long day - what a story!!!

which turned into a very long night. we were to fly home at 7:00 p.m. on the 27th. well, as luck would have it, there was another major snow storm in denver that day (on top of the one on Christmas). i set up text alerts to my cell phone from our airline when we checked in at my mom's house. gotta love that online check-in thing. :-) anyway, on our way to the airport, we see a dozen cars along the side of the road, four tow trucks waiting in the median along pena blvd., and one emergency vehicle also waiting in the median along pena. (for those of you who aren't familiar with the denver area, pena blvd. connects the denver airport with I-70 which runs through the north end of denver.) luckily, we made it to the car rental place in one piece and got all of our stuff unloaded. we got onto the shuttle bus and as we were pulling into the drop-off area, my phone went off. it was the first alert telling us that our flight was delayed by 20 minutes. four minutes later, i got the second alert adding an hour to the initial alert. the next alert (20 minutes later) added 1 hour and 15 minutes to the second alert. the last alert came about 2 hours later and delayed us until 10:22 p.m. then on the reader-board at the gate, our final departure time was slated for 11:22 p.m. it was 12:17 on friday morning by my watch when we finally took off. this time is significant, but i'll get to that later.

so, we get to our gate knowing we will have to do a fair amount of waiting. we find a couple of seats by the window so owen can look out at the airplanes and snow (both new words from our trip). jeffy and i take turns walking around with him and jeffy even takes him to the neighboring concourse to play in the play area they have there. while my boys are going to play in the play area, the gate agents come on over the speakers (there are two flights' worth of people waiting at this point, both planes are delayed in leaving their origination point) and tells us that they have vouchers for us for food. all we need to do is bring up our boarding passes so they can mark who has received the voucher and who hasn't. i called jeffy and they came back. i got the vouchers and went to get food for owen and me. he ate his apples and then his nuggets. i didn't really care as long as they both got eaten. (everyone involved with that whole situation - both airline personnel and passengers - was so easy-going. there really were no problems to speak of aside from the delay in our flight, but everyone knew that it was noone's fault and we all just rolled with the punches.)

at a couple of points during the wait, owen was getting really restless so we pulled out the portable dvd player and watched elmo. don't you just love modern technology!? i sure do. we invited the little girl who was sitting behind us and her mother to join us (girl was not quite 2). earlier in the evening, owen had seen this little girl, gone up to her and given her hugs and kisses. it was very sweet. her mom even managed to get a picture of owen kissing cassidy (the little girl).

anyway, our plane finally leaves Seattle (it was a round-trip thing for the crew), which was announced over the speakers and greeted with much joy on our part. when it gets here, they tell us that they are going to try to get us all on the plane as quickly as possible so as to get us back to seattle as fast as possible. owen is counting people getting off of the plane. when there was break in the stream, he'd ask me, "where's the (insert appropriate number here)?" then when the next person came off of the plane, he'd pick up right where he left off. once he got to 10, he'd start over again, even counting backward from 5 at one point. i'd say that's really good number sense for 2 years old. asthe people are getting off of the plane, some of the people waiting to board near me notice someone behind the wall behind the desk put his hand over his mouth in an "oh " sort of way. said individual then makes an announcement that our flight might still be cancelled due to the length of time the crew has been on duty and that we needed to get everyone on the plane ASAP. well, this prompted a mini rush. "wait!!!" says he, "listen to your gate agent for directions." i'd say we did a wonderful job of getting everyone on and seated in record time. they got the doors closed and secured as soon as the last person was on board and the numbers check was done.

at 11:40 p.m. the head flight attendent then came on over the speakers in the plane and told us that in order to get to seattle that night, we needed to have wheels-up by 11:17 seattle time, which translates to 12:17 denver time. (this is where that time i mentioned earlier comes into play. do you remember what it is?) we sit in front of the gate after push-back for 10 minutes, then move to de-ice which gets done rather quickly, but still takes up several minutes to do the entire plane. we hit the runway and do a bit of taxiing, all the while people are looking at their watches and decideing to go with the watch that is earliest. in our row, that was mine. noone thought we were going to make it. there was a huge applause when the captain came on and told the flight attendents to prepare for take-off. we made it off of the ground with maybe minutes, but likely seconds to spare. the official time of our take-off according to the airline website was 12:20 a.m. once we were airborn, we were fine. we landed in seattle at 2:45 a.m. and didn't get home for another 45 minutes to an hour. i honestly didn't think that i was going to be waking up in my own bed yesterday morning.

boy, what a story this is. owen was such a trooper. one woman told us as she was passing our row during the boarding that owen was the best behaved child in the waiting area and that she could tell that we really work on his behavior. what an ego boost!!! we thanked her very much and i turned to jeffy and told him to give me a high-five. he asked what for. i told him that we're good parents. it's so nice to get that confirmation from strangers. owen slept most of the flight. all but the last 30-45 minutes, during which he cried and just wanted out. i did what i could to help him understand that i couldn't get him out just then. i'm not sure he understood. as soon as we were on the ground in seattle and the plane was taxiing to the gate, i took him out and just held him. he was fine from that point on. fussed for a couple of minutes when i put him in his bed when we got home (he was in jammies before we got on the plane...lucky boy!) and slept until 9:30 yesterday morning. i think we're getting close to being back on a normal sleep schedule around here.

tomorrow is christmas take 3 at jeffy's parent's house with all of his siblings and their kids. that will make 19 people in all. two of the people will be in arms of adults for the majority of the time as they are 15 days old and 6 months old. should be fun!

i'm dreaming

of a WHITE Christmas!!!!!! and i don't have to dream. it's been snowing since before we got up this morning. and it's 3:00 p.m. i'm guessing there's at least a half a foot of the white stuff out there. how marvelous!!!!! last night i was totally resigned to having a white christmas being dependent on which side of the street you lived on. nope!!!! my UW galloshes (did i spell that right?) don't keep anything warm. there has to be something between the galloshes and my skin if i have a prayer of keeping my lower leg warm. when i went out to get some things from the car earlier this afternoon, i jumped into the area where the plow had pushed snow and it was up to my mid-calf.

owen has figured out how to open presents. he practiced some last night at my dad's, then again this morning at my mom's. his favorite presents so far are a toy cell phone, and his cool big nubby ball. it's slightly smaller than a playground ball and inflates and deflates quite easily. i'm not sure what my favorite present is yet. maybe my iPod nano. it's green. :-)

oh, and santa claus. we went to see santa on sunday after church. we waited in line for two hours. owen was such a trooper. he did just perfectly. until it was time to sit in santa's lap. then he decided enough was enough. nuh-uh. don't wanna, mama. huge fit. CLUNG to me. so, i sat down next to santa with owen on the opposite side of me. we managed to get a few pictures on our own cameras and also (had to) buy a package from the people there. quick question: why, when i tell people owen's name do they think i'm saying olan? i think i'm speaking clearly... it happened when we were at the front of the santa line.

tomorrow i go to get my hair done by a gal we've been going to see since i was 9. i try to get a haircut from her every time i'm in denver. it's nice to catch up with her and she always loves seeing owen. we're also seeing some friends who are either current or former colleagues of my mother.

owen has several new words/phrases as of the last couple of days: thank you (as opposed to "mmm-ah!" like he's blowing a kiss, which is how he signs it), santa, snow, what's happening? (tonight to me and my mother as we were frosting/decorating cookies), more dessert (again tonight as we were eating chocolate fondue...which owen loved as was indicated by the entire lower half of his face being covered in chocolate.)

(update: it's now 8:50 p.m. and it's still snowing. )

safe trip

we made it to denver easily, though it took nearly all day from the time we left our house until we arrived at my mom's. owen was a pro on the plane...until he decided that he wanted out of his car seat about 30-45 minutes before we landed. then he fell asleep about 20-30 minutes before we landed. wouldn't you know it! he fell asleep in the car between the airport and my mom's so he got a little bit of a nap yesterday.

as for his nap today, i put him down, he didn't want to be down so he got up and played. then he let himself out of the room. i've known for a while now that figuring out doorknobs was just a matter of time. he had the concept figured out (hold the knob and turn) but didn't quite get the fine mechanics of it figured out. until today. just as jeffy and i were leaving to go do some shopping, my mom comes out on her balcony to tell us he had just opened the door and walked out of her room. oy.

our rental car had 3 miles on it when we got it. how cool to get a brand new car to drive! it's a 2008 jeep grand cherokee. i like it, but jeffy's a little cramped in it. guess we can cross that one off of our possibility list when we go looking for a new vehicle sometime in the relatively near future (like in the next year or so, or when my car dies, whichever happens first)

o had bacon at breakfast this a.m. it's a first. he's getting amazingly good at using his words to ask for "more please" sometimes, "more" just means "some", like when he hasn't had any yet. the question of late is still "what's that?" even when he knows what it is. he's getting to be quite the parrot. it's so cool!

