Climbing Down

Baby recently figured out that things have depth.  We used to have to guard her very carefully to make sure she wouldn't just walk right off the edge of something.  Now, she knows that there is an end.  Take our bed for example.

In the mornings, Baby usually wakes up super early.  We let her play in our bed while we attempt to catch a few more moments of sleep  We used to have to watch her extra carefully to make sure she wouldn't dive headfirst off the bed.  Depending on which side of the bed she was on, Husband or I would have a grip on an ankle at all times  (Over time, it's easy to maintain a grip on something while in light sleep).

Recently, she figured out that she could turn herself onto her tummy and slide herself off, feet first.  It's amazing.  She knows there is an edge, and she can now get down to run around.  The same idea works for the couch.  If she is sitting on the couch with us and wants down, she turns her little self around, dangles her legs, and drops.  Once down, she turns around and grins at us with the hugest smile before she either runs off or wants back up.

The other day we were out shopping at a cute downtown near us.  We went into a store where the baby section was upstairs.  Once upstairs, there was a glass barrier preventing people from falling off the edge and back down to the first floor.  We let Baby walk around (that means she runs around and pulls everything off of hangars and shelves while Husband or I dutifully follow her and pick up what she has dismantled).  Apparently she decided she wanted back down to the first floor, so she went to the edge, turned her self around, and tried to scoot herself backward off the ledge.

Luckily the glass barrier was there so she wasn't going anywhere.  She seemed a bit confused that she couldn't get down.  It was rather funny (and don't worry, we were watching her the whole time.  She never would have gotten herself in that position if we knew it wasn't safe), but also made me realize that while she now understands that things have a ledge, she doesn't quite understand the concept of depth.  Let's just say we won't be taking her to the Grand Canyon anytime soon.      

Babies and Animals

I really enjoy having our cats.

Husband and I rescued our first cat, Tiger, about a year after we married.  He was in a box in front of a grocery store and we just couldn't walk away from the cutest little black and white bundle of fluff.   

He was only a couple weeks old, covered in fleas, mites, and undernourished, but we nursed him back to health.  He has been a loyal companion ever since.  So much so that he thinks he is a dog.  He comes when he is called and he begs at the table.  He loves water (he will jump in the shower if we let him and get drenched), and greets us at the door when he comes home.

A year later we decided Tiger needed a friend.  Husband and I were both busy doing school and work, so we thought another kitty friend would be good for him.

Enter Buttercup. She is our "blonde".   She has orange and black spots on a white canvas.  She is a typical cat, keeping to herself, prancing around, and watching everyone with distaste and distrust.  It took Tiger a while to warm up to her at first, but now they tolerate each other and even give each other a bath now and then.

When I got pregnant, I knew things would have to change.  The cats would no longer be able to roam into every bedroom, every nook and cranny.  Instead, they would be banned from sleeping with us, not able to curl up with us wherever we were.

Needless to say, it was a hard adjustment for the cats, and they are definitely attention deprived.  The past few nights, Tiger has heard Baby cry, then meows at our door.  Baby hears Tiger and decides that she wants to go play.  We hear her go "Da! Da!"  Then she gets all upset when she can't get to him.  It takes us a while to get her to go back to sleep, and by the time we do it's practically time to wake up.   

However, having the cats has also been a huge lifesaver.  Baby absolutely LOVES Tiger.  She will see him from afar and yell "Djiagder!" (That means Tiger, in case you were confused.)  She will chase after him and try to pet him.  She now understands the concept of soft  and will lay her head (or her whole self) on Tiger while he meows pitifully.   


The cats got a new toy this past Christmas.  It's a bright pink mouse on the end of a string with bells.  Baby knows that it is a cat toy because she has seen us play with the cats with it.  She will pick it up and try to get Tiger to play (Buttercup likes to hide whenever Baby is around, in case you were wondering where she was).  The other day she picked it up and laid it across him.  He walked away and shook it off.  She picked it up, followed him, and repeated the process.  They did this like twenty times, not kidding.  It was fabulous.  She was so entertained, I was able to make dinner without holding her (this is a huge accomplishment).

Tiger figured out she wasn't going to give up, so he jumped onto the back of the couch where she couldn't reach him.  Baby picked up his toy and held it above her head, standing on her tiptoes with her arms stretched as high as she could get him.  Unfortunately, she still couldn't reach Tiger.  It was the cutest thing to see.

