All in Good Time.....

After months and months of painfully slow and steady progress on the potty training front, Jonathan is finally there.

He FINALLY tells us when he needs to pee pee and even when he's in the POOL, which I'm super impressed with!

Poop is an entirely different story (sigh), but we're working on it and he is motivated by his big reward of getting to camp out in Simon's room.  I'm still hopeful we'll wrap the whole thing up by the time school starts, but even if he's still not quite 100%, I at least know he'll tell his teacher he needs to peepee, which is a huge step from last year where I had to rely on the teacher to remember to make him go and when things got busy, that didn't always happen.

Still needs a Pullup at night because that's hit or miss, especially when he sleeps in a little.

After this, it will be time to tackle the binky.... but one thing at a time!

He is a stubborn one!

Name-O...

I was putting Jonathan's school picture in his little school memory book a little while ago and there's a whole page to fill out his "favorites" of that particular school year. Filled in all the blanks and got to the bottom where it says: "This is how I write my name". I thought about just writing it for him or letting him scribble, but he has shown an interest in writing actual letters lately and has mastered a couple of the easier ones. He was in the right mood too, so I handed him a pen. "Can you write your name?" I asked.

"I don't know the letters in it!" he replied.

"Well, first comes a J. Do you know how to write a.... " and before I could finish the sentence he had written a not-so-terrible interpretation of a J. I knew he could write an O, so I called out that one, then said "N .... do up down up down." Not bad! "A" was a little more challenging and I held his hand steady, but he made the letter himself. "T" was all on his own, "H" is one of the letters he has mastered, another "A" (help with that one) and "N" again.

Not bad for a little guy who just turned three! :) Mommy was impressed! :)

First VIsit to the Dentist!

Jonathan went to the dentist for the first time today! He climbed up in the chair like a pro and said "ah!"  Got his teeth counted and cleaned and then checked by the dentist. :)

He joined the "no cavities!" club and got to spin the wheel and pick a prize from the prize box! (he chose a beaded necklace and a little airplane) ;)

He did a great job and will regale you with stories about the dentist's office if you ask. LOL! Success!

Happy Guy!

Jonathan seems to have turned some kind of corner over the last week. The tantrums have gone WAY down, he's all around jolly most of the day, he listens, he sits... just yesterday, we had "chill time" in the late afternoon before Tom got home and he and Simon and I snuggled under blankets on the couch and watched The Lorax together. He actually SAT. And watched. And commented on things he liked.

The speech teacher explained to me on Wednesday, after observing some of these changes for herself, and seeing some new things from him during their work together, that sometime between 9 and 24 months the frontal lobe begins to "light up" and this crazy amount of development happens all at once. I told her he has been waking up a couple times a night lately... much like babies do when they are getting ready to crawl or walk and wondered if that had anything to do with it. She thinks I'm probably on to something. The wakings were all in the last two weeks and the new developments have all been in the last week.  Interesting stuff!

She also noted during their play that he's now doing thing thing called "crossing the midline", which means he'll reach to the opposite side for something, (that link is an interesting one and explains why this skill is important) whereas,  he used to mostly just use whatever hand was closest to reach something. Apparently it's a sign this frontal lobe thing is happening and that a toddler is beginning to use both sides of their brain at the same time. Up until this happens, babies only use one side at a time... I'm sure that's the simplified explanation... but kinda cool, no?

Anyway, all this to say, he's like a different kid in many ways now. He's not as frustrated. He's talking a ton and initiating the talking, not just repeating. Amazing what a difference a few weeks can make. He's even more coordinated... less running at full speed and landing on his face, which he was doing a lot of in the months prior.

All good stuff and so fun for a science/psychology dabbler like me. ;)

This Just In....

Jonathan says "up"! :) YAY!

I'm so confused as to what to write in his baby book as his first word... I mean... he definitely was saying kitty there for a long time (not anymore). And then, when, he was just an itty bitty thing, he was holding the toy phone to his ear and saying, "eoh?" for hello. (not anymore and it never started to sound any closer to the actual word than that....) I'm thinking I may just have to write all three. LOL.

A Little off the Top...

After Jonathan got called a girl for the third time this week, (People are just dumb by the way... do you see his truck shirt? I mean c'mon.. but whatever!) I came home today and plopped him in the bathtub and went to town with the hair scissors. Actually, I didn't do a whole lot... mostly just cut off the long hair in the back and on the sides. It was long enough to pull back into a ponytail so it was definitely time. :) The locks are safely tucked away in his baby book already. :)

Yammering on....

