New Photos!
http://picasaweb.google.com/amyswint/2009_03_26#
We had a great time in Texas visiting Reuel's family. The weather was great (better than MA anyway!), the company even better, and I got a serious vacation while Owen was occupied with cousins and grandparents. He ate up every moment. I'll try to write down some memories after I get the house back to normal. It is most unfortunate to be sick with a stomach bug shortly before traveling and to come home to a house in tornado-ravaged condition. But Owen is cooperating pretty well this morning while I try to get things moderately back in order.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Monday, March 16, 2009
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Sick day
Owen was sick again today, no urping, but fever and malaise. We noticed that we've never had such an experience of a compliant child until today...so it was fever-induced lethargy...parts of it were heaven! We went out and about and ran some errands instead of church, and he wasn't SO ill that we shouldn't be doing that, but enough that he just sort of went along for the ride instead of trying to run the show as usual :) Further evidence: after a 1.25 hr nap that started when he let me pat his little head while he fell asleep, he woke accidentally (noise in the house) and was screaming very discontentedly; I went and picked him up and he slept another hour in my arms in the rocking chair. WOW. This has never happened before, at least not since about 3 months old.
I sat down to record tonight's bathtime laugh. Owen has this dreadful 'condition' called molluscum contagiosum...it's some sort of virus that is very commonly passed in young children, and it results in small wartlike thingies that spread very easily. Owen started with one little spot on his back, and now he's covered in probably 40 little spots, all on his torso. At least they are hidden for everyday life. They are flesh-colored, and don't cause him any problem; they just look atrocious! Well, tonight Owen noticed one on his side/mid-tummy for the first time. He started peering down at it and examining. He touched it and came over to me and said, 'nipple!'. I said something like no, silly, that's not a nipple, here's your nipples, and showed him the right spots. So he said, 'li'l nipple!' and pointed back at the molluscum bump. I thought it was pretty funny, but then again I spend all day with a 22 month old and Reuel has been working late all week so it's just been me and little man. So the sense of humor may be in an altered state :P
Owen was sick again today, no urping, but fever and malaise. We noticed that we've never had such an experience of a compliant child until today...so it was fever-induced lethargy...parts of it were heaven! We went out and about and ran some errands instead of church, and he wasn't SO ill that we shouldn't be doing that, but enough that he just sort of went along for the ride instead of trying to run the show as usual :) Further evidence: after a 1.25 hr nap that started when he let me pat his little head while he fell asleep, he woke accidentally (noise in the house) and was screaming very discontentedly; I went and picked him up and he slept another hour in my arms in the rocking chair. WOW. This has never happened before, at least not since about 3 months old.
I sat down to record tonight's bathtime laugh. Owen has this dreadful 'condition' called molluscum contagiosum...it's some sort of virus that is very commonly passed in young children, and it results in small wartlike thingies that spread very easily. Owen started with one little spot on his back, and now he's covered in probably 40 little spots, all on his torso. At least they are hidden for everyday life. They are flesh-colored, and don't cause him any problem; they just look atrocious! Well, tonight Owen noticed one on his side/mid-tummy for the first time. He started peering down at it and examining. He touched it and came over to me and said, 'nipple!'. I said something like no, silly, that's not a nipple, here's your nipples, and showed him the right spots. So he said, 'li'l nipple!' and pointed back at the molluscum bump. I thought it was pretty funny, but then again I spend all day with a 22 month old and Reuel has been working late all week so it's just been me and little man. So the sense of humor may be in an altered state :P
Saturday, March 14, 2009
I feel like it will be hard to forget last night, but I'm sure I will someday, so I want to record some of it. Feel free to turn away, readers who are squeamish of stomach.
