Two Year Olds Talk in Sentences and Have Big Personalities

So my husband and I bought Scarlett a kitchen set for her birthday. We figured that she would love it and it was age-appropriate: she has started imaginative play so this is the perfect toy for that. Well, she loved it. She plays with it everyday. Today, after we got home from daycare, I sat next to her as she "cooked." Maybe I sat too close to her kitchen set. She said to me, "mama, no touch my kitchen; Scarlett's!"


Last night, she was having a hard time falling asleep. We waited an hour for her to fall asleep. She talked, sang, and cried. Here's an excerpt of what we heard from the baby monitor, as she tried to think of ways to get us to come into her bedroom:
"Mama, I have booger. I said, I have booger. Booger, mama! I said, I have booger!"
"Poo-poo, mama. Wet. Mama, poo-poo. New diaper!"
"Happy birthday to Scarlett, happy birthday to Scarlett..." (she sings)

She's Two!

I can't believe that Scarlett has turned two. Time seems to fly by faster and faster. Not only is she two years old now, she also learned that it's all about her on her birthday, even if she doesn't really truly know what a birthday is. That's what a birthday is all about anyway, right? Except for the mammas, who will "reminisce" about their child's "birth" day every year (5:37pm!). For a while, Scarlett had no clue that she was turning two. Of course she had seen each one of her friends celebrate their birthdays but she had no idea that she gets one too (ahh, innocence...). So my husband and I had the "bright" idea of telling her a week before her birthday that it was coming up. Sure enough, she caught on and even learned to say that she's "two". It is funny to hear her say, "happy birthday to Scarlett" whenever we say the word "birthday". I'm sure it won't be as cute when she's 3 years old but we can chuckle about it now. I'm glad that we decided to throw her a birthday party. I still remember her face when everyone sang her birthday song. She seemed really happy.

Is Eating Out Worth It?

We are not ones to eat out much in general. We probably average eating out once a week or once every 2 weeks (that includes ordering take-out). So when we do eat out, we prefer to have a nice dinner. By "nice dinner", I don't mean the 4-star restaurants (except for the rare occasions). I mean a nice local restaurant with white tablecloth with something that I don't usually make at home, and not the In-N-Out drive-through. Since my husband has been attending a conference locally for the past 2.5 days, it's just been Scarlett and I for dinner the last 2 nights. So it was nice to go out to dinner for a change. And, it's Friday night, For God's Sake! We chose a local restaurant that had no corkage fee (which is rare) and is supposed to be kid-friendly but we were only able to get a reservation at 5:30, if we wanted to eat at a reasonable time. Dinner was horrible! The food was good, but who noticed?! Scarlett ate a few bite of bananas that the cook brought out to her, a bite of mac n'cheese, and 4 bites of rice. I was okay with that, as long as she allowed us to eat. Unfortunately, she didn't. I offered her crackers to snack on, which I don't normally do at meal times, just so that we could have a peaceful meal with the wine that we brought. She was restless and just wanted to leave. So we rushed through our meal, all the while trying to keep her entertained enough not to make a scene. How much was dinner? $68! All that money, for a semi-tolerable dinner! I don't want to always have to eat out at a cheap burrito joint or Round Table's but that just sucks! Have you gone out to a nice restaurant with a kid and had a horrible experience? Would you do it again? Why or why not?

Trip Down to LA to See the Yeh Family

Since Scarlett's daycare was closed last week, I decided to take Scarlett down to LA to see my family, especially since she doesn't know my family/her maternal grandparents too well. It was also my last opportunity for her to fly free before she turns two this month. So we went for 3.5 days, leaving my husband at home. Seeing my family isn't as fun as it sounds though. Since my parents work 7 days a week running a liquor store, I had to fend for myself most of the time to keep Scarlett pre-occupied/entertained. For most of our stay down there, we alternated between hanging out at my parents' house, which was very spacious, clean(!), and comfortable, but sans toddler toys, or hanging out at my parents' store. The store is even less kid-friendly than the house. The floor is really dirty and everything had a layer of dirty dust on it. So no matter how often I wiped Scarlett's hands, they got black/dirty very quickly whenever she touched something. Oh did she touch everything! If she only knew that candy is edible (and I intend to prolong the ignorance as long as possible)! She played with all the candy in the store. A box of Lemon Heads or a bag of Skittles make lots of noise when shaken. A bag of gummy bears is fun to squish. Lollipops are just so obviously edible, if mommy would only allow her to put them in her mouth. And all those colorful packets of Bubblicious gum seem so fun to play with.

While it was quality time spent with grandma and grandpa, it was definitely challenging and frustrating for me. Playing with candy only lasted so long, before she moved on to playing with the bottles of Pepto-Bismal or the travel-sized shampoo bottles or the cigarette lighters. I think our 4-hour straight stay at the store consisted of me telling her "no/don't touch that/don't play with that" countless times to the point where we drove each other crazy. I knew it wasn't fair to tell her "no" constantly so I searched the whole store for something she COULD play with. I found nothing. Being at the store also disrupted her nap schedule. Is this the price I have to pay for my daughter to know her maternal grandparents better? If we hung out at my parents house, it's just her and I. My parents have to run the store and my brothers were both at work. So we had to be at the store for her to spend much time with my parents. She saw my brothers even less. I was lucky that my little brother came home right after work every day that we were there. Scarlett got to bug her Uncle Kyle a bit and even took a liking to him. My older brother, however, she hardly saw during our entire trip down there. So my trip to see my family had mixed results: she got to know her "other" grandmother and her little uncle better but I slept horribly, didn't get to enjoy eating lots of Chinese food, or have a glass of wine with my dad. But it's not about me, is it? I guess there's always next time.