The Adventures of Miss Maggie....

As new parents who spend most of the day working, we're both excited to get to see Maggie every evening! We don't want to waste any precious Maggie time!

Here's what she's been up to lately....

 She's a very enthusiastic patriot!

 She's cracking herself up!

 Aunt Kate came to visit her for a day and they had a great time playing!

 She began her golf training.... we haven't told her yet that it involves a little more than licking the golf ball....

 We tried some spinach. Then we banned spinach from the house....

 She's been napping (or laying in her bed and yelling and laughing) with Lovie Bunny

 Playing at Ms. Carol's house! She's a great babysitter!

 I'm so cute the church ladies give me money :)

 Drinking some morning milk....laying on Momma's pillow....

 I am large and in charge! I just prop my leg up on Dad and there's nothing he can do about it!

 Getting in some playtime in the Exersaucer before bedtime... rocking my new froggy jammies!

I am so cute in my jammies!

The 10 Commandments of Parenting

There are probably some really legitimate parenting commandments out there. 


I don't know what they are but I'm sure they exist. Here are the 10 Commandments of Parenting we're living by in the Knight household these days.


**Commandments subject to change at my whim.**


1. Don't leave home without an extra outfit for everyone in your party because there's a good chance poop is going to end up on one or all of you. Maggie decided to poop on a complete stranger at a party a few weeks ago, thereby; completely mortifying her mother, but that's another blog post for another time :)


2. Its cool to go to bed at 8pm. This is because its NOT cool to be mistaken for a zombie in the workplace or look perpetually drugged because your eyes or constantly blood shot or put your car keys in the refrigerator because that is obviously the most logical place for them - due to lack of sleep. 


3. Encourage those man-burps and cheer on those diaper explosions. The alternative is a gassy, cranky, baby with a bellyache, which contributes to the zombie-like parents mentioned above. So throw that dignity out the door! Who needs it! Let the bodily functions flow. 


4. Love the chub. There's a reason no one's come up with Weight Watchers for Babies. Its a bad idea. Your infant is supposed to be chubby and rolly and pudgy. If any other well-meaning parent tries to tell you otherwise you have my permission to slug 'em. You can blame it on me. 


5. Let her cry. You can do it. Its hard. Its heartbreaking. You'll probably pace the floor. You'll wonder if it will ever stop. You'll be sure those huge crocodile tears will be your undoing. But if nothing is wrong and she's just being a bit of a hard-head then you have to let her cry it out. There are no rules that say you can't cry too. You just can't give in or your baby will WIN. And we know this is all about a power struggle right?


6. Don't give her fruit first or she'll NEVER eat vegetables. Personally, I completely agree. I skipped fruit and went straight to chocolate cake. She loved it. Then we went for carrots, sweet potatoes, and green beans. As you can see by her photo, Maggie's not a picky eater. 


7. Don't use baby talk or your child's language development will lag. We're not huge fans of baby talk in the Knight house. We stick mainly to blowing spit bubbles, blowing raspberries on her belly, and pretending to eat off her fingers and toes to get her to giggle. Who has time for language development??


8. Don't let your baby watch TV or he or she will have a short attention span. I agree that TV is a bad habit. But so is falling asleep at church or your desk. So, occasionally Maggie takes in some Mickey Mouse Clubhouse or Franklin the Turtle while Mommy or Daddy snoozes beside her. Judge if you must but only if you have no children, got 10 hours of sleep last night, and promise not to tell me about it. I already feel like an idiot parent half the time and I don't need your internet facts about ADHD to make me feel worse. 


9. Accessorize! Your kid could be wearing a onesie that's 2 sizes too small and smells like spit-up or the sweet potatoes she smeared in her hair at dinner last night but if you put a giant bow on her head no one will even notice. 


10. Hug her so tight she gets squirmy and kiss her so many times she gets squirmy and smile at her like she's the most important thing in the room and soak up every moment because they'll go by too fast, especially if you're stuck in the afore mentioned sleep-deprived zombie state. If you can keep this one commandment...you can throw the others out the window. 


Your friendly neighborhood commandment-maker-uper,


Maggie's Mom

She's a Picky....

Sleeper! This kid will lay in her bed and cry (or fake cough) to get our attention. I've discovered this week that she likes to lay on her LEFT side facing the wall with her paci in her mouth and Lovie Bunny in her arms. 

She also knows her mom is a sucker. For example.... Kevin was out of town officiating a wedding so I had Maggie night-shift last Friday night. Her Superdad usually takes the night shift so I can sleep since I get up before the chickens :)

Anyway...back to our tale of baby-genius momma manipulation. I put her to bed at her normal bedtime....7:30ish.

Maggie laid in her bed and SCREAMED. She was not hungry. dirty. wet. injured. or gassy. 

She was however working on a Master Plan.

The screaming continued for about an hour. It didn't matter that I gave her paci to her 14 gazillion times or that I rolled her over or gave her Lovie Bunny, or that Grandma came in to talk some sense into her. Maggie was having none of it.  She's a girl who knows what she wants....

So when she got to the hiccupy, shuddery crying-breathing - my Momma Heart couldn't take it anymore and I broke one of the 10 Commandments of Parenting (see subsequent post) .... 

I PICKED HER UP. 

Then, I figured I'd already committed a major sleep-training faux pax so why not take this thing all the way. I laid her on my feather pillow in the bed beside me and tucked her in and let her hang out with me while I read a book and waited. and waited. and waited. for her to fall into a peaceful, angelic sleep just because she was in my presence :) 

Here's how the next 45 minutes went:

Me: Sitting quietly reading a book... 

Maggie: Reaches over as far as her dimply little arm can go and uses her tiny chubby fingers to slap at the pages of my book.

Me: Looks over to see what she wants.

Maggie: Giant, light-up-the-sun grin, while keeping paci firmly in place (she's a multitasker already)

Me: Silly my-kid-is -the-the-coolest-kid-ever grin back at Maggie, then I gain my composure and go back to my book. I'm showing this kid who's boss. I'm going to ignore her (core parently tactic, right?) because I'm 5,000 times smarter than a 5 month old and she's going to fall asleep and think it was completely her idea.

Maggie: Reaches over as far as her dimply little arm can go and uses her tiny chubby fingers to slap at the pages of my book.

Repeat this about 100 times and there you go... 45 minutes GONE.

So, I decided this wasn't working according to plan and we made the trip back to her room. I laid her down and she FINALLY went to sleep on her own. No crying. No screaming. 

So who won? I'm going to call it a tie. Yes, Maggie got to stay up and lay on my comfy bed and tricked me into playing her little game. But I got an extra 45 min. with my Maggie and I got to see that smile over and over and over again .... not to mention the fact that the glass-shattering screaming did stop. 

I'm declaring us both winners. Its my blog. I get to do what I want. I make the rules. The End.

(Yes, I am aware that she is laying on her RIGHT side in this photo but its what I had to work with at the time. Give me a break people!)

Totally outsmarted by my 5 month old, 

Momma Knight