Sleep training day 4 and some happy shopping

Today is day 4, I put her in her room at 9:15pm, she gave up crying at 9:24pm. It seems like she keeps crying about 10 minutes after left her room since yesterday. But she starts crying earlier everyday. Day 1 she started at least 3 minutes after I left. Day 2 and day 3 she cried right after I closed the door. Today she cried before I even left. I think that it's because she's getting to know what's going to happen next.
To confirm all these torture process is good for Sophia, I read the book "what to expect toddler years". It turned out I was doing everything right. So I don't feel much guilty while listening her crying without doing anything. All I added after reading the book was a kiss and telling her I'll see her tomorrow. Hope we get over this soon, hope I'm not pushing her too much.
There are some good changes of Sophia after I started sleep training. She eats better, more real food, less snacks. She sleeps less at daycare during the day, I hate to her report says she slept from 12 to 3, she doesn't need 3 hours nap. Hope these good changes help sleep training.
I did a little shopping today, which was very successful. Grocery shopping, got what we needed for the rest of the week and a pound of fresh strawberry. Sophia enjoys sweet strawberry very much and keeps asking more.
I aslo did some happy shopping at Barns and Noble, got some books and a Happy face weekly planner. The cover is very cheerful, the design is very functional, even has a pocket for me to store coupons and notes. Now I can downsize my wallet. Now I think I'll next year refill for full price (scary).

Mom: Are you happy, Sophia?
Sophia: Happy!

Sophia learned a new word "happy" with my happy face weekly planer!

Sleep training day 3

I put her in her room at 8:57pm, she gave up crying at 9:09pm.

Sleep training is very painful

For both Sophia and me.
Day one: yesterday
I put her in her room at 10:52pm, she gave up crying at 11:24pm.
Day two: today
I put her in her room at 9:12pm, now it's 9:30pm, she's still crying but not as hard as when she just began. Update: she gave up at 9:31pm.

Something good and something bad

1. We started to smell "terrible two".
2. First big snow of this winter, super exited.
3. Great dinner with great friends, and great beers!


In the past few weeks, Sophia developed a couple new addictions.
"Elmo". She grew out of little people and fell in love with elmo. She asked to watch Elmo Videos first thing in the morning and first thing after her nap during the day. When she was playing in the playroom, she asked Elmo as backgroud. She asks to play Elmo computer game if we don't let her watch Elmo video. I just hope she will be able to sing elmo's song, count like elmo, go potty like elmo soon. As long as she doesn't request me to watch Elmo with her, I'll let her watch.
Snack. I bet Sophia's favorite spot of our house is the pantry. Because it houses all the snacks. She likes chocalates, chocalate cookies, nuts, dried fruits, crackers, BBQ flavored gold fish. She didn't eat any real meal whole day yesterday, all snacks. I felt pretty bad afterwards. As a mom I'll never let her do that again. Good side is that she ate lots of fruits. She had some pears, grapes and grapefruits ( a new favorite).
Dress up. Sophia always wants to try mommy's stuff, mommy's shoes, mommy's purse, mommy's scarf. She looks cute, and so like me at the moment.
Nosal spray. I remeber when she was little it was so hard to use nosal spray to help cleaning her stuffed nose. But since recently, she started to do that by herself with fun. And sometimes she even reminds me that she need it. Of course she helps with mommy and daddy's noses, too.

Terrible Two is approaching.
Sophia definetely says a thousand times of "no"s every day. She has her own opinion which is opposite to mommy's with no reason. She refuses to put on her top after bath. She refuses to put on her shoes in the morning. She refuses to sit in the chair at dinner time. She threw her food all over the floor. She did it again after time-out. She refuses to go to bed at 11pm. I fought it back by letting her sleep by herself and decided to train her from now on no matter what.


