Today on the way down to my parents' house and back we listened to the Pete Seeger children's songs CD we got out of the library, and it was definitely a success. The songs were catchy and Nicholas seemed happy, but what really clued us in to how much he was paying attention was the way he interacted with the music. I'm not sure if it was the songs themselves or the fact that the CD is a recording of a live concert performed in 1962 and you can hear the audience, but he was completely engaged.
Often when the audience applauded or clapped along to the beat, he joined in. That was pretty cool, but he claps whenever other people clap, so not too unusual. But then came the songs with sound effects and audience participation. Some of the times when the audience was singing along, he "sang" along too. Nowhere near the right words, but a very loud and purposeful "ya ya ya" coming from the backseat, especially when what was being sung were repeated syllables, or semi-nonsense things. The absolute best, though, was in a song about old cars where both Pete Seeger and the audience made car noises by essentially blowing raspberries. Without any prompting from us, Nicholas started doing raspberries as well. That was just cool. And he seemed very excited to participate.
I sometimes wonder how much he is really paying attention to the music we have on in the car. (Especially when I'm listening to the VeggieTales CD for the 8 millionth time and wondering if I can switch over to the radio.) But apparently he really is paying attention. And if this CD gets him engaged, all the better. I'm really curious when he will start picking up on some of the other participatory elements, most of which are aimed at preschool/elementary aged kids.
The other cool thing about this CD is the element of tradition and history. I remember my dad singing many of these songs on long car trips, and so listening to them automatically made me smile and get all nostalgic. And how cool is it that Nicholas was listening to (and enjoying) a concert where the kids in the audience are the same age as his grandparents? I know, I'm a sap.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Memorial Day Weekend
We are busy, busy bumblebees this weekend, so these photos are going to have to suffice as a post.
Nicholas, upon seeing one of our neighbors who he likes come outside:
And a few seconds later, when she came over to say hi to him:
Nicholas, upon seeing one of our neighbors who he likes come outside:
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| From 2010 May |
And a few seconds later, when she came over to say hi to him:
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| From 2010 May |
And the goofy boy messing with his hat:
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| From 2010 May |
Thursday, May 27, 2010
The Vital Statistics, One-Year-Old Edition
The final part of the birthday ritual was this morning, when we took Nicholas for his check-up and shots. The bottom line is that he's perfectly healthy, he's right about the fiftieth percentile for both height (30 inches) and weight (21 lbs., 11 oz.). So he's very average. But he has a big head (75th percentile), which should not be surprising given his lineage.
The food front is the only real big change for Nicholas based on this visit. He's now allowed to eat anything that's not a choking hazard (so not nuts for a while, but he can have peanut butter). More importantly, the doctor wants him to stop drinking formula. So we're trying to get him to switch relatively quickly to drinking whole milk, and exclusively out of a cup (sippy, of course). No more bottles! It's another sad moment for Mommy as she adjusts to the idea that Nicholas just isn't a baby anymore.
But all in all, a successful visit with confirmation that we have a happy and healthybaby toddler.
The food front is the only real big change for Nicholas based on this visit. He's now allowed to eat anything that's not a choking hazard (so not nuts for a while, but he can have peanut butter). More importantly, the doctor wants him to stop drinking formula. So we're trying to get him to switch relatively quickly to drinking whole milk, and exclusively out of a cup (sippy, of course). No more bottles! It's another sad moment for Mommy as she adjusts to the idea that Nicholas just isn't a baby anymore.
But all in all, a successful visit with confirmation that we have a happy and healthy
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Nicholas' Birthday--Part 2
Nicholas' birthday was exhausting, but I think overall he had a good time. It was very un-birthday-like, since we didn't have a cake or anything, but it was full of outings and special treats. The only real birthday thing we did was that when he woke up this morning Joe and I went to get him together and sang to him before taking him out. He thought that was pretty cool.
Since I think I am as tired as the little boy who is sleeping soundly in the other room, this will probably be pretty rambly. Consider yourself warned.
Nicholas and I got to the zoo when it opened, hoping to replicate our fun trip a couple weeks ago, but were very disappointed. Between the heat (nearing 90 and humid at 10am) and the hundreds of schoolkids (I counted at least 8 buses there when the zoo opened), neither Nicholas or I was having a very good time, so we left after about an hour.
I took this at the very beginning, before the school groups had caught up with us, and before the wheels came off the wagon:
Since I think I am as tired as the little boy who is sleeping soundly in the other room, this will probably be pretty rambly. Consider yourself warned.
Nicholas and I got to the zoo when it opened, hoping to replicate our fun trip a couple weeks ago, but were very disappointed. Between the heat (nearing 90 and humid at 10am) and the hundreds of schoolkids (I counted at least 8 buses there when the zoo opened), neither Nicholas or I was having a very good time, so we left after about an hour.
I took this at the very beginning, before the school groups had caught up with us, and before the wheels came off the wagon:
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| From 2010 May |
Nicholas then fell asleep about 5 minutes from home and so rather than having a birthday boy who had taken a 5-minute morning nap, I decided to just keep driving and go straight to our afternoon destination, which is 20 minutes further on the road I was already on. Since I hadn't planned for this, I hadn't packed us lunches, so Nicholas got a very special treat--his first Happy Meal at McDonalds!
After being the biggest brat I've ever known him to be while we were in line (so bad, in fact, that I was tempted to call it quits and take him home, even though we were all the way on the other side of the county), he calmed down once we started eating and snapped back into his normal self about halfway through lunch.
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| From 2010 May |
Anyway, the Happy Meal was an interesting experiment. I would never have expected to get him one because they seem like a waste of money, but when I priced out the things I wanted to get him it actually made sense. So I got a 6-piece nuggets happy meal and a side of small fries and figured he would eat the apples, half the fries, and milk, along with the one jar of baby food that was randomly in the diaper bag, and I would eat the nuggets and the rest of the fries. Instead we split every item, with me eating roughly 2/3 of each. The little boy who hates meat apparently will eat McDonalds chicken nuggets. Which probably says something about the nuggets, right? We've tried giving him nuggets at home before to entice him to eat meat, with no luck. And it wasn't the fried breading because about half a nugget in I started stripping most of the breading off and he kept gulping them down. My guess is that it is that the meat in the nuggets is so processed that it is easy to chew.
After lunch we went next door to Storyville, which has got to be one of the coolest places on the planet. At least for a toddler. Have I mentioned that Nicholas is currently obsessed with magnets? Well he is, and today at Storyville he immediately found two magnet stations. Seriously, I didn't guide him at all, he was walking looking around and those caught his eye and he insisted we go over. I'm really not sure how he knew they were magnets.
He has figured out that for the magnets to stick he needs the colored side out, but he isn't reliable on remembering that he needs to put the magnet on open space. Here he is trying to find somewhere to stick the blue one:
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| From 2010 May |
This set of magnets is pretty cool, but around the corner was an even cooler set. In the engineering section of Storyville there is a magnetic wall and a bunch of gear magnets. I don't know how else to describe them--if you line them up right you can make multiple magnets spin by spinning one.
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| From 2010 May |
Nicholas obviously isn't up for the actual engineering element, but he loved moving them around and spinning them. He did occasionally line them up so that multiple spun, but I think that was pure chance.
Storyville really is pretty amazing. And it seems like each time we go there is something new that he has gotten old enough to play with, or play with differently. And it is free! The only down side is the drive, which is both long and often congested with bad traffic.
Tonight we did presents after Joe got home, but Nicholas was too worn out to really be very interested in them. And instead of another cake I made Nicholas cornbread. Joe and I decided that Nicholas would like that just as much and it was better for us not to eat a whole other cake.
And now Nicholas' first birthday is officially over. :( I had planned on writing a retrospective or summary post sometime today but haven't gotten to it and I need to get some work done tonight so it may have to wait until later in the week.
Happy Birthday, Nicholas!
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Labor and Delivery, Part II
Okay. So it's 2:30 a.m., we've each slept about an hour, and we're watching Friends. Oh, and the contractions have basically stopped.
We decided we would go ahead and go back outside for a few more laps around the parking lot. The contractions came back, at least a little bit, and then would subside, and then came back again. It was now nearly 5 a.m., and no longer dark out. We decided that it was time to go to the hospital and find out what was going on, because we're just not good at waiting and not knowing things.
It was a drive I'd visualized a number of times in the previous few months. I thought about it during the trip to each of the last several doctor's appointments, since the practice's office was part of the hospital complex. And I thought about it on the way to and from work, since the routes overlapped a bit. And oddly, I'd always assumed a middle-of-the-night drive: no traffic, dark out. I'm not sure whether I absorbed too much culture, or that I remember my parents leaving for the hospital at 2 a.m. when my baby brother was born (I was 12 at the time). In any event, that five minutes was about the only period of any length during the entire process that went about how I imagined it.
Alright, so we're at the hospital. We're calm. We're nervous. We're freaking out because the labor can't decide whether it wants to proceed or not. When we got upstairs to the evaluation room, the midwife on duty examined Sarah and determined that she was just shy of the threshold where they keep you, but thought we were close enough. She called our doctor, who asked that we stay there and wait for her to arrive. So we ended up sitting in the evaluation room for several hours. We were exhausted at this point, we both were hungry, Sarah was getting a little dehydrated, Peanut was all sorts of discombobulated and not behaving properly for the montiors. And then the doctor came in and told us to go home. She cautioned us before she examined Sarah that this particular midwife is known for being overenthusiastic in her estimates of labor progression. Then she sent us home to rest and wait, and to come back when "you can't stand it anymore."
So at 9:30, in the midst of a bright, sunny day, we headed home. It was a very odd experience. We thought we'd be leaving with a baby. We'd been there through sunrise, so all of a sudden the day had started (though it was Memorial Day, so everything was rather quiet).
Most of that day (Monday, May 25) was quiet. Sarah had some contractions, but nothing particularly intense. We tried to sleep for a few hours in the morning. We played some games.