Okay, so just in the ONE day since the speech people were here, Jonathan has now officially added the word "go" to his vocabulary.

He also is signing please way more frequently than ever and (also acquired in the past 24 hours), the sign for "all done". His babble has also abruptly changed to that baby gibberish where it sounds like a totally meaningful sentence except that the words are all nonsense.

I think he figured out we were serious. ;) He was a little wary of those ladies and I'm not sure he wants them returning. LOL!

I had to laugh when Ben asked yesterday (not knowing we had people out here to discuss Jonathan's speech), "Do you think Jonathan will have to go to speech when he's in school?" Apparently speech is the cool place to hang out and Ben wishes he could go there... LOL!

Oops. Sorry for the Silence!

I got all Facebooky this week. Here are some of the highlights...

There was this:


That's my Ben. He's all Mr. "I hate school" still... but despite all the cool guy talk, he's doing SO well!! They are learning cursive and his handwriting is becoming downright beautiful. I'll have to scan something new in soon.

There was Simon's broken foot, which I posted about previously. He wore one slipper and one tennis shoe all week, which was sort of amusing. It's back to normal now and he's running and jumping like crazy.. the only difference is that he will no longer sit on the bar stools in the kitchen. LOL.. We're supposed to go have it double checked by an orthopedist, but he's 100% fine now so I'm questioning whether that's necessary.

My washing machine is on the fritz because all appliances hate me. Have I also mentioned we haven't had a working icemaker in months?

We love this recipe! Well, Tom and I do... the boys turn their noses up at it.

I found this little essay a friend posted on Facebook that makes me cry every time I read it.

I bought myself a Ninjago to play with. The boys think this is hilarious and want to battle me all the time. Ben keeps trying to trade me for my awesome weapons, but I refuse. My guy stinks though and I have yet to win a match. Hrm...

I finally got my hair cut. It's a little short but feels SO much better. I was getting tired of wearing it in a ponytail all the time. Ahhh...


No new words from Jonathan. His infants and toddlers evaluation appointment is Wednesday. I'll be interested to see what they say...

Still have the wack-a-doo reader around here. Working on a way to rid myself of her soonish. Stay tuned. If ever you come here and it's locked up, please don't hesitate to drop me an email/facebook message/smoke signal asking what the deal is. I'll try to email everyone the info, but I inevitably forget someone. There is literally only one person I want to lock out, so please don't be shy about asking!! I want to keep all (but one) of you!

Kitty Evolution....

For months now, Jonathan has screeched "eeeeeee eeeee!!!" when pointing at the cat, cuddling with the cat, chasing the cat, "petting" the cat, etc. I've never counted it as a word because he says "eeee!!! eee!!!" when he points to a lot things. Usually things are one of three sounds: "ee ee!" "eh eh eh" or "ooooooooooo oooooo". Not exactly a verbal child at this point.

So yeah...

Anyway, today... TODAY, my friends... he said "Dih-TEE!!!" The first time I chalked it up to a fluke (because over the last seven months I've heard him say everything from "kitty cat" to "marshmallow" once but then never again.) But 15 minutes later, there was another clear, "DIh-TEEEE!!!!"

I'm going to to create a 'third time's the charm' rule. We'll see if he says it again this afternoon or if it goes the way of all the other sounds I thought were words.

Truly, who needs to talk when you have two older brothers who never STOP talking? Interestingly, he actually DOES babble and experiment with sounds more when they are not here, which they happen to not be this afternoon... so there really must be something to that!

I actually have an appointment with Baltimore County Infants and Toddlers to come out and do an evaluation on him in a couple weeks. I'm not particularly concerned there is anything wrong because he's so communicative otherwise. I think he's on Ben's verbal timetable PLUS the older sibling thing added in on top of that. All I know is that we'd all be a LOT less frustrated if we could get him moving on some real words in the near future here. So hopefully they'll be able to give me some tips to get things moving!

Signs, Signs, Everywhere Are Signs....

We have a communication breakthrough with Jonathan! He waves bye-bye now and signs "please." I've been working on "please" for about a month now and he has always looked at me like I was nuts. Yesterday, it finally clicked. Of course now, I am completely powerless and at the mercy of the total cuteness. Hide the marshmallows!

And the Angels Sang....

We took Jonathan's bottle away cold turkey after our road trip this past weekend. It wasn't intentional, although, I'll admit it was long overdue. He didn't want it at all during that awful night he wouldn't fall asleep at the hotel, so we figured we'd already endured the worst of it after that.

We are now two days bottle free and he's basically sleeping all night now. He woke up last night around 10 and cried for a minute and then I think I got up and gave him his binkie in the 1a.m. hour. We replaced the bottle portion of his bedtime routine with a story and he seems okay with that.

