4/24/11: L funnies

L is spending the weekend for the first time ever up at her grandma & grandpa's house in Cheyenne. We met grandma in Ft. Collins for lunch on Friday and she took L home from there.

On Saturday, Grandma said she saw L's light on at 6:15 am so Grandma told L that they were up and she could come out. She said she thinks L likes being in a house with early risers. :) Grandma took L to Kenzie's soccer game in the morning. Then Chase, Kenzie, Jenny, grandma & L drove down to Boulder for Chase's soccer game. Then they spent a few hours at Uncle Dale & Auntie Candy's house. Grandma said they played outside for two hours and did an egg hunt. Then they stopped in Loveland to use some gift cards before heading home around 7:30pm. It snowed most of the way home. After getting a bath, Grandpa read L a book on the couch and Grandma read her one in bed and then she was asleep within 2 minutes.

Today, we got to sk*pe with L before she went to church with Grandma. She was again able to recite Luke 24:6: "He is not here. He is risen!" They were going to have Jenny & the kids over for Easter brunch. Jenny said:

Quote of the day from my niece
L..."Brownies Have mold in them"
Gma..."who told u they had mold? "
L..."scooby doo"

Jenny said that L's cracking her up. :)

4/23/11: Callen puts puff into his mouth

Today Callen used his thumb and forefinger to pick up a banana puff and put it in his mouth. He's been trying very diligently to pick up the puffs but they always just stick to his hands and I don't think I've ever seen one make it into his mouth before.

Oh, and I knew that Callen's name wasn't as unique as Elodie's (boys' names are hard!) so it shouldn't be too much of a surprise that I heard a lady at C*stco yesterday call her son Callen.

We're still having a ton of trouble getting Callen to sleep through the night. After a month of trying to get him back to sleep without nursing him, I've given up. So now when I hear him cry, I just get up, nurse him a little and put him back in his crib awake and he usually falls right back to sleep.

4/19/11: reading

Elodie read "o-f-f. off" out of the C*nsumer Rep*rts book today. She also found "to" and said "to. Going to the mountains." I'm so proud of her!

4/18/11: our 3-Year-Old: Why Lie?‏

from b@bycenter.com:

Your 3-year-old now
If you haven't heard your child tell a whopper yet, don't be shocked if the day arrives soon. She may vigorously deny having broken your antique china cup even if you saw her do it. Why? It's not malicious, you'll be glad to hear. If the incident happened more than a few hours ago, she may truly not recall it, for one thing. Three-year-olds' memories are still short, especially for anything that makes them uncomfortable. Or she may remember, but understanding that it wasn't the right thing to do, she now wishes that she hadn't touched it. So she convinces herself — and then tries to convince you — of her innocence by wishing the smash away. Children don't tolerate emotional pain, so they reinvent their own reality or pass the buck to someone else. This process is quite automatic as children become convinced of the truth of what they're saying.

Intentional, manipulative, or malevolent intent to deceive doesn't happen at this age. Try not to accuse your child directly, especially if you know she's guilty. Instead, say something like, "I saw you knock over the cup. You need to tell me when things like that happen. Come help me clean it up." You want her to be able to come to you and speak the truth without fearing your anger or harsh reprimands. You can teach her an appropriate response and a way to make up for the harm. Above all, your child needs to know that you love her no matter what mistakes she makes.

**Good to know. I'll have to try that technique with L b/c she has started to lie a little bit when she's done something naughty (denying she did it).**

4/17/11: our 7-month-old: Week 2‏

from b@bycenter.com:

Your baby is learning to recognize emotions and moods, and finding new ways to demonstrate those feelings. One wonderful example: You might start getting kisses. They may be drooly and gummy at first, but they'll be just as sweet! When your baby's bored, you may hear a fretful squawk or an attention-getting squeal.

**I've noticed C doing this lately. Doesn't like being ignored as much anymore. He'll also let you know when he wants a toy or he's upset you took something from him (usually a bib or hat next to the changing table when I'm changing him).**

How your baby's growing:

By now, you may have already told your baby that the telephone isn't a toy, or that rattles aren't for throwing, or that her sister's hair isn't for pulling. At this age, your baby may begin testing your authority by refusing to follow your simple directions. She's not really being disobedient or willful — just curious.

Keep in mind that she simply can't remember things you tell her for more than a couple of seconds at a time. The best tactic is to use a simple "no" and then distract her.

**C's done all those things. Sucked on the remote. Dropped toys. Pulled L's & my hair. We just tell him no. I think one of the most annoying for D & I is when C tries to get a book or turn the pages when we're reading to L.**

4/10/11; C starts food again

I gave C some baby oatmeal again tonight after a few weeks off of it b/c he just wasn't into the whole food thing. I also gave him some carrots and he ate it just fine. We'll try again tomorrow and see if it goes well too. When I first introduced food, he seemed okay with it. Then he would only eat like 1/2 of a tablespoon so hopefully he'll keep it up this time.

our 3 yr old's development

from b@bycenter.com:

Your Little Linguist

The charming speech — and kooky mistakes — of the typical 3-year-old are a wonder to behold. Sometimes their silly sentences and words are accidental ("It was gigantormous!"). Sometimes your little linguist will concoct wild words just because they're so much fun to say ("I'm making gorgorolla mud pancakes for you!"). This evidence of your child's growing proficiency with the English language should be music to your ears!

