just the girls

The Hater was gone yesterday for work stuff. Baby and I played hard, napped hard, and snotted hard.

nielsen

Turns out Mom was wrong - everyone IS entitled to my opinion. Or so says the Nielsen company. The Hater and I were chosen to write down everything we watched on tv this past week and we've mailed it back to them. Now the world will be subject to more science fiction and horror tv shows.

Speaking of tv, this was probably the worst week to have us write down what we watch. The problem is that baby is now figuring out that it's something fun to watch, so we've been listening more to the radio and watching less tv while she's awake. We know it's not feasible to declare she won't be exposed to television, but we are making every effort to encourage her to play and explore without that distraction.

Between baby and that very few of our regular tv shows ran new episodes this week, our Nielsen diary was sparse. There was a section in the end where we could write whatever we wanted, so we wrote about the shows we do like to watch that didn't come on this week, which made us feel better.

And then we complained about our shows that have been cancelled.

And about how it's ridiculous how loud commercials are and cited that as a major reason we only watch programming taped onto our DVR.

Meanwhile, baby has a new cold. This one is creeping into her lungs and she's a coughy-semi-miserable little thing. Daycare called this afternoon to tell me "she's not breathing well" and "she won't eat and we can hardly get her to play." Right. So I called the pediatrician and relayed that message to them on my way to get her; of course they worked us in. Except when I got to the day care she looked fine to me. Sure, she looked like a sick semi-miserable little thing, but not like a SICK baby who is working really hard to BREATHE.

This isn't the first time daycare has told me that something was awful and I wasn't impressed. I don't know if it's because this is our first baby and we want to believe that someone with 20+ years of childcare experience will really know when to sound the alarm, or if my lack of mirrored excitement is because I'm a nurse and I can look at someone and tell if they're SICK, sick or Sick.

The pediatrician concurred with me: she's sick. I sucked snot out of her nose before he came into the consultation room so he could see that it was yellow. And she coughed for him on cue. However, this time she did not scream her head off and act like he was going to eat her. This was our regular doctor who The Hater and I both REALLY like. Bottom line - she weighs enough (20# 14oz) to up the benadryl dose, which she'll get around the clock for a few days with tylenol/motrin and TLC.

Easy to say, but it's pitiful when you hear the coughy whiny baby over the monitor and there's really nothing you can do for her. That was our last night and my expectation for tonight's second showing. Like the fragile snot bubble and the Dollhouse series, this, too, shall pass.

upside down

We think she's figured out that things look different upside down and will occasionally stop everything, put her head on the floor, and look up at us. That paired with an "aaaaaaah" (i.e., yay!) is enough to melt our hearts every time.

airing our dirty laundry

practice makes perfect

Dear Coach Dooley,

I'm walking just about everywhere and practicing my cheers.

I hope you're practicing, too.

Love, Baby

country girl glamour shots

(or... things we do when Daddy's out of town and Mommy has been inside playing with me for four consecutive days)

afebrile

We're happy to report that baby does not have a fever this morning. Fingers crossed that this has passed.

Fingers further crossed that the redness the doctor saw in her ear yesterday doesn't turn into a raging ear infection.

sick baby

Someone is home sick today with Mommy. Baby is playing fevery games and living up the joys of day care viruses. So far were really thankful for pain relievers, fever reducers and saltine crackers.

PS: This picture was NOT taken today. She's not much up for posing or Kodak moments right now.

it's not about the W

We still think Peyton Manning is the greatest QB of all time ever.

Period.

In fact, we tried really hard to post these pictures in the 4th quarter, but it just wasn't meant to be... for neither us nor Peyton.

sweet sixteen

Baby took sixteen steps across the room last night. It was very exciting, but I had to hold my tongue and not clap until she was already down. They said at daycare she was walking all over the place and standing up in the middle of the floor without pulling up on something. She's not done that trick for me yet; hoping to see that one this weekend.

Jane said it won't be long until she's running away from us. (Because, of course, I had to send everybody a text message to announce that baby is, indeed, off the charts.) Even knowing that, we're still having a ball watching her learn new tricks.

We pick The Hater up at the airport after her morning nap. We were fortunate that his flight came back to town on baby's schedule. He's had a whirlwind trip with funeral games for the last several days. I know he was glad to be there to help, but will be glad to get back here and rest. (And watch baby run circles around us!)

Meanwhile, I'm watching the 1997 UT-KY game on ESPN. Manning just broke an SEC record. We're cheering for him all over again. Baby will stop what she's doing and just clap her hands. I know that really it's because she's just figured out how to do it, but we're pretending that she's practicing clapping for Peyton in the Super Bowl tomorrow. They do share a birthday, after all.

just sottin there