#twoyearold

Hi GPODers! Today we’re getting an introduction to Jody Petersen’s new garden in Chestertown, Maryland. Jody didn’t have much to work with when she moved to the property but has quickly started crafting a landscape that is not only beautiful but greatly beneficial to local wildlife and pollinators that visit her plantings. While two years isn’t quite enough time to have a mature garden of large,…

Gathering my thoughts and I know in writing this it will shift from talking about her to talking to her, so if it is confusing that is my brain for you on a daily basis while I parent my very strong willed child and a wild Isaac.

One of the things shes been doing is taking the animal magnets off the fridge and making them walk on the ground as she crawls and says “its gonna get you” Its usually the tiger one though she calls it a lion. She also did it with one of the small wooden bees I’ve let her begin playing with as shes mostly better about not putting small things in her mouth.

I have to look at photos and video to remember these last six months. It goes fast and feels like a blur and there have been so many changes for us with moving and dealing with the house floor and all that entailed. I have finally unpacked most of the boxes and now its been working to organize it all and Isaac proof areas. We NEED desperately to reduce the stress in our home and moving to a bigger place was a first step but I did not anticipate living on subfloor for 3 months. ( flooding happened cause we put the washer drain hose in the left, but there isn't a pipe.. suppose to put the drain hose on the right.)

I’ve focused on teaching her to observe and listen and along with watching Signing Time and Baby Einstein videos – her vocabulary has expanded with words and signs and around 18 months speaking short sentences like “where’s the owl” which led to adding anything she knew “where’s the__ “ She showed me that she had absorbed so many words and signs from the signing time videos like “dog” which was “woof woof” at first and “tree” and “leaf” and lots of food words. We did lots of explorations of our community which really was walks in the parks or playing at playgrounds and trips to the store. It had some differences than when Isaac was her age as many programs were not going cause of the vid virus and we also got kicked out of the library for me not masking my face which still just sounds insane. We would pick up lots of library books from hold usually about her current interests or what was going on so like owls and dogs and fall and thanksgiving were the topics.

She learned quickly how to climb up the slide and slide down on her belly and was pretty brave on the playground equipment. Recently she has become nervous. Maybe she notices height now when she didn’t before. She is good at asking for help when she needs it and I try to help her figure out how to move her body to access what she wants to do. Sometimes I have to pretend I’m her in my mind, like what would I do – oh push up my body with my arms so I can move my legs down to get off the step.

Parenting her in the teaching her realm is interesting as I am pulling everything from all the years of babysitting and also how I’ve done therapies with Isaac and how I’ve worked with different development abilities. Keeping myself regulated to help her learn to feel in different environments is a task I really have to be mindful about. Most of her upsets stem from being hungry or tired. And so does mine.. or some sensory issue. Parenting her is healing. Healing me from how I was parented.. I HAVE to break the cycle of the anger reactions which I was the brunt of so much when I was a child. Trauma I have is quite deep and layered, the therapy I tried to do last year didn’t really help... it dredge up a lot and I think taking some aspects from therapy has helped but only after having stopped.

Waverly is very empathic most of the time. She has learned this because of having Isaac as her brother. She has outpaced him developmentally and is taking on the role of bigger sister when she is the little sister. It’s a very weird dynamic. I have been asked a few times already if they are twins or even addressing that Waverly is the older sibling. It really breaks my brain and I am trying to not let it bother me. It is ironic because having been pushed to be the “smart kid” growing up, I’ve always wanted that smart child. And having babysat so many different children, I watched this one 3 year old boy speaking full sentences. I was hoping for a “smart child” and honestly have had to grieve that reality with Isaac. And now with Waverly, I cannot really comprehend how smart she truly is. The connections she makes, and her memory- remembering things now that happen over a week ago. Sometimes it is hard because of where Isaac is at and I cannot compare but it is inevitable.

Waverly has learned to give Isaac space and how to bring him toys and not take them back. Sharing and taking turns. We work on “asking nicely” and using “nice words” and also saying things more clearly like she would say wire for water when she could actually say water.. Her sentence that she has been repeating this week has been “what are you doing down here?” And we usually will tell her and she often asks again.. but then when you ask her she will actually say something she may be doing like “im in the car” or “I am eating mac and cheese”

My hope is to homeschool Waverly and I know that has already begun in the home with “helping” from hand over hand cleaning messes to picking up her toys. She also has a learning tower to stand at the counter and sometimes she will “help” as I will give her bowl of ice cubes or maybe beans to transfer around. One time I actually had her break the green beans for dinner and another time put the cheese on the pizza and put the pepperoni on the pizza. I am leaning more towards the charlotte mason style of learning with some Montessori aspects. We have begun to get involved with the local homeschool community with park playground meet ups and also events like Valentine’s Day and an Easter egg hunt. She has also been going to music class for about 3 months and has really participated since the beginning. We hope to get her involved in gymnastics and swimming soon. I would love to have her go to some kind of bible club or Awana but she might be too little still. We started going to MOPS groups which has probably been the most chaotic experience for her to be back with TONS of kids playing and being without me for 2 hours. She has done well though she will cry at first, she calms better than she did even 5 months ago. She has been ALL about “go find friends” which has been pretty fun to see her just enjoying being around other kids. We pushed for any time with other kids and I was pretty and still am about having play date with someone weekly if not more than one. I have to be careful not to burn myself out but I also have to be flexible which is hard like when someone cancels on us, it really breaks my brain and I have to work to process through it. Thankfully I can distract Waverly most of the time, and I usually don’t tell her so she doesn’t have that expectation.

