Halloween: rockin' the cow

This Halloween was a big success.  Brandon was gone on a field trip over the weekend so we headed out to stay with my family.  Violet went to two trunk-or-treats out there all dressed up as a  chicken.  She caught on to the idea quickly.  Her bag of candy started getting heavy, so I tried to hold it for her, but she would NOT let go of it.  I also witnessed her talking about candy in her sleep since she slept with me all weekend. 

 

 Besides trunk-or-treats, we had a blast with the cousins, went to Stephen F. Austin park, I finally got my hair cut, and we had a Halloween-themed dinner.  It was so nice to not have to stay by myself all weekend.

Her costume was awesome.  Onesie made by me, shiny pants made by Brandon.

 Sunday night, Brandon came home just in time for Halloween.  We went to our ward's trunk-or-treat tonight and Violet finally got to spend some time with Daddy.

 After that, we went to Chipotle to get boo-ritos.  They were doing a Halloween promotion where if you came in dressed up as a farm animal, they would give you one of their huge burritos for just $2.  Since I was a cow and Violet was a chicken, it worked out perfectly.  The cashier even asked to take a picture of Violet because she was just so cute.  And plenty of people got a kick out of my pregnant belly/udder.

Moo!

Best. Pumpkin. Ever.

Okay, so I'm a little excited about this baby.  Excited enough that I immortalized my uterus on our pumpkin.  But isn't it AWESOME?

The bright spot near the top is a rotten part, since pumpkins don't last more than 45 minutes in this humidity.  We can just pretend it's supposed to be the umbilical cord or something.

The problem with articles (more complaining)

I know, I'm whiny. And I'm about to dish on yet another pet peeve of mine. So feel free to not read this if you don't want to hear more of my complaining. But if you do read this, just know that I warned you.

Here it is: Some parents spend more time reading articles on raising a child than they actually spend with their child. And they like to send me the links to those articles, which I promptly delete. You may wonder why I feel this way about articles, considering that I spent most of my last post defending the AAP's recommendations on safety.

I probably wouldn't mind articles if people got them from medical journals or other reliable sources. But it turns out that not that many people subscribe to medical journals (you don't count, Mom). Most people like to get their advice from parenting magazines or websites that throw around phrases like "studies show" and "research suggests" without actually citing their sources. Maybe this comes from being married to someone who does research for a living, but I always wonder, "What studies? What were their methods? How many people did they test? Was there a control group? Were there any obvious lurking variables? Were the results repeatable?" And they never say. (Obviously, because if they did most people would fall asleep after reading the first paragraph. I never said that peer-reviewed journals aren't dry.)

What people also need to think about is, who writes these articles? Not the people who actually do the research. They are probably way too nerdy to make it sound cute and trendy enough to be put into a parenting magazine. It was probably written by a jornalist. Or, if you found it online, anyone who has an 8th grade education and an opinion.

Yeah, for now, I'm just going to delete them all.

"...and my kids all turned out fine."

I really hate it when people say that. People tell you that a lot as a parent, especially now that most new parents have access to all of the AAP recommendations on safety. I find that many times, parents who think they have "been around the block" like to tell you how useless your safety precautions are. I have always put Violet to sleep on her back, because it is supposed to reduce the risk of suffocation and death. And people will say, "Oh, my kids all slept on their tummies, and they turned out fine. My kids had bumpers in their cribs and they turned out fine. My babies ate honey and they turned out fine." And it makes me wonder if people really understand statistics. Yes, your kids probably turned out fine. But the fact is, when you're talking about something like SIDS, the chance of it actually happening are less than 1%, even if you do everything wrong. You could put your baby on its belly and surround it with pillows every night and chances are he will still be alive on his first birthday. But that doesn't mean that preventative measures don't decrease that risk even further. I would rather have a back-sleeping baby with a .5% risk of death than a tummy-sleeping baby with a 1% risk of death, even if the risk is low either way. (By the way, I just made up those statistics, but you get the point.) I understand, some babies sleep better on their bellies. If you decide that getting a few more hours of sleep is worth taking that small risk, then I'm not here to judge. After all, the AAP doesn't raise your child, you do. But please, don't pretend that the fact that your baby is still alive in the morning is proof that the AAP recommendations are all bogus. Observation of your own child does NOT constitute a scientific study.

