Better Days

You all know that I have a 2 year old...and I have a newborn. What I didn't know is how much work it would be to have both. Having a newborn is a lot of work but having a newborn and a 2 year old??

It's exhausting!

**Note: to those of you with more than 2 kids I applaud you and know that you have it even tougher than me!

Needless to say the last 2 months have been an adjustment for all of us and while L has done a great job of adjusting to having a new brother (she is nice to him and doesn't show signs of resentment that he is here) she has also been quite n.a.u.g.h.t.y. lately!! I'm not sure if this is just the terrible twos or if it's because she has gotten far less attention than usual since baby I arrived or both. All I know is that I needed to do something and when constantly getting after her, telling her 'no' and taking away toys and other privileges wasn't working...and when letting her watch far too much TV/movies was making me feel guilty...I decided to make an attempt to do something special with just her everyday. Sounds simple and other mothers would probably have started doing this long ago but apparently I am a slow learner :-). Last week L and I went to a few stores in search of rain boots for her while a sitter watched baby I and another day I pulled out an opposite game and we played it. Those days it was the first thing she told D about when he got home and she still talks about it!! So while reading a friend's blog (thanks, Lesley!), I came upon another blog with all sorts of craft ideas for young children (http://www.notimeforflashcards.com/) and decided to do some of these with L. Today we read The Very Hungry Caterpillar and did 2 art projects! An egg carton caterpillar (it's still drying, I'll post the finished project later) and a handprint butterfly. L really enjoyed it (telling D about it as soon as he walked through the door for lunch), it made our morning go by faster and I think she was better behaved (or just preoccupied?!?!). See?

Thought you might like to see L's idea of 'fixing' a colored pencil when it has dropped on the floor and is broken (the lead not the actual pencil). Stickers fix everything! :-)

And what, you might ask, was baby I doing during all of this? Relaxing in his bouncer, what else?!? Good thing he doesn't care how much of my attention he's getting...yet!

Here's hoping for better days!