Sleepytime Advice Needed!

Amelia and I have been working hard on her bedtime routine and the nights we stick with it she does pretty well. It still takes her a couple hours to fall asleep, but as long as I get her started early enough she gets to sleep at a decent time. The problem is that most nights we don't get home from work/daycare until 6:30 - If I started her to bed at 7:30 I would only have an hour with her at night and she still wouldn't get to sleep until 9:30.

I kind of figure that if Amelia isn't going to go to sleep for two hours, what's the point in putting her to bed at 7:30 - - so I let her stay up so I can see her. The problem is that if I let her stay up until 8:30 it still takes her 2 hours to fall asleep. I have never met a child who takes SO LONG to settle down once she hits the bed. It truly frustrates me to no end; especially since at nap at school she goes to sleep in seconds.

I follow the same routine here that they do there - soft music, book, night light. I have even taken to doing my homework in my room so that I am just across the hall rather than downstairs, so that she doesn't get so scared. NOTHING works. Now that she is sleeping in her own bed, not having night terrors, and we have a regular bedtime routine; does anyone have suggestions on how I can help her fall asleep more quickly? Melatonin doesn't work for her by the way!

The Party

Amelia's birthday party was a HUGE hit. She has asked me every day since when she can have another party with her friends at gymnastics. My sister Tammie took over 300 fabulous photos. I'm only posing a few. There are so many cute ones of all of her friends - so so sweet. They all gave her very thoughtful gifts and obviously know her well looking at their choices.
She had her cousins, Lauren, Katie and Jordan - and so that Jordan wouldn't be the only boy there, we told him to bring a friend, so he brought his buddy Noah - who Amelia adores! Of course Aunt Nancy and Aunt Tammie were also there to help out, but Annette, Amelia's gymnastics teacher did a great job - it had to be the easiest party ever!

In addition to our family Amelia invited Alivia and TaLia from daycare, Olivia from dance (her dance friends Sadie and Gabby didn't make it), Anna from Chinese school, and her friend Lia - such sweet and polite young ladies:)

More Birthday Fun!

After work Friday night Amelia and I went to Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs with Grandma. Let me just say if you have a chance to see it, GO! It is so cute; Amelia, Grandma and I all loved it. I can't believe they were able to transform that short little story into a 2 hour movie.

After the movie I told Amelia she could pick anywhere she wanted to for dinner - except, Chuck E Cheese and our local children's play center (you know the one with the disgusting food and the hamster tunnels for children). Amelia's response, "Some of my friends go to Happy Joes" to which I said, "Well Happy Joes only has pizza and you only like pizza from Z's, so do you want to go there?" Happy Joes also happens to have an arcade - which I was planning to avoid at ALL costs!

We ended up at a local Chinese restaurant where Amelia (after snarfing down half an order of vegetable Lo Mein and a bunch of my Orange Chicken) spent most of the meal watching the fish. She was exhausted, as was I and it was so not worth fighting her to sit down when there were only 2 other people there. She opened her gifts from Grandma which included the book, "The Patch" which she LOVES.

We said goodnight to Grandma and it was off to bed - or so I thought. We got home to find MORE cards and two packages waiting for Amelia. Aunt Judy sent another movie, "Barbie and The 3 Musketeers" and My sister Laurie and her family sent Operation and Connect 4. Oh boy was Miss Amelia excited. She couldn't decide which way to go. Operation was out of the box and on my lap before I could even blink. We had to play it while it was off though because, "That buzzing scares me!"

This little one had QUITE the birthday. Oh and we haven't even gotten to the party yet!

I'm 5!!

