Labor Day Festivities

Yesterday mid-morning we went to Pratt Park for the Prattville Service League's Labor Day BBQ. There were alot of vendors selling things, but the main entertainment was the Miss Labor Day Pageant and some dance troupes. If I can figure out how to upload the video, there is a guy named Tony who performed by himself and then with some of the girls.

Gracie loves to swing, and this was the perfect swing....until she gave Nana a heart attack when she tried to let go!

Gracie and her Nana Kay

Some old, some new

This one just makes her look suspicious....like "what'd I do?"


Cutest toddler in the world in the cutest dress I've ever seen. Then again, I'm biased.


I think her Daddy taught her how to do this.

Random

When I was in college, I did a sociological research project on the comparison between the quantity and quality of time that parents (particulary those working outside the home) spend with their children. And while I pride myself on vieweing quality vs. quantity in terms of importance, the young woman in charge of this blog has taken my breath away the last few weeks. If you have not checked out this blog, I found it through a website called 5 Minutes for Mom. The mother of two who runs this blog lost her 5-year-old little girl in July in a tragic drowning accident.

I find myself going to her website daily, to check up on her and her little Lily. What amazes me most is how she continues to press on, despite each stumbling block thrown in her direction. She has opened her heart to us in her blog, letting us see the heartbreaking sadness as she has to adjust to life without her Little Monkey.

Now while quality of time has always been important to me, I catch myself looking at Gracie with a new set of eyes. Like every single little thing needs to be etched into my brain, every single instance of her life recorded.

It is through this wonderful woman that I have come to understand how fleeting life is and how unexpectedly those that we love can be taken from us.

Now, on to some fun stuff...

Gracie has learned some new things since my last post:

1. She can sing a total of three songs if you ask her to: Jesus Loves Me, The Barney Theme Song (I love you), and her ABCs...although when she gets to "L-M-N-O-P" she usually skips straight from K to Q.

2. She has not started officially potty-training yet, but she is using her potty before her baths and often throughout the day.

3. We are still battling the pacifier issue, but it has come down to only at nap and bedtime...we want to phase it out totally before her second birthday.

4. We're getting tired of Barney. Very tired.

Our first official ER visit

Well, it happened late Wednesday night/early Thursday morning and it was not pretty. Not even 2 years old, and my pitiful little girl had to be taken to the ER @ Prattville Baptist. She had spent the day with my mom in Birmingham (my sisters had a tournament) and my mom actually got home from Birmingham around 8:30-9:00. After I got home from church, anyway.

The first thing she says when she gets out of the car is, "Gracie hurt her arm." And my first reaction was 'ok, did she scratch it up really bad or something?"

And there is my baby girl in the truck, arm limp at her side. I wanted to cry! I was positive it was broken so we called the pediatrician who advised us to go to the ER and let them do x-rays.

So we signed in at 9:45pm and sat around with other patients - including some loud, obnoxious drunked boneheads one of who had a pretty badly busted open face. Who spends a Wednesday night at a bar, getting sloshed and wresting?

Anyway. At 2:45 Thursday morning they call us back to the ER and after checking out her arm, they decide to give her morphine and do x-rays. The morphine worked fast, because she was using her arm to push the curtains around.

Anyway, they said it was something called Nursemaid's Elbow. It's common in toddlers/children under six and can happen again since it happened once. However, we both recooperated all day yesterday and she's absolutely fine now. Back to her usual self.

FYI - She has learned to sing "Jesus Loves Me" all by herself, and she can count to 10 in spanish. She is also losing interest in Elmo, but absolutely loves Dora the Explorer and Barney (oh yay!). She'll be TWO YEARS OLD in a few short months!

Random ramblings

Wow. It's been almost a month since I last posted! Gracelynn did not enjoy fireworks at all last night. I bought some sparklers for $1.00 (read: I wasted my money on the crap) and she liked looking at those...but then somebody behind our house started shooting off the LOUD ones and in a panic, wide-eyed, she looks at me and says, "Mama. I won go." Which in Gracelynn-speak means,"Lady, get me out of here. NOW!"
So we came back inside and let Daddy enjoy the fireworks. Plus, it was bedtime anyways.

She is speaking in more complete sentences, for example the other night she was on the couch with a baby in her lap. She would kiss the baby and then say, "Oh, wee I kiss the baby right there."

She has also been testing out the big "potty", sitting on it before bathtime but not really doing much of anything. Hey, at least she knows what it's for!

Confounded technical garbage!

Ok, so I've been trying for about three days now to figure out how to upload the most recent video I took of Gracie, which involves a red popsicle. She is cutting teeth in the back now and just about every afternoon I've taken to giving her a popsicle. Not that she objects. In fact, that was what she oh so politely asked for at 5:45 this morning when I was getting her ready to leave the house.

"I want popsicle."

Cute, but no. It is too early in the morning for a popsicle.

I'll keep working on the video.

It's amazing...

To think that at one point in her life, she totally depended on me for everything. Okay, so she still does. Sort of. But this little booger is developing her own independence; and fast. And she's turning into a total character at the same time. For instance, she spent most of the afternoon fake crying while her Nana and Daddy cleaned up the yard and I cooked dinner. Fake crying, sitting at the window, and in between "sobs" she'd say "Hey Nana! (or Daddy)" and wave and giggle.

Then tonight when it was time for bed, we went into her room. Daddy brought her milk, and we thought at the time that Gracie was ordering him to "Sit down,Daddy." We made a big show about it, but in all seriousness, she wasn't telling him to sit down - she was telling him to "Get out." and pointing to her bedroom door.

How hysterical is that?

Not even 2, and she's already decided that Daddy is no longer welcome in her room.

Speaking of bedtime...I think my pillow is calling.

Tried to catch some videos of her dancing this afternoon, but she either wasn't into the music or just didn't feel like showing off her mad dancing skills. Maybe next time.