The Small Family     

Major milestone of this week? Theo has learned to say a name other than Mama, Dada, Grandma, or Papa. He has been walking around for days saying, “Em-MA. Em-MA.” This came about Tuesday morning, when I told him we were going to the park to play with Emma. Ever since, he has been saying her name over and over. Hmmm, is he smitten?! The funny thing is, Emma has apparently become interested in the idea of marriage lately, and she told her Mom (my friend Janeane) that she wouldn’t marry Theo “because he’s too little.” (She apparently is opting for “a handsome poet” instead. Given that neither Chris nor I particularly enjoy poetry, I’m not optimistic that Theo will grow up to be a poet. But hey, you never know….)

We also took a trip to the park with Luna this week, which was great fun. Luna rarely gets to go on our walks because I often want to stop at Target or Starbucks, and I’m not comfortable tying her up outside while we go in. (She’s far too cute and sweet--someone would steal her!!) But on Wednesday, our destination was only the park, so we took Luna along for a walk, much to her delight. Theo thought it was great fun to have his best pal with him. He and Luna had a lot of fun tromping around the grass. Theo was a little irritated that I insisted on holding Luna’s leash along with him, but he grudgingly allowed it. (Luna is freakishly strong for her size. I have no doubt that she could pull Theo off his feet in a second if she saw another dog or a person and decided that she needed to go see them right now, as our friendly pug is wont to do.)

We got to see Auntie Lynnie this week--a rare treat! Between her four kids and my one kid and job, we rarely get to see each other. (The 35-mile distance between our houses doesn’t make it any easier.) But this week she was up with Stevie, visiting our Mom, so Theo and I met up with the three of them at the mall for dinner. Auntie Lynnie brought Theo a stuffed lamb toy she had bought for him, and it has joined Fraff and Monkey in his crib as a nighttime/naptime companion.

Theo is experimenting with giving kisses these days, and Fraff is the main recipient. I feel a little sorry for Fraff, though--Theo’s idea of kissing him is sort of a cross between a kiss and gnawing his face off. Poor Fraff is weathering it well, though. Luna is very grateful that it’s not her!

Theo’s latest obsession is Toddler Tunes. I think that’s the name of it, anyway. It’s a two-CD set we bought that features all kinds of classic kid songs. Theo refers to them all as “E-I-E-I-O,” since Old MacDonald is one of his favorites, but he seems to like quite a few of them. What makes me laugh is how violent some of these old songs are. Everyone talks about kids and violence today, and while I do agree that certain things are somewhat alarmingly violent for kids, I’m realizing that these old songs aren’t much different! The farmer’s wife in “Three Blind Mice” is pretty darn disturbing, hacking of their tails and all…. And there’s a song about the animal fair where a drunken monkey sits on an elephant’s trunk, and then the elephant sneezes, falls to his knees, and crushes the monkey to death. YIKES! It’s comical, though, because these songs are all cheery and upbeat and fun to hum or sing along to…but then you stop and listen to the lyrics, and they’re rather grim!

In other news of media, you may recall that we bought a Nintendo Wii with our Christmas money, with the idea that I could exercise with it while Theo plays in the same room. At first this plan didn’t work, as Theo would announce “All done!” and wrap his arms around my legs if I tried to exercise. Well, luckily that has turned around. Theo now thinks it’s great fun to watch the Wii…especially if I hand him a spare controller, so he can “play” along with me. One of his favorite games (and mine!) is Frisbee Dog. You throw a Frisbee at a target, and a cute little dog (who looks somewhat like a little brown pug) jumps to catch it and does happy tricks when you get a good score. Theo loves to watch this game, chortling, “Dog, dog, dog!” every time the dog does a trick. He’s also a big fan of the basketball game, which requires you to jump and shoot as if you were really playing. I think he thinks it’s amusing to watch Mom and Dad jumping around. Anyway, it’s pretty cool that he now likes the Wii, since it means Chris and I get at least a few minutes of exercise each day. I’m still jogging several days a week, at least, though I must report that I’m still awful at it. I’ve been at it for six months, and I thought my endurance would build up. Um, no. I can literally jog for a maximum of about two minutes, and then I have to stop and walk. I think this may have something to do with mitral valve prolapse (a very minor heart issue I have), because aside from my heart pounding a lot, my throat and mouth swell up and my gums start tingling like mad. I can’t figure out what else would cause that, and it’s really quite unpleasant. I thought six months of this would build up my endurance, but as I said, that hasn’t been the case. Poop… Ah well, at least I can say I keep trying, right?!