Could it be that I am finally done with bottles... for GOOD?

So, now that he's sleeping all night, I just have to make sure I don't fall into that, "Hey! babies are easy! Let's have another!" trap and it will be smooth sailing. ;)

Jonathan-ese...

I think we are getting the beginnings of some first words! Just in the last two days, I've been hearing some of the same "words" always directed at the same things.

Here's the current Jonathan to English translation guide --

* "Namnamnam!" - Yum yum yum. Usually uttered while licking the powdered sugar shaker in the pantry.

* "Bah!" - Ball

* "Eowwwwwwwwwwwww" - answer to "What does a kitty cat say?"

* "Raaaaaah!" - answer to "What does the tiger say?"

* "ooo awwwww!" - said while pointing to something he finds interesting, especially soft and fuzzy things that resemble cats and most often, Davey the Cat, who takes this sound as his cue to get up and relocate.

* "Ho?" - said while holding anything resembling a phone up to the side of his head

Off to the Races...

Just two weeks ago, he was still taking a handful of steps and falling... check him out now! Still holding off on his first shoes until the end of the summer though. Bare feet rule! :)

Finally... a Reason for the Rough Nights...

Tooth sighting!! Bottom right one! :) Wahoo!!!

On the Move...

The littlest, he is off on all fours now. I think it happened over the weekend, but I'm not sure. All I know is he's off to the races. He also started crawling over to anything and everything he can and pulling up on it. This makes life exceedingly difficult because I can't take my eyes off him for a SECOND if he's not contained in the exersaucer/jump-up/highchair because he doesn't yet get that he shouldn't let go of things and he has a tendency to just to freefalling sideways or backward. I also have to watch the monitor like a hawk when he wakes up from his nap, because it's only a matter of time until he pulls up in the crib and then falls and whacks his head on one of the sides. He sure is enjoying his newfound supermobility and vertical lifestyle though!!!

On His Own Two Feet...

Mark my words, this child will walk by nine months just like his oldest brother. Just in time for me to be figuring out how to babyproof a new house!!!! It's all good though. He'll be so pleased with himself once he can run with the big dudes!

Just for kicks, here's a photo of Ben the day I managed to catch him with my camera... he was ten days shy of seven months old. Jonathan? Nine days from seven months. Weird, eh?

And, He's Off...

He got even better at it as the day progressed. Also, just yesterday, he started babbling "da da da da" here and there. UGH! The growing up needs to stop! Just kidding, this kind of growing up is actually encouraged.... mobility and the ability to verbalize are valued traits around this house. Now, if he could just learn to dress himself. ;)

OH! And I took him to the doctor today to get his ears checked because he's had a whopper of a cold the last two days. His ears are perfect, which was a huge surprise. So yay for that. Also, he is currently 16 pounds, 2 ounces. :) Quite the little weight to be hauling around lately!!!

The Real Deal...

We were waiting for pizza to arrive tonight, so we killed the time giving Jonathan his first taste of oatmeal. (I skip the rice cereal because I'm still traumatized from giving it to Ben, who had a bad reaction to it) Anyway, the gang was all here, so it was a good a time as any...

First bite -- seriously, somehow he knew exactly what to do with this. He opened right up for the spoon!


Then he tried to take over control of the spoon... seemed to be trying to get it in there faster.


This isn't bad!


Yeah, I'll just take the whole bowl, okay?


Anyway, it was a success. He didn't eat very much, but he seemed to enjoy it. We'll try again tomorrow!

First Foray Into Real Food...

For the last week or so, I've been letting Jonathan taste little bits of mushed up banana off of my finger. The first time he tasted it, he looked at me like, "Really?! Where has THIS been for the last four months!?" and then shoved my finger so far back into his mouth he gagged. Yesterday, I pulled out one of his Christmas presents, the mesh feeder... I shoved a little bite of banana in it and gave it to him in the hopes that it would buy me a few minutes to work on dinner.

He loved it! I gave him some more this afternoon while Simon and I were having lunch and took some pics.

Still haven't given him cereal or baby food yet... but maybe soon. I just haven't had the time to set it all up and give it the time (and photo documentation) it deserves. LOL! Also not sure I'm ready to add it into my crazy daily routine just yet. I think he'll take to it quickly though, from the looks of this!!! ;)

Nomnomnom...

A Milestone Kinda Day!

Little man rolled back to front just now! I missed it too because I had run to the bathroom... left him in the living room on his back, returned to find him on his belly reaching for a toy! Gah!