Weekend with Harlee

During the last weekend of January my sister, Ashland, attended a dance convention downtown. Our dance studio, Southern Dance Arts, took 22 students and 2 teachers to Co-Dance, one of the biggest conventions around. They stayed at the Sheraton and made a fun weekend out of dance stuff. To do that, I offered to keep Harlee for the weekend so they wouldn't have to worry about her while trying to better their craft. I played it off as being helpful, but really I just wanted some good quality time with my little blondie!

So Friday afternoon I left work at 3:00 and went to pick up Harlee. After she was all packed up and had bags upon bags of luggage and stuff, we headed home. When we got there Sidney was in her kennel so Harlee could check out the house without being knocked over, and so Sidney could watch and smell her from a distance to acclimate to a toddler in the house. After she saw her room and I unpacked everything, we took Andrew and headed to Veteran's Park for a good hour of running, climbing and anything we could do to wear her out! In the end, it not only tired her, but us as well! We also decided that I'm entirely too paranoid to have children. haha. But really, this child is fearless and independent. Monkey bars? "I can do it by myself." Climbing up large metal poles with big steps in between? "Don't help me Kassie!" Of course she can't really do it by herself, but she sure as heck tried. And stressed me out the entire time.

Playing is really hard work, and she got in about a 5 minute nap. Luckily the drive home was fast enough that she didn't have long enough to fully recharge. We headed in and Andrew and Harlee watched a movie while I started on dinner. Mac & Cheese and Beenie-weenies. Dinner of champions!

 To say she's an Andrew fan is an understatement. He could have hung the moon for all she cares! 

Some serious concentration from both of them!

After dinner and some play time, we jammied up and spent a little while longer chasing the dog. Sidney was a true champ with Harlee. She was poked, pushed and even spanked once or twice when she thought I wasn't looking. Harlee did pretty much everything except try to ride her. Sidney took it all. We hopped in bed, put on Shrek, and within about 30 minutes we were both out. Andrew had the luxury of having our room to himself while Harlee and I stayed in the guest room.

Saturday morning came a little earlier than I'm used to, but being woken by the cutest bed head made it ok. At 7:00 on the dot Harlee popped up, looked out the window and said with pure excitement, "Kassie! The sun is shining!!" Indeed it is, little one.

We got up, put some cartoons on and after she got over me not having any "panny cakes", she accepted waffles and eggs. We had breakfast, played with the dog, hung out in the kennel, then started getting ready to go to Shannon and Baby Jones' gender reveal party!

Shannon and Ted had a beautiful spread of boy/girl food, candies, sodas and goodies. We hung out with friends and family, and did a lot of playing in Mabry's kitchen. Harlee was a little unsure at first and stuck by me pretty closely, but after about 30 minutes she realized she was in a nice place with other kids to play with and adults to laugh at her! Shannon and Ted did the grand reveal to show BLUE balloons! It's a boy!! Harlee got a balloon and man, was that the best toy ever. She had such a good time, and got the award for best balloon static hair!

After our fun party we headed over to my Mom and Kristina's house for a fun afternoon and zoo trip! Harlee loves Patsy and Kristina and was so excited to see them. We all had a quick lunch, packed up and left for the zoo. It was a beautiful, sunny, mostly warm day and lots of other people had to Zoo bug as well.

 "Look 'Stina! I'm a lion!!"

Sweetest picture of the day goes to these two.

Goofiest award-- to me. As usual.

After a few hours at the zoo we decided to pack up and head home. We grabbed some pizza on the way, and about 5 minutes into the ride home Harlee was knocked out. Unfortunately this was about 5:00, and if she slept this late she probably would not go to bed that evening. Well, I had the choice of the lesser of two evils. Let her sleep a while and deal with a really late bedtime, or wake a sleeping baby, which is never a good idea. I decided to let her sleep for 20 minutes. No more. I hoped this would be a cat nap and she'd wake up refreshed. Sadly I had to wake her up or she would have continued sleeping.

BAD IDEA to wake her up. She dazed in and out, screamed and cried and was inconsolable for about 30 minutes. I had to hold her. Couldn't pass her off, couldn't put her down, couldn't do anything except hold her and apologize for waking her up.

We sat down at the table to try to get some food in her. We attempted to bribe her (desperation makes you do things you wouldn't normally do!) with food, cake, presents, toys, attention. Anything we could think of. Nothing worked. She wanted none of it. Finally I mentioned something about really stinky feet and asked if it was her feet that smelled so bad. I got a "cry, giggle, sniffle, laugh, haha yeaaaa." I'll take it! Signs that she will recover! Kristina and I played the stinky feet game for a good 15 minutes while she slowly started coming out of the funk. She grudgingly ate a few bites of pizza, then decided Patsy needed to smell her feet. Once a 3rd person confirmed that they were in fact, very stinky, all was good in the world.