**In the past month, L's starting making up words just because she can or thinks their funny. She likes to say "that's spanish for..." She's also started saying "ah-ma" instead of "excuse me." She just made it up one day and has been using it ever since (for over a month now). She also seems to like to add "ness" to the end of words. She can be pretty funny.**

Your 3-year-old now
What sounds like nonsense coming from your preschooler's lips is actually a sophisticated kind of language experimentation. He might call his little brother a "pootie" or say, "Look at that prettyful flower." He may call a fountain a "crash water," an invented term that's really pretty clear. These creative concoctions crop up more often as he develops better language skills.

Now that he knows how words are supposed to sound and how sentences are supposed to be put together, he begins to play around with new combinations. "There's a wacky macrackey who lives under my pillow." This wordplay — often combining real and nonsense words — is a lot of fun for preschoolers.

They'll try to make you laugh as they dream up better material. Play along with them and invent some of your own. Instead of serving macaroni and cheese for dinner, set "pumpkin blooey" in front of them.

All these manipulations of sounds and words now will give your child a leg up as he learns to read. (And if you haven't introduced Dr. Seuss's silly wordplay yet, do!)

4/10/11: C's 7 mos. old ;)

from b@bycenter.com:

After your baby masters the ability to grasp an object, an exciting step follows: transferring it from one hand to the other. For now, your baby will experiment so much with both hands that you won't have a clue which hand is preferred, the right or the left. In fact, handedness doesn't usually become obvious until much later. A preference might become apparent around 9 months, but even then, little ones tend to be ambidextrous, sometimes until they start school.

**I don't remember when C started switching toys from hand to hand but it's been a while now.**

Your baby may have already started feeding himself finger foods, although this can begin as late as 10 months. Once he reaches this stage, you can introduce a sippy cup.

Try giving your baby a cup with a spout and two handles. If he's getting frustrated that he can't get more liquid out of the sippy cup, remove the valve in the lid. If he has trouble figuring out how to suck through the spout, take the lid off and let him drink straight from the cup. (Show him how to tip it back so the liquid flows into his mouth.)

**C's not eating food yet. He just wasn't into baby food so we stopped giving it to him. We'll attempt to reintroduce oatmeal tonight.**

4/9/11: L's reading

Before my mom left last week, I bought L some sight word cards and we put some of them up on the fridge. She caught on really quick. In a week, she's learned about 11 words. She knows: I, a, yes, my, to, two, no, on, at, you, and your. Smarty pants! Our neighbor the kindergarten teacher said there's 12 sight words for kindergarten. I need to get those from her. But at this rate, she'll be reading by kindergarten! She'd definitely like to just know it all already.

4/7/11: L's first time skiing

Just a quick post on L's first time skiing. I had been planning on taking her skiing this season but, between all the colds and surgeries it just didn't happen until now. I was able to get free Eldora passes from work and L was super excited to go. When we got there (we got there later than I had hoped) it was almost noon. We rented equipment, her little ski's were so cute, and then I went to the retail store to get a toe clip (I was told that might help) and a harness since I forgot to get those things before we left. Once we got everything on I kind of pushed her down this little hill that was on the way to the ski lift. She moved forward and then fell over. She didn't cry or anything just got back up and moved some more... before she fell. I am not much of an instructor so I didn't know what to tell a toddler. We kind of moved with her between my legs for a little bit but after about 10 minutes or so L was ready to go home. Great, I said, we had only been "skiing" for 10 minutes and she already wanted to go home. I decided that it was ski school time. I signed her up for the afternoon class which was 2.5 hours long. She was really shy with the teacher for a couple of minutes but he got her interested in putting on one of her skis and she started "skating" around. He then took her to their training slope and I went off to do some runs. I didn't do many before I wanted to check on her... I did this often because I wanted to see how she was doing and she looked so cute out there with her little bitty skis on. At the end of the school time her teacher said she did a good job and learned a lot. One of the other instructors there said that she got a little tired about 1.5 hours in and started saying "no" a lot more when asked to do things. She said she had a great time and wanted to do this again so hopefully, next season, we can go a little more often.

4/7/11: C sitting

he's sat a ton today. getting really good at sitting for a long time :)

photos today of my almost 7 mos old. time is passing way too quickly!

Tuesday 4/5/11: C babbles & rolls onto back

About two days ago, I started to notice C saying "ma-ma-ma." Then yesterday I heard him say that and "ba-ba-ba." Every time I tried to catch it on video, he'd just stare at me. Then I just heard him on the baby monitor saying "ba-ba-ba." Too cute!

He's also rolling from his tummy right onto is back again. Finally caught him actually doing it today after days just seeing the evidence that he knew how to do it (seeing him on his back after I'd seen him on his belly and catching him several times with his left arm pinned under his back).