The Daisy Digest: Week of April 12, 2010

Daisy is a little girl now.

This occurred to me as I was looking at her from behind one evening this week. She was standing, looking out the front window with her hands clasped behind her back and saying "Caaa! Caaa! Caaa!" which, in Daisy speak, means any kind of automobile (trucks and SUVs included.)




Her hair has started to get longer now and there are whispy, curly bits around her ears and neckline. I think she's going to have hair like I did as a toddler - golden blonde and curly. I plan to not cut it for as long as I can. When my mum cut mind it went straight and mousy brown. Blech!



After watching her try to sit on all her toys this past week (and often falling and crying in frustration), I finally gave in and asked my mum for one of the brightly colored, leather, toddler armchairs that she has had sitting at her house since before Daisy was born. My dad took off the wooden rockers on the base of the yellow one and it now graces our living room. Of course, I love that it's yellow. Plus, Daisy can say "allow" for "yellow"... when she feels like it, of course.



In reality, like everything else, the chair is a 5 second wonder. She climbs on it, gets settled, pauses and climbs off. Then she walks away, turns back and does it all again. Sometimes the repetitive nature of child play is mind-numbing and sometimes it's plain cute. This falls into the plain cute department.



Bottles and formula are now history in our house. Hallelujah! I cut them out of her world on the Monday after she turned one and, although it hasn't been smooth sailing all the way, the transition hasn't been too tough. The hardest bottle to eliminate was the morning one, since she would wake up and guzzle down eight ounces without a break. We offer her a sippy cup of milk but, ultimately, it doesn't have the same soothing effect as her bottle: she ignores it for the first twenty minutes while she mourns the absence of what she really wants, and then finally gives in and drinks it anyway (although only about 3-4 ounces). It has nothing to do with the milk we've realized - we've done cold and warm and she does eventually drink it - it's really just about the nipple.



All of this has brought breakfast time forward. Without the extra 4 ounces of formula, she gets hungrier much earlier, so now I have to hustle pancakes at 7:15 vs. 7:30-7:45. That 15-30 minutes makes all the difference; time for the caffeine in my morning cup of Joe to register! Yet, I'll take this as a trade-off against washing, sterilizing, and drying bottles and nipples and paying the wopping $20 per can of formula (or $80-$100 a month.) This weekend I'm moving the nipple rack into the pile of items for our summer garage sale, which is sorely needed based upon all the clothes, toys, and other baby gear we've relegated to the garage in the last few months. As if our garage wasn't jam-packed enough as it was!

I was considering adding binkie elimination to our list of "big girl" transitions but I'm on the fence about that one. Although we only let her have the binkie during daytime naps and as a last resort in the car, there have been times in this last week where she was teething so bad that the only thing that would stop her from standing in the middle of the room and screaming, was the damned binkie.

It still amazes me how a baby's world can 180 based upon a piece of rubber in their mouth - I mean, nothing changed, right? - but I have come to accept that the thing has it's uses and that I'm not exactly ready to deal with the consequences of not having it as a crutch right now. Let's face it, even when we do eventually take it away, she will still get upset and cry, all that really changes is our ability to turn off the volume. So, the transition, I've come to the conclusion is really more for us adults and I'm not there yet.

I've heard good stories about moms that wait until their kids are older and can understand words, then they attach their kids' binkies to a helium balloon and have a big send-off ceremony for the binkies. I like the idea but am kind of worried about how long it will be before she will have the capacity to understand that kind of effort. When I was in Montego Bay airport recently, strolling through the zig-zaggy passport control line, I cringed at seeing a young girl, probably the age of 3 or 4, sitting in her stroller with a pacifier in her mouth. I don't want that to be Daisy. So, I'm still thinking about the timing on this one... all I know is, I don't think it's right now.


Of course, as a dose of reality, this time last year I was worrying about my breast-milk supply, how to get more than 2.5 hours of sleep at a time, TMJ, and the possibility that Daisy might be tongue-tied. So, all in all, I'm liking what this year brings much better and the decision on whether to postpone the binkie funeral is really not that big of a deal in contrast.

(As a further jolt of reality, this time in '08, I was dealing with my then-puppy, Maggie, eating everything in sight: http://britishrants.blogspot.com/2008/04/destructojaws-likes-hot-sauce.html. There goes another period in time I have no desire to re-live. Depressingly, however, I did find this post from April '07 which underscores just how much life has changed in 3 years: http://britishrants.blogspot.com/2007/04/my-weekend-dichotomy-of-days.html and makes me want to jump in the car and head off to the city this weekend - if only I had time!)