I had a pretty nasty bug that hit me in the lower GI a couple of days ago now and it made for a rather miserable and sleepless 36 hours. I thought maybe I had eaten something bad. Then, last night I heard crying on the monitor, and boy am I glad I looked to see what that was about...I saw Owen sit up and then urp all over himself and his crib...oh no!! He's never thrown up before last night. We rushed to action to reassure him, clean him up and clean up the bed. He was a sweetheart about the whole thing; he was almost intrigued by this new experience, of course exploring his face and jammies and the mess in the bed with his hands (double yuck!) and then he just wanted to cuddle after we got him cleaned up. It seemed to have subsided, so after some rocking and singing I put him back to bed and attempted to leave the room (we have had *really* bad luck with the child refusing to close his eyes as long as we are in the room with him, so even though leaving makes him cry for a bit, it's often better), but Reuel thought this time we should stay with him. Daddy was right, he was urping again within a few minutes. The sheets and jammies routine, take 2. 15 more minutes, take 3. You'd think we'd have figured out not to change them so quickly by now. But you just have this feeling of powerlessness and without having talked to each other at all, I know that Reuel and I were just in action mode trying to help little man as much as we could, even if it was just changing his sheets over and over! After take 3, Reuel managed to get to bed and catch some zzz's and after one or two more episodes that happened on my lap rather than the bed, I got Owen back to sleep...I got him to not cry as I left the room by telling him I was going potty and I would be back, so go ahead and lay down while I go potty. It was a white lie for his benefit. I saw him sit up for a minute waiting for me, and then he fell over exhausted and went to sleep...for about an hour. I woke to hysterical screaming (I was OUT, having not slept more than a couple of hours the night before due to my own viral manifestations) that may have been going on for a while. Yup, more throwing up and Owen getting really upset about it at this point. I went in and he looked at me as if to say, 'Why is this happening mommy?' and I just felt so devastated. It made me realize in an instant what mothers of truly sick children must go through...it's so hard for me to even see him a little sick. He had a working vocabulary of the night's events by now, so he was saying 'towel, towel, towel!' and 'wipe, wipe, wipe!' and 'dirty, dirty!', wanting to get cleaned up. Reuel didn't wake, and I didn't have the heart to invite him to the party, and I was not about to go to the basement myself and get the earlier laundry and try to change the bed, etc. So, now-experienced parent of sick child rudely put a couple of blankets over the wet spot in the crib, mopped up the jammies (not too bad this time, not much in his stomach!) and spent a good long time rocking and chilling. We made it through 3 or 4 more urp sessions. Owen was getting really tired of it and frustrated by the end when it wasn't very productive and just involved a lot of gagging. I gave him some water despite knowing it would probably come back up and he gratefully gulped it down. We finally made it to sleep for the rest of the night by about 1:30am. I laid down on the floor next to the crib and that was the trick to Owen not getting upset about me leaving, but being able to close his eyes and actually drift off. It was hard to believe, but he woke at his normal hour, happy as a lark. When I came downstairs to meet Owen and Reuel this morning, Owen reminded me of last night's 'trowup' happenings and the 'tauw' (towels) that are 'doo-ty'. I know it could have been worse, and I'm very grateful it wasn't. I think we are really spoiled that we hadn't experienced anything like this until now...:O
I had a pretty nasty bug that hit me in the lower GI a couple of days ago now and it made for a rather miserable and sleepless 36 hours. I thought maybe I had eaten something bad. Then, last night I heard crying on the monitor, and boy am I glad I looked to see what that was about...I saw Owen sit up and then urp all over himself and his crib...oh no!! He's never thrown up before last night. We rushed to action to reassure him, clean him up and clean up the bed. He was a sweetheart about the whole thing; he was almost intrigued by this new experience, of course exploring his face and jammies and the mess in the bed with his hands (double yuck!) and then he just wanted to cuddle after we got him cleaned up. It seemed to have subsided, so after some rocking and singing I put him back to bed and attempted to leave the room (we have had *really* bad luck with the child refusing to close his eyes as long as we are in the room with him, so even though leaving makes him cry for a bit, it's often better), but Reuel thought this time we should stay with him. Daddy was right, he was urping again within a few minutes. The sheets and jammies routine, take 2. 15 more minutes, take 3. You'd think we'd have figured out not to change them so quickly by now. But you just have this feeling of powerlessness and without having talked to each other at all, I know that Reuel and I were just in action mode trying to help little man as much as we could, even if it was just changing his sheets over and over! After take 3, Reuel managed to get to bed and catch some zzz's and after one or two more episodes that happened on my lap rather than the bed, I got Owen back to sleep...I got him to not cry as I left the room by telling him I was going potty and I would be back, so go ahead and lay down while I go potty. It was a white lie for his benefit. I saw him sit up for a minute waiting for me, and then he fell over exhausted and went to sleep...for about an hour. I woke to hysterical screaming (I was OUT, having not slept more than a couple of hours the night before due to my own viral manifestations) that may have been going on for a while. Yup, more throwing up and Owen getting really upset about it at this point. I went in and he looked at me as if to say, 'Why is this happening mommy?' and I just felt so devastated. It made me realize in an instant what mothers of truly sick children must go through...it's so hard for me to even see him a little sick. He had a working vocabulary of the night's events by now, so he was saying 'towel, towel, towel!' and 'wipe, wipe, wipe!' and 'dirty, dirty!', wanting to get cleaned up. Reuel didn't wake, and I didn't have the heart to invite him to the party, and I was not about to go to the basement myself and get the earlier laundry and try to change the bed, etc. So, now-experienced parent of sick child rudely put a couple of blankets over the wet spot in the crib, mopped up the jammies (not too bad this time, not much in his stomach!) and spent a good long time rocking and chilling. We made it through 3 or 4 more urp sessions. Owen was getting really tired of it and frustrated by the end when it wasn't very productive and just involved a lot of gagging. I gave him some water despite knowing it would probably come back up and he gratefully gulped it down. We finally made it to sleep for the rest of the night by about 1:30am. I laid down on the floor next to the crib and that was the trick to Owen not getting upset about me leaving, but being able to close his eyes and actually drift off. It was hard to believe, but he woke at his normal hour, happy as a lark. When I came downstairs to meet Owen and Reuel this morning, Owen reminded me of last night's 'trowup' happenings and the 'tauw' (towels) that are 'doo-ty'. I know it could have been worse, and I'm very grateful it wasn't. I think we are really spoiled that we hadn't experienced anything like this until now...:O
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Fun!
