Ingredients:
2 large bowls
1 spoon
An entire cabinet’s worth of various sized tupperware containers
Warm water
Dish soap
All the towels that you can find within reach

Step 1: Lay out all ingredients on kitchen floor and add one crabby, whiny, inconsolable toddler.

Step 2: Step back to avoid being splashed.

Step 3: After said toddler has completely soaked her pajamas, the towels and the kitchen floor, transfer the now (for the moment) calm toddler to the tub for a nice bubble bath.
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I actually got about twenty whine-free minutes from the above recipe this morning. We’ve been dealing with some teeth coming in and a super whiny Miss Ella. Water and soy ice cream sandwiches (which she calls mimi) are the two things that just about always calm her down and let her sweet smile come out of hiding.

During the warmer months we learned that Ella is absolutely a water baby. She experienced swimming in a built in pool, baby pool, cedar creek, two lakes and the Atlantic Ocean this summer and loved them all. Lucky for me that my husband doesn’t mind cold water, since I am such a wimp when it comes to swimming in water that might be considered the slightest bit chilly. Daddy would always take Ella in the water and they would swim and play until she was wiped out. Now that it’s autumn, we’ll be playing in bowls on the kitchen floor and the bathroom tub to help my water baby get her fix.

Unfortunately the water trick only works for as long as she’s actually submerged in some way in it. Today the peace lasted only a few minutes after getting dried off, but not much longer. Since our water activities we’ve played with just about every toy imaginable, gone for a walk, read a book, visited a friend down the road, had lunch and the whines are still very much present and piercing. So now it is (finally) nap time and I hope my sweet girl gets some much needed rest!

Photo © Rebecca Hess 2007

More Love Thursdays:
Growing Boy
Gearing Up for a Visit
Brothers

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