I'm still surprised I did it, but it had to be done.

I cut Callie's hair, pictures forthcoming as soon as Daddy posts them. I was just going to let it grow and grow (since I favor longer hair on girls) but she can't stand hair clips or headbands and it kept getting in her eyes. In addition to being super long in the front it was SHORT in the back because she still rubs it like crazy. It was split and matted back there, the hairs just looked like a completely different texture thanks to her friction on it.

We aren't big fans of paying for haircuts, especially for babies (and rarely do they do a decent job from what I have seen!). So I did it myself. I decided it would be better to just even it up now and make it short so that when it would continue to grow out the back wouldn't be damaged and could get some length on it. So I aimed for bangs that weren't cut too far into her hair (which I think I achieved pretty well, actually) and evening up the back and sides (which, truth be told, also wasn't all that bad except she has a crazy cowlick over her ear that makes it look hacky even though it's completely even with the other side!).

I was afraid she'd look like a little boy, I really was, especially since I can cut hair quite well but I had no idea how well she'd sit still. But cartoons, a few Hershey's kisses and strategically doing the bangs FIRST, when she'd have more patience? It worked very well. My friends online have seen the pictures already and everyone thought it looked quite cute and feminine (and I trust they weren't just blowing smoke en masse, but I can't be sure!). The high chair made it extremely hard to cut the back but I did the best I could, hopefully next time the urge to cut her hair strikes me Daddy will be home to help so I can put her on a stool or booster instead.

It really does look fine, but it's SUCH a change! I miss my baby's curls :( She looks like a toddler now, not a baby, but it was surprisingly more emotional to give her the cut than I thought it would be. I hadn't realized how attached I was to everything about her until a little piece of it was gone. But after a few hours I got more used to it and now I like it. It needed to happen, I was just resisting. But when Grandma commented on it I decided I just needed to suck it up and stop procrastinating.

All part of growing up! *sniffles*

Other Callie news, let's see... She's in a big 'getting dressed' stage right now, and likes putting her clothes on and pulling them off around the house, which is fine by me (except it means more laundry!). If I ask her for her arms she puts them in the sleeves and she understand what "give me your leg" means and reacts accordingly. She's also learning to label body parts and has a particularly good time with (n)ooshe (nose) that sometimes does or doesn't have the 'n' on the word. It delights her to no end to poke our faces and label. She also likes grabbing eyelashes and making our eyes open and close - we don't let her demonstrate this new ability on sissy, needless to say!

Books are her new favorite thing. She actually want to READ them instead of just turn pages, rip pages, and generally destroy them. Thing is, she wants to read the same one OVER AND OVER. So we have been rotating the downstairs 'toy' books so mommy doesn't go insane. A good two dozen times per days she'll grab a book, whack us in the leg with it and ask to be read to (kook, koh, khk are all the 'book' word) and it's quite nice as its the only real cuddle time she'll allow anymore, as a toddler who never stops! She'll also sit around and 'read' to herself, making silly noises and sounds and turning the pages and pointing at the pictures. It's very cute.

She's also wielding a fork and spoon better and better. She's learned to spear food and things she WON'T eat any more of she'll often take a few more bites of provided we skewer them on a fork and hand it to her. Spoons are rather amusing, she doesn't *quite* get that you shouldn't tip the spoon upside down before delivery into the mouth. But she's definitely getting the idea and especially with the fork can now manage to 'feed' herself for a few minutes with reasonable proficiency and dexterity before ditching it in favor of hands or face-in-the-bowl.

She was 26 pounds at her appointment and if I recall right around three feet tall, 75th percentile for both weight and height (which is WAY up from when she was little and definitely on the small side!). She's very, very healthy and hardly ever gets sick, she eats from all the food groups very well and won't drink juice - just water most of the time and milk with breakfast and dinner. Her coordination is good and she's right on target with all her milestones. She did get her shots, which as I mentioned on Lilah's blog were followed by ANGRY cries more than hurt. She got over it though the site of the shots on one of her legs puffed up and then scabbed over and she keeps picking at it. Then she gets mad when it hurts and cries but picks at it more. Bandaids make her pay more attention to the bump than she would if it was naked, but it is slowly healing on its own no thanks to her fingers!

Oh! What we didn't mention is that for cost purposes we switched both girls to cloth diapers. Diapering two at once was ridiculously expensive and we decided cloth would just be less fuss. I tried it initially with Callie when she was a newborn but between our novice, nervous parenting and my real inability to do much of anything after the c-section we promptly gave up. Prefolds and covers were not a system we could make work readily enough.

Now we're using Pocket diapers, which are contoured with fleece and have inserts that go into them and vary the absorbancy. They're also one-sized diapers, so Callie and Lilah can wear the same diapers and we essentially get to cloth diaper two for the price of one, and if one girl runs out she can use her sister's. It's a lot of washing each day and each change does take a bit more time but it is worth it and very workable. We're using two brands, Fuzzibunz for Callie and BumGenius for Lilah. They're both one-sized, but one style fits Callie's shape slightly better than Lilah. Initially I thought I liked both equally but now I am finding the BG's seem slightly more durable and hold up better. So when we need to buy more for both of them I will likely only buy more of that brand.

We stick the girls in disposables for other people and church but truthfully these are only one step more complicated than disposables, and that is stuffing them. They work remarkably well and I'd estimate in the month we've been using them that we've probably recouped half their cost already in what we haven't spent on disposables. The single size means that it's essentially like diapering only one child financially, which is an extra savings. Each diaper just has extra adjustable velcro/aplix tabs and several rows of snaps on the front so the rise of the diaper can be adjusted - Lilah on the smallest setting (though she is almost into the next setting, wow!) and Callie on the largest. There is PLENTY of room for Callie to grow and I am hoping that this will make it easier to potty train her. I have heard that to be the case from multiple cloth-diapering moms as the kids feel wetness much better than in a disposable and they function more like big-girl underwear.

Anyway, that's a new development. I feel crunchier already ;)

She's also in 2T (toddler) sized clothing now! Another big step towards growing up, and MAN is she growing fast. I still can hardly believe she's not even two yet, some days she feels like she was just a baby and other days I swear she's all grown up already and have to remind myself she's still very, very young. Time flies when you're tearing around the house like a maniac!

Okay - to be nice, I will include a preview of Callie's new hair since I am not sure WHEN Peter will update pictures - it's a bit "Mia Farrow", thank goodness, and not "bowlcut"! Ignore the chocolate dribble, remnants of the bribe!