The high chair is here

Another big step for Eliza is on the horizon as she is showing an interest in food and sitting with us at the table when we eat. So this morning I got the high chair down from storage and put it in the eat in area of the kitchen. It didn't hit me until I walked away, then came back that little baby Eliza is about to sit up and sit with us at the table. Wasn't she just born like ... oh. Time really does fly.

Our thoughts are with Jenn Hambel and her impending delivery. Well wishes to the Hambel clan, check their blog for photos of Parker, even though he's scheduled to arrive next week, I have a feeling today is a good day. Then again I thought he'd be a girl.

Happy Halloween to all and remember the 31st and the 1st are a Pagan holiday, celebrating the end of summer and the beginning of the next year, so enjoy!

Trick or Treating

This past weekend saw the girls and I attend the annual mom's club trick or treating outing at a local retirement community. Morgan was Tinkerbell and Eliza was a flower. Morgan had a blast (most of the time). Halfway through she handed me her candy bag and held on to a red lollipop. She wanted to eat the lollipop and didn't care about the rest of the candy. I promised her she could have it on the couch in the lobby when we were done. The magic time came, we went to the lobby and she started looking back and forth between the four different couches. I told her it didn't matter which one, she made a bee-line for the closest and devoured it.

The Other Schorr Girl

A lot of text here about one of the girls, hows about news of Eliza, the Other Schorr Girl?

Where to begin really? She can make your heart melt when she smiles and bring out the opposite when screaming at bedtime. We had a run in with what can only be described as "Colic" which is latin for 'pissed off baby.' Our pediatrician, who has been seeing patients less than I have suggested adjusting bedtime to just before the screaming and it worked for quite awhile. Now we are tweaking the bedtime routines and hopefully it will jive soon.

Eliza is a blast to just hang out with on the couch. She loves to stand on her own and makes funny faces as she does so. She is very ticklish and does more of a fast grunting than a laugh, but we're working on it.

She spends most of the day in awe of her sister, watching her move with her mouth open almost wondering aloud, "How long until I can do that Daddy?" She is now aware of her hands and that they are indeed under her control as evidenced by her new found interest in holding things. She reaches out and grabs toys, hair, anything really. Her least favorite thing so far is standing still. I think watching her sister on the move all the time has her wishing she could do the same. Carrying her can get tiring, although I'm not sure how Kim handles them when I'm at work. Having to give each one equal attention is near impossible when one wants you to help her build a Lego tower and the other wants to walk around in your arms. (Kim's response: Caillou, Caillou, and more Caillou. Moms, you know what I'm talkin' about.) For you non-moms, Caillou is a bald French Canadian cartoon Morgan adores.

Eliza now sits up on her own in corners of chairs, so long as she can lean back against something and will rock from side to side as her head turns, again watching Morgan move around.

She is truly an absolute blast to have around and I love that she smiles when she sees me and it's not just gas. Now I'm looking forward to them blaming things on each other.

Who will raise your taxes next year?

I found this link sponsored by an independent group which allows you to enter your family's income, then how you pay for healthcare and it estimates your tax burden next year based on both candidate's tax plans. Under McCain my costs go up $100 per year. Seems not so bad...under Obama we would receive a $4500 decrease in taxes.

Try it for yourselves:
http://www.brandimation.com/ria/election08/

I even tried it with a fake income over $250,000 after all the talk about "Joe the Plumber" (not even a plumber, nor is he buying his boss' business) and I still would get a bigger tax cut under Obama. Not until I stated I would buy my own health insurance with no dependents did McCain give a bigger tax cut.

Whatever your choice this November, please remember to vote!

