

Yesterday was Reese's second birthday party. We had been prepping her for the experience all week when we picked up her cake, balloons, crepe paper, etc. She also got some great practice blowing out candles and understanding the "birthday process" last weekend during Daddy's birthday celebration.

When Reese woke up (promptly at 7AM), we heard her talking on her monitor. It's not unusual for her to talk to herself when she wakes up, but when we listened closely we heard her saying, "I'm going to be two. I'm going to be two. I'm going to hold up two fingers. Ellie, I'm going to be two."

The morning was filled with party prep, including blowing up balloons and hanging crepe paper garlands. Mommy accidentally bought a package of small balloons for the party. I thought they'd be great since they included a wide assortment of shapes and colors, I just didn't realize that they were all small--better suited for water balloons than the decoration I had envisioned. Due to their size, they were near impossible to blow up. With my abdominal muscles stretched over a pregnant belly and my diaphragm squished by a growing infant, I'm not sure what possessed me to try and blow up the balloons, but after two I began to worry the exercise might send me into pre-mature labor. So...Daddy got out his multi-function battery charger/generator/inflator and took care of the rest. Reese loved watching her pile of balloons grow. She arranged them into a "house," ran through them screaming, threw them up into the air, and kept repeating, "Look at all these colorful balloons! I love them!"

Around 11, the party goers showed up the party began. Grandma Bailey brought the beautiful curtains for Reese's big girl room that she made and we hung them up immediately. Soon the house was full of family.

To keep Reese occupied while Daddy made lunch, we decided to open presents immediately. Reese commented on the size of all the packages and repeatedly mentioned how excited she was. In the 24 hours since the party, all of her new toys have been broken in.

After lunch we dug into Reese's birthday cake--a chocolate/chocolate ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins. Reese specified pink icing with green, blue, and purple polka dots. (I offered the idea of ballerina slippers, but polka dots won out.) Reese was anxious to blow out the candles and could barely wait for us to finish singing happy birthday. Once the song concluded, she expertly blew out each candle. Unlike last year (when there was a lot of prompting and prodding) Reese dug into her cake and devoured every last crumb. In the end, her face was pink, her clothes were a mess, and she was very satisfied.


All the guests left during nap time (which quickly followed cake) and Reese enjoyed an afternoon playing with her new toys.

Tricycle Triage

I should be assembly a tricycle right now. I've been at it for the better part of an hour and it's not finished--truth be told, there are still two pieces of hardware from step one that are lying on the floor un-installed. I can't figure out if I need to screw them in (they do have threads) or pound them through the holes. Add to this my paralysis that I will somehow damage the hardware so it is un-installable or that Reese will sit on the tricycle and it will collapse, and I'm taking a break.
Kevin and I decided to let logic rule our game plan for tonight, and we threw gender roles out the window--he went to HEB to get food for tomorrow's birthday party while I attempted assembly of Reese's tricycle. At the time it all made sense--I couldn't haul the 40lbs gas tank for our grill and I didn't want to buy alcohol in my current state of obvious pregnancy, so why make one trip into two? But, since Kevin's been gone longer than I've been at work assembling, maybe we're both failing at this genius approach.

My imminent emotional break-down about my inability to assemble a tricycle is probably multi-pronged. I'd like to blame hormones first and foremost. My brain withers into mush during pregnancy (what Aunt Kim likes to call "placenta brain") and my growing waist line makes pushing large items together difficult. The two in combination definitely slowed me down on this project. Second, is the realization that my 13-year relationship with Kevin has always meant that assembly jobs were done in tandem or with Kevin's expertise only. Yes, Kevin designs and builds things for a living--but at one point I thought I had enough brain power of my own to assemble something independently. Put these two issues in combination and I'm on the verge of tears, thinking to myself, "What if Kevin wasn't around to help?"; "What if I was a single mom?"; "God forbid anything ever happen to Kevin." It's enough to drive me mad.

* * *

Update: Kevin returned from HEB. He didn't forget anything on the list and was only moderately flustered by his wait at the check out line.

He quickly gave me a run down on how the screws I hesitated to install were, in fact, NOT screws, but some kind of molded plastic with grooves referred to as "Christmas trees". It took him seconds to install them correctly. He then proceeded to tighten all the hardware, align the steering wheel properly (apparently I would have had Reese making hard rights all the time), and finish the job in less than ten minutes.

I handed him hardware, fetched tools the instructions didn't call for (did I mention there were no words, just pictures in the instructions?), tried to explain why this all amounted to a near break down, and thanked him profusely.

Oh the behind the scenes action that happens when children go to sleep the night before gift-giving events... I thought it was worth capturing for posterity.

First Dentist Visit

Reese had her first visit to the dentist this morning. I thought I was getting ahead of the game--my pediatrician hadn't recommended a dental visit yet and none of the other people I know with kids Reese's age had been to the dentist yet. So, you can imagine my shock when the dental office mentioned that they recommend that every child has their first dental appointment at age one--NOT two. Guilt trip accomplished, now can we move on? I felt like saying, "Well, she technically won't be two until the 24th--suck on that!" but of course I didn't. I took my wrist slap and moved on...to filling out ten pages of paper work. There were entire sections asking how I thought Reese would behave during the exam. My mind was flooded with scenarios--most involved screaming and crying, and a few involved a straight-jacket-like-papoose or sedation (for both of us, of course). So, I left half of the questions blank and wrote "unknown" next to the other half.