While we were napping, we missed the only phone call that could possibly distract us that day. Two weeks earlier, some of you may recall, our car had been stolen while parked near campus. We had assumed it was gone for good (Civics are the most stolen car in America, and it's because they have very interchangeable parts), and went out and bought a new (to us) car. But during our nap, the Baltimore police called to let us know that they'd found our car! [ed.: "Found" may imply that the police were "looking" for the car, when we suspect that someone saw the car parked in front of their house with no license plates and informed the police of a suspicious vehicle.] Because it was Memorial Day, I could not get anyone on the phone back to confirm what was going on, and it would take an awful lot of work to actually get the car back (another story for another time), and we didn't know if it was drivable, but it was good news about the car!
Maybe Peanut sensed our happiness, because it was not long thereafter that Sarah's contractions picked up in intensity. Now, as I mentioned yesterday, her labor had not been textbook. Instead of the contractions starting at 15 minutes apart and getting progressively closer, they'd been about 2-3 minutes apart for over 24 hours. So with the increase in intensity the contractions actually slowed down, but now they were real. By 6pm, after another round of prep and the first half-hour of Back to the Future, we were back on our way to the hospital.
From here things seemed to go really fast. They took us upstairs. The nurses didn't believe that Sarah would stay, because she looked too calm. Then the midwife did an exam and they were amazed that she wasn't screaming bloody murder based on how far along things were. They checked Sarah in. The anesthesiologist did the epidural, after which Sarah wasn't in much pain. At about 9 p.m., the doctor came in and said she would check in again at midnight. We tried to rest with the lights down. Because of the medicine, we were both able to a little bit. Finally, we realized we couldn't sleep, and put on bad television. As I recall, we ended up watching part of Leno's last week on the Tonight Show, with Mel Gibson trying to do a redemption interview after his divorce.
At 12:30 the doctor came back, took one look and said, "time to push!"
[ed.: Gory details here.]
Then, at 1:31 a.m., Nicholas arrived, screaming his little head off. I don't think he stopped until they wheeled him out of the room an hour later for his bath.
We decided we would go ahead and go back outside for a few more laps around the parking lot. The contractions came back, at least a little bit, and then would subside, and then came back again. It was now nearly 5 a.m., and no longer dark out. We decided that it was time to go to the hospital and find out what was going on, because we're just not good at waiting and not knowing things.
It was a drive I'd visualized a number of times in the previous few months. I thought about it during the trip to each of the last several doctor's appointments, since the practice's office was part of the hospital complex. And I thought about it on the way to and from work, since the routes overlapped a bit. And oddly, I'd always assumed a middle-of-the-night drive: no traffic, dark out. I'm not sure whether I absorbed too much culture, or that I remember my parents leaving for the hospital at 2 a.m. when my baby brother was born (I was 12 at the time). In any event, that five minutes was about the only period of any length during the entire process that went about how I imagined it.
Alright, so we're at the hospital. We're calm. We're nervous. We're freaking out because the labor can't decide whether it wants to proceed or not. When we got upstairs to the evaluation room, the midwife on duty examined Sarah and determined that she was just shy of the threshold where they keep you, but thought we were close enough. She called our doctor, who asked that we stay there and wait for her to arrive. So we ended up sitting in the evaluation room for several hours. We were exhausted at this point, we both were hungry, Sarah was getting a little dehydrated, Peanut was all sorts of discombobulated and not behaving properly for the montiors. And then the doctor came in and told us to go home. She cautioned us before she examined Sarah that this particular midwife is known for being overenthusiastic in her estimates of labor progression. Then she sent us home to rest and wait, and to come back when "you can't stand it anymore."
So at 9:30, in the midst of a bright, sunny day, we headed home. It was a very odd experience. We thought we'd be leaving with a baby. We'd been there through sunrise, so all of a sudden the day had started (though it was Memorial Day, so everything was rather quiet).
Most of that day (Monday, May 25) was quiet. Sarah had some contractions, but nothing particularly intense. We tried to sleep for a few hours in the morning. We played some games.
While we were napping, we missed the only phone call that could possibly distract us that day. Two weeks earlier, some of you may recall, our car had been stolen while parked near campus. We had assumed it was gone for good (Civics are the most stolen car in America, and it's because they have very interchangeable parts), and went out and bought a new (to us) car. But during our nap, the Baltimore police called to let us know that they'd found our car! [ed.: "Found" may imply that the police were "looking" for the car, when we suspect that someone saw the car parked in front of their house with no license plates and informed the police of a suspicious vehicle.] Because it was Memorial Day, I could not get anyone on the phone back to confirm what was going on, and it would take an awful lot of work to actually get the car back (another story for another time), and we didn't know if it was drivable, but it was good news about the car!
Maybe Peanut sensed our happiness, because it was not long thereafter that Sarah's contractions picked up in intensity. Now, as I mentioned yesterday, her labor had not been textbook. Instead of the contractions starting at 15 minutes apart and getting progressively closer, they'd been about 2-3 minutes apart for over 24 hours. So with the increase in intensity the contractions actually slowed down, but now they were real. By 6pm, after another round of prep and the first half-hour of Back to the Future, we were back on our way to the hospital.
From here things seemed to go really fast. They took us upstairs. The nurses didn't believe that Sarah would stay, because she looked too calm. Then the midwife did an exam and they were amazed that she wasn't screaming bloody murder based on how far along things were. They checked Sarah in. The anesthesiologist did the epidural, after which Sarah wasn't in much pain. At about 9 p.m., the doctor came in and said she would check in again at midnight. We tried to rest with the lights down. Because of the medicine, we were both able to a little bit. Finally, we realized we couldn't sleep, and put on bad television. As I recall, we ended up watching part of Leno's last week on the Tonight Show, with Mel Gibson trying to do a redemption interview after his divorce.
At 12:30 the doctor came back, took one look and said, "time to push!"
[ed.: Gory details here.]
Then, at 1:31 a.m., Nicholas arrived, screaming his little head off. I don't think he stopped until they wheeled him out of the room an hour later for his bath.
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| From Nicholas Is Born |
Becoming a Toddler
Now that we know we aren't anticipating an imminent move, I've finally started doing some of the work to make the house more toddler friendly. Step 2 will be trying to figure out if there is any way to babyproof our kitchen cabinets. But today was step 1, which was more fun.
Our living room has gradually been transformed into Nicholas' playroom, but the bookcases along one wall still had board games and movies on the bottom two shelves where he could reach them. I think he first started pulling things off at around 6 months old, but he couldn't really do much damage to them or himself at that point. But he is now starting to figure out how to actually get boxes and cases open, which means the small pieces and breakable things inside are accessible. Combine this with the fact that we needed more space for his toys, and a change needed to be made.
And so today I moved all the movies into the cabinet under the TV, removed the framed pictures that had been on the top shelf of each bookcase, and rearranged to make the bottom two shelves Nicholas-friendly.
See:
And when I stepped back and looked at the result I was struck by something--we don't have a baby anymore. Those shelves are very clearly housing the toys of a toddler.
And no, the shelves didn't stay like that for long. I brought Nicholas home from daycare and he promptly beelined for the shelves, very excited by all the toys. He thinks the bins of blocks, balls, and trucks are the greatest--he promptly pulled them out and started removing each toy individually. Luckily he thinks putting them back in is as fun as removing them . . . for now. He also went individually to each toy and excitedly picked it up to show me. It was like he was discovering them each anew. Granted a few of those had ended up buried in the bottom of his toy bin for quite awhile. We'll see how this new system works over the next week or two and we can reevaluate.
Speaking of toddlers, doesn't he look like such a big boy?
There are no more babies here, Mommy. Tomorrow I turn 1 year old!
Our living room has gradually been transformed into Nicholas' playroom, but the bookcases along one wall still had board games and movies on the bottom two shelves where he could reach them. I think he first started pulling things off at around 6 months old, but he couldn't really do much damage to them or himself at that point. But he is now starting to figure out how to actually get boxes and cases open, which means the small pieces and breakable things inside are accessible. Combine this with the fact that we needed more space for his toys, and a change needed to be made.
And so today I moved all the movies into the cabinet under the TV, removed the framed pictures that had been on the top shelf of each bookcase, and rearranged to make the bottom two shelves Nicholas-friendly.
See:
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| From 2010 May |
And when I stepped back and looked at the result I was struck by something--we don't have a baby anymore. Those shelves are very clearly housing the toys of a toddler.
And no, the shelves didn't stay like that for long. I brought Nicholas home from daycare and he promptly beelined for the shelves, very excited by all the toys. He thinks the bins of blocks, balls, and trucks are the greatest--he promptly pulled them out and started removing each toy individually. Luckily he thinks putting them back in is as fun as removing them . . . for now. He also went individually to each toy and excitedly picked it up to show me. It was like he was discovering them each anew. Granted a few of those had ended up buried in the bottom of his toy bin for quite awhile. We'll see how this new system works over the next week or two and we can reevaluate.
Speaking of toddlers, doesn't he look like such a big boy?
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| From 2010 May |
There are no more babies here, Mommy. Tomorrow I turn 1 year old!
Monday, May 24, 2010
The Labor and Delivery Story, Part I
With Nicholas's birthday coming up, I've been reading over our posts from last year around the time he was born. In doing so, I realized that we never told The Story, or, What Happened the Day (and Two Days Before) Nicholas Was Born.
So, to set some context. The due date for Peanut was May 22, a Friday, which came and went with no excitement whatsoever (so little, in fact, that we managed not to mention it on the blog). That Sunday, Sarah woke up and thought her stomach felt funny, but couldn't quite place why. So we went to church, then to our friend Eddie's for an already planned brunch. Towards mid-afternoon, Sarah noticed while resting her hand on her belly that it was tensing up in rhythmic waves at relatively predictable intervals. Hmmm, we thought. So we timed it, to see if it might be real. And sure enough, the tensing up lasted about 30 seconds, and occurred every two to three minutes. Holy cow, we thought, Peanut might actually be on his way! (Though of course publicly we still referred to "its way.") On the other hand, this was not "textbook" early labor, which involves contractions every fifteen minutes or so. But we just hoped that would speed things up; this was back in our naïve pre-parenting stage, you see.
