Proof that a big girl officially lives in this house

I set up Kiya's brand new twin size bed today. I took apart the rest of the crib and it is now official. Sniff Sniff. There is no longer a crib in this house at least for now :)



And here she is reading one of her favorite books :)

We have been home 18 months today. We came home with a less than 6 month old 12lb baby. Now we are 2 weeks away from a full fledged 2 year old that weighs close to 27lbs and has more spunk than I know what to do with sometimes. She is keeping me on my toes and in the last week I have gone up and down the stairs more times than I can remember returning her to bed at nap time.

That said she is the light of my life spunk and all and I am so proud of my big girl. She loves being a big girl. Last night she was just beaming with pride when she went pee pee on the potty before bedtime and got to flush the toilet. Now if we could just convince her that the hours between 3am and 5am are meant for sleeping and not singing/talking that would be helpful.

My oh my...what have we done

Some how we managed to survive the weekend of change. Kiya did great with the potty training. There were a few times that she resisted and we just left the bathroom and went on with our day. She did have multiple successes though and she seemed really proud of herself. It for sure hasn't all clicked yet but it will.

Today will also be the first time at daycare that they will take Kiya to the potty. She says potty, knows that other kids go in there so we figured let's go for it. We do have a rule at home though that she can't flush the toilet or have toilet paper unless she goes pee pee or poop in the potty. I know some may say that is mean but otherwise she would just keep asking to go potty just so she could flush and wash her hands.

We also took the crib apart. It converts to a toddler bed. In my state of denial, I thought for sure Kiya would stay in bed. She stays on her mat at daycare at naptime so it didn't seem like a stretch. One loud thud heard from downstairs and we both ran up the stairs faster than the speed of light. Apparently she found a way out of her toddler bed. She either climbed over the bed rail or squeezed through the gap. Not fun. We put her back in bed and within minutes she was out again.

For safety reasons, we put the mattress on the floor for the rest of the night. Mommy foiled two other attempts over night to get out of bed. We are using the super nanny approach so first time she gets up we tell her it is bed time and put her back in bed. Second time she gets up we gain return her to bed and say good night. Third and subsequent times there are no words, we just return her to bed. I have seen this routine go on for hours on the TV show so our 30 some minutes until she fell asleep didn't seem that bad. We shall see how tonight goes.

Then there was this morning....my sweet, curious daughter got out of bed and decided that playing with diapers would be a good idea. She went to the cabinet and started to take diapers out and put them in the diaper pail. I heard a noise and went and saw her standing in the middle of the room with a diaper. I thought at first oh maybe I should change her. It was about 5:45am. So I changed her diaper and then realized there were 3 other clean diapers in the diaper pail. Sigh.

I put Kiya back to bed only to hear about 20 minutes later a very loud "all done". She was standing at the baby gate at her door. Dave was up with the dogs and it freaked him out. He wasn't expecting to see her there but there she was. He put her back to bed but again that didn't last long. She was up and out of bed again by about 6:30am, a full hour before she used to get up. I HATE daylight savings time by the way.

So needless to say I was up super early this morning with Miss Kiya. We are marching forward and will be purchasing a twin size bed for Kiya this weekend. The toddler bed thing isn't working out. We will make it work for the week but it has to go. We fully expect that she will get out of bed no matter what size bed she is sleeping in but the whole using the headboard to stand up and try to climb out of the toddler bed is so not safe. I don't want to hear anymore thuds so the mattress will stay on the floor.

I went shopping this morning for twin size bedding. That was more of a task than I thought it would be. I wanted something girlie, childish and that kind of went with her yellow walls. A lot of the bedding I saw was way too old looking or just plain ugly or covered with some cartoon character, etc. I wanted to stay away from that. 3 stores later and T.arget had what I was looking for. I will post pics after her room transformation this weekend.

Life with a curious, smart and super mobile toddler is exhausting but at the same time I wouldn't change a thing. She is a spunky little girl and while it is challenging at times she is super fun and life is never dull when you spend the day with Kiya.

