Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Our little Monster is 11 months!


I don't think I've said it before, but Tacy is a monster.  A very cute little monster.  She absolutely loves to make monster noises.  Sometimes it's growling, other times it's a roar (in a deep gurtaly voice) and then there are just her random low monster noises.  She sounds like a bear, a dinosaur, a...monster.  So Tacy is our little monster.  It's even funnier because she usually makes these noises when she is really happy.  So she is crawling after Daddy making monster noises and laughing, or she is playing with toys and smiling really big, etc.  It's really cute.

I have been wanting to make Tacy a tutu her whole life but I have a hard time trying to pick which color(s) of tulle I would use.  So with her monster noises, I decided to do turquoise blue and purple (like Sully from Monsters Inc.).  It seems so fitting for her and her noises, plus turquoise and purple look really good on her. So I finally bought the tulle and made her tutu today (my goal was by her 1st birthday because I want to get birthday pictures with her wearing it).  I'm happy with how it has turned out and that it fits her well.  Now I just need to make a matching headband.  I really would like to make a onsie with a cute little purple and turquoise blue monster on it, but I'm not skilled at small paint details and puffy paint doesn't last very long.  
trying out the new tutu
Along with her monster tutu and monster noises, I told Brad we should do a Monsters Inc. themed birthday party for her.  Only thing is, Tacy is only turning 1, so games are a little too old for her and her party will probably just have family members.  But I do want to do raspberry filled cupcakes (maybe a cake) since raspberries are purple and they sound really yummy.  Maybe I will dye the cake blue....

As other new things about Tacy:

She loves to squat.  She will pull herself up with furniture, a box, a chair, mom/dad, etc. and then squat down and then stand up, squat down, over and over again.  She will also squat instead of sitting down all the ways sometimes.  

Tacy is going to be a cautious walker.  She cruises along furniture and still loves to walk holding onto mom/dad's fingers (one finger per hand) but if you let go of one hand or both she will slowly squat down until she is sitting.  Sometimes she will stand for a second or two before starting to sink to the ground, but it is all done in a very cautious manner.  When I walk outside with her and she sees a leaf she wants to pick up, she will let go of me with one hand, pick up the leaf, and then raise that hand up again for me to give her a finger before she will start to walk again.  Very cautious.  Too much like her Mommy I guess.

Tacy loves to throw things.  Yup fun stage.  She has broken a bottle we used to mix her formula for cereal and a sippy cup from dropping them on the kitchen floor.  On a good note though, she loves to throw her little balls Brad got her for Christmas.  She will hold it in her hand and sometime actually throw it, other times just drop it, or squeeze it till it pops out of her hand.  Then she looks at you as it rolls away and says "Woah" and sometimes "Oh wow!"  Very cute.  I love this game.

Tacy is now staying up later.  She will talk in her crib, cry, and then start carrying on more conversations with her toys in her room I guess until we get her.  For the past week she doesn't go to bed until 8ish.  This might be normal for most kids her age, but Tacy starts sucking her thumb and acting tired at 5:30 still.  Oh well, she is sleeping in until 7-8 now so that's nice.

Tacy crawls up stairs by using one knee and then getting her other leg right up on the stair and pushing herself up to the next one.  So one knee and one foot each step.  When she gets in this flow she moves pretty fast.  Hence why we have to put the gait up to keep her from getting to the stairs because she can move fast.

Tacy loves to bang toys together.  She has these little different shaped blocks that fit into a house and she loves to hold two of them and bang them together.  This is sometimes the only thing that keeps her still long enough to change her diaper.

Tacy still loves the bath.  She crawls so fast into the bathroom if she notices you didn't close the door all the way.  Once in she goes straight for the bathtub, pulls herself up, and walks into the corner between the tub and the toilet where she then grabs her body wash and shampoo and pushes them into the tub and laughs.  Then she turns around and bangs on the toilet and will walk over to the trashcan (on the other side of the toilet).  

Trash cans are really becoming a problem because Tacy loves going through them now.

We are trying to teach Tacy the word "dog".  Sometimes she will point to a dog when you say dog, other times not so much.

Tacy is good at parroting.  Sometimes she will repeat what you say.  Brad got her to say Tacy today.  She also said Papa (what everyone calls Grandpa Taylor now) when Grandma said it.  She doesn't do it all of the time, but frequently she will repeat something that you say.