Snow white weekend
It snowed very heavily this weekend, which was nice because it wasn't too cold. Our neighbour kids built two snowmen in their back yard. Sophia jumped up and down when she saw the real snowmen vs. those in the books. She keeps calling snowman as "memo", don't know where that came from. While wzg was cleaning up the snow on our drive way and porch I wrapped up Sophia and let her play in the snow. She was super exited while playing in snow. She laughed, giggled, talked (I didn't understand what she was talking about) in the white snow. When she felt the cool of a real snow ball she didn't want to come back inside. Now I wish another big snow, so that we can play outside again. This is the first time I learned the joy of winter.


Beers!
Another great thing during this weekend was the dinner at zl's house. I liked it because it was very close, about a mile from our house, don't need to worry about traffic; it was super casual, not much cooking, not much preparing, all about chatting and eating. I had one beer and two cups of tea. I think they might cancel each other because I didn't have any problem falling asleep at night.

Pig tails

Sophia starts to love to have pig tails.

2nd birthday

Yesterday was Sophia's 2nd birthday. I made some cupcakes for her to bring to daycare and share with her friends. They look great in handmade boxes. I also wrapped up some goodies for her friends.
Presents? Since we opened last week, (she was sick, I let her open early), she didn't have anything to open, so I bought her some shoes and clothes. She was very happy, and insisted trying everything.
She's still too young to understand what birthday is, so I didn't make it big. Took some pictures at home, had a dinner at restaurant, sang birthday song, that's about it.
Next year it may not be so easy.

Meeting with Sophia's teacher

Here are some comments we got from Sophia's teacher:

To learn about self and others
Sophia sits with her peers while painting or glueing. She likes to be read to and will bring a book over to you. Sophia likes to play "Riang around the rosie" and row row, row your boat.

To learn about moving
Sophia loves to dance and sing songs. She jumps up and down. When outsite one the playground Sophia climbs up onto the jungle gym then slides down. Sophia pours water from one container to another.

To learn about the world
Sophia enjoys dressing up with her teachers and peers. Sophia tried to feed her baby doll chips. Sophia is always waiting to wash her hands after diapering or playing. Sophia looks at you for reaaurance when another child pushes her.

To learn about communicating
Sophia is beginning to use her words. For example: she will say "Ina", "not nice" and some of the other children's names. Sophia points to familar things in books, for example: baby, dog, birds.

Favorite activities and special interest

Sophia enjoys puzzles, painting, and all sensory activities. She is very interested in music instruments. She really likes playing our little piano.

Situations or experiences that cause distress

Sophia gets upset when people take toys from her, but when asked she will give toys back. If tender teddy stops by Sophia will hide behind her teacher.

Next step at the program and at home

Learning to clean up after ourselves at school and at home.

And I'm a proud mom of a little chef, here is a picture of what Sophia made the other night, a little salty, but with green onion, it tastes nice.

Projector is great!

Much better!

Sophia has been much better since Thursday night. However she doesn't behave so well as before becauseI indulged her a little while she was sick. She's addicted to Elmo potty game. She keeps asking to play that PC game all the time.

What a slow week!

This week has been very very slow because Sophia was sick. Yep, good days go fast, bad ones go slowly. Sophia started to throw up on Sunday night. She only went to daycare 2 days out of five this week. The daycare is haunted by stomach virus. She was getting better last night, played a lot, especially her new weebly catsle. I bought that for her 2nd birthday, but can't help opening it for her last night. Her eyes sparkled when she saw that toy. She played that whole night last night. Well worth the $$$ I spent.

2007 wishlist

Since the holiday laziness, I didn't go much shopping in Dec, which left me under budget for the month. Now it's time to plan the new year, 2007. Maybe I should have done that in 2006.
This is going to be a long list, and will take me longer to put together. Let me think....

One week with Daddy at home

I don't have any vacation at this holiday. So it has been daddy time. Sophia spent more than a week with daddy at home. Not at home, they went out shopping and played at museum, visited little friends and so on.