Family Weekend

On Friday Daddy's brother K and his wife J drove up from NJ to stay with us for the weekend. It was beautiful and still light out when they arrived, so we headed out to the park where they got to see LR enjoy the slides and swings. He was happy to get out of the house and they got to stretch their legs a bit. Then Daddy's other brother (also K, so we'll call him Uncle Corbin), came in late, so didn't get to see LR in the evening. LR had an awful night that night and we got very little sleep. I gave him Motrin, so I'm not sure what the problem was. Luckily it didn't seem to affect him too much on Sat.

LR got to play with his uncles and aunts all day. We walked to the grocery store and hit a playground on the way. He was well behaved until he woke up from his afternoon nap. Then he was a little whiny until bedtime. The loss of sleep finally caught up with him, but still, he's easy to distract so he was never fussy for long.

LR now points to his teeth and says "tee" every time I open the bathroom door. He loves to brush his teeth and gets irritated when I take it away from him after 5 or 10 minutes. I hate the way he gags himself intermittently with it, but I love his dedication to oral hygiene. I sign "finished" and then we rinse the toothbrush off and I pry it out of his ridiculously strong little fist. So like the bath, I now sign "later" to him each time he asks for it. I let him brush first thing in the morning and then at night after the bath. Today I even gave in and let him brush after lunch.

LR showed off his dribbling skills, both oral and soccer. He says "kick" when he kicks a ball... or toy car... or person. I don't remember the sign for "kick," but he wouldn't be looking at me anyway when he kicks a ball, so I'm not worried about it. He's actually drooling a little less than last week, but I don't think that molar has completely come through yet. I can feel it just under the surface which must still be bothering him since he woke at 4:30 this morning. Hoping for slightly more sleep with fewer interruptions tonight.

Pa-pa! - It's not what you think

I had to go to the cell phone store yesterday because apparently cell phones don't do well when saturated with drool. Who knew? Anyway, LR and I walked into the store and he immediately ran to the kid-friendly height display cabinets and started pulling out all the packaged accessories. As I redistributed his war chest, he started signing "phone" by touching his middle finger to his cheek. So while LR overwhelmed me with his brilliance, Sprint underwhelmed me with their customer service. I was told to wait while one staff member fixed a computer and the other completed a task for another customer who obviously wasn't present since I was the only person in the store. Why do cell phone companies continue to punish customer loyalty? I don't get it. Guess I have a "kick me" sign because I signed up for another 2 years. *sigh*

So the Dr. Seuss pop-up book now has its own word. We don't have "ma ma" or "da da" yet, but this special book gets "pa pa" for "pop-up." He wants to read it all the time now and it's definitely showing some wear-and-tear. I may have to add it to my pile of board books that will need replacing before baby #2 comes along.

After 3 nights of restless sleep for all 3 of us (LR kept waking up for 2 hours on average), we finally figured out that he was in pain. I gave him a dose of Motrin before bed last night, put him to bed at 7:30 and I didn't hear from him again until 6:30 this morning. Awesome! Had a play date with his same-age friend R today and R's mother showed me that he had just broken a molar. I checked LR's mouth and sure enough, his back right gum is super swollen. That accounts for the horrible sleep. More Motrin tonight and fingers crossed.

Mostly Pics

We had a great day in the park yesterday and we got a lot of good pictures. So I'll skip the editorial today, except to say that his new sign and word is "clock."

Seriously, a soccer star in the making. He loves dribbling the ball around the field. Can't say I blame him.

Signing "car" because a car just drove by. His hands should be fists, but he's keepin' it real, yo.

Tickle wars with Mommy.

Come this way, Daddy!

Signing "ball" for the camera since we'd just put it in the wagon.

Listening to the water. Daddy got this pic of LR at his most peaceful. He's totally content to rest his head on my hand this way with his ear submerged. I've blogged about it before and thought you might want to see it. It's really adorable.

It's a big world out there, my friend!

Bigger Steps

LR had a great morning with the nanny yesterday and when I got home we packed up and headed out for lunch with his friend R and R's mom. LR gets restless in restaurant highchairs. I can't keep him entertained with food or toys. R on the other hand could sit in his seat endlessly. R's mom, much more prepared than I, handed out toy cars to both boys. LR decided he wanted the bigger car, so traded with R. R didn't seem to mind.

After lunch we hit Old Navy and picked up a few rugby shirts for LR. It's not just that we love the sport, he just looks adorable in them. While shopping I realized I was starting a migraine. It was mild, so we took our time checking out and getting back to the cars. I let LR walk in the parking lot a bit, but he found a shopping cart he wanted to push and when I finally had to pick him up, he had a hissy fit. By the time we got to the car he had recovered. At home I took some migraine meds and we played for awhile. The headache intensified, so I turned on the TV and asked LR to play by himself. He kindly obliged. Then I tried to get him down for a nap 3 times. He finally went to sleep and I took more meds. He woke up an hour later and when I went to get him, the head rush was intense. I brought him back to the couch where he fell back asleep in my arms. I called Daddy and asked him to come home to help me. After hanging up, I put LR on a blanket that had been sitting on the floor and ran to the bathroom. Luckily LR stayed asleep and Daddy arrived ten minutes later and sent me to bed where I passed out while they had dinner. This is the first migraine (with the exception of the spinal fluid leak post delivery of LR) that made me throw up.

