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Oh, the idiosyncracies!

2005-07-03T07:49:00.000-07:00

Cady has these little idiosyncracies 300000000000000000000000000000000000000000 (that's her contribution to this post) that are really cute and amusing. She's turning out to have pretty good manners. If I ask her to please put on her clothes, she'll say, "no thank you." Or when she's in the midst of a tantrum she'll stick in a "please" here or there.

Also, sometimes it's scary; I'll walk into a room and loose objects will be lined up perfectly straight in a row, her small plastic animals lined up at attention, or her toy cars posed as if at the starting line. Cady's also very clean; definitely not from me, but organized -definitely me. If there's a piece of trash on the ground, she'll go through great lengths to make sure she personally deposits it in the trash. I'm turning out to be a pretty lucky mom.

four small steps for Cady, one giant leap for mommykind!

2005-06-20T20:40:00.000-07:00

YaaaaY!! Cady is finally getting the hang of it... she used the toilet an unprecented FOUR times today. Still using the running around naked (Cady, not me) trick, but this time it works!! The secret: Give her lots and lots of milk and juice and liquids and the rest is all about timing! I was so excited I kept awarding her w/ those gummy bears that are actually vitamins in disguise. She's only supposed to take 2 a day, but this is a special occasion.

Actually I resorted to things I never thought I would say to my kids. I said to Cady, "Joann doesn't wear diapers anymore." (Joanne is this super-toddler, who's 3 months older than Cady, but she's already fully toilet trained, and also happens to be Cady's best friend.) They are soooo cute together. I wish there weren't weirdos out there, otherwise I'd post some pics.

Mistaken Identity

2005-06-20T04:23:00.000-07:00

Today when the phone rang, I picked it up and heard a voice say, "Hi, this is Ray. Can I speak to Lee please?" I paused. "You mean you're Lee and you wanna speak to Ray, right?" "No," the voice insisted. "This is Ray, and I need to speak with Lee." "Ray Lee? Or Lee?" I asked confused. (Ray has 2 other colleagues, one's name is Lee Sobeleski and the other one's Ray Lee. "No, Lee," said the voice even more persisitently. "Wait... is this 759-****," the voice continued, giving our home number. "Yes," I said. "But are you looking for Ray C? or Ray Lee, or Lee? Because Ray C's not home right now." That was when Ray finally realized he had hit the speed dial for home instead of Lee's number and was like, "Oh wait, " laughing. "Is this Peggy?" "Uh, yeah. Who's this?" "It's me," he said. "Me who?" I asked still confused. "Me!!" "Who is this?" "ME!" We went on like that for about 5 minutes before I finally realized I was talking to my own husband. Later he complained that I couldn't recognize his voice. I was like, dude, you read back your own phone number to me and still didn't realize you had dialed home.

"No!" and "I'll Do It!"

2005-06-15T01:09:00.000-07:00

That's all I hear these days. "No!" and "I'll do it!" Today I asked Cady, "Do you want to go outside?" to which she screamed, "no!" "Do you want to stay inside?" "NO!" even louder. Whenever I try to open the car door, "I"ll do it!" Whenever I try to open the front door, "I'll do it!" Whenever I try to pour her milk, "I"ll do it!" Throw away something? "I'll do it!" In some ways, it makes my life easier, but it sure makes everything take longer.

The Closed Door

2005-06-15T00:50:00.000-07:00

Whenever Cady is about to do something bad, she closes the door behind her. I found this out one afternoon when I was tutoring. She snuck in the room, saw that I was preoccupied and left without a word, closing the door behind her. It seemed suspicious to me, so as soon as my lesson was over I rushed out and sure enough, she had covered our light yellow loveseat with large circles and swirls in ink. (This was when she was about 20 months.) I spent the entire afternoon scrubbing away. We bought a StainSafe warranty with the sofa but they didn't cover pen marks. So now whenever Cady closes the door behind her, I wait a few seconds, then burst in on her, just to see her jump. And she really is usually up to some mischief.

From Potty Mouth to Potty Training

2005-06-14T21:05:00.000-07:00

3. Number of times Cady actually made it to the toilet to do her business. 9. Number of times she didn't bother. With the toilet or the diaper. I had heard from someone that the best way to toilet train is to just let the kid run around diaperless around the house. Supposedly kids don't like the feeling and won't pee/poo on themselves. So much for that.

Once when she was just getting ready to poo (you can tell by the contortions of her face), I rushed her over to the toilet and sat her down on the kiddie size seat. I think it traumautized her cuz not only did she not go poo then, she didn't go for the next day and a half. The experience literally scared the crap out of, in, Cady.

