I guess I'm just not hardy stock...

So, all early this week I had wanted to do a post about our fabulous time seeing Thomas the Tank and basically hanging out in Lancaster County last weekend. We had a great visit and Sophie, along with all the other throngs of screaming, crying passing out kids, just LOVED Thomas. You would have thought it was like seeing the Beatles live from the shrieks of joy and ecstacy coming from these kids everytime Thomas made his way back into the station to pick up the next batch of kids. Anyway, I'll get to that later because as always, something unexpected happened when yesterday morning Sophie woke up covered in her own pee. And, I mean COVERED. Her hair was wet, her jammies were wet, the bed was wet - it was nuts. At first I thought maybe I hadn't put her nighttime diaper on right (she is darn near impossible to change these days and I'm frequently changing her diaper while chasing her through the house or wrestling her down from standing up on the couch). But, I checked the diaper and it seemed to be on fine and covering all the right bits so why on earth was she so soaked???? Well, we called the doctor and got an appointment to have her checked out but in the meantime, our thoughts started to run wild because well, when you do a google on "toddler soaked diaper" all the hits lead to diabetes. So I start reading all these diabetes sites and forums and in no time flat I'm hysterical. I mean, HY-STER-I-CAL. (Just ask my sister in law or my friend Heather both of whom fielded panicked hysterical phone calls from me). Ok, so I get her into the doctors and she says basically "well, don't panic until we know the results of a urine sample." A urine sample??? How do you get a urine sample from an 18 month old. Well, let me tell ya, it's not pretty. Poor Sophie withstood two attempts in the doctors office and heroically and patiently dealth with having the first and then second urine bag removed (i.e., unstuck like the nastiest bandaid you ever had) from her poor little body. But of course, two bags and 30 minutes later and still no pee. So, they sent me home with bags which I attempted to put on her yesterday afternoon and fed her copious amounts of fluids and still NO PEE! Finally, this morning, we hit jackpot on the 5th urine bag which I drove to the doctors office and we waited for the results which thankfully came back completely and utterly fine. No glucose in the urine, no weird proteins. She just had a big pee or a defective diaper or who knows. Maybe in her sleep she undid the diaper and rolled around in her own urine and then meticulously put the diaper BACK on before we went in and got her in the morning. Kids. Go figure. Looking back on it now from the safety of a negative result, I'm embarrassed by my over reaction but when you start imagining a life of fingersticks and insulin pump sites for your baby, your mind and heart do awful things and go to very very sad places at the slightest chance of such a fate. Anyway, that's what my mind and heart did and I apologize to those who had to deal with me. In the meantime, she does indeed have yet another cold. Seriously, in the midst of all this she was sneezing again yesterday which inevtiably means a cold is on the way and sure enough she had a low grade fever this morning and is yet again, a walking projectile snot shooting machine. (If you've been keeping track that makes for two colds and one viral rash in four weeks but who's counting, really?)

Anyway so let me end this post on a funny story about our time in Lancaster County.... We're driving around through this beautiful farm land with horse and buggies taking the Amish to and fro and enjoying the simply gorgeous sunny fall weather. We pass this one Amish house and there is an Amish woman out front mowing her lawn. Sure, that's great. She's mowing the lawn, right? Well, then we pass the back of the house and there is a baby SITTING ALL ALONE in the backyard with a little black bonnet on it in the middle of the grass. I mean it. ALONE. This baby was the age where babies have to sit because they have just learned how to sit and hold their heads up and that is basically all they do. It was in the middle of the grass on a little towel or blanket SITTING THERE ALONE!!! Nobody was with it. The mom was out front MOWING. Now, I cannot even imagine having the hardiness, the strength of character to let my baby sit by itself in the middle of the lawn with absolutely nobody near it and not able to hear it's shrieks (because I was mowing) if some godawful thing were to happen. What if it fell over and rolled away? What if a large hawk came by and swooped down and grabbed it? What if it got stung by a bee??? What if some nasty tourists from Philly came by pulled over and grabbed it to take home and raise as their own? I was stunned. Just stunned. But, I guess that is how life is out in Amish Country. If you can't survive sitting in the grass by yourself at a tender young age of barely being able to hold your head up, then I guess you'll never make it to being able to tend the fields or mow the grass in your bare feet while your baby sits alone in the back yard later on in life, huh??

New "ick"

Well, there's a new "ick" in town at El-Rancho-Oxenford. Yesterday morning Sophie woke up with a 102 fever and red splotches all over her face, neck, back, arms and legs. We called the pediatrician's office emergency beeper number and had the nurse tell us "Well, usually the doctor will want to see a baby with a high fever and a rash." (Uh - right...) Tylenol helped her fever drop quickly but the rash didn't go away so quickly. She was seen at 9:45 am and the doctor, after checking her out, said that it seemed to be a viral rash. These are apparently common in babies and toddlers and there isn't much you can do for them but give tylenol for discomfort. She hasn't had a high fever again all day but the rash is still present although it does fade sometimes and get stronger other times. As for how the poor kid is holding up, she seems to be pretty much herself except for not being able to sleep very well yesterday for naps and then staying up way way too late last night (almost 11pm) before we finally got her down. Today she seemed tired (that's what staying up till 11pm and waking up at 5:30am will do to ya, kid) but otherwise mostly happy. It's always an exciting new adventure here.