A new approach

after two consecutive nights of being up with a certain short person in our home in the way too wee hours of morning, i've taken anew approach to bedtime. he can play a little bit after i tuck him in, but i set a timer and then go back in when the timer is done to make sure he's in bed. last night took three total tuck-ins. same thing so far tonight. he was asleep by 9:00 last night and slept clear through (yay!!!!!) and tonight he's down (after my second time of stopping the reading/playing/whatever) and i'm still listening to see if he gets up again.

i think we have a new favorite food. pasta. as long as it is coated in sauce, he's good. last night was chef boyardee. tonight was real pasta - buitoni tortolloni with a fancy carmelized onion and garlic tomato sauce. he gobbled it up! sweet!!!!! then at the mall he tried a bite of teriyaki chicken and thought that was pretty good, too. yippee!!!!

christmas break is officially here. we kicked the first group of kids out at 11:20 and the second group out at noon. teachers got to leave at noon-thirty. i met my friend katie for lunch (had to change the venue due to zero parking at our first choice). it was really nice to just sit and talk and not have to worry about little boys getting fussy or bored.

and the neighbors are officially gone. there is a pile of their stuff on the curb (public property). if they set foot onto the property, they're tresspassing. many of the immediate neighbors know this and will be keeping an eye on things over the next week or so. they apparently did some major damage inside the house (kicking in all of the doors, for example) prior to leaving. hopefully, we're done with them for good. good ridance

seven!!!

finally! seven is added to his counting. it sounds like "doo-duh" but it's constant. now he can really count to ten! next we're going to start on the next ten...

other new words include something that resembles "barbecue" - his favorite sauce.

i am so blasted tired right now. owen bonked his head last night right before i tucked him in. i was up at 4:30 this morning and poked my head in to check on him. bad choice. he was wide awake and standing up on his bed. he saw me and it was all over. i brought him back to bed with me. he got back to sleep. lucky him. glad i only have one more teaching day left before break. wednesday is a half day, kids go home at noon, i'm out at 12:30 and then meeting my friend katie for lunch and shopping before we go pick up our boys at daycare.

tree season is almost over for the year. i am so glad!!!!!

pre reader?

i think owen is getting ready to take the next step toward reading. we went to see his new cousin, eric, on saturday afternoon. on the way back to the car, he stopped us and touched every letter on the tailgate of a truck, saying each letter as he touched it. what a smart little boy? any bets on when he starts reading?

we had a battle of wills at dinner tonight. i wanted him to eat more mcnuggets before he got more apple dippers but he wanted the apples. he tried whining (didn't work - i don't understand whine.) so i offered him bbq sauce to have with his nuggets. success! he ate the rest of the chicken and then i gladly gave him his apples to finish.

muppets christmas carol is over. bath time!

A new phrase

"stop bugging me!" that's the new phrase. i'm not sure where he picked it up, but he certainly has heard it somewhere. it's pretty funny. he even knows how to use it appropriately.



a week from tomorrow is my last day of school for the calendar year. but who's counting? it's a half day so i might take the afternoon to do something for me. like a nice lunch, either alone or with a friend or two. (katie? you wanna?) thursday will be spent getting ready for our trip.



we had a rough night last night. o was up in the middle of the night for 90 minutes or two hours coughing. poor kid. that also means that mom and dad were up. not good for any of us since jeffy is working two jobs (reg job and at the tree lot) and i had a video taping session for my national boards to do this morning. i got up since i am working fewer hours at present.



speaking of hours working, owen is really missing his daddy (and so am i). this is a rough tree season for us because owen isn't really old enough to understand why daddy isn't home ever. the good news is that jeffy gets thursday off for my b-day.



time to get the little one started down to bed.

Red Letter Day

in so many different ways!

first, the ways pertaining to our little boy. we are officially done with teething for several years with owen. he cut his 20th tooth today. :-) i'm so glad! i never thought he'd get all of those chompers. isn't this an amazing picture? how did i get so blessed to have this kid as my son?

he is also turning somersaults on his own. quite the fun thing to watch. i'll try to get it on video and post that one of these days. he bends himself in half, puts the top of his head on the floor and pushes himself over with his feet. all of this and he's just two!

as for some sorta-old news, we finished up the antibiotics for an ear infection this a.m. this is the first infection he's had since getting his tubes in in april. i knew there was trouble last monday when i got him up and there was dark-colored discharge on his pillow and in his ear. luckily we had an appointment that afternoon to get his flu shot and his chicken pox shot (how often does it work out like that, huh?) so i had the doctor look at his ear while we were in. great timing, if i do say so myself. he got really good at letting us do his eardrops. in fact, he even would remind us (tried to do that tonight but i told him that we're done!)

now for the other thing. we have some icky neighbors. as of tomorrow, they won't be our neighbors anymore. :-) yahoo!

one more to go

teeth, that is. owen now has 19 of his 20 teeth cut through. we're waiting on the bottom left 2-year molar. this bout of teething has been pretty easy, relatively speaking. i'm glad we're done for several years now, at least with him.

jeffy and i think we heard him open and then close his bedroom door last night when he was supposed to be sleeping. we know his door closed, and i'm pretty sure i closed it all the way behind me on my way out after i tucked him in. we may need to purchase some more safety paraphernalia (that's a funny spelling for that word, but it's right!) here in the next few days. we'll see how owen does with this new skill. if he stays in his room when he's supposed to be there, we'll leave the doors as-is. if he continually escapes, we'll put the doohickies there to keep him from turning the knobs.

this weekend, as usual, i was totally blown away by his new skills. this time, he has shown that he can correctly identify most of the numbers, either by picking them up and telling me what they are, by telling me what a number i point out or hold up from his puzzle, or by correctly grabbing the correct puzzle piece when i ask for a certain number. the only ones he doesn't yet say without prompting are zero, seven, and eight. when he counts to 10, he gets 1-6, then 9, 10. he's learning so much so fast. i love watching this process! it will be interesting with the next one when he or she comes to watch and see how he/she is different from the big brother.

thanksgiving is this week. i have one more day plus a half day of work. kids leave at noon on wednesday, we get to leave at 12:30. my dad gets in on wednesday afternoon and stays until sunday evening.

sounds and sentences

"Where the ball?"

this was owen's sentence tonight. i threw a ball with suction cups at the window. it bounced off and stuck to one of his books nearby. he didn't see where it went so he looked at me and with upturned hands aske the question.

"Bee buh". that was just a few minutes ago at the fridge. he held up the capital B from his fridge phonics set and said the name and sound, then put it in the slot for the letters. amazing! absolutely amazing.

i have a small update on the chicken pox. no, he doesn't have them...yet. turns out the infected child was there a day with just a few pox on his tummy and they were suspicious but not sure. he came back the next day (Thursday) and it was a definate yes. IF owen doesn't have the chicken pox by the 26th, he'll be getting the second shot of the vaccine along with his flu shot. so, we should be done with the chicken pox with him by the end of the month one way or the other. i'm taking bets on whether or not he's gonna get the chicken pox. anyone want to make a wager? i say he gets sick as he seems to get everything that goes around day care.

i have a soprano metallophone at school that had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day today. in my last two classes of the day, it had bars (accidentally) kicked off, was jumped over, and used as a step. the two children who did the latter two things are off of the instruments for quite a while, possibly forever. i will make a laminated paper diagram for them to use with their fingers from now on. the girl who kicked the bars off was just shifting positions (from sitting to kneeling) and didn't mean to do it. she fixed it right away and did beautifully the rest of the time. ugh. saddly, the children who jumped over and stepped on (!) the instrument didn't surprise me at all. too bad for them, huh? no skin off my back, though.

Big skills!!!

