The Last Month Or So

While it doesn't feel like I've really accomplished much over the last month and a half, we have been very busy. As most of you already know, my mom broke her leg while on vacation with dad and my grandparents in France. This resulted in surgery for her (while still in France) and a 1 3/4 inch screw going through her tibia and fibula. They arrived home about a week after they were originally supposed to, and Melanie and I have been spending our weekdays at my parents house ever since. This is where the feeling of not accomplishing anything comes from. We get there between 9 and 10 in the morning and don't leave until between 6 and 8 in the evening, so by the time we get home I'm just too tired to worry about putting laundry away, so it stays in the basket. Melanie gets some wind-down time playing with her own toys at her own house. Putting her to bed as soon as we get home is not an option because she'll sleep for 30 minutes and then be up again, so it's just easier to give her an hour of play time before we start her bedtime ritual. She often gets a bath in the evening (the highlight of her day!), a snack of some sort and Matt puts her to bed (when he's home, which has been 10-14 days here, 10-14 days in California as of late). I really appreciate Matt putting her in bed since it gives me a little time completely to myself to just put my feet up and relax (which I need to do since my legs have been swelling on the days I stand too much)

So yeah. Not really earth shattering, but time consuming none the less. It's really no different than what I would do if I were at home, except that it's harder to get those little at home projects done seeing as I'm at my parents house instead of mine. So the dusting goes undone, the vacuuming is neglected. At least the dust bunnies are happy with the current arrangement! We just won't be entertaining any guests here for a while :)

On a happy note - the basement is almost finished! We just have to pick out carpet and have it installed, and then it's done! Matt has one more room to paint, but it's just the computer/sewing room, so it isn't a high priority as far as I'm concerned. I'm very excited! Hopefully we'll get to look at carpet tomorrow or Monday night and get that taken care of before Matt leaves town again on Wednesday. Yay!

Well, that was a lot of rambling on my part. Here are some pictures to go along with the babble.

Melanie napping with Grandma

Super baby!
Complete with bib-cape and mom's super sunglasses

Melanie's first chocolate pudding

I've been keeping pudding cups in the house to help make

me feel a little less guilty about giving in to the occasional chocolate

craving and Melanie gets to help me eat them sometimes

Our hammy little one

Peas anyone?

Just kicking my feet up

Sharing crackers with Tobey while mom gets his real breakfast

Our monkey in action

If only I had a banana...

Dad and Melanie time
I just thought this one was too cute not to share

Peek!
Baby in a box of beans

(a Parents as Teachers suggested activity that Melanie really

enjoys - the bean box is suggested, Melanie is the one that decided to climb in it)

Wake Up Daddy!

Matt came home from work one day and decided to use one of Melanie's foam wedges to take a nap.

Daddy isn't paying attention to me... whatever shall I do?

So she decided to awake him with a kiss.

And then decided that his head needed to be cleaned with a washcloth.

The End.

Melanie Likes Shoes

Thank goodness for the speaker phone function on cell phones!

Matt left town (again) for California on Friday, and seeing as he's been gone more than two days now Melanie has hit that lovely stage where she realizes he's gone and doesn't really know how to cope with not having daddy time each night, so bedtime is just kinda ugly. Pile on top of that a measly 45 minute nap (and that's a generous estimate) and it makes for a lovely evening ritual for mommy.

On the way home from a family dinner at my in-laws' house Melanie fell asleep, so I got her inside and laid her down, to which she woke up screaming. So I figured she just needed a bit of play/wind-down time in her own home (considering at that point it had been about 11 hours since she had been here last) so I let her out of her room to play. I put on a Baby Einstein video (she loves the music) and tried to get her to eat some fruit and a waffle, which she was not interested in. So we played a bit and I made a phone call. She then proceeded to get into stuff, and I'd have to stop her, which would result in her crying and me consoling her, and then her repeating the offense, and so on. So the phone conversation ended and we made a second attempt at eating the waffle. Still not interested. So I got out some yogurt. That was ok, but when I put the yogurt on the waffle that was exactly what she wanted. So the best meal I got out of Melanie today was a waffle with cherry yogurt on it. Whatever works. Tried to lay her down again, more screaming. Tried to have her lay down in bed with me. Still screaming. So we came out into the kitchen and called Matt on my cell phone. She seems intrigued by the whole cell phone/daddy's voice thing since I have a picture of Matt that pops up when I'm talking to him, so Melanie thinks she's talking to the picture and insists on looking at it any time Matt talks to her on the phone instead of actually holding the phone to her ear. So I finally put the speaker phone function on and Matt and I just had a conversation while Melanie sat with me and she finally fell asleep and stayed asleep.

I'm not sure if she just needed the reassurance of Matt's voice (he's the one that normally puts her to bed at night) or what the deal was, but for both of our sakes I'm glad it worked. I feel really badly for Melanie since her whole world is being turned upside down between her and I spending all day at my parents' house helping take care of mom and grandma, and then topping that off with Matt being out of town so much recently. And when all of this finally settles down and Melanie gets back in her groove (assuming she can remember what it is by that time) then an even bigger change will take place and she'll have to share the spotlight with a sibling. Oh, the life of an 18-month old!