Tacy is on the "see Mom eat food" diet.  Sometimes she will do it with Daddy too.  But if I'm eating something, she will crawl right over, pull herself up on my legs, and stare at me and more importantly what I am eating.  Tonight she stared down my tacos.  So Tacy now eats whatever I'm eating (within reason).

Tacy still only has her two bottom teeth.  She has been drooling like crazy for the past week.  But I feel like I have been hoping for more teeth for an eternity cause more teeth = more food she can eat and the sooner she will be done drooling.  Oh well. 

Tacy loves cheerios and graham crackers, but she makes faces whenever she eats a goldfish.  She can be picky about cheese.  She also likes tortillas, quesadillas, chewy bars, and ice cream.
How Tacy eats her chewy bars - through the wrapper
We love our Tacy Lou.  I can't believe in one month she will be one year old.  

Monday, July 1, 2013

Life of a Worker Bee

Well I have officially been working as a nurse for 2 weeks now!  Originally I was told that I would have to orient for 3 weeks before I would work on my own, but after one week, Clearfield told me that they thought just one more week of orienting would be enough for me because all the nurses I was training with said that I was doing an amazing job.  As for West Valley, I guess the DON/ADON (directors of nursing) got the same feedback so after two weekend shifts there, this weekend they had me work on my own!  Craziness!  

Orienting was kind of interesting.  Basically I would work with a nurse and help/follow them while they showed me what they did and tried to teach me about charting, policies etc.  Some of the nurses it really felt like I was in clinicals again because they didn't have me do to much but watch.  Other nurses would ask me to do all of their charting (which isn't easy when I don't know the patients).  Some nurses work so slow and others work really fast.  But I had some really awesome nurses that I worked with, helped me learn a lot and were great teachers. 

So at Clearfield I had talked with the DON about working short shifts (6pm-midnight) but they just did their July schedule and all but one of my shifts is a full night shift (6pm-6am).  So I oriented 2 night shifts.  I survived, but it definitely will take some getting used to.  Thank goodness Tacy has been taking some really long morning naps.  Friday night (6/29) was my last orienting and I worked with one of my favorite nurse co-workers.  She let me do everything and helped me with what I was unsure about.  I got home Saturday at 7am.  West Valley asked me if I could work there from 2-10pm on Saturday and 6am-6pm Sunday (on my own).  I agreed.  So I slept for 5 hours Saturday morning, then got up, got ready, saw Tacy for 15 minutes and went to work at West valley.  My first shift alone (I worked half of another nurses 16 hour shift) was a little hard.  West Valley does things a little different than Clearfield (even though they are the same company). But I survived and was so ready to go home and go to sleep.  I got home at 11:15pm (2315 to me now) and got ready for bed.  I was able to sleep about 4.5 hours before I had to get up and go back to West Valley for the day shift.  That shift went a little better, although at 8:00am a patient did fall/roll out of her bed onto the mat next to her bed.  So I had to learn how to fill out an incident report.  It definitely is interesting/nerve wracking now that I'm the nurse so when anything happens, everyone turns to me.  I had so many residents trying to ask me about billing, how to discharge, and the fall of course.  So I had to really take charge, be calm with assessing the fall patient and help direct the billing questions to the right people.  All in all I feel that I did well for my first 20 hours on my own.  

Needless to say, by the time I got home on Sunday at 7pm I was tired.  Tacy was still up so I got to put her to bed.  So over the weekend I saw my baby for maybe 30 minutes.  Not fun, but the paycheck will be nice. Brad has been really great this weekend allowing me to sleep when I can while he watched Tacy and being supper Daddy keeping her happy, doing the laundry, and going grocery shopping.  

Now I get to relax a little because I don't work again until Tuesday night (for a full night shift) but at least it is at Clearfield (I really do like that facility the most, plus they have a well working AC).

It has been in the 100s for the past 3-4 days, which has made even walking outside to the car miserable.  With our one car having no working AC, driving is no fun (whoever is with Tacy gets the AC).  Even with AC in a car, it can take a while to actually start to feel cold again and we show up everywhere pink faced.  Poor Tacy still has to sit backwards so getting cold air to her is a challenge because the whole car has to cool down first.  Good thing she is such a tough little girl.

After my long weekend, we are taking a few days off to go up to Island Park, Idaho to relax and enjoy a bit cooler temperature.  Just our little family will be up there so it will be fun to have a family vacation, to relax, and try to avoid mosquito bites.