We had already arranged to play games and have dinner with Sarah's parents, and we went ahead and told them to come up. Every book, every mother, every class instructed us that early labor is characterized by three things: pain, anxiety, and boredom at the slow passage of time. Might as well play Ticket to Ride, right? Sarah at this point was uncomfortable but not in pain, and the social time made life move a little quicker through the evening hours.
Once Sarah's parents left, we figured we should get things set to go for the hospital for when the time came, so we did our final preparations of bags and snacks (for me), the kinds of things we couldn't have packed earlier because we used them frequently. It was a nice evening, so we headed outside to walk, both because it helped Sarah feel better as things progressed, and because walking is supposed to help things progress. We were very grateful that we'd decided to leave the city, because we felt no worries wandering our complex's parking lot at 10pm (or 11pm, or midnight ...), or the parking lot of the small office park next door. I have no idea how far we walked that night (May 24 to 25), but we spent hours doing laps, then coming back inside. As the night went on, the contractions got more intense. At some point (maybe 9pm or so?) we called the doctor to check in, and she told us to come in "when you're starting to have to really work through" the contractions. She also said she thought she would see us that night, in large part because the contraction timing was already at a place where you'd normally go to the hospital.
At some point we decided to try to sleep a little while, maybe at like 11:30, but I don't think either of us fell asleep for more than a few minutes at a time between then and 1am. Sarah woke up with somewhat more intense contractions, we went walking again, and then decided it was time to think about heading to the hospital. We went back inside and took showers (not knowing when we'd get the chance again). I had something to eat, since I was allowed and am generally a pansy about these things (Sarah acquiesced because she'd rather be jealous of watching me eat than have to deal with a cranky father-to-be). We put on an episode of Friends as we did our final final prep (using the counter on the DVD player to track contractions) and steeled ourselves for what was about to happen.
Sometime around the ten-minute mark the contractions began to subside.
[Stay tuned for the rest of the story tomorrow, including the surprise ending!]
So, to set some context. The due date for Peanut was May 22, a Friday, which came and went with no excitement whatsoever (so little, in fact, that we managed not to mention it on the blog). That Sunday, Sarah woke up and thought her stomach felt funny, but couldn't quite place why. So we went to church, then to our friend Eddie's for an already planned brunch. Towards mid-afternoon, Sarah noticed while resting her hand on her belly that it was tensing up in rhythmic waves at relatively predictable intervals. Hmmm, we thought. So we timed it, to see if it might be real. And sure enough, the tensing up lasted about 30 seconds, and occurred every two to three minutes. Holy cow, we thought, Peanut might actually be on his way! (Though of course publicly we still referred to "its way.") On the other hand, this was not "textbook" early labor, which involves contractions every fifteen minutes or so. But we just hoped that would speed things up; this was back in our naïve pre-parenting stage, you see.
We had already arranged to play games and have dinner with Sarah's parents, and we went ahead and told them to come up. Every book, every mother, every class instructed us that early labor is characterized by three things: pain, anxiety, and boredom at the slow passage of time. Might as well play Ticket to Ride, right? Sarah at this point was uncomfortable but not in pain, and the social time made life move a little quicker through the evening hours.
Once Sarah's parents left, we figured we should get things set to go for the hospital for when the time came, so we did our final preparations of bags and snacks (for me), the kinds of things we couldn't have packed earlier because we used them frequently. It was a nice evening, so we headed outside to walk, both because it helped Sarah feel better as things progressed, and because walking is supposed to help things progress. We were very grateful that we'd decided to leave the city, because we felt no worries wandering our complex's parking lot at 10pm (or 11pm, or midnight ...), or the parking lot of the small office park next door. I have no idea how far we walked that night (May 24 to 25), but we spent hours doing laps, then coming back inside. As the night went on, the contractions got more intense. At some point (maybe 9pm or so?) we called the doctor to check in, and she told us to come in "when you're starting to have to really work through" the contractions. She also said she thought she would see us that night, in large part because the contraction timing was already at a place where you'd normally go to the hospital.
At some point we decided to try to sleep a little while, maybe at like 11:30, but I don't think either of us fell asleep for more than a few minutes at a time between then and 1am. Sarah woke up with somewhat more intense contractions, we went walking again, and then decided it was time to think about heading to the hospital. We went back inside and took showers (not knowing when we'd get the chance again). I had something to eat, since I was allowed and am generally a pansy about these things (Sarah acquiesced because she'd rather be jealous of watching me eat than have to deal with a cranky father-to-be). We put on an episode of Friends as we did our final final prep (using the counter on the DVD player to track contractions) and steeled ourselves for what was about to happen.
Sometime around the ten-minute mark the contractions began to subside.
[Stay tuned for the rest of the story tomorrow, including the surprise ending!]
Sunday, May 23, 2010
Freestanding . . . And a Few More Pictures
Nicholas stood up this evening, completely by himself in the middle of the floor! For about the past week he has been occasionally going up to his feet and hands, trying to get to standing, but never could get out of that triangle shape. But tonight he somehow did it. And then promptly took a couple steps on his own to get to a toy.
I'm wondering if this was the last key to actually walking as a mode of locomotion. He loves walking, but only either holding onto someone/something or as a game. So he walks between people (always falling at the last step, because that is part of the game), but if he wants to get somewhere, he crawls. (But, man is that crawl impressive these days.) He has the physical ability to walk, but mentally isn't a walker yet, I guess is the way to describe it.
I guess we'll see if this new standing up thing changes that or not.
Joe's parents sent some pictures from their camera, so I'll post a couple highlights here.
Speaking of the walking game, we played it with Joe, Patrick, and I as three points to walk between on the floor of a store to kill time on Saturday afternoon:
I told you Nicholas had gotten much more comfortable with Uncle Patrick!
And this is my favorite picture so far of Nicholas and his Grandma Alice.
I'm wondering if this was the last key to actually walking as a mode of locomotion. He loves walking, but only either holding onto someone/something or as a game. So he walks between people (always falling at the last step, because that is part of the game), but if he wants to get somewhere, he crawls. (But, man is that crawl impressive these days.) He has the physical ability to walk, but mentally isn't a walker yet, I guess is the way to describe it.
I guess we'll see if this new standing up thing changes that or not.
Joe's parents sent some pictures from their camera, so I'll post a couple highlights here.
Speaking of the walking game, we played it with Joe, Patrick, and I as three points to walk between on the floor of a store to kill time on Saturday afternoon:
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
I told you Nicholas had gotten much more comfortable with Uncle Patrick!
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| From 2010 May |
And this is my favorite picture so far of Nicholas and his Grandma Alice.
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Nicholas' Birthday -- Part 1
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| From 2010 May |
He has Elmo-themed decorations, including balloons and some pictures of Elmo that hang from the dining room chandelier. But, the centerpiece of the Elmo festivities was this cake:
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| From 2010 May |
I'm not quite sure why Nicholas looks terrified in this picture,
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
The really exciting thing about the day for me was how comfortable Nicholas has gotten with everyone. He was very excited to see each of his grandparents and his Uncle Patrick, and by the end of the day was excitedly walking to Patrick and asking to be held by him. This is huge for Nicholas.
And so, as a final thought, here is Nicholas and his Uncle Patrick in their matching hats:
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| From 2010 May |
Go Terps! (and a job update)
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| From 2010 May |
Nicholas had it right last week—Go Terps! In this picture at the zoo he is sitting on a statue of a Terrapin, which is a turtle native to Maryland, or at least I assume so, since it is the University of Maryland mascot.
Well, it turns out this Maryland boy is going to get to stay in Maryland for another year, because I have a one-year position at the University of Maryland. We are all very excited, both about the job and about being able to stay put. I really cannot even begin to describe the number of weights that were lifted off our shoulders with that one phone call.
And so, GO TERPS!
Crazy lady
Who is this crazy lady?
That was very clearly the look Nicholas was giving the photographer yesterday when we took him to get pictures taken. She was trying to make him smile by doing all sorts of baby talk and he was just looking at her like she had three heads. In all honesty, it was the expression Joe and I each were trying really hard to keep off of our faces because she was being pretty absurd. And so he wasn’t smiling, or at least not real smiles, just half-hearted fake smiles. And after a bit of this she tried to declare the session done but we knew she hadn’t gotten a single picture that actually captured his personality. So we ended up breaking out his toys. That make it a little better, although in most of the pictures where he is actually smiling he is looking off to the side at one of us. Why would he smile at the random crazy lady? We tried standing behind her, but each time she would yell at us for messing with her light.
Anyway, we got a few decent pictures, although none that were phenomenal. That is the problem with professional pictures—their cameras and printing process is much better, but they have trouble really capturing him because he is not comfortable with them.
Speaking of pictures, today is Nicholas' birthday-part 1, so hopefully I will have lots of pictures to post later. We have Elmo everywhere! It may actually be too much and overwhelming for Nicholas. What can I say--it didn't seem like much in the store but when you concentrate it in our dining room it does take over a bit.
Anyway, happy early birthday, Nicholas!
That was very clearly the look Nicholas was giving the photographer yesterday when we took him to get pictures taken. She was trying to make him smile by doing all sorts of baby talk and he was just looking at her like she had three heads. In all honesty, it was the expression Joe and I each were trying really hard to keep off of our faces because she was being pretty absurd. And so he wasn’t smiling, or at least not real smiles, just half-hearted fake smiles. And after a bit of this she tried to declare the session done but we knew she hadn’t gotten a single picture that actually captured his personality. So we ended up breaking out his toys. That make it a little better, although in most of the pictures where he is actually smiling he is looking off to the side at one of us. Why would he smile at the random crazy lady? We tried standing behind her, but each time she would yell at us for messing with her light.
Anyway, we got a few decent pictures, although none that were phenomenal. That is the problem with professional pictures—their cameras and printing process is much better, but they have trouble really capturing him because he is not comfortable with them.
Speaking of pictures, today is Nicholas' birthday-part 1, so hopefully I will have lots of pictures to post later. We have Elmo everywhere! It may actually be too much and overwhelming for Nicholas. What can I say--it didn't seem like much in the store but when you concentrate it in our dining room it does take over a bit.