A birthday and a dumb idea

It's official.  Violet is 2.  All that time and I still can't believe what a cute little girl she is.  The night before her birthday I stayed up late finishing a dress that I was making for her.  On her birthday, she loved being the center of attention.  All we did was have some cupcakes, but to her it was the greatest thing in the world.  She is growing so fast and has so much personality.

 And for those of you who don't see me much, I included a belly picture. 

Speaking of bellies, I did something really stupid on Sunday that I am now paying for. Brandon was trying to measure how high in the air Violet could jump. After she did it, she turned to me and said, "mommy jump." And despite the fact that I am 7 months pregnant and 30 lbs over my normal weight, I stood by the tape measure and repeatedly jumped as high as I could so that Brandon could measure my vertical.  I'll admit, I knew this wasn't the brightest idea, but I thought I may be a little sore the next day and then be over it.  No way!  My entire body has felt sore/bruised for the past 2 days.  It hurts to sit, bend over, and lay on my side (which is the only position in which I can lay anymore).  The muscles in my abs (or what's left of them), back, chest, arms, and legs have gone on strike.  Seriously people, don't do it.  My body hurts so much that it is tricking itself into thinking it's actually sick.

Camping!

This weekend we went camping for the first time in over a year.  I had wanted to go much more often but during the spring, Brandon was too busy and in the summer when he actually had time, it was WAY too hot. We had a lot of fun but because of the drought, we weren't allowed to build a fire, which meant no s'mores.  We also forgot to take a flash light (or any kind of light) and got to the park around dusk so there wasn't much to do with Violet before bedtime.  That didn't keep her from being very entertained, though. We put her to bed in the tent at about 8:45 but heard her jumping around and talking until about 10 pm.  It was quite a night in the tent.  Brandon, Violet, and pregnant Lindsey all shared a full-size air mattress.  Since I have so much extra weight now I normally sleep with 2 pillows but I forgot them all at home.  At 4 AM I took a trip to the bathroom, which woke Violet up.  When we tried to go back to sleep, she sang "Jesus wants me for a sun beam" in our tent for awhile.  The next morning was better, and we got to have some fun at the park.

Violet learned how to swing from a vine,

 

we went down to see the river,

and we went on a nice walk... before we all got hot, sore, and tired and called it quits for the day.

A conversation at our house this morning

(as Violet is sitting on the porch, going through Brandon's rocks)

Me: Brandon, Violet is sticking fossils up her nose!

Brandon: Violet, stop sticking fossils up your nose! Those snails have been dead for 70 million years!

I am definitely married to a geologist.

An interesting start

Since I didn't announce this pregnancy right away, I almost forgot about a few funny things that happened right at the beginning.  I went to a party with Violet and some friends at the beginning of April.  The entire time I was there, Violet kept sticking her butt in the air and looking at me through her legs.  One friend (who is Navajo, by the way) looked at Violet and said, "in my culture, when a baby looks through its legs, it means there is another baby on the way." I thought it was pretty interesting and just laughed.  Little did either of us know that a week later I would be holding a positive pregnancy test.  (I can't tell you how hard she laughed when I told her that she had predicted this baby.)

In May we went to visit Brandon's family.  We knew we would be telling them about the pregnancy since that was the only time we would be seeing them all year.  I don't normally announce these things in a cute or creative way-- it's just not my style.  But for some reason I thought about the Mexican Christmas tradition of the cake with a little plastic baby Jesus inside and I convinced Brandon that it would be funny to make one for his family.  So in Idaho we found some plastic babies at the dollar store and put them in a cake we baked (which, as you can see, was SUPER ugly) and watched with delight as his family found tiny little babies in their slices of cake. The look of confusion on their faces was priceless. 

 Hopefully our baby will be much cuter.

Mixed signals

I often find myself catching Violet doing something and saying, "Stop that!  But first, do it again so that I can get a picture of it."  Yes, I am one clear and consistent parent. 

In this picture she was supposed to be helping me make key lime pie for Brandon's birthday.  Instead, I caught her drinking a jar of sprinkles.

 I got Brandon a rock light for his birthday.  It turns out the rock it's made of is halite (aka salt).  So Brandon showed her to lick it.  And now she licks it ALL THE TIME.