Playgroup Reunion

When Katherine was born I started a playgroup for babies that were born around the same time. Over the last two and a half years different people have been involved and come in and out of the group but there was always a core group of us that has continued on. Kathy, Janna and I were the main core of the group from the beginning and then Kathy moved out of town last November. She was back in town this week so we got the kids together along with Jen and Evie (who have been consistently involved but Evie is a year younger so not since the beginning).

It was a pretty chaotic lunch and playgroup. We had Robert and Sammy who were born Dec. 05, Katherine Feb 06, Evie Dec. 06, Sara May 07 and Laurie Jane July 07. All kids were mobile and all wanting to eat.

We had the brilliant idea of trying to get all 6 kids together for a picture on the couch. At first both boys adamantly refused so we just had a cute picture of the girls.

The Girls

Laurie Jane, Evie, Sarah and Katherine

Finally we were able to get the boys in the picture though they were not that happy about it.

Kathy's son Sammy was pretty much Katherine's first friend. Those first few months the four of us were together several times a week. Katherine and I sure miss Kathy and Sammy (and now Sarah too!). Here are some pictures of Katherine and Sammy then and now.

The results

Wow! I would have never guessed that the baby bedding opinions would result in a landslide! I really like both so I thought the opinions would be closer to equal. With the combined comments and emails the total is 24 votes for the blue and white and 3 votes for the floral and gingham. A lot of great input was given for me to digest. Since it was such an obvious opinion and the blue and white one is already made whereas the floral and gingham one would require some work, I will stick with the blue and white.

So, now my question is for all of you that said I should accent with other colors. What in the world do you mean? Where should I put those other colors? I am not going to remake the bedding so that I can add other colors of piping, ruffles or ties. If I were to do that I would just start over. Do I do it though art work on the walls, curtains or what? I am decoratively challenged so if anyone would like to go shopping and help out I would love it. So far I have only spent about $75 on the bedding and curtains so there is some room in the budget for some other stuff. If you know of any great places to buy cute kids stuff and especially art for the walls let me know. I am free on Tuesday and Thursday when Katherine is at MDO. Let me know if you want to help out.

So I spent way too much time on etsy.com tonight searching for artwork. Here are some of the ones that I liked. What do you think? They come from Sarah Jane. Her theme is kind of vintage french kids art so maybe it goes well with the toile. Many of the pictures come in several versions so you can vary the background color and hair color of the kids. Sorry I went a little oveboard on posting the pictures :)

There are 9 month prints. The artist is still working on the summer ones. I like them but it might be weird to only have a few and I don't think I need 12 prints.

I think I like the bunny and tea party ones a lot. It would help to introduce pink into the room and they all coordinate well.

These are from belleandboo.

Indecision

Squeak is due in 5.5 weeks. I need to make a final decision on her room. But I keep going back and forth in a state of indecision. I will blame it on pregnancy brain and chasing a toddler. So, I would love to have your opinions. The room is painted two shades of blue and that will not change so remember that when looking at the two options. You can click on the pictures to see them larger.

Option one. Blue and white toile dust ruffle, bumper and curtain valances. I have struggled with how to integrate any other colors into the room. It is a difficult to match blue.

Option 2 requires a little work but stuff I already have. This would involve a little sewing to refit the bedding I used when I was single. It is a floral dust ruffle and green gingham bumper. I would use the chambray sheets we already have. A positive is that I have a ton of the material for accessories and some pieces are already cut for curtains and table toppers. I put it on the crib but obviously it does not fit well yet. The dust ruffle is hanging too low and the white would not show so much. You can get an idea of what it would look like though.
So, friends and family. Let me know which one you like best by leaving a comment. Cost and effort don't need to be factored in because the cost for either is minimal and so is effort. Just tell me which you like best. Either way, Squeak will sleep in our room for the first few weeks so if it is not totally finished, this type-A mom will be just fine.

Blog analysis

This may a boring post for some, but for those of you whom also are mommy bloggers, I feel it is pretty important. Do you know who is reading your blog? I am not just talking about grandparents, relatives and friends, but what about those anonymous people? If you think there are no anonymous people reading your blog about your kids, think twice. Think about how many times you have looked at a friends blog, linked to one of their friends, and then one of theirs and then before you know it you are laughing at a post or crying over some story and your husband asks you who you are reading about and you have no idea. (This has never happened to me, I promise :) So, probably people get to your blog the same way as well. It is pretty harmless most of the time.

But what about those who land on your blog by searching google for something. They are not linking from your friends' blog. Do you know what they are typing into the search engine that lands them at your blog? You do if you have some kind of tracking or analytics program installed on your blog.

