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Henry was a holy stinkin' terror yesterday. Wouldn't listen to me. Did the opposite of everything I would ask him to. By the end of the day, my patience was entirely gone. Actually, by naptime my patience was gone. Dave offered to put him to bed but by that point I wanted to see the whole ordeal all the way to the bitter end. No way was I going to lose out on the satisfaction that closing the door on him for the rest of the night would bring. Sounds terrible, doesn't it? Some days are like that though.

Yesterday morning, I watched my friend's kid during playgroup and then brought him home with us afterward. It couldn't have happened on a better day because at least one member of the 3-and-under-set was listening to me and doing what I asked, on top of being an all around pleasant kid.

This morning I took a deep breath, opened the door to his room to get him up, and sure enough Henry was pushing limits right away. This time, though, I immediately plopped him on a chair and left him to stew for approximately five minutes, no second chances. Within three minutes he was right back on the chair. Since the second time-out, he's been pretty good. Right now he's blissfully snoozing away upstairs. Lucky kid.

Posted by Jenn at 02:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I had an inspiration for today's post, but it's now gone the way of the dinosaurs. Instead, I'll tell you about how when we came downstairs this morning, Henry proclaimed it was dark in the house. I asked him if he'd like me to turn some lights on and he said "No. We don't want to waste energy."

Also: IT'S SNOWING!!!!

Posted by Jenn at 03:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Gravity has a regular habit of winning Elsa's battle to stay vertical and so every once in a while when we're all hanging out, Kim and I will hear a loud thump, and upon investigation we'll sometimes find Elsa sprawled on the floor on her tummy. Henry's used to this, and being a gentleman, always runs and asks her if she's okay.

The other day Henry and I were hanging out at Elsa and Kim's house. There was a lot of pretend swimming, pretend eating, and real pleading for apple cider (at least on the part of Henry) going on. At one point Elsa decided that Henry needed a big hug, so she ran over and put her arms around him. He squirmed and yelled "No! No! No hugs!" until she let him go. Kim told Elsa that she didn't think Henry wanted to be hugged and that she needed to ask him first anyway. After hearing this, Elsa turned to look at Henry, who was looking at her warily. After a few seconds deliberation, she decided to go for it anyway and lunged after him, at which point Henry turned and ran for his life. They charged around the house at full blast, eventually ending up back in the living room. Elsa gave Henry a big hug from behind despite his loud protestations, then turned and walked away. She then went and sat at one of the chairs at her little table, purposely fell off, and landed with a thud on the floor. Henry ran over saying "Are you okay, Elsa? Are you okay?" She said "Yes", then she held her arms out and said "Henry pick Elsa up? Henry pick Elsa up?" I turned to Kim and told her that Elsa definitely has some Southern in her.

Henry may be older, but Elsa is, without a doubt, wiser.

Posted by Jenn at 11:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

...whenever Henry gets a cold I figure it's only a matter of time before it hits me. After a burst of energy this morning that came to an abrupt end once I picked Henry up from school, I'm now dragging. I want someone to come over and make me a delicious, healthy dinner, maybe some sushi, and then send me off to bed.

I'm going to muster what little energy I have left to point you in the direction of Dave's blog. Last night he wrote a great post about chemicals and how they're villainized by the media thus creating havoc and confusion and a rising influx of English majors stampeding into the halls of venerable learning institutions, English majors who could've been outstanding scientists if they hadn't been scared into studying the works of dead authors by the likes of major news outlets. Or something to that effect. That didn't happen to me though. I happen to really like dead authors. Dead languages too. Maybe I'll post tomorrow in Old English, just for a laugh. Also, I prefer dead bugs.

Posted by Jenn at 04:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Henry won't go downstairs in the morning unless you go with him, possibly because he thinks if he goes down alone, who knows how long it'll be before someone comes down to cater to his every whim. One shudders to think... The other morning I was making beds (ha!) and putting dirty clothes in the laundry hamper (as if!) while Henry patiently waited for me at the top of the stairs. Finally he piped up with the following: "Mom, c'mon... Hey! Mom! C'mon! Mommy, c'moonnnn... Mommy! C'mon!" and when I finally wandered over and started going downstairs with him, I got: "Good girl, mommy, good girl!" This happens to be pretty darned close to what we say to Flash whenever she pees on command in the backyard, and I'm not so sure what I think about that.

Posted by Jenn at 07:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Not too much, as it turns out. Henry tossed and turned all night Friday, getting approximately three hours of sleep. He had a little fever on Saturday morning and said his ear hurt. We put him down for a nap at 11AM, he slept hard for five hours, and when he woke up, he told his Grammy his ear had cleared. On Sunday he was fever free and aside from looking tired seemed on the mend so we headed to the red line for a quick train ride before his nap. On the way back, he wanted to get off, told us his ear hurt again, and that he wanted to go back to Grammy's house. Dave and I decided to take him to the emergency room at Mount Auburn Hospital where he had the most amazing experience with medical professionals he's ever had. He hates having his temperature taken, but the nurses and doctor had such great bedside manners that he was perfectly happy to let them do whatever they wanted. He was such a trooper. It turned out he had an ear infection and that his eardrum had burst, which would explain why he woke up on Saturday saying his ear had cleared. Now he's on amoxycillin, or "pink juice", three times a day. We went in to his pediatrician this morning for a followup. His great experience at Mount Auburn really gave him confidence to keep his chin up for this appointment. He fussed initially at the prospect of going to the Dr.'s, and, in fact, requested a trip back to the "new doctor's office" we visited on Sunday. Once we got in the examination room though he let the nurse take his temperature and even stood on the scales all by himself. Then, as if things couldn't go any better, our pediatrician's office went and hired an amazing new doctor whom Henry liked very much. Dave and I walked out of there on cloud nine. I think Henry did too.

