Tuesday, September 27, 2011

untitled

We had a lovely visit with Oma and Grandpa (aka "Gampa") this weekend. We are very thankful that they were able to come and stay as long as they did. Brian and I had some errands we needed to run without the tiny tag-along. He had a very good time getting undivided attention from his grandparents. He also really enjoyed terrorizing their dog, Bailey. It's very sweet to hear him say hello - "Hi Baiey", but I'm not so sure that Bailey loves the attention.

I'll post plenty of pics soon - gotta get them uploaded to the computer first.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Day One

Today - September 25, 2011 - Bennett had ZERO accidents! Totally dry all day long.

Attaboy.

Friday, September 23, 2011

das mies broom, redux

Every now and then, I get a hankering to clean. Don't get excited, it doesn't happen very often! (As anyone who knows me at all can attest . . .) The other day, I decided to sweep the kitchen floor. Bennett went to the toys and got his broom to 'help'.

I'll be darned if he didn't walk to the wall where his little kitchen is situated. I stealthfully watched as he slid his kitchen away from the wall to get to the spots on the floor behind it.

Wonders never cease - he appears to have learned something about cleaning, from me.

Thursday, September 22, 2011

laundry

Today, Bennett and I had a really great day together. We went to Rolly Pollies this morning to make up the class we missed last weekend. Of course, he wet his car seat on the way there because he told me had to go potty as we were stopping at a stop light on a very busy street and I could not turn right! Ugh. I don't know why I let these sorts of things bother me so much.

Regardless - we had a great time in class, especially when Mr. Jim told us that we could consider bumping Bennett up to the two year old class. Yay! I think we'll give it a try next week to see how it goes.

After class, we came home and played outside for a little bit. Bennett really likes to dig - which makes his clothes really dirty. I don't mind the dirt, honestly. I mind the peed upon clothes more, for some reason.

He slept for two hours at naptime and I was even able to nap for a little bit. After his nap, I tried to get him to go to the bathroom and he flat out refused, even threw some real tears into the mix. Of course, he was doing all kinds of potty dances. As I was moving to get the potty seat on our toilet, he let loose - spraying the whole toilet, the floor and the wall around the toilet. Not the way to make a happy mama!

THEN - he jumped in mud puddles when we went to the playground to meet up with friends. I had to change his pants, shoes, socks AND unders. Oh my lordie!!!

We seriously added to the laundry load today. I would like to have just one day when he wears only one outfit from wake to sleep.

Monday, September 19, 2011

The reason I haven't updated recently . . .

is because Bennett has been having a couple of rough days! I don't know if it's the molars coming in, runny nose and congestion, or just being nearly two. Hell, maybe it's all three. Anyway - we've been dealing with a lot of whiny-heiny business and that makes it hard to celebrate the really cute times.

Today, for example, we didn't have any play dates planned, so we spent the morning running errands. Bennett was exceptionally good at Target (including four requests to go pee in their potty) and JoAnn fabric store. He usually cries when we have to go to the fabric store, but not today! Yay! Then, we got home and he promptly peed in his carseat. Then he peed on the high chair.

After a one hour nap (!) he peed on himself several times before making it to the toilet. He then peed on the living room chair AND in his crib when I put him up there for a couple of minutes of "regrouping". I put him in a diaper after that. Ugh! I don't like it when I lose my patience.

The good stuff (lest I forget that there is good stuff, every day!): he put some puzzles together, he read some books with me. He snuggled on my lap a LOT today. We baked cookies together and he didn't make a total mess of the kitchen like last time! He ate well at lunch (two cheese sticks and some grapes, don't judge me!). AND he pooped in the potty twice. That's surely a success.

The great thing is that tomorrow is another day. We're hosting playgroup and then meeting up with friends in the afternoon at a playground. Let's hope that the weather is nice!!

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Safety

This week, Bennett and I went to Story Time for Toddlers at our local Barnes & Noble store. We try to go every week because we LURVE Grandma Fay. She is the best at telling stories and singing songs and oh that voice! I wish I had some video to share with you because she is the quintessential cartoon grandma.

Anyway - as we were leaving this particular story time, I was holding Bennett's hand as he walked beside me. (He's doing a LOT more walking now that he weighs six hundred pounds!) We got to the edge of the sidewalk and I nonchalantly took a step toward the parking lot. Young sir planted his feet, bent at the waist, stretched out his hand and yelled, "STOPS!" I was so startled that I froze with my foot mid-air. I looked down to my right just in time to catch him looking both ways before he turned that angelic face up to mine and said, "goes."

Monday, September 12, 2011

The Adventuresome Boy

One really neat memory I have from my little girl years is that my mom would make up really great stories to tell me when she was tucking me in at night. The star of these stories was a very smart little girl who had jam packed days. Each night, when it was mom's turn to tuck me in, I got to hear all about that day's adventures.

Clearly - I learned at a certain point that the star of those stories was me. I still insisted on hearing those stories, much to my mother's chagrin, I'm sure!

