After the last couple of weeks, it’s nice to be home.

After that one afternoon in daycare, Jia and I jetted off to Charleston SC for my brother’s wedding. Little did I know that Jia was on the edge of her sanity, scared and afraid I would leave her at any turn. We arrived in SC to my mom greeting us at the baggage claim/terminal exit. I got her out of her car seat, hoping she would run over to my mom. She just stayed with me and buried her head in my legs, but I figured that was a normal shy response. No biggie. Then, when mom picked her up, she would start whimpering “Mommy, mommy??” but as long as she was close by me, she would tolerate being distracted by mom. This changed when we walked outside with our luggage to see my dad waiting for us. The minute she saw dad, she started to worry; started to cry. I installed her car seat into their back seat as she wailed and wailed. We kept reassuring her that I was coming with her, but she couldn’t hear me through her tears. I picked her up and placed her in the car seat and she threw up all over herself. This was a first.

This pretty much set the tone for the next 6 days. She never let anyone hold her, and she wanted to be held most of the time if there were other people around. Thank goodness I brought my Beco Gemini carrier, the backpack carrier came in handy for sure. She slowly got more comfortable with my mom holding her for short periods of time, but any time a stranger or my dad came into the room, she would desperately cry “Mommy?! Mommy?! Mommy?!” even if I was sitting right next to her at the table, or if I was standing right beside her. The second to last day my mom was able to play with her while I took a nap. Oh that was another thing – no naps for 9 days straight (starting with the day she went to day care). She also couldn’t sleep in the Pack ‘N Play, and would cry and cry for me, so for the first time EVER, we co-slept. (Is it still considered “co-sleeping” if it’s with your toddler? I guess the meaning of the term still holds true.) We co-slept for about 5 days while in Charleston and she had the best sleep. She would wake up occasionally and start whimpering or asking for me, and I would stroke her back for a second and she would plop back down into bed and fall asleep instantly. It felt nice and reassuring for me, that I could comfort her immediately.

After that draining week, Jia and I arrived back in Los Angeles, with 2 days to relax before Jeff and I left for a wedding in Vegas. Jia’s grandparents (my in-laws) flew in to babysit and dogsit for the weekend and THANKFULLY she did really great with them. She still occasionally would ask for Mommy and Daddy, but she was easily amused and wasn’t upset that we were gone, just missed us.

Anyway, now that we are back home and back from Vegas, I can breathe a huge sigh of relief. We aren’t going anywhere ANY TIME SOON! (whew) Now we are working on getting back into the swing of things and slowly acclimating her into daytime at daycare. Today (Wednesday) was her first day back (Day #2) at daycare. Only 4 hours for today (had to get groceries for Jeff’s 33rd birthday dinner, and was cooking straight from 11 AM until 1 PM and I’m still not done with the entree), about 6 hours tomorrow, then a “full day” Friday; a slow transition to ease the process (for me? for Jia?). We swung by the day care for 1 hour yesterday, so that Jia could familiarize herself with her daycare environment once again, and the tears started once she saw her classroom. After she realized I was staying with her, she began to walk over to the other kids, pick up balls and hoops, and was actually smiling. Today is probably a different story, we’ll see how her daily report went.

Anyhow, here’s what we’ve noticed she’s doing lately: 

• speaking in sentences (Mommy sleeping? A-Yeh (Jeff’s dad) sleeping? Milk please)
• says “bless you” after you sneeze, pretty consistently
• counts as she walks down the stairs, repeating after us
• knows that we live on the 2nd floor, points up to the #2 on the elevator frame and says “two?”
• can identify correctly, to date: blue, green, purple, pink, orange, yellow, red.
• moved her up into her size 5.5 stride rites, though a size 5 would probably be better (we skipped a half size)
• breaks into a jog/gallop
• getting better at being in the car, I haven’t heard her get really upset about driving around lately. I didn’t even realize this actually happened, til typing this right now
• eating hard boiled eggs
• as mentioned above, says “please” very nicely now. as a reference, when I asked her to say please, she used to slap my face. So, her saying “please” when I encourage it, is nice haha!
• says about 50-80 words
• hugs and kisses the doggies
• loves swimming, starting to kick her feet in the water. She can go from her tummy to her back, and back to her center. All while wearing her puddle jumper… I need to figure out swim lessons soon.
• Snacks we must have on hand when we leave the house:
  • crackers (teething crackers)
  • pouches
  • cheese
  • oranges (about 3 clementines)
  • milk (I swear, those Organic Valley individual single serve non-refrigerated milks come in SO SO HANDY!)

OK gotta go pick up the munchkin!