Show me the Money....

I wasn't going to write this blog UNTIL things had worked themselves out (literally) for fear that I would be judged for not rushing my darling sweet child to the emergency room, BUT I keep thinking of funny little things that I should write, and know I'll forget them! So here goes..... go ahead judge me... she's still alive.....

I have never wanted my child to poop so much, I've been her own personal cheerleader since Sunday night... that fateful Sunday night.... it was a dark and stormy night... no wait that's not my story to tell.... ANYWAY it was Sunday, Sophia being the little entertainer that she is, came to find me in the kitchen to show me her new "trick" - If you have been around Sophia lately, you will know that she is obsessed with Halloween -  ghosties, pumpkins, trick or treating... and VAMPIRES... I didn't think that my 2 year old was going to LOVE the whole vampire scene.. but thanks to Mickey Mouse (damn you Disney AGAIN!) and Max & Ruby (really Rosemary Wells!?!?) Sophia's new passion in life is vampires...

So back to this "trick" (and this should have been one of those times when maybe I shouldn't have laughed with her.. I'm still learning) Sophia bounds into the kitchen and smiles at me..... cute... no wait.... I take a closer look and on inspection come to find that she has 2 nickels shoved up under her top lip... the puzzled look on my face was all Sophia needed to announce to me that she was a "VAMPIIIIIIIIRE"..... and I laughed... and then she laughed and then........ SHIT... she coughs and splutters, one nickel comes flying out of her mouth and the other.... well in her words... "I ate the monies Mummy"... my heart lurches in my chest.... she's still breathing.. check.. she's now laughing..  I hand her a drink and she gulps it down.. ok not stuck anywhere... so I do what EVERY clueless good mother does... I jump on Google... (well first I skype my hubby... but he was about as much use as a chocolate teapot.... "maybe she'll poop out a dollar" - THANKS Honey! OK give him more credit.. he told me to call the nurse advice line... I totally skipped that idea as I knew they would just tell me to go to the ER, like they do for every situation).. so Google it was.... come to find out (well I kinda already knew) that kiddos swallowing foreign objects is quite normal... I just never thought it would happen to us...

So taking the advice from my online army... I skipped the ER... instead for the last 3 days I have been making sure she eats and drinks as normal.. slipping extra apple juice, prunes, corn (poop enducing food) and the occasional fiber one bar her way, to help the nickel make it's way through... nothing is stuck as she is still pooping... just hasn't pooped the nickel yet... her color is fine, she's not breathing funky, she's her normal happy self.... if you ask her is her belly hurts she says no... well then she thinks about it and says "bandage please" ... we'll give it a few more days and if nothing appears I'll take her to the Doctor.

Just to clarify - the reasons I didn't rush my monkey to the ER are numerous... the biggest being I didn't want to freak her out... I didn't want her to get strapped down for an X-Ray, poked and prodded, maybe havng to force her to drink something nasty to get it moving... the things that would make for a VERY unpleasant time for a 2 year old... I'll figure we'll let nature do it's thing.. and then if nothing transpires.. we'll take the ER route..
I'll save you the updates every time she poops..!!

Apple Strudel a la Apple

Pinterest is my new guilty pleasure, I seem to spend countless hours on there, pinning random crap to my boards!  All of it cute and delish looking, but most of it I'll never attempt to make, see or taste, it's a wonderful waste!

Today however, after adding yet another pin to my mmmmmmm FOOD board, I decided to make something that caught my eye a few days ago (I'm not going to share the pin on here, because you should all go sign up for pinterest and then you can follow my boards and see my original pin!) but the inspiration for said pin comes from HERE YES folks, apple pie in an apple - GENIUS! Plus saves you some major calories for the gobbs of thick custard you are going to pour on top!

What I created today can only be described in one word... magnificent! It wasn't quite apple pie, as I only had puff pastry on hand, as one does, and didn't feel like making my own pie dough... so I made APPLE STRUDEL a la APPLE! YUM!