Big girl room, potty training and more

Change is a coming to our house in the form of all things big girl. It makes me happy and sad to see Miss Kiya growing up. It is happening so fast but she is ready to be a big girl. I kind of think she has always wanted to be a big girl. She wasn't much in to being a baby until she figured out that she got more attention that way. So we battled that for awhile especially with daycare  but not anymore. (Before she walked they would carry her places instead of putting her down and making her hold their hand and walk from point a to point b. The Mama Bear stepped in an a former teacher of Kiya's to make sure that wasn't going to continue and it hasn't.)

First up, the removal of the crib from Miss Kiya's room. This weekend we are transforming her crib into a bed. Bed rail and gate have been purchased. Room has been cleaned. 4 bags of baby girl clothes were donated. It is time. Time for the crib to go.

Next up, potty training I think... This one is tough. She is definitely showing a lot of the signs that she is ready but not all. We know exactly when she is going poop and if we ask her if she is she says yes. Last night we asked her if she was and she said yes and we asked her if she wanted to sit on the potty and she said yes. So diaper on we went over to the potty and she sat down. So I kind of think we could get her to go poop on the potty but not sure about the other. She drinks A LOT of milk and water throughout the day....she is sometimes dry after nap but not usually. She wets A LOT at night. Do we go for it? Wait a few more weeks until she is officially two?

I am going to talk to her teachers at daycare about it today and see what their process is like. If we are doing it we are all doing it together and I don't really want it to be a long drawn out 6 months of sort of potty training. I know night time potty training will take longer and I am okay with that but I don't want to rush things if it means it will take forever to get her daytime potty trained. I would rather wait and still change diapers.

Kiya has fully entered the terrible twos. Sigh. She can throw a tantrum like no other. They aren't frequent so when she does throw one boy is it a good one and usually over something very trivial. We are just rolling with it. We know it is a phase and will pass. We ignore as best we can and take breaks when needed.

She has also decided that whining is the best way to get things. Wrong answer in this house. We have a no whining policy. If she wants milk, to sit on the couch, her book, her blanket or whatever she needs to use her words not just point and whine. So the plus side she is learning a bunch of new words but the downside is that sometimes mid whine she starts to meltdown and needs a break.

We are working on manners so if she wants a book it is book please or in Kiya speak book peas :) And if she wants her milk and says please and we get it for her with some prodding she will say thank you. She is getting better at saying thank you but sometimes we ask her, Kiya what do you say? And her answer: say with a grin. Sigh. We have a spirited one on our hands for sure.

So that is where we are for now...phasing out all things baby and getting ready for our big girl to shine like the superstar that she is.

Growing up

This weekend it hit me. My baby girl is growing up. She doesn't look like a baby anymore. She doesn't act like a baby anymore and she sure doesn't have the attitude of a baby anymore. How did this happen so fast....in less than 4 months she is going to be 2.

That said we overhauled the play area this weekend. We cleaned out all of the baby toys and put them in the basement. We, okay well Dave, put together her new table and attempted to put the chairs together. We wound up having to return the chairs so for now those are still in the box.

We purchased our first baby doll stroller. Kiya is very much in love with her baby, her doll and a toy at daycare. Yes she distinguishes between her baby (which is a little stuffed baby that came in a Peanut shell) and her doll which is a black cloth doll. Sometimes she asks for doll and sometimes baby. There is also a baby doll at daycare that she LOVES and holds onto most of the day. She has progressed from the stuffed lizard to the baby doll....can we say girly girl :)

Anyway in talking with her therapists and teachers, one of her teachers suggested getting a baby doll stroller for Kiya to push around the house. We did. She loves her babies and she loves her stroller and has showed A LOT of interest in pushing her own stroller around. Maybe this will help but either way she needed some big girl toys.

I also got her a pink fabric bin on wheels for her stuffed animals. She hates it. She cried when it was empty. She cried when it was full. She has a completely irrational hatred of this fabric bin. I have no idea why. Maybe she doesn't like the new organization of the play area....not sure.

And today I started researching potty seats. Wow, there are a lot of them on the market. I just can't decide. I got a lot of great feedback from other parents. My main concern is with the casting in the future if it will be too hard for her to sit on a stand alone potty seat....maybe we would be better off with a seat the fits right on the big people toilet.  I have no idea and I have a feeling we will purchase both and she which she likes best.

Next up a garbage truck and a kitchen play set. She is fascinated with both of these things :)