Beach Babies

A good example of our crazy cold wet summer ... yesterday was our FIRST beach outing. And also a good example of the weirdness of three-year-olds. They always do the exact opposite of what you expect. So I guess I should expect it by now, huh?

Last time we were at the beach was a random day in April or so. The Atlantic Ocean in New Jersey that time of year is FREEZING. Yet Kiddle eventually made his way down to the water and would not come out. Seriously. He was blue and shivering, but he kept getting further and further in. Eventually we had to drag him away from the beach, with him screaming, "I GO WATER! I GO WATER! I GO WATER!" all the way to the car and all the way home.

So I was thrilled to finally make it to the beach yesterday, thinking that Kiddle would absolutely LOVE it this year. Silly me. He had a great time running around and digging in the sand. But he wanted NOTHING to do with the water. And if I went in just to rinse my feet off, he stood on the beach screaming, "NO MOMMY! GET OUT OF THE WATER!" Weird, weird, weird. The only thing I can attribute his fear to was how rough the surf was. The waves were pretty intense, and — as a child of the bathtub-water Gulf Coast — I can certainly understand how intimidating it can be.

This, of course, marked Bigga's very first beach trip. He was a trooper as usual, napping in the stroller and hanging out under the umbrella tent.


Want some chips to go with that sand?

Soccer For Tots

Or, as it should be called, Soccer For Parents and (Sort Of) Their Tots.

Kiddle went to his first soccer session today with his buds LK and Jack. His class is all three-year-olds and, as I'm sure you can imagine, it was totally chaotic and adorable. Their "field" was an entangled mass of kids and parents: "Hey, let's go listen to Coach Matt." "No, no, stay in the grid, please." "You've already got a ball; you don't need Emmett's too." As expected, super natural athlete Jack rocked it and LK was one of the best at actually listening to Coach Matt and following directions. As for Kiddle ...

He hasn't quite figured out you DON'T use your hands:



Or that you DO use your feet:



But when you get to BUILD A ROCKET SHIP and kick the ball? Suddenly, he's focused and into it:

Blast Off!

Such a silly little thing to write about, but I want to make sure I remember it. And what's a blog for, if not to wax (un)poetically about any silly ol' thing you want, right?

Kiddle's imagination hasn't really kicked in too much yet. He'll play with his animals, but mostly in a putting-them-in-and-out-of-the-barn approach, or he might go as far as re-enacting a bit from the Backyardigans or Sesame Street. I see glimmers of true imagination now and then, but I was particularly struck by something he did tonight while we were getting him ready for bed.

He already had a sippy cup of water in hand, when he discovered a slinky on a bedside table in our room. He first tried to fit the cup through the slinky, telling me it was TOO BIG. But next he stuck the slinky on the bottom of the cup, while letting it dangle toward the ground, and told me it was a ROCK-ET SHIP.

Why, yes, little one, that absolutely looks like a rocket ship! Brilliant!

Well, maybe not brilliant, but I was sure impressed since that's not the sort of thing he usually does. He then spent a while counting down a blast off from the ground and flying his rocket ship around the room. That part was brilliant because he totally distracted me from the fact that he was supposed to be going to bed.

Kiddle peed on the potty!

Yay Kiddle!

His friend LK, who is very proud of her big girl underwear, was over for a playdate this afternoon. Her potty training is going well, but she's still in the stage that you need to put her on the potty every half hour or so. This, of course, meant Kiddle had to sit on the potty too.

Now, sitting on the potty is nothing new. He loves to do it so he can flush the toilet. But today was the first time he's actually produced some pee while sitting there. Way to go! Hopefully it was a bit of a light bulb moment ... but I'm not holding my breath. We're still a lonnnggg way from potty training.

"Oh no. The bridge is out. I fix it!"

Yes, two complete, understandable (at least by me) sentences in a row. Yee haw! So it seems we're making a bit of progress on the language front. Finally. I swear this kid is never going to talk (... although if I hear "Mama, Mama, sit sit sit!" one more time ... argh!). I know, I know, he'll definitely talk one day and I'll wish for his silent days.

***

I did have a good touch-base convo with his speech therapist this week though. One thing we've never done -- because no one thinks it's truly a concern -- is have his hearing checked. I mean, I know he can hear just fine, but he still has such a mush mouth, it's gotten me thinking that maybe he's not hearing the same things we are. And his therapist said, yes, go ahead and get it checked, but she doesn't see any indications that we'll find anything wrong there. She still thinks he is just simply delayed in his speech. So that's a bit of good news, I suppose.