Another way we’ve been having a lot of fun lately is with our little landscape assistant. Theo loves, loves, loves going out in our backyard and playing with shovels, rakes, and garden shears. (The latter is a no-no, but he has managed to grab them a couple times when we’ve accidentally left them on the table--he climbs the chairs to get them.) This week I snuck out back when Chris and Theo were doing yardwork and took some pictures. We’re trying to enjoy the outdoors as much as we can before the blistering Sacramento summer heat arrives. Unfortunately, there are several months of the year where it’s just too darn hot to do much outside here, so we enjoy the spring weather while it lasts!

Friday night was date night for me, Theo, and Grandma Diane. Chris had a fantasy baseball draft in San Francisco, so he left in the early afternoon and was gone until after midnight. To break up the long afternoon/evening, I invited Grandma Diane to join Theo and I on an outing to Whole Foods. Yes, I know, this sounds more like a Chris outing than a me outing--he’s the grocery-store-obsessed one in the family. But actually, Whole Foods has a great salad bar/prepared foods section…AND a nifty play area for Theo. The play area is a little “grocery store” for kids, filled with tons of fake produce and products and baskets so they can “shop.” Theo loves it, and on Friday evening, he practically had the place to himself, save for a little two-year-old named Mia. Grandma Diane and I were able to enjoy our sandwich and salad while Theo played and occasionally ran over for a bite. At one point he decided he wanted to sit in a regular chair like a big boy, so he climbed up next to me and proceeded to eat some corn salad with a big-boy spoon, too. I was really proud of him¾he hasn’t had much interest in utensils until recently, so we haven’t pushed them. But on Friday night he sat and very carefully ate his corn like a big boy for probably close to 10 minutes.

Funny thing is, it had a lot of cilantro and onions in it, so I was rather surprised he liked it. I shouldn’t have been, though--that kid has the most amazing palate for such a little guy. Pretty much the only things he won’t eat are cooked carrots and scrambled eggs. (And he will sometimes eat scrambled eggs¾just not often.) He loves broccoli, Brussels sprouts, sweet potatoes, turkey, chicken, oatmeal, fruits, soy yogurt, quinoa…you name it. It’s kind of funny because I remember when I was nursing him, I read somewhere that if you have a limited diet while nursing, some people think your child will develop a limited palate. My diet was VERY limited while nursing, since I couldn’t have anything with dairy (and dairy is in EVERYTHING, it seems)…and yet Theo actually has a really broad range of tastes. Thank goodness for that--I know it can be a real struggle to get toddlers to eat healthful foods, but so far we have been extremely lucky that Theo is a cooperative fellow about eating things that are good for him.

Following along this topic, we discovered yet another surprise food that Mr. Theo likes: bell peppers. I actually really don’t like bell peppers, so I’m wondering whether he’s really my kid. ;-) Saturday morning we went to the zoo for a bit (where Theo very much enjoyed the yellow-billed magpies and, of course, the giraffes--the chimps were putting on quite a show, too), and then we decided to go to Crepeville for lunch. Crepeville serves, as you might imagine, crepes. I got a chicken curry crepe and Chris got a Denver crepe (think Denver omelet in a crepe). Both of ours had peppers in them, and neither of us has a particular penchant for peppers (couldn’t resist that alliteration!), so we were pushing them to the side. Theo, after eating some potatoes with his fork (yay!), requested a piece of bell pepper, so we gave him one, figuring he wouldn’t be too keen on it. Wrong! He devoured all the pepper pieces from both of our plates and probably would’ve eaten more if we’d had any left! I say, “Ewww,” but I’m glad he likes them.