Friday morning I had my alarm set for 6 a.m. knowing I would hit snooze at least twice (yes - I'm a snoozer!)...Unfortunately Amelia had other ideas! She came in my room BEFORE my alarm went off climbed into bed with her pillow, blankets and animals - leaned over my face and said, "Mom, I'm 5 today!" Yes, and it was 5:55 a.m.
I'm sure you can all guess that she was excited to open her gifts. I had put out two for her to open in the morning - and she ripped them open. A new monkey shirt to wear to school and a new leotard (since hers area all too small) for her birthday party and for dance class. She said, "Mom these are what I liked at Target!" She seemed to have forgotten that they had gone in the cart while she was there and that I paid for them in front of her and that I had them on the kitchen table for a couple hours before I realized she forgot about them and put them away for her birthday:) She said the same thing about most of her gifts from me, as I don't shop alone often, but she forgets easily what she picks out:)

After she opened those gifts she asked where the rest were, I informed her that they were downstairs for her to open after school. She wanted to open them now. Well why not - we had plenty of time! She opened her books, and game - and the thing I wouldn't let her have for the LONGEST time - PLAYDOH! Oh was she surprised by that!
Then she opened a beautiful flower clip for her hair, from my friend Minako Suzuki in Tokyo - but what she was more impressed with was the birdhouse card that Suzuki had folded birds for out of Origami. She must have looked at it for 5 minutes!
Next it was on to the 3 packages from Aunt Judy and Uncle Dave - OH Boy! Movies! Tinkerbell, KaiLan's Great Trip to China AND Barbie The Island Princess!
I had 1 VERY happy girl with WAY too many gifts. I asked her if I should call her friends and tell them they didn't need to bring gifts to her party and she started crying - obviously I had 1 very TIRED girl too.I told her I was getting in the shower and she said, "But Mom it isn't morning yet, it's still dark outside." I said, "No honey, it is morning - haven't you heard my alarm clock going off?" Her response, "Oh is that what that is?"

Night Before Birthday

Amelia got home Thursday to discover some cards in the mail. She decided that she didn't want to wait until her birthday to open them.
She got two cards from Aunt Judy and Monkey Boy (that's Uncle Dave). The first one had 5 quarters in it and it said, "How many candles? How many quarters? How many cards will Aunt Judy send?" Oh was she excited! The other card from Judy and the Monkey had 5 dimes in it. I bet you can guess - on her birthday she got two more cards, one with 5 nickles and one with 5 pennies....then on the day of her party she got one with 5 - $1 bills in it! WOW was she excited:)Thursday night she also had a package in the mail from one of her China Cousins, Tahlia. Tahlia's family sent Amelia a card which she LOVED. The stickers didn't last 10 minutes before the princesses on the card were beautifully decorated. Tahlia's big sister Jazzie also shared some more eye patches which she doesn't need anymore. THANK YOU! - As you can see in the pictures, Amelia's face is getting pretty sore from the adhesive, but she is still wearing her patch like a trooper. The ones from Jazzie seem to be the most gentle, so I will have to order more of those! It's nice to have friends who share their knowledge!

After I put Amelia to bed I got out the wrapping paper to finish wrapping her gifts. She came to my door because I hadn't checked on her yet, I told her she couldn't come in and I'd be right there. I went and tucked her in again. Then she came back again as I was finishing up. I told her to come on in. She looked at the pile of stuff on the floor and she said, "Are those ALL for ME?" Yes, I said...then she picked up the packages and said, "This is a book" (she was right). "This is a game" (right again). "Another book?" (yep!) "This is clothes, but I don't like clothes, and this is more clothes!" (right and right.) Finally she picked up two and didn't have a clue. Man she's a stinker!
I sent her back to her room and went to bed, knowing it was going to be an early morning as we had cupcakes to take to school and I had an early morning meeting...little did I know!

Apple Orchard

Amelia's class took a field trip to a local apple orchard on Thursday. Boy have their voices gotten LOUDER since the field trips last year. The kids did great though, I was amazed that putting nearly 40 kids used to sitting in car seats on a school bus with their friends without car seats that any of them (my daughter in particular) could sit still.

It was a 45 minute trip each way and Amelia's class sat near the rear of the bus. This mom gets a little (OK a lot carsick) and I started to feel nausaus before we even got out of town. I opened a window and closed my eyes and that helped. Amelia looked over and said, "The teacher's said we CAN'T sleep on the bus. Besides, you'll miss ALL the great SITES!" Little did my daughter (who was not sitting next to me, but to her buddy know that I was about to be sick on her little friend sitting next to me (who was asleep). If I weren't so proud I would have asked to move to the front of the bus, but no - I made it to the Orchard just fine.