However ... at this point I don't really see the therapy really doing much good. And that's simply because Mr. Independent has yet to see the point of doing what his therapist wants to do. He'd rather just play with the toys and chat a bit. Great. Glad he's happy to be there. But it's a really expensive hour of playtime. Ronnie said that's fairly typical of his age -- after all, he's only two -- and hopefully one day soon he'll grasp what we're trying to accomplish there.

Aside from the fact that he does not have a people-pleaser bone in his body, I think a big part of his slow progress is that he's not that frustrated yet. He gets along just fine in the world and there have only been a few times he's gotten really mad at me for not understanding what he wants. (The full day of "I-AN, I-AN, I-AN!!" comes to mind. Several hours later ... Me: "Oh, you want to watch the Mystery Island episode of Word World?" Kiddle, with a big grin of relief: "I-AN!")

***

Another adorable interaction we often have:

Kiddle, on all fours, crawling about the room: "Moo. Moo. Moo!"
Me: "Oh, you must be a cow today."
Kiddle: "No, Mama. I a Kiddle!"

Hee hee.

Okay!

It seems like I've mostly been noting the anomalies about Kiddle lately, so I wanted to make sure I recognize some of our favourite things that happen on a daily basis. Most of them revolve around funny conversations we have -- his speech has improved, but is still not very understandable.

He used to tug on my hand and say a mangled combination of "go" and "come." And I'd always say "Go where?" So now he tugs on me and says, "Go where, Mama."

He loves to bump into me on purpose and say, "Sorry!"

When you ask him to do something, he says, "Okay, I try it!"

And our favourite ... Kiddle: "Cookie." Me: "You want a cookie?" (trying to clarify what he just said.) Kiddle: "Okay!"

What a great manipulator.

Well, goodnight then.

Tonight Kiddle PUT HIMSELF TO BED.

Well, not really. I'm sure he thinks he's just taking a nap. But little does he know ... he's in for the night. He's developed a habit of going upstairs to hang out in his room with his pacifier whenever he needs a little break. So tonight around 6:00, instead of eating dinner, I heard him head up the stairs. Fine with me. Chill out all you need, kid.

But about 15 minutes later I realized it was eerily quiet up there. I went up to check on him and found him passed out on his bed -- lights on, pants off. I gave him a dose of Zyrtec, put some pants on him, added a blanket and turned out the light.

So it's 6:30 and my kid's asleep. Woo hoo! Although I know I'll be paying for it when he wakes up after his "nap" in two hours or, alternatively, at 4:00 in the morning. Either way, I'll take it.

A bad influence already

Cooper introduces Kiddle to the comedic stylings of Tom & Jerry:

First snow of the year

Well, the first one that (kind of) amounted to anything anyway. And, if you believe the weather forecasters, it sounds like we're in for it later this week.

Three words in a row!

Finally! I heard a very clear three-word sentence out of Kiddle last night. He went upstairs to get his Word World cow and a few minutes later I heard him saying, "Where cow go? Where cow go?" as clear as day. Way to go Kiddle!

What? Aren't you going to miss me?

A big step forward for Kiddle today ... for the very first time he didn't cry when I dropped him off at preschool. Lord, that only took two months of twice weekly meltdowns. I have my fingers crossed for Thursday. Let's hope it's a trend, and not a one-time anomaly.

First day of preschool ...

and I wish I had a better report. Lots of crying unfortunately.

I had hoped it would go smoothly. Last Tuesday we got together seven of the nine kids in his class for a playdate at the park. And on Thursday we went to an open house at the school so Kiddle could see his classroom and meet his teachers. He did well at the open house (I was in the room with him), but today he cried when I dropped him off and an hour later when they brought the kids up to where we were waiting, I could hear him wailing the entire way. Poor Kiddle.

But he didn't cry the entire time, at least. Laurie said he stopped within a few minutes and settled in with some markers, but he did have a hard time when they transitioned from one activity to another. And then when they got the kids' stuff together to bring them upstairs to us, he completely freaked out. I'm sure he thought they were taking him somewhere without me.

