The Toddler Years

Scarlette | A Prematurity Status Update

June 21, 2012 By Kayla Aimee

Since Scarlette has been home from the NICU I can think of exactly three times when I’ve shed tears over her delays. Once was when I was struggling to put down a feeding tube and drew back blood. Once was when she was trying so hard to grab for a toy during a physical therapy session and it broke my heart that her body just couldn’t do it. And the other was the day my best friend gave her little boy a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Four little triangles in chubby fingers did me in.

“There’s something wrong with Scarlette, Nat. And I have no idea what it is.”

Around the time Scarlette turned 15 months old I started to notice she was having difficulty eating. I was also noticing a few quirky things about her personality, like the fact that she refused to touch stuffed animals or wouldn’t wear denim.

(Some of y’all asked for an update on her diet/development and this is it- but it got really long! Please click continue if you want to read all about medical/sensory stuff. If not, come back tomorrow when I tell you a funny story about my neighbors ) [Read more...]

44 Comments Filed Under: Adventures In Preemie Parenting | A Blogumentary, The Toddler Years

Story Time About Story Time

March 30, 2012 By Kayla Aimee

We are officially out of lockdown! Goodbye winter quarantine, hello spring!

So in celebration of being able to leave our house, I decided to take Scarlette to the 0-2 Story Time at our local library. Support your local library, amen.

My child loves reading, as evidenced by the photos above. I mean, you saw the cutest video in the world, right? And if not, don’t tell me that you skipped watching a video of my baby. I prefer to remain under the impression that everyone finds her as irresistibly cute and charming as I do.

Since she is all about books and loves it when we read to her, I naturally assumed that she would love it when other people read to her and thus, would love story time.

The first rule of parenting? Never assume anything. Rookie mistake, y’all. Rookie mistake.

The thing is, here’s the thing: while she really does love listening to people read to her, it turns out that she loves attacking other children more.

She saw the other children sitting so nicely on the circle rug, all criss cross applesauce with their listening ears perked to hear a tale about bunny rabbits and she was like “OTHER BABIES! MUST! GRAB! ALL! THE! OTHER! BABIES!”

And as I gently restrained her from launching herself at the them, she threw herself on the floor and began what I like to call ” Scarlette’s First Meltdown In Public.”

Never having really been in public with Scarlette, I was completely unprepared to handle this situation.

I mean, I’ve pictured that moment in my head. The one where she loses it and I calmly and swiftly resolve the situation while the other mothers glance at one another and nod their approval, in silent agreement that I am a fantastic mother and obviously they should invite me to join their play group.

In real life, however, it went down like this: “Holy crap my child has never thrown a fit like this before. I have no idea what to do. Should I take her out? Do I leave all my stuff? Where do I go, the library is not really all that big? OMG is she seriously kicking her feet right now? I really need to do something because I feel like an idiot. I’ll just start handing her random things out of her diaper bag. Crap, I was not expecting that other little kid to take her teething ring away from her. I have no idea what the social protocol is here. Do I just take it back? I’m going to just take it back. Great, now the other little kid is digging in my diaper bag for Scarlette’s snacks. Oh, crumb. Why are libraries so flipping quiet? That is only making my kid’s screaming sound even louder. I vote we all start talking in libraries. Not talking in the library is a stupid rule. Good, they turned on some music. She likes music. Yay, let’s clap! WHY IS SHE STILL CRYING?! This is not how I pictured story time. Maybe if I let her go she will calm down. Okay, letting her go was a terrible idea. How long is story time anyways?”

Then the story time lady handed Scarlette a sticker, which she promptly set about trying to eat and that occupied her through the next round of The Wheels On The Bus.

After that we attempted making a bunny rabbit craft and by attempted I mean I handed Scarlette the paintbrush and she repeatedly threw it in the floor. There is a one eyed, one legged bunny hanging on our fridge.

And that is the story of our first visit to story time.

Tune in next week for another episode of Motherhood: I Have No Idea What I’m Doing.

40 Comments Filed Under: The Daily Scarlette, The Toddler Years

Funny Girl

March 22, 2012 By Kayla Aimee

Scarlette is getting to the age where I have funny stories to tell on her because she’s developing such a little personality.

We’ve just recently started venturing out with her. I took her to the grocery store this week and had my back to her for a moment while checking out. The woman in line behind me said “Excuse me, does your baby know sign language?” “Yes, she does” I answered, a bit confused. I mean, that seemed like a random thing to ask someone.

“Well, she keeps looking at my food and signing ‘eat’ to me” she said.

Apparently, my child saw her bunch of bananas and was like “Hello total stranger, PLEASE FEED THOSE TO ME RAT NAO!”*

Scarlette has also discovered my anatomically correct boy baby doll. Don’t even try to tell me you forgot about this. I had planned on giving it to her when she was older but she saw him in my closet and dragged him out. Then I had to put one of her diapers on him because she was fascinated by his boy parts. She loves this doll and will randomly walk over to him and hug him. “Such a sweet girl to your baby” I tell her.

She had toddled away from a half-empty bottle of milk so I scooped up both it and the baby doll, pretending to feed it. “Look Scarlette, Mommy is feeding the baby!” I told her. This is what my baby book says to do y’all. It says to engage her in pretend play with baby dolls. So I did. Scarlette whipped around, reached out and yanked the bottle out of my hands. She took a sip from it and then threw it on the floor.

I picked it up again, because I’m glutton for punishment and also because I wasn’t sure if she was jealous or just hungry. You know, because sometimes she puts her bottle down and then she spots it ten seconds later and is all “MILK! I AM SO THIRSTY! I HAVEN’T HAD MILK IN FOR-EVER! MILK! MY PRECIOUS! MYYYY PRECIOUSSS!”

So you know, there’s that.