To make a long story longer, Monday was the only day we really went out and did anything. We went to Shelburne Farm in Stow to go apple picking because what else does a person do when they're in the big city other than drive out to the country? Henry loved pulling apples off of the trees, but not as much as he loved the sugar-crusted cider donuts we bought and consumed while we were there.

To make lemonade of the whole situation, the fever and burst eardrum forced us to lay low all weekend which means we actually got some much needed r and r. Now we're home, maxin' and relaxin' and enjoying, as Henry says, the trees with all the colors.

Posted by Jenn at 09:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

...the time of year when a mother's paranoia shifts from fear that her kid will drown in a swimming pool, to fear that we'll all die of carbon monoxide poisoning. All of this is to say that today I turned on the heat for the first time, just to get the house temperature up from a slightly chilly 63 to a much more comfortable 66. Then I turned it off again, because despite the definite chill that's been steadily creeping into the air, it still feels too early in the season to be turning it on at all.

We spent the morning hanging out at Megan's house. Her mom is in town visiting. Henry had such a great time, that when he was climbing out of the car after arriving back at our house, he said "Megan's house is fun!" Also while we were there, Henry's nose started running and wouldn't quit. Right now he's upstairs coughing intermittently, all of which leads me to believe we are now officially embarking on cold #3 of the season. This doesn't bode well for the rest of the year, unless he's busy inoculating himself now against everything the 08-09 cold season will have to offer. I'm a firm believer in getting the tough work done early instead of putting it off, so if he's getting it all over with now so he can surf from November into next summer on a wave of good health, he'll have an even bigger and louder drum set waiting for him on the other end.

Posted by Jenn at 03:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

me: Henry, are you a boy or a girl?
Henry: Uhhhhh...nope, I'm Henry!

That answers that. It's been a busy, preschool-centric week here. When I haven't been driving Henry to and from school, I've been spending a lot of time on flickr looking at other people's bento boxes. There are some amazing ones out there. The school Henry's attending has a trash-free lunch policy, which fits in nicely with my apparently strong (and previously latent) desire to accessorize food.

Henry's very much enjoying preschool so much so that he doesn't seem particularly thrilled to see me when I arrive at the end of the day to pick him up. On Wednesday morning he did do me the favor of telling me he didn't want me to go back to the car, and he even gave me a hug when I said good-bye, which is something I normally have to bribe him for, so that was a nice change of pace. He loves the teachers, and loves the activities, so I'm happy that all in all it's been a rousing success for him. Wait until it snows and they take him sledding. He won't ever want to come home.

Posted by Jenn at 07:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

I got back home from dropping Henry off at his first full day of pre-school. When I left he was sitting outside with one of the teachers and a few other kids pulling sunflower seeds out of sunflowers. He was very pleased with the activity and once in a while he would turn around with a seed he had just worked loose, holding it up for me to admire. While he was engrossed with that activity, I snuck over, told him to have fun at school, patted his head, and walked away. It was a little more difficult to leave than I thought it would be, but of the two of us, I'm glad I'm the one whose heart was breaking just a little bit.

Before we left the house this morning I asked Henry if I could take a picture of him to commemorate the occasion. He said "NO!" and ran into the living room. After a little cajoling I convinced him that I would not be taking any pictures of him, after which, of course, I managed to sneak one in as he came back into the kitchen to go to the car. He wasn't pleased with me after that, but it was totally worth it. He doesn't exactly look nervous about going to school, does he?

Now I get to figure out what to do with the next two and a half hours. I'm thinking maybe I should take up smoking again to help calm the nerves, what do you all think?

Posted by Jenn at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Today Henry had his pre-school orientation. He wasn't thrilled after I got him strapped in the car and told him where we were going, but then on the drive he said that school is where all the numbers and letters are and he seemed to be vaguely interested in at least checking it out after that. It's a nature-oriented school so he spent most of his time outside, filling up a sandbox one bucket at a time, helping to clean carrots and apples that eventually got cut up for snacks. He also got to sand and oil wooden blocks that will be used inside the classroom. Basically everything he did was the coolest thing ever. One of the teachers took us inside with another little girl about Henry's age so he could get used to the classroom. He was very interested in two tasks. One of them was using little tongs to pick up little balls which he then placed in little holes. Doesn't sound like much, but he was seriously into it. The other was putting sesame seeds into a little pitcher and then pouring them into another little pitcher, and back and forth, etc, etc, a task he did just long enough for him to never want to stop doing it ever.

After orientation was over I told him I was taking him out to lunch to his favorite restaurant and he said "Okay, go have lunch, then go back to school!" His first day is Monday. Hopefully he'll remember the warm gooey feeling he had about it when he left today.

Posted by Jenn at 04:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Henry worked a little math magic while we were visiting my parents.

Henry happens to know that a certain someone, we'll call him "Grandpa", hordes his beloved root beer popsicles so that he can share them with his grandson whenever said grandson comes to visit. This may not seem like a big deal, but it requires the consumption of blue raspberry and the ever-unappetizing banana flavors of popsicle, because you can't just buy root beer flavor alone, you have to buy the mixed bag. Life always requires a sacrifice of some sort, you know?

Anyway, Henry's Grammy made him spaghetti and meatballs for our first night back in Boston. Henry ate one or two bites, squirmed a lot, ate another one or two bites, then finally made a break for the freezer, which he tore open, quickly locating the bag of popsicles. We told him he couldn't have any until he ate more of his dinner, so he reluctantly returned to his chair where he sat sort of still but not really, all the while looking longingly at the freezer. After about a half an hour of trying to get him to eat, my mom told him he could have a popsicle if he had three more bites of meatball. She held up three fingers, which Henry studied very closely. Finally he got off his chair, pushed down two of her fingers (and her thumb, which was slightly sticking out; he didn't want there to be any confusion), and said "Henry have a popsicle after one more bite of meatball."

We agreed to his terms. What choice did we have? He used math against us!

