Little tidbits

A few random things about the kiddos that I'd like to capture:

• As I was rocking Cleo to sleep the other night, Gus came into her room and said the following: "Penis? Where are you penis? Mom, where's my penis?" It was, needless to say, amazing.
• Cleo is sitting up all by herself now, which is fun. She isn't crawling yet, but she rolls all over the place and is kinda scooting on her stomach (backwards).
  
• We've started giving Cleo and Gus baths together. At first Gus didn't really like it--he wanted the bath all to himself. Now he requests that they take a bath together. We put Cleo in her infant bathtub, sitting up, and Gus sits in the regular bathtub. It works well, and they both love it. Gus will give her toys to play with, and she splashes all over the place, which cracks Gus up. She LOVES the bath so much. It is so fun. I should take photos. They will both kill us someday for the photos, I'm sure! :)
• Tonight at dinner Andy told Gus he was going to get a timeout b/c he wouldn't eat any of his dinner, and he was throwing his food around the table. Gus then said, "I want a timeout, Dad. Can I have timeout now?" Yeah...

This crazy weather

So just a couple of days ago it was in the 70's and today it snowed quite a bit. We had a playdate at our house this morning. It was so much fun. The guys (Jim, Tom and Andy) took the older kids (Gus, Ash and Ebi) outside. Ebi wasn't too pleased with the sleigh and snow, so Tom took her off right before they took off. I was told that right after I finished filming this video Gus fell off! But they had a blast out there. I'm really glad the kids had fun, but, I'm so ready for this weather to leave. I want the warm weather back, now. Plus I discovered that my walking route that I love is 3 miles, not 2! And Andy showed me how to tack on another mile so it's a total (roundtrip) of 4 miles. But I don't want to walk in this cold, snowy weather, so bring on the sun...

A few quick updates:

1) Gus has been using the potty at least once a day for the past few days. Woo hoo!
2) Gus got into the preschool we applied to and the class we wanted. Woo hoo!
3) We are going on a double date tonight, which is huge for us, since it seems we haven't done this in so long. We're going with Tom & Marisa to a restaurant in the Power & Light District in Kansas City, and Annie is going to watch all three kids: Gus, Cleo and Ebi. Cleo and Ebi should be asleep by the time we leave, so hopefully the job will be relatively easy for Annie. Fingers crossed! :)

More later!

Doing the deed

So, Gus pooped in the potty for the 1st time ever yesterday at daycare! Yahoo! We're so excited for our little dude. Gotta give a shout out to Jen, our daycare provider. She rocks in so many ways. She's helping us potty train Gus by implementing her "naked" strategy. It's working so far! Gus walked around without pants yesterday at daycare and when he was ready he simply sat down on the potty, picked up a book (ha!) and did the deed. Hilarious. We'll see if it continues...I'm sure there will be good and bad days, but we're excited he's at least done it once.

Over and out...

Updates on life

We took Cleo to the opthamologist yesterday for her blocked tear ducts. We were there for 2 hours, and she was so good. She didn't cry at all and when she was tired (it was during her morning nap time), she just fell asleep on my shoulder. The doctor ended up doing a somewhat invasive procedure but the chances are really good that the blocked tear ducts are unblocked now. The doctor took her into another room (thank God) and basically stuck a long device down into her tear duct on each side to unblock it. She brought C. back, and she had definitely been crying, but overall she did great. Her eyes have been bleeding a bit, but not much, and they said that was normal. I guess if this doesn't work, surgery is the next option, but they said 85% of the time this works. The doctor said that if she had not outgrown this by now the tear ducts probably wouldn't unblock without some help, so I guess I'm glad we did it. She is fine now...although she didn't sleep well last night. I imagine she'll be back to normal tonight. And already we've noticed the goobers and tears that usually crust up in the corner of her eyes in the morning are pretty much gone, so that is a great sign!

We're on a waiting list to get Gus into a preschool in Lawrence. It's through the Methodist Church, and our daycare provider sends her kids there. In fact, if Gus gets in and gets our preferred class, he'll be in there with his daycare friend (and best friend in the whole world), Elizabeth. So that will be awesome. Chances are good it will work out, we've been told, so fingers crossed. We're supposed to find out soon. We toured the preschool and it's really gorgeous--it's a new building in far West Lawrence (6th and K-7) and they even have a nature walk out there. It's really amazing--so many huge windows. We were pleased. I've heard nothing but great things about this place and the director comes highly recommended. She was very nice. I think Gus will dig it. He would go 3 days a week for 2 hours a day.