The moral of this post is that babies and animals work well together.  For us, anyway.  (I'm sure if you had a pet snake or something you would disagree).  Once the child figures out the animal exists (it took Baby a while), he or she is easily entertained.  Whenever we want to distract Baby, we ask her to find Tiger.  Off she will go, on a Djiagder hunt.  When she is not wanting to take a bath, we invite Tiger into the bathtub where he happily plays with the bubbles and keeps Baby entertained.  

What would I do if we didn't have the cats?

Baby Sign Number Five AKA Croup Strikes Again

We skipped Sign Class Number Five.  I was bummed because it was animal signs. Oh well, we'll figure out what we missed when we go to the next one (last one!).

Baby ended up getting croup again.  I thought it was supposed to be a once a season kind of thing, but apparently not for my baby.

Wednesday night Baby woke up in the middle of the night.  Husband went and got her and brought her to me saying, "She sounds funny."

I rolled over and said, "She's fine.  Go to bed."

Husband replied, "Are you sure?" 

Me, "Uh huh."

Then I heard her and my heart skipped a beat.  She was making that croup sound again.  The one where her chest is all tight when she breathes.

Husband made a few phone calls so that he would be able to stay home with her on Thursday and I would take Friday if need be.

We propped her up, turned the humidifier on high, and waited out the night.

The next day I went to work an Husband stayed home with her.  She coughed a lot, threw up a few times, had tons of snot, refused to eat, and was terribly cranky.  Husband called the doctor and the doctor said it sounded like croup again.  Plus, babies who tend to get it more than once have a higher tendency to be diagnosed with asthma.  Great.

Friday was my holiday, so I stayed home with Baby and Husband went to work.  Thursday night was rough, so Baby and I were both tired and cranky.  I did have family come visit on Friday, so that was nice.  Unfortunately,Husband got upset at this and said Baby shouldn't see anyone when she is sick.  I disagree.  Don't you want people to stop by when you aren't feeling well?  What about patients in a hospital?  Besides, they were more to keep my company than to play with her.

Saturday Baby woke up with a weird rash on her.  She had a giant red patch across the top of her chest, then a bunch of smaller patches going down to her belly button.  Like hives, kinda.  On her arms and legs were little red circles.  I was worried, so I called the doctor and made an appointment.

My first thought was chicken pox or measles.  Aren't those the ones that have little red spots?    I had Husband Google it while I  called for an appointment. 

A doctor called us back a while later and listened to her symptoms over the phone.  He said it sounded like a typical virus.  Some babies get rashes after having a fever (Did I mention she'd had a fever since Thursday?) and it's the body's way of pushing it out.  It also happens more on body parts that are warm (so there was more of a rash on her chest where she'd been wearing her onesie).  If it seemed to bother her then we could give her some Benadryl.  He didn't think she needed to be seen, but we should call back if she got worse.

I was relieved she didn't have the measles, but it was a really weird rash.  I changed her into a loose fitting shirt and shorts and the rash was pretty much gone by the next day.  However, she was still coughing and snotting, so we called Baby Sign to let them know we wouldn't make it.

I also had Baby's one year pics scheduled for Sunday and had to cancel those.  I was really bummed about that because it was perfect weather for outdoor pictures and I knew just which dress she was going to wear.  Hopefully when we reschedule the weather will be just as nice.

Monday I stayed home with Baby.  For the first time in a few days she did not have a fever when she woke up.  However, she did wake up and throw up all over everything, including her hair.  Yuck.  I took her in the shower with me to try to clean her off.  She didn't really care for that, so I tried to be quick.  She still smelled a little, though.

Tuesday she went back to daycare, despite the runny nose and cough.  I felt really guilty about leaving her.  She even cried when I dropped her off.  M was really surprised by that.  She never cries when she gets dropped off.  Usually she is excited to go play and will wave bye-bye to us.  I spent a few minutes reassuring her, then took off for work (where I was a fifteen minutes late for a meeting-oops).

Wednesday she had an awful rash again.  It was all over her armpits, and down her chest and legs.  I called the doctor again and had a phone appointment.  This was our third time talking to the doctor in a week!  The doctor said it was only something to worry about if she seemed really uncomfortable (she didn't), or if she was having a hard time breathing (nope), otherwise it would go away on its own.

