What to do about toddler aggression?

"Emmy.. Don't hit mama. That hurts mama. Be nice..."
This mantra has been overheard quite a few times over the past couple of days in our household. Emmy seems to have developed a rather sudden aggressive streak (hitting, biting and pinching) that she is taking out on mama, and only mama. Aren't I lucky??
It comes out of nowhere. I will be washing dishes, or playing a game with her, and suddenly Em will get this fierce, intense look on her face, and OUCH! she delivers a blow. Or several blows.
Now, I have seen my fair share of Supernanny. I know that it is important to make eye contact with your child, to get down on their level and speak to them in a serious, authoratative tone. Thus, I established the mantra. Sometimes, when I look Emmy in the eye and speak to her, she pulls her hands away and seems to have listened. Success! But most of the time, it seems this sets her off, and she gets more upset and hits/pinches with even more anger.
So for the first time in our roles as parents, we have established TIME OUT. C thinks it is important that we use those words in our mantra, i.e.: "Emmy.. Don't hit mama. That hurts mama.... If you hit mama again, I will have to put you in Time Out"
For yesterday's outbursts, we used the crib in Emmy's room as the "naughty chair", but C thinks (and I agree) that creating a negative association with her crib might be quite detrimental in the process of establishing a better bedtime routine. I  have my reservations about a "naughty chair" because I am quite convinced that Emmy will either pop right up from the chair, or try to climb up on it and dance (yes, this is another not-so-great tendency she is starting to develop). If we use a "naughty step", Emmy will almost certainly use it as an opportunity to try climbing up the steps so that she can practice her yodeling from the top of the staircase. In other words, it is hard to find a situation that Emmy can't somehow manipulate into a fun time. We are thinking of trying a "naughty, empty play pen" in a secluded area (AKA, baby jail).
I am kind of wondering if this sudden aggression is due to her day care attendance (she has only been attending day care for about a month and a half now), or a cry for more of my attention (though frankly, in order to give her any more attention than I already do, I will have to cut back on some essential functions such as eating, peeing, and/or taking a shower)? I wish I could ask her to explain why she is mad, or sad, so that we could get to the crux of the issue, but if I ask her that question, she will likely answer "beggelserbiggebillmumm" (an approximation of her 15 month old lingo).
I am totally open to suggestions on discipline, except for suggestions that include hitting, spanking, biting, or pinching my girl. I'm a lover, not a fighter, and will not change the core of who I am, even if it means I will need to develop a lot more patience as a mommy.

The inner (and outer) debate on whether to have another baby...

When I found out I was pregnant with Emmy, I truly felt like I had just been blessed with one of those itty bitty micro miracles. You know, like G-d may have had a "slow day at the office" and was reaching the way bottom of his/her to-do list, and was about to take a nap or play Angry Birds or eat a really good sandwich when (s)he saw a post it note stuck to the bottom of his/her shoe that said "allow d to finally get pregnant"... and (s)he did... and it was GOOD!
Truthfully, C and I were not TRYING to get pregnant, but ever since the beginning of our relationship (and I am talking the VERY beginning of our relationship... more "beginning" than I would honestly like to admit to) we were taking zero measures in order to NOT get pregnant. Looking back, I would say we were being quite stupid and irresponsible. But I also truly thought I would never be able to get pregnant (for various reasons) and therefore thought the risk involved in having unprotected sex was incredibly minute.
C proposed in August of 2009, and after excitedly jumping up and down on the couch for a good three and a half days, I settled down and we set a wedding date for June 6, 2010. I have to say that in accepting C's proposal, I also felt quite guilty because I believed my fiance was making a lifetime commitment to someone who would NOT be able to provide him with any children. We talked about this on a number of occasions, and discussed the possibility of looking into adoption, etc. We were both "ok" with not being able to get pregnant, though I would also say neither of us were truly thrilled.
In early 2010 (after about 2 and a half years of quite regular, quite unprotected sex), with the wedding date only 5 months away, I woke up one morning with a severe gag-reflex at the thought of coffee. Huge... red... flag. Slowly other symptoms of pregnancy started surfacing - achy boobies, morning nausea... but I couldn't believe that I could actually be pregnant. I think I waited through about a week of very obvious pregnancy symptoms before I took the pee test on a lunch break at work. I was SO sure I would get that little minus sign.  But woh - WHAT??!! I got a PLUS sign, and I was preggers.
To this day, I still look at Emmy and say to myself  "did this actually happen?"
And now, with Emmy being 15 months going on 16 years old, and with other tick-tock timeline issues forcing me and C to make big decisions about whether or not we are going to expand our family of 3 to a family of 4, I find myself wondering "could this actually happen again???"