Posted by Jenn at 10:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Remember back in March when I listed out the three things I wanted to accomplish by the end of this summer? To jog the memory of those who don't:

1. Lose the binky.
2. Get Henry into a "big boy bed"
3. Get him potty trained

Of those three things, the one which really struck fear into my heart was number 1. And 2. Aaaaaand 3.

As it turns out, it wasn't too bad. We tackled item number 1 first by telling Henry we lost his binky. He asked for it a few times then he seemed to just get over it. He never cried or seemed very upset that it was gone.

Item number 2 took care of itself while we were at the beach. Ages ago I bought him one of those toddler aerobeds for traveling. He hated it so we kept using the Pack and Play even though he outgrew it in length and weight. After a week of sleeping in it while on vacation, he decided he'd had enough. He asked to sleep in our bed which we let him do until it was time for us to go to bed, after which we would move him back to the Pack and Play. Henry did this every night until we got home. He seemed pretty happy to get back to his own bed, but we figured if he had spent a week getting accustomed to a bigger bed, we didn't want to lose this opportunity to transition him to one at home. So we brought up the mattress in our guest room and he's been happily snoozing away in the freedom of a full-sized bed ever since. The bonus is now we can crawl in with him and talk about our day after he's been tucked in. It's one of my favorite times of day.

The third one we accomplished with the help of my friend Gabriella who I've since told should write a book about potty training. I thought it was going to be a nightmare, but it was pretty easy, until, of course, he regresses, but, you know, la-la-la-la-laaa...

So, the potty training was the really big thing we needed to accomplish because at the end of the summer Henry is starting school. In fact, he's starting school on the 8th of September. He isn't going to know what hit him. I feel bad, because once you start preschool it doesn't end for a really long time. So long carefree days of playgroups and sitting around banging drums, and hello text books and teachers' dirty looks. Poor kid.

Posted by Jenn at 05:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This week Henry embarked upon the journey that is commonly known as "potty training". Armed with only toddler-sized underpants and a very large bag of M&M's, I laid out the ground rules for basic bathroom etiquette (his dad can flesh out the rest since I don't know exactly what-all men do in the bathroom, being a lady and all) and soon we were on our way. I'm not going to expound upon the particulars because once a kid is old enough to both sit on the potty *and* sincerely ask his mom for a little privacy, I figure I should respect that request all the way to Moveable Type's "Create New Entry" screen. Plus I don't want to jinx our amazing progress. Let's just say he's doing so well you can practically hear the M&M's rattling around in his tummy. Let's also say he's doing so well he got an extra special treat in the form of a magnetic fishing pole complete with little wind-up fish to catch. It's going to be a fun time in the bathtub tonight.

And just for the record, there's nothing like potty-training to make you feel like everything in your house reeks of urine, regardless of whether it actually does or not. One should really not have to focus so much time and attention to another persons, ummm, "outputs".

Posted by Jenn at 03:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last week on Thursday Henry woke up with a runny nose. On Sunday I felt a little under the weather. Henry developed his usual cough but we started using his asthma medication straightaway and after a couple of nights full of good sleep we were both on the mend.

Until Wednesday night. I didn't sleep very well for whatever reason, and was exhausted all day yesterday. Sometime in the early afternoon Henry developed a dry cough which got progressively worse. He had a hard time falling asleep for his nap, then an even worse time last night. He was consistently coughing every 30-60 seconds. At 2AM we were all still tossing and turning. I came downstairs and caught a few z's on the couch, but needless to say we all woke up today feeling pretty lousy. I'm practically walking into walls over here, delirious from both a lack of sleep and from a cold that won't go away. Dave's been burning the candle at both ends trying to get grading done so he's not feeling that great either, and Henry just won't stop coughing. We took him to the pediatrician this morning. I was fully expecting to leave with a prescription for steroids which is what usually happens when he has a persistent cough like this, but when the doctor listened to his chest he said Henry's lungs sound clear and his ears look great (I was worried about another ear infection) and that we shouldn't bother with his albuterol anymore for this cold because it's not going to help. This was all very good news except it turns out our kid is probably coughing because of a tickle or irritation in his upper respiratory system, the prescription for which is honey during the day and a mild sedative at night, the sedative's purpose being mainly to help him relax enough to get some sleep since the cough is keeping him up. So is there an end in sight? Who knows.

Meanwhile, I'm on edge because I've been listening to Henry cough nonstop for 24 hours now. There's no where to escape from it in our house because our place is so small. I end up sitting around waiting for him to start coughing again, and when he does, I get irritated, and then I feel incredibly guilty that I'm irritated because good grief, I'm his mom! That combined with the lack of sleep resulted in a quiet bout of crying on my part when Henry spilled the entire contents of his cup of milk all over the dining room table and floor this afternoon at lunch. I cried all the way to the bathroom to get a towel, I cried while mopping it all up, and then I was okay. It passed just as quickly as it came.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that tonight is better.

Posted by Jenn at 02:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

My kid could win an Oscar lately for some of the dramatic acting he's been throwing his whole being into lately. The last two days have been priceless. Yesterday he threw major fits at Megan's house so we left early, which, as far as punishments go, is right up at the top of his "Things I Will Never, Ever, Be Able to Forgive My Mom For. Ever" list, which made the howling on the way home easier to take because wow was he ever learning a lesson. And for the record, he was an angel after his nap.

Then today there was some drama over leaving the park. He's always good about leaving the park because we do the whole "Pick one more thing to do and then we're heading home," bit which always diffuses fireworks. So today he picked a slide that had been adopted by a carpenter bee that buzzed and hummed and tried to stare us down. While I was doing acrobatics keeping the bee away from Henry long enough for him to go down the slide, Henry sat at the top, seemingly paralyzed with fear. After five minutes I'd lost all patience, especially because by that time I started to get the feeling that Henry was less "afraid" and more "enjoying the show". So I carried him home. And I cursed the bee. And Henry cried. And I didn't have much sympathy.