Anyway, happy early birthday, Nicholas!
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Aquarium
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| From 2010 May |
To give you the context, the blue is the dolphins' tank at the aquarium. I'm not sure if Nicholas was actively clapping for the dolphins or was testing his ability to take his hands off the ledge to clap while remaining standing. But, either way, he was delightfully happy, as you can clearly see in both of his faces. I love that reflection.
Anyway, as you have guessed by now, we did go to the aquarium this morning and had a wonderful time. Joe has taken Nicholas a couple times this spring, but I haven't gone in a long time and it is such a different experience now that Nicholas is older. It took us probably 45 minutes to make it past the first few exhibits because he adamantly did not want to leave them. When you first get into the aquarium there are these tubes of water that have bubbles going through them. He has always been fascinated with them, but this time he held onto one and wouldn't leave. I got bored pretty quickly and so pulled out my camera and played with it while he watched the bubbles.
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
We went through something similar at the first tank with fish. The aquarium is very little-kid friendly and quite a few of the tanks begin a foot off the ground, so Nicholas can stand at the tank on his own and have a great view.
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| From 2010 May |
He again resisted all of my suggestions that we move on. It was great to see him enjoying himself so much, even if I was bored.
My only complaint about the aquarium is the school groups. From what I've heard the aquarium gets much more crowded during the summer with tourists, but I'm hoping that it will be less annoying because at least it will be individual families. Kids who I'm sure are perfectly sweet on their own are pains in the butt in school groups. Little Nicholas is standing at a tank happily watching fish when a group of 20 middle-schoolers swarm to the tank, basically smashing him against the glass and stepping on him. Not cool! Do they not see the little kid there? I was right there but they just shoved past me. Yes, I very quickly grabbed him out and he wasn't hurt and mostly just confused, but this was just the most extreme example of the ways in which the school groups ruin my experience there.
Anyway, we had a really great time. There are some more pictures in the Gallery, per usual, as well as some pictures of his playtime this afternoon, which consisted of many of his current favorites. This includes, as you can see in this picture, holding up things for us to name.
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| From 2010 May |
And this one I just love because he is so happy:
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| From 2010 May |
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Randomness
Some random Nicholas updates, in stream of consciousness, basically because that is what I am mentally equipped for right now.
Nicholas has apparently started saying "all done" at school. He hasn't said it at home yet, though, even tonight when we prompted him. But his teachers were insistent that he has done it very clearly and deliberately multiple times.
He also sort of says "hat." It is more like "ha" but he does it while touching his hat, so I'm guessing that even though it sounds like a random syllable it actually has meaning. Given his new fascination with his hat, I'm beginning to wonder if the seemingly randomly happily touching his head recently has been linked to the hat somehow, either with it on or wanting it on. He has become so attached to this hat that I wonder what he is going to do when we replace this one, which we need to do soon because it is incredibly snug. He has been wearing this one 90% of the time he has gone outside for the past 10 months or so--winter to protect from cold and summer to protect from sun.
Nicholas is starting to pick up on games really quickly. Allison tonight balanced one of his plastic blocks on his head, which of course fell off, making him laugh. The second and third time he cracked up into giggles. Then he started trying to do it himself. He couldn't make them balance and so eventually gave up, but he tried quite a few times. I, for one, was impressed with how quickly he tried to mimic.
He was also trying out crying and the effects of crying tonight at dinner. I think he legitimately hurt himself, which started it, but then it was for effect. He was eating and randomly burst into hurt and surprised tears. The bottom tooth is really fighting through the gums right now, so sometimes he does this when he accidentally gets food there. But he then started doing what seemed to be more deliberate tears. He was also really tired, which I'm sure was part of it, but he was definitely checking our reactions.
He began putting his graham cracker up to the top of his head (meaning getting food in his hair), I would take it away, and he would cry. We did this a couple times before he finished the cracker peacefully. Finally at least this was a dinnertime misbehavior where there were actually consequences that mattered to him. We have been struggling with him throwing food he doesn't want and how to discipline. Saying (and even yelling) "no" has no effect (or makes him laugh), taking away the food doesn't really do much since his whole goal is to get the food off his tray in the first place. We have tried creating a place (his cupholder on his tray) where he can put food he doesn't want to get it off the main part of his tray without throwing it, which he has picked up on some but only follows about 50% of the time. But I am getting really frustrated. But taking away a graham cracker? Now that is a consequence because those are his absolute favorite food. It was just chance, though, that this time he was misbehaving with a graham cracker. If only he was old enough to understand "If you throw food you don't get a graham cracker." Then we'd have something.
Last night in the bath he hit his head on the side of the tub, but my battles to get an ice pack on it must have paid off because there is no bump or bruise to speak of. I hadn't planned to give him a bath but had to because he was rubbing spaghetti sauce in his hair at dinner, then in the bath he kept standing or kneeling and one of the times tipped forward before I could get him back down. It wasn't from far and wasn't hard, but a red bump began appearing almost immediately, so out he came and out came the boo-boo buddy. Even an ice pack that looks like Cookie Monster wasn't enough to get him to willingly let me hold it on, but when I sat down with all his favorite books, he was distracted enough to let me hold it on for 10-20 second increments over 5 or 10 minutes. I was worried it wouldn't be enough, but apparently it did the trick.
We went to Alice's first birthday party last weekend. We had a lot of fun, but since for all purposes the two of them are the same age, this has made me start grappling with the fact that Nicholas is turning 1. And, I won't lie, it is really hard for me. Those first couple months were pretty torturous and I love the little boy he is becoming, but part of me is really sad to lose the baby Nicholas. And so I am trying to soothe the ache by buying things and starting projects. Tonight I bought some cute Elmo birthday decorations. No, he doesn't need decorations, especially since we're doing a small birthday gathering rather than a full-blown party, but the kid does love Elmo. And I have a couple photo projects in mind. I really do still have tons of work to do, but without the deadlines of pre-defense insanity, am discovering a new love of avoidance. And what better way to avoid work than looking back at his baby pictures?
On another random note, Nicholas and I saw the biggest dog I have ever seen in my life on Sunday, and Nicholas didn't believe me that it was a doggie. He loves dogs right now and knows what that word connects to, both in pictures and in real life. So when we saw a woman with a Golden Retriever while at the park where we go hiking, I let him stop and watch. The owner didn't mind and seemed to love how Nicholas would break out into a huge grin each time the dog turned towards him. I told her that he loves looking at dogs right now, so she called over to her friend, who called up to this little porch, where a massive animal uncurled itself and lumbered down the steps. It was a Mastiff (however that is spelled) and weighed over 200 pounds! She brought it over and I told Nicholas it was a big doggie, at which point he gave me a look that clearly said, "Mommy, that is not a doggie. I know that word, and that is not it." He was intrigued by it, but not happy and excited like with other dogs. After about 5 minutes of watching from my arms, he squirmed down and took a few steps towards it, but each time the dog turned its head back towards him, he shrunk back a little. I still don't think he believed me that it was a dog, but as a generic large animal, he got more comfortable with it.
On another note, our "hike" on Sunday was all of about 1/4 mile because Nicholas insisted on walking for most of it. Oh well, at least I was outside and around trees.
Okay, each of those probably could have been a separate post, but such is life. Nicholas and I are home tomorrow and have a full day scheduled. My plan is aquarium in the morning since it is supposed to rain, then much needed errands to the post office and grocery store in the afternoon. And maybe some laundry and/or cleaning thrown in there for good measure. I should work during naptimes but since the work on my schedule for the week is about as fun as a root canal I have the feeling I will be napping or blogging instead. See, this works out well for you. :)
Nicholas has apparently started saying "all done" at school. He hasn't said it at home yet, though, even tonight when we prompted him. But his teachers were insistent that he has done it very clearly and deliberately multiple times.
He also sort of says "hat." It is more like "ha" but he does it while touching his hat, so I'm guessing that even though it sounds like a random syllable it actually has meaning. Given his new fascination with his hat, I'm beginning to wonder if the seemingly randomly happily touching his head recently has been linked to the hat somehow, either with it on or wanting it on. He has become so attached to this hat that I wonder what he is going to do when we replace this one, which we need to do soon because it is incredibly snug. He has been wearing this one 90% of the time he has gone outside for the past 10 months or so--winter to protect from cold and summer to protect from sun.
Nicholas is starting to pick up on games really quickly. Allison tonight balanced one of his plastic blocks on his head, which of course fell off, making him laugh. The second and third time he cracked up into giggles. Then he started trying to do it himself. He couldn't make them balance and so eventually gave up, but he tried quite a few times. I, for one, was impressed with how quickly he tried to mimic.
He was also trying out crying and the effects of crying tonight at dinner. I think he legitimately hurt himself, which started it, but then it was for effect. He was eating and randomly burst into hurt and surprised tears. The bottom tooth is really fighting through the gums right now, so sometimes he does this when he accidentally gets food there. But he then started doing what seemed to be more deliberate tears. He was also really tired, which I'm sure was part of it, but he was definitely checking our reactions.
He began putting his graham cracker up to the top of his head (meaning getting food in his hair), I would take it away, and he would cry. We did this a couple times before he finished the cracker peacefully. Finally at least this was a dinnertime misbehavior where there were actually consequences that mattered to him. We have been struggling with him throwing food he doesn't want and how to discipline. Saying (and even yelling) "no" has no effect (or makes him laugh), taking away the food doesn't really do much since his whole goal is to get the food off his tray in the first place. We have tried creating a place (his cupholder on his tray) where he can put food he doesn't want to get it off the main part of his tray without throwing it, which he has picked up on some but only follows about 50% of the time. But I am getting really frustrated. But taking away a graham cracker? Now that is a consequence because those are his absolute favorite food. It was just chance, though, that this time he was misbehaving with a graham cracker. If only he was old enough to understand "If you throw food you don't get a graham cracker." Then we'd have something.
