A 2 Year Old's Wish List

I was working on Nadia's birthday wish list today. Her birthday is 3 months away, but mine is next month. There are generally very few things I can think of to request for myself so I was going to share both lists so that if anyone in the family wanted they could buy something actually for Nadia (or Ian) as my birthday gift. So far my birthday wish list contains swim diapers for Nadia for our trip to Florida in May, swim trunks for Ian, 2 convertible car seats (as Nadia will still be using the size she's in now when Ian outgrows the infant size one), and a 9x13 casserole dish as mine has cracks in it. Ian will probably also need some summer clothes as unless he has a huge growth spurt he's not going to fit the summer clothes I already own when we're in Florida. Listed below are the items that I currently have on Nadia's wish list -suggestions for family members or things that Paul & I might get her. I am posting it here as I am very open to suggestions of what she will probably enjoy from ages 24-30 months (she's the lucky one in that Christmas is 6 months after her birthday whereas for Ian the two events are only 13 days apart). Please let me know if you have an idea of something Nadia might like! While creating this list I ended up ordering a Plasma Car for her. I've seen pics and read about them many times on Cindy's Ethiopian triplet blog. I hope Nadia will enjoy it. I am certain I will give it to her immediately. I have stored a few items in a closet for her birthday, but generally I am terrible at waiting to give her a gift. :-)

1. Tumbling mat
2. Hugg-a-planet (earth)
3. Tricycle
4. Art smock
5. Play-doh
6. Finger paint
7. Finger paint paper
8. Mr. Potato Head
9. Toy camera

This week three books came in the mail that I bought upon the recommendation of Joy. I got used copies of The Toddler's Busy Book, The Preschooler's Busy Book, and the Arts & Crafts Busy Book. Arts and crafts are NOT my thing. I knew I'd need help coming up with ideas of fun things to do with Nadia in that area.  Each book contains 365 ideas. My goal is to introduce a new activity of some sort to Nadia during Ian's morning naps on the days we're at home together. Yesterday I got a basket and put a little blanket in it and put one of her dolls in it and then we played together by feeding the baby a bottle and putting the baby in "bed". She enjoyed that. Today I got out her 1 inch blocks that she hadn't played with in awhile, and we worked on building towers. I don't ever recall seeing her build a tower with blocks before so I was impressed with how tall of a tower she could build! I think these books will help me when I start to run out of ideas on my own.

I stayed home yesterday morning so that Ian could have a morning nap in his crib and Nadia could have a long afternoon nap. Well Ian did take a decent morning nap due to my running upstairs many times to pop his pacifier back in his mouth. I felt like I was training for a track and field event as I would go over the gate (hurdle) and up the stairs as fast as possible and then come back down very quickly as well to get back to Nadia as soon as possible. I've been wanting more exericse. I guess this is my new aerobic workout, lol. Both of them struggled with their afternoon naps which meant mine was very short as well. Ian did pretty well last night. He slept about 7.5 hours between 9pm and 6am. His first stretch was about 4 hours long, second was about 2.5 hours long, and his third about 1 hour long. That would have meant a pretty good night's sleep for me except Nadia was up from 11:00pm-12:40am (and then soon after she got to sleep is when Ian awakened for the first time so I was awake from about 11pm to 1:45am). Paul went and rocked her and gave her milk, but after he put her back in her crib she kept crying out "mommy," "daddy," or "milk" for more than an hour. Finally I went in and hugged her and told her it was nighty night time and that she needed to lie down and be quiet or I was going to take her doggy out of the crib. Well that did the trick! We didn't hear another peep from her. I will use that tactic more quickly the next time this happens. I hope her waking in the night doesn't become the norm as she generally sleeps through the night. She did set a new record this morning in that she didn't wake up until (drum roll please) 7:40am. Can you believe it? I can't! This helped make up for some of the sleep she lost in the middle of the night, and she made up the rest of it during her long afternoon nap. She also set a record today of taking the longest nap she's ever taken before! We are definitely going to stick with an 8pm bedtime if it means she'll get up later in the morning and have a nice long afternoon nap. I am a huge fan of DST for the first time in my life!

Ian rode in a stroller for the first time this morning (see above). It's supposed to get up to 67 degrees today. YAY! It wasn't that warm this morning which is why I had the kids bundled up. It was my first time using the double stroller that my sister passed down to us. Thanks, Yvonne! Ian didn't last too long. I ended up carrying him on the way back and shortening our trip. I am hoping in time he'll last longer. Nadia definitely wasn't ready for our trip to be over especially since I gave her a few rocks to hold. That girl LOVES rocks.

Nadia's sentences sometimes really amaze Paul and I. One that stopped us in our tracks was "I'll get it." There are humorous moments too such as when Paul said she could take a sip (of her milk) and she obviously thought he said sit because she promptly sat down on the kitchen floor. When we're reading a counting book to her, she no longer wants to hear us count. She says "Nadia" (meaning she wants to do it) and then she points to each object (ex. butterfly) and says a number word. She usually only gets up to "three," but I'm sure she'll be going higher in the near future. We think she's a smart little girl, not that we're biased or anything, LOL.