Lately by the time naptime rolls around I just want to crawl into bed and not get up until the next day. Everyone talks so much about how much sleep kids need, yet hardly anyone mentions how much moms need. Taking into account the way I've been feeling lately, I'd put that number somewhere around seventeen hours of sleep a night. This would mean putting us to bed around 3PM and waking us up around 8AM.

Sounds glorious.

Posted by Jenn at 03:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Things are heading south over here. Last night Henry was up a lot with a cough. We gave him two doses of albuterol during the night, plus two doses of Tylenol. Unfortunately it would take him a while to be able settle down long enough to fall asleep, so we were all awake for about an hour to an hour and a half each time. I had fitful dreams that I attributed to being awake so much during the night, but as the day progresses, I'm feeling worse and worse so I have a feeling I'm getting his cold.

Henry went down for a nap about twenty minutes ago and I can hear him coughing away upstairs. Because he's an over-achiever, he also has a sore throat. I gave him some decaf tea with honey in it. Not too sure it did anything because he stopped drinking it fairly early on, but it was worth a shot. Might have to try a popsicle or cold apple juice later on this afternoon. Hopefully he'll catch a couple of z's, otherwise it's going to be a long evening.

Karen, Thomas, and Beth came over to play this morning. We had pumpkin pancakes and bacon. After breakfast we headed down to the park where we ran into Phoebe and Otto, the latter of which was tearing up the ground what with all the fast tracks he was making everywhere. Henry's cold definitely hasn't slowed him down at all; he was too busy running all over the house and park today and showing off for Karen to stop long enough to feel sorry for himself. I, however, am going to settle down in the living room with some tea and honey and commence wallowing in self-pity. I'm not above that at all.

Posted by Jenn at 03:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Back in 2001 or 2002, Dave and I went and saw Harry Belafonte perform at the North Shore Music Theatre. At one point during his concert, he told a story about how when he was first embarking on his singing career, his mom told him to make sure he liked every song he sang. Her theory was that whatever song he didn't particularly like would be the one that would become a big hit, and he'd be stuck singing it over and over at concert's for the rest of his life. That song for him happens to be "Jamaica Farewell". And by the way, mother's are always right.

When I made my dad and Henry matching pairs of the World's Ugliest Pants, I thought it would be a great laugh, that we'd pack up Henry's pair, and that we'd only see them when there was absolutely nothing clean left in his bureau. Little did I know they'd become the most requested pair of pants in the household. Whenever I ask him what pants he'd like to wear, he always says "Henry's wear orange pants." I now have to look at them almost every single day of the week. The lesson to I had to learn the hard way is: make sure I like whatever it is I'm planning on sewing for my kid, because if I don't, it will become his favorite article of clothing.

And by the way, mother's are always right.

Posted by Jenn at 04:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

You know what would be fantastic? If just once when I say to Henry that it's time for a nap, he goes upstairs, reads a book with me, climbs into his bed, lays down, accepts kisses from all of his stuffed animals, snuggles in under his blankets, and goes to sleep. Although if he did do this once, that would create an expectation that he'd do it again and I'm sure it would only lead to disappointment. My kid sure can protest. And procrastinate.

Meanwhile, ever since Dave got back from his conference, whenever I'm around Henry insists that I be the one to do things. This is especially true when it's time to wash his hands and face before bed. We go into the upstairs bathroom and if Dave is with us, Henry insists that he leave the room. In fact, he insists that Daddy go into Henry's room. When we're all done in the bathroom, Henry then kicks him out of his bedroom and wants him to go downstairs. The other night he asked Dave to leave so Dave stood around in the hallway. When Henry noticed him in the mirror, he said "No, no daddy stand in the hallway, go like this!" then he climbed down off of his stool, walked into the hallway, then walked into his bedroom, physically demonstrating exactly where he wanted Dave to go. It was hilarious and odd all at the same time. This isn't a problem if I happen to be out of the house; as long as I'm nowhere to be seen, Henry's perfectly fine with being put to bed by Dave.

There are three things I'd like to accomplish by the end of the summer: lose the binky once and for all (we had a minor setback), get him into a big boy bed, and potty train him. The most important one is the potty training since he's going to be going to preschool in September and there's a moratorium on diaper changes there, but I'd like to wait on that one until the weather gets a little warmer. I'm not terrifically pushed to get him out of his toddler bed and I'm also not terrifically pushed to spend money on a new bed period, so losing the binky got bumped up to the top of the list. We started with his nap yesterday. So far so good. He asked for it a lot yesterday afternoon and evening, but today he only asked about it once. He's been a bit crabby but that's understandable. Hopefully it'll soon be a distant memory. I'm pretty proud of him for handling it as well as he is, and I'm also proud of myself for managing to put off the whole potty training thing. Again.

Posted by Jenn at 02:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Last Thursday was our last full day in Boston and when I asked Henry what he'd like to do he said "Ride on the train." My kid's so easy.

We headed out the door and on the walk to the closest train station I decided that since people usually go somewhere specific after they get on the train, we'd head over to the Aquarium to check out the seal exhibit (which is right outside the entrance and therefore free).

Henry got the true commuter's experience since he not only rode on the red line, but on the green and blue lines as well. Later when it was time to get back on the trains to go home, he summed up how he (and many others) felt about this particular adventure by emphatically declaring "No ride the blue train! No ride the green train!" True, true.

I have a soft spot in my heart for Long Wharf and I try to go at least once whenever we visit. I love being near the water and watching the planes take off and if you're lucky in the summer you might catch sight of a tall ship. Despite the many field trips I took as a kid to various historical sites around Boston and Concord, I feel like there's nowhere else in the area that is as steeped in history as that one spot, for me anyway. Before heading over to the Aquarium Henry and I walked down to the waters edge and looked at the occasional boat that would motor by and watch the planes taking off and landing. Henry particularly enjoyed throwing rocks down a set of stairs onto the lower level of the plaza.