Owen now helps get himself dressed. I'm absolutely amazed at the consistency of the second skill I'll mention. The first thing he can do is get his socks on. Usually, though, there is at least one sock with the grabby bits on top instead of on bottom (he won't slip if he's walking on the tops of his feet - lol!!!) the second, and to me most amazing, skill is putting on his crocs. 9 times out of 10, they're on the correct feet. he did that yesterday morning and jeffy thought i had put his shoes and socks on. nope. little man did it himself. today he got on his socks (both upside down) and one of his crocs - left one on the left foot. incredible. i wonder if this will transfer over to other types of shoes. time will tell. the way i'm looking at it is that once or twice would be accidental, consistent occurence is intentional. one more think owen likes to do now is feed the cat. he'll come into the kitchen and sign and say "more" and i'll open up the cupboard so he can get the food out for max. he's gotten really good at understanding "all done" and putting the scoop back in the bag and closing the door. he's turning into a great helper!

at church yesterday, owen was eating cheerios and at one point acted like he was done by "closing" the ziploc bag. jeffy tried to take it from him (he was done, right?) and owen looked right at him and said, "no-no daddy!" then i tried to take it and he told me, "no-no mimi!" i had to cover my mouth to stiffle the laughter. very cute. the other new thing is, "night-night mimi" (or whoever he is saying goodnight to). so cool!

this morning we had grands cinnamon rolls for breakfast. once owen finished his, he immediately asked for "more!" he got a banana instead. no complaints from said short person. if you'll look at the picture, you'll see the green turtle cup. it is not a sippy cup. this is the first meal at home that owen has not used a sippy cup for his drink. on his first attempt today, he didn't realize that a lot of liquid would come out and he spilled a little bit. after that, he took good careful sips. there was a little bit of drippage, but nothing major and he never once turned the cup upside down so i'm not even worrying about it. it's all a part of the learning process.

after breakfast was a much needed bath. after the bath was a much needed haircut. call me old-fashioned, but i really prefer his hair shorter rather than longer. i just think it looks neater when it's shorter. that, plus it's easier to trim it shorter than longer. i really hate hair flopping over his ears and into his eyes (or even close to his eyes). i finally today wrote down which settings i'm using for his hair cut. that way i don't have to guess. here are the before and after shots. he didn't stay too still for the after shot. the decision i've made for after haircuts is that owen gets as many m&m's as he is years old. so that means that he gets two m&m's after each haircut this year. some may call it bribery. i say, "whatever". ;-)

the workshop this weekend was a blast. i had a great time visiting with my friends and their two kids on saturday morning. i also ended up buying my own dulcimer. actually, it's a kit. the body is made of cardboard, which i will need to paint before i can get the whole thing put together. if i find i'm using my cardboard dulcimer a lot, which i think might be a possibility, i will at some point go and get a real wooden one. however, i would spend ten times what i spent this weekend for a wooden one so this really is the way to go to see if i'll really use it. if not, we're out $35 and owen has his first real instrument. i think i'll let him play it a little bit regardless. i have to decide what color i'm going to paint my dulcimer's body and make sure we have the appropriate kind of glue. i also need to get the strings, tuning mechanisms, and a few other things that were supposed to come in the kit but didn't. luckily the gal i bought it from lives just a few blocks from my school. that means about 10 minutes from our house. should be easy to get the stuff. i sent her an e-mail yesterday letting her know i was missing some stuff. at least i can get started on the painting. :-)

this morning jeffy was so funny! at a little after 6:00 a.m., he all of a sudden rips the covers off of me. i ask him what he's doing. he says, "you forgot to set your alarm." i reminded him that i don't have to go to work today. it was then that he remembered that it's veteran's day and apologized. very sweet and very funny.

i think we'll stay in most of today as it's looking to be a very blustery day.

waiting

to find out which 50% owen is in. we had a note sent home from day care today saying he has been exposed to the chicken pox. he got the first shot of the vaccine a year ago. i talked with a nurse and she told me what to look for and said that he has a 50/50 chance of getting it and wished us luck. the way i'm looking at it,he either gets chicken pox and we're done with it or he doesn't get it and we finish off the vaccine (2nd dose of the vaccine) and we're probably done with it. i think i'd rather he not get it and get the second dose of the vaccine - that will mean no missed work - but we'll have to wait and see. i really hope he can hold out until thanksgiving week. it's a short week of school (2.5 days) so it could be a managable thing. keeping my fingers crossed...

owen's speech is really improving lately. he's becoming more understandable more often. apple went from "at" to "appo". "pizza" is very clear. "dinosaur" is "di-doe". he's also counting to six and knows at least three letter sounds - b, d, m.

school is continuing to go well, we had our veteran's day assembly today and my choir sang. they had two weeks to learn their two songs (all but memorized!) and also to learn the poem "In Flanders Fields". they did such a wonderful job. i am so honored to be their teacher and directress.

i was supposed to have a release day yesterday for my national board process. "supposed to" being the operative words. turns out it was one day too early for finance to finalize approval for all of our release days. i'll still get the day, just on another date. more on this on my national boards blog.

tomorrow i drive to shoreline for a 7 p.m.-10 p.m. workshop, which continues on saturday all day. i'm not going to make the drive home on friday night. instead, i'll be staying with some friends in everett for that night. it will be a much better drive than coming all the way back home and then back up there again.

i am so ready for christmas break. i need the down time from work. i also need time to recoup from the cumulative hours of sleep i'm losing by a certain someone being up way too early and starting to play in his room. i get to stay in bed, but i'm still awake and losing sleep. the other day, he didn't nap at all at daycare. instead he was awake and trying to wake up his friends then quickly jumping back to his mat. what a little imp!

i received word on monday from the backpack people. owen and i will be in the 2008 calendar! immediate family will be getting calendars for christmas, among other things. we get 12 free. :-) i've asked about purchasing more. they're thinking about selling them and will let me know when they decide. i'll let you know as well. :-) i'm so excited! i'm a calendar girl! owen's a calendar boy!

chatterbox

owen is a real chatterbox these days. he can count to five (both in words and on his fingers and the words match the fingers!) this morning it was "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, wake up jeff!" this as i was trying to get back to sleep at 4:30 after giving him some meds for his cough. it was pretty funny. "dinosaur" is also a new word in our vocabulary!

he has taken a liking to our organ of late. he can climb up onto the bench, usually by climbing over the sofa arms. he loves it! i've been in contact with a friend of mine whose son is a concert organist asking her if this is how jelani got started. it is. :-) if owen is still interested in playing something, i might start him out on violin (since i play) sometime after he turns three. piano maybe as he gets older.

favorite toys currently are the leap frog fridge phonics set he has (drives daddy nuts!), his legos, and his giant pegboard. all of them are birthday presents.

poor thing is hacking away right now. i've given him medicine but we are still waiting for it to work.

He's 2!

This is a couple of weeks delayed. Sorry I got busy between when I started it (on the 15th) and today (the 23rd)...

I'm just absolutely amazed that my little boy is two. The weekend was wild. My mom got here on Thursday afternoon, met me at day care to pick up Owen. That evening we went to her cousin's house for dinner (I've never met this cousin, and it was a really nice evening.) Owen behaved himself royally. We are so blessed to have such a wonderful and well-behaved little boy. (That said, he just threw a tantrum because I took him out of the bathroom where he was playing with the soap...) It was pretty late when we got home and Owen went right to sleep.



Friday was his actual birthday. I had a workshop in the morning in Seattle at the UW so Gramma took him to the Seattle Aquarium in the a.m. We came back down for lunch and then took O to his check-up. He is (drum roll please) 36.5" tall, which puts him in the 95th percentile and he weighs 31 lbs (8oth percentile!!!!). This means he's still getting taller and is putting on decent weight. He is still mister skinny-butt, but he's a tall mister skinny-butt! We went to dinner that night at Chuck E. Cheese. Never again will I go there on a Friday night. It was way crowded and I got over-stimulated. I can't imagine what it was like for Owen.



Saturday was a take-it-easy sort of day. We were getting ready for the birthday party that night. Jeffy helped a huge amount by taking Owen out of the house and running a couple of errands. That was probably the most helpful thing he could hsave done since I kept trying to put Owen's toys away and he kept taking them right back out. There ended up being five fewer people than we were planning on, which still put it at around 25 people here, and Owen again got pretty overwhelmed. A quick walk around the block helped him cool down.



I really didn't get to enjoy the party on Saturday because I was too busy dealing with the chaos of 25 people in our house. Not sure what I can do to change that in the future since most of the people were family and you can't easily not invite in-town family.