I first installed a tracking program on our old blog just out of curiosity. I was so excited when I saw someone had read my blog all the way from Turkey but I thought it was pretty random what they searched for that landed them there. I thought nothing of it. Well, my mom googled that search and all of the other links were inappropriate. We then began to be more careful about not posting last names or locations for security reasons. When we went to Norway we started over with a new blog with all of these precautions in place. I did not like the idea that someone searching for something inappropriate would end up on my blog and know who I was. There are child predators out there people!

Just last month this happened again and I noticed by looking at my tracking program that a number of searches had been done for a phrase that was intended to find inappropriate material. While only one person spent any time on my blog, that scared me. I went back and changed my post so that those search words were not present and now when I look at my analytics, that search no longer lands on my blog. Besides the safety issue, it is just fun to see what people search for that lands them at your blog. They are usually harmless and just interesting. Some of my common searches are:

• BPA free sippy cups
• Toddler and jet lag
• stop nursing cold turkey
• cute pigtails
• toddler music
• bathroom remodel
• bed time prayers
• Red, Hot and Blue potato salad
• housing appraisal
• netti pot
• toy management

If you are not already using some kind of analytics program or tracker on your blog, you should. I personally use google analytics but there are others out there. I just find it pretty easy to navigate and it gives me the data that I am looking for.

I only check my stats a few times a month. It keeps record for the last 30 days so that is adequate. First I look at the overall page that currently shows me that in the last month I had 1503 visits and 2794 page views along with other data. You can click on any stat and it gives more details and even graphs for the visual types. I enjoy the map and seeing where people are who are viewing my blog. I always click on the map "view report" to get more details. By scrolling over each country you can see how many visits were from that country. I had 1394 from the US, 42 from Norway and 27 from Canada as my highest. That makes sense because I am in the US as are most of my friends and family, we lived in Norway, and a lot of Canadians read the same blogs I do and my link off of my comments to get to my blog. You can click on any country and get even more details like the city where people are located that view your blog.Then you see how many pages they viewed and how long they were there. Sometimes it shows 0 time spent on your blog.The most important thing that I look at is the traffic sources and content overview sections. In the traffic sources, you see how people arrive at your blog, be it search engines or from other blogs. My #1 source is listed as direct which is someone directly types in the web address or have me saved in their favorites. I think this also includes when someone has me added to their reader program and most of my comments on this post indicate that most of my readers read me through a reader. #2 is google searches, #3 is blogger referral which I assume is by clicking "next blog". After that there are a lot of people who get to my blog by clicking on others' blog. Thanks to my top traffic suppliers Chrys (this month actually beating out google), Kim, Will and Jaime, Heather, Sundee, Misty, Erin, and Jen.

Go to Google Analytics. If you use blogger or have any kind of google account, it is easy. Just sign in using your google id and password. To add a new website or blog go to "Add Website Profile" and follow the directions. I do not remember exactly what all I had to do, but it was super easy to just follow the directions.

Sorry that this is a more technical post. It will not interest all of you. But, I hope that other mommy bloggers out there reading this will think of what they are doing to keep their kids safe on the Internet. I think that using an analytics program is one tool to help you know who is reading your blog and why. Let me know your thoughts!

Aquarium

A few weeks ago Anne and I took the girls to the Aquarium or as Katherine called it, the "inside zoo". It was a fun day but very crowded due to 978 school children attending. There was an actual sign with the number, I did not make that up. The girls enjoyed it though it was not always easy to keep up with toddlers among all of the elementary kids. We decided that as wonderful as the Aquarium is, at their age the regular zoo is probably better because there is more room, it has more animals that they know and it is cheaper. The main bummer of the trip is that I brought my fancy camera to take wonderful photos of the exotic animals and when I pulled it out, there was no memory card. So, thanks Anne for taking some picture for me.

Sitting in front of the turtles

Katherine loved climbing on the railings. I had to be right by her at all times!

Anne caught Katherine in rare form.

Anne and Penelope both brought their baby dolls and enjoyed showing them the fish. So cute!

Naptime struggles

It seems that nap time is a roller coaster these days. Some days it is a piece of cake. We read 3 books, snuggle, turn out the light and turn on the white noise machine (rain is Katherine's favorite) and she is out for 2 hours. Then there are days like last Sunday and today where it takes a very long time to get Katherine down for a nap.

I started trying to get her down at 2:15. That is my new chosen nap time because her new MDO does not do naps and we get home at 2:15. She often takes naps that late anyway so no big deal. She finally went to sleep at 3:45. In that hour and a half between, we read books and snuggled as usual. But when I turned out the light and left, she threw a fit. Now that she is in her big girl bed instead of a crib, she can get up. I had put a child proof door knob cover on the inside of her door and she tried for 15 minutes, screaming "MOMMY" the entire time before I went to get her. She asked if we could nap in my bed. At this point I was ready to try that. So, we snuggled in my bed. I fell asleep on and off periodically waking up when she would poke my eyes or pull my hair. She never slept. Finally I told her that she had to go back into her room.