I've started talking to women about having a second child. There are two issues that generally come up:
1) A woman never gets her body back after her second child (I never got my body back after my first, so this is not a deal-breaker)
2) A woman has to want to have the baby for HERSELF, not so that her other child will have a companion.
Hmmm.. really? Because, honestly, though I am totally excited about the possibility of holding another newborn in my arms, and showering it with love and motherly attention, I would have to say that the MAIN reason I would want to have a second child is so that Emmy will have someone else in the house to talk to besides mama and dada. I mean, I remember growing up in my childhood house, and I can't even IMAGINE not having my older sister as a companion. There were many times when our folks acted bats%^& crazy and I am so thankful I had someone else to turn to for sanity-checks. On a more positive note, I want Emmy to have someone besides mama and dada with whom she can share a collective memory bank (because lets face it, mama and dada's memories are no longer at their peak), and a collective imagination while playing at home. And ok, maybe sometimes I kind of think to myself "having TWO children to support us in our old age and visit us and give us grandchildren would be better than just having ONE child bearing that burden".

Of course, whether my reasons are judged as good or bad, I think C and I have a tough road ahead of us in our pursuit of baby #2. It took us two and a half years to get pregnant the first time, and that was when we were young and drunk :) and had lots of free time on our hands. I am giving myself til June 2013 to get pregnant again. If it doesn't happen, who knows? Maybe we can foster parent, or look into adopting a baby, or maybe we will just find a really cute puppy.

Little E in the NYC (and the NJ)

What a crazy end to 2011(!) - poor Em came down with a viscious cold (24 hours of throwing up, followed by the "head cold from hell", which made her not want to drink or eat anything for 7 days, which led to us taking her to the pediatrician and then to the ER, where thankfully she did not have to get an IV but she WAS forced to eat a popsicle for like 8...long... hours. ugh.) Then just as Em was returning to her normal, cheerful and energetic self, her germies attacked Dada and put his body in a week-long vice grip. Poor Dada. Now everyone seems to be on the mend, (hallelujah) and I have promised Dada that the next time Emmy gets sick, I will try to catch whatever she has and hold her germies captive in my body.
I felt bad about leaving Dada all by himself when he was feeling "not so fresh", but I had promised my extended family a week-long visit over Christmas break. Emmy and I trekked down to Jersey for the better part of last week, so that we would have plenty of time to spend with all our relatives. We had lots of fun visiting with Sabi and Savtah (one set of grandparents), seeing Moma in the hospital (recovering from galbladder surgery), hanging out with Aunt Ellen and Grommit (the woof woof) and playing with Emmy's older second cousin, Ella.
Emmy REALLY has a thing for girls who are about two to three years her senior. She follows them around in what seems to be something akin to Bieber Fever, watching their every move and attempting to hug them at every opportune (and not so opportune) moment. Ella was wonderful at sharing her toys, and Emmy was thrilled to be in the company of a "big girl".
On Friday Sabi, Emmy and I took a trip into New York City to see the beautiful holiday windows at the big department stores. I carried Emmy in my Ergo carrier for most of our walking tour, and her head was tilted back at a 90 degree angle (a la "flip top head") for at least an hour of our walk. True, we don't spend much time around skyscrapers and neon-lit buildings, but I was suprised that Emmy was so taken with the architecture that she hardly glanced at the gazillions of people who were passing her by (she is usually a huge fan of people-watching). I would say of all the windows we saw, the Lord and Taylor windows were the best for Emmy because of all their moving parts and child-themed allure (I would also give them bonus points for showing children's artwork in some of their windows). Bergdorf Goodman was also spectacular, with its displays made entirely of paper, human hair, etc. I took lots of photos, but none of them came out very well because of the reflections in the glass.
Of course our trip had to include a stop at FAO Schwartz, which was crowded beyond belief. Luckily the floor with the toddler and baby gear was less congested, so we were able to play with some of the toys on that level and Emmy was able to work off some of her energy (it is hard for her to stay in her Ergo for really long periods of time without a break, as comfortable as it is.) We DID get to see the BIG PIANO which is really just a tourist trap now, and we got Sabi to take a photo of us with Indiana Jones, lego style.
All in all a fun day, and I realized that I actually kind of enjoy the city more when I am focused on doing kid-friendly stuff, because it limits the possibilities of what there is to do in such a big city. I think I will take Emmy back this summer, when the weather is warmer, so we can explore Central Park and maybe visit the Children's Museum too. It is nice to think that each time I return to NYC with Em, she will be a little bit older, and her interests will have shifted and developed, so that it can be a different experience with every visit.