He can count and a social commentary

well, just a little bit. he counts to two, but he starts with one! not too long ago, he thought counting started at two, not one. tonight, he very clearly was counting, "one, two! one, two!" i'm constantly amazed with how smart he is and how much he learns every day. it would be interesting to go back and count how many times i've said that in this blog. anyone up for the challenge?

another amazing thing to me is that owen turns two in a week. when did that happen? can it really be that two years have passed since he was born? we have a huge party planned for saturday of next week. by "huge", i mean in attendance. jeffy's entire family (all 18 of us, my mom, owen's godparents and their two kids (four more), plus my friend faye and her family (five more). that makes 28 people in our home. our house will be busting at the seams, but it will be fine and fun. two of the attendees are just a few months old, one is just over a year, owen and another are two, then there's a 3 year old and a 4 year old before we get to the older kids (ages 7-11) and the adults.

owen got a hair cut the other night. it looks very nice if i do say so myself. i'm really getting the hang of it. three different attachments were used, all on purpose. i did it after his bath and it looks so much neater that it was. he was getting pretty shaggy by my standards for him. i don't like seeing his hair flopping over his ears. he looks much better with the shorter hair. after his haircut, he got a few m&ms. if you look closely in the pictures, you can see the left-overs of the m's on his face.

now for the social commentary. while i am disappointed that marion jones has used steroids, i am very impressed and find it quite refreshing that she is owning up to it and that she appears to be willing to take whatever consequences come her way. in today's socitetal norm of "i didn't do it and i'll never 'fess up." it's very important that our kids see that it is better to take responsibility and face the music than to continue lying and get away with illegal things. this is a quality i am trying to instill in owen and also in my kids at school. i always acknowledge when a student owns up to something, even if it means getting in trouble.

the weekend is here. i have a workshop tomorrow in fway then jeffy and i have tickets to a concert here in town. the highlight for me will be beethoven's 4th symphony. owen is spending time with grandma and papa and then is coming home for bedtime with grandma. sunday will be our usual family day.

conference week is upon us at school. i will be masquerading as a middle school teacher this week on monday, tuesday, and wednesday as the middle school teachers are in cincinnati for a training of their own and it's a cheap way to have classes covered. specialists don't usually teach on half-days anyway so i suppose we have the time available. i could, however, make good use of the time if i didn't have to teach middle school. oh, well. i'll hopefully have a good part of each afternoon (m-w) and tuesday night until about 6 or 6:30. the way things work here in my district is if we work a late night in october and another late night during conferences in december, we don't have to go in the friday of the december conference week. (that usually falls on the friday of the first full week of december.) of course, the year i had owen, that friday ended up being a snow day.

wednesday we will have our 6-month check on the ear tubes and then on friday of next week, we have our two-year check with the pediatrician. i'm sorta nervous about this winter if the ear tubes come out (on their own). we could be facing more ear infections. i'mnot looking forward to that if it happens. we are missing meeting the new pediatrician by two work days. she starts on the 16. owen's appt is on the 12th. we'll meet her later in the year, i'm sure.

potty training has sorta slowed down and that's just fine. he is, after all, just two. we have plenty of time for it. oh, and the baby gates are down in the house now. he tried climbing over the one at the kitchen door this weekend. he's done well with having free access to the kitchen.

too funny!

owen is starting to not want to be separated from daddy. jeffy is making a donut run this morning (mmm...donuts!) and when owen saw daddy getting ready to leave, he (owen) started to throw a fit and cry, just like he did yesterday when jeffy left to go mow the lot. jeffy and i both laughed, jeffy got owen into jeans and his hawks t-shirt and the boys are heading out the door to get donuts. i told jeffy to get owen a donut with sprinkles. owen was so excited to be going with daddy. he was jumping up and down at the door. oh, and he's wearing he seahawks winter coat, too. very cute this morning. we'll watch football all day today, and do some cleaning for the birthday party that's coming up in a couple of weeks.

more stuff on friday

choir practice was fun. before i went, we went to borders and i got a couple of new cd's. one came out on tuesday (brian setzer orchestra) and the other came out a week and a half ago (songs of america - produced by janet reno.) owen and i had lots of fun dancing to the brian setzer orchestra cd tonight when i got home from choir practice.

as we were heading out the door, we noticed the family who lives down the street out with their little boy who is 15 months old so we went over to chat. while we were there, owen started navigating their stairs - WITHOUT holding on to anything! he was so steady doing it. i was totally amazed, almost to tears. he was so proud of himself, probably playing off of my reaction to him doing that. he's growing up so fast!

another new word for him lately is "row". he says it as he climbs up into my lap, takes a finger from each hand into his hands and waits for me to start singing "row row row your boat." then tonight he also said, "clap". i initially didn't understand what he was saying so i asked him to say it again and help me understand what he was saying so he started clapping, then he did "la la la la la". i immediately knew he was requesting "rock-a-bye your bear." language acquisition is awe inspiring.

sick day

for both me and the little man of the house. he has been getting a sporadic fever in response to those nasty two-year molars. they caught it at day care yesterday so he can't be there today. grumble grumble grumble. i have that beginning of the year cold which is threatening to go into my sinuses. i took a personal sick day instead of using a family leave day since i am also sick. i had to go back in last night after dinner (and after calling around to see if owen could go anywhere today so i didn't have to miss work...) to finish my sub plans. I then e-mailed them to one of the middle school teachers (i had my middle school class this morning) and the office coordinator. the latter couldn't open anything initially but the procedures. not the lesson plans, not the middle school project info to give to the kids. i only found this out when i called in to make sure everything made it to the sub. the office was supposed to have the phones on at 7:30. i didn't get anything but the immediate voicemail until 7:50. that was ten minutes before middle school starts. i was slightly frustrated, but everything turned out just fine. he should be done in about 20 minutes.

owen is down for his nap - no fighting, no getting out of bed multiple times. once jeffy gets home, i'm heading out for tgif (aka "choir practice") with people from work. he knows this, so i hope he hurries home tonight. i'll be upset if he doesn't get home in time for me to make it out. we're going to the waterfront tonight so it's going to be yummy.

one of owen's newest words is "tractor". he says it pretty clearly. i know grandpa will be happy with that one! ;-) he can also point to a picture of a tractor and correctly i.d. it. granted, most big machines are currently "tractor" but he'll get it right eventually. kids tend to over generalize anyway.

i am amazed that my little boy will be two in exactly two weeks. where has the time gone? i look at the quilt and his hands on the quilt and then at his hands now. it's incredible how much has changed in the last two years. two years ago, he relied on me for absolutely everything. now, he is somewhat self-sufficient. he is communicating his needs to us in a pretty effective way. he his gaining new words daily. this morning we were watching disney channel and i told him to say "hi, mickey mouse!" and he tried it! (deep thought: why can't i type that name without thinking of "em-eye-see kay-ee-why em-oh-you-ess-ee"?) he's imitating more and more of what we say and do. my favorite is closing the doors by backing into them (it's how we have to close the front door if we want it closed completely.)

Flying Monkey

that's what owen became this weekend. i was sitting on the couch on saturday morning when he climbed up onto the coffee table. it is about a foot from the coffee table to the couch. i told owen to put his feet on the floor, and he decided to jump toward me on the couch. unfortunately started laughing so he did it again several times. by the time he hit time number 10 or so, i realized that i really shouldn't be laughing because that was only encouraging him. wonder how long he'll go before he breaks a bone...

he slept through the night last night for the first time in several nights. two nights ago he woke up at about 1:30 hacking and coughing (due to nasal drainage...he's got that start-of-school cold right along with the rest of his class at daycare). he finally coughed so much that he threw up. we had to launder every bit of bedding, including the pillow and comforter. everything is clean and dry except for the comforter, which is currently finishing the drying process between two chairs spanning the living room and dining room.

i need sleep. the delete key has been my best friend tonight. off to bed with me.

getting better

owen went potty a total of four times on saturday. none on sunday (but we were at the fair most of the day so we didn't worry about it too much.) and three times today, i think. once first thing this morning (even with a full diaper!) and then twice at day care. he's pretty much transitioned up to the toddler room by now. that's a good thing. it's really where he needs to be for a multitude of reasons. i'm glad he's finally there. the coolest thing in my mind is that one of his teachers is the older sister of two of my favorite students. it's nice to have the family connection. the button on the book is still a favorite thing to push. usually he'll say, "button" when he wants to push it. i've pretty much learned to tune it out by now so it really doesn't bug me at all.

