When You are a Mom...

You will appreciate the week between Christmas and New Year's Day. All the stress of pulling off the perfect Christmas is behind you and most of the hosting of dinners and parties have passed. You have a week to relax with your husband home (hopefully) and your child(ren) have all the new toys they could possibly need to keep them entertained. Christmas decorations can be left up until New Year's Day without anyone questioning your ability to keep house.

Ahh...vacation!

Gift Shopping with String Bean

A friend from church is adopting a toddler from China. Tonight, String Bean and I went shopping for her "toddler shower." I figured that String Bean would know what to get being that she fits into the same age group.

As we roamed the aisles of the store, she squealed in delight at all sorts of things. First, she discovered there was a purple dress on the rack and that I was wearing a purple sweater and that pretty much blew her little mind. Next, she found a sippy cup that was exactly like hers and attempted to drink out of it without success.

When we finally made it to the toy section, there were books to be discovered, toys to ride, balls to throw and buttons to press. We finally settled on some kids' kitchen ware (spatulas, bowls, colanders and the like). The great thing about taking her to shop for someone else is that I have a great idea of what to add to her Christmas list!

A Perfect Party

As you know, String Bean turned two this week. Today she had her birthday party. Had we invited all her friends and fans our house never would have held everyone, so we had to limit it to family and babysitters.

The morning started out with String Bean taking Pop (grandpa) to her favorite park. With the two distractions gone, Mr. Bean, my mom (Nana) and I were able to set up for the party and cook lunch for everyone. Mr. Bean assembled his famous homemade lasagna the evening before and prepared most of the green bean casserole. Mr. Bean also put together an awesome slide show of String Bean's Second Year. He got the garlic bread ready while my mom and I spot cleaned, moved furniture, set the table, laid out the buffet, and decorated with photos of String Bean.

String Bean and Pop arrived home from the park and while Pop took a bath, String Bean took a (very brief) nap. When she awoke, Nana gave her a bath while Mr. Bean and I took care of last minute details.

Auntie Carolyn showed up early to the party since today was String Bean's fitting for her flower girl dress for the wedding. My mom made the dress and had to do some last minute hemming, but wanted to be sure the length was correct first.

Guests began to arrive at 11:30 and lunch was served at noon. Just prior to eating and saying the blessing, String Bean lead the group in singing the "Choo-Choo Song" which introduces everyone in the room. String Bean was the perfect hostess.

Following lunch, we watched the slide show Mr. Bean had made. It was a hit. By demand of the cousins, presents were opened immediately following. Ama and Grandpa tuned in for the present opening via Skype and enjoyed seeing everyone and everything String Bean got. String Bean enjoyed opening the gifts and loved everything she got (which was evidenced by her playing with every toy this afternoon).

We ate ice cream and cupcakes while String Bean made a mess.

It was the perfect party and we are happy that String Bean is loved by so many!

Clean Up

Don't you love it when you clean up the living room and your kid wakes up, comes in, and completely trashes it?

We are teaching String Bean to clean up after herself, but tonight just was not the night to make it happen. I'm afraid I missed the window for putting her down, which translated in her not going to bed until 10 pm. Rather than force her to clean up her mess, I just put her down.

At what age did you start teaching your child to clean up after themselves? (I was going to add "At what age did they catch on and do it on their own?" and then I realized that was a silly question!)

Who Are the People in Your Neighborhood?

An elderly lady in our building gave String Bean a radio, wind-up Sesame Street toy a few months ago. She absolutely loves it. The toy was this lady's granddaughters when she was a toddler. That granddaughter is in college now.

We've wound up that toy a million times in the last couple months and yesterday after a few weeks of being touchy about whether working or not, it finally broke. Mr. Bean asked me to look on Ebay
to see if they happened to had any. Being that the toy is 20ish years old, I seriously doubted I'd find it. Boy was I shocked when I found this! (Of course, this link will expire after awhile.)

For $10 (including shipping) we are all set for round 2 of the toy. We kept the old one so we can use it for parts should the need arise. Mr. Bean is sentimental about this toy since he grew up watching Sesame Street back in the early 80s. It plays the song "Who Are the People in Your Neighborhood?" which is fitting since it came from a neighbor!

Traveling with a Toddler

Tomorrow, String Bean and I are traveling to Seattle. It is about a 5 hour flight from here. The airport it about an hour away, and we have to get there two hours early. We are renting a car and the hotel is 30 miles from the airport in Seattle. So...we are looking at an 8 or 9 hour journey when it is all said and done.

Luckily, my parents (Nana and Pop to String Bean) are meeting us at the airport. They planned their layover to be here so they could take the flight to Seattle with us. I am spending all day today getting laundry done, carseat vacuumed, random kid things packed, and wondering what is missing from my list.

On this trip, I am taking a small plastic bucket with a lid and putting all String Bean's little toys in it so she has something to play with on the airplane and at the hotel on the other end. Since "in" and "out" are her favorites right now, this bucket should do the trick!

Wish me luck!

Scary Toys

I fully expect any kid to be afraid of Darth Vader's mask or some of those action figures fashioned after alien movies. What I didn't expect was String Bean's reaction to some of her Christmas presents. Elmo Live was under our tree. At first, he was funny. Then he came closer to her. Forget it. She cowers when he gets too close or when he starts laughing. You'd think he was a monster. Oh, wait...he is.

String Bean also got a book about farm animals. (For the life of me, I can't find you a link to the product to see it.) It is called the Push and Pop Farm Book. It has a little wheel you spin on the edge of each page and a cardboard photo of an animal pops up from between the pages. All it takes is catching sight of that book, and a look of disapproval shows on String Bean's face. If she can get her hands on it, she hands it to whoever is the closest and shakes her head "no." Forget about opening it, or even worse, popping up the photos. She loses all her composure and tears start falling.

I don't see what is so scary about these toys. After all, they don't make that horrible sound the vacuum cleaner makes!