First the kids were shown an inactive behive and told how the bees spread the pollen so that the trees can make apples. Then we went out to the trees and they were told about how many types of apples there are in that orchard, in our state, in the United States, and in the world. Next they were taught how to pick an apple - FINALLY they got to pick an apple and eat it (they were REALLY good!)

After the kids had all picked an apple, the owner of the orchard told them to just throw them into the orchard when they were finished - as MANY of the kids chucked their uneaten apples, Amelia looked up at me and said, "I can litter?" Then I explained why...

We walked back up near the bus to learn how to make apple juice. Getting 40 kids to sit on a small 3 tiered bench was very challenging. They ALL wanted to be on the top. Once we got most of them settled, the orchard dog came up and they ALL got down to pet him - then the fight for the top happened ALL over again! FINALLY most of the kids were seated and they proceeded with the demonstration. One of the little guys got to "try" to crank the apple press while one of the other kids got to put the apples in- it was a lot harder than he thought it would be. The kids were facinated when juice actually started coming out. My favorite part of the day was when one of the kids sitting nicely watching the demonstration finished eatting his apple (remember they were told to throw the cores into the orchard) well he threw is core and it BEANED another kid in the back of the head. The kid he hit didn't say a word! He rubbed the back of his head - turned around - didn't see the apple and just went right back to listening...I was in awe at that little man's restraint! The kid who hit him - put his hand over his mouth and looked mortified. I said nothing and no one else even noticed...I just giggled and giggled!

Once the demonstration was over it was nearing lunch/nap and the kids were getting cranky - so we piled back on the bus for the trip home. They were much more quiet - MANY of the kids fell asleep...my daughter just sat and said, "I'm hungry" for the 45 minute drive home - of course she decided to sit by me THEN:)

It was a nice trip and I was so happy I could go along. I love seeing how the kids interact and learning who all of Amelia's friends are. It also gave me a whole new perspective on how easy my job really is!

Happy 5th Birthday Amelia!

I can't believe my baby is 5! It seems like just yesterday we were celebrating her first birthday. She is growing so quickly - what's funny is that at every age I've wanted to stop time and keep her that age forever - being her Mom just gets better every year.

Love That Smile

Photos Galore!

Eric, one of the guys I worked with during my VERY SHORT stint selling cell phones, is an awesome photographer! His focus has been on weddings, but now he is starting to expand his business into portraits. He did a super fun shoot with Amelia at a local park recently. His goal is to bring out natural expressions and he CERTAINLY captured Amelia's spirit.

I'll be posting some of my favorites over the next several days to celebrate Miss Amelia's 5th Birthday this Friday!

I really wanted a photo of Amelia in some flowers, there weren't many in the park, but there were some daisies, my favorite! Eric picked Amelia up and set her down right in the middle of the patch and started snapping...Amelia was FREAKING out because there were bees all around. I love how she is looking up out of her glasses like, "Get me out of here!" It was REALLY hot that day and after about 45 minutes Amelia was FINISHED! Eric had 1 more idea he wanted to try, but Amelia would not cooperate! These have got to be some of the funniest expressions I have ever seen!I love this one, because she's making a face that I make ALL the time - seriously, I have the wrinkles to prove it! I may have been making it at that very moment!

Maximum Stress Level!

I don't know if my stress level can get any higher without steam literally blowing out my ears...I am back in class now and seriously questioning whether continuing my Masters right now was a good idea. My supervisor had a beautiful healthy little girl on Monday, Elise Marie and I am so happy for her and her husband, but it means she'll be out for the next 11 weeks. I don't expect my work load to increase much, because she had been tapering off and delegating much of the work the last month or so.

That said, my work load has increased 150% since February, I am truly at capacity and then some. I know I should appreciate having a job that I truly enjoy, but at this point I wish our managers could see that we really do need more employees. We lost several through attrition and layoffs this year, and we were actually suppose to hire due to our increased work load. I don't mind working hard, but when I start to bring my stress home with me - I know that something has to give. I'm wondering if it should have been school.

Amelia has been so good about putting up with me; when I'm stressed I get frustrated with her much more easily. Plus I have less time to spend with her than I did all summer when I wasn't in school. I am expecting her to do more to help take care of herself than ever - it isn't more than she should (believe me!), but it is more than she is used to and that is a big change. My growing expectations along with her change in classroom, patching, and a move to her own bed has added a lot of stress to her little life too.