I hope she'll be happy to learn that I have begun telling Bennett stories titled The Adventures of the Adventuresome Boy. He's begun to look forward to them, and I really like that he likes hearing about his day. What's really great is that even though he's starting to get relaxed and fall asleep as I'm telling the stories, if I miss a detail or tell something incorrectly, he quickly corrects me!

Sunday, September 11, 2011

whoo hooo!

Total sidebar - but I think it's pretty cool that I've reached 1,000 pageviews sometime in the last 36 hours.

Vocabulary update

Every now and then, I think it's wise to notate the things that Bennett is saying, especially the new things. Here's what we have heard this weekend (he's 22 months, 3 weeks old, for the record).

Bum
Back
I need that one.
Daddy's chair
Mama's shampoo
More Elmo lala
Dip
Not that one
No potty
Alberta bubby night night
Daddy's glasses
Mama's glasses
pink juice
more milk please
breakfast waffles
more dance
Daddy guitar
he says all his body parts
I dig
More dig
Lawn mower

Daddy tools
ladders
George
shower
zoo
hose
party
clap
happy
keys
monkey
Mama's stories
choo choo
round and round
and so many more (including "crap" which I said before I realized he had turned into a parrot. Sorry mom.)

Friday, September 9, 2011

temptation

A quick story about something that happened this morning. . .

Bennett and I are part of a playgroup. There are about twenty families that regularly participate in meetups. As would be expected with a playgroup, several of the kids are within six months of his same age.Therefore, we've been invited to several birthday parties in recent months. This morning was yet another party for someone turning two. The mom had made very cute funfetti cupcakes and had them displayed on a cake stand in the middle of the dining room table.

When we arrived, the kids were to play in the living room for a while before partaking in lunch and dessert. Bennett had a great time playing with his friends and with the birthday girl's toys. Even though he had walked in and out of the dining room several times, he hadn't seemed too interested in the cupcakes. Until we sat down for lunch, that is.

We were served pizza and pasta salad (two things Bennett really likes to eat!) He had one bite of pizza and then started pointing and grunting, "dat!" toward the cupcake stand. I couldn't get him to eat anything else, despite my explanation that there would be no cupcakes without having lunch first. "Do you see all the other boys and girls eating lunch before they get a cupcake?" Didn't matter. He wanted a cupcake. We had to leave before they even finished lunch because there was no way I was going to torture him and make him watch six other kids eat a cupcake while he didn't get one. But even more importantly, I wasn't going to back down from that rule. Even if I looked like a mean mommy to the others. Gotta get the better carbs in before the sweet carbs.

In rebellion, he wet his pants and carseat on the way home. We were less than a block away and he had peed in their toilet less than ten minutes prior. Stinker. :)

Thursday, September 8, 2011

water bubbies

Today was 1,000 times better than yesterday. I recognize that I'm setting myself up for disaster tomorrow, but what the hey - wanted to let you guys know that we were totally on a roll today! There was only ONE accident and it involved just pee and it was only in unders, no pants! AND we were at home, thank goodness.

We had a great morning running errands, but Bennett did not want to stay at story time because I had neglected to bring him a snack. Since the other kids (one other kid) was eating, he thought he should as well. Whatever, when I told him that all of our snacks were at home, he said, "home." Then he started to pull me toward the door.

A long nap later, we went to a local playground where we had a great time with four friends and there was no blood involved. Not even any tears! Bennett ran and chased and climbed and swang. (swinged?) Who cares, he was on the swings and having a blast.

In the evenings, he's taken to enjoying a "big boy shower" with Brian while I get ten minutes to catch up on email. Tonight, Bennett really wanted to take his bubby in for a wash. Brian, who is always thinking on his feet, grabbed a wash cloth, and handing Bennett the tag end says, "Look, Bennett, this is a water bubby. It's made just for going in the water! This way your sleeping bubby won't get wet." Genius.

"dat mies broom"

Today was not the greatest in Bennett/Mama land. Someone tiny was a very whiney hiney and someone not as tiny was lacking in the patience department. I surprised myself with the ability to ignore the broken record repetitiveness of "dat mies broom" being cried out throughout Target. I never thought I'd be one of those mothers with the quasi-out-of-control kid in the retail center. I am that mother now.

I lost my cool when it came to the toilet today. I must have changed his pants five times today. And all but one of them were AT HOME! Sheesh. I'm not real sure what we're doing wrong, but it's terribly frustrating. I hope we'll see some improvement soon. I keep encouraging and giving humongous praise when he keeps himself dry, but I'm tired of doing laundry every day!

In related news - we're back in cloth diapers for naps and overnight. Since he's no longer getting milk before he goes to sleep (yay me!) and we're putting him on the potty right before we put him in the diaper, he wakes up with diapers that are way less soaked than before. I'm double stuffing (acutally quad-stuffed his night-time dipe tonight, we'll see how that works!) them to improve absorbency. I'm thinking that this may help us get to sleep-time dryness a little more quickly. And we won't waste anymore money on the 'sposies.

I promise to post more photos soon - got to get them off the camera.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

He surprised me today . . .

This morning, we met our friends Katie and Patrick at Barnes & Noble for story time. He was supremely well behaved (which is not the surprise) and followed all of Grandma Faye's instructions. Yay! We came home and had lunch before he went down for a lovely nap.

