The Small Family     

Well, our biggest news of the week is that THEO IS A WALLYPOG AT LAST!!!! For those of you wondering what on earth a Wallypog is, it’s a child who has mastered survival back-float through the Wallypogs Swim School. And after two summers of working at it, Theo has finally done it! I took him to his lesson Monday morning, and he did fantastic. Still bellowing mightily, mind you…but floating for several minutes on his own and recovering from almost all falls into the water. His teacher, Monica, said, “I think this might be the week!” I went home and told Chris, “Well, I think that’s a little optimistic, but maybe next week….” And then I took him Tuesday morning, and he basically did everything he needed to do to graduate. Monica said, “Technically, he’s done it. But why don’t you bring him back tomorrow, when you have your camera, and we’ll do his official graduation?”

And so, Wednesday morning, Chris took two hours off work, and we headed down to the pool for The Big Day! And Theo came through it with flying colors! Technically, he only had to float for five minutes to graduate, but he did more than that. You can see our remarkable son’s graduation on the Videos page of our site (at the bottom--the video is called “Our Little Wallypog”), if you didn’t already see the video on Facebook. (I posted it there the day he graduated.) You’ll see Monica start by pulling him into the water off the edge of the pool. He actually went in deeper than she intended, but he surfaced within seconds without a hitch. And then proceeded to float on his own for seven full minutes, after which time Monica stopped him so they could practice “falls.” (Note that he floats just like his daddy--legs moving all the time. But hey, whatever works.) In the video, you’ll see Monica do a “dipsy” with him twice--flipping him feet over head. Why do they do this seemingly rather cruel flip? Because chances are, if a child falls in the water, he falls headfirst, with his feet following. (He leans over to look into the pool, and whoops--headfirst into the water.) So they need to be able to recover from a disorienting “fall”--thus the dipsy. You’ll see that Theo surfaced and floated after the dipsy without a problem both times.

She also had him do several falls off the side of the pool, and you’ll see that by the end of his graduation, he’s actually jumping off the step on his own when she tells him to…and then surfacing and floating.

You’ll also notice that he’s talking throughout the video (though I muted the audio and put a soundtrack to most of it, since there were a lot of other people at the pool that day and thus a lot of distracting background noise). Wonder what he’s saying? He’s trying to get Monica to sing to him a lot of the time--which she didn’t do, because they need to be able to float even when they feel “alone.” That’s also why she stays behind him most of the time--so he can’t see her. So he’s telling her “ABC, ABC! Twinkle Twinkle! Bus!” trying to get her to sing his favorite songs. (“Bus” is “Wheels on the Bus,” in case you were wondering.)

When he’s pointing, he’s pointing at the nearby swing set and bellowing that he wants to go on it. The deal every day was that if he was a good boy who cooperated with Miss Monica at his lesson, he could go on the swing set afterward. Alas, he only got that privilege about half the time, given his stubborn streak. ;-)  

And last but not least, sometimes he’s yelling, “Jump! Jump!” because, believe it or not, he actually likes jumping into the pool (from a sitting position on the side or from the steps). In fact, we took him to the pool at the gym on Friday night, and he actually asked to “Jump!” and “Float!” several times…so we let him, and he jumped and floated like a champ there, too.

There were tears and cheers all around at the pool on Wednesday. Deborah and Monica (his teachers) just love him, and they cried when he finally graduated. And the other parents at the pool think he’s hilarious because he is so stubborn and spends so much time yelling at Monica that they all think he’s pretty much a kick in the pants. And then there’s his girlfriend, Scotti (who he calls “Soggy”). Scotti is Monica’s eight-year-old (?) daughter, and she’s in love with Theo. She would bring green beans to the pool for him, because she knows he loves them, and she would always talk to him and play with him afterward. (You’ll see the side of her face right in the very beginning of the video, and there's a picture of them together in this week's album, too.) And she told her Mom and Grandma (Deborah is Monica’s mother and Scotti’s grandmother), “It’s not going to be fun at the pool anymore without Theo!” And the love is mutual. Theo talks about “Soggy” all the time, as well as “Mocka” (Monica). He he he…I think my boy likes older women!

