Your Three-Year-Old

I just finished Your Three-Year-Old by Louise Bates Ames, PH.D, which I borrowed from the library. Overall I thought it was a helpful book to read. Many of the characteristics that they mentioned were ones I had seen Becca exhibiting. I liked how the authors took a mostly laid back approach to interacting with your child, encouraging parents not to freak out about every little quirk and action.

Although I see reasons for using babysitters and childcare other than mom or dad, I didn't agree with a few of their constant advice to put the difficult three and a half year old in child care, nursery school or with a babysitter for most of the day. They had other ideas too, but this was the main one presented at first.

I would recommend this book to other parents. I think it is helpful to read just before your child turns the age of the book. While I don't agree with everything in the book, I did find that just knowing that my daughter is acting like a normal three-year-old helps me to take more of it in stride and just let her be herself.

Next on my reading list: Your One-Year-Old, already have from the library.

My three-year-old, proudly posing with her lacing cards:

Girls' blog updated

I have quite a few new posts at the girls' blog, so if you've given up checking, head over there.

Cassie in pictures

Sitting by her new scratching post


Helping us organize the cupboard:


Sweet Cassie


Our curious Cassie:


An attempt to catch the green eyes:


And here's where she is as I type this right now:

Dentist

Nate and I went to the dentist today for the first time in two years. And I haven't flossed much in the past year. Not good.

Worst thing: Very painful because of the no flossing--must floss every day

Best thing: So close we could have biked there if I had gotten going on time.

It's not a good idea for me to go that long without a cleaning. I just get so much tartar build-up. We already have our next appointment.

Weekly Schedule

I think I've finally got a current workable schedule down for us for each week:

Monday (Upstairs) Cleaning Day

Tuesday (Downstairs) Cleaning Day

Wednesday Play Day (includes MOPS every 2nd and 4th Wed, play dates, going to zoo or museum, or just taking it easy, do some art or play together at home)

Thursday Baking Day (mostly when I'd like to bake our bread for the week, but I might try baking other things if I have time)

Friday Grocery Day and Friend Day (when we go to Trader Joe's and when we have friends over for dinner)

Saturday ? Day (okay, so nothing on this day--it changes each week)

Sunday Lord's Day

I was trying to clean all on Monday, but it was stressing me out and making me an impatient Mommy. Plus, if I divide it up, then I can get the cleaning done in the morning, allow Becca to help, and maybe even have time to dust too.

And on a side note, we moved our dining room table into our kitchen. It's a little crowded, but so much more convenient for now. Our dining room is a bit empty right in the center, but that will hopefully be solved if we can find a good used farm table with benches sometime in the near future.

Cassie

Nate really doesn't like Sarah for her name. Sounds too human, he says. So we're trying to call her Cassie today and seeing if it sticks.

Cassie was just sleeping in front of my keyboard on my desk before she started playfully batting at my fingers typing and then brought out her claws. We're trying to patiently each her not to use her claws or teeth on us, so I said "ouch" and picked her up and gently set her on the floor. We're hoping being consistent and playing with her with some toys we just bought and teaching her to use her new scratching post that should arrive in the mail in the next week will help her learn.

Name choosing

We're between two names for our kitty: either we keep her name as Sarah or we change it to Cassie (rhymes with Lassie). Both fit her, I think. To me, she seems just a little bit more like Sarah, but then at other times, I call her Cassie easily.

I think Nate wants her name to be Cassie. Becca likes Sarah, but is okay with Cassie sometimes. You should hear Becca call her "Sarah". It's so sweet sounding. :) I'm back and forth. I probably lean towards Sarah most of the time, though.

Sigh.




She can see her reflection in the window to the right of her and she's been batting at it. It's pretty funny. We've also enjoyed watching her chase after the plastic balls with the jingle bells inside.

My new alarm clock


This is the best picture I could get of our little Sarah with Photo Booth on my Mac. Yes, we're keeping her name for now; it just seems to fit her. She is very affectionate and so far wants to be right where we are. Sarah has the most amazing green eyes I've ever seen. Maybe I'll be able to capture them sometime.