Morgan's Field Trip

Last Monday Morgan and I (this is Kim, by the way) went on a very exciting field trip. She had a wonderful time and impressed me with how well behaved she was.
The day started with a train ride - yes, her first trip on BART. She was very excited about the whole idea, she has seen the train from the freeway all the time and has commented on it more times than I can count. So we got our ticket, made our way through the turnstiles and onto the train. If you have every gotten on BART from our local station, you know that since it is the end of the line, the train is there for close to 10 minutes before it leaves. But Morgan wanted it to leave right when we got on. We got our seats, I explained we had to wait for other people to get on. A few people got on and Morgan said "OK, they're here, let's go!" When the train finally started moving, the look on her face was priceless; it just light up in a big surprised smile.
We had to change trains partway through our trip and she stuck right with me and enjoyed waiting at the new platform and watching the train pull into the station. Once we got to our final destination, she wanted to get on another train. I had been worried about keeping her occupied and quiet for the train ride. I needn't have worried. She spent the whole time looking out the windows and telling me every time we went into a tunnel.
Our destination was Habitot, a children's museum in Berkeley. We met up with a few other moms and kids from my mom's club. I'm not sure if "museum" is the right term for this place, but it was great. It is a really nice play and discovery space. They have different areas including a water play area, a wall to paint, clay, a couple of train tables. Morgan loved the grocery store area where she could take a shopping cart and fill it with plastic food from a few bins. There was also a diner section with menus and cash registers so they can play restaurant. I ordered a taco and a potato, and Morgan went to the bins and brought me a taco and a potato. Of course, I don't think I got the correct change, but that's ok.
On a potty training note, Morgan had no problems whatsoever that day. She even stopped in the middle of her water play, told me she needed to potty, went, and asked to go right back to the water play area again. I was worried about the time on BART because there are no bathrooms even in the stations, but she handled it perfectly. I was so proud of her.
Morgan had a great time, left with a new toy ("bouncy guy"), and had a enjoyed pointing out all the tunnels on the return train trip. Overall, Morgan and I had a great morning together without the distraction of the new baby. It was great quality time that we have been missing lately.

Schorr Family Sleep-a-thon

Raise your hand if you've had a full night's sleep in the past, oh 3 months. OK, all you people giggling have slept well and we need your sleep! Help us out by going to bed an hour later or waking an hour early and let the universe redistribute that sleep to us. Eliza wakes usually twice, Morgan now at least once and I can't even find a quiet night at work anymore. This morning I rolled out of bed at the firehouse only to look at the clock and realized we had been asleep for 3 hours since our last call. When I arrive home Kim will, I'm sure, be exhausted and both girls ready to continue their day.
So sleep less people and send those winks, z's, mimi's what ever you call them! We need them! Thank goodness my parents are coming to visit for a few days. Forget an adult date with my wife, I'm taking a nap.

Goodbye Aunt Mary

Meeting Ori

An adventure into The City today to meet little Ori, son of Teri and Dickie who was born a mere 12 hours after Eliza this summer. Even though our families are only 41 miles away, they've never met Eliza either. And when you add in that Trisha and her son Kieren (Kee-ran, I'm butchering the spelling for sure) are in town, we had to stop by. Tami and Tiffany, Trisha and Teri's sisters (for those of you having trouble following along, yes all the sister's names start with a T) also came by to meet all the little ones and visit all together. Morgan had a blast running around their old City house, up and down the stairs and Trisha colored with her a bit. Everyone passed around children so at any one time 2 people had no child to monitor. It was nice to see everyone again and finally meet Ori.

After a long drive home Morgan and Eliza were ready to climb into bed. Morgan wanted only 1 book instead of her usual 2 and closed her eyes as I left the room. My mother will simply adore this next part of the story. I hear a sudden cry from her room and open the door to see her getting out of bed. Does she have to goto the bathroom? Is she in pain? No. "We have to brush my teeth Daddy!" In all the rush to get them into bed, I had neglected to brush her teeth.

How I spent last Christmas

Thinking ahead to the holiday season I am reminded of how I spent the holidays last year, off work on disability. For those who didn’t know I had a decent accident last year at work. Decent enough to send me to the hospital in the ambulance. In remembering the event I came across pictures of the building I was in when I got hurt and I wanted to put something together to kind of commemorate it. So without being too dramatic, although I’m sure it will be, here is the story of how I spent last Christmas Vacation.

Early morning December 17th and I’m working on an Engine. A call comes in over the radio for a reported fire in a part of town not too far away and it sounds big. We get called not 5 minutes later to investigate smoke in the area a few blocks from the fire. We arrive downtown and the smoke is so thick the buses have stopped moving. Weaving around stopped cars we can barely see until we turn the corner and see the large old building with flames shooting a good 30 feet out 2 giant windows in the front. Old buildings in this part of town are usually wood frame structures with brick or stucco facades and this thing is cooking.

Our engine is one of the later ones to arrive and the fire is pushed back up the stairway before we aim our hose lines at pushing the fire back towards the large windows. Making our way up the stairs we turn and enter a large open room, I say open because there is a faint glow of fire far away in all directions.

Take a look at this video and you’ll have an idea of where we found ourselves. Take special note of where the man is dancing, near the middle in the bright red pants. The entrance to this room is below the camera and those big windows are where the fire was blowing out from. Remember that location in your mind.


