35 Months Old!

Can you believe Jordan is only a month away from turning 3? It's mind boggling. In the last month she has turned even more into a strong, opinionated and highly verbal little girl. She is super proud of her new prosthetic. She didn't wear it much this week after we discovered a skin breakout that is healing very well (we'll start using cotton balls at the bottom of the gel sleeve). She had to bring the arm to visitors this week to show if off. While I was away this month, she talked all about what she was doing at school, dance and with her grandparents. We video chatted almost every day. That was really cool. Earlier this month we spent so much time together building her new arm. We're so happy with what she is able to use - three different hands! How cool is that?

With growing up comes big challenges. She and her brother are all about fighting for dominance. There's tattling and complaining. But that just comes with the territory. Other challenges: We're officially in the food fight zone. She doesn't want to eat anything except snacks. It will take a while to get past that. She's also turned up a notch on fighting to go to bed... I actually had to threaten the wrath of Santa last night. (If you actually go to bed, I'll tell Santa you're good. If you keep screaming and crying, I'll tell Santa that you aren't a good girl. Ack.)

Jordan's love for dance continues. She'll start dancing just about anywhere. She loves to sing and she tries really hard to know the words to songs. The down side to leaving her current preschool means she isn't performing in the Nutcracker this year. But she does have a winter recital with her dance school. Thank goodness for that!

This coming month means some big things for Jordan: A new school, a big trip to Florida and possibly a two-day trip to one of the happiest places on earth! (We're hoping Santa says we can go to Disney World... I guess we'll have to wait and see! ;-) )

My little valentine

Jordan had a ton of fun with this Valentine's Day. She started the day with a yummy breakfast snack at home and at school. I had been pretty bummed that I was going to miss her school party since I was helping out at Cam's event at his school. UNTIL... The poor kid got sick. Suddenly I had a chance to see Jordan eat ALL of the chocolate that her friends gave her for the holiday. And since I'm the dorky mom, Jordan handed out little containers of Play-doh instead of candy. To be honest, I watched two of the 9 kids in the class try to eat the dough. (woops)

Jordan ate ALL kinds of sugar. I mean a lot. That picture proves it. She was covered in chocolate. So what did I do? I took her to work so she could eat more sugar while I worked. You know, newsrooms are famous for their collection of food. What was even more incredible, my sugar-high daughter even ate dinner when we got home. I don't know how she did that, but I can only predict ugly things to come in future diapers.

How's that for a post-Valentine's Day post. Pretty darn loving, he?

I'm seeing a trend

I was a big nature-loving hippie type in college -- At least before I really got into this journalism thing. I would hike and camp and eat a lot of vegetables. Yeah, I went through a vegetarian phase and I'll admit I'm still a bit skeptical about meat products.

But as my life got busier and more focused on other things, I stopped worrying about it... Until I had children. When the ultrasound said our second child was a girl, I got extra concerned. I worry about the effect American produce and meats have on the hormones of a girl. I worry about a lot of things when it comes to food. So when I was pregnant two and a half years ago or so, I started returning to my organic ways.

Lucky for me that was also when our economy slowly started taking a turn. The price of organic milk isn't much more expensive than the non-organic kind, but fruits and vegetables, meats and other things keep going up. So lately I've been struggling with the organic vs. non-organic choices at the grocery store. Our bill has doubled from what I used to spend with two adults and a little boy. Now that it's two adults a growing boy and a little girl, things are different.

It's tricky. I want to offer the family healthy food. I want to afford it... But it also has to be easy to cook. Dang work. It always gets in the way.

Oh yeah. And it pays for that expensive food.

I see a pattern.