I spent the next few days making sure she wouldn't get overheated and get the rash again.  Meanwhile, we still have snot (like TONS) and coughing.      

 

Baby's First Birthday

Baby's first birthday was a huge success.


If you remember, I was a little stressed with party planning.  I didn't have a lot of time to put things together or go shopping for supplies.  Plus, I didn't know how I would fit everyone in the house if it rained.  However, it all worked out in the end.

The weather was gorgeous, to start off with.  Then, I had a few families cancel on me due to illness or last minute plans spring up.  While disappointed they couldn't make it, especially since they were ones with children, I was a little relieved that I wouldn't have to plan for them.

Baby and I went out shopping in the morning to pick up the food.  I was keeping the menu simple with kid friendly foods.  I had also baked all the cupcakes the night before so I wouldn't have to do any baking the day of.  Husband stayed home to make his famous mac' and cheese.  He also did some cleaning and yard work.

When I got home my mother came over to help with prep work and play with Baby.  Pretty soon we had everything set up except for decorations.  I had a cupcake table where people could add their own toppings (I recommend this if you are short on time.  It was so much easier not to have to frost cupcakes, and I think people had fun doing their own.).  I also had a cute Disney princess tower on which to stack the cupcakes.

On the other table I had a spread of apples and caramel dip, assorted veggies with ranch dip, chicken nuggets, the mac' and cheese, cheese and crackers, and chips.  For drinks, I had Capri Suns and natural sodas.

The first set of guests arrived before I had a chance to set up decorations, so I put them to work (they are a close couple friend of ours).  They put up crepe paper for me to make the rooms look festive.  I had balloons, but apparently I had bought the wrong kind.  When Husband blew them up, they said Happy Valentine's Day instead of Happy Birthday.  We tried turning them inside out to hide the words, but it didn't work.  We only blew up two.

People started to arrive and Baby was excited to see all the people.  She was so cute entertaining everyone.  She was in a good mood (she had napped right before) and was much more relaxed than at Christmas time.

I had a coloring station set up for the older kids (it was a box turned on its side with a few small chairs.  I didn't have anything kid sized, so I was very proud of my box idea) and all of Babies toys were out.  People hung out and ate.  Then Baby opened her presents (meaning, I opened Baby's presents and tried to get her interested.  The older kids were more interested than her.).

She got a ton of toys for her birthday.  She received a lot of educational toys, which was great.  She got quite a few books to add to her library, a lot of shape sorting toys and building toys, and some really cute outfits. 

I had a lot of fun, Baby had a lot of fun, and I hope the people who came had a lot of fun.  Even though it was pretty basic, I think next year I might try to have it in some type of kid facility.  We'll see. 

Baby Sign Number Four

It was Super Bowl Sunday, so Husband decided not to go to class.  He was really mad that it wasn't canceled in honor of the big game.  He was hoping he wouldn't be the only dad who ditched that day.  Baby and I went to Sign Class on our own.  It wasn't as good as last week, but she didn't have any total breakdowns.

Each week we go around the circle to discuss any progress our babies have made with signing.  Half the time I think the parents are lying.  (Is that terrible?  I figure, if Baby doesn't do it, and she's the oldest, then the others aren't as well).  Baby can do the light sign, and that's it.  For everything else, she still points.  Or screams.

This week we learned signs for getting dressed.  We learned hat, comb, shoes, socks, and coat.  We sang a few songs about getting dressed and played with the stuffed bear puppet that she uses.  The teacher brought out the parachute and this time Baby actually sat under it with the other babies instead of wanting to be on the outside with us.  The teacher also brought out bubbles, which Baby loved.  She stood right in front of the teacher and kept pointing at them.  The teacher tried to get her to do the sign for "more," but Baby ignored her and kept pointing.

During the class Baby did okay.  She didn't snatch from the other babies as much as before.  She did crawl all over the mom next to me, who said she didn't mind.  Then Baby sat in her lap for practically a whole song.  Her own daughter was sitting and playing nicely on the floor.  I wasn't sure what to do without a child in my lap, so I just did the signs with everyone else.  It was a little weird, and I'm not sure why Baby did that, and I have to admit I am a little jealous.  She never wants to sit on our laps.

