My first review
I’ve mentioned before that Eliana doesn’t watch much TV. In fact, the only show she watches is Signing Time. I have my TIVO set to record it. She prefers the older ones when the kids are younger. So far she can sign “eat”, “more”, “milk” (sorta), and “bread” (sometimes). I haven’t really reinforced it. Oh sure once in a while I’ll toss out an “eat”, but for the most part, I do nothing. So I was surprised that she was picking them up.
We were given the opportunity to preview a couple new episodes of Baby Signing Time. It took me forever to let ther watch them since I had to move to a room with a DVD player and there’s nothing to strap her into for her to sit on, so I kept putting it off. I finally made the time (well, 2 days worth of time) and I have to say it was ok.
It’s definitely babier than she’s used to and there’s a ton of repitition (good for learning). I was surprised and a little disappointed that there were cartoons. One of the things I liked most about the ones we have is that there are no cartoons. The songs got on my nerves since they just do the same one over and over again. I think the kids would like it though since it gives them the chance to learn it. I like that they kept the kids signing. Eliana likes that part too. Yes, she told me.
Eliana watched it for about 20 minutes before she gave up altogether, which is about the same as with the older ones. She danced and swayed to the music just like she always does. She looked back at me and smiled every now and then just like usual. So I don’t guess there’s any difference to her. She hasn’t started doing any new signs since watching it, but she did only watch it once. It took a lot of watching to teach her the ones she knows.
So I guess I prefer the older stuff. Eliana, apparently, likes them both the same. All in all, I’d recommend it. It definitely taught Eliana and I love that she has a couple signs in her pocket. I’ve started reinforcing it everyday since I see how proud she is when she signs. I’ve learned a lot too.
Yeah, I think she likes it.
3:15am
Tony will be home tomorrow afternoon. About damn time. Maybe tomorrow night I won’t be awake at 3:15am. Maybe I’ll finally get some decent rest. I really hate that I can’t sleep when he’s gone. And maybe, just maybe I’ll have something to blog about. I know it’s been so very boring around here lately and I’m sorry. I’ll do better. I don’t think sleep deprivation looks good on me.
And Eliana has been waking up every night for the last week and I am so over it. She doesn’t stay awake long and I usually don’t even have to go in there, but still. She should be sleeping. I know it’s the teeth and it’ll pass, but I wish it’d pass quick.
I decided I’m not going to say “bye” when I get off the phone anymore. I’m going to say something completely random, like “monarch butterfly”. So far that’s the only one I’ve come up with. I think it might be nice to leave people bewildered and amused. I know I enjoy that feeling. Makes me giggly.
The other day I was talking to Coty about something I can’t remember. I think she was saying she would just come help me clean or watch Eliana or something. I asked if she could travel through space (as in, the distance between Georgia and Texas). She said no, she’d be travelling through time. I’m all, “don’t you mean space since it’s the distance that’s important?” and she’s all, “no, time, since you’re an hour behind me.” Apparently time travel is just crossing a time zone. Who knew?
It’s very late. Don’t judge me.
Check your couches
My phone fell into my couch. Not under the cushions or anything easy to fix like that. It fell into my couch. Like where the springs are. Of course I couldn’t have my couch ringing all the time, so I turned the couch over and took out the staples from the bottom material.
This is what I found in my couch:
I also found a bunch of toys, another binky, and a coaster under the couch. And a pair of pajamas in the cushions.
What’s in your couch?
Oh Me of little faith
I am of the opinion that Eliana doesn’t talk. I’m not sure if my expectations are just too high or what. Sometimes I think she might have said something that sounds like a word, but I always write it off as a fluke. I don’t know why I do this. So I’ve compiled a list of words Eliana probably says except her mother doesn’t give her enough credit.
- Look
- What’s that?
- Dog
- Kitty (only she says “bweeAH”) (Yeah, I don’t get it either.)
- tree
- snake
- bear
Safe and sound
Here’s what happened. I spent a lot of time not sleeping and being mostly ok with that. But life got really boring and unbloggable. So I didn’t blog. I know, I suck.
Then a hurricane was coming my way, so I spent a lot of time watching the weather channel and worrying. The path changed and it wasn’t headed toward me, but I didn’t want to take the chance that it would alter again. The house was boarded up and we were outta here.
We went with some friends to Laredo. On the way there, Scamper crapped on the seat of my car. Monkey threw up on the water bottles in the back AND in my diaper bag. The hotel we stayed in was awful. After running around for an hour, Eliana’s feet were BLACK. She would have been cleaner if she’d been running on dirt. Needless to say, she wore shoes after that.
I let her run herself ragged, but she was still difficult to put to sleep. She screamed for an hour. I cried. I finally managed to get her to sleep at 11pm. The AC stopped working at 1am. Since Eliana was sleeping, there was nothing I could do about it. By morning we were both miserable. I cried some more.
My friends and I decided to try to find someplace better to stay. We started calling around and most places didn’t take pets. We finally found a place that did and it sounded nicer. My friend and her husband went to check it out while I stayed with the kids (Eliana and 2 boys, ages 13 and 10). When they came back, we all left.
The new place was SO MUCH BETTER. My room wasn’t huge, but it was clean and had a king-sized bed. The shower was enormous. Their room had 2 queen beds and was really big. It was perfect for everyone to hang out in. We went out to lunch and spent some time walking around the mall. It was actually pretty nice. Eliana and I rode on the carousel.
When went back to the hotel and found out they have a happy hour in the lobby from 6-7pm. Free beer, popcorn, pretzels, and peanuts! It was 6:30, so the adults decided to head down. The boys were more than responsible enough to watch Eliana for an hour. (We should all be lucky enough to have kids as great as these. I am not even kidding, they are awesome!) Had a beer and some pretzels. We had been gone for an hour and when we got back, Eliana was sleeping. The older boy said she was sitting on the bed next to him playing with her toy laptop. He said she got tired of playing with it, pushed it away, laid down and fell asleep. I cannot even tell you how amazing this is. Yes, she’s always been a great sleeper and (usually) easy to put down, but NEVER that easy. We all hung out and chit-chatted until about 10:30.
I carried Eliana into our room and laid her on the bed. She didn’t wake up. I hated the thought of leaving her in a diaper all night that she’d already been in for a couple of hours. She was lying on her tummy, so I carefully got her skirt off and changed her diaper. While she was on her tummy. And asleep. And she didn’t wake up. Yes, I’m sure she was breathing. She slept peacefully all night long and woke up at 5am. I gave her some snacks and she played for a couple of hours. Then she climbed back in bed and went back to sleep. She must have been so worn out from the day before.
The man friend knocked on the door at 9 to tell me they had called some friends of theirs who didn’t evacuate and everything was safe to come home. So we packed up the cars, had a little breakfast and headed home.
I still have boards on my windows. I never lost power. We didn’t have to leave, but hindsight is 20/20. Better safe than sorry and all that. I’m glad to be back, but I feel like I’ll be cleaning for a week. The house was all nice until I ransacked it trying to pack up to evacuate.
Tony’s still gone for a couple of weeks, so I have time. And it’s not really that bad.
I’m so thankful everything turned out ok and we were safe. I hope my friends in the path stay safe and don’t suffer too much damage. I’ll be thinking of you.
Insomnia
I don’t sleep well when Tony isn’t here. I’ve slept about 7 hours total in the past 2 days. I spent all day being so tired, but here it is, 2:17am, and I’m still up. I had hoped since I spent the day being so exhausted, it would make it easy to sleep tonight. Um..no. Catching up on sleep…I’m doing it wrong.
On the bright side, if I can’t catch up on sleep, at least I’m catching up on cleaning.