We are keeping her in the guest room during the night so we can set the alarm with the motion sensor and not have her set it off and so she doesn't go try to visit the girls in bed at night. She had a little present for me this morning, so I might have to keep her litter box in here too. At least she was polite and went on the towel I had laid down for her. :)

I'm up this early (6:30 is early for me!) because she kept meowing and making noise once Nate left for coffee. I had just gotten back in bed after getting Ally back to sleep. Oh well. It's like having another child. :)

Nice day
I had a nice day with the girls today. After getting quite worn out at the fair yesterday, I was thinking we would stay home today. And we did for the whole morning. I had cleaning to do (Monday is usually cleaning day, but we put it off to go to the fair). Both bathrooms are clean and all the floors are swept/vacuumed and mopped. I would have dusted, but I don't have a lot of surfaces to dust at the moment.

After Ally woke up from her morning nap, we had lunch and then I hopped in the shower. Nate kept an ear out for them as they played in their room while I showered. When I got done with my shower I pulled back the curtain and there was Ally. :)

I have been enjoying shopping at Trader Joe's, but Nate has been not liking the oj that they have there; it's full of pulp. I don't mind, but I can see how he wouldn't like it. So we had to make a trip to a different grocery store and I decided to make a trip up to Fishers to visit my favorite SuperTarget.

We picked up a few groceries and also a few other things. I got some solid pine shelving for the guest room/craft room closet (Nate helped me put it together tonight...thanks, honey!), a nice rug with recycled rubber tires for the backing for the door from the mudroom to the kitchen, and a kiddie pool that folds up flat into a circular bag. Our local public pool is closed for the summer (boooo!), so we told Becca we'd get a kiddie pool for the backyard. The girls enjoyed trying it out tonight.

We also checked out the 16 inch bikes for Becca. We might have to suggest a certain purple Magna one to Nana and Papa for Christmas or birthday. ;)

After visiting SuperTarget (don't forget the Super...I like them better than the regular ones) we headed over to Handel's for an afternoon ice cream snack. Both girls enjoyed a dish of mint chocolate chip with me.

Most of why I had such a nice day, though, was that I really enjoyed being around Becca. I love my daughter dearly, but sometimes I can get worn out with working with my little three-year-old, but today she was sweet, helpful, funny, and enjoyable to be around. We all have our good and bad days, right?

Two other things happened today...we got in touch with a contractor and set up an appointment soon to have him look at our wood siding and talk about replacing some of our windows. And the foster mom of the cat we want got ahold of us today. We get to meet Sarah on Thursday and take her home with us if we like her. I'm so excited. She sounds like a great cat.

If we do get her, we will probably change her name. I think Sarah fits her, but it's such a common name for girls that I'd like something else. Any suggestions for an oriental tabby that has a sweet and loving personality?
(Becca and Gramie)

(Becca and Beppa)

Mowing and State fair

Yesterday I mowed the lawn for just about the first time in my life. We have a reel mower that some friends of ours are letting us use. It's actually not too bad to use, but probably needs to be sharpened. I also used our new weed wacker (aka weed eater, trimmer, edger). I had to get pants on to use that. Flying grass and weeds don't feel to good on the bare legs.

The weather has been quite nice for the past two days. I'm mourning our lack of screens in our windows. We have to get someone out here soon to discuss windows and screens. It would be so nice to actually have the windows open.

We biked up to a park tonight about a mile away from our house. The girls had fun playing and it was nice to be outside. When we got back, we all snacked on peaches. It started with cutting up one peach for Becca. She sweetly left the last slice for me and then asked for another peach. We cut up three more! Ally ate a couple slices on her own too and was very sticky afterwards.

Tomorrow is kids day at the fair and I am seriously thinking about biking down there with the girls for a few hours. I think they would really like seeing all the animals. I would too. :) I might be insane for going, but if the weather is nice again, I think it would be a good day. If anyone else is going, give Nate's cell phone a call.

Kitty

We've been promising Becca for a year that when we moved into a house we would get a kitty. It looks like that time is almost here. We head home tomorrow (we're at my parents') and sometime in the next week I think we will get to meet at least one kitty that we will consider adopting.

Sarah is an oriental shorthair tabby that apparently has a sweet and amazing personality. From the three cats I showed Becca, she picked out Sarah. I was glad, cause she was my first choice too. She lives with a foster family, so we have to arrange a meeting with her foster mom. I'm excited to meet her.

If we get her, I'm not sure if we'd rename her or not. I think Sarah is a cute name for her, but it would be fun to give her our own name too. What would you name an oriental shorthair tabby?

Sorry for the lack in posts on both blogs. We've been busy visiting with family and friends and I have had a hard time finding time to post, though there are no lack of topics. I'm armed with lots of pictures and will post in the next week, I hope.