Here's how you can creat this fab dish yourself! (my photos aren't as good as the original source, but you get it..)

Preheat your oven (190C) and gather utensils/bowls/ingredients etc

Cut tops off apples and scoop out the middles, slicing scooped apple into a bowl (discard core) peel and dice top of apple (the bit you cut off at the start) - add a dash of lemon juice to stop apples from turning brown.
Place hollowed apples into baking dish.
For each apple you will need

• 1 Tbsp Sugar
• 1/2 Tbsp Flour
• 1/4 tsp Cinnamon

Mix together and then mix with diced apples -

then scoop apple mixture back into apples and mound slightly

Now you need to add the pastry tops, we used store bought puff pastry, you can either buy your pastry or make your own, it doesn't really matter... roll out pastry and cut, we used a flower and heart cutter, but use whatever floats your boat! Next you need to make little vent holes in the top, to let the steam escape

and then put your shapes onto your apples, don't try and mould them as the heat of

the oven will do that for you

Brush tops with beaten egg and sprinkle with sugar, place into preheated oven and bake for 20-25 minutes until tops are brown and apples are tender (I had to place foil on top of mine after about 15 minutes to stop the pastry from burning)

et Voila - Apple Strudel a la Apple

Served wth custard - YUMMY!

Sophia Chats With Daddy

Sophia has been doing remarkably well with this deployment, she's pretty hardy and will never be called a Daddy's Girl, but she for sure misses him.  We go through the almost daily ritual of

S: "Sophia's Sad"

M: "Why?"

S: "Lost my Daddy"

M: " Oh you didn't lose your Daddy, he's at work, he'll be home at Christmas"

S: "Sophia happy now"

She's definitely one for a routine, and that's what the little interchange has become.  We talk about Daddy a lot, and I chat with him most days on Yahoo and then a couple of times a week we skype, today was one such day....

Sophia has been pretty bummed about our trips to the post office recently, she always seems to be sending packages, but after the vast amounts of mail she got on her birthday, she hasn't received anything since.. so I asked Josh to remedy this situation and send her something in the mail.  She's forever sending him cards and lots of artwork for his room, she's got to the point now where she'll make something and say "Sophia's NOT Daddy's" LOL I guess she wants to keep her work (I told Josh he had better bring back every scrap of paper she has mailed him!) Today Daddy came through on his promise and there was a nice little puffy envelope waiting for Sophia at the collection window... She was so excited I let her open it then and there.... tearing through the paper she gasps as she spots her teddy bear from Daddy.... Minnie Mouse (her favourite companion) is quickly forgotten and tossed on the floor and she takes the bear in her clutches and runs off! I shout after her "you'll have to tell Daddy thank-you" to this she replies "Thank-you Daddy" - laughter ensues from the people standing in the collection line....

We get home and Skype Josh... Sophia tells him all about her bear, thanks him over and over and then tells me to "move out the way Mummy" - I put the laptop on a cushion so she can see and shuffle down to the other end of the couch.. obviously not far enough away for Sophia as she tells me again to move out the way and points out the living room door... off I go.. hiding around the corner so I can still sneak looks at them and listen...

what happened next is probably one of the sweetest things I have ever witnessed between my husband and child, they simply chatted.. Sophia read him Each Peach Pear Plum, complete with scary witch cackle and the sound of Robin Hood's horn, she pointed to all the people asking and then telling Daddy who they were... she moved on to her snowman book, lifting the flaps for Daddy to see... they talked about her teddy bears, Mickey Mouse, the clothes she was wearing, her hair, mundane run of the mill stuff, but it was so sweet to see the light and happiness in both of their faces.. Sophia hasn't been so great with web camming Josh, just a few snippets here and there until she notices something shiny in the background and take off to investigate... but I am sure today MORE than made up for it...

Sunday Rant!

