A Letter to Periwinkle at Three Years Old

Dear Periwinkle,

In less than two days, you will be three years old. Three years ago, I was searching for apple cider donuts at Dunkin, complaining of an aching back, cleaning the house, and eagerly awaiting your arrival in 3 weeks. Little did I know it’d be only 36 hours. Little did I know how completely my world would change.

And so here we are. You are so smart and conversational, I often forget you are only three, rather than thirteen. Your logic and reasoning skills are rather astounding (though I may be biased) and absolutely adorable. You informed Boomer he could not come in the playroom because he did not have fingers and thus could not play with the toys. You negotiate more time before bed, more cookies, more pears, more trips to the library, more stickers, with the ease of a studied lawyer. You are an expert at dealing with an Indigo meltdown, often giving way in an attempt to soothe him. “Okay, Inno. We can watch Mickey first, then Daniel Tiger,” even though it is your turn to choose. My heart swells with pride when you do that, seeing your empathetic soul. When we brought the cats to the vet and they were crying in their cages, you started crying along with them, begging us to let them out. The cats barely give you the time of day, and yet your heart ached for them. 

You are sweet and loving, yet still fiercely independent. “I do it” has turned into “Let me do it myself!” but your stubborn pride is the same. Often, you will turn back to me moments later, “Can you help me?” on your lips; but more and more often, you succeed where once you struggled. It is bittersweet seeing you accomplish more and more on your own, my girl who from minute one pushed away from me to look around the recovery room in the hospital. You still take in so much of what you see and hear, recalling it days or even months later when I think you must have forgotten by now. 

You handled moving (again) like a champ. You transitioned into your new shared room without issue, and this past month you transitioned again into your big girl room with little struggle. In the morning you proudly announce, “I slept in my room all by myself!” If only falling asleep all by yourself were easier, but we’ll get there.

You have taken to preschool like fish to the water (although swimming lessons this summer were a failure—things to work on). I love seeing the worksheets sent home, with your circles around all the letter A’s and B’s, your scrawling handwriting as you learn to trace letters and now words. I have no doubt you soon will be reading me stories instead of vice versa. I’m so very proud of all you are accomplishing. You are also pretty much potty trained, which is awesome. Just . . . awesome. Keep it up!

This year has been so much fun, seeing you experience everything around you and seeing you turn from a baby into a little girl. I’m in complete denial that you are old enough to not be in diapers, old enough to pedal your tricycle and help me bake cookies. Old enough to remind me to stay within the lines when I’m driving (I always do), and to tell me that a stop sign is an octagon, not a hexagon. But you’ll always be my baby girl.

Love,

Mama

Ketchup and Lies

I suppose it was bound to happen sooner or later, but it still seems like it came out of nowhere. One day, they were eating almost everything I put in front of them. The next day, everything required ketchup.

Their future.

And I do mean EVERYTHING.

Roasted chicken? "Ketchup?" No big deal.

Cauliflower? "More ketchup!" I can handle this.

Beef stew? "No! Want ketchup!" Excuse me while Mommy suppresses the urge to vom under the table.

Some sliced grapes? "Ketchup, mommy!" My stomach literally turned at this one, a real-life horror straight out of the book If I Could Keep You Little by Marianne Richmond, which mentions finding out "you like ketchup with your grapes." Who knew it was a real thing? And can we never do that again, please?

I wouldn't mind so much if they weren't starting to scoop the ketchup straight into their mouths, bypassing the nutritious food entirely. We've now taken to dribbling the ketchup on top of the food to ensure they eat something other than lycopene and sodium for dinner.

And yesterday on the way to daycare I caught Periwinkle offering her stuffed bunny "More ketchup, Bunny?" Adorable, right?

On a related note, I'm now lying to my children with regularity. They will eat pasta only if you assure them that the red sauce on top is ketchup. Also, all meat is known as "chicken" because that is all Periwinkle "likes." Don't tell her she's recently had salmon, beef, pork, and ham, if you'd be so kind. I'm not sure she could handle the shock.