So that’s our super-big news for the week, and we are so pleased and excited that all Theo’s hard work finally paid off!

In other Theo news, potty training continues to go very well. Theo hasn’t worn a diaper other than for naps and nighttime in nearly three weeks, and he’s been nearly flawless this week with using the potty (one time he got a little outside the potty as he was running to get to it, but I consider that success, as 95% of it went in the potty, and he was on his way there and just got a bit ahead of himself). He wears his big-boy pants whenever we go out, and he stays dry. We’re still doing a lot of “naked time” inside the house just because he hasn’t quite mastered pulling his pants off by himself yet, and it turns out that he’s a very independent potty-goer. Instead of telling us he needs to go, he will very often just march in there, go, and then come present us with the evidence. So I don’t want to derail him by putting him in pants that he can’t yet remove--it’d be really sad if he went to the potty like a big boy and then ended up soiling himself just because he couldn’t get his pants off by himself! So every time he is in pants, we have him work on taking them down himself, and I think soon he will have mastered it. Until then, he is still The Streak.

Another major potty milestone this week: Theo is now using potties other than his own. Not all the time, but we’ve had three successes with potties other than his own. And one was at the gym, of all places. The day he graduated from float class, he asked to go to the gym in the afternoon. (He loves their play-care.) So we took him there, and as always, we had him go potty before we left home and put him in big-boy pants. We always tell him, “If you need to go, ask one of the grown-ups, and they’ll help you.” But we didn’t figure he’d do it so soon, because up until this week, he has wanted nothing to do with any toilet other than his own. And although the play-care toilet is child-sized, it looks like a small version of an industrial toilet--so kind of scary, if you think about it! Anyway, after 30 minutes of working out, we went to pick him up at play-care, and they said, “Oh, hi. He just finished going potty.” My jaw dropped, and I said, “In your toilet?” thinking perhaps they meant in his pants. Yep--indeed, he went in their toilet. And he was so proud that he came running over and dragged me into the bathroom to show me the toilet he had used. I was so proud!

We’ve been met with some skepticism about this potty-training method, but I have to say that I’m sold, as is Chris. I don’t know if it would be as easy with every kid as it was with Theo, but it sure worked well for us and for Theo. He seems to have no anxiety about going to the bathroom like a big boy…and no desire to return to the world of diapers. (He often stays dry all night and through his nap, too.) And as for the skepticism…well, here’s something I’ve learned as a parent: There is always going to be someone who thinks you’re doing things wrong and who feels compelled to tell you that. But I’m a firm believer that every child is different and thus every parenting situation is different, and everyone has to find the right fit for his or her family. What we do isn’t always by the book, but it’s always well researched and thought out, and it works well for the three of us. And I’m pretty sure we must be doing something right, because we have a pretty terrific kid!  :-)

But on to the other events of the week. Chris and I started out the week with a “date” to the State Fair to see one of his favorite bands: Little Big Town. The last concert we saw was George Strait (my favorite!!) when I was six months pregnant. Little Big Town opened for George Strait on almost every show on that tour--except Sacramento and one other location. Chris was quite disappointed, as he’s a big LBT fan. (Though I liked Josh Turner, who filled in for them….) So this time, when Chris saw LBT was coming through town, he was determined to go. We bought tickets, lined up Grandma Diane to babysit, and off we went.

I actually really enjoy the State Fair, even though it’s extremely hot (especially now that they’ve moved it to July--it was over 100 degrees!), so I was really looking forward to it. We got there a couple hours before the show so we could eat and go see the exhibits. Every year we try some horrible fried fair food, and this year was no exception. After a decidedly unhealthy dinner of a corn dog and barbecued corn (for me) and a tri-tip sandwich with cheese fries (for Chris), we ended the meal with two fried delights: fried M&Ms and fried tiramisu. The tiramisu was blah--it just tasted like unbaked dough, really. But the M&Ms…ooh la la! Heaven on a stick, I tell you… In case you’re wondering how they did it: It appears they had a “stick” of caramel that they shoved a popsicle stick in. Then they rolled the caramel in M&Ms, dipped the whole thing in batter, and deep-fried it. The end result looked like a corn dog but tasted like a hot, gooey candy bar. I couldn’t eat a whole one myself (super rich!), but I very much enjoyed my half of the one Chris and I split!

