THE GREEN(wald) HOUSE … (growing rosemary & raising a little wolf)

Aaah, it’s that time of year again….

That’s our front door yesterday afternoon, after shoveling for the second time. Rosie came out to play with me while Sammy napped, though she wasn’t really digging the cold weather and the huge snow drifts on the side of the house…

We will definitely be having a white Christmas this year….

What a huge change from last week when we were in Florida at the beach, enjoying the sunshine and 80 degree weather…

We had a great time in Florida, just visiting and relaxing and not doing much. I really enjoyed catching up and spending time with my sisters. Jackie, Em and I had a girls night out at a local wine bar, (careful you don’t get dizzy viewing our crazy patterned shirts)

and we all had fun taking some yoga photos on the beach too.

As Christmas draws near, we made the inevitable trip to visit Santa (this time planning ahead instead of waiting until X-mas eve as we did the last couple years). Santa’s helpers were having camera trouble, so we took one quick shot with Joe’s i-phone, and this was the best we could do, as Sammy wasn’t too happy about sitting on Santa’s lap…

Rosie told Santa she had been a very good girl this year (and she has, for the most part) and she asked for a tea set from Santa, and a train set for her brother. Good thing mommy Santa already planned ahead and got gifts on sale (waiting in the garage for X-mas morning)

Sammy has been such a cutie pie lately, which is the only thing that keeps me from throwing him out the window due to all his screaming (enough with the screaming already!) He is constantly adding words to his vocabulary, but still is not talking consistently, and prefers screaming as his primary mode of communication.
Words he uses lately:
mama, dada, sis-a, mo, nurse, ni-ni, uh oh, all done, up, open, out, hi, bye, apple, ball, fish, bubby, gigi, egg, doggie, eye, teeth, hat, baby, wa-wa, bath, phone, wow wow wubbzy, Dora, Elmo, no, toes, diaper, book, bubbles, peek-boo…
and to a lesser extent:
teddy bear, slide, banana, go blue!
He also does animal sounds for a cow, duck, dog, cat, frog and monkey and he makes car “vroom vroom” sounds, gives kisses, waves hi and bye and gives high fives.

So, he is definitely progressing, just not as quickly as I would like, for communication to be really possible instead of the god-awful screaming.

He is still a great napper, thank god! I can usually count on around 3 hours a day, or 2 at the very least. And he can go down as early as 10:30/11am, or as late as 2:30-3, depending on when he wakes up and what our schedule for the day is. That’s pretty much the only easygoing thing about him at this age though. We are still battling his burgeoning independence, he does not ever want to be restrained, in a car seat or high chair, and was especially defiant when having to sit on my lap on the plane for take off and landing. Yes, I was that mom with the kid kicking and SCREAMING at the top of his lungs during take off and landing on both flights to Florida. It was really not fun.

At night, he goes down to bed pretty easily after nursing. Though lately when nursing he has been changing sides about every 30 seconds or so, which just gets irritating after a while. And, he is also still waking 2-3 times a night to nurse (usually 12, 3 and 6am), and I know at 17 months old, he doesn’t need the nutrition, he just is used to the comfort. Joe and I are going to try to work on his frequent night waking during the holiday break and hopefully I can start getting some decent sleep. Speaking of nursing, he has been very aggressive, yanking and pulling my shirt collar down whenever he gets the whim, all day long. He has been thinking it is a game lately too, blowing raspberries, poking me, biting and laughing, and really making me re-consider my commitment to child-led weaning.

He is such an active toddler, he climbs everything, and is constantly in motion. His favorite activity is dumping out the bucket of blocks (or any container of toys) about 10 seconds after I just picked them all up, and also completely emptying and demolishing the play kitchen after I put away all the play food and dishes for the 20th time.

Rosie melts my heart when she is being a sweet, cooperative, three and a half year old. She can be so complimentary, telling me “you are the best mommy in the world” or “you make the best eggs ever” and I have to remember those little moments when she makes me want to rip my hair out with her whiny, defiant tantrums. She is no longer quite as fixated on being “first” at everything, so that’s great, but she still loves to be in control and dictate everything.

She loves doing crafts - drawing, painting, cutting, gluing, writing. She can write her name pretty legibly now, though she usually has trouble with the “s” and I have to help her and remind her which way it goes.

She loves to learn new things and is always asking questions and making statements of facts and things she knows. We were watching the old school “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” the other night before bed, and she turned to me about halfway through and said
“That’s silly, reindeers can’t talk! But they sure can walk….and fly!” I love how, in her mind - reindeer talking is crazy - but flying is perfectly logical!
She also loves to talk about things we have done “Remember when we watched Dora and the Snow Princess?” “Remember when we went to Target?” “Remember when we ate pizza?” “Remember when we made banana cupcakes?” We have fallen into a routine of doing some craft or baking activity almost every day during Sammy’s nap. It’s our special time to bond without Sammy constantly getting in the way and climbing all over and spilling things.

She does love her brother, most of the time. And, when she is not taking toys away from him, she is usually kissing him or tickling him, or encouraging him to play something with her. She uses him to get what she wants a lot. She will come up and tell me “Sammy wants to watch “Wow wow Wubbzy”, or “Sammy wants to have a snack”. Along with her brother, she loves climbing and jumping. Their new game is throwing all the cushions off the couch onto the floor and then jumping off the couch onto the cushions.

She got her very first pair of tap shoes and ballet slippers from GiGi for an early X-mas present this year, and she loves to dance and make up dances and say “watch me do ballet mommy!” as she spins and jumps and twirls. So we will be looking into getting her into her first real dance lessons at the beginning of the year.

She is going through the phase again where she wakes up screaming several times a night. This most recent time I think it was related to the cold we had that stuck around for a few weeks. I think her stuffy/runny nose was waking her up, and then she gets frustrated and scared when she is awake in the middle of the night and she doesn’t know why. She doesn’t transition well between sleeping/dreaming world, and waking up. I just realized she grinds her teeth in her sleep also, so maybe that is what wakes her up occasionally too. Whatever it is, it usually results in her ending up in bed with Joe and I at some point during the night, and that usually helps her sleep soundly. Maybe it is just the comfort of mommy and daddy that helps her sleep through the small things that would otherwise wake her - I don’t know, but I don’t mind her in bed with us. The only problem is when I bring Sammy in bed to nurse, he sees his sister and gets excited and wants to wake up and play instead of nurse and go back to sleep.

We tried to take some family photos before Thanksgiving to use for our holiday cards, but they didn’t turn out as good as we had hoped. Everyone was laughing and squirming and nobody would sit still and look at the camera.

Here is a little snowy moment with both kids from earlier this month…

I imagine we’ll have a lot of these wintery photos come March….

And here is Sammy doing his best Randy impersonation (from “A Christmas Story”)

“I can’t put my arms down!” “I can’t get up!”

I’ll leave you with my favorite photo from Florida that Emily took of me and the kids. I love how it captures the loving, nurturing moments of being a mama.

Have a Festive Winter Solstice, Happy Hanukah, and Merry Christmas to all!