Eventually we headed over to the seal exhibit at the Aquarium, making our way through scores of school kids who were congregating near school busses that would take them back to school, so we couldn't have timed things better. Henry fell madly in love with the seals, and spent a full five minutes with his nose against the glass. I asked him if he wanted to go in and look at the fish and he actually seemed pretty excited about the prospect. When I tried to buy a ticket the woman behind the glass said she happened to have an extra ticket so I totally got in for free which, you know, score!

Although the penguin exhibit was closed for maintenance, Henry really enjoyed wandering around and checking everything else out. He loved seeing the crabs in the Harbor Island exhibit and the giant turtles in the main tank, but by far his favorite thing about the Aquarium was the giant red lobster lollipop we bought on the way out of the cafeteria. When we walked outside some kid came up to Henry and started saying something until he caught sight of the lollipop that was half hanging out Henry's mouth. He stopped dead in his tracks and stared, wide-eyed. Later he passed us again with his dad and I heard him say "Dad, that kid has the biggest lollipop!" His dad looked, laughed, and said "Yeah, he really does."

A (short!) trip on the green line and long ride on the red train later we were back at home, waiting for Grammy and Grandpa to get home so we could get in one last hurrah before we headed back to PA the next day.

Friday was a very long and sad car ride home.

Posted by Jenn at 09:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

How about I regale you with yet another tale about my kid?

Last Fall we managed to break Henry of the binky habit, but then he came down with his first bout of cold-induced asthma (although we didn't know what it was at the time) and the only way we could get him to stop his coughing long enough to fall asleep was by giving him back his binky. Then came a few other colds and more asthma attacks and soon we weren't thinking about how to break him of his binky habit at all anymore because it was turning out to be pretty useful.

Then came the first really bad day of this latest cold. Naptime came around and I told Henry to grab his binky and sleepyhat and we'd head upstairs. He said "No. No binky. No sleepyhat." My first thought was that this was going to turn into a way to procrastinate going to bed once we got upstairs, but the joke was on me. He let me tuck him in, turn off all the lights, and close the door, with nary a peep about running back downstairs to grab the hat and binky. And so it went that night, and the next naptime, and still I was completely blown away that he had made this decision on his own and was following through.

Then last night I came home from walking the dog and all I could hear was Henry yelling "AAAAUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!" nonstop from his bedroom. I asked Dave what was going on and he said he had no idea. I ran upstairs, opened the door, and instantly the yelling stopped and Henry just looked at me, totally calm. We talked for a little bit then I asked him if he wanted his binky or sleepyhat and he said he didn't. As soon as I closed the door: "AAAAUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!" So I opened it again and stuck my head in and instantly he was quiet. I left the door open a crack and went downstairs. As soon as I got downstairs: "AAAAUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!"

This went on for a while so Dave went up. Then he came back down and Henry started yelling again. We didn't bother going back up. We decided this was some weird way of settling himself down to fall asleep. A little bit later it was quiet. Around three in the morning he woke up coughing a bit, but then fell back to sleep after having a drink of water. Then at 4:45 he woke up again coughing so I gave him some albuterol and he fell asleep again.

I think we'll be taking an early nap today.

Posted by Jenn at 01:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Henry's sick. This morning he woke up with a slightly runny nose and now he looks like death warmed over, not that he needs a nap or anything, at least according to him. I just gave him some Tylenol and wrangled him into bed; I'm hoping against hope that he'll fall asleep quickly and easily and without a lot of coughing.

When Henry gets sick like this our rules about tv watching get pretty lax. When I'm sick I tend to watch a lot of tv because it helps take my mind off of my nose/sinuses/cough/whatever and it keeps my having to talk to people at a minimum because no one should have to put up with me when I'm sick and therefore crabby. I figure it's only fair for the same rules to apply to the kid. Henry's latest and greatest favorite thing on television is "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse". This saddens me greatly because I'm more of a Bugs Bunny kind of girl, but maybe Henry will come around with time. A few weeks ago we went to playgroup at a little girl's house and she had a pink Mickey Mouse ears hat that Henry immediately fell in love with and wore for the most glorious five minutes of playgroup time there ever was. If only I'd had my camera.

Anyway, this afternoon while Dave was home for lunch I ran to the grocery store and bought things to help us get through a toddler cold: chicken noodle soup, cereal bars, sweet potato puffs, and orange juice. Oh yeah, and Kleenex. Lots and lots of Kleenex.

Posted by Jenn at 02:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Today I'm too tired to come up with a title.

The day started out pretty good. Henry and I hung out with some friends, then came home for lunch, but then Henry threw up and I'm not really sure why. He had choked a little bit two minutes before it happened so it's possibly related to that, but it had also seemed like he'd worked it out, so I don't know. He had a fever the weekend before last and although it passed with no other symptoms at the time, he developed a cough a few days later. We started him on albuterol (which is an asthma treatment) a few days ago and although last night he seemed better, today he's been coughing a lot again. It's not a nice cough either. It sounds like it hurts although he doesn't seem to be too bothered by it. I'm not sure what to make of it all. We're carrying on with the albuterol as aggressively as the doctor recommended when he prescribed it to us, and if there's no improvement over the next day or so, we're going to head back to the pediatrician's. I feel bad for Henry. He's got a lot of energy and is still running around being himself, but he's not napping well because he coughs more when he's in bed than he does when he's up and about, so he looks pretty tired despite his upbeat attitude.