We were all making progress, good progress. The theatre seating was getting knocked down and the ladder truck crews had made it to the roof and opened a large hole allowing the smoke to escape. We could see what was happening around us and most of the large room area was full of firemen tearing walls open to find hidden fire. We were shooting water into one of the balcony areas still smoldering when one of my co-workers asked if they could switch spots with me and use the nozzle. I happily obliged and moved back, picking up the hose about 6 feet behind her and helping to steady the heavy hose.

The next thing I remember is hearing someone shouting, “Hey are you all right over there?” I recall seeing the chinstrap to my helmet waving in front of my face, which was odd on account of I had tightened it around my chin and for it to be where it was meant I was face down. I answered, “I’m fine, give me a minute.” I felt an arm lift me from my shoulder and realized I was on my knees, looking down, surrounded by debris. “Help me get this guy out of here,” there was a lot of commotion around me. “Tell the Chief there’s a man down, the ceiling collapsed.” The next few minutes are blurry to me but a good friend was there helping me and told me the rest.

This photo from a few days later shows the section of ceiling that likely fell on me, an approx 4' by 8' section of wallboard and plywood that fell almost 30 feet. And yes that is our union hall next door. We saved that.

I was carried to the main stairwell and they lay me down to assess my injuries. I was holding the right side of my head and asking repetitive questions, a sign of a head injury. They began removing my fire coat to check for injuries when I asked them, “Is the building still on fire?” “Yeah” “Then put my coat back on.” I didn’t know that where I was had been a safe area. The ambulance ride became more real halfway through when I recognized the sweating, nervous Paramedic was one of the ones I had helped to train earlier in the year. After an hour or so at the
hospital I was released with diminished hearing in my right ear, a headache like I’ve never had before and the need to call Kim and tell her what had happened.

“Hey I’m running late,”
“There was a big fire on the news, are you there?”
“Not anymore.”
The next few weeks I was on medication in case my brain was bleeding and it meant no alcohol and no caffeine. That’s big for me. Everything seems to have turned out fine and I haven’t experienced anything that would make us worry, but it was a reminder that not all my work calls are B.S. Hopefully this Christmas break will go better.

Recalls and recklessness

Eliza joins me in front of the keyboard as she is screaming everywhere else we try to put her.
Her crib, made by the Jardine company, has been recalled, a second time, so we sent in the parts and received a voucher for a new crib. Check for your recalled baby items here. the first recall was due to brain dead parents assembling the front gate upside down, even though there is a big plate marked "PUSH" on the front. I guess they never noticed the letters upside down. We skipped that "recall" and just confirmed that we had in fact assembled the crib properly. This most recent recall involved the wood slats breaking and injuring 4 children. No deaths, just 4 kids got scratched. So we went to get Eliza's new crib yesterday and I assembled it this morning so Kim and I could get our room back. Eliza is not a fan of sitting still and cries as soon as we sit down. Kim just took the crying child to eat, but she has yet to settle down.

A friend of ours mentioned on her blog a guest on the Oprah show who left their daughter, unknowingly, in the car on a hot day while she went to work. Temperatures outside reached over 100 degrees, meaning inside the car was easily 150 degrees. A horrible way to die and a reminder to slow down. With all the confusion people are adding to their lives today, we all need to remember to slow down. Less activities, less work, less school. I am not immune to hurrying at times. More than once I have arrived at a destination only to find I neglected to completely secure one of my children in their car seats. It happens. But completely forgetting your child is in the car is inexcusable.
Friends have told me stories of forgetting who had what child and quickly realizing what had happened but there are people out there who can't even read simple letters on a crib to see if it is installed properly.
In the Air Force they have giant REMOVE BEFORE FLIGHT tags on the planes. If your schedule can not be altered to see if your child is indeed in the car try adding your own type of REMOVE BEFORE FLIGHT tag. Moms: Place your purse next to the car seat regardless of whether you have the child in the car or not. Each time you get in or out you will be required to look at or past where your child will be to retrieve your items. Dads, get in the habit of putting your bag or briefcase in the same place. Don't carry a bag? Place your wallet and phone where the car seat goes. If these simple tips seem too difficult to follow or you don't have "time" to do them, you need to seriously rethink your priorities.
The extra 5 minutes waiting in line at Starbucks in the mornings can be better spent checking to see if you have a human being with you or not.
Dropping Jr off at the daycare, Grandma's, a friend's...take the time to ensure you have the child and if not, find out who does.
I hate to sound overly preachy about this but the increasingly busy schedules and activities I hear families undertaking will only lead to more confusion. Buffer more time into your day or take less responsibilities into your day. I would love for Kim to return to work full time, but her salary would be eaten up by daycare and someone else would be raising our children. And I only work 9 days a month. I can't imagine the chaos that comes from both parents gone all day every day.
And I'll pass along a quick story that sums up why I can't get too mad when Eliza freaks out and won't stop crying.
Back in Mission Viejo at my father's promotion ceremony to Captain, a Chief stood at the podium trying to say a few words. The fire house apparatus floor was full of young families with a number of children and babies crying. I remember wanting them all to be quiet and we could barely hear the Chief. He said very calmly, "You know some of you may be upset about all this noise but I've learned something over the years as I'm sure most of these men have as well. A crying baby is a breathing baby. When you walked into the room on that call, that baby was silent and all you wanted to hear was that baby crying." I remember that like it was this morning and I continue to believe every word of it.
Eliza is most certainly breathing.

