My poor baby girl. When we started out on this great trip. See that picture, that’s how our trip started out.

Today’s trip home didn’t go as well. It was kind of sad. Her eye teeth have put her in a pretty sour mood. In our first flight she was okay until we had to put the iPhone away right before we landed. She threw a huge fit and didn’t really calm down until I started singing a lullaby.

The lullaby kind of worked in the second flight, but we went from the first plane, to the bathroom and then to another plane. There was no time to cool off from the previous flight. So I gave her tooth medicine, motrin and a bunch of lullabies. In the end, the only thing that calmed her on that flight was cuddles and a good dose of free Sesame Street downloads on the iPhone.

In the bus ride to our parked car, Jordan once again freaked. This time it was because she was sick and tired of sitting on my lap. The only thing that helped: Dora vodcasts. We watched the four or five on my iPhone constantly. The guy sitting next to me said: “Aren’t you glad you’re an early adapter?” I was… And so were all the other folks in the van. It was a funny moment.

Jordan didn’t sleep well last night… periodic crying, restlessness. It was so sad. When she woke up she was warm and unhappy. She just cuddled for 20 minutes with me before she was ready to eat breakfast. Darn teeth.

What stuns me is how this is really the first time we’ve had trouble with teeth. I didn’t even know when she got molars! So I’ll let her get all the pity she needs on these teeth. Her brother cried through every single one! It’s too bad we’re out of town… This is no fun! Thank goodness the yummy waffles this morning helped brighten the day.

Miss Jordan had her first dentist appointment today. Very exciting stuff. She did a pretty good job and the dentist said Jordan’s teeth are getting closer to coming in. She’s 20 months old tomorrow! 20 months! It’s due time she gets those teeth don’t you think?

She was exhausted when we got to school… But she only slept for 40 minutes.

So by the time we got home, she was a wreck and I still had to cook dinner. She was in FULL meltdown. I held as strong as I could to not run out of the house screaming. But I kept it together.

That picture is officially my first photo to post from my new phone. I finally got the iPhone. I’m LOVING it. I’m also more connected to my world than ever before. It’s so damned easy to read email, respond to voicemail, text messages… All of it. It’s nerdy. But it’s awesome.

BTW, I noticed blogger is offering the chance to upload video directly into blogs. So I had to give it a try. Here’s Jordan being a monkey during our vacation.

15 Months Old
Originally uploaded by NerdyMom.

She’s growing so fast. But you know, I’ve been able to slowly work into the toddler world with Jordan. The lucky part of not having a walking toddler is how I’ve been able to watch her personality grow, her language grow… Her love of the world and communication grow. I’m not focusing my attention on her need for walking speed. She scoots fast, but it isn’t as efficient as walking. And that gives me more time to hold her, sit with her and just play. At this age, Cam was so on the go, my head was spinning. My world with Jordan is going to change into something like that soon. But I have to say I’m lucky to have enjoyed an extended “baby time.” But with more communication. Girl knows what she wants and I’m getting good at reading it.

Jordan is doing a fantastic job at walking with my help. It’s a really new thing. I hold onto her hips and she is moving – both left and right foot going forward. I’m thrilled. I’m scared. I hope we’ll be able to continue to make so much progress. I got an email from a parent web page that said: “Happy 15 month old birthday. At this age, 90 percent of kids walk.” I shouldn’t care. But I do… Just a little bit.

One other little note: Her top molars started poking through this week. Must be why her nose has been drippy and her cough returned. She still doesn’t drool.

Yesterday Jordan’s sixth tooth arrived after all that hard work. Thank goodness. This morning we had fun with breakfast. I enjoyed taking pictures of her and I decided to capture just a normal moment with my girl in video. We giggled at each other while she popped Cheerios and threw her sippy cup on a regular basis. So here’s just a little moment in the high chair:

Jordan has been working very hard on words, but lately it seems her standing and pulling up skills are trumping words. But in the last day, she points at pictures and dolls and says: “tritty” I have to believe that means “pretty.” I find that to be pretty darn sweet.

Can you believe she’s 13 months old now? Just amazing.

I’ve started working out again… I got up at 5:20 this morning to exercise. So why amd I still awake? That’s a good question. Randy just gave me a stern talking to before he went to bed. It just feels like I can never do enough — with work, with blogging… with just brainlessly surfing the web or knitting (which I learned how to do this weekend). So I should head off to bed. I just wanted to update with a few smiles to share with everyone. I’ve been pondering heavier thoughts… But I’ll hold off for another day.

Take the number up to five. Jordan had another tooth appear today and I expect the next top tooth to emerge at any moment. Hopefully she’ll get a bit of a break from all of this tooth making and feely happier. Actually, she hasn’t been that moody, but it’s been noticeable to me.

Yesterday Jordan got to play in the bigger baby room almost all day. She does really well in there. It certainly won’t be the same lovey and warm environment with little squishy babies. She’s ready to be there full time and I’m impatient.

