Lots has happened in the three weeks since my last post. My mom came out a couple of weeks ago and we had a great time. We went to the zoo where Owen had a blast watching the animals play, particularly the walruses (who were coming right up to the glass), the sharks and fish, the otters, and the monkeys. Some of the kids there were scared by E.T., the big male walrus at the zoo, coming up to the glass and swimming with his belly to it. Sometimes E.T. went from bottom to top, other times he went from side to side. Owen didn't care. He just loved it. Had a huge grin on his face whenever any of the walruses came by him. When Owen saw the puffins, he immediatly said, "Duck!" It took me a while to figure out why he knew that word and why the puffins were a good place to stick the label (hey, he's 16 months old. That's pretty good in my book!) Finally, several days later, we were reading a favorite book (Moo Baa La, La, La by Sandra Boynton) and on one of the pages is a duck. Duh! As we were getting ready to go home, we went on the brand new antique carousel (does anyone else catch the oxymoron here?) I guess we waited a little bit too long to take Owen on it because, well see for yourselves! Yes, that's Mr. Owen asleep on the carousel. He tried so hard to stay awake but, alas, it was hopeless. Next time we go, we'll take him on it earlier!
Now for the success mentioned in the title of today's post. I have finally figured out why O stopped putting himself to sleep at night. He was over tired and we were putting him down too late. On Wednesday night, I tried putting him down at 7:30 and let him cry himself to sleep. It took 40 minutes, but he did it. He woke up once around midnight and I tried to put him down before he was asleep enough. I was up for another hour or so (got back to bed around 2:00 a.m.). Thursday night, it took him a little longer to go to sleep, but he finally fell asleep around 9:00 (starting from 7:50 or so) and went clear through the night. That means that we (Jeffy and I) also got to sleep clear through the night. Last night, it took him about a half hour to get to sleep, and tonight, only about 5 minutes. Granted, he hadn't slept since this morning and was likely extremely exhausted. Poor little guy. To top it all off, he had a temp of 100.9 right before I put him down. I gave him Tylenol and will be checking on him through the night. This probably doesn't have anything to do with the fact that we stopped nursing this week, does it? (Honestly, I forgot to nurse him on Thursday morning. Didn't realize it until nearly 10:00 that morning. He hasn't seemed to miss it or want it, and neither have I. Guess it was time, huh?)
Today we hung out with our friends Katie and Peter. We went to lunch where Owen and Peter had a blast. They were so well-behaved. No loud noises, until they started banging on the table with their hands and laughing. And they both ate pretty well. Owen is now able to take bites off of sandwiches and fruit. It didn't work so well when the canteloupe was still on the rind...Mommy had to cut the fruit off for him, but she didn't have to cut it up! Yay! After lunch we went to the play area at the mall. My little monkey boy discovered how to climb UP the slide. Oy vay! We really need to get him a slide or something. He loves to climb. (He also loves bananas, which is why I call him my little monkey boy. He'd eat bananas at every meal if I'd let him!) We then went to my favorite "discount" store (concentric red rings) where we bough two of the Little Einsteins DVDs. Owen loves this show. So do I. They take exerpts of real classical music, and pieces of real artwork and work them into the show. Owen only has to see Rocket and he starts to pat his legs (that's how they get Rocket to power up to fly) and then he'll raise his arms in the air for "blast off!" Too funny. He loves any kind of music. He's becoming a great little dancer. Check out http://www.disney.com to see more about Little Einsteins.
So in addition to "duck", Owen can now bark like a dog, nod his head for "yes", and has said peek-a-boo and mine. Ah, yes. Let the toddler years officially begin! It's time for what I call, "The mes, the mys and the nos" as those seem to be the three favorite words of just about any toddler. Oh, and he can now accurately point out four of the five senses - all but touch. Taste is really funny, he sticks out his tongue.
School continues to go well for me. My 4th and 5th graders just finished up a unit on musicals, with the end project being writing their own musicals. They had to take a folk tale or fairy tale of their choice and adapt it to a musical. They had to have at least one song, and could use an existing melody, but had to write original words to the melody and their song had to help tell the story. They got into groups of 3-5 kids. A few groups really understood it and nailed the assignment. Some other groups sort of got it and did ok. Other groups didn't get it at all. They were graded on four things; adaptation of the story (they could alter it, but the main skeleton of the story had to be recognizable - think Pretty Woman and Cinderella), song (did it help tell the story), preparation (which included use of class time, cooperation within the group, and general practicing for the performance), and finally the performance itself. Extra points could be earned for using an instrument, writing an original melody, and/or having a second song. They really liked the assignment and some have even started writing their own play on their own time. Guess I've created a bunch of monsters here, huh? The process was a lot of fun to watch. Basically I just sat back and helped out when kids needed me to. Gotta watch the video and do grades for them tomorrow.
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