Natalie’s Blog

I should start by mentioning that we’ve long since given up cloth-diapering and Natalie’s been wearing Seventh Generation Disposable Diapers since she was about 7 months old. We’ve always been happy with the diapers, until a couple of weeks ago, when they started leaking. The only other time her diapers leaked was around when she was a year old and needed to move from size 3 to size 4. She’s been wearing the size 4 diapers for the last 8 months. The leaking was beginning to drive me crazy, especially because it would often happen when she was sitting in her car seat, which meant the car seat needed to be cleaned as well. One particularly frustrating day, I think I changed her pants 4 times. I figured it was time to move her into size 5.

But then I looked at the sizing chart:

Stage 1: 8-14 lb., 44 diapers
Stage 2: 12-18 lb., 40 diapers
Stage 3: 16-28 lb., 35 diapers
Stage 4: 22-37 lb., 30 diapers
Stage 5: 27+ lb., 26 diapers
Stage 6: 35+ lb., 22 diapers

and I realized that at 22 pounds, Natalie is at the very lowest weight for size 4 and still well within the weight recommendation for size 3! We also realized that the leaks didn’t seem to be a problem of absorbency—it was more like Natalie would sit a certain way, causing a gap between her leg and the diaper, and pee would just soak into her clothes. We got some size 3 diapers, which seemed small after she’s been wearing the size 4s, but we’ve haven’t had any more problems with leaks! As a bonus, the size 3 diapers include 5 more diapers per pack!!

So, is Natalie shrinking? Probably not. I think she’s just gotten taller, but not gained much weight, which means that her legs are not as chubby as they once were.

Natalie uttered her first full sentence while on our camping trip! Since she’s always liked cleaning, what she said was especially fitting.

Natalie said…drumroll please…

“Oh no, it’s dirty!”

Here’s a picture of one of Natalie’s favorite camping activities: washing the storage bins!

Natalie is a natural camper! We had a wonderful time enjoying the great outdoors at the DAR State Forest in the Berkshire Mountains of western Massachusetts. We had great weather and Natalie had a blast being outside all the time. Some photo highlights…
Natalie relaxing in her very own camp chair:

Generally being cute:

Eating a whole tomato like an apple:

Sleeping in Daddy’s arms:

Playing with hammocks:

Making funny faces in the woods:

Hanging out with Aunt Katy:

Saying “Good Morning Newts!” every day:

Chris & Katy enjoyed organizing the camp kitchen:

And Natalie loved standing on tree trunks pretending the be The Lorax:

A couple of tidbits…

I’ve found that there are lots of things to feel guilty about on this parenting journey. The latest pangs of guilt had to do with Natalie’s shoes. She’s been wearing the same size shoes for a while, and since I was still able to put her shoes on, I didn’t think much of it. Last Saturday, Natalie started pointing to her shoes and crying. We went to the shoe store, where her feet measured a size and a half bigger than the shoes she’d been wearing. Oops.

While I was changing Natalie’s diaper this morning, she was talking about the two pink bracelets she was wearing. She can’t quite pronounce “bracelet” correctly, so it took me a few minutes before I understood what she was trying to say. Chris overheard the conversation and said, “it sounds like she’s saying ‘bullshit.’” Anyone want to guess what Natalie then started saying next??

We’re going camping in Massachusetts next week—Natalie’s first camping trip! Wish us luck…

Even though the “Great Tomato Scare” is over, we’re thrilled to be growing our own tomatoes this summer! I enlisted Natalie’s help to pick some ripe ones for dinner the other night. To help her distinguish the ripe ones from the unripe ones, I asked her to identify the different colors. First, I pointed the red one and asked “what color is this one?” Natalie replied, “red!” Then I pointed to a green one and asked the same question. Her reply? “Apple!” Despite my attempts to teach her about unripe and ripe tomatoes, she insisted the green ones were, in fact, apples. Finally, I relented and said, “Alright, honey, just don’t pick the apples, okay?”

Natalie is quite the little helper in the garden! She loves to water the tomatoes:

She loves to help pick them…

and gathering them:

And eat them! (only I didn’t get a picture of her eating them)

Pictures from Chris’ cousin Louisa’s HS graduation party!

Despite her loathing of baths, Natalie still likes to hang out in the pool:

Especially with Grandma:

The mango sorbet for dessert was a big hit:

Chris caught this funny picture of Natalie and her Grandpop making identical faces at each other:

A list of 19 points of interest from the past month:

1. Natalie officially knows all the basic colors: blue, red, purple, orange, green, pink, black, brown, and white. Yellow is still tricky—she mistakes it for orange sometimes.

2. Natalie learned to pick her nose. It’s cute and gross at the same time.

3. She’s beginning to learn letters. She knows B, I, H, and T really well. Starting to get M, D, N, R, G, K & S.

4. Her communication skills continue to flourish. Chris was remarking today that Natalie’s speech has gotten much more conversational. She’s saying more and more two-word phrases and putting adjectives in front of nouns. As in, “big truck!” She also knows to put an “s” on the ends of words to make them plural or possessive.

5. Natalie got her first skinned knees this month after wiping out pushing her stroller on the sidewalk.:

6. She wore her hair in a pony-tail for the first time:

7. She likes to discipline Tillman by wagging her finger at him and saying “no no no” when he tries to drink out of someone’s glass.

8. Since recovering from her illness, Natalie is once again tolerant of bathing, diapering, and dressing.

9. She’s exploring opposites. She likes to shout “up down,” “on off” and “yes no” over and over and over…

10. Natalie became obsessed with bracelets this month. Last week she got upset when she couldn’t fit her hand through the hole of a bagel to wear it around her wrist.

11. She likes to discover new places to admire her reflection:

12. I never thought this would happen with our sweet child, but like a lot of toddlers, she answers almost all questions with a resounding “no!” The other day I offered her a cup of juice…Natalie shouted “no” and then grabbed the cup out of my hand and drank it happily. Go figure.

13. She finally learned to say her Aunt Kary’s name. Sounds like “dah-ree”

14. Natalie played her first card game with Grandma:

15. She went on her first solo carnival ride. Pictures soon.

16. She’s gotten really into playing with puzzles. We got her this new puzzle and she had it figured out in about 2 minutes.

17. Natalie started transitioning into the toddler room at daycare. It’s not going well. We’re investigating other childcare options. More on that later. For now, here’s a picture of her in the new classroom:

18. Natalie is loving the books Mother, Mother, I Want Another, Zoo Clues Animal Alphabet, and Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear?

19. Finally, Natalie really likes to make this pucker face:

Last Thursday Natalie and I drove into Manhattan to have lunch with Aunt Cynthia and go to a party. I was nervous about driving in on a holiday weekend, but luckily all the traffic was going out of the city. Natalie fell asleep within 15 minutes and slept the entire way to Chris’ office on Canal Street.

Here we are with Great Aunt Cynthia at FAO Schwartz. Chris wanted to take away her bottle for the picture, but I thought that a picture of Natalie screaming in protest would be worse.

Then Chris and I took Natalie to a party. Natalie and her buddy Josie were psyched about their party hats (for about one minute, which is one minute longer than I thought they would wear them):

Natalie’s been very wary of strangers lately, so she’s reluctant to walk in strange or crowded places. Since she’s been wanting to be carried more, I got out the beco, which I thought she’d never want to go in again. I was glad to get more use out of it. I think she’s making a teething face…she’s chewing on the inside of her cheek.

The whole day was so exciting that Natalie was completely zonked 5 minutes into the ride home. Thank goodness, because we got caught in the holiday traffic and it took us an hour just to get out of the city.