Meanwhile, after the throwing up episode at lunch, (which appeared to be an isolated incident but when coupled with this cough made me freak out just a little bit) (because really, when you're kid's healthy you worry, and when you're kid's sick, you really, *really* worry) I tried to get him to eat something else. He sadly shook his head at everything I offered until I waved a bowl of animal crackers under his nose. He took the bowl over to the coffee table and with each crunch, both of us felt better. After that we went for what was supposed to be a quick tricycle ride before naptime but which ended up being an hour and a half long excursion because nothing with a two and a half year old can be ever done in any kind of manner that might possibly be deemed "quick". He abandoned his tricycle in favor of walking because the allure of all of the puddles created by all the melting snow was just too strong to ignore. We came across one house that had a long puddle right under some gutters that were dripping. Henry squatted for five minutes and watched the water splash as each droplet hit the puddle. It was just so darned fascinating.

Now it's way past the time I usually get him up from his nap but we got home so late and it took him so long to settle into a coughless sleep that I haven't got the heart to wake him up yet. Poor kid.

Tonight I have a meeting to go to in New Berlin. I think Megan's going to have to kick me under the table a lot to make sure I don't fall asleep. Lucky girl.

Posted by Jenn at 05:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The latest thing we've been teaching Henry is getting him to pump his fist in the air while loudly proclaiming one of the following: "Wicked!", "Rock on!", and "Party on Dude!". I tried to convince him that Billy aka Earl Pickens would totally dig it if he went up to him after music time was over and pumped his fist at him and said "Rock on!" Henry didn't think that was such a good idea.

Today's music hour was a huge success as far as my kid was concerned. (Are there other kids on the planet? I had no idea! I thought mine was the only one.) As soon as the guitar came out of the case Henry was frozen in one spot. Unfortunately that one spot happened to be behind and to the right, so it wasn't a very good vantage point. After trying to suggest that perhaps it would be better if we joined everyone else who had the good sense to sit in front of Billy, he might be able to see the actual guitar playing that was going on. Henry wouldn't budge so I had to take his hand and walk him over to the rest of the group. I sat on the floor and Henry stood next to me, mouth slightly agape, eyes unblinking. By the end of the set, he was on his knees with his head in my lap. It was apparently completely cool and totally overwhelming. What wasn't cool was when I sang along ("No mommy sing.") or clapped to the beat ("No mommy clap hands."). I was totally stifled, man.

We made pizza for dinner tonight. We've found an amazing and amazingly easy pizza dough recipe. I thought I'd share it because it really does make one of the best pizza crusts I've ever had and you just can't keep something like that to yourself.

Posted by Jenn at 08:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My friend Karen went into labor this morning and on the way to the hospital they dropped Thomas off at our house. I was curious to see what it would be like being alone with two kids running around the house because lately Dave and I have been having the "Should we have another kid?" conversation. Not that having two boys who were born within weeks of each other, both of whom are now at a fairly reasonable age (meaning that you can reason with them, sort of), is anything like having, say a two year old and a newborn, but you know, I was curious nonetheless.

Since I wasn't sure when Karen's mom was going to be arriving in town, I mapped out the whole day: playtime, lunchtime, movietime, naptime, restofmovietime, playtime, dinnertime, playtime. Little did I know Karen was going to be superwoman and have her baby before the morning was over, but I did get to have Thomas for four hours today and it was a lot of fun. The three of us made play-doh spaghetti, built a fort with tunnels and tents, mastered the harmonica (at least mastered making sounds come out of the harmonica), colored with markers, washed our hands, danced to some music, ate some Spaghettio's, colored some more, washed our hands some more, and generally wreaked havoc, and would you believe somewhere in there I managed to sit down and read some of my book? I only read about four or five pages but still! Hands down the best part was when Thomas' dad showed up and when he asked if he wanted to go home Thomas said "No." And then I got a big hug right before they left.

Feeling pretty darned good over here.

Posted by Jenn at 02:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

When we were on sabbatical in Boston a year ago, we happened upon one of those displays at a grocery store that proffers really inexpensive DVD's. We picked up two. One of them is a collection of old cartoons, like the first Casper the Friendly Ghost (which, by the way, is really a sad cartoon) and the other features sing-along "Screen Song" cartoons, as in follow the bouncing ball. We watched the first one right after we got it, but Henry was not interested, so we packed them away someplace clever, and only recently rediscovered them. I unwrapped the sing-along collection since Henry's big into music, and there's one in particular that instantly shot up to the top of the "Things My Kid Will Watch 4 Billion Times in a Row" list. Whenever he says "Watch tuba!", we know he's referring to this:

Posted by Jenn at 02:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Back in September I signed up to make a monthly donation to our local PBS station. Today our free gifts came in the mail, an Elmo doll and a Sesame Street "Let's Make Music" dvd. Henry eschewed the doll as if it were a box full of socks unwrapped on Christmas morning, then dug around in the envelope until he pulled out the dvd. Once he spied the tuba on the cover he was all "Watch this! Watch this!"

It features some of the cast from "Stomp!" which means there's lots of drumming rhythms. Henry's got a holiday tin and a round box that used to hold molten chocolate cake mix arranged in front of him on the coffee table and two drumsticks in his hand. I'm pretty sure the word "heaven" is one that he would use to describe the state he's currently in, if he had any idea what feelings the word "heaven" intimated.

Christmas came early this year!

And poor Elmo! Never has he been so spurned by a member of the toddler set. Tsk, tsk.

Posted by Jenn at 11:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Henry's sick. Again. For those keeping count, this is the third time in six weeks. All I have to say about it is: AAAAAAUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

Posted by Jenn at 02:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

A couple of inches of snow fell last night. My mom and I attempted to take Henry for a walk in it. He refused to put even one foot down on the ground outside. We ended up pushing him through slush and over unshoveled sidewalks in an umbrella stroller. I say "we" but mostly it was my mom. An umbrella stroller is not the best all-weather mode of transporting a toddler. It was seriously hard work.

Meanwhile, Henry's thoughts on snow can be summed up thusly: good from far, far from good.

Posted by Jenn at 07:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday at approximately 11:30AM:

me: Henry, would you like a V8?
Henry: B8! B8! B8! Okay B8!
me: Oh boy! V8!