Potty (Mouth) Training

2005-06-12T22:35:00.000-07:00

At around 20 months, Cady began forming words. I noticed she had the habit of pronouncing her "f's" like "b's", so fish would become "bish" and "fun" sounded like "bun." I tried correcting her by exaggerating the fffffffffffffffffff, but she would just say fffffffffff...bish instead. Around the same time, I had developed a bad habit of cursing. To set the record straight, I don't usually curse, I think getting married triggered it. j/k. Anyway, it was a particularly frustrating night. I was trying to put Cady to bed before my tutoring session at 9. Ray was OC, Cady was stalling as usual, and I was rushing around trying to find the Blanket that she never leaves home, or goes to sleep, without. I couldn't find it anywhere in the house, so I realized I must have left it in the car downstairs. It was 8:50 and I had to log on to tutor in 5 mins. Frantic, I began searching for my car keys. I looked in the usual places; top of the kitchen counter, under the sofa cushions, in the laundry basket, but I couldn't find them anywhere. That was about the time I lost it. I started throwing the sofa cushions around trying to find my keys, all the while saying, "f__k!" "f__k!" under my breath. Up to that point, I still hadn't realized how impressionable Cady was... until the next morning when...

The incident from last night was just a faint memory; I had found the keys, retrieved the Blanket, made it in time to tutor, everything was all good. This morning I was looking for my keys again, getting ready to take Cady out, and I wondered aloud (but happily this time), "Where are my keys?" That was when, to my utter mortification and dismay, Cady walked over to the sofa and cheerfully started throwing pillows, calling out, "buck" "buck," and looking at me with a huge grin on her face. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry, but the second emotion was stronger. I felt like the Worst Mother in the World. Especially since Ray was right. Whenever I turn into the Screaming Old Hag, he says, "Don't curse in front of Cady." But I guess I underestimated her pick-upability.

A few days later when Ray was trying to give Cady a bath, I heard her say, "buck" "buck" again. "What is she saying?" asked Ray, looking for me to translate as usual. "I think she wants me to tie her hair," I lied, because "buck" in Taiwanese, means to tie up her hair, and that was one legimate word she had learned. So yeah, now whenever she says buck, I say, "oh, you want me to tie your hair?" Hopefully that will phase that habit out.. And I'm very careful about what I say around her now.

the day the maggots flew

2005-06-10T15:38:00.000-07:00

I'd been driving our new white Corolla for about half a year when I began noticing this sour smell coming from the inside of the car. I shrugged it off as all the soured milk that spilled from the not really spill-proof sippy cups. Then one day as I was driving, one of those small annoying little flies flew past my face. I opened the window and tried to shoo the thing out but it wouldn't go! As the days went on, I was swatting at 4 or 5 small flies. This time I opened all four doors in an attempt to free them, but yet again, they seemed determined to stay. A week later, I opened the car door, and a whole swarm of small flies greeted me. I began to suspect in-breeding. So I looked under the passenger seat and found an old cup of rotting, soured milk. There was one fly floating in the gunk. I tossed out the cup and thought, problem solved.But the next day, when I opened the backdoor, a swarm double the original size rose up from Cady's car seat. Horrified, I yanked the car seat from its restraints and gingerly peeled away the washable cover. Little white pieces of what I thought were crumbs began to fall. As I looked closer, the white crumbs began to squirm. And as I looked into the interior of the car seat I realized there were hundreds, upon hundreds of squirming little maggots!! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrroooossssssssss!!!

So the maggots had collected and fed off all the little Craisins, trail mixes, whole wheat bread and cereal crumbs that mixed with sour milk to create a mush that had apparently sustained a whole colony of small flies. No wonder they didn't want to leave. Anyhow, I had to clean it all out in our bathtub, but so far my car is maggot free. Now there's just mold growing on the seat.

first walk

2005-06-10T15:30:00.000-07:00

Cady officially started walking on her 1st Birthday! She kinda stumbled one or two steps before that, said Ahgong and Ama when we went back for a visit, but took her first, real steady stroll the night of her first birthday. Now there's a date that's easy to remember.

first talk

2005-06-10T15:02:00.000-07:00

Let's see, what was her first word? She started off babbling semi-phonetic sounds, but definitely her "b's" were the most prominent. Actually there was one time we were walking through a tunnel in Central Park. Ray and I were shouting "echo" "echo" just for fun, when suddenly out of nowhere a small, yet distinctly sharp voice called out "echo." We looked at Cady, she looked at us... and then nothing more. She went back to babbling. That was in October of '03 so she must have been about 10 months. Then there was the time I'm pretty sure she said, "toe."

But her first real word that I actually recognized and got all excited about was the word, "baby." We were playing in her room, and a Gerber lotion sample was lying on the floor. She pointed to the Gerber baby on the packaging and said, "baby." I'm trying to remember when that was, hopefully I've got it written down somewhere.

So anyway, contrary to popular belief, "mommy" and "daddy" came way later. Mostly I just remember how she had a prediliction towards saying her "b" sounds. Which, thankfully would save me from earning the Worst Mommy In the World award later in the future. But more about that later.

intro

2005-06-10T15:01:00.000-07:00

I suppose one day Cady will ask the typical questions kids ask about their early childhood. What was my first word? When did I first learn to walk? Was I good or bad? And I always thought I'd have a ready answer, the date, time, context, a vivid picture; after all, raising Cady is quite the unforgettable experience. But since Cady was born, I've lost my wedding ring, misplaced my keys, forgotten the dry cleaning, left Cady behind at a restaurant (once)... so maybe it's time to blog it all down.

By the way, until I'm all caught up with everything I'm trying to remember, none of this is in real time. It's just a few recollections.