o started crying at 11:10 last night. i got up and went in to see what was up. he was. he was standing next to his bed in a small space. he managed to get himself mildly stuck between the bed, the wall, some sterilite tubs, and a wooden magazine rack we use for his books. once i got him unstuck (which just meant up onto his bed - he couldn't get that done by himself) and laid down with him for a few minutes, he was out for the rest of the night. i was out of bed for a total of about 20 minutes. i'm liking this bit. lately, it's taken no longer than about 30 minutes to get him back to sleep at night, if we even have to do it at all. i think having the big bed helps cause i can just climb in and snuggle with him until he falls asleep.

school is going well. the kids are learning so much already. my kinders can keep a great beat and follow direction all at the same time. it's quite cool. and so fun to watch. i made yet another small child cry today. same class as last time, but different kid. this one didn't want the red sticks either. she wanted blue. ugh. she ended up sitting out in a chair for most of the class time.

tomorrow is my first day off this year. i don't like taking a day off this close to the start of school, but it's a family funeral. jeffy's aunt died on thursday night. Lou Ann had been battling cancer for about a year. when they first found it, it was already everywhere (and i mean everywhere) and they didn't expect her to make the weekend. services are tomorrow morning at 10:30. it's too late in the morning for me to be able to take off just the morning (i'd have to be at school by 11:45 if i took a half day off and i can't make it back in time so i just took the whole day.) jeffy will be going to work, then leaving in time for the funeral, then heading back afterward. i'll just have some me time before and after. maybe i'll do some planning on my national boards. we'll see.

success...

so far. he's gone twice in the potty today. that's the most consistency we've had yet! he just loves pushing that darned button on his potty book. whatever works, right folks? and we're still on our second pair of underwear today! i guess he didn't quite finish this morning first thing so he managed to wet himself pretty quickly. i got him changed and all has been dry since!

all geared up

and ready to "go", i hope! owen is going to be in underwear (and vinyl pants) this weekend to see what happens in terms of potty training. we have 9 pair of training underwear, 3 pair of vinyl pants, a book that has a button with a flushing potty sound (the button is a hit with owen!) and cool foamy soap that comes out of a hippo's mouth (huggies clean team, i think) that he'll get to use when he goes potty. we'll see if we have to up the ante or sweeten the pot but i'm hoping that (1) keeping his underwear dry and (2) using the hippo soap will be incentive enough for him. we may have to resort to my parent's old stand-by: m's. the trick will be keeping those safe from him and daddy. maybe we'll find a cool depenser that only lets a small amount out.

anyway, he's continued to stay dry most of the day at day care and has even gone potty there once or twice. it's still tough with not knowing which room he'll be in, but when i talked with one of the directors, she said that we can send extra underwear and vinyl pants instead of pull-ups and they'll work with that. my aversion to pull-ups is that they don't let the child feel when they're wet. sure we'll be washing underwear like mad (too mad and we'll go back to diapers for the time being) but we won't have to keep buying the pull-ups. i'll keep you all posted on his progress.

the first full week of school is done. it was a good week. kids mostly behaving, classes going well. my prek/k classes can really sing this year! i have a hand full of truely tricky kids, but at least they're not all clumped together in one group! last year was a different story. it's a wonderful bunch of kids this year. cute stories from yesterday (yes, they all happened yesterday) include a little boy who came in, and proceded to start undressing himself, shoes and socks first. then he started in on his shirt, and by that time i had caught him and told him to put everything back on. he eventually ended up being my partner during the beat activity we were doing with rhythm sticks. in another class, one of my little boys totally melted down because he got the wrong color of rhythm sticks. (he got red, he wanted blue.) now usually i can talk with the kids and they'll be ok with it. not this little boy. i eventually told him that if he couldn't accept the red sticks and maybe get a different color another day, that he couldn't do the activity with us. the para that is in that class for another student ended up taking the first student back to the room where he went right to the cool-down area and told his problems to the stuffed penguin that is there. when the para returned, she mentioned that as she was walking under my window (their class is in a portable on the playground, which my room overlooks) on her way back, not only could she hear everyone using the rhythm sticks, but she could hear the beat being kept with them also! yay!!!!

we went to the homecoming game at jeff's h.s. last night. the district had closed the building a couple of years ago and sent the entire staff and student body to another site in the district while they re-did the inside of the building and added some more space. this is the first year back in the building. we're going for a tour later this morning, maybe with some friends. after that, it's offto grandma's!

owen's aunt sheena and uncle nick are moving this week from up-state new york to our city. yay! it will be really nice to have them nearby. nick is a teacher so i'm going to try to help him with finding something in my district, even if it's for subbing.

when we went to the fair last weekend, owen whinnied his way through the 4-H horse barns. it was hilarious! he even went potty in the big potty at the fair. we're going back tomorrow with katie, rob, and peter i think. we went to the rodeo last weekend, too. owen liked that. he'll do the mutton bustin' in a year or two (kids are set on a sheep and try too hold on for 6 seconds as the sheep bolts across the arena toward other sheep standing in the middle. the kids they had doing it during the rodeo last week were really funny and cute when they were being interviewed.

pictures!

Here are some pictures, just as I promised.

The first couple are of our little man reading, a favorite pasttime for him. He's not wearing any pants to make trying the potty easier for me. Too bad he didn't get that bit...

Can you tell he's not the least bit camera-shy?

Again, he's reading. I sing the words to this book to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle. Before I took these pictures, I could hear him singing away as he was reading. I even heard a few words I didn't know he knew ("see" is one that comes to mind).

I just love the look on his face in this one.




A boy and his bed. It's a beautiful thing. Too bad he doesn't realize that right now and go take a nap. He's been playing for at least the last hour, despite my poking my head in there several times and telling him to go to sleep. I've even physicall put him in his bed at least three times this afternoon. On another note, aren't the sheets and comforter cute?!




A wider view of his bed. It has been moved over to your right by about a foot so as to make it a little harder for him to work the lightswitch. He can still manage to reach it, however. The safety rails have a latch at each end so they can swing down quite easily and automatically catch and lock when they are raised. It makes changing diapers on the bed much easier. Yesterday morning, I found him laying cross-wise in his bed, head to your right, feet toward the left, between the rails

dry spell

in more than one way. i realized it's been two weeks since i've posted last so here is all that has happened in the last two weeks:

owen has his big boy bed in his room. he's pretty good about staying on it when it's time to be sleeping, even if he's not sleeping. he has cool car-and-truck sheets. i'll post pictures a little later.

separation anxiety is hitting for really the first time. owen loves his mama. that's a good thing. the other good thing is that at day care, he knows i'm going to leave, but he also knows that he has to stay. the way i look at things, he doesn't have to like it, but he does have to cope with it. he's coping. it helped yestereday when we got there earlier than normal (i have different hours depending on the day of the week this year) and the wiggles was on. he made a bee-line for that and was good.

owen should start transitioning up to the toddler room at day care starting on monday. this was helped along partly by the fact that he (1) woke up dry yesterday morning, (2) went on the potty yesterday morning, and (3) stayed dry most of the day yesterday but didn't go potty in the potty a second time. we're working on it. (this excitement sure beats the excitement we had on the first friday of school last year - a dead body on the sidewalk in front of the school in the morning.)

school is going well so far. i've seen all but two of my classes so far. these kids are really mine now. i'm finding i'm the most comfortable with my upper el classes that i have ever been. when i started teaching, that age group (4th and 5th grades) was my least comfortable. now, i've had these kids their entire school career so they really don't know any different. my rules haven't changed at all and they know me and my routines. it's really nice. i have even taken on a middle school class this year. i have them at 8:00 on monday and friday mornings. since i start teaching at the beginning of the elementary school teacher's day, i show up at 7:30 instead of 8:00 and get to leave at 3:00 instead of 3:30. i felt like i was playing hooky yesterday when i left as the elementary kids were getting loaded onto buses. i'll get used to it. my middle school class is going to be great, i think. this is the first year i've really felt comfortable having a middle school class. it is also the only situation in which i would take on middle schoolers, seeing as i've raised most of them since 1st grade. they came in so quietly yesterday, found their seats (i let them choose their assigned seat instead of me assigning them like i usually do.) there were some good questions about the course as i was describing it. and a collective moan when i announced the first quiz, which i gave yesterday. once i explained what was on the quiz, they were relieved. one kid even made the comment about how i can't do that on the first day. they have the weekend to finish it up and we'll discuss it on monday. basically, i'm just finding out what they know (or think they know) about music, how and why it changes, the different genres of music, and what composer names they might know.