Toward the end of the class, Baby got bored and wanted to wander outside the circle.  Each time I brought her back, she screamed in protest.  The teacher said she would be a good candidate for the advanced class where the babies learn emotion signs.  Then they can express themselves instead of screaming.  I was hoping that's what this class would be about, but apparently not so much.  I don't think we are going to sign up for the next class.  It's rather expensive and not worth what we paid.  Plus, I like not having plans on Sunday afternoons.

Oh, and Husband was the only dad who stayed home to watch the Super Bowl.  He's embarrassed to go back next week because he thinks he will look like the bad dad.   

Baby Sign Number Three

We are halfway done with our Baby Sign class.

Today was by far the best session yet.  It was the most interactive, engaging, and fun for babies and parents.   Husband and I both had a fun time, and Baby did too. 

The signs for this week were all about bath time.  We learned bath, bubbles, duck, frog, and water.

When we learned about the signs for bathtime, the teacher filled miniature bathtubs with a tiny bit of water and let the babies play with it.  Baby loved splashing the water with the other babies.  She was also drawn to the baby dolls, which I thought was interesting.  We don't have any "lifelike" baby dolls at home.

When we learned the sign for bubbles, the teacher blew bubbles for all the babies to look at.  Baby really enjoyed that.

We sang songs, played with the parachute, and interacted.  Overall, the class went by really quickly and we left on a positive note.  Hopefully the rest of the classes will be just as good.   

Car Seat

I like the fact that Baby is little.  This means that she is easier to carry.  She often falls asleep in her carseat, so we just keep her in it and place her somewhere until she wakes up.  Very convenient.  This also means that she hasn't outgrown her carseat, per se.  The car seat goes up to 22 pounds, and Baby is somewhere around 17 pounds.  She has a whole 5 pounds to go!  In Baby weight, it could take a while to get there (Okay, so her length is average and her feet hang off the edge, but she still looks comfortable). 

However, she is one year old now (where did the time go?) and we need to switch her to a different carseat.  I know she will really enjoy facing forward and not reclining all the time.  She'll be such a big girl.

I've attempted looking into a new carseat, but have no idea what I am doing.  Target has really cool color coded floors in their carseat aisle that tell you which carseats to look at for which age.  In Baby's range, there are limited choices.  That are really expensive.  I mean really.

Husband and I are also torn over what to do.   In terms of daycare and driving her, that is.  Usually, Husband drops off Baby in the morning, handing her over in her carseat.  Daycare uses the carseat if needed during the day, and I pick her and her carseat up in the afternoons.

When we switch to the next carseats, I don't think it will be that simple.  Or it might be simpler.  I have no idea.

Daycare has the bigger carseats, so we won't need to drop one off with Baby every day like we do now.  That will be nice.

The problem is that only one of us will have the carseat in his or her car.  How do we handle that?  Do we get two?  We're looking at spending a few hundred dollars, then.  That's a lot of money!

Potentially, we could drop the carseat off at daycare every day and switch it back and forth.  The problem with this is that I don't know how hard it is to install and uninstall a toddler carseat.  The infant one was nice because it had a base that you click it into.  Then you were set to go.  If you didn't have the base, it had spots for the seatbelt to strap it down.  Nice and Easy.

I have no idea how the older carseats work.  They just look so huge and bulky to me, and I think it will be a big ordeal to move one from car to car every day.

Sometimes I wish we were back in the fifties or some other era where parents just held their children.  None of this fancy, bulky, heavy, carseat business.

I suppose safety is important, though.

In the meantime, I'll keep trudging through the carseat aisles until I finally figure this thing out. 

The Sleep Deprived

Baby has always been a pretty good sleeper.

Wait, I totally take that back.  She hates naps during the day and is perfectly fine on getting by with little catnaps or no naps.

Baby has always been a pretty good sleeper during the night (after the newborn stage, of course).

I've heard of parents whose children wake up in the middle of the night and the parents complain that they didn't get any sleep. Their children have a mixed up schedule and think waking up means play time.  Thus, they won't go back to sleep and want to play instead. 

I didn't understand what they were talking about.

Before having Baby, I took the phrase "sleeping through the night" very literally.  It meant that a person went to bed at a decent hour, then woke up sometime in the morning.  When I heard parents talking about their children sleeping through the night, that is what I pictured.