While being sick in the bathroom I couldn't stop thinking of what I would have done if he had been awake. What do you do if you physically can't take care of your child? It makes the prospect of having another baby even scarier. My doctors have given me the go-ahead despite higher than normal counts in some of my Lupus blood work. If I flare while pregnant, how can I take care of LR? When I talked to R's mother later in the day she said I should have called her and she's probably right. I have a lovely woman downstairs with her 3 kids and plenty of nice neighbors. I realize that I don't have much of an emergency plan in place and that we should probably think of one.

On a lighter note, LR is still impressing us with more signs and words each day. He's signing "phone" and "train" now. He touches his cheek for phone and he wrings his hands for train. Our phones can also act as walkie-talkies, so I've been calling LR and chatting with him from a room away. He doesn't talk back much, but he does listen.

In the bath this evening, he put his head on my hand on the surface of the water again. He stayed there for awhile and then moved on to something else. A few minutes later he did it again, but all by himself. He got on all fours and put the side of his head in the water. Daddy and I watched in amazement as he turned his head and blew bubbles for the first time and then put his ear back in the water. I'm going to look into swimming lessons this weekend. I don't want to miss this opportunity, this small window in time when he's not afraid of the water.

He amazed me this evening during book time before bed. I showed him a book I had been saving until he's older a few days ago. It's a Dr. Seuss pop-up book. It goes through 7 different Dr. Seuss books and is beautiful, but he's too aggressive with the delicate pop-ups, so I let him touch just a few of the sturdier pieces. He loves it to death and has wanted to see it every time he spies it in the bookshelf the past few days. I put it away this morning hoping he'd forget about it for a little while. At bedtime I read him "Each Peach Pear Plum" and then "Jamberries." Then I pulled out "Hop on Pop." Halfway through the book he turned toward his bookshelf, signed and said "book, book." I assured him I was reading him a book and finished it. He turned to his bookshelf and signed again while whining. I let him off my lap and he toddled over to the shelf. I realized he wanted the pop-up book, but it wasn't until I sat down that I realized he had recognized the drawings from "Hop on Pop" as Dr. Seuss which reminded him of the pop-up book. Cool, no? Or is it more amazing that Dr. Seuss drawings are that recognizable. Either or, it was a neat moment and both Daddy and I have seen big leaps in cognitive development recently. In other words, he's wicked smaht!

Sick But Happy

LR napped for a total of an hour on Monday, a half hour in the morning and another half hour in the afternoon. It certainly wasn't enough, but despite the runny nose and (I suspect) sore throat, he was pretty happy. Tuesday was better, but he still didn't sleep much during the night. I slept even less. Last night was great. He actually slept through and seemed to be recovering today. It was a mild cold and all 3 of us got it, so it was virulent but not vicious.

LR has picked up a few new signs in the last few days. He seems to have a handle on zebra, giraffe, and book. He says "ba" for bath, bottle, ball, and book, so the signs help me differentiate. Today he stayed underfoot while I tried to make a pasty (meat, carrot, potato pie). If I'm anywhere else in the house he's fine playing by himself, but as soon as I try to do the dishes or cook, he's grabbing at my legs and - this is new - biting my jeans. Biting has gone from a game to a more serious call for attention. Not sure what to do about it, but hoping it's just a phase and will go away soon.

About a week ago he started picking up the books next to our bed and thumbing through them. They're my "Chronicles of Narnia" paperbacks and he's generally very gentle with them. He runs his thumb across the pages of the first one he picks up and then tries each one in the series in turn. A born reader? We hope so.

It's Samba Time

LR's latest obsession is the samba CD we got as a gift during our one year baby group reunion gift swap. Actually, it was a music set which came with a maraca, a tambourine, castanets, and a whistle. He loves track 2 on the samba CD so much that he signs "again" just as the song finishes so that I'll play it again. I put it on repeat and must have heard it a dozen times today. Usually he likes to dance by himself, but apparently the samba is a partner dance and he insists on being held while wiggling and squiggling in our arms. He also kicks. Makes the dance extra fun.

