September 25th

The other day my mom sent Vallerie an umbrella to match the rain boots I got her. Vallerie was thrilled. There was a letter that went with it and Vallerie had fun reading it. There were also lollipops, which Vallerie also loved. I snapped a few pictures of her with the umbrella and in the boots.

Yesterday I decided to make Vallerie a chart. This chart has things like "go to bed nicely", "Finish dinner", etc. Well, when she does one of those things then her duck in that row can move forward. (little magnetic ducks) When she gets her duck to the star she gets a reward.  When I implemented it yesterday she was not really into it at first, so I decided to make her ducks move ahead for really simple things like throwing out her garbage. Well, that seemed to work. Last night she was hopped up on sugar (more on that in a bit) and Eddie and I told her that if she went to bed nicely, without fussing that in the morning she could move her duck forward. Well, she did, and this morning when she got up, the first thing she said to me was that she wanted to move her duck.

Last night was movie night! After dinner we got a big bowl of popcorn and another big bowl and filled it with candy (gummy worms, candy pumpkins, circus peanuts, and twizzlers) then we moved the couch really close to the tv and watched Epic. It was pretty good. Vallerie did a few funny things while it was on. She covered her eyes a few times and said "wowzers" (weird). She got a little antsy towards the end, but it was past her bed time. When we did get her to go to bed she was literally bouncing off the walls. Lesson learned I suppose.

This morning, Vallerie found the bowl with the candy in it. She wanted that for breakfast. I told her no and she totally freaked out. Then I told her that if she didn't calm down then I would take her ducks away. That worked like a charm.

Here is a picture of her chart and one of her being silly.

September 19th

It's been a while The website wasn't working for me so I haven't been able to actually do anything. Not that there's much going on anyway.

Last week Eddie's sister had her baby. Eva Ellen. While she was in the hospital we watched her son Raymon. He was a good kid. Our Vallerie was mean. I realize she is an only child and everything is "hers" but she was just mean. She would rip toys out of Ray's hands, push and pull him, and just not be a very friendly child. So, we decided that she needs child interaction and we are going to put her in daycare for at least one day a week. Maybe pre-school. She's almost fully potty trained. Almost as in, she is, but has the occasional accident.

Speaking of our wonderful child, she's been doing this new thing where she'll ask you for something and then no matter what you say, her response is "deal" and then she'll put her hand in yours and make you shake it! I don't know what I agreed to the other day, but I'm a little scared.

It rained really hard last night and stormed something terrible. Our windows were shaking! It woke me up, but luckily it didn't wake up Vallerie. I have no clue how on earth she slept through it.

That's really all that's been going on. We're happy it's fall. We've had the windows open for about a week now. Had to close them last night with the storm. It wasn't raining when I came in to work today, but as soon as I pulled into the parking lot it started. By the time I got out and on the sidewalk it was pouring. 2 minutes after I get inside it has stopped. Lovely.

September 5th

It's hard to believe that September is here already. Fall is Eddie and my favorite time of year, so I'm actually pretty happy that summer is ending. I wish it was fall weather all year round.

Ok, so I have a few things to blog about (I wrote them down so I wouldn't forget)

Vallerie has been talking to her stuffed animals. Mainly her favorite, Bot. Not only does she talk to them, but she makes them talk back. They have their own voices too. Bot's voice for example is low, and her dolls (barbie princesses) have high voices. It is so fun to hear her play like that. Bot is her favorite. He now needs his own food and occasionally his own drink. She won't share her food with him.

It stormed over the weekend (for like 15 minutes) and Vallerie was scared. She didn't want to sleep in her room so Eddie and I put her in our bed and laid with her until she fell asleep. Then we left and went to the living room to hang out. When it was our bed time, I went in to lay down and Vallerie was taking up 3/4 of the bed. She was laying sideways. So, I told Eddie that he would have to sleep on the couch. Vallerie never stops moving. When she's awake she doesn't sit still. She is no different when she sleeps. This kid was all over the place when she was asleep! I finally had to put her back in her own bed just so I could get some actual sleep.

This may seem like a normal thing to most people, but Vallerie has never, and I mean never slept in our bed. Oh, we've wanted her to, but she just never has. So this was a real treat for us. I loved every second of it.

A couple weeks ago I bought Vallerie some rain boots and promised her that the next time it rained she could go out and jump in the puddles. So since it stormed/rained the night before, I took Vallerie out to jump in the puddles. She loved it. We walked up to the gas station and she was jumping in puddles all along the way. By the time we got home she was soaked.

While we were gone a little girl from up the road stopped by with her sister who was almost 4, and wanted to know if Vallerie was home so they could play. (We had met them before when we bought some fundraiser stuff off of the older one) Eddie said that we were out walking to the station. Vallerie and I actually met them as we were walking home (we didn't know they stopped by the house at the time) and the older one said that she thought that Vallerie and her sister could be friends because they were about the same age. She said she was taking her sister to the park. I didn't think anything of it and Vallerie and I went home. Eddie told me that they stopped by, and I felt bad for not getting the hint that they wanted to play with Vallerie. Since Vallerie was wet from puddle jumping, I put her in the tub. Well, the girls stopped back by on their way home from the park. Since Vallerie was taking a bath she couldn't play. We told the girls to come back the next day and Vallerie could play then. They didn't come back. I was a little sad because I want Vallerie to have friends her age, and now we know there is a little girl a few houses down that is her age.

Vallerie is really becoming a little person. It's amazing to watch all the neat things she does. She'll sing at random. Instead of asking for something or talking to us, she'll just randomly sing whatever she wants or is thinking. She almost always sings when she goes to the potty.

Eddie and I got these cloth poster things (from a game) They are the perfect size for a cape. Vallerie will put one on and run around the house. Her superpower is shrinking people. She will make out a growling sound (that's when she's shrinking you) It's so funny.

Last night at dinner we were talking to her and she told us that there was a monster under her bed. After several questions we found out that the monster is a giant spider. He's friendly, he has blue eyes, he wears a shirt, and his name is Shappyshaw. What an imagination this kid has. Wow.

We got the back part of the roof done. It looks really nice. You can't really see it from the street, so it doesn't look mismatched when driving by. We'll need to do the rest some time in the future. Hopefully we'll have the $ soon. It'll probably be within a year or two. Don't want to wait too long on it.

I believe that's all the news I have for now.