02.25.06
Posted in Noah, Elisabeth at 2:01 pm by Chelle
I am amazed that everywhere we go, people make comments on how much Elisabeth looks like her brother. Really I shouldn’t be surprised, because why wouldn’t she? It’s funny how a lot of people also say, though, that she looks like me, while they also say that Noah looks like Dan. So does that mean Dan and I look like each other? I doubt it. I remember when Noah was little, my mom sent me a picture from when I was little, and it could have been a feminine version of Noah. I can’t find that picture now, but it would be interesting to see if Elisabeth also looks like I did at that age. Of course, it also seems that more and more often now, people initially think Elisabeth is a boy. I don’t know if it’s all the dark hair, or if they see Noah and the similarities. I try to look at her objectively and still see girl. It’s in the eyes. But I do have to agree, they sure look alike. I mentioned to Dan that at least he knows she’s not the mail man’s kid, with as similar as she is to Noah. He then pointed out that they could both be. I guess, if the mail man looked like Dan. I have to admit I don’t even know what our mail man looks like. For all I know Noah and Elisabeth are dead ringers for him. Wouldn’t I be in trouble then!
There’s no doubting the love between the two; it’s like a giant gooey love-fest when they start grinning at each other. For Elisabeth, the sun rises and sets on Noah. For Noah, Elisabeth is the cute baby sister he has to tell every stranger in the store about. I constantly have to untangle the two, telling Noah repeatedly not to lie on his sister when he tries to hug her, and prying the freakishly strong grip of her hands off of his hair.
The thing is, there are so many similarities I see between the two, but then in other ways they are so opposite. I wonder how much of it is being a baby, and how much of it is the fact that they’re brother and sister, how much of it is boy and girl, and how much of it is just personality. Noah liked to sit and observe. We never had to worry about him putting things in his mouth. Elisabeth would eat anything. She also wants to socialize and flirt with everyone, and man can she grab. Noah was shy (and still is), and takes a while to warm up to someone even though he desperately wants to interact. I guess in that respect Noah is more like me and Elisabeth is more like Dan. They both devour books, although half the time that’s literally true in Elisabeth’s case. They’re both smart, and easily bored with new things and want to move on to the next thing. Aside from the obvious germ problem, I wish there were a toy library out there, because both of them figure out toys and then they lose their interest. They both have memories like elephants, a blessing and a curse. Noah was more methodical, he’d learn his sounds step by step, focus on the ba, then move to da, etc. Elisabeth has gained an entire repertoire of sounds at once, and makes sentences. “Ba wa wa da va ma ba fffft pa!” They can both be little imps at times and give these sly little looks that lets you know they’re in on something that you haven’t gotten yet. Noah was a grumpy baby a lot, and things bothered him. Elisabeth is easy going until she’s not, and then the drama starts with pure screams. Weird noises bothered Noah. For a long time animal sounds (made by people) scared him to death, but he could bang away to his heart’s content. Elisabeth thinks sounds are funny, but jumps and flinches every time you clap your hands, no matter how repeatedly you do it. Noah would wait and figure something out before he tried it, and Elisabeth tries and tries again until she figures it out. They both love music and are transfixed by songs. Both of them like opera. Elisabeth is desperate to get her hands on Noah’s cars, and he’s sometimes kind enough to share one for a minute before he gets protective and takes it back. Both of them are little shits, and drive me to distraction some days.
But they both are full of love, and smiles, and snuggles. Noah loves Jesus, and we’re teaching Elisabeth to love Him, too. She’s oddly quiet and observant when we pray. They’re both different, yet the same. They’re my precious children. Their smiles light up the world for me, and I can’t imagine life without them.