jeffy is working the fair today. joy. don't have a clue when he'll be home, but it will be after owen goes to bed. we were thinking about going to the zoo, but it's too late to go, get everything in, and be home at a decent time for a nap. i'm a bit overwhelmed currently, and i think that probably has somethign to do with needing to recover from the week and having to run after a very busy almost 2-year-old all day long. anyone want to come over and help? i need it!

all for now. maybe i'll get pictures posted while he's napping. or maybe it will wait until after the fair tomorrow. we have rodeo tickets. i'm excited! i love the fair. owen will even be able to go on the rides this year (the minimum age is two, but he's close enough and definately passes for two.)

a monkey-boy by any other name

is still a monkey-boy. owen is really starting to mimic what he hears. he now will say "all right" when he give a high-five. mama taught him that. :-)

we went to our friend peter's birthday party today. owen loved the cake. he ate a small piece of each kind. he was a huge mess afterwards. makes up for not touching his cake at all at his own birthday last year.

he and i were up for about 2 hours in the middle of the night last night. i'm not sure why he woke up, but i'm thinking we're going to have to just let him get re-used to getting himself back to sleep when this happens. it may mean dealing with crying in the middle of the night. the good news is that after he woke up around 9 last night, he played for a few minutes and then went right back to sleep. i wonder if things will be easier once he's acutally in a bed, with sheets, and not on the floor. i guess time will tell on that.

owen starts back at day care tomorrow. he'll be in the toddler room from the get-go instead of starting back in waddlers and then moving up to toddlers in october. i'm going in to get my room going since we have open house on thursday night. i'll have all day tomorrow and thursday afternoon to get things ready. should be easy. i've done this enough years now it's all down to a science. my to-do list is on the board, and things are already getting crossed off. :-) it's nice to feel productive.

giving up

counting new words, that is. too many to keep track of each day. this morning, i was in the kitchen and he asked for an apple. usually, he wants a banana in the morning, but this morning, it was an apple. he got the half left over from dinner last night.

nap time is still going well with the mattress on the floor. bedtime is another story. last night he was up until 11:00. i do like him being able to play in his room between when he gets up, but the playing constantly at night is getting a bit old. advice on getting him down at night is readily accepted.....

UPDATE: it's 8:45 p.m. and owen went down before 8:00. he's quiet, like he's asleep. after i read his stories (in his bed, tonight, not in the rocking chair like we've done previously), i tucked him in, turned on his cd, turned off his lamp and closed the door. he played relatively quietly for no more than 10 minutes and it's been quiet ever since. he did wake up from his nap at 3:00 this afternoon so he was probably pretty tired. i'm hoping we can manage the same thing tomorrow night. (9:00 p.m. - ugh. i just heard something that sounded like a double thud and then playing from his room. i'm leaving it alone for right now. we'll see what happens...)

jeff's sister and our niece came over for dinner tonight. jeff's working at the fairgrounds for a concert and our brother-in-law was also working so i invited samara and isabella over. dinner was nice. it was good to have company. isabella played on the activity mat while the rest of us ate dinner. owen refused to eat just ketchup on his nuggets. he acutally dipped one, put it in his mouth, took a few chews, then spit it back out. i put some bbq sauce in with the ketchup and we had success. silly boy! samara and i have decided to do this again when both of our guys are working at night again.

a note on the potty training: owen is sitting on the potty several times a day now. he has yet to do anything in the potty, but at least he's sitting. actually using it will come in time.

My big boy!

You will notice that my big boy is not sleeping in his crib. Last night, he decided that he didn't want to do that any more. I put him down at 8ish like usual and by 9:45, he was crying and screaming. I went into his room and he handed me his jammie bottoms, teddy bear and blanket, then reached up for me. I took him out, and started rocking him. He started playing around a little bit so I tried putting him back in his crib. He didn't like that one bit. Next, we went into the living room where I turned on the TV to try to get him to sleep that way. That didn't work so I went into his room with a pillow case to put on the pillow in there and took the mattress out of the crib and put it on the floor. I then brought him into his room and he laid down right on the mattress. He played for a few minutes, but basically went right to sleep. He woke up sometime after 7:00 this morning and was playing happily while I came too. I was a little worried about him going down for his nap in terms of playing, but he again played for only a couple of minutes and went to sleep, as you can see. I guess he's ready for the big boy bed, huh? I don't know if we're going to get the mattress, box spring, and sheet set this weekend or if it will wait a little bit. At the bare minimum, the crib is being taken apart this weekend so we can have the space usable again. We already have the bed itself, it's the one jeffy's brother slept on and jeffy had the same style bed as a little boy. Pretty cool, if you ask me. We're considering painting the bed. I'm guessing that won't happen, though. At least not any time soon.

a sentence?

i think we had our first four-word sentence tonight. owen was putting his bucket hat on his head and i asked him what was on his head. he pointed to it and said, "this is a hat". he is getting to be such a big boy! i'm amazed to tears, and so incredibly proud of him. last night we were reading "brown bear, brown bear, what do you see?" and when we got to the white dog page, i said, "white" and owen said "white dog". i know he was mimicking the word white, but he still said it!

we went to a car wash today - a local company was doing free car washes to help celebrate their 50th anniversary so we went. it was one of those where you get on a conveyer belt. that made it so i could watch owen the whole time. when the soap started hitting the windshield, his eyes got as big as saucers. i'm not sure he knew exactly what to think of it. at one point, it looked like he was about to cry from fear. (he didn't though!) now my car is nice and shiny clean. it needed it, too. desperately.

update on the zoo thing

i had a message from the p.r. director at the zoo today telling me that we will be getting the top zoo membership as part of our prize package. she also gave me the phone number of the lady in charge of the zoo society. i called her and left a message just to confirm what the first message said. she called me back and we might be getting our card fairly soon and it will be good until february of 2009, one year from when our current membership runs out (i think). i'm excited about it! we can take three guests every time we go to the zoo.

two new words today: hat and another one that i can't remember... that makes three or four new words in the last couple of days. begin vocabulary explosion now! it's so cool to witness.

a reason why and a lesson learned

we now know why my mom won the naming contest at the zoo. today i got a phone call from her cousin beverly trying to get a hold of my mom to let her know that my great-aunt passed away last night. beverly was trying to find my mom's phone number but couldn't since she only uses her cell. beverly lives just one city over and saw the article in the paper last week. since that article had my last name in it, she was able to find me and my phone number and therefore get a hold of my mom. it's amazing how things work out. if mom hadn't won, beverly would never have been able to find me to get my mom's phone number and we wouldn't have known about my great-aunt's passing. we're going to get together with beverly in october when mom's here for owen's birthday.

now for the lesson: NEVER try to use a cookie sheet to make jello jigglers. use a cake pan instead. i ended up with (red -what other color would it be!) jello all over the kitchen. literally. it was all over the counter and the floor, in drawers and cabinets, as well as on the doors to the drawers and cabinets. once i got the mess cleaned up, (and formula 409 works beautifully for getting red off of countertops and floors) i tried again, this time using a cake pan. i still managed a small spill, but it was very small, just one little sploosh as the liquid was moving while i was putting it in the fridge. owen loves jigglers, and i'm having a hard time getting him to understand that he needs to wait until play group today to have more.

owen's doctor

i just found out where she is going: children's hospital in seattle. wonderful hospital, excellent reputation. it's a great move for her. we'll be sad to lose her, but at the same time, we're really happy for her. too bad seattle isn't closer...

ballgame kudos

we went to the mariners game today and it was great fun, as usual. we also took the train up and back, as usual this summer. the m's beat the chi sox 11-5 and swept the series. :-) the train coming back was slightly delayed. here is where the kudos come in. it was standing room only and one passenger in our car collapsed before we left the station. he had a heart attack. luckily, there was a first aid kit, an automatic defibrilator, and sounder (the train) personnel right there. the man had flatlined, but was brought back. the sounder people, seattle fire department, and a couple of passengers did a wonderful job. the man is very lucky to be alive. it was really scary to witness, and i'm glad he came through this part.

moh wa-wa bee!

ok, so the last word wasn't said, it was signed and only after i asked for it. but, that's not the point. the point is that owen walked up to me this morning with his sippy cup asking for more water. i said, "more water please?" and he then signed "please" while asking for more water. then he signed a prompted "thank you" as he was walking away (back to me). what a big boy! i love that he is actually becoming easy to understand. you don't always necessarily have to understand owenese to get what he's saying. language acquisition is an amazing thing. i've never had the chance to see it day in and day out and been able to just marvel at what is being said.

