We have finally battled through to where we are all feeling well for a few days! This is fantastic! It will not last long, but for now this is good. I am feeling energetic and happy and kind of calm for the first time in… um. I have no idea how long.

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Ember is not quite crawling yet, but she seems so close! From sitting she leans forward on her hands and “walks” out until she’s on her hands and knees, then backs back up to sitting. Sometimes she flops onto her belly and then yells in annoyance. Yesterday she managed to push backwards from her belly until she was on her knees and then back up to sitting! She can do it pretty consistently now, unless she’s on the slippery hardwood. She also moves by bouncing on her bum, she manages to scoot across a room that way.

She is clapping and shaking her head when you shake yours. She loves to put her fingers in my mouth (or anyone’s mouth!) and thinks it’s hilarious when I pretend to eat them.

Her eating skills have increased tremendously as well. She’s doing the pincer grasp now, reaching for bits of… okay, well, everything. She never put anything in her mouth until I started giving her tastes of food. That seems to have opened a door and now she is constantly wondering what does THAT taste like? Our carpet needs to get vacuumed far more frequently and she has a habit of worming her way over to the recliner, which the cats have shredded, and trying to eat the fluff from it. I need to tape that up or we need to replace the chair. (Replacing the chair is only an attractive idea until we realize that the cats will destroy the new one, too.) Complicating matters are her very sensitive gag reflex, so every time she does manage to put random fluff in her mouth she gags – not chokes, but gags loudly – and throws up. Then I have to stick my finger in her mouth to sweep out the fluff, causing her to gag and throw up again. The first couple times she did it I was shocked, now I just sigh and wipe her off. At least it’s just milk still.

She gets some bites of purees, but I am more likely to just mash or cut up something I’m eating to give her. She’s had little bits of noodles, chicken, fruit, toast. She’s doing very well with it. The purees she’s actually eating, rather than making horrified faces at while spitting it out. She does a lot of moving food around in her mouth, using her tongue and looking thoughtful.

The sleep situation has changed a lot since we returned from vacation. We previously had a co-sleeper set up beside the bed that she never used. She hated the flat, hard mattress compared to our lovely soft mattress. Now Kate is in a big bed we moved the crib into our bedroom, leaving the front off and side-carring it to our bed. She’s doing very well with sleeping in it – not perfectly, but she does start the night out in it every night and take naps in it, which is huge. Okay, most of the time I accomplish this by putting her in it and then leaning over her to nurse her. However when she’s feeling well (not sick and miserable) I have been able to nurse her and then leave with her awake, leaving her to fall asleep in the crib. She grumbles a little, sometimes whines and sometimes giggles, but falls asleep peacefully and takes a normal nap. I love this! I wish she wasn’t sick so often. But either way she’s now sleeping in her own space and I in my own space, which is like birds singing sweet songs of joy.

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** Potty training below. **

So potty training just kind of happened upon us. For a while now I would let Kate run around naked after her bath or suggest that she got try peeing on the potty in between diapers. For months she had willingly sit on it, but never actually peed. A few nights ago she finally did. And it went just as I expected: we shrieked and danced and made A Big Deal out of it and she was proud as punch.

I figured, okay, she finally gets the point of this potty thing, I’m going to just leave her naked and see what happens. I was fully prepared for some puddles and me hustling her to the potty, but I figured that she really doesn’t like getting wet – she’s kind of prissy – so it shouldn’t take long for her to get the picture. I kept an eye on her but the kid can hold her pee like nobody’s business; judging by her diapers she pees only like 3 times a day. It took a long time, but hours later I saw her jump up from her toys, run over to the potty, and pee in it. Just like that. She gasped, “Mama! Pee-pee potty!!” and I again was jumping up and down and squealing things like “Wow! Good girl!”

In the evening we took her downstairs with us but it’s really cold down there so I put on panties and pants. She ended up peeing in them. To her pants = diaper = just pee.

The next day again I left her naked. She ended up running to the potty whenever she had to go – I have her little potty set up in the living room so it’s easily accessible. When Den took her downstairs in the evening he brought her downstairs he brought the potty and left her pants-less. It worked, no accidents!

Today was the big question. Will she poop on the potty? I was scared of that mess being a teachable moment, but I was watching her closely and asking her if she had to go. This evening she ran over to the toilet and sure enough!

Since then she’s had only accidents when wearing panties. If she’s naked she goes on the potty every single time. I’m not quite sure how to make that transition, but she definitely does not like having an accident. I think she just gets distracted and forgets she isn’t wearing a diaper unless there’s a breeze up in there.

We need to figure out the panties thing in order to attempt to take her out of the house. We have not tackled using an adult sized potty yet, which will also be necessary. But so far this is going far better than I would have expected!

This morning we all got up a little bit earlier than normal in order to go to a playgroup. I got everyone up, dressed and fed in good time, so I sat down at the computer for 2 minutes to eat breakfast.

I heard a loud fart/poop across the room. Nice, Ember. So much for that clean diaper.

Before I’d even gotten up Kate – who was in panties – gasped and said, “Oh no, wet! Mama, pee pee!” I see her standing in the middle of the floor, legs apart, looking down. There’s a few dribbles on the floor and her pants are all wet. I go over and help her out of the pants and try to keep her from stepping in the pee puddle. While I take her wet pants to her room to put in the laundry basket I hear her walking along behind me. She says, happily, “Mama, look! Paw prints!” and points to the wet footprints she left behind her all the way down the hall.

I got that cleaned up and went to change Ember only to discover that poop escaped the diaper and I also need to locate a new sleeper to put her in.

Needless to say, we were late for playgroup this morning.

Today was a very good day. Everyone was happy and calm and there was very little whining. And when I tried taking a couple photos of Ember in the good late-afternoon light Kate sat down next to her, leaned over towards her sister and said, “Picture friends!”

Man, I just adore my girls.