Morgan says the darndest things Part II

While out for our afternoon walk after dinner last night Morgan said, out of the blue, "I want to get on the school bus and go to school. Then I don't need you anymore." After further questioning she revealed that by taking the bus I would not need to drive her to school.
Soon after spilling a bit of water on the carpet she said to me calmly, "Don't touch the water daddy, I'm going to get a towel." She went into the kitchen for a towel and came back, cleaned it up and said, touching my leg, "OK daddy, you can go there now."
She is also following politics and is quick to point out "Bara Bobama" and "MaAin", now if we can get her to pronounce "Mahmoud Ahmadinejad" properly we'll be all set.

A quick word about ads

I'm sure visitors have noticed we added advertisements to the Carriage House happenings in an effort to make a little side change for the girls' college funds. Well, it is working. Those of you who are simply loading this page with your ad blocking software turned off, are making quite an impression on the folks at google who manage our ads. That's right, those are OUR ads. We choose the size, color and location and google's advertisers scramble and compete to place ads on our site based on what topic we're discussing, hence all the ads for potty training. But you may have also noticed up at the top of the page is our very own google search bar. Now you can search the google safely from Carriage House and help us out at the same time. Every time a supporter of ours does a search, it helps. Every time you choose to click on a featured ad in the results, the girls are rewarded.

So sorry if the ads are annoying or detracting from the experience here, I gave it a try and we're doing OK so far. So if you see an ad that interests you, by all means learn more.

On a related note have you been over to Justin's therapy page? It's a place for me to tell all the hilarious and ridiculous stories from work. You can also find it down on the left here under "You called 911...for this?" Oh and there are ads there too.

It's Bath Night!

Morgan loves to help Eliza take a bath and on this occasion Eliza enjoyed every minute of it. The girls seem to always smile and laugh at one another and Eliza is quite curious ofthe camera as you can see in the video below.
Grand and Grandpa McDowell are staying with us this weekend and the girls are loving it. Kim and I are also enjoying a few moments of quite here and there I'm not ashamed to say. So enjoy the video of the bath and I'll pass along more soon.


Just a quick note on the potty training front, Morgan is now doing it completely on her own and when she decides it necessary. She's still in a diaper at night, but the day time is covered. Well done Morgan!

Potty UPDATE Update

Never count your chickens before they hatch.


That comes to mind as I review my day, which was going so well, as the previous posting suggests. If you have not read it yet, please do so before continuing here.
While I was passing along to the world how wonderfully my daughter was doing at potty training she was making quite the disaster area in her room. I won't go into details in case you're eating, but let's just say I deal with stuff like that at work and I hate it. She had done so well earlier in the day and then to have such a complete regression is indeed a bummer, but we will prevail. There was a glimmer of hope when, while I was cleaning up, I heard a toilet seat close, a toilet flush and the sink turn on. I ran in to see Morgan washing her hands, "I peed daddy!" with a giant smile. She did. Not in the toilet, but she at least made it into the bathroom and we're just down 1 more pair of training pants.

Potty UPDATE

Well shiver me timbers, yesterday was talk like a pirate day.

I digress.
Morgan is doing fantastic with her potty training and is even reminding us of when she should go. We wandered off to the farmer's market this morning as we often do and we left her in the cotton training pants, no liner. Brave, I know. She was fine walking all around and riding in the stroller and when we got to the car to leave she told us she wanted to pe before we went to our next stop. Luckily we still have the little potty in the back of the car. Kim led Morgan over to a quiet spot and she went potty all by herself, no trouble at all.