I’m trying to focus on me a little bit lately. I went to the gym twice this week. I even work up at 5:25 this morning to head over to the gym. I will admit: I like working out. The trick is allowing myself time. A good friend and I take a walk every Saturday… So if I can just add one other day of exercise, I’ll feel better about myself. I spent the last year focusing a lot of time for Jordan. I’m officially going to allow myself priority again. Obviously that’s important for the sake of sanity. So as Jordan keeps growing, I need to keep learning how to be better to me. I will benefit, my attitude with life will benefit and I figure the family will benefit. The trick is fitting in healthy living into my insane life.

Best meal ever
Originally uploaded by Jen.

Jordan got to hang out at the newsroom for a while today. I love having her around. The funny part is when Stacey and Randy start playing around with the kids. That’s when silly things happen.

They decided to put Jordan in a take-out box… a larger than life take-out box. It was full of fortune cookies. Newsrooms that are CNN affiliates got one of these boxes. But I bet none of the other newsrooms got to have a baby inside… At least a baby this cute.

I’ve been working and going to appointments a lot this week and I feel like I haven’t spent enough time with the kids. I’ve visited Jordan in her classroom for the last few days. Today she wasn’t happy I left her to go to work. Her teachers say she called out for me for quite a while: “MaMa! MaMa!” How sweet and heartbreaking.

As for my teeth, the good news is I didn’t cause any massive damage to my front tooth. It got polished so the little chip doesn’t get worse or bother my tongue. As for the pain I’ve been feeling, the dentist thinks it’s because I bruised my tooth. I should be okay. I got a new mouthguard. I shouldn’t feel as much jaw pain using this one. But I have to admit, if my children or husband see me wearing this thing… They may cry. It’s not pretty. Randy says if he had to wear something like this, he’d rather have his teeth fall out. I don’t agree. So I’ll wear this thing and see how it goes.

Jordan has two teeth working through her gums… She’s a bit drippy and in a pretty good mood. But I’m in the middle of some teeth drama of my own. I’ve been grinding my teeth at night for a while. I got a mouth guard that left my jaw in pain every morning. I stopped wearing it while I was pregnant because I was uncomfortable enough (thank you very much).

I’ve kind of noticed that I grind my teeth during the day as well… Not the creepy, noisy kind. I just kind of play with my teeth a lot when I’m stressed… Or working hard on something. I find myself in one of those situations on a daily basis.

So that brings in my tooth problem. Over the weekend, I noticed something pointy on one of my front teeth. I figured it had always been there and I just noticed. So I went to the mirror to discover a tiny chip in one of my front teeth. I’m FREAKING out (but not grinding my teeth about it) Not long after I found it, the tooth started to hurt a little and feel sensitive to temperature: FREAKING out more. So I called the dentist.

I’m going in tomorrow morning really early. I figured that would be a big deal right?

Well, Randy has had to work early mornings because of this non-stop ice issue we have across the state. Schools left and right continue to close. So he’s coming in early. I’ve been working late training new editors. I never see him. But when I scheduled my dentist appointment, I figured he could take the kids to school.

Not the case anymore.

Now I have to get up extra early, feed the dogs, wake the kids, get them dressed, fed and out the door into school before a 7:30am appointment that is NOWHERE close to school.

Wah.

On the upside of my constant work and busy schedule, I’ve been hanging out at school a bit more with Jordan. She’s so sweet and smily. And when she gets hot and sweaty (which happens a lot because scooting is hard work), her hair gets all curly. I’ll have to catch a picture of it. I’m kind of hoping she’ll have curly hair like her Grandma. Maybe she can get really curly hair like her Aunt Tisha. That would be really cool. Or maybe she’ll just end up with boring hair like me. But lucky for Jordan, she’ll never be boring. That’s one thing she’s lucked out on! She still has a mullet. I think we’re going to have to trim it soon. But I’d hate to get rid of those blooming curls!!

Jordan was iced into home with weekend while her parents had to work a bit. She didn’t seem to mind it a bit. She was content to scoot all over the house and play. Her favorite item to play with: Shoes.

There wasn’t a lot of talking for Miss Jordan this weekend. She spent the majority of the time dripping and coughing. I think she has at least two more teeth coming through. So she was more interested in getting hugs, playing with toys and sleeping. The one thing I’m noticing is how she just doesn’t use her arm when she wears her prosthetic. She’s still holding it behind her shoulder. The one thing she is using it is to help push herself up from her belly. And she’s in that position a lot these days: If she’s unhappy, she’ll fold up and bonk her head on the floor, fall onto her back and then she rolls onto her belly crying. By the time she pushes herself up, she usually calms down.

So gross story of the weekend has nothing to do with Jordan. Big fluffy dog Dudley discovered that an ice storm is the only way he can catch an animal in the backyard. A rabbit got into the yard and just couldn’t get out fast enough. I watched Dudley prance by the back door with the rabbit hanging from his mouth. Gross. Gross. Gross.

So here’s the latest developments in our world: Jordan is officially one week into the four-tooth world. One of the first things she did with a mouth of teeth was grind them together. It was a horrible sound…. Just quiet enough to hear if you were holding her close. I figured that was the worst she could do with her new pearly whites.

I was wrong.

Today she bit one of her teacher’s toes. And if that wasn’t bad enough, apparently she bit a friend when she wanted a toy back. Two bites in one day. I can only hope this won’t be a common occurrence. I’ve always wondered if I could handle a biter, I’m just going to hope today was an anomaly.