We recently took off the bed rail because she was climbing on it and I felt that it was more likely that she would fall over the bed rail while climbing and get hurt than that she would get hurt falling out of bed. She has only fallen out once and it scared her so we put her crib mattress on the floor until she learns to sleep on the side near the wall. I told her that she could sleep in her bed, on her mattress on the floor or on the carpet. She chose the mattress.

It is now 6:25 and she is still asleep! I knew she needed a nap and the effort I put in during that hour and a half was worth it.

The negative is that we were supposed to meet our community group for dinner at 5:30 and then go to the town hall meeting at church at 6:30. Obviously I missed dinner and I may miss the town hall meeting as well. The bummer is that on Sunday when we had problems we missed a swim party with these same people. I promise, Katherine really is sleeping! I wish I was with you all at Chipotle right now. I am sooooo hungry!

So much to do, so little time

According to my "widget" in my sidebar, there are 45 days left until my "guess date". (I prefer to think of it as a guess date rather than a due date because who knows when Squeak will arrive). Some days that feels like it is sooooo far away that it will never get here but recently it has felt much more immanent and I realize that I have a very long list of things to do and I am not sure that they will all get done.

Here is my overzealous "to do" list. Note that not all of the items relate to Squeak, but I realize that time will be even more limited when she arrives. By the way, I thrive off of lists and crossing things off so I will return to this list and cross them off as they are done.

Squeak's list

• Pick a name
• Schedule photographer for birth
• Order return labels for the announcements
• Decide on announcement design
• Update mailing list and print announcement mailing labels
• Wash cloth diapers
• Wash preemie, newborn and 0-3 clothes
• Talk with Dr. Cindy about doula stuff
• Tweak and finalize Birth plan
• Make a new nursing cover (Katherine's was lost in Helsinki, I did buy fabric 6/13)
• Get a gift for Squeak to give Katherine and for Katherine to give Squeak.
• Order bows and headbands
• Paint name on canvas(bought letters instead)
• Get a blank wall calendar
• Check that preadmittance at Baylor is in order
• Pack hospital bags
• Go to Peppermint to look at baby carriers and register
• Order birthing skirt?? (I have no idea what to wear during labor and don't look forward to a hospital gown)
• Schedule and get a massage at Maternity store
• Wash and install the car seat
• Get all baby toys and paraphernalia out of garage and clean them
• Declutter bedroom to make room for pack and play

At Home

• Paint bathroom doors and shelves
• Install bathroom doors and shelves
• Organize and put away bathroom stuff
• Vacuum Squeak's room (since we are moving around the furniture)
• Vacuum dressing room (from the mess the workers made
• Put together Squeak's bookcase
• Move the glider in Squeak's room)
• Move the buttons on Katherine's shirt
• Decorate nursery
• iron Katherine's clothes (remind me not to buy tiny clothes that need to be ironed

Computer type stuff

• Do a google calendar for the family
• Make a hypnobabies checklist
• Make a phone list to put in my calendar
• Blog, blog, blog
• Use itunes gift certificate
• Find a nightlight lamp for Katherine's room
• change credit card info on auto bill pay (ours was lost and canceled)

There is a lot to do and I am sure this is not even the half of it but it helps me to have a list to organize my priorities. I want to make sure that most of all I spend a lot of quality time with Katherine since I know that her world is about to be turned upside down and I will not get as much time with her when Squeak comes.

Happy Birthday Evan!

Saturday we attended Evan's second birthday party. It was a cookout at their house with water sprinklers for the kids. Evan was in Katherine's MDO class this year and we got to know his parents at family camp last year. It was a fun afternoon with good food, good friends and fun!

Katherine is the birthday expert. She thinks all parties are for her and she likes to help everyone blow out their candles.
Katherine and Evan sit to eat their cupcakes.
Katherine has "messy mouth".
Evan also has a messy mouth.

Katherine actually wanted to wear two pigtails which is a rare occasion. Even more rare is that they stayed in for the entire event. It had been so long since she had let me do her hair that I did not realize it was long enough for all of her hair to fit in the pigtails instead of the front part. I thought it made her look so old. It was so cute but she has not let me do it again.

The Foosball table was a hit but Katherine and Evan were more concerned about each keeping a ball than about trying to play. They would only drop their balls into the playing field at the same time and usually rather than trying to kick it to the goal they would immediately grab it back out for fear that the other child would get both balls. You got to love 2 year olds and their "ability" to share.

For lunch we had 6 kids actually sitting at a table to eat their hot dogs. Jacob actually did sit most of the time though he is standing in this photo.
Yummy

Happy Birthday Evan!