Settling back in

It's been a few weeks since my last post, mostly because I haven't taken a lot of pictures and there hasn't been too much to report. On New Year's Day, we went to Liz and Dave's in Three Hills for our southern Alberta family get-together. It was a fun day - the drive home was a bit treacherous, but we made it! This week we got back into our normal routine - Brian went back to work on Monday and we missed him a lot, especially that first day. I went swimming again and our volleyball league started up so that was great for me! We had a busy weekend with some junior high basketball girls staying here on Friday night, a big Kroeker family party on Saturday night, and then a Penner birthday party for lunch and the afternoon. It was fun, but exhausting. Again I have to marvel at how adaptable Lynsey is - I think I take it for granted that she just goes with the flow, but we really are lucky because I know some babies don't do as well as she does.

As far as Lynsey's progress, well she has been busy busy busy as usual! The taking away of the soother has not bothered her a bit - in fact, Brian and I both think she is less whiney during the day without it. She still has her moments, but before I think she was whining so we would give it to her, and now that it's gone, she doesn't have that reason to whine anymore. Needless to say I am thrilled that we did it! She had a few rough nights, but it really didn't take long and she was totally fine at night without it again. I forgot to mention last post that in the last three weeks or so, she has started sucking on her sippy cups more consistently! Hurray for Lynsey! She uses a straw quite proficiently as well(although she still often sucks in too much at a time which causes her to cough). At least she is sucking on it! She started turning around in circles making herself dizzy which is kind of funny to watch:). We've taken her outside a few times in the last week since it's finally warm enough, and she just loves it! She's so cute, this little marshmallow, trooping down the sidewalk!

Christmas in La Crete, falling down more stairs, taking away the soother, etc.

We had a great Christmas up in La Crete! Before we went up, we had the Penner Christmas at Brian's parents where Lynsey, once again, got spoiled:). We left for La Crete at 4:20pm on the 23rd and it was a pretty good trip. We took it easy on the roads, especially the Red Earth road, and where at my parents house just before midnight. Lynsey did pretty well! She seems to reach a point of acceptance where she realizes that she is stuck and can't do anything about it. She has her occasional outburst where she tries to get out of her carseat, but quickly realizes it's not happening and settles down again. All in all, I would say she's an above average traveller. We had lots of fun with my family up in La Crete! We played some games, did a puzzle, visited - good times! Lynsey was a bit whiney at the family gathering on Boxing Day - she likes being around people, but I think it was just a bit much for her. We did have a pretty scary moment on Christmas Day when she fell down my parents stairs. She gets too brave sometimes and I knew it, but we just lost track of her for long enough for her to try to stand and turn, and down she went. Amazingly, she was totally fine! Those are hard stairs, and she fell a long way, and all she had was a mark on her nose and some rugburn on her forehead! A miracle - we were sooo thankful. We left on the morning of the 27th and drove to Westlock to visit with Ryan and Ruthy. We left their place around 8 and went home - it was so good to be home! We had decided before we left that when we got home, we would take Lynsey's soother away. My doctor said it was time to do it because of how many teeth she has, and from the reading I did, it seems like if you don't do it around the age of 1 you basically have to wait until they're 2 which I was not willing to do. She has benefited from the soother and I'm not sorry I started her on it, but I think it's time for her to stop depending on it to go to sleep. The first night was okay - she went to sleep beautifully, getting our hopes up pretty high, but she got up once at 2, at which time she was pretty easily soothed back to sleep, but when she got up at 6, it was a different story. She did not want us to leave her alone in her room. It was a rough morning. However, her second day (yesterday) was much smoother - her nap went well and she had a great night, only waking up once at 6:30, where she was once again easily soothed back to sleep and slept until 8:30. I think it was the right time to take it away, and even though it was hard to see her so sad and know that there was a solution to her problems in the drawer right next to me, I don't regret doing it now. Now that the worst is behind us, I'm so glad we did it!

She is saying more words now and it's very exciting! She says "ba" for ball, and "haa" for hot, and she is understanding more and more of what we say. I asked her to come and give me a hug and she actually did! It's so fun to see this new phase where she is learning to talk and listens to what I say! It's also interesting to contrast her personality to the other kids her age she saw this Christmas. Amazingly, she never cried when a kid took a toy away, but many a kid cried when she took their toy away! I hope so much that this means she will have Brian's easy-going personality - her life will be much less stressful if that is the case:).

Christmas time!

Since my last post, it has become clear that Lynsey is beginning to understand some of the things we say, and she is definitely starting to mimic us more. She makes car noises when she pushes toy cars (or anything for that matter!), and anytime we tell her "no" she says it back to us. She doesn't exactly know what it means, but we think she might finally be STARTING to get it! She stands by stuff she's not supposed to have and says "no no no no" so although it doesn't always deter her, she knows there's something different about these forbidden things. I asked her yesterday to kiss her doll three different times and she did all three times so we think she MIGHT be starting to understand some of the things we say! I love that we can communicate a bit with her now!

We did our family Christmas last Saturday. I know it seems really early, but the week was so busy coming up and we wanted to do it at home alone before we left to go up north, so we thought Saturday was as good a day as any. Obviously, Lynsey doesn't really care too much about presents yet, but it was still fun to give her some new toys. Steve and Andrea came over on Wednesday and stayed with us for a few days. We then drove up to Edmonton on Friday afternoon despite all the cold weather and snow we've been having - the show must go on! The roads were fine - we didn't have any trouble, although there were several people in the ditch, so who knows what they were doing. We went to the Oilers game in the evening while Lynsey stayed with her Grandma - what a fun game! The first few periods were kind of iffy, but they picked it up in the third to tie it and we got to see a shootout live for the first time! I get sooo nervous when I see a shootout on TV, so you can imagine what a basketcase I was to see it live! Unfortunately, we couldn't pull it out in the end, but it was a very exciting game and we even got to see a fight in the section over from us so I'd say we got our moneys worth (well, Brian's mom got her money's worth because the game was her gift to us - great idea!!). Yesterday we had Christmas with Brian's family. Lynsey had to quickly open her presents and then she went to bed while the rest of us exchanged gifts, but it was for the best! Over the years, I'm sure she'll want to be around for all the gifts but for this year, she needed to be in bed at 7:30:). So far, Christmas has been a really good time! More Christmas today with Brian's Penner family, and then on Tuesday it's off to La Crete. Here's hoping the weather's good!