pictures and a word

I have found Miah taking her pants off before--and nowadays she tries to put on her own clothes--but never her diaper. The babysitter says that after listening to Miah not take her nap for awhile, she went in and found Miah without pants or diaper. Afterwards, Miah thought it would be a good idea to sleep.

She has recently discovered the fun of somersaults on our king bed and is currently practicing hurdles over Roxy. She must be planning to try out for track this Spring.

Mark and I have also learned that Miah spells "no" like "NOooooo." When she says it pointedly like that, and especially when she points at you like you're in trouble, it's too hilarious to find obnoxious--yet.

I can't believe I get to take her to school tomorrow for a couple hours! Why? Our school goes on a two day retreat each year. I've never been because I've either been pregnant or had a child to pick up after school. It might have worked for me to go on the work crew this year with Miah, but I've enjoyed staying behind and getting work done in years past. Not this year. We have more students on the retreat and more students at school. At one point it was not even organized chaos when a teacher disappeared to socialize, one teacher put his head down for a quick cat nap, and I lost two students in the process. It's really not that difficult of an assignment, we just have too many students and teachers who trust them enough (because our students are easy to trust) to lose sight of their responsibility at times. I'm starting to think that the retreat might have been less stressful for me this time around. Certainly it would have been more fun.

Miah just said "trash"! She might have been slow to say words, but my consolation is that the words she choses to say mean something to her.

sundays are good

Sundays are good for giving Miah a chocolatey treat, learning new words--"kick" and "catch" as in "kick the ball," clipping coupons, long naps, lesson plans, menu plans, updating the blog, and finding Miah in odd corners of the house.

Again I found myself lulled by Miah's silence and it took me a while to realize she had been quiet too long. In her world it was just long enough to carry the dog food to the back bedroom and convince Roxanne that she should be fed by the handful from the dog bed. Roxy is too much like a toddler herself, so while she ate, she didn't luxuriate in the situation. When I came in, she gave me the look that read, "It wasn't my idea." Miah had to pick up a cup of kibble and carry the bowl back to the kitchen.

We haven't fixed our camera yet, but Mark has taken a few not-to-be-missed moments like when Miah fixed her hat backwards and posed for Dad.

Notice the carpet in these pictures? It was installed Thursday. Mark and Grandma tell me that when Miah first saw it she ran to the middle of the living room and cried, "Whoa!" Then she dropped and rolled in glee. Happy, she ran to every room in the house and repeated the performance.

Always helpful anymore, Miah busied herself with reassembling her crib. The story goes that she found a screwdriver and, mimicing Dad, would screw in a screws, change positions and continue.

I knew this had been a long week for everyone, so I fulfilled my dance chaperone obligations with Miah. I dressed her up for the Hawaiian theme. She made us laugh by practicing her dancing skills to the radio, but she was a little overwhelmed when the real dance began. Instead of dancing she played with Emma, my co-worker's 22-month-old, and endeared the male teachers. She was a wonderful distraction from the "dancing".

kiss the cook

Miah helped me bake brownies from scratch--the only way to make brownies. First, we unwrapped the baking chocolate. Miah was so involved that I let her unwrap an extra square before rewrapping it for another batch of brownies.

Then, while Mom melted the chocolate and butter in the microwave, Miah occupied herself with scraping a fork through the buttered baking dish. What fun!Mom was a little nervous about giving a 19-month-old a 1/4 C of flour, but after practicing a few times, Miah was able to dump the last bit of flour into the bowl all on her own.

A few minutes later the batter was ready to go in the oven and Miah indulged in the fruits of her labor, gooey brownie dough.

On Friday I answered the phone in my classroom, "Why don't you answer your phone?"

"I've been in meetings, and then we had an after-hours fire drill. I just got back to start grading." Mark's voice didn't sound normal. "Are you OK?"

"Not really. I'm lying in the middle of the driveway."

A little baffled and very alarmed I asked, "Do you need me to come home?" Meanwhile, I'm calculating how long that will take me and how much time that gives me to pick up Miah and fumbling to find my cell phone to start making phone calls.

"Yeah, if you could get off early that would be great."

I drove home, slightly upset that all the other district schools were released at that very moment, and imagined the most horrible things: Was Mark at odd angles? Did he fall from the roof? What in the world had caused his voice to drastically change and call me for help? I was only slightly comforted that he had called me and not 911; it couldn't be too bad I guessed.

I He was at odd angles. His sternum was in line with his left leg. Probably the accumulation of all the work he has done on our house in addition to his crazy 24-hour shift added up to a little reach ruptering a disk in his spine. Ouch. I've never seen him bite his lip so often.

Mark can already laugh at the scenario, but it has put him out of work for the week.

(Mark doesn't like the way I told this story, so I'm going to let him write his version tomorrow because it is bedtime for the Covey's.)

when it rains it pours

In August it rained. Sure, we had our share of rain showers and hail and lightening strikes, but life also decided to hammer us one drop at a time. I've been reluctant to say that about this month because we have also been able to look at some peaks from our valleys and they're beautiful.

One of the drops that fell upon our household is a broken camera--which might not have been so bad if other factors hadn't come in to rob our funds to fix it. After a whole summer of zealously taking the most ridiculous pictures, trying to capture every little moment of Miah, it's been a little maddening. But I always have words with which to paint pictures.

So picture Mark trying to paint our house with busy little Miah who LOVES climbing. (I wonder whom she inherited that from?) Intent on painting, Mark didn't realize she had climbed onto the scaffolding until she started jumping on it and nearly caused him to fall a few hard feet onto the driveway. Another picture I wish I had is of her helping to carry the drain pipes down the driveway. Mark says she grunted and strained beneath the few pounds of weight she hefted.

I can believe this because later that same day she poked through her diaper bag, pulled the straps over her shoulders, walked a few hard steps, stopped, waved, and said, "bye bye". Just in case I didn't believe her she took a few more steps and repeated the performance.

On the flip side, she is still my little cuddle bug. Unlike last year, when she was more than willing to be left at someone else's house, she has decided to cry and fit when I leave her in the mornings. I decided that our first order of business this weekend would be to cuddle, and cuddle we did both Saturday and Sunday mornings.

back to school

School has begun, and that means a test of my commitment to the family blog. This also means that Mark spends more time with Miah. In just the first week Mark sent me the following e-mail: "I have decided that when I walk into the living room I don't like to see your daughter sprinting across the top of the back of the couch. Particularly when she intentionaly dives head first off of the back onto the seat portion. She thought it was great fun, I thought I was having corenary." I asked him to tell me this story twice when I got home: "She dove from the top of the back of the couch, you said?" She sure did.

We can count the number of real scares she has given us on our fingers, but she is only 18 months. I think we'll be running out of phalanges pretty quick here on out. Phalanges and bandages because ever since her first scraped knee I shared with you here, she seems to have permanent scrapes on her knees. They'll probably stay there until the first snow.

Miah, taking after both of her parents, has a hard time falling asleep at night. Now that I have to rush her off to day care, she doesn't have the luxury of making up lost time in the mornings. This makes her super cuddly in the mornings and awfully hard to let go, but this morning she made it worse by crying. She has never cried over me leaving her before; talk about pulling your heart out.

My first week at school has been a true roller coaster and I'm trying to be patient with it all. The best news I've had all week is that the 10th graders became phenomenal readers last year. 96% were proficient or advanced in reading and the other four students placed in the high third of partially proficient. It will be hard to top that! And the pressure to repeat that performance is almost entirely on me this year (last year three different teachers taught these kids).