What do you mean this isn't ketchup?

And they now refer to spaghetti as "pizza" and meatballs as "robots." Indigo requesting "More bobots, mommy?" is perhaps the cutest thing in the world. I claim no part in these mistakes -- they are all them.

However, Periwinkle referring to a stuffed lion as her "binosaur" is definitely my fault. Their recent obsession with dinosaurs has led to some serious tiffs over Indigo's red dino he got for his first birthday, and which is suddenly THE toy after a year of being ignored. So the lion has an identity crisis now.

Don't judge me.

A Letter to Periwinkle at 18 Months

Dear Periwinkle,

I am constantly reminded of myself when I look at you. It goes beyond our similar facial features and wild, curly hair, though. You are a know-it-all, bossy little kid. You crack me up. If Indigo is doing something you know he shouldn't be doing, you call out to him with your nickname for him, waggle your pointer finger back and forth, and say, "No, no, no!" Then you look to me or Daddy for approval. I love that you are trying to help. It's adorable. But I must warn you to not become a tattle-tale. Sometimes breaking the rules is okay. Of course, sometimes you tattle on yourself, which is perfectly acceptable (and hilarious).

You have such a matter of fact attitude about telling your brother what to do, and about picking out books to read, and about walking from here to there and back again. You are full of confidence. I love that about you. But remember to be humble, too. Remember sometimes other people will struggle with what you find easy, and remember to have compassion when they need help to get there too. Sometimes you will want to help, and that is wonderful, but do it gently, kindly, and without making them feel badly about needing help. This can be a fine line to walk, but I know you will figure it out with grace and charm. Hopefully more quickly than I did. And remember that there will be times when you will require their help, and that you should accept their help with the same grace and kindness.

But all of this is rather serious for an 18-month-old girl, I suppose. You are still a baby. Or perhaps not. A toddler. You still shriek when you don't get your way. You still throw your sippy cup on the floor when you are feeling tempestuous. You still cry in the morning if we don't get you quickly enough. You still toss food on the ground instead of saying "All done!" and waiting for us to remove you from your high chair.

But soon you won't need the high chair. Soon you won't have a crib at daycare. You'll have little benches to sit on and cots to nap on.

In the morning you and your brother sometimes blow each other kisses. I wake up with a smile on my face on those days. We'll hear you say, "Where Mommy, Daddy?" and Indigo will raise his arms up in a questioning manner and say, with his voice dripping concern, "Oh, no!" I love it. And I also feel bad, so I scurry in there, or send Daddy in while I steal a few extra moments snuggled in bed. And you both break out in grins and start jumping up and down, so excited to see us.

Watching you two interact more and more has been the highlight of the past six months. You give each other hugs and kisses. You chatter to each other and make each other laugh. When your brother is crying, you get so worried about him, and you rub his back like you've seen me and Daddy do many times. It is perhaps the sweetest thing I've ever seen. Never mind that you, too, are unhappy it's bedtime. When he cries you reach out to comfort him. When he calls out for his Elmo or his "bankie" you bring him Elmo and his favorite blanket. You are such an amazing little sister to him. He is so lucky to have you.

Worried about your brother crying upstairs.

You saw Daddy blow his nose one day, and you just had to do it. Now if the box of tissues is within reach, you grab a few, hold them to your nose, and blow raspberries to make a similar sound. Then you delicately hand the tissues to me to dispose of. You are so into imitating everything we do. A clean diaper fell on the floor, and you picked it up and tried to shove it into the diaper pail. If you find scrap paper on the floor, you bring it to the trash and put it in. You like when we give you a paper towel to "clean" your tray, and you enjoy studying mail. I even got you to help Swiffer the floors once. I will have to think of other ways to have you help us around the house, while you still enjoy it!