tonight i took out some flash cards and was seeing which words he knew. i'd show him a card, ask him, "owen, what's that?" his reply, "that max!" or "that ball". absolutely amazing. he's picked this weekend to start creating two-word sentences. he's right on schedule for that skill. :-)

new words: max (the cat), how ya doin'? (how do?), hot dog, hi there!, that

ride 'em cowboy!

owen is having a blast on his rocking horse right now. he got it from santa at christmas time and the ears have buttons in them that make the horse clip-clop and whinney, and makes the head and tail move. he knows how to work the ears. every time the sounds stop, he looks at me and says, "did it!" he's also discovered that if he pushes one ear while sounds are going, it will stop the sounds. i didn't even know that would happen. sort of an on-off toggle, i guess. if only i had thought to put him in his cowboy hat....

i had a really long night. i woke up sometime in the 1:00 hour and didn't get back to sleep until sometime in the 5:00 hour. owen woke up at his usual 6:30. when i got him out of bed, he was asking me for something because he said something, pointing, then signed and said, "please?" i didn't understand him, unfortunately. he's playing on his own right now, which is good.

i'm trying to decide whether or not to go into school for a little bit today. it'll be really hot in my room (not warm - HOT) as i get the morning sun beating in off of the blacktop and i have a full bank of windows from the top of my counters to the ceiling and from wall to wall. i also have three skylights. it makes it really nice in the spring and early fall as i don't have to turn on my overhead lights. the biggest trick on the warm days is to open both the top and bottom windows (three of each for a total of six) as soon as i walk in, and then turn on my fans. that generally does a pretty good job of keeping things cool, along with drawing the blinds down to physically block out the sun.

pictures with coco

so here's the story of getting the pictures yesterday.

we finally get down to the exhibit at close to 3:00. owen is starting to get tired but coco is right up against the glass. wendy, who works in marketing at the zoo, takes the first picture of us with coco against the glass.

after this picture was taken, the two keepers from that area of the zoo came and took my camera and went into the enclosure. the man had my camera, the lady had a shovel. anoa are quite aggressive, as we got to see because as soon as the next picture was taken, baby bean (the mama) got up and charged the two keepers. that's what the shovel was for, to head off any ramming by mama.

after this near-ramming, the male keeper went up on a rock bridge that is over the enclosure, while the lady came out on our side of the enclosure with a bamboo branch to entice baby bean to come near the glass. where baby bean went, coco bean was sure to follow. we got a few more pictures of them, some with us, some without.

in the above picture, if you look really closely, you can see that coco bean is starting to sprout her horns.

in these two, she's peeking out from behind her mama.

roller coaster day

what an interesting day this has been in terms of news. first the official announcement about coco, then i get a call from a friend to tell me that our pediatrician is moving in mid-september (WAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!) and then i get a phone call from my s-i-l in ny saying she got a job in seattle and they'll be moving out here next month. oh, and i've been battling a migrane all afternoon, but owen helped by taking a very long nap today so mama could rest on the couch.

jeffy still doesn't know about the zoo thing. i'm going to make him read about it in the paper tomorrow. if it's not there, i'll show him the press release i've printed up from the zoo's website.

her name is coco

the press release is out so now i can share the news. our local zoo has a new lowland anoa (from asia, a species of water buffalo) who was born in early July. she is very cute. we managed to coincidentally be at the zoo the first day she was on exhibit. the zoo did a "name the baby" contest, asking people to write in and suggest names. i did that, using the name that the zoo keepers all liked and were lobbying for, and had my mom, who lives in denver, do the same thing. yesterday, they assigned a number to everyone who suggested either coco or cocoa and then had someone pick a number to determine the winner. they picked my mom's number! she called me and told me that i should be getting something from the zoo because she won. i was totally amazed. the prizes for winning are a family membership, lunch for four at the zoo cafe, and a prize pack from the gift shop.

go to http://www.pdza.org/ to see coco and read the press release. we're going to the zoo with friends on monday so i'll be sure to get pictures (if possible) with me and owen up next to the glass with coco. i'll post those when i get them.

Coming soon...

to a blog near you. Some really cool news, which is also slightly humorous when you think about it! Be checking back in the next day or so. It has to be official before I can spill the beans. :-)

cheese!

we went to playgroup today and owen tried a little bit of cheese. he tasted it, then gave it back to me. the big thing, though, is that he tried it. something he's never done before. admittedly, cheese has a bit of a strange taste on its own. eventually, he'll decide he likes it not in or on anything. gotta love the babybel mini wheels!

the big deal at playgroup this morning was the brand new baby that was there. hayden was born early last week. all of us mommies were making huge efforts at showing our little ones the baby. i am one of two moms in the group who is not currently pregnant or who does not already have two children. we're not even going there for another year, but i still want owen to start getting a frame of reference for when i do get pregnant. the silliest thing owen did was call hayden "isabella". guess he thinks that any little baby is called "isabella". funny how his little mind works. he may get really confused when his next cousin comes in december.

the little bugger was up at 3:50 this a.m. jumping and chattering in his crib. that lasted about an hour, and then jeffy's alarm went off at 5 and again at 6 (i hate it when he does that!) so i really didn't start to get back to sleep until after 6. then owen was up shortly after 7. i let him play in his crib until after 8 because i just couldn't bring myself to haul my sorry you-know-what out of my nice comfy bed. exhaustion is a bad thing when you have a child as active as mine is. at least it's daddy's night to put him down. i may hand over the reins as soon as daddy comes in the door tonight, which might just be at bedtime the way things have been going with his work schedule the last couple of weeks (113 hours over the previous two weeks, 12 hours in yesterday.) i'd be napping along with owen right now, but i have a violin lesson coming in about 30 minutes so what's the point? maybe i'll just lay down on the couch and rest until my lesson comes.

not a fluke!!!!!

we had lunch with my m-i-l today. owen had chicken strips! of course, they had to have ketchup and had to be eaten with a fork, but we can live with those stipulations! lol. we can now take owen to just about any restaurant and order off of the menu for him. at thips point, the only kind of food we might not be able to order for him would be asian. we'll test that later on. we have a favorite local vietnamese place.

we came home and i asked him to go into his room for his nap. he went right there, and straight to his crib. what a good boy! he'll nap for about three hours.

my toe is now a very pretty purple, but i'm moving much better today. it's wrapped (taped to the next toe over), which i think is actually helping me move fairly normally. :-)

i said something to owen the other day that i never dreamed i'd say: "owen, no pillow fights with the kitty." jeff just laughed. i've had several pillow fights with owen. guess he thought the kitty was a perfect sparing partner. it really was a funny thing to say to owen.

YEEOUCH!!!!!

that's about what i said this morning when i split my toes on my left foot between the pinky and ring toes. pinky's broken, i suspect. it hurts like heck when i move it. thank goodness for the crutches i have from when i sprained my ankle three years ago.

jeffy didn't get home until 10 last night. before he left today, he said he'd hopefully be getting home earlier than that tonight. it won't take much. he knows that i need some help. i called him to ask him to bring me home tape so i can tape my toes together. i really hope he gets home in time for dinner tonight. owen didn't see his daddy at all yesterday. that makes it from monday night until jeffy got owen up this a.m. that he didn't see his daddy.

lunch today was with a friend and her 3 year old son and 2 week old daughter. we went to red robin and i looked at the kids menu and suddenly realized that we went from one or two options to five options for owen to eat. it's so freeing! he had the corn dogs and fries and actually ate most of his corn dogs! yay! i'm almost hesitant to say anything, but i think we may be over that hill!

new word today - shoe, as he handed my mine :-)

Chicken Nuggets!!!!!