I rinse out his cup, pour some V8 into it, put the lid back on, put the straw back in, and then hand it to Henry.

Henry: Sob! Wail! (Falls to the floor, tears streaming.)
me: What? What did I do? Oh, right...

I take the straw out and hand the cup and straw to Henry. He hands them back to me.

Henry: Mommy do it.

I reinsert the straw into the lid of the cup and hand it back to Henry.

Henry: Sob! Wail! Trauma!
me: Gah! NOW what did I wrong?...oh...wait...

Open refrigerator, put cup on bottom shelf, close door. Henry walks over and taps the refrigerator door.

Henry: Mommy do it.

I open the refrigerator, Henry reaches in, take his cup of V8, and walks off into the living room, happily sipping away. Meanwhile, I have a nervous breakdown.

Posted by Jenn at 02:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Look! It's a stove!

Dave's dad worked and worked and worked on this over the course of the last three days. At one point I told him I felt like he was Cinderella, stuck in the garage. After watching the process from the sidelines, I can confidently say neither Dave nor myself would have had the patience to do a good job. His dad on the other hand, had the patience to do a spectacular job, because it came out beautifully.

Want to see a picture of Henry pretending the sink is a drum?

I need to find something to put on the stove top to act as burners, as well as find a handle for the oven door. Aside from those two things, all it needs is some kitchen supplies, like food and pots and pans, and it'll be ready to get some serious cooking done.

Posted by Jenn at 02:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Henry's sick again. Double ear infection. Wheezing. It's a good thing he likes taking medicine through a syringe because he's been doing it a lot lately. Also, we've been to the doctor's so often lately, that he now starts to cry in the parking lot as opposed to in the hallway that leads to the examination rooms. Despite his unhappiness at being there, he's always very polite, sobbing out a "bye-bye" as nurses and doctors come and go.

No one got much sleep last night, least of all Dave because he got up early to try and make a doctor's appointment for Henry. I think we'll be looking at an early nap time for a lot of people today. Henry especially needs the rest. One look at him and you can immediately tell how exhausted he is. He was up and down every half hour to hour starting around 1AM, and finally at 4:30 he was so frustrated and exhausted that neither Dave nor I was any kind of comfort to him. Dave suggested perhaps it would be best to let him cry out his frustration a bit, and sure enough after two minutes of crying and general moaning and groaning he was fast asleep. It was difficult to do that because I desperately wanted to help him feel better, so I'm grateful that Dave was thinking clearly enough to suggest that.

Anyway, here's hoping he sleeps well this afternoon and starts feeling better soon.

Posted by Jenn at 01:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The February before Henry was born, Megan gave us our first baby present. It was a newborn-sized romper with a matching hat. You can see them both in the picture below. We chose it as his "going-home from the hospital" outfit.

No one knew what an important item this hat would become in Henry's life. It essentially became his security blanket. There are two knots on top that he chewed on to get some relief from teething pain. As a result of almost two years worth of hardcore noshing, the hat's looking a little beat up.

Beat up is pretty generous. When you take away the glamour that the camera naturally adds, it's pretty disgusting. As you can tell from the picture, the seams at the ends of the knots are the only things that have survived, the fabric itself having surrendered ages ago. Also, the knots are kind of yellow. And brownish. And he still chews on them, so after a couple of nights, it smells pretty bad too. But he loves it, so what can I do?

I can make him a newer, better one that he'll love just as much! So I went over to Wal-mart (the only store that sells fabric within a forty minute drive), except they didn't have knitted cottons for sale by the yard. So instead I bought two 5T turtlenecks. I came up with some measurements based on his old hat, which still fits pretty well because it stretches out, and then I added a little room to grow. I even made a pattern with black contruction paper, so it would feel official.

I cut the pattern out and sewed the two sides together. I almost sewed it with the two wrong sides facing, but caught myself at the last minute. Boy, would that have been embarassing. After sewing it together using a straight seam, I decided I should probably reinforce it with a stronger stitch, so I went over the straight seam with a really tight zig-zag.

The final result, modeled by Henry himself:

Cute, right? He only wears it when he doesn't realize the hat I've put on him isn't his old one. Which I take as a compliment. However, there's no replacing an old friend, no matter how hard your mother tries to.

Posted by Jenn at 05:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Henry and I got up bright and early this morning to make our 8:00 AM Dr's appointment. Man, it was hard getting out of bed. There was much coughing during the night keeping everyone up, so when the alarm went off, it felt like it was buzzing two minutes after I'd finally fallen asleep. It was worth it though; the doctor checked Henry out and said he thought he had a sinus infection. Good to know. We now have 10 days worth of antibiotics sitting pretty in our fridge, the first dose of which is coursing through Henry's system, hopefully taking care of business. I should have also asked the Dr. about Henry's addiction to Cars and if there are any twelve step programs we could take him to in order to help him get over it. I have a feeling though that if I had asked he would have suggested we simply stop putting it into the DVD player and I'm not sure I'm capable of that. It turns out Owen Wilson is ridiculously cute, even when he's an animated red car.

Posted by Jenn at 12:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I didn't really say much about Henry's Halloween experiences did I? Allow me to rectify that situation poste haste.