I can't wait to see what the next six months bring. What new skills will you learn? What new funny phrases will you utter with complete seriousness, sounding older than you are? What will scare you, and what will intrigue you? The summer is coming, and with it such adventures!

Just stop calling me "Mom," okay? It's "Mommy" or "Mama." At least for a few more years, please.

Love,
Mama

Fun Facts

1. Indigo hasn't bitten anyone in over a week. Yay! I feel like we should have a countdown (countup?) for this. Something like this:

2. Black Cat knocked over our tree this weekend, scaring the beejeezus out of all of us, but especially Indigo, who was perilously close to said tree. I thought we'd lost all our glass ornaments, but shockingly only two were shattered and three were broken and hopefully fixable.

3. Periwinkle and Indigo are apparently the "mayors" of their daycare room. They wave and say "Hi" and "Bye" to everyone who comes in. Everyone. When should I start teaching them to not talk to strangers?

4. They have perfected the "Who, me?" face. For example:

5. They look ridiculously cute in their hats. See here:

6. Periwinkle is really into mimicking. We've gotten her saying, "Wow", "Boomer" (White Cat's name, although it is more like "Booma" so she's got the Boston accent down even though we live nowhere near there), and "Tree," which is more like "tee". Pretty exciting stuff. Time to stop swearing, pronto!

7. They are obsessed with pouches. If they see me packing them in the diaper bag they flip out until I give them one. We have to be very stealthy with the pouches, or it's meltdown time. Luckily this means they eat all sorts of veggies quite willingly via these pouches. They do also eat whole veggies, but the pouches are great for when we are out and about. I recommend Ella's Kitchen, Sprout, and Plum Organics.

And that's it for today. I just thought you'd all like to know these things. Have a great day!

A Letter to Periwinkle at Eleven Months

Dear Periwinkle,

Eleven months. Is that it? Only eleven months knowing you; your smile; your sweet, sleeping face? Impossible. You bring such joy to our lives every single day that it seems a part of us must have been missing before you came into the world. And lately you have been bringing that joy in such fun new ways.

What's up, Mama?

You can now wave and say, "Hi!" in this adorable, chipper voice. One rare night when you fought going to sleep, I was holding you and you just kept waving and saying, "Hi!" like that would somehow save you from bedtime. "Look, Mama, I'm doing that thing that always makes you smile! See, I'm waving!" It didn't work. Mama won that battle. But it was damned cute. We're working on "Bye" now, although you will wave and say, "Hi" as we leave a place. Daddy says we should have taught you "Ciao" instead, since that works both ways. We'll get there.

This past week you also brought "Uh oh" into the picture, out of the blue. You'll say it and then drop something (wrong order, sweetie). And sometimes we'll just hear this little voice from the backseat saying, "Uh oh." Always with a slight pause in between. Daddy and I just crack up sometimes because it is just too cute we can't take it anymore.

Red Sox girl (to Daddy's chagrin)

You also learned how to high-five at daycare. I'm hoping since you are getting good at these hand gestures you'll soon start doing some of the baby sign language too, especially "all done" and "more." Sometimes you don't want your whole bottle anymore and you slap it away and we end up with formula everywhere. A simple hand gesture would be much cleaner, thank you.

So much hair!

You've also started sticking up your pointer finger. I'm trying to get you to associate that with the question, "How old are you?" so maybe by your birthday (in only a MONTH) you'll be able to proudly raise that little chubby finger in response. We'll see how that goes.

You also seem to be using that finger to actually point at things. You pointed at the Cat in the Hat stuffed animal Grandpa G got you but then seemed apprehensive when it got closer to you. You two are still in negotiations about physical boundaries, it seems.

Pointing at the Cat in the Hat

Another foe is the big orange ball. It started out in the pool but has come inside since your brother really likes it. But we keep it away from you because if it gets to close to you, you cry and cling to us. We get it, baby girl, we'll keep you safe. Except in "Chloe's Color Book" (thank you Citrus Lane) there is a big orange ball, and you always point to it when we get to that page. Always. And almost never do you point at anything else in the book. It's as if you are working up to the REAL orange ball by touching the one in the book. You'll get there.