We had a great time going to the aquarium with Nathan and Sara yesterday...on their membership pass for free, no less! Owen is a fanatical fan of fishies (whee-shees) whether in books, at Petsmart, or in the pediatrician's office, and as expected he exploded in squeals of delight and faux run-on sentences at his excited high pitch when he saw the first giant whee-shee tank. He especially liked the tropical tank with bright colored specimens, and the touch-tank where he could handle (aka attempt marineicide) the sea stars and horshoe crab also ranked highly. He liked the penguins (peh-buens) , but was more fascinated by the aquarium staff cleaning their rock formations than by the peh-buens themselves. The black light near the top level that caused his white sleeves to glow was a major hit, and he would run in and out of the light to see the effect. The sea lions, my personal favorite, didn't hold his attention for a moment. Pictures below!
Owen is getting fantastically good with his letters, almost as good as with numbers. These early reading skills are confusing, now that I see them through his eyes. How do you know when O is zero or the letter O, a capital L looks like a 7 upside down, and turn over a capital U and it's a small n. Not to mention colons and semicolons share so much with lowercase i that they get labeled as such routinely. Owen's favorite letter activity right now is to play with his bathtub letters...stick them to the tub walls, to his tummy, identify them all as they float around him in the tub like he's in a giant bowl of alphabet soup. We have had extremely educational baths lately! Baths had been the source of major tantrums until I discovered the concept of transitioning upstairs with an object. It goes like this: 1. Carefully avoid using the word bathtime. Don't mention that it's coming, don't mention why you might want to go upstairs. 2. Say, "Owen, what do you want to take upstairs tonight? Should we take a book or a toy?" 3. Having bypassed the concept of quitting playing, Owen excitedly hunts his object of choice and happily heads for the stairs on his own and practically jumps in the bath. I am amazed at the enormous impact of subtle changes in language choices. Now I just have to remember to take something from his room downstairs every night because it's getting rather crowded up there!
The little man has started climbing much more lately...that wasn't one of his top skills for quite a while, but he's getting better, which is somewhat harder on me :) He has really grasped the concept of using a stool to help him get a leg up to where he wants to be. He hasn't really grasped what makes a stool functional . So, sometimes he'll go and grab a newspaper, or a dish towel and put it on the ground and attempt to use it as a stool...umm, need a little more than 1/2" elevation there Owen. Of course, he has about 4 useful stools scattered around the house that he knows how to go and get, but he is like his mother in this way. Why put in the effort to getting the 'right' tool when there might be something within arm's reach that I can use instead to get the job done? Reuel and I have labeled this ATT (available tool theory) in the kitchen, where I shun as many extraneous, cluttersome gadgets as is reasonable, and this is no doubt the root of why I can remember flossing my teeth when I was a kid with strands of my hair after eating popcorn rather than going and getting floss that was 3 rooms away. Gross!
Vocabulary is pretty much impossible to catalog these days because it's exploded too much. But there are a lot of funny and cute usages that pop up during our days. Owen has taken to saying 'Later!' when someone is leaving (including Daddy in the morning). His use of the affirmative 'uh-huuuh' in response to questions is ubiquitous. At night before putting on pj's we put 'grease' (aquaphor ointment) on his dry skin spots including his 'bummie' by his request, and he makes eye contact with me, uses very serious eyes and reminds me to use only a 'li'l bit mommy'. (We just bought the jar of ointment with a wide-neck opening rather than the tube, and there were a few incidents where Owen got more than a li'l bit.)
Oh, there's so much to write. But enough for now!
The giant sea tank with rays, sharks, fish, sea turtles (one which is 560 lbs!)