First I need to apologise for not writing as much as I said I would but I've got  that age old excuse that I've been busy.... busy with ummmm well what's that thing called, the thing that gets in the way of all the awesomeness and great adventures... oh yeah I've been busy with LIFE... living my life with my mini me at my side....

-- my mini me, my constant companion, the sunshine in my life and the subject of today's rant.. SOPHIA (insert scary slasher music here...)

As much as I love Sophia, this deployment is getting old, and the new phase of her not sleeping even older.... we have moved on from the "no cry sleep solution for newborns and babies" to the "no cry sleep solution for toddlers and preschoolers" which should be re-titled "the no cry sleep solution for anyone over the age of two who likes to keep their parents on their toes" - as we know, children are constantly evolving and changing, exploring and growing, so what may have worked for months on end no longer applies, you have to stay one step ahead, changing it up and starting all over... it's exhausting.  But the lack of sleep even more so.

It's all my fault (something the book tells you not to say (out loud)EVER) My mother warned me not to have an August baby, my whole life was one BIG warning.  My sister was an August baby, and she was a complete pain in the arse (and when I say "was" I mean "is" and when I say "pain in the arse" I mean "complete fucking nightmare") August babies are stubborn and contrite, needy and narcissistic, if you say it's black, they will swear up and down that it's white... Sophia is an August baby.

So getting back on topic, SLEEP or lack thereof is my rant for today, Sophia has got in this terrible habit of sleeping really well until I go to bed, I don't know if she senses it, or it's suddenly quiet in the house, but about 30 minutes after I'm in bed.. Sophia is in my bed too (yes we're still doing that terrible thing of mid-night co-sleeping - stop judging me and get off my blog).. and she sleeps soundly next to me until about 3am, and then the fun begins, she wakes up, she's thirsty, she wants the dog, she wants her doll, she wants her clothes off, she wants them back on, she can't keep still, she can't get settled.. on and on and on. The biggest thing is that she physically can't keep still, she can't sit still during the day and evidently this is mirrored at night.. she's kicking and wiggling, squirming and flailing.. usually in my direction.. she can't keep to her side (well Josh's side) of the bed.. she has to be right up on me..

"The Book" suggests introducing a "lovey" I laugh in the face of a lovey.. we've had a blanket with a tag, success for a few days, we've had a taggie (about a million little tags sewn around a fleece) not successful at all.. we've had a baby doll, occasional success, but by far Sophia's favourite "lovey" is ME - more to the point my face... Sophia spends hours each day and night caressing my face.... awwww how sweet some of you might say.. to that I say NO... it is not sweet.. it is horrible.. she likes more than anything to "fiddle" with my lips, brushing them with her fingers, pinching them (this hurts), picking them (this hurts too) you may think I'm being mean or being a baby about it.. but it's insane... and until you've had multiple hours of someone constantly having their hands on your mouth... you don't know squat.  (August babies strike again - my sister LOVED to stroke my Mums hair when she was tired/going to sleep) So my lips get sore and chapped and still she continues, what can you do.. slap her little hand away, take it away over and over.. because she laughs, she gets even more persistent.. almost hurting me on purpose... so "Book" NOW what do you suggest!?!!??!?!?

This whole loving on my face is relatively new... she didn't do this as a baby.. she didn't touch or fiddle.. she just slept.. and she slept fine with me.. I want to go back to those days... but we have to go forward.. there is no choice.. so join me on this turbulent journey as I work through "the book" getting her to sleep through the night in her bed, then getting her to stop loving on my face and eventually getting her to go to sleep by herself... it's not an easy fix, it won't happen over night.. but slow progress is what I expect.. after all you don't see many college students heading off, not potty trained, drinking milk out of a bottle and sleeping in their parents bed.. we'll get this licked (hopefully before college!)

p.s. I need to also appologize for the terrible spelling in this piece.. I hit spell check and it highlighted every.single.word. WTF? FML!