Last night in the bath he hit his head on the side of the tub, but my battles to get an ice pack on it must have paid off because there is no bump or bruise to speak of. I hadn't planned to give him a bath but had to because he was rubbing spaghetti sauce in his hair at dinner, then in the bath he kept standing or kneeling and one of the times tipped forward before I could get him back down. It wasn't from far and wasn't hard, but a red bump began appearing almost immediately, so out he came and out came the boo-boo buddy. Even an ice pack that looks like Cookie Monster wasn't enough to get him to willingly let me hold it on, but when I sat down with all his favorite books, he was distracted enough to let me hold it on for 10-20 second increments over 5 or 10 minutes. I was worried it wouldn't be enough, but apparently it did the trick.
We went to Alice's first birthday party last weekend. We had a lot of fun, but since for all purposes the two of them are the same age, this has made me start grappling with the fact that Nicholas is turning 1. And, I won't lie, it is really hard for me. Those first couple months were pretty torturous and I love the little boy he is becoming, but part of me is really sad to lose the baby Nicholas. And so I am trying to soothe the ache by buying things and starting projects. Tonight I bought some cute Elmo birthday decorations. No, he doesn't need decorations, especially since we're doing a small birthday gathering rather than a full-blown party, but the kid does love Elmo. And I have a couple photo projects in mind. I really do still have tons of work to do, but without the deadlines of pre-defense insanity, am discovering a new love of avoidance. And what better way to avoid work than looking back at his baby pictures?
On another random note, Nicholas and I saw the biggest dog I have ever seen in my life on Sunday, and Nicholas didn't believe me that it was a doggie. He loves dogs right now and knows what that word connects to, both in pictures and in real life. So when we saw a woman with a Golden Retriever while at the park where we go hiking, I let him stop and watch. The owner didn't mind and seemed to love how Nicholas would break out into a huge grin each time the dog turned towards him. I told her that he loves looking at dogs right now, so she called over to her friend, who called up to this little porch, where a massive animal uncurled itself and lumbered down the steps. It was a Mastiff (however that is spelled) and weighed over 200 pounds! She brought it over and I told Nicholas it was a big doggie, at which point he gave me a look that clearly said, "Mommy, that is not a doggie. I know that word, and that is not it." He was intrigued by it, but not happy and excited like with other dogs. After about 5 minutes of watching from my arms, he squirmed down and took a few steps towards it, but each time the dog turned its head back towards him, he shrunk back a little. I still don't think he believed me that it was a dog, but as a generic large animal, he got more comfortable with it.
On another note, our "hike" on Sunday was all of about 1/4 mile because Nicholas insisted on walking for most of it. Oh well, at least I was outside and around trees.
Okay, each of those probably could have been a separate post, but such is life. Nicholas and I are home tomorrow and have a full day scheduled. My plan is aquarium in the morning since it is supposed to rain, then much needed errands to the post office and grocery store in the afternoon. And maybe some laundry and/or cleaning thrown in there for good measure. I should work during naptimes but since the work on my schedule for the week is about as fun as a root canal I have the feeling I will be napping or blogging instead. See, this works out well for you. :)
Sunday, May 16, 2010
That's Where We Meet
You have to hand it to the marketing department at the Children's Television Workshop: they know how to get kids hooked. We have tried our best not to have Nicholas watch TV yet (I think pediatricians recommend none before age 2, and yes, we make an exception for The West Wing). But he's still hooked on the characters from Sesame Street, especially Elmo. It is, in large part, because of their ubiquity. His diapers have Elmo, Ernie, or Cookie Monster on them (and he likes seeing the character on the new diaper when I'm changing him, and it's now part of the routine). We have several Sesame Street books, and have taken a bunch more out of the library, of which his favorite is Elmo Says... (kinda like Simon Says, but furrier and cuter). And yesterday at Alice's birthday party, he was captivated by a sign that said "Happy Birthday" with the Sesame Street characters on it (including, of course, Elmo). Every time he saw it he practically jumped out of the arms of whoever had him and beamed.
Now, this is not a bad thing, of course. If he's going to get hooked on something in popular culture, I'd much rather it be Sesame Street than just about anything else. It's a classic, which appeals to me (and us both, I think), it's intensely educational in terms of language (and bilingual to boot!), manners, friendship, dealing with adults, and so on. We don't want to punt on any of this, to be sure, but he's going to pick up on TV eventually, and if it's Sesame Street or fart jokes on Nickelodeon, I take Elmo and Oscar every time.
In any event, as Nicholas begins to discover the world around him, it's been fun to watch him develop attachments to cultural objects. And then for us to share them with you through the blog!
Now, this is not a bad thing, of course. If he's going to get hooked on something in popular culture, I'd much rather it be Sesame Street than just about anything else. It's a classic, which appeals to me (and us both, I think), it's intensely educational in terms of language (and bilingual to boot!), manners, friendship, dealing with adults, and so on. We don't want to punt on any of this, to be sure, but he's going to pick up on TV eventually, and if it's Sesame Street or fart jokes on Nickelodeon, I take Elmo and Oscar every time.
In any event, as Nicholas begins to discover the world around him, it's been fun to watch him develop attachments to cultural objects. And then for us to share them with you through the blog!
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Zoo Trip
As I mentioned in a post earlier today, Nicholas and I went to the zoo this morning. And we had our best zoo trip yet, by far.
I like the idea of taking him to the zoo. He loves outings. I like getting out of the house. He is interested in watching animals and big kids. My parents got us a membership for Christmas, so I don't feel guilty going for just an hour or two. It seems perfect.
But the zoo hours are not convenient. It doesn't open until 10. Nicholas usually goes down for his morning nap around 10:30, so that doesn't really leave time to go before his nap. If we wait until after he wakes up, we have to do lunch, and so it is 1:30 by the time we actually make it down to the zoo. And by that point it is usually too hot, making us uncomfortable and the animals lethargic.
But today we decided to intentionally screw with his naptimes, so I left the house with him at 9:30 and we were at the zoo when it opened. And we had an absolutely delightful time for about an hour and a half, at which point he was tired and resorted to sucking his thumb in the stroller, letting me know it was time to go.
The weather was gorgeous (70 and sunny!), the zoo wasn't too crowded (Preakness in Baltimore today), and Nicholas was remarkably chipper.
We spent the whole time in the two sections we'd never made it to on our other trips. This means we never made it to the main part of the zoo, but that's what a membership is for, right?
The Children's Zoo is my new favorite part of the zoo. It isn't perfect in terms of stroller/child friendly, but a million times better than the rest of the zoo. There are also some cool play structures as you go through for older kids, but even given his age limitations, he enjoyed it a lot. The animals were up close and kinds of animals that are just inherently less camouflaged. They are also animals that are in general a little more active in a confined space, so Nicholas was able to actually see them.
I think his favorite animals may have been the ducks, which seems like a waste of going to the zoo, but then again, where else is he going to see ducks in his daily life? Oh, and the rooster, who was about a foot away and kept crowing. He thought that was funny. He also enjoyed watching the donkey eat out of a big ball, although he kept trying to climb into the pen, I think to get the ball, honestly. I need to remember that just because I think the giraffes and elephants are cool doesn't mean he will, and stop focusing on those animals. There is no reason why a duck is inherently less interesting than a giraffe if you've never really seen either.
We also went into the petting zoo, where you can pet or brush goats, but he was pretty nonplussed. He wasn't scared of them (which I sort of thought he might be), but he also wasn't that interested in them. He did pet them some (although never when I had the camera out), but didn't react much when he did. Although he got a little more interested when he started pulling the goats' hair, but I stopped him from doing that pretty quickly. They are tame animals, but I don't want to know what happens if they get mad. In general, Nicholas just wanted to walk in circles around the petting zoo and watch the other kids pet the goats. After about 10 minutes I decided we should move on and stop taking up space for kids who really were interested in interacting with the goats.
Anyway, we had a great time and I also managed to get him to pose for a few shots. It is hard to get pictures on outings with just the two of us unless there is somewhere good I can set him down. So what you get are a few staged shots. But they are better than nothing and Nicholas was intrigued by the things he was sitting on.
Our little Maryland boy--sitting on a Terrapin and wearing an Orioles hat:
Cowboy Nicholas:
I like the idea of taking him to the zoo. He loves outings. I like getting out of the house. He is interested in watching animals and big kids. My parents got us a membership for Christmas, so I don't feel guilty going for just an hour or two. It seems perfect.
But the zoo hours are not convenient. It doesn't open until 10. Nicholas usually goes down for his morning nap around 10:30, so that doesn't really leave time to go before his nap. If we wait until after he wakes up, we have to do lunch, and so it is 1:30 by the time we actually make it down to the zoo. And by that point it is usually too hot, making us uncomfortable and the animals lethargic.
But today we decided to intentionally screw with his naptimes, so I left the house with him at 9:30 and we were at the zoo when it opened. And we had an absolutely delightful time for about an hour and a half, at which point he was tired and resorted to sucking his thumb in the stroller, letting me know it was time to go.
The weather was gorgeous (70 and sunny!), the zoo wasn't too crowded (Preakness in Baltimore today), and Nicholas was remarkably chipper.
We spent the whole time in the two sections we'd never made it to on our other trips. This means we never made it to the main part of the zoo, but that's what a membership is for, right?
The Children's Zoo is my new favorite part of the zoo. It isn't perfect in terms of stroller/child friendly, but a million times better than the rest of the zoo. There are also some cool play structures as you go through for older kids, but even given his age limitations, he enjoyed it a lot. The animals were up close and kinds of animals that are just inherently less camouflaged. They are also animals that are in general a little more active in a confined space, so Nicholas was able to actually see them.
I think his favorite animals may have been the ducks, which seems like a waste of going to the zoo, but then again, where else is he going to see ducks in his daily life? Oh, and the rooster, who was about a foot away and kept crowing. He thought that was funny. He also enjoyed watching the donkey eat out of a big ball, although he kept trying to climb into the pen, I think to get the ball, honestly. I need to remember that just because I think the giraffes and elephants are cool doesn't mean he will, and stop focusing on those animals. There is no reason why a duck is inherently less interesting than a giraffe if you've never really seen either.
