New Quilt

I've mentioned one of my closest friends is currently expecting, and they just found out it's a boy! I admit a teensy bit of disappointment because I was hoping for a partner in crime for Sweet'ums, but a boy is going to be a blast. He's going to be beautiful, I just know it.

And, of course, a new baby means making a new quilt. I'm thinking of making something a bit bigger than a crib blanket so he can use it longer, so maybe 60" square. I think I've got a block pattern picked out (the 2 by 4 block at that link), so now I just have to choose fabrics.

In some ways it should be easy enough. They're doing the nursery in brown and blue with teddy bears. This is great! Teddy bears are generic enough to be easy to locate, and the colors are pretty trendy right now.

The challenge for me is going to be finding fabrics that are masculine enough to use for a boy blanket. Being female, and having a daughter, I'm drawn to fabrics that I would use for her. Finding non-floral prints for a boy should be an interesting challenge and hopefully I'll be able to pull this off.

I'm also excited to announce that today, my daughter went to Poppy (my dad) and told him she wanted to sit on the potty. So he put her on the potty and she sat there for a little while. Finally he thought she was "done" so he took her off and put her diaper back on. Just a little while later she had a dirty diaper. This might seem like defeat, but I'm excited that she noticed the urge and connected it to sitting on the potty, and even more excited that she actually told someone!

So this is a good day for me. We've got a new quilt in the works and maybe, just maybe, my child will one day decide that going potty like a big girl is worth the effort.

Silly and Excited

My baby won her first award!



Ok, so it's not a big award or anything, but she won the BGMC award at the church my parents go to. For those of you not familiar with the program, it's the children's missions program in the Assemblies of God. She was apparently the top giver in the church for the month of July. Keep in mind, this is a very small church.

I don't know how much change was in her Buddy Barrel or where, exactly, all of it came from (she's good about picking up and collecting money she finds, and I'm sure Mom gave her plenty to put in there). But I'm proud. I do believe it's important to teach kids to have a giving attitude from a young age. It's a virtue we've wanted to work on with her but have had limited opportunities to do something with her that she could understand. The old church didn't really do much like this, and I'm glad that she's being involved in this program now.

One thing I think is really cute is that she uses my old Buddy Barrel from when I was a kid. The program encourages kids and churches to take care of their barrels ("be good stewards," to use their words), not lose them or break them or mistreat them. That thing has to be almost fifteen years old. How's that for longevity?

Last BGMC Sunday the pastor's wife told my mom to make sure Sweet'ums was there this month. I'm pretty sure at the time my mom told me that the P'sW had told her that she had something for Sweet'ums, because for whatever reason my mom and I were already sure she'd won. I even made her a dress for the occasion (which is a little big because she's between sizes right now). When they got there today though the pastor's wife thought it was odd that Mom knew Sweet'ums had won. Apparently she had no idea until this week herself, which makes me wonder if the District handles it now instead of the individual churches. So either we just had an attack of intuition or the pastor's wife forgot that she knew.

Anyway, that's all I've got. I'm just a proud mom tonight and wanted to share.

Brain Fog

We had a great time at our movie the other night, even though Sweet'ums couldn't sit still and ended up going to sleep. Despicable Me was a cute movie, for those of you with kids who would appreciate it.

Sweet'ums' gymnastics class went pretty well. I'm still not sure if I like the teacher but I know our options are limited and really, we have to give her a chance. I just don't think she spends enough time with each child (there's only five of them!) and she doesn't seem to have a clue how to handle toddlers. You have to think one step ahead of them if you want to keep them in line, and Sweet'ums ran circles around this poor girl. Too bad parents aren't allowed to help with this class! She looked like she needed it!

I went to the doctor for my ear yesterday and for now everything looks great. I'm relieved about it.

And last night my daughter was up for the longest time coughing again. I'm thinking we might have to take her to the doctor yet again for this mess. I don't want her to get really sick this time just to get something done about it.

Hence, my brain fog. I wrote an email a while ago that was barely coherent; for those of you I commented on in the last few minutes, please bear with me if I make little sense. I'm trying!

This coming week I'll try to get some pictures of my girl in action in her class.