I've been a bad, bad blogger lately! I just can't seem to get motivated to post anything these days. The only time I have to sit at the computer for any real length of time is during Scout's one (sometimes short) nap a day and then after she goes to bed. These days, I've been using those times to either sleep a little or get things done around the house....OR just to sit on my rear and watch soap operas while eating lunch. I miss blogging so much, though. I'm going to try hard not to be as lazy about it in the future.

I should summarize the happenings around here.

-- Scout is walking almost full-time now. She went from only taking maybe 10 steps at a time sporadically throughout the day to using walking as her main mode of transportation almost over night!

-- She is sleeping soooooooo horribly lately. She developed a nasty yeast diaper rash from the antibiotics she was on for her ear infection and I was thinking that might have something to do with the crummy sleep. But her butt is almost clear now and she is still waking frequently through the night. I have resorted to letting her fuss a little longer than I used to because sometimes she will sound like she is not really "awake" when she cries and will just roll over and go back to sleep within a few minutes.

-- She says momma and (maybe) dada pretty frequently. Yesterday she said "baby" plain as day after I had pointed to a picture of a baby and said it...but I have yet to get her to say it again since then. Little stinker.

-- She has learned sign language for "more" and uses it in the correct context all the time now. I love it! She made up her own little variation of the sign and that's what we use now. I watched a baby signing video that said to go with your child's signs instead of forcing them to adapt to the real signs, so that's what we've decided to do. We're now working on "potty", "milk", "eat", and "diaper change". Sometimes I remember to sign for "mommy" and "daddy", but I'm not very consistent about it.

-- If she's in a rotten mood, Scout throws little tantrums now by flinging her head back then forward and arching her back while screaming if she doesn't get what she wants. Yeah. Fun. I particularly love it when she does this in my arms and head-butts my nose several times in the process. I think that's why I am all of the sudden getting proactive about the whole sign language thing....I know it'll help her not to get so frustrated if she has the ability to communicate better.

Here are some recent pics, for those of you who haven't already seen them on my Flickr page:

My new haircut:

Hhhmmm....what else?

-- DH has been having to work really long and hard hours lately. Maybe I'm just all wacky and hormonal from my stupid period (which came 2 weeks early...ggrrrrrr) but yesterday I was just thinking about how grateful I am to have him. He does so much and works so hard so I can be at home with Scout and we can have nice things.

-- My mom, step-dad, and grandma will be getting here soon. April 12th, to be exact. They will be staying 2 weeks and will be here for Scout's birthday! Woohoo!

-- We just hired someone to maintain our lawn for us this summer. DH HATES yard work with a passion and I can't seem to find the time to go out there to mow and weed-eat and rake, etc. I don't know where I would put Scout while I'm doing all of that and doing it during her nap is not feasible for many reasons. (including the fact that it takes 3-4 hours to mow and trim our yard with our push-mower) The guy is supposed to come within the next couple days to do a "spring clean-up". There are a ton of leaves smashed up against the back of the house, the flower beds are overgrown and ugly, the ditches are full of leaves and branches, and all the bushes need cut back. I really wouldn't mind doing all of that, but I just can't find the time! We normally wouldn't be able to afford a service like this, but we are able to use some of our tax refund for it. I'm so excited that our lawn will no longer look trashy!! (umm...which is more than I can say for my car)

Labels: firsts, my car, my house, pics of scout