I keep telling myself, just get through this week, just get through this month and it will all look better. I really think if I can get to October 2nd and get all of the MUST DOS off of my TO DO list I will feel a lot better - and hopefully that will make Amelia feel better too:)

My Big Girl

Amelia has been doing just awesome wearing her patch; I am truly amazed that it doesn't frustrate her. I ordered some cloth patches to go over her glasses last week thinking there was no way she was going to put up with a sticky patch on her eye every day...lets just say she didn't love them.

The patches came and were SO cute; she put the pink one with the butterfly on immediately. Then proceeded to the bathroom to look in the mirror - she didn't even come out and I heard, "MOM, I LOOK RIDICULOUS! GET THIS THING OFF OF ME!" She came out with her glasses off and was pulling the patch off. I asked why she didn't like it. She repeated, "I look ridiculous, my friends will laugh at me." I asked if she liked the plain ones that stuck to her eye better and got a resounding YES!

The next day she wore her boring beige patch again...then on Saturday we received an envelope from our friend Sandra with some ADORABLE stick-on patches to try. Amelia wanted to put one on right away, but she was done patching for the day, so I convinced her to wait until Sunday. Yesterday - I couldn't get it off of her! She wore the cute little pink patch for 9 hours! That's a little more than the required 6. Sandra, thank you! They are a hit, the kids at school LOVED the pink camouflage one today.

You may notice that her non-patched eye is puffy - we don't know for sure what's going on with it. I took her to Urgent Care yesterday, but the Doctor wasn't sure if it is from Allergies, or if it is VIRAL Pink Eye. Viral meaning it can't be treated with antibiotics. Since it doesn't have any symptoms other than the swelling she thinks it is allergies (in 1 eye) so we've added Zyrtec to her Singulair; it looks better today (day 3), hopefully it's gone tomorrow! Poor kid, has to see out of 1 eye and it's nearly swollen shut. She is SUCH a trooper!

Chinese School

If there is 1 thing I NEVER have to convince Amelia to do it is go to Chinese school. They had the month of August off and she asked me EVERY Friday if it was time to go back yet. Finally last week I was able to say yes and when they started back she got a new set of text books. This is the first time she's had her own book and is responsible for weekly homework. Miss Lily her teacher thinks she and Anna, the other little girl in her class who just turned 5 are now old enough to have some more responsibility.

Amelia is so cute with her books - we packed her bag with markers and pencils and a notebook. We keep a bag packed for each activity she has because otherwise we would ALWAYS be looking for things.

Yesterday my mom picked her up at school, this is the first time anyone other than me has picked her up or dropped her off. I called my mom right as she should have gotten to school to make sure she found it OK and she was just walking into the room. I heard Amelia say in a VERY excited voice, "Grandma, this is Miss Lily my teacher!"

Last week Amelia mentioned her homework several times, but it always seemed to be at bedtime, so we didn't get it done. Amelia was NOT going to let that happen again this week. She ran up to me about 45 minutes ago and said, "Mom I need to do my homework, my CHINESE SCHOOL homework" (we had done her preschool homework earlier today). She got out her bag, her book and her pencil and started practicing writing and speaking. Then she ran over, shut the TV off and said, "I need it to be quiet so I can concentrate."

She kept asking me questions, and of course I was reading off the Pinyin (it is only there for me, not for her) and my pronunciation was all off...so Amelia said, "Mom I'm going to have to teach you aren't I?!" Then she asked me to read something that was written in Pinyin...she said, "No what does it say in English, that's English!" I then explained that it was Chinese written differently - to which she replied, "Oh how stylish!" (I think she was listening to me talk to Aunt Judy about fashion week a little too long this morning:)

I am so happy she enjoys Chinese school, but I don't know how much she is learning. My mom did tell me that Miss Lily said Amelia is learning quickly and can read several Chinese characters. I know she can write them as she does often - Mostly I know how good spending time with other Chinese children is for her spirit...she's never in a better mood than she is after Chinese school!