Both boys liked finding brass penguins around the aquarium
Chatting about the specimens
Sea lion tank outside.
We had a great time going to the aquarium with Nathan and Sara yesterday...on their membership pass for free, no less! Owen is a fanatical fan of fishies (whee-shees) whether in books, at Petsmart, or in the pediatrician's office, and as expected he exploded in squeals of delight and faux run-on sentences at his excited high pitch when he saw the first giant whee-shee tank. He especially liked the tropical tank with bright colored specimens, and the touch-tank where he could handle (aka attempt marineicide) the sea stars and horshoe crab also ranked highly. He liked the penguins (peh-buens) , but was more fascinated by the aquarium staff cleaning their rock formations than by the peh-buens themselves. The black light near the top level that caused his white sleeves to glow was a major hit, and he would run in and out of the light to see the effect. The sea lions, my personal favorite, didn't hold his attention for a moment. Pictures below!
Owen is getting fantastically good with his letters, almost as good as with numbers. These early reading skills are confusing, now that I see them through his eyes. How do you know when O is zero or the letter O, a capital L looks like a 7 upside down, and turn over a capital U and it's a small n. Not to mention colons and semicolons share so much with lowercase i that they get labeled as such routinely. Owen's favorite letter activity right now is to play with his bathtub letters...stick them to the tub walls, to his tummy, identify them all as they float around him in the tub like he's in a giant bowl of alphabet soup. We have had extremely educational baths lately! Baths had been the source of major tantrums until I discovered the concept of transitioning upstairs with an object. It goes like this: 1. Carefully avoid using the word bathtime. Don't mention that it's coming, don't mention why you might want to go upstairs. 2. Say, "Owen, what do you want to take upstairs tonight? Should we take a book or a toy?" 3. Having bypassed the concept of quitting playing, Owen excitedly hunts his object of choice and happily heads for the stairs on his own and practically jumps in the bath. I am amazed at the enormous impact of subtle changes in language choices. Now I just have to remember to take something from his room downstairs every night because it's getting rather crowded up there!
The little man has started climbing much more lately...that wasn't one of his top skills for quite a while, but he's getting better, which is somewhat harder on me :) He has really grasped the concept of using a stool to help him get a leg up to where he wants to be. He hasn't really grasped what makes a stool functional . So, sometimes he'll go and grab a newspaper, or a dish towel and put it on the ground and attempt to use it as a stool...umm, need a little more than 1/2" elevation there Owen. Of course, he has about 4 useful stools scattered around the house that he knows how to go and get, but he is like his mother in this way. Why put in the effort to getting the 'right' tool when there might be something within arm's reach that I can use instead to get the job done? Reuel and I have labeled this ATT (available tool theory) in the kitchen, where I shun as many extraneous, cluttersome gadgets as is reasonable, and this is no doubt the root of why I can remember flossing my teeth when I was a kid with strands of my hair after eating popcorn rather than going and getting floss that was 3 rooms away. Gross!
Vocabulary is pretty much impossible to catalog these days because it's exploded too much. But there are a lot of funny and cute usages that pop up during our days. Owen has taken to saying 'Later!' when someone is leaving (including Daddy in the morning). His use of the affirmative 'uh-huuuh' in response to questions is ubiquitous. At night before putting on pj's we put 'grease' (aquaphor ointment) on his dry skin spots including his 'bummie' by his request, and he makes eye contact with me, uses very serious eyes and reminds me to use only a 'li'l bit mommy'. (We just bought the jar of ointment with a wide-neck opening rather than the tube, and there were a few incidents where Owen got more than a li'l bit.)
Oh, there's so much to write. But enough for now!
The giant sea tank with rays, sharks, fish, sea turtles (one which is 560 lbs!)
Both boys liked finding brass penguins around the aquarium
Chatting about the specimens
Sea lion tank outside.
Friday, March 6, 2009
We had two lovely midweek lunches with Reuel's Aunt Molly during her recent visit to the great barren north, and this week we went to Chuck E. Cheese (Duck-ee! in Owenese) after our scrumptious bowl of soup and panini at Panera. What a treat. Owen enjoyed himself thoroughly, although for the first time he was quite intimidated by the thought of getting close to the giant, tacky, mechanized, singing creatures. I have always been surprised that he wasn't more upset by them in the past. I guess the previous visits when he was littler when mommy would use the tokens to play skee-ball stuck with Owen because he was very excited to find the 'balls!' and throw them around the room (rather than up the ramp). Aunt Molly helped him figure it out. He also discovered the slide and said a hearty 'Whee!' each time he flew down.
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