Afterward, we went and saw the livestock exhibits, where I fell in love with a baby pygmy goat. (Oddly, Chris wouldn’t let me bring it home. Pshaw!) We swung by the animal nursery (baby piglets!) and then headed over to the lovely, air-conditioned arts exhibits. I love the photography and artwork contests, and Chris really enjoys the furniture-making contests. They also had a really neat animation exhibit that we both liked, and we stopped into the small-animals exhibit (also air-conditioned…ahhh!), too. I think Chris was mildly embarrassed by my enthusiastic reaction to the chinchillas and fancy chickens, but he has learned to live with it. :-)

The Little Big Town show was quite good, although we had to escape our seats. We actually had very good seats (10th row), but people were packed in like sardines, and everyone in front of us was standing, so we couldn’t even see the show. (But the people behind us were sitting, so we didn’t want to stand and block their view.) So after about three songs, we ditched our seats and went to the back of the seating area, where we had several rows to ourselves and a much better view of the stage. I don’t know much LBT music, but I enjoyed the show anyway. And Chris knows all their songs, so he really loved it.

We got a favorable report on Mr. Theo upon arriving home. Grandma Diane got to see firsthand what a master he is at the art of stalling, as he conned her out of drinks and all manner of other things to try to avoid bedtime. He he he he…

Since Theo graduated from float classes on Wednesday, we had Thursday morning free, thus I was able to take him to the park before the heat set in. And what did we find at the park but three baby kitties! One black and two gray--and Theo has been talking about them ever since. He loved the kitties and kept wanting to scratch their backs. They loved him, too, and kept following him around. The only slight problem came when he saw one climb a tree, and he decided that he, too, should be able to climb said tree. It’s still a baby tree, so not so much….

Friday morning, Chris and I took Theo to Little Gym, and I’m pleased to report that Chris now has a girlfriend. Wondering who? How about none other than Jazleen, the little “bully” girl that Theo keeps trying to share with?! For two weeks in a row, Jazleen has been quite attached to Chris. Last week she walked right up and sat down in his lap for the ending song, and this week she kept bringing him books and balls. I think she loves him. Good taste, little one… ;-) (For the record, she hasn’t been as bullyish the last two weeks. Maybe she was having a bad couple weeks before that.)

I had to take my Mom to an appointment in Sacramento on Friday afternoon, so Chris and Theo spent the afternoon together while my Mom and I had a delicious lunch at the Cheesecake Factory and then attended to our business. Mmmm…cheesecake…. Can never go wrong with that!

We haven’t been to the farmer’s market in Davis in quite some time, so that was our destination on Saturday morning. It’s held in a big, nice park, so Theo always enjoys running around and playing there, and we loaded up on lots of fresh produce, including pickling cucumbers! You may recall that last week I mentioned Chris’s and my desire to try some new, homemade things as a sort of fun, do-at-home-cheaply activity. This week was homemade pickles, and I’m pleased to report that they are awesome! Chris actually hates pickles, and I had to pretty much beg him to try one. But he ate it and said, “Wow, that’s good! If pickles all tasted like that, I’d eat them! This is the best pickle I’ve ever had!” He even decided that he would let them grace his hamburger that night. I think that’s high praise. :-) Next week, we may try homemade strawberry preserves, since strawberries are in season and plentiful right now.

We also split a sandwich at our favorite deli in Davis (Zia’s), and Theo devoured a kidney/garbanzo bean salad, getting oregano all over his face in the process. A good time was had by all!

Sunday was the Great Purse Search. You see, now that I no longer need to schlep around a giant diaper bag filled with…well, diapers…I figured I ought to treat myself to a cute new purse! And so, I now have a lovely new purse that I found for a bargain $18 at Ross. I love a bargain! And I love not carrying a diaper bag anymore!

So that’s the big news from the Small household this week. Hope you’ve all had a good week!