Third Tooth

Ian's third tooth should be popping through the gum any day now. I can feel the tooth very easily. I was expecting his third tooth to be one of the two central incisors on his top jaw, but nope his third tooth will be a lateral incisor on the bottom. He'll have 3 teeth on the bottom and none on top. Nadia had far more than 10 teeth when she was his age. The dentist will be pleased that Ian hasn't used a pacifier since he was 4 months old and hasn't ever sucked his thumb. Nadia will have her first real dentist appointment this summer. I really need to buy something to help her get over her thumb sucking habit.

16 Months Old!

1. Ian thinks that all of the cars he plays with should have a driver. If he can't find a person (be that of the people that go with the doll house, one of their Little People, a Lego person, etc.), he will put any random object in the driver's seat of the car. It cracks me up! He definitely loves to play with vehicles. Sometimes he even makes sound effects for them. It's so cute!

2. The Robeez shoes were making marks on Ian's ankles so he's been promoted to "real" shoes. Until two days ago (when Grandma brought him his first pair of black Nike sneakers), he's only been wearing a pair of size 4 brown sneakers whenever we leave the house. A free box of shoes from Thredup arrived yesterday in the mail, so Ian now has several pairs of size 4 shoes.

3. We now know Ian is allergic to eggs. He also very prone to catching colds. He sneezes and coughs a lot and always seems to have a runny nose. If you aren't super quick with wiping his nose with a tissue, he will either use his hand (if he's playing by himself) or your shirt to wipe his nose.

4. For a few months I thought that "nana" meant Nadia. I became convinced of that a couple of weeks ago. I now consider Ian to have a 3 word vocabulary: Mama, Dada, and Nana. Nadia isn't pleased that he's saying her name because she wants him to say it correctly. No amount of explaining on my part has convinced her that it's sweet that he's trying to say her name. I guess it's just not something she can appreciate at her age.

5. He's now walking all over the place! Way to go, Ian!

6. Although we still have bad days, and although I'm still very limited in what I can feed him by spoon, most days I can feed him 10.5-16 ounces a day of baby food (fruits or veggies), pudding, or yogurt. He does pretty well with orange veggies as long as he gets a bite of fruit interspersed now and then. Green veggies must be REALLY diluted by fruit, or he'll gag.

7. Ian LOVES to get into my purse. Nadia has thus far never shown any interest in my purse. I need to find a new place to put it. If he realizes he's been caught red handed, he grabs one thing out of my purse (ex. wallet or calendar) and scurries off away from me. He cracks me up! The most annoying thing is if my coupons are in my purse because I have them separated in envelopes, and it's annoying to have to resort them all.

8. His favorite stuffed animal at the moment is Nadia's small Junior (Asparagus). Thankfully she doesn't mind sharing this one with Ian because her two favorites at the moment are Larry (the Cucumber) and Petunia (Rhubarb) also known as "Sweetpea Beauty."

9. Ian will not take any naps in his crib. He will cry for a full hour, but he won't fall asleep unless he's #1 in someone's arms or #2 in his carseat while we're traveling somewhere. In the past month he only took one nap in his crib, it was two days ago and lasted 40 minutes.

10. At night he typically sleeps from about 7:45 or 8:00pm to about 5:30-5:45am. He usually doesn't cry at all when I put him down. He does usually wake up at least once during the night and cry for a few seconds. He sleeps on his belly and as soon as he wakes up in the morning he stands up in his crib. This past weekend he woke up at 6am two days in a row, which was greatly appreciated, but then yesterday he woke up at 5:15am.

11. In addition to vehicles, his favorite toys at the moment are books, the ball popper (he's played with that far more than Nadia ever has), and anything he can push around (Nadia's doll stroller, the Mega Bloks fire engine, etc.). I've been very impressed lately with his attention span for playing by himself. His is longer now than Nadia's has ever been.

12. Ian can destroy a room in just a few minutes. He definitely makes messes more quickly than Nadia ever did. He loves to take bins of toys (ex. Legos) and dump them all out on the floor. I am very grateful that Nadia is getting better at helping me clean up toys because Ian is a one boy wrecking crew!