Exploring

You are now a pro at walking around holding our hands. You pull up on your crib constantly and are starting to make your way around it on your own. You pull up on basically anything you can. A few times, you've been standing holding my hands when you let go, and you stood on your own for at least five seconds before you fell onto your rump. I don't think you even realized what you did, but I was so proud.

Not the safest choice for pulling up

You're also quite the prolific artist. In your new daycare room, where you are doing quite well and are apparently the "boss", even of kids older than you (that's my girl! Taking after Mama!), fingerpainting is a near-daily activity. You've painted apples, leaves, handprints, and a snake. I guess it's time to buy some art supplies for our house!

Turn off the flash, Mama, it's 6am

This month we went to the Big E in Massachusetts with Grandma and Grandpa. You saw lots of big animals and were very brave around them, and also quite fascinated by them. You also went to the doctor. You are now 20lb 13oz and 28 inches long. You got your flu shot like a champ. The doctor said you are perfect.

I'm so proud of all your accomplishments this month. You are so engaged with the world around you and you just soak it all up. Keep learning, little girl. Learning is pretty awesome.

Love,
Mama

Starting to "read" books

A Letter to Periwinkle at 10 Months

Dear Periwinkle,

You, my little baby girl, are giving us a run for our money. You are now a speed demon at crawling, and before I've walked out of the room you are halfway across it trying to follow me. You crawled over to the liquor cabinet the other day and tried to open it. Time to get some latches on the doors! If we put your bottle on the floor, you give a little cry then crawl over to it at super speed. It's adorable. It's also time for baby gates, as you put your arms up on the bottom step, so I know attempts to climb the stairs can't be far behind.

You're holding steady at two teeth, which you show off with your adorable open-mouth grins. You're using those teeth to tear through chicken, pork, and black beans, which seem to be your new favorite food.

This month you had a lot of firsts. First bath in the big tub. First time in swings at the park. First time in a grocery shopping cart. First eight steps while holding my hands. That's right. You walked a little bit! And quite speedily, at that! You've also pulled up in the crib a few times, although I still haven't seen that.

You also got your first denim skirt and your first pigtails. Completely cute.

 

You seem fascinated with putting things in buckets and taking them out again. I hear this is an important learning game for you babies, so I'm proud of you for working on it so intently. However, you are seemingly terrified of the large orange ball we have. Your brother loves it, but you just start shrieking.

In general, you sleep great. It doesn't seem to matter how you nap during the day, at 6:30pm you are out like a light. And at 6am, sometimes earlier, you are awake and chipper, sitting up and trying to pull up on the crib. You also try to get toys off the shelf next to your crib, so I sometimes find those in your crib with you!

You are my little troublemaker for sure, and I love you for it. I can only imagine what you have in store for us as we get closer to your first birthday!

Love,
Mama

Nine Months Old!

Periwinkle and Indigo turned nine months old last week while we were on vacation. I still have to write their letters for this month, but to tide you over until then, here are some adorable pictures from our week.

A chilly last day at the beach.

Under a tent on the beach

Small babies, big hats. Hilarity ensues.

Photo shoot on the beach.

A Letter to Periwinkle at Eight Months

Dear Periwinkle,

You have a tooth! It's just barely peeking out of your gums, but it is there! We knew it was coming for about a week, as that area of your gums was definitely getting harder, but it was just so exciting to finally SEE it. A tooth! My little baby girl has a tooth, with more soon to follow. Insane. How are we at eight months already? How are you teething and getting on all fours and nearly crawling? Aren't you still my helpless little preemie? I know you will still need me for quite a while, but still, that tooth seems like such a big step as you continue to develop into your own independent person. And once you can crawl and then walk it will be harder to dictate where you go. You'll be expressing your opinions and throwing tantrums and laughing and growing into a little girl. But I suppose I'm getting ahead of myself. It is just your first tooth.

