Misc Round-Up: Hits and Misses

Dear Laney,

Here's an assortment of things that have happened lately, none of which is interesting enough to rate its own blog post:

1) I silently worship this heater:

You were having such trouble sleeping through the night, until one evening we put you in your crib and cranked up this bad boy to 80 degrees or so. It seems that what you really wanted was to sleep in Alabama-like heat. All week, you have slept 11+ hours in a row. If it weren't for that pesky Commandment #1 about "honoring no other gods before me," I would decorate this heater with sequins and bow down to it every morning.

2) You tried your first hamburger.

Yesterday, we met Dad in town at the Iron Horse pub for lunch and they had sliders on the Kids Menu. We learned that you don't care at all for hamburger meat, you can cope with a bun, and you LOVE pickles. You ate the entire garnish assortment. I also had a string cheese for you to eat while we waited, and the waitress said "I have a 15-month old, but I'm always nervous about giving her those because I worry she's going to choke." Then, you inhaled all 6 inches of that cheese in about 3.5 seconds. As the waitress' eyes got wider, I considered entering you in a contest somewhere. Or a carnival.

3) We're having an issue with tantrums.

Lately, when things aren't going your way - someone takes something dangerous away from you, you're not allowed to hurl yourself off the deck, or I decide that an hour of climbing the slide is probably enough - you respond by banging your head on the ground. Hard. And if I put my hand down there to catch you, you get even MADDER, like I've foiled your plan. I was recently making fun of the British for inventing the toddler helmet pictured above, but now I'm thinking it may not be such a bad idea. Grandpops says not to worry - you have a hard Burbach head. Grandma Sue says your Uncle Nate used to do the same thing on the outside of their house when he was your age. Here, we've learned two things: This behavior is relatively normal, and I've married into a family of nuts.

Earlier this week, you banged your head into the handle of the grocery buggy and bloodied your own lip. I became The Mother With The Bleeding Baby At Walmart. Unacceptable.

4) You're belly button obsessed.

After mastering "Where's Mama's nose?" I thought we could move on to something more fun, so one day I had the idea to teach you "Where's Mama's belly button?" About a hundred times a day, you lift up my shirt to be sure it's still there. Fun at home, not so much fun in public.

But the best side effect of this is that sometimes Dad wants to play with us, and he lifts up his shirt to show you his enormous, hairy belly button. And you always get a look on your face like "What IS that thing?!?" I hear you, sister. You could hide a Cadillac in there.

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So... that's a sampling of what's going on at our house this week.

Love,

Mom