We also went into the petting zoo, where you can pet or brush goats, but he was pretty nonplussed. He wasn't scared of them (which I sort of thought he might be), but he also wasn't that interested in them. He did pet them some (although never when I had the camera out), but didn't react much when he did. Although he got a little more interested when he started pulling the goats' hair, but I stopped him from doing that pretty quickly. They are tame animals, but I don't want to know what happens if they get mad. In general, Nicholas just wanted to walk in circles around the petting zoo and watch the other kids pet the goats. After about 10 minutes I decided we should move on and stop taking up space for kids who really were interested in interacting with the goats.
Anyway, we had a great time and I also managed to get him to pose for a few shots. It is hard to get pictures on outings with just the two of us unless there is somewhere good I can set him down. So what you get are a few staged shots. But they are better than nothing and Nicholas was intrigued by the things he was sitting on.
Our little Maryland boy--sitting on a Terrapin and wearing an Orioles hat:
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| From |
Cowboy Nicholas:
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| From 2010 May |
A Few Pics
Yesterday afternoon Nicholas and I went on a long walk that ended at the playground. It was a very pretty (if humid and gross feeling) day, so I decided to see if Nicholas would let me take a few pictures before we started playing. And then when we got home I set him in the grass so I could fold the stroller up and he was just so cute that I couldn't resist taking some more pictures. There are none that I am particularly pleased with. Between the humidity and the fact that his hair is just getting too long, he looks pretty disheveled. But, if you're interested, the pictures are here.
And here are a couple that I like because his personality shines through, even if they aren't great examples of good photography:
And here are a couple that I like because his personality shines through, even if they aren't great examples of good photography:
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
Foiled Again
Normally Nicholas naps with little fuss or problem, but on days when we have carefully worked his naps into a schedule that has little flexibility, all hell breaks loose. Today we are going to a birthday party for Alice at 3. Since that is exactly when he usually naps we figured we'd stretch him this morning and do one early afternoon nap. So we put him down an hour ago. Too bad he has spent that entire hour talking and playing in his crib.
So now not only will he be missing his afternoon nap, but he'll have had no naps today. (Well, except 5 minutes on the way home from the zoo.) This should make him a delightful party guest.
So now not only will he be missing his afternoon nap, but he'll have had no naps today. (Well, except 5 minutes on the way home from the zoo.) This should make him a delightful party guest.
Friday, May 14, 2010
Strong Tastes
I'm not sure if his likes and dislikes are getting stronger or if he is just now more able to clearly convey his preferences, but Nicholas clearly has favorites, things he tolerates, and things he actively dislikes. So, just for fun, I thought I'd compile and share a list of Nicholas' likes and dislikes.
Likes:
Likes:
- Anything that rolls (balls, trucks, cars, bottles full of water)
- Vehicles that make noise (construction vehicles, motorcycles, souped-up cars)
- Faces (pictures, dolls, stuffed animals)
- Music
- Frozen peas
- Strawberries
- Bananas
- Potatoes (especially french fries)
- Biscuits or cornbread
- Pasta
- Baby swing at the playground
- Board books (especially the ones with flaps)
- Watching big kids
- Having his teeth brushed
- Dogs (as long as they don't get too close or are just in pictures)
- Bathtime
- Sesame Street characters (even though he has never seen the show)
- Going out, almost anywhere
Dislikes:
- Meat
- Having his nose wiped
- Snuggling
- Long car rides
- Green beans
- More than 4 or 5 bites of any solid food except those listed in the "likes" list
- Food staying on his tray that he doesn't want to eat
- Falling down (I know this sounds obvious, but plopping down on your butt from a foot above ground with a diaper cushioning your fall does not lead all children to cry as though the world has ended.)
- Having to stay seated in the tub
- Staying home all day
- Sitting still
I know these lists could be much longer, but they are what is occurring to me right now. The difficulty we have is deciding how much to push him to try new things and how much to cater to his list of "likes." Is it bad for him to eat spaghetti Os, frozen peas, and cornbread for every meal?
Teeth and Colds
The little boy is having a rough few weeks.
He is cranky and whiny and being a complete pain. He is still all stuffed up and the cough is driving him crazy. His nose is also constantly running, which means we have to wipe it frequently, which he hates.
And those molars I had been so excited about coming through without bothering him seem to be really bothering him now. I guess the initial poking through wasn't as bad as the blunt large surface area sections that are now coming through.
He has also been pulling on his right ear, but since the doctor just looked in his ears on Wednesday and that is the side the molars are coming in on, I am hoping it isn't actually another ear infection.
At any rate, he is not a happy little boy. And his crankiness is wearing me out. We ended up keeping him home from daycare yesterday, which means I have 5 straight days with Mr. Crankypants. Yesterday we even tried putting in ToyStory, hoping it would capture his interest enough that he would sit still and rest. And it did, for about 7 minutes. I think that is a record for him in terms of TV watching, but it was not quite the respite I was hoping for.
I am just hoping he can beat this cold soon and the teeth can finish coming through and he can go back to his normal self. Because as much as this is hard on me, it is so much harder on him.
He is cranky and whiny and being a complete pain. He is still all stuffed up and the cough is driving him crazy. His nose is also constantly running, which means we have to wipe it frequently, which he hates.
And those molars I had been so excited about coming through without bothering him seem to be really bothering him now. I guess the initial poking through wasn't as bad as the blunt large surface area sections that are now coming through.
He has also been pulling on his right ear, but since the doctor just looked in his ears on Wednesday and that is the side the molars are coming in on, I am hoping it isn't actually another ear infection.
At any rate, he is not a happy little boy. And his crankiness is wearing me out. We ended up keeping him home from daycare yesterday, which means I have 5 straight days with Mr. Crankypants. Yesterday we even tried putting in ToyStory, hoping it would capture his interest enough that he would sit still and rest. And it did, for about 7 minutes. I think that is a record for him in terms of TV watching, but it was not quite the respite I was hoping for.
I am just hoping he can beat this cold soon and the teeth can finish coming through and he can go back to his normal self. Because as much as this is hard on me, it is so much harder on him.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Comprehension
Nicholas still doesn't say any words, but every day he shows that he understands more and more words. I'm sure he understands more words than we realize, but here are a handful that he clearly understands and reliably acts upon:
- clap
- high chair
- dinner/lunch
- banana
- bath
- truck
- ball
- blocks
- shoe
- diaper
- bedtime/naptime
- Mommy
- Daddy
- sit down
- walk
- up
- dance
- bounce/jump
- bang
- shake
- no
- good job
- mail (well, this he knows means going downstairs)
- mailbox (which to him means his toy mailbox)
- sippy (sippy cup)
- bottle
Coughing and Gagging
Nicholas has had a cough and runny nose for a week or two at this point and it finally got to the point that I took him to the doctor this morning. It seemed silly to call the doctor over a cold, but his cough was just getting worse. It was often more like gagging than coughing and a couple times had led him to gag so hard that he threw up a little. Not to mention that it kept waking him up early from naps and every hour or two some nights.
The doctor's conclusion was that yes it is either just a cold or allergies, so nothing to worry about or really treat. He is basically just gagging on excessive phlegm. Delightful.
The doctor did however prescribe a cough and cold medicine to help. Luckily our munchkin thinks anything that comes in a medicine dropper is an exciting treat, so he happily took the medicine. I'm not sure if it is the medicine working or the half hour I had him play in the bathroom full of warm steam this evening, but so far tonight he is doing better. He is still coughing, but no scary gagging or waking himself up coughing and leading to crying. Knock on wood.
And as I wrote that, he broke into a coughing fit, so apparently knocking on wood didn't work so well. Poor baby.
Anyway, the doctor warned me that the medicine he prescribed might turn Nicholas into "Rosemary's baby." Apparently the stimulant in the decongestant causes some babies and little kids to go more than a little crazy. Not in ways dangerous to their health, but in ways that make them and their parents miserable. Since it isn't essential medicine, his recommendation in this case was to discontinue the medicine. Luckily so far at least (2 doses in) I have not seen any such metamorphasis in our Nicholas. He isn't on his best behavior, but he is no worse than he has been for the past week.
Overall, he is more tired and clingy than normal, but his face still lights up when he sees his ball or truck, so he is still in there. But Mommy is exhausted.
The doctor's conclusion was that yes it is either just a cold or allergies, so nothing to worry about or really treat. He is basically just gagging on excessive phlegm. Delightful.
The doctor did however prescribe a cough and cold medicine to help. Luckily our munchkin thinks anything that comes in a medicine dropper is an exciting treat, so he happily took the medicine. I'm not sure if it is the medicine working or the half hour I had him play in the bathroom full of warm steam this evening, but so far tonight he is doing better. He is still coughing, but no scary gagging or waking himself up coughing and leading to crying. Knock on wood.
And as I wrote that, he broke into a coughing fit, so apparently knocking on wood didn't work so well. Poor baby.
Anyway, the doctor warned me that the medicine he prescribed might turn Nicholas into "Rosemary's baby." Apparently the stimulant in the decongestant causes some babies and little kids to go more than a little crazy. Not in ways dangerous to their health, but in ways that make them and their parents miserable. Since it isn't essential medicine, his recommendation in this case was to discontinue the medicine. Luckily so far at least (2 doses in) I have not seen any such metamorphasis in our Nicholas. He isn't on his best behavior, but he is no worse than he has been for the past week.
Overall, he is more tired and clingy than normal, but his face still lights up when he sees his ball or truck, so he is still in there. But Mommy is exhausted.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Other random pics
Oops, I forgot to put up a link yesterday to some of the other new pictures in the Gallery. So for pictures of Nicholas in the Harvard shirt Joe brought back from Boston, Nicholas and Alice playing, and Nicholas at Storyville, go here.
Sunday, May 9, 2010
Setback
As Sarah mentioned in the previous post, we put Nicholas through his paces this weekend: traveling around, a party, a hike, lots of people (strange and otherwise). So we decided to give him a treat tonight. While getting ready for his bath, we remembered that Sarah had bought bubble bath a few weeks ago to try out at some point, since she'd noticed Nicholas enjoyed playing with soap bubbles that formed when she was giving him his bath one night. We figured tonight was as good a night as any, and that he'd enjoy it.
Um, wrong.