So hopefully he will react better on Thursday. But I suspect it might be worse because then he'll know I'm leaving him there. I'm not really surprised by all this; he's never been dropped off before and he's also in an intense stranger anxiety phase right now. We continue the gradual phase-in process for a couple of weeks. Thursday the kids are only there for an hour again. Next week is longer while we also add valet drop-off and pick-up (although somehow I doubt he'll react well to someone reaching into the car to take him! I'll probably be walking him in for awhile), then we're finally up to the full three hours in the third week. Six hours a week to myself! Woo hoo!

Mush Mouth

Big week ahead! Today was Kiddle's first speech therapy session and tomorrow is his first day at preschool.

I had him evaluated just before we went to Oklahoma. While he's had quite an explosion of new words in the last couple of months and he's finally consistently attempting to mimic what I say, he's just not understandable by anyone except me. And I can't understand him when he says something out of context. He hasn't seemed terribly frustrated so far. Mostly, I think, because his three best words -- more, done and no -- cover a wide range of situations. The therapist we met with in July thought he had a typical two-year-old boy delay, and while we don't need to be terribly worried about him, he does need some help.

So this morning we met with Ronnie. I was concerned about how it would go, considering his current massive dislike of strangers, but he seemed to feel pretty comfortable with her. And, even more impressive, he actually sat in his chair for much of the session. Oh, and did I mention he didn't say one word? Not ONE! At least not until we were leaving and he said "bye bye" clear as day. And at $145 per not-covered-by-insurance session, that was a pretty expensive sentence.

We've got a ways to go, it seems.

Trains, Boats and Helicoptors

My parents were just here for another visit (they had free tickets on American as a result of being caught up in the MD-80 fiasco in April) and Kiddle continued his love affair with Ahdah. It's not that he doesn't like his dad or my mom, but for whatever reason my dad is the only person Kiddle will hang out with and not even notice I'm not around. I can't explain it, but I'm not going to fight it.

We had a great visit with them. They're so laid back and don't expect to be entertained. But I was feeling a bit guilty that we haven't done anything really fun the last few times they were here, so we went into the city on Tuesday to see the new Waterfalls public art exhibit. And it was beautiful, interesting and a bit of a let-down all at the same time. We did a half hour Circle Line tour which took you right by each waterfall, but really the best view was from the end of the South Street Seaport where you could see all four structures at one time.

Transportation was the theme of the day. Kiddle was fascinated and a little scared with each new encounter. First was the train ride into the city. I should add here that he doesn't like things that move (shocking, I know, since he's typically a daredevil baby). Last time he rode the little train at the zoo he cried the whole time, and has refused to get on it since then. He even freaks out if you put money in the little truck/car/horse ride-ons at the mall. He'd been on the subway as a baby but this was his first ride as a conscious-of-his-surroundings toddler. And, just as I expected, he wasn't thrilled. Fairly upset, wouldn't get out of my lap. But by the time we got into the city he'd calmed down and realized that trains are ok.

At the seaport, he stood at the railing of the dock saying, "Boat. Boat. Boat." At least until the line started moving to board ... then he was not interested in being a passenger. Of course, once we got underway he decided boats were the coolest thing ever and spent most of the trip running around madly. He had better sea legs than the rest of us (definitely inherited from his dad's side of the family). The river was filled with barges and police boats and speedboats and helicopters and sailboats and trucks and buses crossing the bridges. It was transportation overload and he was in heaven.

Then the return trip on the train was a totally different story: he ran onto the train like he was a seasoned commuter and sat himself down in his own seat with a smug little smile on his face. Such a big boy!

Neat and Messy

Two cute things from today:

While I was cleaning up after breakfast I saw Kiddle come into the kitchen and put something in the trash can. Curious, I lifted the lid to see what he had dropped in there, but all I could see was some plastic wrap. I looked around the corner into the living room and was surprised to see that he was working at getting the cellophane wrap off an unopened puzzle. I couldn't believe my eyes. The Master of Disaster cleaning up after himself?! Not possible. But sure enough as I watched, he got another piece off and headed for the kitchen. It was like someone had switched him with my super-neat nephew. But then he finished up by throwing the puzzle pieces all over the floor and walking away. That's my boy!

Later in the day he was sitting on the couch when I asked him if he had a poop in his pants. He responded by leaning to one side, reaching around to touch his bottom and said, "POO." Well, ok then. I guess the answer is yes. That's the first time I've heard him say "poop" and most definitely the first time I've seen him associate the word with the action. Again, oh, the things we celebrate as parents.