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11.08.05
Posted in General, Elisabeth at 6:19 am by Chelle
Shortly after having Noah, I remember reading in a parenting magazine about how something rarely talked about (namely, poop) becomes one of the central conversation topics in your home after having a child. I found it amusing until I realized that yes, it’s true. Once you have children, the subject of poop is no longer off-limits. At any time, really. You can frequently hear around our house “did he poop today?”, “how was it?”, “we need to buy bananas”, or “he needs prunes for snack”. All of this in relation to Noah, of course. The conversations regarding Elisabeth have some slight variations. “Did she poop?”, “How was it?”, “What color was it?”, “how much?”. There’s also the discussion of texture, and comparisons to mashed potatoes, pudding, peanut butter. Then, of course, there are the conversations revolving around which brand and style of diaper best contains the “poop explosions” that Elisabeth sometimes has, and the resulting conversations about how best to pre-treat and wash the clothing that was the unfortunate casualty of the explosion. Noah has picked up this phrasing - when he tells me that Elisabeth has pooped, he now says “she exploded”. I have no idea if he knows what he’s talking about. It’s amazing that Noah doesn’t have bad dreams about his baby sister spontaneously combusting.
Elisabeth has managed to catch a virus that Noah had or has. While in Noah it’s respiratory, in Elisabeth it’s presenting as abdominal. As a result, Dan and I tackled what seemed like a tag-team diaper marathon yesterday morning. No less than 7 poopy diapers in just under an hour. Then the conversations became something like this:
(after 2 poops)
“I’m getting worried about this”
“Well, she didn’t poop last night”
(another poop)
“It’s sort of green”
“No, it’s yellow”
“No, it’s not. It’s green. And it’s wet. That’s diahrrea.”
“No, it’s yellow. But it is wet.”
(another poop)
“That’s definitely green. If you put mustard next to it, it would look green. What do you think, spinach colored?”
“No way, that is not spinach colored. That’s like dark green. This is too yellow.”
(another poop)
“Ok, now I think you should call the doctor”
(another poop)
“Maybe we should take a picture with the digital camera to show the doctor”
(I don’t think I said anything. How do you respond to that?)
Then later, in the car…
“Ok, so what, like avacado color?”
“No, there’s not enough yellow”
“You keep saying it’s yellow, it’s not yellow!”
“No, I mean avacado doesn’t have enough yellow in it”
Then, in the doctor’s office, Dan looked around and found a picture of kids playing in the grass. He proceeded to try to find the shade of grass that best described the appropriate shade of poop. (This from the person insisting it was yellow).
- Completely aside, I think Dan sees the world in shades of yellow. We’ve had a long-running argument about our CREAM-COLORED house being yellow.-
Incidentally, our pediatrician told us that the majority of phone calls she handles are in some regard to poop. Too much, too little, color, consistency, etc. Seems we’re not the only ones who talk about poop all day. What’s ironic is that while this takes up a good portion of your day, you won’t find parenting forums or chat rooms devoted to baby poop, and the subject is rarely discussed with other parents. Perfectly acceptable to discuss your child’s poop over the dinner table with your spouse, but not in company. It’s the unspoken baby poop rules, apparently. One would think that if more parents would discuss their children’s poop with other parents, the poor doctor wouldn’t have to talk about somebody else’s poop all day. I wonder if she has nightmares about baby poop. It’s a wonder that we don’t, really.
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11.05.05
Posted in General, Elisabeth at 6:38 am by Chelle
It is currently 6:28 AM. A fairly reasonable time for someone to be up in the morning, right? Wrong. At least for me it’s so wrong. I am not a morning person by nature. Never have been (except for undocumented claims by my mother of my infanthood. I don’t remember it, you can’t prove it!).
I have been attempting to fix Elisabeth’s sleep schedule, meaning lots of frustration on both of our parts. So far it’s been slow going. In my limited successes in getting her to bed at a somewhat reasonable hour (which at this point is anytime before 6 am in my opinion), I forgot to address the fact that I am used to being awake at night now. I’ve always been a night person, but not since my days of college have I been so often awake until sunrise. So now my family is sleeping peacefully. Elisabeth woke to nurse at around 5 this morning and promptly went back to sleep. I, however, lay there wide awake, because as my body now knows well, when I wake up, I need to WAKE UP. I have become so accustomed to grabbing sleep when I can that now there is no such thing as a regular nighttime sleep pattern. Isn’t sleep training supposed to work the other way around??
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