Our little boy was really excited to get into the bath, but when he saw the bubbles covering his toys and all of the water, he freaked out. He was unhappy when I set him in, and he would not sit down at all. I've never really seen him like that, especially about the bath. But we had to take him out, and I spent about ten minutes draining the tub several times to make sure that all of the bubbles were gone (they're very stubborn).
Unfortunately, we had so freaked him out that even removing all of the bubbles didn't help, and he freaked out again.
So to make a long story short [ed.: too late!], I ended up having to get into the tub with him, which, as you'll recall, we did for the first few months of his life, but hadn't done in, well, forever.
By the way, it was a more interesting story when it happened and I said, "I should blog about this." Though if I apologized for dullness every time I posted, there would be several hundred apologies here. C'est la vie.
Um, wrong.
Our little boy was really excited to get into the bath, but when he saw the bubbles covering his toys and all of the water, he freaked out. He was unhappy when I set him in, and he would not sit down at all. I've never really seen him like that, especially about the bath. But we had to take him out, and I spent about ten minutes draining the tub several times to make sure that all of the bubbles were gone (they're very stubborn).
Unfortunately, we had so freaked him out that even removing all of the bubbles didn't help, and he freaked out again.
So to make a long story short [ed.: too late!], I ended up having to get into the tub with him, which, as you'll recall, we did for the first few months of his life, but hadn't done in, well, forever.
By the way, it was a more interesting story when it happened and I said, "I should blog about this." Though if I apologized for dullness every time I posted, there would be several hundred apologies here. C'est la vie.
Mother's Day Weekend
We had a delightful Mother's Day weekend. Yesterday was my defense (graduation) party , and while Nicholas was cranky due to a skipped nap, Mommy and Daddy thoroughly enjoyed getting to see so many friends. And Uncle Matt stayed overnight, so this morning Nicholas got some one-on-one playtime. He enjoyed showing Uncle Matt how each of his toys works.
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
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| From 2010 May |
The last part of the hike he was not so happy, though. We just pushed him a little too far, apparently. But we definitely have plans to go on a bunch more hikes this summer.
All in all, a delightful weekend.
Friday, May 7, 2010
As Promised . . . The Boy Playing Ball
As I mentioned a couple days ago, we are out of space in the account we had been using for the Peanut Gallery. The solution we've come up with is to start a new account to supplement. So you'll notice some changes on the toolbar on the right. The picture previews and link to the Gallery are now only for pictures beginning May 2010. Older pictures are now in the Archive, which you can get to by clicking on the slideshow and then the tab marked "Joe's Gallery."
So far in the new gallery there is only a video I took last weekend of Nicholas "playing ball." This is his favorite game, although it has lots of variations on any given day and can be played either solo or with adults. In the video Nicholas also shows off some of his new skills (real crawling, pulling up, sitting up from tummy--all the things he learned to do when he suddenly discovered he has knees), as well as illustrates how much more difficult these skills are when you won't let go of the ball you're holding onto. Because this video is huge, we will probably remove it at some point to make room for more photos, so the above link will only work in the short term.
For the past week or two Nicholas has forgotten about walking on his own as he worked on these newly discovered skills. And we were completely fine with that. But last night when friends were over for dinner we asked Nicholas to show them how he could walk on his own. And that apparently was enough to remind him that he could do that. Oops. So today he has been doing a lot of walking. He'll be playing with something on the other side of the room and turn around, suddenly get this look of excitement and take off for you. At one point he walked halfway across the apartment on his own--a good 15 feet!
So far in the new gallery there is only a video I took last weekend of Nicholas "playing ball." This is his favorite game, although it has lots of variations on any given day and can be played either solo or with adults. In the video Nicholas also shows off some of his new skills (real crawling, pulling up, sitting up from tummy--all the things he learned to do when he suddenly discovered he has knees), as well as illustrates how much more difficult these skills are when you won't let go of the ball you're holding onto. Because this video is huge, we will probably remove it at some point to make room for more photos, so the above link will only work in the short term.
For the past week or two Nicholas has forgotten about walking on his own as he worked on these newly discovered skills. And we were completely fine with that. But last night when friends were over for dinner we asked Nicholas to show them how he could walk on his own. And that apparently was enough to remind him that he could do that. Oops. So today he has been doing a lot of walking. He'll be playing with something on the other side of the room and turn around, suddenly get this look of excitement and take off for you. At one point he walked halfway across the apartment on his own--a good 15 feet!
Tenth Tooth
Yes, that is right--Mr. Nicholas is currently in the process of getting his tenth tooth. One more and he can tie his age! The really crazy thing is that this is the third tooth in a week. Geez.
But this one is in front so we can see it trying to come through and so were able to help him out a little by numbing it. I'm just hoping that once this tooth finishes breaking through it will spell the end of the congestion and crankiness. Cross your fingers.
But this one is in front so we can see it trying to come through and so were able to help him out a little by numbing it. I'm just hoping that once this tooth finishes breaking through it will spell the end of the congestion and crankiness. Cross your fingers.
Internalizing Danger
So because of our frequent (and sometimes only) commenter Rob, I ended up reading a series of posts on another blog about kids and "stranger danger". The author's main point:
Instead, she suggests that we "start parenting from a point of logic and sanity, instead of parenting out of fear."
First of all, amen.
Now, I tend to agree with the sentiment. I do think there is in parenting circles today (God, the prudent academic in me is gagging on the broad generalizations, but whatever) a rush to identify and eliminate risks. Hence we get recalls of cribs that can injure a baby when not put together properly, warnings to be hypervigilant for potential food allergies, and on and on. Do all of these have a degree of worthwhile caution? Absolutely. Does Nicholas eat the occasional strawberry or piece of chocolate? Yep. Call Child Protective Services right away!
In painting all adult men with the broad brushstroke of "danger," I would argue we actually make it more difficult for children (adults, too) to figure out just who is and is not dangerous. If we eliminate all nuance from the discussion, children have no skill set from which to draw to calculate much of anything about the people they encounter. (And speaking of generalizations, boy could I go to town on a loss of nuance in society. But this blog is about Nicholas, childhood, and parenting, so enough about that.) It would seem much better, then, to develop a comfort around people who are extremely safe (family and close friends), and give Nicholas the means to figure out for himself how to trust neighbors, how to decide how much to trust strangers he encounters.
And I ended up commenting on one of the posts, because the discussion turned to how this woman's husband felt that he couldn't be open with kids around because of this very danger. I must admit that I share that feeling as well, and it makes me sad. It also reminds me of my grandfather. Here was a man who lived to have fun with kids. He was the kind of person who could see a five-year-old with an ice cream cone, walk up, take a bite of the ice cream from the kid, and have the kid laughing in stitches. So maybe he posed a public health risk if he had a cold, but the point is that he never once seemed to think about whether kids would find him threatening. Now maybe some of that ease came from knowing him later in life (being a grandfather probably helps in knowing how to appear innocuous and fun), but from what I've heard, that's what he was always like. But how would he behave today? Would he have mall security escorting him from the food court for talking to a little girl and making faces at her?
The point is, if I even have one, that I have some of those genes that allow me to interact with people and to want to interact with kids (not nearly as many—I would never even contemplate crashing a wedding in East Asia, let alone do it). But I don't interact with kids I don't know. Now, you might ask just how much that kid at the next table at Red Robin loses because I don't smile back when he looks over. In the grand scheme of his day, probably not all that much. But on the other hand, it's the little things. If society has made the two of us mutually nervous to extend what should be common courtesy, that makes the world just a little bit less fun, a little bit more sad, a little bit too protected. Multiplied over dozens of interactions, kids learn not to trust anyone, and that can't be good for any of us.
There's this attitude in this country that any man who is interested in or talking to children is a child molester. I think that this is as dangerous an idea as the idea that all women are objects/sluts/etc. It is as destructive as the idea that all Arabs are terrorists. It is not a prejudice that I think should be taken lightly
Instead, she suggests that we "start parenting from a point of logic and sanity, instead of parenting out of fear."
First of all, amen.
Now, I tend to agree with the sentiment. I do think there is in parenting circles today (God, the prudent academic in me is gagging on the broad generalizations, but whatever) a rush to identify and eliminate risks. Hence we get recalls of cribs that can injure a baby when not put together properly, warnings to be hypervigilant for potential food allergies, and on and on. Do all of these have a degree of worthwhile caution? Absolutely. Does Nicholas eat the occasional strawberry or piece of chocolate? Yep. Call Child Protective Services right away!
In painting all adult men with the broad brushstroke of "danger," I would argue we actually make it more difficult for children (adults, too) to figure out just who is and is not dangerous. If we eliminate all nuance from the discussion, children have no skill set from which to draw to calculate much of anything about the people they encounter. (And speaking of generalizations, boy could I go to town on a loss of nuance in society. But this blog is about Nicholas, childhood, and parenting, so enough about that.) It would seem much better, then, to develop a comfort around people who are extremely safe (family and close friends), and give Nicholas the means to figure out for himself how to trust neighbors, how to decide how much to trust strangers he encounters.
And I ended up commenting on one of the posts, because the discussion turned to how this woman's husband felt that he couldn't be open with kids around because of this very danger. I must admit that I share that feeling as well, and it makes me sad. It also reminds me of my grandfather. Here was a man who lived to have fun with kids. He was the kind of person who could see a five-year-old with an ice cream cone, walk up, take a bite of the ice cream from the kid, and have the kid laughing in stitches. So maybe he posed a public health risk if he had a cold, but the point is that he never once seemed to think about whether kids would find him threatening. Now maybe some of that ease came from knowing him later in life (being a grandfather probably helps in knowing how to appear innocuous and fun), but from what I've heard, that's what he was always like. But how would he behave today? Would he have mall security escorting him from the food court for talking to a little girl and making faces at her?