When he woke up, I had planned for us to go to a playground we had not visited before. I mentioned this to Bennett, "Hey buddy, you ready to go to the ladders?" His response, "No. Home." You're kidding me, right, kid? You'd rather stay home than go play and climb and run? Fine by me - I've got kitchen cabinets to reorganize! He played with water and our rice cooker - "mines rice cooker." Um, no buddy. Mines. :)

Monday, September 5, 2011

what's new???

I decided today that I should probably blog at least every other day. Too much is happening and he's changing more and more every day! I need to document it since I'm not writing in my journal (or his baby book, for that matter) like I should.

Today - he ate broccoli for dinner. I had made chicken divan and he picked the broccoli pieces out of his serving and ate them first. Brian was shoveling in chicken so he'd at least get a little protein, but he kept asking for more, "Mores, peeese?" followed by a large green goo filled grin. Brian offered Bennett the broccoli from his plate and I gave him some of mine. Still, "mores? peese?" Seriously, how can you say no to that?

Saturday, September 3, 2011

Beaver Island State Park

The fact of the matter is that Bennett is a ton of fun to play with!

This morning, we went to our usual class at Rolly Pollies and he had the most fun. That's nothing new, but he is discovering some new skills! For instance, he is this close to jumping with both feet up in the air at the same time. He's also very close to doing a forward roll on his own.

He is climbing the ladder apparatus with serious confidence and is trying his hardest to climb the rock climbing wall that they have installed in one corner. Today Bennett worked the water fountain all by himself AND he got a compliment from one of the other mothers - "He's so patient! I wish my daughter (who is several months younger) would be like that!" Just made me grin.

After Bennett's nap, we decided to go check out Beaver Island State Park which is just across the bridge on Grand Island. I don't know what took us so long to discover this awesome place! It's a beautiful sandy beach along the shores of the Niagara River. We were there for a little over two hours this afternoon and wore that baby out! He swam, he played, he dug, he built, he sat and ate snacks. The most important thing is that he didn't put up a fuss when we left. Yay! for small victories.

We will certainly take visitors to the beach when they visit next summer. It's open every day from 11a to 7p. There are at least four lifeguards and restrooms and a boardwalk and lots of picnic space. We also saw a small marina - we'll certainly be checking to see if they rent boats and jetskis. Bennett will be the perfect age to start exploring the water next summer! Can't wait to share it with you all.

Thursday, September 1, 2011

and another new word

We are watching and hearing Bennett's vocabulary explode a little more each day. He has names for all of his grandparents except for Brian's dad, Leonard. He calls both grandmothers "WaWa" (I don't know why) and he calls my dad "DahDah" (again, not real sure why, but I guess he is a little confused by the Daddy part of Daddy-o.) He hasn't yet called Leonard by a nickname. He can point to all of the grandparents in photos when I call them by their "real" names - Oma, Grandpa, Granna and Daddy-o.

A couple of days ago, we went to the post office to mail a package to Brian's parents in Ontario. I talked Bennett through the process as we packed up their photo book and some toll road fees . . . "We're mailing this package to Oma and Grandpa. They live in Ontario, which is northwest of us." etc, etc, blah blah.

Today, he saw the box that the photo book had been shipped in originally as it was sitting on the back seat next to his car seat. He pointed and said, "Gampa". :)

Can't wait for Gampa to hear it live!

Monies!!

Bennett owns at least three piggy banks. One of them is shaped like the Cat in the Hat. In the last couple of days, he has frequently wanted to "play" with "Tat"! (we're working on that hard /c/ sound). So, yesterday, I decided to put the Cat on the floor and see what Bennett did with him.

He immediately found the plug on the bottom and pulled it. He was quite surprised that "monies" came flying out. "Tat poop monies!" was his exact quote, I believe . . . (we're also been working very hard on pooping on the potty instead of in his "unners") Yes, there is money coming out of the Cat's bum, little one.

We started to count the money and talk about the different sizes, but honestly, the most fun was had by putting the money back into the Cat's Hat and then watching it fall again, out the bottom.

I have tried to be vigilant about separating the US currency from the Canadian so that we can show him a little way that his two points of origin are different, but very similar. Hidden among the US coins was a $2CAN piece. He immediately noticed it and held it up. I told him that it was a tooney because it was worth two dollars in Canada. Bennett practiced saying tooney over and over. He was able to find the tooney no matter how deep in the pile of coins I buried it (even if it was inside Cat)! He insisted on calling it a "hooney".

Tonight, we played with the Cat (which has become quite broken in the manhandling over the last two days and no longer holds any "monies" thanks to a cute toddler we all know.) Anyway - Cat was helping to calm an otherwise very upset boy. As I dressed Bennett around the piggy bank, Brian came in to say goodnight. I asked of Bennett, "Can you tell daddy what kind of money you put inside Cat today?" He looked right at Brian and quipped, "A TOONEY!" Brian did a double take and my jaw flew to the floor.

I guess it's clear that he does hear me, just chooses not to listen sometimes.