Baby #1

I have so not kept this blog up to what I really wanted and intended it to be. I would love to keep daily track of Hailey and the awesome hilarious funny things she does, says, sings. So instead I will make one really super long post about everything!!

**FYI this is EXTREMELY long winded and stories just for me. I don't have room in her baby book for all this and I know when she is 14 and hates me I will come back and read these and laugh and cry at the same time! So skip to the bottom pics if you like ;)

Sleep- My girl did NOT sleep much at all (especially at night) the first 3 months of her life. All we did was take naps on the couch together all day everyday. Then she decided she should take after her Mommy & Daddy and sleep. All. The. Time. Wait I take that back, at night she did. But during the day. Ut uh. She had to be swaddled, rocked/bounced, with a binky, and usually to music. Was Mommy desperate?? Oh heck yea. Is that going to happen with Baby #2?? Um no. The first 10 months of Hailey's life she never fell asleep by herself. Then I let her CIO, (cry it out) sucked for a couple weeks but now my child is the best sleeper EVER. She took 2 2 hour naps until she was 23 months old. HA! On top of sleeping 11-13 hours at night. LOVE her! So I guess she is making up for being such a pill in the beginning of her life! Now she goes to bed around 9:15 and gets up between 8:30-10am usually (ha) and takes a 2 hour nap from 2-4 everyday. Oh it's so joyous!


Vocab- So I'm sure most of you remember me freaking out over her not talking but my land that child never shuts up now! I often look at Steve and say "why oh why did I want her to talk so badly?" Ha! She is just starting to string 2-3 words together. She repeats a LOT which makes me want to gab my eye balls out most of the time, so I know she is getting there and learning from us everyday. Some of my favorite things to hear out of her mouth are;

Oh my! (I am trying to watch my language and I say this instead of other 4 letter words. It's pretty freaking hilarious. She'll say it over and over again)

Daddy workin (she has this accent on working and it cracks me up)

Unkle Anee (Uncle Andy. Hilarious. She doesn't call anybody else aunt/uncle just their first names. But she is OBSESSED with Andy)

Ama (Grandma. Also cute, I love hearing her ask to go see Papa, Ama, and Unkle Anee)

Every time we drive my Burger King, Sonic, or Taco Bell she screams POP and points. Ha. Sue me, we eat out WAY to much.

Fox, except her version is a different 4 letter word that I would NEVER want her to say in public or at church. I can just see her in nursery one Sunday and there is a fox in a book or something and she screams FU!* oh my I will be so chawed.

Buca Boo, Peek-a-boo. Seriously so freaking cute it cracks me up. She puts her little hands over her eyes, take um off and screams BUCA BOO at you. Cracks me up every time.

One More/One More Minute, like most kids she does way better with a warning. "One more bite of food then you can have a treat." "One more minute outside then we have to go in." Etc. So she gets it. And she does WAY better about going inside if she has her one minute warning. So the other night we were outside watching Fireworks and we told her in a couple minutes we were going in, then one more minute we were going in, then we told her it was time to go inside. She looked VERY serious holds up her little index finger and says "mon more mint" sooooooo funny. And the other day she was playing with her dora memory game on the floor w/ Steve and he told her all done and to pick up so they could play a different game and she sat there holding up her little finger saying "mon more gam" and he could NOT understand her, I was laughing WAY to hard to interpret plus I wanted him to figure her out on his own. She probably said it 14 times before he figured it out. It's so cute the way she says it. Cracks me up.

Huggy and kees, hug and kiss. It's adorable. I'll be cooking dinner or doing laundry and she'll run in the room yelling HUGGY and hug my leg. Sweet girl.

She is 2. She has HUGE tantrums (more later), but back at the beginning of May my favorite Aunt Duffy came for a week and stayed with my parents. We saw her 3 or 4 times and of course her and Hailey had an instant connection. (this was the 1st time Duffy had ever seen Hailey) So the last night for us to see Duffy before she left I gave Hailey a bath. This is our WORST time of day, she always runs away from me and I have to fight her to put lotion/jammies on etc. So my sister and Duffy were trying to dress her and hold her down. She was kicking them and head butting and it was horrible. We had LOTS of talks about NOT kicking and that isn't nice or she would be in BIG trouble. We told her she is to ONLY kick at swimming in the pool. About 4 weeks after Duffy left she sent Hailey a cute little post card, about 3 days after she got it Hailey had it in the car, I was singing along to the music and not paying attention to Hay and all the sudden from the back seat she pipes up "Dumfy (Duffy. HA!), NO Kick. Naughty. Kick swim" hilarious! Glad I got through to her and she remembers it's not ok to kick. (also love that she calls her Dumfy (sounds like dumpy sometimes). Cracks me up.

Osha (or something that sounds like that), Off. So funny she can say most things so clearly but for a good 8-10 months off has sounded the same. Nobody but me and Steve know what she is saying. I'll be sad when she can say OFF like a normal person.

She is also HUGE on music and songs. We took swimming lessons, and they had us sing songs at the beginning and end of class. One of them was Hokey Pokey and she FREAKS and LOVES if you sing she will do all the motions. Hilarious! She calls it "Pokey pokey" HA!