The point is, if I even have one, that I have some of those genes that allow me to interact with people and to want to interact with kids (not nearly as many—I would never even contemplate crashing a wedding in East Asia, let alone do it). But I don't interact with kids I don't know. Now, you might ask just how much that kid at the next table at Red Robin loses because I don't smile back when he looks over. In the grand scheme of his day, probably not all that much. But on the other hand, it's the little things. If society has made the two of us mutually nervous to extend what should be common courtesy, that makes the world just a little bit less fun, a little bit more sad, a little bit too protected. Multiplied over dozens of interactions, kids learn not to trust anyone, and that can't be good for any of us.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Growth Spurt, Teething, or Just Being a Pain?
Yesterday was my long-awaited first weekday home with Nicholas and it was honestly pretty painful. Not quite what I had in mind. After how delightful he was all weekend I guess he was due for a day of being a pain, but that doesn't make it any more fun.
He has been clingy and congested a lot of the week and grumpier than usual. He has also been eating like a horse since sometime late last week, as well as drooling to an extent I haven't seen from him in 4 or 5 months. So maybe he is going through a growth spurt, maybe he is teething, maybe he is feeling sick, or maybe he is just in a bad mood. We'll see what the next few days bring.
I still have videos from last weekend to post, but we're out of space in the online gallery. We may start a new gallery, but that is only a temporary solution. For some reason these recent videos are huge file sizes and so a single one would take up something absurd like 25% of the space in a Picasa account. So we need to play around with them and see if there is anything we can do to shrink the file size. But eventually you will be able to see him crawl and "play ball."
He has been clingy and congested a lot of the week and grumpier than usual. He has also been eating like a horse since sometime late last week, as well as drooling to an extent I haven't seen from him in 4 or 5 months. So maybe he is going through a growth spurt, maybe he is teething, maybe he is feeling sick, or maybe he is just in a bad mood. We'll see what the next few days bring.
I still have videos from last weekend to post, but we're out of space in the online gallery. We may start a new gallery, but that is only a temporary solution. For some reason these recent videos are huge file sizes and so a single one would take up something absurd like 25% of the space in a Picasa account. So we need to play around with them and see if there is anything we can do to shrink the file size. But eventually you will be able to see him crawl and "play ball."
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Defying all Expectations . . .But You Won't Catch Me Complaining
Nicholas got two more teeth in the last couple days! And not just any teeth--I'm pretty sure they are two of his 1-year molars. What makes this really remarkable is that he has been positively delightful this weekend, on his absolute best behavior.
This child defies all logic sometimes, since molars are supposed to be the most painful and he was way less bothered by them than his other teeth. But, hey, I'm not complaining. I was dreading the day he cut those teeth and apparently we got halfway there without me even noticing. I am in awe of this little guy.
*Shaking head in amazement.*
This child defies all logic sometimes, since molars are supposed to be the most painful and he was way less bothered by them than his other teeth. But, hey, I'm not complaining. I was dreading the day he cut those teeth and apparently we got halfway there without me even noticing. I am in awe of this little guy.
*Shaking head in amazement.*
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Fun but Exhausting
Nicholas and I had a wonderful day, but I'm beat. I had planned to get some work done tonight but since it is already 10 and I can barely keep my eyes open, I'm going to write a blog post and go to bed instead. I would yell at myself, but I don't have the energy.
Joe is in Boston for the weekend so I have Nicholas all to myself. Not a big deal, I figured. And it wouldn't be if it wasn't also the weekend (when we catch up on everything household related) and a weekend after we've spent weeks (okay, maybe months) just treading water. The bottom line is that in addition to the normal daily stuff I have laundry and an errand list a mile long to tackle. But I'm not really complaining because I finally get to spend time with Nicholas, who is just downright fun these days. I'm just going to assume my defense will go fine next week even if I don't get around to reading those last few books . . .
Anyway, so what did we do today? We started off the morning by going down to hang out with my parents. The original plan was to go for a hike, which didn't end up working out, but we did go for a walk around the neighborhood with Nicholas in the hiking backpack carrier to try it out. He felt like he weighed virtually nothing, which was nice, but I miss being able to see him. But he seemed to mostly enjoy it (especially when he saw neighbors' dogs, since he has decided he loves dogs), and he had a lot of fun playing with his ball and truck with my parents. That boy and his ball--he is a tad bit obsessed.
Then we came home, both took a nap and then did an epic Wegman's trip. The trip didn't start off well, since the fact that our entry ramp is closed for construction doubled the travel time. Nicholas is happy to chill in his carseat for a 10-minute trip, but 20 minutes starts to get on his nerves, especially on a day when he has already done two 30-minute drives. So he was really mad at me for the last part of the ride, but quickly forgave me when I took him out of the car. He then proceeded to be absolutely delightful . . . for the entire hour we were in the store.
He is just able to make so many more connections now. This is the first time he noticed the train that runs on tracks along the ceiling and man did he think that was cool! And he was very happy to hold items I gave him without putting them in his mouth or throwing them on the floor, which meant he could have new "toys" to play with as we went.
And I really don't think it is a coincidence that the item he was most excited to hold onto was the box of cornbread mix. We got some cornbread when we picked up BBQ a couple weeks ago and he loved it, so I figured I could get one of the mixes and whip up a few bisquits for him. Well, as soon as he saw the picture on the box he started smiling and laughing and wanted to hold that box the rest of the time.
He also got really excited about the balloons and pinatas when we walked past the little party section. He was reaching up for them, clearly asking for one. I was actually tempted since he was being so amazingly good and patient, but resolved instead to get him a balloon for his birthday. Don't worry, he will only be allowed to play with it with very close supervision, but he was just so excited by them!
When we got home he just wanted to get down and play with his ball and trucks and he was laughing so much that I couldn't resist playing with him. We put the Derby on and Nicholas thought the horsies were fascinating. I'm not quite sure what this kid's deal is with animals, but he seems to like them a lot right now. (Hence my resolve to take him to the zoo one day this week.) And it prompted him to temporarily forget his ball and remember about his rocking horse and go play with that for a bit. I doubt he made the connection between that horse and the ones on tv, but I think when I kept saying "horsey" about the horses on tv that prompted him because he connects that word with his rocking horse.
I then ate ice cream while he ate dinner (I am going to be so sad when he understands what ice cream, candy, and soda are and I can no longer have them in front of him), gave him a bath, put him to bed, made my own dinner, did dishes, went back down to the car to bring in the non-perishable groceries I hadn't messed with while carrying him, finally squeezed in a shower for the day, and realized my evening had disappeared.
But we sure did have a fabulous day. On tap for tomorrow is church, Target, and Babies R' Us. I really wish we could just go play at the park, but the boy is completely out of diapers at daycare so errands it is.
And, yes, I've been taking pictures, but I can't post them without Joe's computer, so look for those on Monday. I even have a video of Nicholas showing off his new "real" crawl.
Joe is in Boston for the weekend so I have Nicholas all to myself. Not a big deal, I figured. And it wouldn't be if it wasn't also the weekend (when we catch up on everything household related) and a weekend after we've spent weeks (okay, maybe months) just treading water. The bottom line is that in addition to the normal daily stuff I have laundry and an errand list a mile long to tackle. But I'm not really complaining because I finally get to spend time with Nicholas, who is just downright fun these days. I'm just going to assume my defense will go fine next week even if I don't get around to reading those last few books . . .
Anyway, so what did we do today? We started off the morning by going down to hang out with my parents. The original plan was to go for a hike, which didn't end up working out, but we did go for a walk around the neighborhood with Nicholas in the hiking backpack carrier to try it out. He felt like he weighed virtually nothing, which was nice, but I miss being able to see him. But he seemed to mostly enjoy it (especially when he saw neighbors' dogs, since he has decided he loves dogs), and he had a lot of fun playing with his ball and truck with my parents. That boy and his ball--he is a tad bit obsessed.
Then we came home, both took a nap and then did an epic Wegman's trip. The trip didn't start off well, since the fact that our entry ramp is closed for construction doubled the travel time. Nicholas is happy to chill in his carseat for a 10-minute trip, but 20 minutes starts to get on his nerves, especially on a day when he has already done two 30-minute drives. So he was really mad at me for the last part of the ride, but quickly forgave me when I took him out of the car. He then proceeded to be absolutely delightful . . . for the entire hour we were in the store.
He is just able to make so many more connections now. This is the first time he noticed the train that runs on tracks along the ceiling and man did he think that was cool! And he was very happy to hold items I gave him without putting them in his mouth or throwing them on the floor, which meant he could have new "toys" to play with as we went.
And I really don't think it is a coincidence that the item he was most excited to hold onto was the box of cornbread mix. We got some cornbread when we picked up BBQ a couple weeks ago and he loved it, so I figured I could get one of the mixes and whip up a few bisquits for him. Well, as soon as he saw the picture on the box he started smiling and laughing and wanted to hold that box the rest of the time.
He also got really excited about the balloons and pinatas when we walked past the little party section. He was reaching up for them, clearly asking for one. I was actually tempted since he was being so amazingly good and patient, but resolved instead to get him a balloon for his birthday. Don't worry, he will only be allowed to play with it with very close supervision, but he was just so excited by them!
When we got home he just wanted to get down and play with his ball and trucks and he was laughing so much that I couldn't resist playing with him. We put the Derby on and Nicholas thought the horsies were fascinating. I'm not quite sure what this kid's deal is with animals, but he seems to like them a lot right now. (Hence my resolve to take him to the zoo one day this week.) And it prompted him to temporarily forget his ball and remember about his rocking horse and go play with that for a bit. I doubt he made the connection between that horse and the ones on tv, but I think when I kept saying "horsey" about the horses on tv that prompted him because he connects that word with his rocking horse.
I then ate ice cream while he ate dinner (I am going to be so sad when he understands what ice cream, candy, and soda are and I can no longer have them in front of him), gave him a bath, put him to bed, made my own dinner, did dishes, went back down to the car to bring in the non-perishable groceries I hadn't messed with while carrying him, finally squeezed in a shower for the day, and realized my evening had disappeared.
But we sure did have a fabulous day. On tap for tomorrow is church, Target, and Babies R' Us. I really wish we could just go play at the park, but the boy is completely out of diapers at daycare so errands it is.
And, yes, I've been taking pictures, but I can't post them without Joe's computer, so look for those on Monday. I even have a video of Nicholas showing off his new "real" crawl.
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