First Day Patched

Amelia got up this morning (after sleeping in her own bed ALL night!) ready to put her patch on. I was nervous about how she would react once we got to school - I really should know better.
When we got there, the school age kids were waiting outside for the school bus - she ran up to the line and said, "Oh no, I'm wearing a patch!" Then she ran into the building, entered the code, ran down the stairs, to her room, and went in and said, "Oh, look, I'm wearing a patch!"

I talked to her teacher and let her know that ideally I would like her to wear it until nap, but I realized she would probably want to take it off earlier. I asked her to just leave me a note with what time she took it off so we could do more time tonight. I put some extra patches in her bag in case she needed them, but forgot to tell her teacher about them. I also meant to call school to check on her but got caught up on work and forgot that too.

When I got to school today at 5:30 Amelia ran up to greet me - WITH HER PATCH ON!
I asked her if she had it on all day and she said yes. She ran back to her friends and I asked her teacher (a different one) if she had really worn it all day. Amelia took it off at nap, but when she woke up she asked for a new one. "She told me she needed to exercise her eye some more. She took me to her backpack and showed me where they were and how to put it on." How funny is that. She had it on the entire time she was awake from 7:30 to 5:30! I don't expect her to continue this enthusiasm forever, but I was pretty impressed.

Tonight as I was putting her to bed we were talking about her day and I asked her how she liked wearing her patch. She said it was OK. Then she started talking about how her friend Jackson wore a patch once because he fell down. I asked her if she told her friends why she was wearing one and she said, "No, Melissa did at Circle Time." Melissa is the head teacher and from the sounds of it she talked to the kids about why Amelia was wearing a patch on her eye first thing this morning. Whatever she said, Amelia was a very happy, very comfortable little girl when I picked her up tonight.

Praying tomorrow goes as smoothly!!

Glasses & Patch

Amelia had her follow-up appointment with her eye-doctor today. She was SO excited when I picked her up at school. She told all of her friends that she was going to the eye doctor - and then I got to hear about the last time all of her friends had been to the doctor...too funny!

When we got to the doctor she quickly verified with the assistant that today she just had to play games, no drops! She hates to have her eyes dilated! The assistant checked her eyes and then the doctor came in and did some more tests (aka, played some more games). Her right eye which is much weaker than the left has improved since her appointment in May - she is able to read an entire line smaller than she could then! However it is still really weak, so we will now be patching her left eye for 6 hours a day for the next 6 weeks.

Amelia completely understands that her right eye is weaker and that by covering her left eye she can "exercise" it and help it get stronger. We stopped at the store tonight and got some plain patches, we put one on for about an hour and it was a bit too big so her glasses kept sliding off her nose. We were talking about it at dance tonight and her dance teacher from last year told us about this website. Her doctor specifically said to use the adhesive ones so she can't look around them, but because these block front and peripheral vision I feel confident they will be effective. I ordered her a purple sparkle one and a pink one with a butterfly on it. If these don't work then we will be getting some of theesethat our friend Jazzie liked so much. The problem is, the smallest ones of these are larger than the ones I bought tonight. I wonder if I'm not applying them correctly. One of the moms at daycare patched her little guy two years ago, so I may ask her for some assistance in positioning the adhesive one in the morning.

Hopefully Amelia leaves it on all day!

Family Fun!

Last Sunday a bunch of our family got together for Sunday dinner at my mom's house. We used to do these all the time when all of the grandkids were younger - often every Sunday after church whoever could would just show up for breakfast. Now most of the grandkids are growing up - my oldest niece, Lizzy with be 25 the day after Amelia turns 5! Now that everyone is so busy we had to schedule this family dinner 2 months out and even then not everyone living in the state could make it.
Those of us who did had a great time - we celebrated my Sister Laurie's 25th Wedding Anniversary, she and my Brother-In-Law Phil started dating when I was about Amelia's age! Instead of a big party they and their 3 daughter's spent 3 weeks in Italy earlier this summer.

Senior Prom
Happy 25th Anniversary!

The kids had a blast running around playing with grandma's dog Buster - the fatest dog on the planet:) Amelia loves dogs as much as I do and I hope some day she will have her own dog to teach tricks too.
It was great to have some time with family - we need to take more time out!