On Tuesday we took Henry to the mall for their trick-or-treating night. This is a mall that I've been to many times, at many different times of the year, many different times of the week and day, and never have I seen more than twenty shoppers wandering around, each of them no doubt wondering how a mall with so many stores in it could possibly not have any shops worth going into (with the exception of Victoria's Secret and Old Navy, but Old Navy is less than a year old so we were entirely without for a really long time.) Naturally I assumed that no one would be there for tricks-or-treats either, but wow, was I wrong. There were throngs of kids and families, all lined up single file, waiting for six o'clock to hit, at which point everyone started to shuffle in a big slow-moving circle around the mall, getting candy from employees who were stationed outside each store. It was the strangest thing I'd ever seen. It also didn't seem like the ideal way to spend the next twelve hours because that's how long I calculated it would take us to make the circuit considering how slowly the line was moving. We had decided to give it five more minutes when a girl in costume came careening through Sears with a shopping cart full of candy and started dishing out heaping handfuls into kids' eagerly awaiting treat bags. Dave took Henry over and on the way back, Henry peered into his pumpkin, stuck his hand in, pulled out a mini-Hershey bar, and then decisively said "This one!" Dave and I declared the evening a success, and immediately headed over to Wok Express for some delicious mall Chinese food. (No, really, it's pretty good!) We got some interesting looks from the families who overheard us decide to leave. I don't think they could believe we were throwing in the towel when there were people at the mall willing to give us candy! for free! whereas Dave and I felt like this was the last year before Henry gets caught up in trying to get as much candy as possible. We decided to take advantage of it.

On the actual evening of Halloween, Megan, Megan's mom, and Leo came over so we could go to a couple of neighbor's houses, ostensibly for candy, but mainly to show off how cute our kids were. Henry really didn't seem to care much about the candy after the first house. He was of the opinion that since he already had some, why bother knocking on anyone else's door? By far his favorite house was our neighbor Howard down the street whose wife is out of town. He was blasting the blues and cooking up indian food. While we chatted outside, Henry kept peering around the front door trying to figure out where the drum set was; he could hear it, he just couldn't see it. Howard doesn't know it, but Henry would have gladly sat on the couch to chat about music with him over some Chicken Tikka Masala. He may have even been willing to share the juice box Howard gave him, which is saying a lot for a two year old.

Posted by Jenn at 03:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Henry had his last tumbling session today. He was a little maniac too, running circles around the gym many times over. I'm attributing it mostly to a touch of cabin fever: on Monday, because it was my birthday, we both stayed in our PJ's until after naptime, then yesterday we woke up to a gray rainy day. Indoors is not the natural habitat for a toddler, at least not my toddler, so by this morning he was ready to see lots of people other than his mom and he was ready to expand his realm to a much bigger indoor arena. So, on his last day of tumbling, he ran around in circles, jumped on the trampoline, walked a bit on a balance beam, crawled through a tunnel, attempted to vault a big foam thing shaped like a mailbox (but then thought better of it), rode his beloved airplane for three seconds, stole some safety cones, got a timeout, spun around on a sit and spin, and got a lollipop for his trouble ("Oh boy, pop!"). The end. Last Wednesday because we were feeling totally wild and crazy, we decided to go ahead and sign him up for the next session. Henry really is enjoying it and after the first class I noticed he was doing more physical things outside of tumbling, like learning how to jump, and that can't be a bad thing.

I also signed up for the next session of belly dancing. This time we're going to learn Turkish style belly dance which is going to be a lot more aerobic. It also features a 9/8 beat which when I first heard the teacher say that thought was impossible because you can't have 9 beats in an 8 beat rhythm, but apparently you can. Can't wait to see how I do with that.

Posted by Jenn at 03:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last weekend we experienced our first temper tantrums from Henry. I don't remember what the first one was all about, but I definitely remember the second one, because an hour later I was sitting on the couch madly knitting, chowing down on peanut m&m's, and wondering when the tightness in my chest would dissipate.

He's completely entrenched in the "I want to do it my way" stage of the game and it takes a bit of a toll on a person's outlook on life over the course of the day. By naptime we've both had it with each other and are equally pleased about getting some alone time to spend in a darkened room, staring at glow-in-the-dark stars or reading a book until nodding off, depending on which one of us we're talking about.

When they're little tiny babies, when the end of the day rolls around and you've put them to bed, sometimes you feel like all you've managed to do is keep them alive, nothing more and nothing less. Of course you've also been talking to them, playing, showing them around, but you don't remember that and you feel like you're not doing much of anything at all. Lately I've been feeling that way again, except this time around I feel like all I'm doing is being stern and aggravated. Sometimes I'm amazed when Henry wakes up from his nap and is excited to see me because I'm not sure I'd be all that excited to see me. He's testing boundaries all the time so it's not surprising I'm saying "no" and having to redirect him to other things a lot more, but it's still a little hard to get used to.

Yesterday a friend of ours came over for dinner. Henry was shy at the outset, and he came charging over to me so he could snuggle under my chin and inspect our guest from a safe location until he decided what he thought. It was the most glorious moment of the day, because it was one of the first times in a long time he wasn't running away from me.

Posted by Jenn at 03:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

On Sunday Henry bonked his head on our dining room table and after thoughtfully rubbing it for a few seconds, he looked at me and said "Mommy kiss" and shoved his head towards my face. So I gave him a kiss on his head. And then I devoured him because it was so cute.

The next day he bonked his head again, I have no idea on what because I wasn't in the room at the time because I may have been checking my email instead of watching my kid. What, like you haven't ever done that? Henry shuffled in whilst rubbing his head. I looked at him in a way that I'm sure would be best described as "hopeful puppy dog" and sure enough he said "Mommy kiss!" then once again he shoved his head in the general direction of my face.

For two years my kid has been actively and successfully fending off kisses and suddenly he's going out of his way to ask for them, sometimes without the excuse of an injury.

Life is good.

Posted by Jenn at 03:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Henry's butt was looking a little red yesterday so I took his diaper off and let him run around in the buff for a while. I set the computer up so he could watch "The Wheels on the Bus" on youtube while I snuck into the bathroom to brush my teeth. When I peeked into the room to check on him, he was standing up in his daddy's chair, legs wide apart, staring down at the seat. I took a closer look and lo and behold, he had wee-wee'd all over the chair. And he apparently wasn't too keen on sitting back down in it. Can't say I blame him. I wiped it up with a washcloth while Dave went and got some industrial strength (but environmentally safe) cleaner with which to cleanse the chair. Thoroughly.

While Dave rabidly disinfected, I intr