After attending baby classes, I learned that sleeping through the night really just means not waking for a stretch of five hours.  Like sleeping from midnight until five in the morning, or some time frame thereof.  Under that classification, Baby has never slept through the night. Ever.

So I made up my own definition for sleeping through the night.

To me, sleeping through the night means waking up every three to four hours for Baby to nurse (yes, all you naysayers, still.  I realize that she is turning one in a few days and still nurses all night long even though according to all the books I am teaching my child terrible habits and spoiling her.  However, if you do a little more research into breastfeeding and working moms, one will learn that breastfed babies, especially those who refuse bottles, switch their cycles around to eat more at night when the mom is around.  Don't criticize, it works for me.  Okay, I'll get off my high horse now).  Baby nurses from a half asleep mommy for a few minutes, then drifts peacefully back to sleep, as do I.

However, this past week it felt like I had a newborn again.

On Monday night Baby woke up at four o'clock in the morning.  I understand why she woke up. She had a stuffy nose and was having a hard time breathing.  Usually I can get her to go right back to sleep.  But not this night.  She woke herself up fully and wanted to play.  She started babbling to herself  (which is really cute because you can see her little brain working while she tries to spit different sounds out), and calling out for "da."  "Da," depending on the inflection and number of times she repeats it, can stand for Husband, me, or the cat (can I be considered fluent in Babyspeak?).  In this case, it was the cats who were aware that we were awake and were now running around and meowing at the doors.  Baby gets very excited when she hears them and wants to join in the running around.

Anyway,  I didn't get to go back to sleep and then had to get up for work.

I was hoping the next night would be different, that Baby would not wake me up at four in the morning.

Well, the next night was different, that's for sure.  Instead of waking me up at four in the morning, she decided to wake up at two.  In the middle of the night.  As in, two hours after midnight, four hours after I went to bed, and four hours before I was supposed to wake up.  I was not a happy camper.

At first I thought that maybe it was close to the time I had planned to get up and Baby just woke up a little early.  But with a glance at the clock I realized this was not so.

The night before, Husband mentioned that I could have woken him up as well (he sleeps through everything).  At two in the morning, I thought it should be his time to wake up.  I whispered to him to wake up.  I shook him.  I shook him harder.  And harder.  I hit him.  I kicked him.  Eventually he rolled over and yelled at me to leave him alone.  So much for that plan.

Baby and I hung out for a little bit while she did her babbling bit again.  I did get her to go back to sleep about an hour later, and when it came time for us to actually get up, I had to wake her so we wouldn't be late.

The next night was four in the morning again.  Did I mention that I had a huge headache the previous day from not getting enough rest?  I was really feeling the effects of not getting enough sleep.  I had a persistent sniffle that wasn't going away and seemed to be developing into something worse.  Didn't Baby realize I had to work?  And needed my sanity?

Thankfully, the next night Baby slept through the night (by my definition, of course).  I woke up in the morning and felt so refreshed, it was amazing.

I'm hoping that was just some sort of phase, perhaps related to her cold or teething.

Now I understand those mothers who say their child kept them up in the middle of the night.  You totally have my respect and I don't mind when you can't think straight or lose track of what you are saying mid-sentence.  Sleep deprivation will do that to a person.

Trimming Baby Nails

Trimming baby fingernails has to be one of my least favorite things to do.  It trumps changing dirty diapers, even.   I know it's one of the things you have to do, but it is so not fun.  Plus, I feel like every time I trim her nails, I have to go and do it again.  Like laundry.  Or dishes.  It's never ending.  But so much worse.

I've been very fortunate in the fact that Baby doesn't scratch herself.  When she's tired, she makes these cute little fists and rubs her eyes with the backs of her hands.  She's done that since she was a newborn, which meant we didn't have to put those little glove things on her hands.

No, she doesn't scratch herself, she scratches me.

I tried to trim her nails today.  I really did.  Today after her bath we sat down and I tried to distract her while I went after her nails.  She just kept screeching and twisting and turning and biting that I gave up and just put her to bed (yeah yeah, she won this round- she fights dirty).  

Yesterday at some point that I don't remember, she scratched my chin.  I didn't notice, but Husband looked at me and commented that I was bleeding.  Today a coworker noticed the scratch and asked me what happened.  Embarrassed, I told him Baby had scratched me.  Which made me realize that I needed to trim her nails.  Again.

