June 30, 2013 - admin

Did you miss me?

I’ve been a little preoccupied. Now, I don’t expect you all to sit at your computer patiently waiting for the next post on this humble blog to pop up in your newsfeed or in your inbox. So I don’t expect you to have noticed that I haven’t even posted Charlotte’s 10 month photos/update. Actually, I haven’t even taken her 10 month photos. Weeping. I’m weeping at the thought of that. It has definitely become much harder to take her photos as the months progress, and the arrival of summer has packed our schedule full of activities way more important than mini photo shoots and blogging:

I have been picking up a few extra days of patients at work now that my sister is home for the summer and is able to watch Charlotte. She loves spending time with her Aunt Mel and cousins.
Charlotte and I have also been enjoying play-dates at the aquarium, park, and the good ‘ol baby pool in the backyard.
Chris and I finished our resource parent {foster parent} and adoption training through the city of Virginia Beach and are now in the process of completing our home study. The process is very extensive {as I think it should be}. We met with our case worker 2 weeks ago to fill out paperwork {background checks, DMV records, and the like}. We also had to answer questionnaires and decide on the ‘parameters’ we feel comfortable accepting {for us, we only placed limits on age – birth to 3} , any race or gender is welcome in our home! Eventually we will expand the age, but our current room/bed/toy situation is perfect for a younger kiddo in need of a safe place. We went to DHS to be fingerprinted last week and met with our caseworker again to provide an extensive history {our family history, relationships, work history, education, parenting style, support systems, etc} and this week our case worker is coming by for a preliminary home inspection. Once our home study is complete our application will be put before a board for review and approval. Once we are approved we will be ready to have another kiddo in our home. It could be that same day we are approved, it could be in a week, it could be months… we will just wait.
I have also been planning Charlotte’s first birthday party. Talk about emotional. I probably should have done way more at this point (with a little over a month to go), but I have been in severe denial.

Stay tuned for Charlotte’s 10 month update later this week. I am PROMISING right here in written word so I had better deliver.

June 7, 2013 - admin 1 Comment

Real life parenting: multiplying dishes

I just did a weeks worth of dishes. Not even kidding. Bottles, bowls, coffee cups, almost every pan we own…The only counter space in our kitchen not covered by dirty dishes was in front of the microwave and Keurig {priorities}. Granted, we have minimal counter space to begin with so it gets covered quickly, but there really was no excuse for the filth… I just didn’t want to do dishes. There’s something about washing bottles that I really despise. Thank goodness we go through minimal bottle paraphernalia because I breastfeed {nursing, for the win}!

Also {apparently I drank truth serum tonight} my husband told me yesterday that he would do the dishes because ‘I don’t want you to hate me’.
Yikes.
Me: ‘I won’t hate you’
Him: ‘well, I don’t want you to be mad at me’
Me: ‘I won’t be mad at you’
Him: ‘well, I don’t want you to have disdain for me’
Me: ‘ok’

It seems I have a pretty bad habit of being grumpy towards him when I have to do the dishes. I H.A.T.E. doing the dishes. Wrinkly fingers, dry skin, the bits of food circling the drain… Gah, just typing that gave me a full body shiver.
Nevertheless, it makes me feel awful to think that my husband would do something just so I wouldn’t be grumpy towards him, and especially for something that i have no grounds to be grumpy about. I definitely need to work on my servant’s attitude. I started tonight by washing with a smile on my face.

Also, since we are already confessing, I’ll offer full disclosure: after I finished washing everything and cleaning the counters I rewarded my ‘awesome housekeeping’ with a giant bowl of icecream {and a few spoonfulls straight from the carton}.

June 1, 2013 - admin

Spring done gone got away from me!

It is June 1st. I repeat. JUNE FIRST! It makes me sick to think of how quickly we are closing in on ‘B’Day {which is, of course, Charlotte’s first birthday}.

This post, though, will serve to catch you up on all the Baker ‘happenings’ so far this spring. My apologies for the massive photo binge that is about to happen.

Chris and I had an awesome day-date some time a few weeks back {if we’re being honest it was more like a month… maaaaybe two months back} . We took Charlotte to spend the afternoon with Papa and Honey {my parents}. On the way out to their house we stopped at Bergey’s Dairy farm for a little family adventure.

She did not like the sheep. I don’t blame her. I seriously thought it was fake. I’m still not 100% certain it was living.

Waiting for ice cream {for mommy and daddy, of course}. I wish so badly this photo wasn’t blurry. Still completely adorable.