I tried to prepare Reese for our visit this week by talking a lot about who the dentist was and how they would use tools to look at her teeth. I didn't find any books at the library (like I initially intended), and we didn't do a pre-visit, or consult any you tube cartoons/footage...but, hey we were busy with other things.

After a long argument over insurance pre-verification, we were seen by the dentist. To my relief, Reese's exam took place in a small office, and did not include a traditional dental chair. The dentist spent the first five or ten minutes explaining the procedures to me and assuring me that all kids cry during the exam because they're scared and they don't know what's going on. She also mentioned that the crying is actually a good thing because with wide open screaming mouths, she can see and inspect the teeth more easily. She then grilled me on our brushing and flossing habits as well as Reese's diet. I got a bonus explanation about why it's not good to give your kid cookies all-day, every day. I know I'm a young mom, but really? I must look like I don't take nutrition seriously.

After all that, Reese got to look at the dental tools, told the dentist she has a "Thomas toothbrush" (she's never seen Thomas the Tank Engine cartoons, but knows his name and insisted on picking him out at the store), and layed down in Mommy's lap for the exam. Reese opened her mouth at all the right times, didn't shed a tear, and the dentist finished the exam with all her fingers in tact. The only hiccup to the whole appointment was that Reese wanted to lick all the fluoride treatment off of her teeth while it was being applied. Who can blame her, though, when they make that stuff taste like candy?

We left with a new toothbrush, a perfect review (not even any plaque build up!), and our second appointment scheduled for February.

It's always amazing how the things I prepare for the most difficulty with (e.g. doctor's visits, blood draws, dental visit, church attendance etc) are always smooth sailing...it's the routine events that bites us in the ass every time.

Big Girl Swimming

At the beginning of the summer, we "invested" in a life jacket for Reese. With an upcoming trip to the beach, and a slim chance we might be out on the lake, it made sense. Finding one that fit her, however, was more of a hassle than we expected. I quickly became educated on the different "levels" of life jackets available and realized that unless you weight 30lbs+ there are technically no options. (If I had to guess, Reese will be pushing 30lbs around the time she enters Kindergarten.) We settled for the smallest one we could find at Academy (pictured above--and, yes, it does say "for children 30-35lbs" inside). Reese picked it out and (to our surprise) requested the brightest yellow one available. Since then, she's used it at the beach and most of the times we enter the "big pool" in our neighborhood.

Most of our recent trips to the neighborhood pool have been spent simmering to death in the toddler pool. With only a foot and half of water and daily temps at or above 100, the "froggy pool" may as well be a hot tub as far as pregnant Mommy is concerned. With each trip I try to lure Reese into the big pool instead. I'm usually lucky to split our time 50/50 between the two, and while the big pool is cooler in temperature, it does mean that Reese is generally glued to me the entire time. Even with her life jacket on, the idea of loosening the death grip she keeps on Mommy is out of the question. A couple demonstrations about how "Look, honey, your life jacket helps you float by yourself!" have ended in tortured screams and looks of pure panic. Believe me, I wasn't asking the kid to swim the length of the pool, I was just showing her that being at arms length wouldn't be the death of her.

Friday afternoon brought a wonderful and unexpected turn of events. After our mandatory time in the toddler pool, Reese willingly donned her life jacket and we headed over to the big pool. Reese held my hands as we descended the steps, and then it happened: she let go and started swimming away from me. I let her go a few feet ahead before showering on the praise. To my delight (and relief) she was almost as excited as I was! For the next forty-five minutes, she doggie paddled, and kicked around the pool by her self. I was always within arms reach, but she never faltered or asked for help. In our two visits since (with a probable 3rd scheduled for this afternoon), we have spent the entirety of our visit in the big pool. When I ask Reese if she wants to go to the pool, she says, "Yeah! And swim in the big pool with my life jacket! By myself! Like a big girl!"

Ahh, sweet relief.....now, only seven or eight more years until I can be the parent reading a magazine in a pool chair while their kids swim independently and wear themselves out.

Almost Two

Only two more weeks until Reese is officially two! I've been trying to reminisce lately and take in the idea of her growth and progress over the course of the last two years, and I still can't decide if I feel like time as flown by or not.

Lately, one thing that has been certain to me is that Reese and I are ready for a break from each other. I feel terrible saying such things, especially since I know that not everyone has a choice about whether or not to stay home with their young child. But, two years of day-in and day-outness is wearing on us both. It may be her age, my pregnancy, or a combination of any number of factors (maybe our personalities are too similar?), but I'm ready for mother's day out to begin. I think even 8 hours of time apart--even with a new baby in the mix--a week will make a huge difference for us both. Not to mention the benefits of a "school" environment and all that good stuff...

Just a heads up for any "regular readers:" the reesebailey.org and reesebailey.net addresses will only work for a little while longer. The blog content, however, will remain in tact at reesebailey.blogspot.com. I have plans to change the blog address soon. Since I will likely be blogging about baby #2 also, I feel like we should have a more diplomatic name. Who knows, I may even get crazy and blog about (gasp) things Kevin and I are up to.