18 Months

Turning 18 is pretty significant so 18 months is too, right? At least at our house it was! I got to thinking about Blythe turning 18 months and how this would be her last big milestone as a single toddler (started to type kid, but she's not a kid just yet, I will hang on to toddler a little while longer) who had undivided attention from mom and dad. I didn't go nutzo and have a party, but I did make a point to have a nice picnic. We just happened to be watching Ian on Saturday so we had Ian and his parents out to the park for a hot dog picnic and we picked the park near Oslo's house in hopes of seeing him as well. Blythe lucked out and got to see both her buddies! After our picnic and running around the park we piled Ian and Blythe into the car to return home for an afternoon nap.

Ian giving Blythe a birthday kiss

Blythe, Ian, and Oslo hanging out on the lamp post

When Blythe woke up from her nap it seemed that she had woken up on the wrong side of the bed, she was a bit fussy and clingy. It wasn't long after nap time that Ian's parents returned from their basketball game to collect Ian. Patrick and Kera (our wonderful neighbors who are due a month ahead of us) had invited us over for dinner and Jason had volunteered we would bring dessert. Jason had a craving for peanut butter cookies so he and Blythe set out to make them. Of course Jason ignored all warnings against letting toddlers eat raw eggs and Jason and Blythe went to town licking up the dough from the spatula, bowl, beaters, etc. After they finished "precleaning" they put the cookies on the cookie tray. Blythe really enjoyed this because it was like playing with play-doh. The special cookies were the ones with nice little Blythe hand/finger prints instead of your typical fork scraped lines.







I guess making the cookies was just a really great distraction from the fact that she didn't feel very good. As soon as the cookies were in the oven and Jason sat down she immediately crawled up in his lap and laid her sad little body down on his, pulled at her ears and said "aw." Jason and I both looked at each other with a pouty face because it is oh so heart wrenching when your little one is sick. We quickly realized that it had nothing to do with her waking up on the wrong side of the bed, she was running a fever and it appeared that we had another ear infection. I immediately went into 'oh no I am bad mom' mode because just a few weeks ago we had our first every ear infection. We were given an antibiotic that Blythe absolutely HATED. I am talking 2 adults holding her down and having to squeeze teeny tiny amounts in at a time and forcing her to swallow kind of hate. We were supposed to continue to give it to her until the bottle was gone, but after 10 days we had had enough. Further confession: there were even days when she only got one dose instead of the prescribed 2 doses because Jason wasn't always up and moving in the morning before we needed to leave. So because of this negligence I was thinking oh no, now she has a double ear infection and its all my fault (sniff, sniff).

Sunday she seemed sickish off and on, but quite a bit better. I needed to make her 18 month check-up anyways so I figured I would aim for Monday in case we did have an ear infection we would want to have that remedied before Nathan and Caitlin's wedding this weekend. I lucked out and when I called this morning they had a 2pm appointment. O.K. well I lucked out that they had an appointment in the afternoon, but the timing was completely unlucky. That is RIGHT during nap time and my baby needs her rest, but I knew I needed to take her today, just in case I had caused this. So I set out to be supermom with the expectation of picking up Maddie, swinging by to get Blythe and making it back to the house and have her down for a nap by 12:30 so she could get a quick hour in. My supermom cape was just a little shorter than I had hoped for so it was more like 12:45 before I got her down so that gave her 45 minutes to nap. I pondered whether it would be better to just postpone the nap till 3ish or let her get what she could and I opted for the later thinking that it was already going to be a somewhat challenging Dr.'s appointment with 2 kiddos (I need to update on Maddie, more on that later) and having a really fussy, over tired kiddo would not add to that fun. So I reluctantly woke her up at 1:30 (I just hate waking up a baby/toddler/kid it just feels so wrong) and threw her in the car, needless to say she was NOT impressed.

By the time we got to the Dr.'s office she was well on her way to recovering from the abrupt wake-up and enjoyed the table and chairs at the Dr.'s office. All the while I cant help but think that she is probably picking up some kind of other virus from the other sick kiddos who have played there. Maddie was a real trooper and sat quietly in the stroller gnawing away on a once frozen teething ring. Blythe weighed in at 20 pounds 12 ounces and 31 inches long. That drops her down to the 10th percentile for weight and the 25th percentile for height (WOW how her body composition has changed). AND we lucked out because both her ears look great and the doctor said she looks perfect so some little short lived virus on Saturday, THANK YOU, I can now remove my bad mommy badge. We usually end up with 3 or 4 shots and this time we only needed 1, hep A, to be caught up and that was nice. We don't go again until 24 months. wow. 2 years old. 2 babies by then. NOT ready for that. To my surprise by the time we got home both her and Maddie were showing signs of wanting another nap so they are both sleeping soundly.

We had spaghetti for dinner last night and well the bowl got a little anxious and jumped right off the high chair. Lucky for the clean-up crew it landed right side up (aka mommy because Jason had a take-home test that started at 8am that he was still working on. Blythe and mommy do NOT like take home tests, it takes away from our daddy time)!

Blythe is ALL about her babies these days and she can turn just about anything into a baby bed. Here she is 'helping witht the dishes' needless to say I couldn't really load any spaghetti sauces dishes in there otherwise her babies would have been a mess.

Sewing Projects:

This weekend I set out with 2 sewing projects in mind. A growth chart for Blythe, I decided that she probably should of had one by 12 months so she certainly needs one for 18 months. I was determined to enjoy her 18 month birthday with her as well as complete this growth chart. She helped me cut out the fabric Saturday morning and I sewed it during her nap. Of course since I actually got the growth chart finished we didn't actually measure her on Saturday and somehow we forgot yesterday :(. So hopefully we will get her measured today and I haven't decided which date I will use.

Blythe helping mommy cut the material

Blythe abandons the sewing project to read to her babies


Checking to make sure Dada is measuring her just right.

Investigating the growth chart, check out the hair in the back!

My second sewing project was by request of my wonderful sister in law, Rachel. Mr. Wilkes and her are training for a triathlon and she wanted a wet bag for her swimsuit, so naturally I jumped at the chance to make her one and I couldn't leave Mr. Wilkes out. This was my first attempt at sewing a zipper so I can't say its professional, but hey I think I did a pretty good job. Pics to come.