We have to potty train Gus by August if he's to get into this preschool, so we're working on that now. We were just going along without any "methods" but our daycare provider recommended a method that worked on both her kids. I'll report more later on the specifics, but it involves letting Gus walk around the house completely naked. That's right...ha! I don't know how I feel about that yet, and I know this method isn't for the clean freaks out there. At first I think Andy was nervous, but he's on board now. So, we're going to try it. The idea is to let the kid pee or poop without a diaper...they feel uncomfortable, and you move the potty into the room they are in most of the time (living room in our case), so they can run over to the potty when they feel they have to go. Like I said, more details later as we go through it! :) Jen has already started doing the process a bit at daycare. She let him walk around naked yesterday, and he did pee a few times on the carpet, but then he sat on the toilet and read his book for a long time, I guess. He didn't go on the toilet, but he wasn't scared of it, so that's good. Baby steps. Funny note on this...we've let him watch the Elmo potty training DVD quite a bit, thinking that would kick start things. Well, our little stinker has decided that it's great for Elmo to wear big boy underwear and poop and pee on the potty, but, it's just not for him. In fact, when we say, "Hey, Gus, do you want to pee or poop on the potty like Elmo?" he responds with "No, the potty is for Elmo." Ok, little smarty pants...

That's it for now. We're going with Hannah and her girls, Ash and Eloise, to a nature center today in Lawrence. Should be a good time! I'll try to remember to take the camera...

ek

Photos and video

Our sturdy boy

Gus had his 2 1/2 year physical today. He's 37.5" tall and 34 lbs. = 86% for height and 88% for weight. He is and always has been our sturdy kid. He's pacing to be over 6 feet tall, so we shall see. We will have a big, stocky boy and a short, petite little lady, or maybe he'll stop growing and she'll have a crazy growth spurt and she'll be the tall one. Who knows!

The weekend was swell. We had family in for Cleo's baptism. It was very nice, and she wore a lovely dress. I have no photos posted yet b/c I cannot find the camera cord...I've searched high and low for the thing and cannot locate it. Once I find it I'll post new photos from the weekend.

The weather this week is so lovely. It's awesome out today but I'm trying to keep the kids on somewhat of a nap sked, so I feel like I'm inside most of the time. Cleo is still napping right now (she kinda skipped her morning nap b/c of the doc appointment, so she's been sleeping since 1pm...and it's almost 4pm). I may need to get the little lady up soon so we can enjoy the sunshine.

More later!

Random bits

A drawing by our babysitter, Annie Harrigan (she's a visual arts education major at KU and just an all-around great artist). This is a drawing of Gus and our cat, Funny Face.

This past wknd was so fun. Saturday we visited Leah and Dan and met baby Ben. He is just so cute. He was so tiny, but bigger than Cleo was when she was born. It's weird how you forget how small they are when brand new. We then went to Megan and Blake's house for dinner (they also live in KC). We had such fun catching up, and I love their house! Gus and their 2-year old son, Oliver, became magical friends...almost like immediate BFF's. Megan and I would spy on them playing in Oliver's room, and they were doing "Ring Around the Rosie," taking hug breaks (so cute), and chasing each other through the house. They were in love, and Gus cried when we left . We need to get those boys together again soon. It was so nice to see them. I hadn't even met Charlotte (their baby girl, 10 months) yet, and she is beautiful. So pretty and has such bright eyes and cute pigtails. It was fun.

Sunday we went back to KC to our friend's Super Bowl party (Josh and Heidi). It was also very fun, my fave part being when Bruce Springsteen almost flew through the tv, crotch first, when sliding across the stage during his halftime performance. Too amazing for words, really. I ate way too much junk, though. Ugh.

I just took Cleo to her 6-month appt. today, even though she 6 1/2 months. She is still our short little nugget! She weighs 15 1/2 lbs. (33%) and is just under 25" long (12%). Her head is 16" (5%). Her doc still thinks she could go through a growth spurt sometime and end up being much longer, but right now she's kinda on the short side. Who knew. According to her weight, she's supposed to be taking in around 38 oz. of formula a day...ha! Whatevs...I'm lucky if I can get her to take in 26 oz. a day. The doc said as long as she's gaining weight and growing, he's not concerned. She's just not as fond of her food as most kids her age. My child? What? She did not get that from me...must be an Andy thing. But she's healthy and happy. Her right eye tear duct is still blocked, and the doc had no luck unblocking it (which is always a bummer b/c that process is no fun for her). We are going to take her to a pediatric eye specialist in about a month to have it fixed.

That's about it for now. Oh, I'm officially done nursing. I weaned her and was finished at almost exactly 6 months (about a week after). It did hurt more than I thought it might, even though we slowly weaned, but all is well now. I have gone through a bit of a mourning period, which surprised me. I've missed it more than I thought, but overall I'm glad I've stopped. Cleo was starting to become rather distracted and disinterested, and I was personally ready to stop pumping and nursing. So it's all good, and I made my goal!

ek