Speaking of his love of music and dancing, last night we walked with our friends D&H and their son King J to a pub in Davis Sq where we listened to a bluegrass band play for an hour. We got there early to have some food and were definitely given the stink-eye by a few patrons. I felt out of place bringing a stroller into the pub and was afraid I had the wrong night or misunderstood my friend who had told me about the band. Luckily other families started to appear within twenty minutes. The band was wonderful and LR spent most of the time standing and dancing in front of them. The lead singer tried to give him a high five, but he ran away. It was very cute. We sat next to a dad who leaned over and asked Daddy what our son's name was. Turns out the six year old sitting next to him had the same name. We thought our name choice was pretty unique and since this is the first boy I've met with the same name since LR was born, I feel pretty secure in our decision.

Today we had a play date with our friend and her son R. R was having a rough day so he was a little fussy which rubbed off on LR a bit. They had a little spat over the walker, but once R's mom put it in the bedroom it became a non-issue. The boys sat and shared Cheerios, sippy cups, and toys. They're just doing parallel play, but it's still fun to watch them interact when they have to. We found out that they both like to hang out in the laundry room. Not sure what it is about that room that draws them. Anyway, toward the end of the visit, both boys were starting to get tired, so R's mom sat them down to read. They were totally engaged and I managed to snap a quick picture of them enjoying Pat the Bunny.

After his afternoon nap, LR was super cranky. Inspired by his friend maybe? We don't know, but he spent some quality time by himself behind the rocker in his room. Don't know why he decided to hide, but Daddy and I thought it best not to disturb him. He was rediscovering all the noises his walker makes. (I've had the sound turned off on it for a month now.) He watched me come in and take the picture, but didn't seem phased and didn't come after the camera for once. Not sure what was going on this evening, but the bedtime routine was tough. He cried when Daddy put him down, but then all of a sudden the crying got super intense. I was afraid he had hurt himself, so I went in to see what was wrong and I found the problem immediately. I opened the door and stumbled into his blankey on the floor. If there were any lingering questions about his attachment to the blankey Gigi made him, they're gone now.

Listening to the water

LR has been so much better this week. Last week the Roseola really bowled him over. This week he was a gem. Today we went to a play group after I got home from work. He enjoyed the new toys more than the company of the other kids, but it was good to see how he interacts when he has to. For example, if another toddler was standing between him and the toy he wanted, did he gently push the child aside, or did he just try to march through. So many choices... He and his friend R ran around stealing push carts from each other. He also found a great egg maraca. He also discovered the hostess' broom! It wasn't anywhere near the other toys. Is it a family thing? His cousin Bud is obsessed with mops and brooms.

At the playgroup I asked other moms about switching from bottle to cup. Some said it was easy, others have yet to try it. I got my opportunity to try as soon as we got home. He took most of a bottle and I thought he was tired, but he perked right up and played for another hour. Finally he seemed tired enough to nap, so we read in the glider in his room for awhile and then I rocked him. He struggled to sit up, so I turned him away from me, but kept him in my lap. He leaned back and within a few minutes was asleep. I put him in the crib and he slept for an hour and a half. Hoping we can cut out at least 1 bottle a day to start with.

After his nap he was a little cranky, but recovered quickly and played with his cars which he always accompanies with car noises now. He's trying to figure out the difference between cars, trains, planes, trucks, bikes, and boats. He was hungry well before I got dinner on the table, so I handed him crackers while I was working in the kitchen. His pronunciation of cracker isn't bad. Sometimes it's "crack" and sometimes we get a second syllable out of him. He kept signing and saying more, so I hurried along his veggie corndog which he meticulously dipped in ketchup with every bite. Ketchup dipping is new this week. We started with some home fries last week and he sort of got the concept, but often ended up sticking his whole hand in the ketchup and then licking it off. Tonight he demonstrated mastery of the condiment skill. It's one of those gateway skills, I'm sure.

At the end of dinner LR saw the ice in my water glass and signed "cold." He picked that sign up in the grocery store yesterday when I handed him a bag of frozen peas, corn, and carrots. So now he uses the "cold" sign for ice. I gave him a small piece of ice and he chewed on it. I don't mean he gummed it like babies do. He used his front 4 teeth and bit through the pieces of ice. It was gruesome to listen to. Once he finished that piece he asked for more. I gave him two more pieces before I offered him a mango popsicle. He tried it but wasn't so interested in it. He'd like to stick to his unflavored popsicles, thank you very much.

After dinner I asked what time it was and he signed "bath!" Bath time is more interesting now because he wants to rest his head on my hand in the water. He puts one ear to my hand and I put my hand just under the surface of the water. I'm guessing that he likes the sound of the water in his ear. He keeps his mouth open so that water comes in a bit, but he doesn't put his nose or eyes in, just chin, cheek, and chin on one side. Then he'll pick his head up and switch sides. Not sure what made him start doing it, but I'm fascinated by his fascination with the sound of water.

He seemed wide awake at 8, so Daddy started the bedtime routine at 8:15. He still wasn't sleepy, but Daddy put him in the crib anyway. I think he just crabbed himself out (20 minutes later). Not a great end to the day, but the day itself was great.