Her other favorite songs are;

Itsy Bitsy
Pat-A-Cake
Jesus Loves Me (she sings "Bible tell toe" or something that sounds like that)
Jeremy Camp's new song "The Way" has a part where he says "nah nah nah Jesus, nah nah nah you are the way, etc" and she will yell out "nah nah nah" over and over and sometimes throw in there a "Jesus" sooooooo sweet I HAVE to get this on film soon
And in Blue October (just for A. Meg!) in the song "Calling You" the sing Uh oh oh oh oh oh oh, ohhhh oh" and she will sing "oh oh oh" over and over again. So prec

Clothes-My girl is a clothes horse. This is partly me, partly Carters, and mostly both Grandma's fault. Ha. She LOVES to pick out her own clothes. I usually let her pick her own pants out, then give her a choice of shirts that match the pants. I also usually let her pick out her own jammies (again with the whole after bath thing....do whatever I can to make it go more smoothly). I figure the less fights we have the better!

Food-She loves to snack. Meals; notsomuch. She would live off popsicles, fruit, juice, cereal, and potatoes if we let her. Oh and don't forget POP (sprite. I NEVER give her caffeine, but other certain aunts are a different story. I digress). That girl LOVES her some pop. I sneak meat in, and if she sits at the table for 45 minutes after me and Steve are done until she eats at least a couple bites then so be it. Dinner can be a real challenge. She wants us to feed her. She is perfectly capable of feeding herself but always just sits and says "Momma/Daddy help" over and over and over until we give in. Ugh. Luckily she LOVES veggies and fruit so I know she gets something good in her everyday.
Also Breakfast is a huge challenge. Neither of us (me or Hay) are morning girls so I never fight. A cookie?? Fine (every once in awhile NOT every day). We ALWAYS have at least 1 serving of fruit and then I let her pick something from the fridge/pantry. Breakfast is just to early to fight over. I don't have it in me. Mother of the year I tell ya.......

Friends-We have met some AMAZING friends from mops and enjoy a weekly (sometimes) play date. She loves to share and doesn't understand stealing toys (YET!), so it's fun to watch her interact with other kids. Right now her main pals are, Eleena and Samara (sweet sweet neighbor girls who LOVE her and call her Baby Hailey. Ha!), Cara, Abby and Zo, and a couple others! We love to meet at the Zoo or the splash park and just run and scream :) Plus Momma LOVES the adult time w/ the other Momma's it's what keeps me sane!

Play-My child would live outside 24/7 if I let her. A couple weeks ago it was like 90 degrees by 10am so we sat on the back patio in our bathing suits and I turned the hose on as low as it would go. I filled water balloons (which she was scared of?!?!), and she carried water from a rubbermaid bowl with a spoon allll over the patio. It was a sweet time with her, and we had lots of fun! She hates coming inside and always throws a fit.
She would also swim/live in the water if I let her. She asks to wear her swimsuit 24/7. Girl loves her some water.
She still loves stickers (although she doesn't call them Sticker-ta anymore :( ), and her grocery cart she pushes all over the house. She LOVES her doll Jenna. Jenna goes everywhere with us. I see her being a little Momma like I was growing up :) I will be extra patient with her and her doll obsession since I know where it stems from :)

Discipline- So being a Nanny I knew 20 months-3 or 4 was a hard age. I never knew it was THIS hard. Or that a child could be THIS stubborn. Did you know your child can limp to the floor and refuse to move (except to crumble onto the ground in PURE tantrum form) like 8 times in 5 minutes?? Oh yes. Every.Single.TIME we go to walmart we have the same exact fit. I grab a cart and tell Hailey she has to get in and she crumbles to the ground and upon being picked up kicks, screams, and ends up chucking her shoes off her feet half way across the entry of walmart. Oh and she is usually flailing her arms and whacking me somewhere (usually the head/face). Just keeping it real ppl. Everybody we meet says how sweet she is and can't believe how well behaved she is. And yes 97% of the time she is. But man can she push buttons!!! I eventually get her in the cart, but she fights me until the end. We talk a LOT about being a good girl/naughty. She knows the difference. When she is naughty I tell her, and warn her she better be good or ___ or ___ will happen. (and I ALWAYS carry the threat through!) Man it's hard! There are so many days I feel like the WORST MOM ever. I need to calm down and have patience. :( I try my hardest and pray about it every night. I know I'm doing the best I can and MOST days we get along and are fine, but we have our moments. The hardest thing is that she is my mini me (attitude wise). We butt heads ALL day. It's hard to see her act nasty and throw the tantrums when I KNOW she can be so sweet and good.
It was hilarious last night she was playing so well on the couch all by herself while I watched tv, and she kept looking at me saying "good girl", like look Momma I'm being good! So I would just praise and hug and kiss her and tell her how proud I was for playing so good and being a good girl. I def know the girl lives off the praise and does better with positive then when I try to tell her to stop or not doing something or act a certain way.
So our other new way of discipline is to stick her in the corner. Our master bedroom is right off our living room, so when she is acting out or being bad we make her stand in the corner of the door frame (sorry hard to explain) with her nose on the wall. She will stand there perfectly still for a minute or 2. Sometimes she comes running to me when we tell her to get out, and she will hug and say sorry, and other times she will continue the tantrum, and even others she will say no and continue to stand in the corner. What a toot! But it seems to get through to her more then going to her room or anything, so I hope we get through to her. It's SOOOOO hard!!!
Sorry I could go on and on about the 2 year phase, it's harder in so many ways then the newborn stage, but at least I get 9 hours of sleep a night! What happens when I have a newborn AND a 2 year old?? I might have to be committed! HA!


OK I think that is all. I need to do this more often so it's not so long and so there are more things I remember to put down! Bless you for sticking it out for so long. As crazy as she is and so many days I tell her she is going to go live at Grandma's, she sure is gorgeous and LOVES her Momma and LOVES to cuddle. It sure does make me feel good to be needed and get all her "Huggy's" ;)