Owen ate chicken nuggets at play group today! my friend katie brought them to go with lunch and i put a couple on owen's plate with some ketchup. he also had the pizza that was for lunch. i wonder if we're getting over the hump here with foods. he ate hot dogs on sunday and now chicken! i'm so excited!!!!!!!

dinner tonight was dillas. but there was a hitch. he wouldn't touch them until i brought out the salsa, and it's not even the mild salsa - it's medium!!!!! glad he has a taste for the spicier things. oh, did i mention the pretzels in salsa last week? glad that was his tummy and not mine.

be looking for a picture of owen with his cousins here in the next week or so.

peer pressure

we went to target today and there was a mom trying to get her two-year-old son into the cart. her son was protesting (as she put it, they were having a difference of opinion) and she was doing her best. oh, and she's also 6 months pregnant. i went over to hold the cart so she had a better chance of wrangling her son into the seat. we started talking and she told me that her son wanted to go to the grocery store and ride in the truck (on the back of the cart) there. she said i must have been quick to get owen in, i said he goes in very easily (which he does.) then, she used owen as an example and said to her son, "look at that big boy sitting in the cart. can you sit in the cart just like him?" her son said he could and flashed a big grin at us as he willingly went into the cart seat. peer pressure can be good (that was actually part of my motive for going over, to see if owen being in the cart could help get the other little boy in.) how nice to have my big boy be the good example! i hope he continues to do that in life!

It worked!!!

when we went to the pediatrician a couple of weeks ago, i asked her about owen's eating - namely how to get him to eat more variety. she suggested going on picnics and bringing new foods along. well, we did just that today. we had a picnic with most of jeffy's family and hot dogs were on the menu. guess what owen ate!? it wasn't pbj because i didn't even pack that. he ate nearly an entire hot dog. no bun. dipped in ketchup. yummy! he also had two kinds of fruit, some chips, and a little bit of cookie. good lunch, little one! the next test will be to see if he'll eat a hot dog at another time. hopefully, he will. maybe even corndogs...gotta get another box of the mini corn dogs next time we're at the store.

busy weekend

and it's just saturday night.

yesterday was our fifth wedding anniversary. we left mr. o with the mother of one of my students from school (the student is also one of my private violin students), who told us what a good little boy we have. what a huge compliment! she has her daughter (7th grade this fall) and a son who will be in kindergarten in the fall, so she knows about boys. jeffy and i went to dinner at a wonderful restaurant on the water front. we've had a bit of a history with the building - the restaurant it was prior to this one is where jeffy asked my parents for their blessing before proposing to me in april of '01. he and i had a plan (i'd excuse myself to the restroom after we ordered and he'd ask...funny thing is that my mom almost went with me.) they of course gave their blessing and the rest, as they say, is history. anyway, back to the restaurant. one day, the people came to work and it was closed. for good. just a sign on the door. the property was sold and duke's chowder house came in. we went there as a family shortly after it opened and had some minor service issues (mainly, we never got our food). i wrote a letter to the owner, told him what had happened, also mentioning that our server was doing everything he could to get us our food, as was the manager. in addition, i made mention that there were no changing tables in the women's room. nowhere we could change our little ones aside from the floor in the handicapped stall. i suggested that if they wanted to continue welcoming families (there were several children there, and they have a kid's menu), that it would be a very good thing to have. long story short, i received a very positive reply from the owner, along with a coupon for two free meals. he also thanked me for the recommendation on the changing table. we've been back twice since then. last year, there was no changing table. last night, there was. :-) letter writing works! i feel so cool!!!!!

after we had dinner, we went minigolfing. we haven't done that in about two years. i seem to remember having to bend over in a rather funny way just to pick up my golf ball the last time we went...i won the first round, jeffy won the second round. he also beat me by 6 strokes overall when both games were combined. it was a really fun night. we need to do that more often. :-)

so today, we went to the mariner's game and had a blast. they won 4-3 over the Oakland A's. i got a couple of shots of the first baseman from our seats for a friend of mine. i think she'll like them...possibly his best side.... ;-) we tood the train up and our seats were 15 rows up from the field, a section or two into the outfield from first base. killer seats. won them at a silent auction last november.

tomorrow is a family picnic up toward mt. rainier. should be fun. and loud. our family gatherings always are. heck, when there's 18 in the immediate family (three generations), it's bound to be both of those things!

anyone wanna call this? (I already have)

i took owen's temp just before dinner and it was a little high, but not too bad. 99.5. coupled with his general crankiness, nasal-drainage induced cough, waking up (and going pretty much right back to sleep) in the middle of the night, clinging to mama, and change of appetite, i think i pretty much know what is going on. any guesses from all you there in lookoutworldhereicome land?

oh, and we have a new skill. attempted last night, perfected today. at olive garden. owen can now successfully (and rather quickly, i might add) remove his shirt. he did it last night after eating dinner, it took him a while, though. today at lunch with grandma, aunt sheena, aunt samara, cousin isabella, aunt michelle, cousin mikey, aunt cissy, and cousins kaitlyn and austin he managed to remove his shirt again. he did it yet again after he had his snack, then nearly immediately not once but twice after i put it back on. he did, however, try to get it back on.

we had a very busy morning. before going to lunch, we went to the waterfront for a walk. we made it nearly a half-mile farther today than we did last time. today it was a two mile walk! yay! we went for a walk around the neighborhood last night (well, owen did some walking and was carried some as well). then we went ot aunt samara's and then to lunch with the girls. we'll go to the zoo on friday with aunt sheena before she goes back to NY on monday. i'm trying to be good about getting exercise several times a week.

bath time. my poor guy just doesn't feel so well right now. :-(

animal sounds

we were reading a favorite book today - "moo baa la la la" by sandra boynton - and something brand new happened. i read the first part, owen did the corresponding animal sound. he didn't do a pig's propper sound, nor did he do the rhinos (snort and snuff), but he got everything else. that includes saying "bow wow wow" in the clearest i've ever heard it. add that to his rapidly expanding list of vocabulary. along with "hello!" very cool indeed.

at playgroup we had spaghetti. once i told asked him if he wanted to try spaghetti, he did the motion from the wiggles song. it took me a minute to realize what he was doing, but as usual he was right on! (he didn't eat the spaghetti by the way...no surprise there...)

i think we have a sitter set up for friday night, which is our fifth wedding anniversary. our friends katie and rob might be sitting for us. maybe even overnight, if they decide they are up for that. katie will call after she talks with rob. keep your fingers crossed!

molars?

i wonder if owen is starting to work on his two-year-old molars. he's been pretty fussy and crabby the last few days, also not to keen on eating a whole bunch of food. pbj is still good and a favorite, though pizza is a close second, and dillas are third. today for lunch, he ate about five bites of dilla, then threw the whole thing on the floor. i gave him some grapes just to get something in his tummy. he's still trying new foods! doesn't like most of them, but he's trying them! yesterday, aunt sheena even got him to eat a carrot stick. the cutest thing yesterday was when he was trying to give baby isabella her bottle, after she had finished it! oh, and he was up for two hours on sunday night as well as friday (i think) crying. i sure hope it's molars and we get them done before school starts in a month. after this, we're done until he's about 6 and then we'll be able to reason with him and explain why it's hurting so much and have him understand. this toddler teething thing is rough.

this morning we got up, owen got breakfast (nana and o's) and we went to the mall so mommy could get a cinnabon and a starbucks. (i know, i was really bad this morning. but, i don't usually get either of them so i don't feel too guilty. ). owen was greeting all of the mall walkers, even extending his hand so they could shake it. a few did. one lady remarked at what a nice young man he is. basically, he charmed the pants off of everyone he greeted. this of course between bites of mommy's cinnabon. after i ate, we went to the play area. we weren't there two minutes when he made his first run for it. this happened four times, after which i posted myself at the opening and ran interference. he told me he was done by bringing me his shoes and then leading me back to the stroller. on our way out, he was using his new word, "bye-bye!", complete with waving. very cute!

i made another attempt at cutting owen's hair last night. the first try since the "uh-oh! that's way too short!" several months ago. this time i used a longer attachment and it looks nice. i like the look in the back, and for summertime, this attachment is good for the top too. i think i'll make it longer for when it gets a bit cooler but this works for right now. the lesson learned last night, though, was this: strap him down when giving a hair cut. he was all over the bathroom while i was trying to cut his hair. trial and error, right?

pictures from our trip are coming. just waiting for permission from a couple of people to post pictures with them.

Pictures from our trip

Owen and Benjamin, the son of some friends of mine from high school, playing behind the manual scoreboard at Coors Field in Denver.

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With Daddy and Benjamin behind the manual scoreboard at Coors Field in Denver.

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A new way to get down the slide... :-)

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Another new way to go down the slide.

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On the swing at Gramma's apartment. O loved this! He even started trying to pump!

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What a cheese-ball! We're with my mom's friend Rallie. She's 90 and absolutely amazing!

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At Casa Bonita. The lighting was really bad. Sorry about that!

We're standing in front of the waterfall.