I do know he’s my son, though, because of his great love of bathroom humor. Theo thinks burps are absolutely hilarious. When he does a loud one, he will often force another one and then laugh like crazy. It so happens that Theo got a birthday gift card to Target from Aunt Linda and Uncle Bill, so I took him over there and got him a LeapFrog alphabet toy. (It’s an electronic learning toy that teaches the alphabet, basically.) Well, on Saturday night Theo discovered that the letter A is really fun on this toy; if you press it, it make the sound for A…but it sounds oddly like the guy is belching when he says, “A makes the sound AAAAAAAHHHH!” Theo thought this was the funniest thing ever, and he kept pressing the A over and over again and laughing like mad. (Yes, I know I’m going to regret laughing at his love of burps when he gets a little older, but I can’t help it. I like a good burp joke as much as anyone…) I got a short video of this amusement, which I have posted on the Videos page. (Scroll to the bottom of find it¾and be warned that it’s pretty low quality and unedited! Just thought it was cute, so I posted it.)

Sunday morning, we once again saw Grandma Diane, as she accompanied Theo, Luna, and me to a pug meetup. Chris isn’t a huge fan of pug meetups--he’ll go, but he’s just as happy to stay home. So, we took Grandma Diane with us instead. I thought Theo would enjoy seeing the pugs for maybe 20 minutes or so and then would get bored, but I was wrong. He played (mostly with Grandma Diane) for a good 90 minutes before he finally started to slow down. He and Grandma wandered around the dog park picking up rocks and bits of sticks and other treasures and putting them in a baggie, while Luna and I visited with the other pugs and their owners. By the end, both Theo and Luna were very dusty and happy, and a good time was had by all. Theo even took a lovely 2 1/2 hour nap after all that morning excitement, so I took him to the park in the late afternoon to burn off some energy before bed. This resulted in him learning two new words: mower (thanks to the man mowing his lawn across the street from the park, which was evidently fascinating to watch) and rock. I’ve come to realize that Theo knows a lot of nouns. When he has some verbs to put with them, he’s going to be a real little chatterbox!

And in the less exciting world of work, I’m actually quite enjoying my new venture. It’s just 10 hours a week (though where I’m going to find 10 extra hours a week is beyond me!), but it’s fun because I get to choose which articles I want to edit. So far, I’m doing almost all travel ones¾hotels, to be specific. Things like “The Cheapest Hotels in San Antonio” and “Dog-Friendly Accommodations in Ocean Shores, Washington.” It satisfies my inner travel junkie…at least a bit. :-) I’ve also done some how-to articles that have been fun. I now know how to install a new dryer hose--woohoo! I admit I was really tempted to edit “How to Install a Koi Pond Bathroom,” because I wondered whether that’s a bathroom for the koi fish in my pond or a bathroom for people that includes koi fish in some bizarre manner. However, I had already reached my article quota for the day, so I let that one slide by. I did, however, discover in my editing that there is a dog hotel in Florida that will shuttle your furry friend to/from their establishment by limo or private jet. No, I’m not kidding. Good lord. I’m going to go stay there myself! Sorry, Luna, you will not ever be on a private jet. I’ve only been on a private jet once, and probably never will be again, so I’m certainly not letting the pug go on one! (I can thank Grandma Diane for my journey on a private jet. Turns out Kaiser Hospital has deep pockets--when my Mom got very sick while we were in Calgary, they stabilized her in Canada, and then we were flown home on a Lear jet. My Mom figured my Dad was up in heaven going, “No fair! You guys got to fly on a Lear jet without me?!” For the record, Lear jets are the way to travel--we got home from Calgary in less than three hours--a smooth, beautiful ride. But I’m still not ever letting my pug fly on one…at least, not without me!)

Okay, I’ve rambled enough this week. Have a wonderful week, all!