The sticker chart method was altered early on to include m&ms as a reward for dry panties and using the potty, but when we're out she never asks for them. Kim and Morgan put a lot of work into this thing and is sure does make things different. In a good way.

Eliza is still using her diapers and the cloth diaper service is working out easier than I could have ever expected. I wish we had gone to it sooner. More updates as they happen...

Potty training is here

And it has us all captive! Kim and I, well mainly Kim, took the initiative this past 4 day off of work to dive headfirst into potty training. Kim set up the idea a week ahead of time by telling Morgan we would be teaching her doll, Morgan Baby, how to use the potty. We've had a potty out and waiting such a moment for well over 6 months now and have never used it.

Kim also devised a sticker reward system to let Morgan celebrate certain aspects of using the toilet the rest of us have forgotten. 1 sticker for sitting down, another for pottying, another for flushing and the fourth for washing hands. Then there are the candy rewards for having dry pants at the start of the adventure and another candy for actually pottying. It's a brilliant system and has worked well for 3 days now.

We even tried introducing an "on the road" element, using the potty at Costco, with great success. It has not been all "fun and games" however and there have been more than 1 accident, but she is only 2. This evening, while Kim was dealing with a fussy Eliza, Morgan decided to wet her training pants while looking me in the face saying, "No daddy, I don't need to pee." Then when she was put on the potty to finish that episode, I went in to put the wet pants in the bin and she wandered away. It wasn't until a few minutes later that I noticed the wet spot on the floor. "Did you have to go and pee on the floor? I asked if you were done and you said yes." "yeah." "Well, are you done going potty or do you want to do it on the floor again?" "Don't get mad at her!" Was shout whispered from the other room.

It is so frustrating when she won't do the simplest thing and yet so exciting when she wants to, succeeds and is proud of it. When she came running over to me screaming, "I peed daddy, I peed!" earlier today I got a big hug and told her, "All you need to learn now is to tie your shoes and drive and you're all set."
Since I started typing this post she has come out of her room, after bedtime, to ask if she can use the potty, event hough she is back in a diaper for the night.

It takes time I keep telling myself.

Kim read in a book today that the most important things in potty training are a positive attitude and patience. Yeah, patience, sure, whatever. I have patients at work I'm not allowed to scream at and kids at home who don't appreciate sarcasm. Day 4 tomorrow, let's hope it keeps getting better.

Dance Off! Morgan vs Morgan

Sure she dances, but I didn't notice until recently that her styles vary based on the type of music she's listening to. So here it is, the first Morgan vs Morgan Dance Off! Make a comment and tell us which dancing style you like better!



Vampire Weekend Morgan


OR



OK GO Morgan


Tell us what you think! Want to see Morgan dance to your favorite song? Mention it in your post and we'll see if she'll dance to it.

Morgan says the darndest things

Kim here again! Morgan says such great things from time to time that I thought I would share. And this way I will remember them after she stops saying them. I will update this post as needed in the future.

- Mispronunciations:
Cookie Monster is "Cookie Machachine," almost cookie machine, but not quite.
Popsicle somehow sounds like "parking lot." Not exactly sure how she does it or how to spell it, but if she asks for a parking lot while dragging you to the freezer, don't worry, she's not crazy.

-While Aunt Jennifer was visiting and we were watching Morgan ride her tricycle in the back yard, Morgan stopped and left for a minute. She came back and in response to "where did you go?" replied, "I just had to go change my mind." Of course, this was greeted by amazement and laughter so she did it repeatedly the rest of the afternoon, and a few times since. Jen and I thought it a wonderful way to get out of a conversation: "Excuse me, I have to go change my mind."

-The other day Morgan was playing with her Grandma and her magnetic letters. She said she was going to "build a word" (the TV show Word World, anyone?). She proceeded to lay out a bunch of letters, and a couple of numbers, in a big line. Once she was satisfied she ran her finger under the letters like she was reading them and pronounced, very authoritatively, "Peanuts!"

I'm learnin' me the internets

So it's obvious that the blog is undergoing changes. I'm slowly learning how to alter the code for these things and having interesting results, so if you check in and everything is out of whack, give me a few minutes, I'm "learning." Soon to come here in the pages of Word From Carriage House: Morgan plays air guitar, Eliza laughs at aforementioned activity, Kim knits and Justin juggles. OK, only 3 of those are real. As we say at work, "More to follow."

Morgan helps Eliza

When Eliza had a little bit of spit up, Morgan jumps in to save the day!