This time she reached out and hit the bottle out of my hands as hard as she could. Then she proceeded to smack the baby doll across the head. I also tried brushing the baby’s hair. That sent the hairbrush flying across the room. The good news is that she has a really good arm. The bad news is, I’m a wee tiny bit nervous about her first play date…

Also? I feel as though we’re all in agreeance about the idea of her being an only child.

*”rat nao” is southern for “right now” as in, that is how we sound when we say it.

15 Comments Filed Under: Adventures In Preemie Parenting | A Blogumentary, Scarlette Year One, The Daily Scarlette, The Toddler Years

Like Father, Like Daughter

March 5, 2012 By Kayla Aimee

Okay so we know she LOOKS just like Jeff. I am currently scanning in his old baby pictures to give you further proof that isn’t even necessary in order to accentuate that fact.

She’s a bit quirky though and naturally, we had all assumed she got that from me.

Currently Scarlette refuses to wears shoes that do not have bows or flowers on them. It doesn’t matter if I put boots on the child, she will determinedly find a way to take them off. Shoes that have bows or flowers on them though? She is enamored with them and will randomly stop whatever she is doing to lift her feet up and stroke them admiringly. Sometimes she will get the other pairs of shoes with flowers on them out of her closet and lovingly carry them around the house. I have no idea why we bother buying the child toys.

She has a pair of silver slippers with bows on the toes and when I took them off for naptime she started crying. I had no idea what her problem was until she took them back from me and held tightly them to her. She ended up sleeping with them because I see no harm in that. Honestly, I might sleep with my silver sequined Kate Spade ballet flats if Jeff would allow it. I mean, they sparkle AND they were a really good deal. You can see how we thought this quirkiness originated with me, right? We all just thought maybe she was slightly neurotic.

At her recent doctor visit we were discussing her oral aversion issues, more specifically on her refusal to eat anything of texture. And by “refusal” I mean “makes herself throw up anything that isn’t pureed.” It’s not at all frustrating.

I mentioned how particular she seems to be: she does not want to wear denim unless it is lined or there is something under it. She wants me to put a hat on her every day. She has declared war on anything made of sweater material. And I brought up her shoe obsession.

Her doctor thinks she has a texture aversion in general and asked if I or my husband did.

And that’s when I was like “It’s not me! IT’S NOT ME!” Because Jeff? That’s totally him.

I put a denim dress on her this week and I was telling him that I had to take it back off, put shorts + a onesie on her, and then put the dress over that in order for her to be comfortable wearing it. And he said “Of course you did. Who wants to feel just plain denim touching their skin? That’s awful.”

And if you know my husband in real life, you’re probably thinking to yourself “Oh, so THAT’S why I see Jeff wearing Adidas track pants ninety seven percent of the time…”

18 Comments Filed Under: Adventures In Preemie Parenting | A Blogumentary, The Toddler Years

Confessions Of A Babywearing Mom

February 23, 2012 By Kayla Aimee

When I was in college I majored in Sociology which meant taking a lot of classes about different cultures. And also this one class called Human Sexuality that most definitely should have come with a disclaimer.

In one of my anthropology classes we learned all about some tribe in some country that wears their babies. I obviously paid a lot of attention and really earned that B. All I remember about that class was that A) my teacher was a ninja. Like, he literally studied to be a ninja in Japan or something. And B) I became obsessed with babywearing and decided that whenever I had a baby, I was going to strap it to my body with a strip of cloth. My twenty year old self felt very hip and granola about it all.

My twenty-eight year old self sees the irony in feeling hip about doing something that you learned from women who have been doing it for centuries. Anyhow, I’ve been wearing Scarlette since we brought her home from the hospital which feels like a century so naturally I’m going to talk about it like I’m an expert. <- mommybloggersyndrome

I use the Balboa Baby Adjustable Sling by Dr. Sears because my friend Florica recommended it to me and showed me how hers worked. When we brought Scarlette home, I had to carry not only her but also a portable apnea monitor that she was attached to + a portable pump for her feeding tube. There is a pocket on the front of the Balboa Baby sling that the pump fit into and I found that really helpful. Most days I did laundry, dishes, etc with her sleeping against my chest in the sling and the $&*@!! apnea monitor banging against my hip. I do not miss you, apnea monitor, no I do not.

I discovered that I didn’t like the feeling of a wrap sling. Mostly because of my neurotic fear that it would somehow unwind itself and my baby would go twirling down to the floor like she was in a tiny little Cirque Du Soleil stunt. And we couldn’t use a front/back carrier because of her risk of hip dysplasia. So the ring sling worked best for me. I wore her cuddle style when she was little and keeping her upright helped a lot with her reflux. Now I wear her hip carrier style and she is so much lighter in the sling than when I just hold her myself. When we go to the doctor I clip a toy to the ring and she happily entertains herself until she sees them come in with the needles. Then she screams like a banshee and hunkers down in the sling to hide.

Scarlette loves being in the sling. When she’s feeling tired or overwhelmed she will bring it to me so that I will put her in it. I’ve found that it’s great for quarantine purposes. If we do get out, I wear her and keeping her that close to me prevents people from touching her. Well, except that one lady who lifted up my nursing cover to see her. That lady was crazy cakes. Why would she do that? Why am I wearing a snuggie in that first picture? There are so many mysteries in this life.

I won’t tell you about all of the benefits of babywearing because lots has been written about it by people who are way more educated than I am + they can tell you how to do it safely. And also because I’m not trying to persuade you if it isn’t your thing- I firmly believe families should do what works best for them. But since this works best for us, I thought I’d share what we do. If you have any questions though, I’m totally happy to answer them in the comments!

*It’s not really a snuggie. THIS is me in a snuggie. You. Are. Welcome.

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