The Small Family     

Well, Theo has learned a fun new word this week: mine! Every toddler’s favorite word, right? That and “no,” anyway. The funny thing is, this new word came about in reference to the pooper-scooper shovel, which he was carrying around the backyard. He kept saying, “Mine! Mine!” about it. Um, okay, sure--if you want the task of scooping poop, Theo, be my guest!! (Alas, he has developed an odd fondness for this tool--he also kissed it. I think it’s a true sign of a reformed germaphobe that I didn’t keel over right on the spot from that.)

Another new word he loves is “mow-mow.” This is his word for lawnmowers, people mowing the lawn, or anything to do with lawn-mowing, really. He’s obsessed with lawn-mowing, and I can’t take him to the park now without him saying “Mow-mow! Mow-mow!” and trying to charge across the street to the house where, a week ago, we saw a man mowing the lawn.

We’ve spent a lot of time at parks this week, enjoying the nice spring weather. It’s supposed to start raining again tomorrow, so we’re living it up while we can. Sunday morning, we even got a try a new park when we met Janeane, Emma, and Jamie at a huge park near their house. Wow, what a place! Lots of slides and things to climb, and Theo even rekindled his former love of the swings. (For a long time now, he has wanted nothing to do with the swings and howls to be gotten out of them pretty much the minute I put him in. But today he was content to swing for a good 10 minutes, next to his lady friend, the lovely Miss Emma.)

We also enjoyed the nice weather this week by building a new canopy in our backyard on Saturday. Well, assembling is a better word. It’s a movable 10-foot-by-10-foot canopy from Target…some assembly required. It actually wasn’t bad to build--only took us a couple hours, and Theo was a big help. Chris showed him how to use a ratchet, so he got to help ratchet a few bolts. He was quite proud of himself. And we were quite pleased because the exertion of helping us to assemble the canopy apparently wore the boy out, and he took a three-hour nap! That’s pretty much unheard of in our household--I can count on one hand the number of times he has done that in his life. I had a ton of work to do, so I was quite pleased.

Work has been the recurring theme this week. It seems all my authors decided to finish their manuscripts at once, so I’ve been buried. Chris has been helping me out with a couple interview chapters, so he’s been working nights on those while I work on other bits. Chris has also been putting in a few extra hours at work, to bring in a little extra money for that darn tax bill. So, we don’t have too many pictures or too much exciting news to post this week. Work doesn’t make for very interesting blogging, I’m afraid.

We did, however, have a fun date night on Friday. Grandma Diane came over to watch Theo while Chris and I went to the credit union to establish our new account. Long story short, we are ditching Bank of America, our longtime bank, because of their complete unwillingness to work with us on something, despite the fact that we’ve been perfect customers with no late payments, no overdrafts, and outstanding credit scores for more than 14 years. (Well, I have--Chris came on with them a few years ago, when we combined our finances.) I won’t go into the details here--it’d just make me angry all over again. So anyway, we took advantage of my Mom’s offer to babysit so we could go establish our new accounts at Patelco. And while out, we also went to sushi for dinner--yum! And, we went to Toys ’R Us to do Theo’s birthday shopping. As usual, we could’ve spent a fortune in there, but I’m pleased to say that we stuck to our budget, and Theo will be getting three very nifty presents from us next weekend. (A water table for outside that actually pumps water through a faucet--he is obsessed with the hose and water and always wants to be playing in the backyard, so we think he’ll love this. Also a small bubble gun, because he loves bubbles. And a ViewMaster. Remember those? They look like a small plastic camera, and you put a disk in and press a button, and you can view different pictures? Theo is very interested in cameras lately, so we figured he might like that.)

So although setting up bank accounts isn’t the most exciting date activity, eating sushi and shopping for Theo was. We had a good time, and my Mom reported that Theo was a little angel, despite developing a fever partway through the evening. I think her biggest amusement came while they were out in the backyard. Theo desperately wants to go through the gate into the front yard, but we won’t let him. So he tries to climb the fence. On my Mom’s watch, he apparently dragged his little bike from the patio around the side of the house to the gate, and then used it to try to climb the fence. He fell off and ended up sort of hanging over the bike, so my Mom inquired, “Would you like some help?” He apparently looked seriously at her and politely said, “No”--as if to say, “No thanks, lady--I don’t need your help! I’ve got this covered.”

Another fun thing this week has been Theo’s obsession with counting. Five was the first number he learned, and eventually he added six to that. All of a sudden, he can count from five to twelve (sometimes thirteen). And he’s doing it all the time! We’re not sure what he has against one through four, but he always starts at five and goes up to at least twelve. Ha ha, that’s my boy--never doing things the “normal” way!

I actually managed to get some iPhone video of him counting and using his fork (because he always has to multitask, much like his mama), so I’ve posted that to the Videos page. Just scroll down to the bottom of the page, and you’ll see it. The words are a little garbled because he had his mouth full, but you get the idea. (It starts a little slow, but hang in there--the counting is really cute!)

We also introduced Theo to the wonders of the computer this week. He’s so interested in what we’re doing on ours that I figured he might like something he could do on one. We have a couple old spare laptops, so I bought a Sesame Street program for ages 18 months and up and installed it on one of our spares. He loves it! It’s designed to help kids learn letters, numbers, shapes, colors, words, sounds, following directions, etc., and it’s set up in such a way that the child can press any key on the keyboard to get a response. (Because what 18-month-old can grasp the concept of pointing and clicking at a specific place with the mouse or pressing a specific key?) So the parent helps the child move from activity to activity by clicking on certain directions when necessary, but for the specific activities, the child simply presses keys, and that makes certain things happen in the program. One activity, for example, has Ernie asking the child to imitate certain things he’s doing--clapping his hands, raising his arms above his head, nodding yes, etc. Theo was a champ, able to imitate almost everything. Another activity brings up letters, numbers, and objects based on whatever key the child pushes--pressing the A brings up a letter A with an apple, and Ernie talks about the apple. It just things like that, but Theo is having a ball with it. It’s really fun to work on it with him. It requires some participation from me, but it’s mostly interaction from Theo, so I’m able to set him up on that and accomplish some nearby task while he works through the activity. Lots of fun for him, and it even gives me a chance to get a few thing straightened up while he plays.

It’s hard to believe it, but Theo will be two years old in just over a week! Next weekend, Grandma Kathy and Grandpa Tom will be coming up to visit, so we’ll have a birthday dinner for Theo probably on Sunday, with Grandma Diane joining us too. I’m planning to make white chili and white sangria, at Grandma Kathy’s request, and I’ve got big plans for Theo’s cake. What I should really make him is a mow-mow-themed cake, but that’s a little challenging. So instead, I’m going to make a truck-themed cake, as he loves all things that go vroom. I’ve already got green food coloring to make some grass (perhaps out of shredded coconut) and Cocoa Crispies cereal to make a dirt/gravel road. I picked up some Matchbox trucks as the vehicles…now I just need to figure out how to get a tree or two on there. Anyway, you can bet that I’ll be posting lots of pictures of the festivities in next week’s blog, and that should make up for the distinct lack of exciting pictures this week.

Happy week, everyone!