Birthdays, Appointments and School...in that order.

I feel like it's been so long since I've last blogged.  I'm not sure I even remember how to do it!  Okay, that's a lie.  I'm good at rambling on and on and on.... it's like riding a bike.  Why do they say that?  Have you tried riding a  bike after a several year hiatus?  It's kinda scary.  No joke.  I tried it not too long ago, at Walmart.  Nevermind.

Where have I been?  Celebrating a very special birthday with a very special girl.  Then getting snowed in.  Then a pediatrician visit.  It's been busy 'round here.

The party was nice.  Very small, but nice.  Kinley was completely oblivious to the party.  She only cared about the fact that she had a very large room to push her dinosaur around.  The cake, she really didn't care about.  She squished it between her fingers until it didn't even resemble a cake anymore and then sucked a little off of her hand and shoved the rest into her ear while she "talked" on her "phone."  I know that the whole cake smash is what the first birthday is all about...but it was just too gross to me.  The thought of my baby ingesting that much sugar was too much.  And the clean up was even worse.  I mean, the cake was *compacted* into the child's ear canal.  I was slightly concerned with how I was going to safely get it out.  But it's done and we all survived.  She got some really cool presents and our living room looks even more like Toys R Us and less like our home. 

At her pediatrician visit, she was listed as the 13th percentile for height and the 25th % for weight.  She's still a tiny thing.  I guess I expected that somewhat.  When we are out and about and people ask how old she is, they are surprised when we say her age. Everyone always says that she's so tiny, so I guess I expected it.  I am just surprised that she's so short. 

The pediatrician estimates that she'll be about 5'4-5'5 like mommy and thinks that she will be the late bloomer in her class.  I'm so perfectly fine with that!  I don't need to deal with boobies in the second grade.  Richie was happy with this answer as well.

At her one year appointment

She's is on target with all of her development but is ahead of the game on her behavioral development.  The doctor saw first hand how she likes to test her limits and so instead of working on the parent "homework" for 12 months, we are on the 15 months "homework."  At 12 months, parents should be using the word "no" and teaching the child that it means something.  Well, Kinley understands the whole "no" aspect but likes to take it a step beyond that and test us to see if there are consequences.  So now we're on the 1-2-3 stage.  Dr. Natalie witnessed my struggle with Kinley pulling my hair and thinking it's hilarious.  I would tell her no and she'd laugh at me (which is my fault because I think that everything she does -good or bad- is freaking adorable, and I laugh at her when I should be serious) so Dr. Natalie said "NO! We don't pull mommy's hair because that is ouchie to mommy!" and Kinley was shocked.  She looked at the Dr. with huge eyes and was just floored that someone other than mommy or daddy would tell her no.  But she didn't cry, as I expected her to.

A few seconds later, she yanked my hair again.  Dr. Natalie again said "NO! We don't pull mommy's hair because that is ouchie to mommy!" and I pulled her hands off of my hair.  A few seconds later, Kinley looked over at the Dr. out of the corner of her eye and grabbed my hair again....  she tests everyone!  So Dr. Natalie took her from me and gave her to Richie and told her that since she wouldn't stop pulling mommy's hair, that she had to sit with daddy for a while.  Kinley was just like "whatever lady."  Haha  But I couldn't hold it in and I started laughing uncontrollably.  To me, it was hilarious because Kinley's little face was so serious.  The Dr. said "mom, you are not helping the situation."  But honestly, I couldn't hold my laugh in any longer.  Ugh.  This is going to be some serious homework for me...and I thought Shakespeare was challenging.

We've had a few rough nights lately where Kinley is getting up crying a few times a night.  Dr. Natalie thinks we're super close to getting a tooth and says that its most likely the cause of the night wakings.  She has encouraged me to drop those day time nursings and keep them only for naps and bedtime.  It's going to be so hard, but I know that I have to do it for school anyway.  So I'm going to try and cut one or two out during the day. 

Other than that, she is doing perfectly.  I'm so super proud of her.  I've noticed such subtle differences in her since her birthday.  It's almost like she knows that she is one now and that she needs to act like a toddler, because it's like she's just more independent all of a sudden.  She is getting around so much easier, doing so much more than she seemed to a week ago....  she grew up and I feel like I didn't even notice.  :(

Today I have to get busy on her Thank You cards and our Christmas cards.  I *have* to do it.

I have hit yet another road block on my school plans.  It's nothing that will prevent me from starting back in January as planned, but just more crap to deal with that I hadn't planned on.  And it's my own fault, really.  I may have to take yet another class.  Or retake it, I should say.  I took in initially in '99 so technically it's expired.  I haven't heard if they're going to make me redo it for sure or not, but knowing my luck, I will be adding it to the list.  My goal is to just get graduated as quickly as possible.  I don't care about anything else at this point.  I have this semester, the summer off (or to pick up any courses that they throw at me at the last minute) and then student teaching in the fall.  Then I am done, done, done.  I hope.