Sometimes it works if I trim and Husband distracts her.  He will jump up and down, clap, play with her toys, make funny sounds and funny faces, all in effort to keep her mind off of what I am doing to her little nails.

It hasn't worked so well lately. She's no longer falling for our tricks.  She won't sit still long enough for me to trim her nails.  She tries to grab the nail clippers.  She squirms and screeches.  Now she bites, too.

It's not like she has bad memories associated with getting her nails trimmed.  I have never once cut her nails too short and made her bleed (I've heard of this happening).  Instead, I am very careful and make sure I am holding the clippers just so before I actually clip.  Which does take a really long time for each nail.  I just don't want to hurt my baby and make her apprehensive each time we need to trim her nails.

I guess the method didn't work because she hates it now.

I put it off until I don't think I possibly can anymore.  It would be so embarrassing if daycare had to tell me to trim my own daughter's nails before sending her in.

Today, I glanced at myself in the mirror and realized I had lots of little scratches all over my stomach from Baby playing with me earlier.

Guess I'd better get Husband to hold her down and get to town.

Tomorrow.

She'll be in a better mood in the morning.  

First Birthday Party Plans

I wasn't going to give Baby a first birthday party.  Seriously, what's the point?  Baby isn't old enough to remember it.  She doesn't need anything (well, we do need a new car seat, but that's another post), she doesn't understand the concept of friends (she for sure does not understand sharing!), and she will probably get overwhelmed (remember Christmas?).  A party would create a stressed out mommy (who is working full time, doing an online class, leading an after school program, going to Saturday workshops, and being a wife, in case you forgot). 

As for the picture aspect, I was just going to place a cupcake in front of her and let her go to town.  That's all you need, right? 

Well, apparently Husband had different ideas.  He thinks having a birthday party is a big deal (he's such a traditionalist) and Baby needs to have one, regardless of all the aforementioned items.  He's even agreed to do whatever I ask him to in order to make sure it goes smoothly (we'll see how well this works out). 

I started inviting people, Husband wanted to invite people, we didn't want people to feel left out, so now I have about thirty people coming to Baby's first birthday party.  This includes children ranging in ages from a few months to ten years old.  The child median age is two and the mean is one and a half (that's my math teacher coming out).

Where am I going to fit all these people?  I have a couch, a loveseat, a recliner, a rocking chair, and eleven kitchen table and folding chairs.   That's eighteen.  I'm still twelve short.  If it does not rain (Lord willing, please don't let it rain!), I have eight patio chairs outside.  We're getting closer.  Four people can stand.  They should be chasing after their own kids anyway.  Right? RIGHT?

What am I going to do with all these children?   I don't know what to do with other people's children.  I know what to do with my own (and even then, that's just guessing).  As mentioned earlier, I really really hope it doesn't rain.  Kids like to go outside, right?  I think I can dig up a soccer ball or something for the older ones.  The babies can play with Baby's toys.

I was also thinking of doing bubbles.  Everyone likes bubbles (I love bubbles!).  Yet another item for outside.  Then there are coloring pages (I'm crossing my fingers the walls don't get colored on).  I am contemplating play doh but leaning on the side of no for that one.

What to do with the adults.  I told Husband we are not buying alcohol for this party.  It's a kids party!  People should be watching their children, not getting relaxed.  Plus, it's not in my budget.  I'm buying decorations and food.  If we're having a party, it's gonna look good!  I have to impress all my adult friends and make them think I have it all together.  

My brilliant idea so far is to do a cupcake decorating station.  That takes care of the cake part of the party and lets people have some fun in that.  Hopefully that will work out okay.

Is it cheesy to do a little survey about Baby?  Like when her due date was supposed to be, when she started crawling, etc.  I think that would be fun!  Or is it too baby shower-y?  I could give away a prize to the winner.  I still haven't decided what to do there.  

Then, there's the lists of things I want to get done before people come over.  I actually opened Baby's baby book and realized that I should have filled out the whole thing by now.  Oops.  Add that to the list.  Then, we don't have any pictures of Baby up around the house (we have pictures of us, but they are like ten years old). Add putting up pictures to the list.  I'd love to have my bathroom painted, but that one is really  not going to happen.  Maybe by her second birthday. 

Not to mention cleaning and baby proofing. 

Guess I'd better get started.