We are going to have to lower your crib sooner rather than later, as you've started rocking on all fours in your crib. It's not such a big step to grab onto the rail and pull yourself up. And then we'd be in trouble. I should know. Your uncle used to tell me how to climb out of my crib when I was a baby. We gals are trouble.

This month you've definitely been asserting yourself. You shout at your brother to get his attention. You shout hello when I pick you up at daycare. You shout at the cats in excitement to try to get them to play with you (hint: yelling at them will not work. Trust me.). You shout when I put your new hat on you. You shout when you wake up in the morning. You just really like to shout when you are excited. It's adorable, but kind of loud. Try to tone it down a bit. Work on a squeal or a giggle, perhaps.

You still don't nap that great during the day at daycare. We're lucky to get two hours of napping out of you. But, unlike your brother, bad napping doesn't seem to affect your nightsleep, because you are usually the first to fall asleep, usually within minutes of being put down. One day last weekend you did nap the full 3.5 hours, and you took forever to fall asleep. So maybe you are just a two-hour kind of napper.

On Sunday you were super ornery (probably because of that tooth coming in) so I took you and your brother out for a walk, despite the heat. We don't use the infant carriers for walks anymore. You can sit up in the stroller like a big girl. We slathered you with sunscreen and put your new hat on you and you were just so happy. Perhaps you love being outside as much as your brother does! However, you did NOT like it when I walked through a sprinkler. There was no avoiding it. I think it shocked you so you started to cry. I managed to convince you it felt good (it felt GREAT!) on such a hot day. I can't wait to bring you into the pool. I need to buy a bathing suit first...

This weekend is your baptism and I hope the water isn't an issue for you then. Of course, people will just think it's cute if you start to cry, so don't sweat it too much.

Love you, little girl,
Mama

Hello Again

I know I've been neglecting the blog lately. So sorry! But with two babies who are figuring out how to get around there's no more just putting them down and doing other things anymore. They can scootch off the couch at will, roll all over the place, rotate, switch places on the blanket on the floor, amble far off of the blanket in the blink of an eye, and Periwinkle is even figuring out how to reverse-crawl to some degree. No rest for this mama!

On the move

Periwinkle is even getting really good at sitting up on her own. Indigo still needs the bumbo seat, or two boppies behind him, to stay upright. He'll get there. As usual, he's about a month behind her on the physical milestones.

 

 

Periwinkle got some new hairbows this week. Blue hates them and thinks they are unnecessary. Of course he also says he prefers me with no makeup, and makeup is VERY necessary, so you can see how I don't trust his opinion on girly things. Peri has been described as Aunt Jemima and Tupak Shakur. I think she's just adorable, either way! And she is obviously very happy with her new accessories.

Bag by the Love, Mich Collection (a high school friend makes awesome bags!)

She's been having some issues at daycare, however. For one, she has taken to shouting at her brother. She doesn't shout at any other kids, just him. And it startles him, and he gets that crazy wild-eyed look that he gets when he wakes up from naps or I use the flash on my camera. She's also taken to stealing toys from him. Whatever he is playing with, she tries to take. Once she gets it and he moves on, she wants that toy. It never ends. Once she finished her bottle first, so I sat her up. She promptly reached out for his bottle. I need to teach her about sharing...

Also this week I guess she and another baby a bit older than her were hanging out on the floor. The other baby took Periwinkle's socks off her feet and started waving them around in the air. Periwinkle burst into tears. I can't help thinking she wasn't upset so much that she found herself without her socks, but rather at the blatant taunting the other baby was doing. Because we are a pretty sock-free household once we get them home. I also can't help cracking up at the idea of the other baby stealing Peri's socks. All I know is that I've got my eye on that other baby now. No messing with my kiddo!

In any event, that's what's going on lately. I'll have a more Indigo-centric post in a few days.