trick or treat

With the end of daylight savings time still a few days away, the skies did not darken until well after 6:00 tonight and by the time Ally was costumed and ready to hit the streets of our old neighborhood, she was pretty pooped (though she would crack a faint smile for an M & M). She also had a low fever yesterday and this morning, so though she didn't seem to be sick she wasn't her jolly self. We stayed outside for about an hour chatting with neighbors and Ally held out her treats bucket in an obliging sort of way. By the time we were home, she was falling asleep as we put her into her crib.

happy pumpkin day, part 1

Today was the Halloween party at our family daycare. It was a full house with all the children at the daycare now (8 total, though half are part time) plus children who were at the daycare previously, plus their parents. We played pin the tail on the cat, ghost bowling, and a guess the ghost game which involved putting a white sheet over a child and having another child "guess who?" There were also of course lots of sugary snacks and by the end of the party Ally was bouncing on and off the sofa squealing "some! some! some!", her name for the white chocolate snack mix I brought. (As in, "Ally do you want some?") As you can see, Ally is a ladybug this year, though the hearts rather than dots make me think they were thinking "lovebug" at Old Navy.

the anti-spoonmaster

After reading about our friend's son who has become quite handy with a spoon, I was inspired to be more persistent in my attempts to encourage Ally to use her fork and spoon at meal time. So far the attempts have had mixed success. She will often manage to get a few bites in her mouth with the spoon and she likes watching me "poke" her food with a fork, but when it comes time to really get to the eating, Ally prefers her hands. Meanwhile, I have never let her try certain foods, like soup or yogurt. But recently I decided to let her try yogurt solo. Note the results.

my favorite things

by Ally, 17 months.

10. Goldfish crackers
9. Acorns
8. Ducks
7. Spinning
6. Cheese
5. Teddy and Mr P
4. Kitties
3. Hugging
2. Crayons
1. Throwing mulch

change, and change, and change again

A common piece of advice I heard as a new mother was to lower my expectations. And it's good advice, though the way in which it applies to life as a parent continues to change as Ally grows (we, of course, stay completely the same and never grow either up or out). With a newborn I learned to lower my expectations for the cleanliness of my home, the quantity of my physical activity, and the quality of my sleep. But generally these expectations involved changing my life and place in the world. As Ally's sense of her place in the world changes, a.k.a. our little dictator earns her stripes, I'm also learning to lower my expectations for her behavior. So here's a list of things Ally has done, say, within the past week that I thought a child of mine would never do.

1. Refused a healthy lunch of chicken, brown rice, and broccoli and demanded a microwavable bowl of chef-boy-ar-dee macaroni and cheese.
2. Fell in love with a pink highlighter found on the ground at the playground, which she carried until I pried it from her hands and she sobbed.
3. Poked me in the eyeball and said, "eye."
4. Ran through the condo naked as I chased her with a diaper.
5. Watched her Mama ignore her requests to "color" because Ally refuses to let go of crayons once she has them and colors everything in sight.

Perhaps the key conclusion though is that changing my expectations means also realizing that even when all of these things occur within a single afternoon, Ally will still turn out ok. Probably.