Richard came over to visit Mom and did the Donald Duck voice until his throat probably hurt. She was very entertained with him. I asked Kristina if she was willing to come home with me to help me wrangle Harlee and she agreed. Yes, I could use some back up! We packed up, told Patsy goodbye and headed back to my house. We were worried she'd fall back asleep so we kept her talking the entire 30 minute ride home. We got to the house and she was still awake. Thank goodness. We decided Play-Doh would be fun, so we broke it out and made a mess.

After all 5 colors were combined into 1 giant glob of pukey-purple, we cleaned up and got ready for dinner. Harlee was still full of energy. Kristina happened to bring some glow sticks aka 'globs', so after dinner we made a deal. If she put on her jammies, brushed her teeth and got ready for bed, we would have rave in the bedroom with glow sticks. This was apparently a very worthy deal. We got out some glow sticks, headed to the bed room and turned off the lights, turned on some tunes and proceeded to dance, jump, wave them around, run in circles, and be at 100% energy for the next 30 minutes. I hoped all the craziness would wear her down, but it didn't.

(Very bright phone flashes in a dark room make it kind of hard to keep your eyes open)

After a little fighting we put away the "globs" and turned on a movie. We cuddled up on the couch and while Kristina and I were exhausted, Harlee was not. 30 minutes later I made the executive decision to move to the bedroom. Shrek returned and Harlee was not tired. First she needed to potty. Then she needed to poopy. Then she needed a snack. Then she needed to tell Sidney goodnight. She was pulling out every stop she could to keep from having to lie down. After the bathroom trips and snack I put my foot down and said no more. It was 11:00 and we were done playing. She finally tuckered out about 30 minutes later. Finally! That afternoon cat nap fully recharged her battery. Lesson learned!

Kristina was the end all and be all of aunts that day. I was cool, until Kristina came around!!

Sidney was upset she got kicked out of the sleepover. She's as bad a bed hog as Harlee!

Thankfully staying up so late meant Harlee slept in until 9:00. She popped up and this morning said, "Sidney is in her cage waiting for me!" Well she was actually sleeping on Kristina on the couch after Harlee crowded her out of the bed. Granted with Kristina, Harlee and myself it was pretty crowded. To be so small, she sure takes up a lot of space.

We got up and Harlee reminded me that we didn't have any "panny cakes" but cinnamon rolls and eggs would suffice. We putted around the house and took our time eating and getting packed and ready. Kristina and I decided a trip to the Galleria would be a good way to get out of the house even though it was rainy and dreary outside. We made the agreement with Harlee that if she was really good and stayed in her stroller, she could ride the carousel at the end of the trip. She complied as well as a 2.5 year old can and we made good and did 2 trips on the carousel. Talk about a happy little girl.

We took Kristina home and played with Patsy for a little while before heading back to Alabaster. Same as the day before, she fell asleep in the car right at 5:00. I was not going to make the same mistake of waking her up, so I let her sleep in the car while I loaded all of her stuff up to return her to Ashland. As soon as I started to pull out of my drive way she woke up, and was so upset. She wanted cheese puffs, but they were in the trunk. She wanted Mommy, but when I called Ashland so they could talk she didn't want to listen. She got so worked up she couldn't calm back down. So after 20 minutes of listening to her cry it out and me talking the whole way through, she calmed down enough to hear me talking about our zoo trip the day before. That got her going a little and she joined in to recount all the animals we saw and the silly hair the elephant had. Finally, she stopped crying. Until we turned onto the street her house was on, then she worked back up again because she didn't want to go home! What?! We'd had so much fun and go-go-go that she didn't want to leave Aunt Kassie! So we made another few blocks and talked more about the animals and calmed back down.

We got to Ashland's house right at 5:30 (super bowl kickoff time!) and Harlee was not too happy about going home at first. She held onto me and hid in my should for about 15 minutes until she realized, "Wait, this is my house and my people!" Then she cooled off and wanted to play in her 'temp' (blanket tent).

All in all we had such a fun weekend together. It was great for everyone. Ashland and Jan got to do dance stuff without worrying about Harlee, I got to have great time with my favorite blonde haired girl, Sidney got put to the test with a kid running around (and passed with flying colors!!), Patsy and Kristina got great quality time, and Harlee had some awesome adventures. I love that little girl with everything I have, so I probably had to best time out of everyone.

Nieces truly are the best, and the best sleep comes the night after they go home!! :) As tiring as it was chasing a toddler when I'm not used to it, I'd take her again in a heartbeat.