Sleep. She FINALLY sleeps in her own room and her own bed. It has been about 2-3 months where she has been going to sleep as I sit next to her bed after nursing a short bit and then she will sleep through the night. I still nurse her in the morning and at nap, but I try to lessen and lessen. Now I am trying to figure out how to take nursing out of her bedroom, maybe like a specific chair and only before bed and not IN bed. I really do not want to fight to wean her completely and I know the milk is helping her immune system. I am really not sure what would be better for my sanity – to completely wean her with the fight or to just keep what we are doing. But she fought going to sleep SO much with dad the other night and I don’t know if she just wants that comfort from nursing or what else can be done to help her. She makes herself throw up when she is upset, sometimes from hyperventilate crying so fast but other times shes even stuck her fingers in her mouth. We have taught her how to do some deep breathing to try and keep her calm and it works sometimes. She is pretty strong willed and determined – and pushes the boundaries.

My relationship with my mother is a complicated one and I feel that its shallow at time and there were very hard times when I was younger.. She often reacted in anger and hit me for many unreasonable things. The hitting stopped only when I hit her back. Correcting Waverly we tried some hand tap and some spanks but it taps too much into that anger reaction for me. Also it didn’t work because she would hit us if she didn’t like something.

It is hard because I am really trying to be a gentle parent but I have had to be more stern with her which taps into my anger issues. So sometimes its warranted and other times my patience is less and the sternness comes to fast which I think has scared her some. When she chooses not to listen, I try to figure out why most of the time.. she often just wants to be silly and play but other times it may be needing something she can’t explain or express. She has some emotional intelligence and can see that she feels sad or upset or that shes happy.. I will use sign language and words saying “listen to what mama says” and that often works, but sometimes she just shouts at me “no, GO” Removing privileges like shows or certain toys helps motivate her to listen and sometimes food but I try to not use food. We have used 5 minute timers and that has worked well for her.

Our days our filled with errands and taking Isaac to school or therapy. And there are days at home and she can play and color or play with her kid kitchen. She really likes to color and has crayons and some pens and also a chalk board. This week shes been saying what she has drawn – happy face and rainbow.

Convincing her to eat, though she has been doing better these last weeks. I don’t push her to eat but try to give her something she would like. Some days she eats all the berrys and other days she eats pickles and oranges. Today we went out to breakfast as we woke up late and she had a bunch of sausage and some whipped cream.

We are working on making new friends. We have some good old friends but often they are busy. And well some moved away and rightfully so.. I HAVE to believe God has us here for a reason. Because I said, if we don’t get this house we are moving to Florida.. and we got this house.. I want to be intentional and try and reach out to old friends and hang out and also find new friends – for myself and for Waverly. I also cannot get to caught up in those friends who don’t reciprocate in some way.. I don’t cut people out like I’ve been cut out because I HATE how it feels and I don’t think we are called to do that at all. Boundaries are reasonable in most things but this “cut out ‘toxic’ people is honestly wrong. Cutting people out just because you don’t agree on a couple things will probably leave you without friends. Its mainly been vegans.. and the prochoice friends I once had..  but I digress.. that’s probably a whole different blog post..   This is supposed to be about Waverly but its more about how I parent her.. which is against the grain of most societal norms. It’s the opposite in many ways of how I was raised which makes things pretty difficult.. And theres a wild Isaac.

Watching turning red…there was lots of controversy over this movie.. Though watching it with Waverly showed me how many emotions she does understand. I hope to continue positive understanding through her changes as she grows.

Shes my mini me and its been surreal to see how she has grown. I am really trying to think about how she feels and sometimes its hard. My biggest prayers since she was born is that I have a love for her and there are times in the angry moments, I feel no love. So I really try to not get there and find ways to have more patience – comes from God. His help each moment. I love the songs Waverly has learned and that she has learned the song Jesus Loves Me. Of all people to remind me to teach her that song was my mom just randomly one day on the phone asking if we sang that with her. We had a couple times but not daily which is what my parents did do with me before bed every night.

“run run run” she says as she toddles through the house and around the table and the island. Shes getting faster and faster and I hope I’ll be able to keep up. We are stuck in reaction cycles.. so. Many. Stressors. And stress eating. TRYING so hard to be healthier and its much harder than it has been. It helps my house has 2 flights of stairs now.

Hiding. Peek a boo she has loved. But also just hiding her hand or her feet or whatever.. CUPCAKES.. she LOVES them..She also has a cupcake toy which I think encouraged that for her. Going to friends birthdays has led her to randomly be singing happy birthday around the house.

“no more smile” when she doesn’t want to be photographed or videoed.. its most because she can’t have the phone. She likes to pretend to use a phone and call Grandpa. Or a friend.

She loves dogs but in theory as she is still intimidated when up close.

Observing a bird in the park eating a worm. Hearing an airplane and sharing that she hears it and asking where it is.  

Grabbing my face and saying I love you or asking if I'm ok.