The real disturbing thing is that we finally got to meet my beautiful perfect new little niece, Liana Love, on Monday. Had I know that Sophie was going to come down with this new "ick" I would have never ever risked infecting my little niece. Thankfully, Sophie was really crabby being there (probably because she had the "ick") and didn't want anything to do with that baby and got pretty darn put out when I was holding her. So, that probably was in our favor because thank goodness so far so good and Liana seems to have not caught the virus and hopefully won't at this point.

Here are some photos of our little visit. I can't wait to get my ick-free hands on her again soon!!! Congratulations to Richard and Theresa and Welcome to the World sweet Liana Love!!

Last Hoorah

We were lucky enough to get one more week down the shore with GGMom over Labor Day.

Unfortunately, we weren't lucky enough to have great weather and a Noreaster came through during our week so we only got one day on the beach and it was really really windy. All the rest of the week was clouds and rain. We still managed to have lots of fun anyway though. Here are some of the other adventures Sophie had since she wasn't able to get back on the beach one more time.

Practicing balance beam at the great 34th Street playground

Having a photo shoot in my new coat from the Old Navy outlet in Atlantic City

Playing some Dance Dance Revolution on the boards

Dorking around with Mommy and Daddy in Atlantic City

Having fun at the Children's Museum in the Shore Mall

"Playing" mailcarrier at the Children's Museum. Don't worry, Dee Ree, she hated it.


Sticking my hands in the water in the "touch-tanks" at the Atlantic City Aquarium

Watching the sea anemones (just like in my book Goodnight Ocean!)

Relaxing on the bench at the Aquarium

Reading books with GGMom

Playing in the dunes when Mommy dragged me and Daddy to the beach in 25 mile an hour winds

Ollie golly love

Sophie sure does love her fur brothers... Ollie is especially beloved because he will come near her and even do things like let her "brush" him (although if you look closely you will see she is "brushing" him with a camera lens cap). For a while there, Ollie started hiding from her all the time too (Mr. Chen has *always* kept a safe distance from Sophie) but recently he has let her come close to him again. She loves him so much - she just follows him around all the time. And, if we're out and I say "let's go home", Sophie will say "Ollie Golly???" with love and glee.

Another Painting Session

A week or two ago, Sophie had another painting session during a day that felt (to me at least) like the "longest day ever" because she was teething so bad. So, I hoped maybe painting would entertain her and cheer her up a bit. She seemed to enjoy it but alas there wasn't a lot of smiling. It was a lot of demanding for more paint but still she seemed to have fun and it bought us 20 mins or so during "happy hour." In other art news, this morning Sophie made a mark on her easel and looked at me and said "S" and lo and behold it DID look like an "S" - she is really enjoying the power of coloring and if I had a dollar for every time I say "coloring is for paper" in the course of a day, we'll let's just say I'd have plenty of money to go buy all the magic erasers to clean up the crayon marks on the floor, walls, glass doors, sofas and tables that she is making these days... Crayons are now treated like a controlled substance in our house. She loves them and loves to walk around with them and leave her mark everywhere. What a complex world it is for toddlers who must learn that coloring is for coloring books and paper only. Not for reading books. And, how come Elmo can color on his furniture but Sophie can't?? Poor kid - no wonder she gets annoyed.

More words

Of course, how could I forget these words that she says:

Kids, more, keys, off, Alice, Bob (long story), Elma (for Elmo) and last night for the first time ever she said bowl and Merry Christmas. Crazy, huh??

Just short for her vocabulary

So... a few weeks ago I took Sophie in for her 15 month check-up. Yes, we were late (first we were on vacation, then our pediatrician was on vacation) so she technically had her 15 month check-up at 16 and a half months but oh well. She weighed in at 23 lbs 15 ozs and 31 and 3/4 inches long. I asked the doctor what percentiles she was in and she said 50% for both height and weight. Then, I said "a lot of people think she looks small or short for her age" and the doctor said "No, she's just short for her vocabulary." Isn't that a riot???

Well, she DOES talk a lot and everyday there is a new word (or two or three somedays) that she can say. Her list of words has increased to the following:
Mama, Dada, PopPop, Ollie-Gollie (Seriously, that is what she calls our cat Ollie. It is also what she calls our cat, Mr. Chen. And, it's what she calls most cats, actually.) Ice, No, Help, Down, Grass, Glass, Fish (but it sounds more like shish), Ocean (but it sounds like oshe), Bye, House, Horse, Hat, Apple, Cheese, Ball, Pizza, (but it sounds more like peace), Please, Peas, Rice, Star (but it actually sounds more like Gahr), Geese, Bah (does that count?). I bet there are a few others I'm forgetting. It's just so wild. Like the other day, we're sitting there at dinner and she is eating rice and Jim and I are talking away and she keeps saying "Rice, Rice". We didn't think twice about it at first but she had never said it before so when we finally realized it we were like "YAY! Yes, RICE!!!"

In other news, she has been teething again off and on which has created for some interesting days for us. (She has two molars on her left side but so far none on the right so we think they're the ones giving her grief now.) But, then she'll have several days of no teething in a row and she's a happy little camper.

She has also become obsessed with coloring. I remember not so long ago (what, like a few weeks ago) I was pushing the coloring, giving her crayons and trying to show her how to actually make her mark. Well, let's just say SHE GETS IT NOW! She colors on the walls, the couches, the floor, the GLASS. So, crayons have been confiscated as of today and will now be a controlled substance in our household. How DO you teach the difference between it being ok to color in your coloring books but not in your reading books anyway????

And, of course, today is Sophie's 17 Month Birthday!! Happy Birthday Sweet Sophie Angel!! We love you so much and are so enjoying watching you learn and grow each day!!!