Meeting the cows.

We love our Little Gym classes. Next week is Show Week {the last ‘performance’ of the semester}, but Charlie is already enrolled in her summer Bugs class which will start the following week so we won’t even skip a beat!

She loves Ms. Jackie… the one who provides an endless supply of shakers and bubbles in class.

Papa came to play during a class.

Charlotte is very good at independent play and exploration with toys.

Putting the little people horse in, taking horse out, putting horse in again, taking horse out, throwing horse, crawling to get horse, mouthing horse, beating horse against boat and so on.

Charlotte absolutely adores her two cousins and I am so grateful that she gets to spend Tuesdays and Thursdays with my sister.

We had a yard sale a few weeks ago. It was pretty much rained out; actually more like ‘fogged’ out because a low fog/rain cloud hovered over my driveway the entire day. Chris and I have such a wonderful family support system: my parents, my in-laws, and my sister-in-law all came to help us. Since there weren’t many customers, my mom busied herself helping me get organized and encouraging me to purge even more. That’s what she does, professional organizing, and boy did I need her help. The other grandparents kept Charlotte entertained.

Since business remained slow, Chris and his dad replaced our kitchen sink. It was, of course, harder than they anticipated, but they were eventually successful.

The next weekend we decided to try our hand at yard sale round #2, which was much more successful thanks to the sun actually arriving for the day and sticking around a bit. Also, Charlotte learned how to drive.

Charlotte has gotten so much better at being in the church nursery {ie: away from me}.

The best plan is ‘Out of sight, out of mind’ – once she has even an inkling that mama is nearby but not holding her she resorts to Llama drama {which she learned from the Llama Llama books of course. More on those in a bit}.

We love meeting up with other mommy’s and babies from our mom’s group for outings and play dates. We love to go to the mall or the park.

Charlotte is also learning to get along with her friends and is starting to understand the word ‘gentle’

{probably because I say it over and over again, but repetition is key}! Of course she still swats at other babies because, let’s face it, that’s what babies do, but she is learning. I can see it!

My birthday present from Chris was a membership to the Zoo so we can go any time we want! We have had several beautiful days there {though one of them just happened to coincide with the field trip day of nearly every elementary school in the area}. I got some practice with maneuvering two kiddos instead of just one during one of the outings, which was a great experience and OH so exhausting.

We attended an event at the zoo to meet the author of Llama Llama Red Pajama {and other silly alliterative and rhyming books} and have her sign our books. Charlotte could have cared less, but I absolutely love this book series {I think my love for books serves me well as a pediatric speech pathologist, though sometimes I do go a bit overboard}

I love this particular series because the little Llama is always full of drama, which reminds me of a very expressive 9 month old I know.

Mother’s day was a blur. I sometimes forget that I am a mother, and I definitely forgot that mother’s day is a holiday that applies to me now! Last mother’s day Charlotte was busy making me nauseous and puke-ey. This mother’s day Charlotte was busy making me laugh and smile {and chase after her, and wipe her bum}. What a difference a year makes, and well worth all the Llama drama, I’d say.

I rekindled my love for the library last week. I hadn’t been for well over 5 years. Sad, I know, but all that is behind me now and we will just move forward with our relationship {though it’s not completely over between Kindle and me}. Charlotte loved our library outing too, though she didn’t quite understand the ‘quiet’ rule. Her new favorite game is to see how her voice echoes in new places. The bathroom at chic-fil-a wins, hands down. She gave quite a performance in there last time. The library echo was less effective, but that didn’t deter her one bit. I just hope we are allowed back in.

My mother and father-in-law have been wonderful the past few months by watching Charlotte for Chris and I while we attend our foster parent/adoption training classes each Wednesday evening. They even feed us dinner, which is such a blessing because it is a scramble to try and get to the classes on time because of Chris’ work schedule and rush hour traffic.

Chris threw me a beach bbq birthday party at the beginning of May. It was absolutely frigid but I was so blessed to have many of my friends shiver out in the cold with me. Charlotte wasn’t really in to the whole sand thing, but I certainly tried to get her to touch it a few times. She is not keen on novel textures and immediately goes into ‘superman’ mode with her arms back and her back arched in order to avoid touching it. We’ll keep trying.

Just soaking up all the snuggles I can get from her before she doesn’t want anything to do with mommy anymore and slams her door in my face before writing in her diary about how much she hates me. What?! Just mentally preparing myself for 16 years down the road.