13. He enjoys playing with Nadia's dollhouse and kitchen. His favorite item of play food is an ice cream cone. Sometimes he carries that cone around for hours!! When he plays with the dollhouse his favorite thing is to put the people and dog in and out of the house by means of the front door. He prefers to play with that side of the dollhouse whereas Nadia prefers the other (open) side.

14. He LOVES to knock down towers (of blocks), and he really loves to be in a swing, which is a big difference from last summer when he didn't want to swing at all.

15. He now weighs 23 pounds. He's staying right along the same line on the growth chart (a little less than 25th percentile).

16. He loves to play with DVD cases. We always had the rule for Nadia that she wasn't allowed to touch a remote, CD, DVD, or DVD case. Well as long as the case is empty we now allow the kids to play with a DVD case. It's an instance of "choose your battles." It's such a big deal to Ian; so we changed our rule.

Puddles!

When we got back from Nadia's make-up gymnastics class I took the kids to the playground. I took them then because it was in the 60's and although they were forecasting warmer temps for the afternoon, they were also calling for thunderstorms. Sure enough it started raining a few minutes after the kids woke up from their afternoon naps. I was grateful I had taken them earlier or we wouldn't have been able to go to the park. It stopped raining after dinner; so I took them outside for a bit. They enjoyed using the sidewalk chalk on the driveway and splashing around in some puddles. It's so much fun to watch kids find such great delight from something as simple as stomping in a puddle.

I wish I could say we're all healthy again, but I can't. Paul actually worked from home today (after staying in bed until about 9:30am). Dads get sick days albeit Moms don't. His trip is about 150 miles a day; so with the price of gas these days we save almost $20 every day he works from home. Paul has a sore throat today. Nadia still has a cough and runny nose, but otherwise she's fine. Ian still has a bit of a runny nose. He didn't chuck At All Tuesday through Friday, which was amazing. The last three mornings he's had one huge eruption each day. I still am congested and now have a cough. I've now been sick for 15 days. What a cold! The good news is that on Friday I started to have some energy again. Last Monday through Thursday I didn't feel like doing anything. Just trying to read a book to Nadia would make my fever go higher and my headache worse.

Printing the Blog

The last few months I've been working on editing my blog. I deleted over 300 posts and also deleted portions of hundreds of other posts. I took out some of the adoption posts (since we never adopted) as well as ones that were about miscellaneous topics unrelated to the kids (football, basketball, movies, politics, finding bargains, etc.). I could have continued to spend hours editing the blog, but I decided enough was enough. I have learned from my experience, and I'm now labeling a post with "edit" if there's a portion of the post I want to delete prior to printing or with "delete" if I want the whole post deleted before I print that section. It should be MUCH easier to edit the blog the next time I print a portion of it. I'm thinking in June I'll print my 5th volume (September 12, 2010-June 2011).

The last few days I was exploring options for printing the blog. Blurb was cheaper than Blog2print, but I didn't like the way Blurb arranged the posts and pictures. I was tempted to just go with Blog2print until I actually uploaded my posts and realized the cost would be a little more than $400 to print from December 2006 - September 2010 (into four volumes because books are limited in terms of both pages as well as number of pictures). That price was for one black/white soft cover book (Dec 2006 - June 2008) and three full color hard cover books.

I think these volumes will be special to me in the years to come, and I also think that Nadia will treasure reading them some day (and maybe Ian's wife?). Many pictures that I've never included in a scrapbook or photo book are included in the blog. It's also a combination of a baby book and diary of sorts. In the end I purchased pdf files of the volumes from Blog2Print ($8 each) and then ordered the copies to be made from another website for $100. I read reviews which said the Blog2Print books turn out really nice. If I don't like the quality of the company I am using this time, I'll try a different company next time. If I print one book a year it won't be as expensive as right now when I'm printing four years of posts. I actually like the fact that I also have pdf files. If the books are damaged or lost, I can view them electronically or print them again. Three of the books are 200+ pages long and the fourth book is 400+ pages long.

Third Sticker

Yesterday I reintroduced Nadia's sticker chart. She had earned one sticker last Wednesday, and then we took a break since she had almost no appetite while she was sick. Her appetite came back this Wednesday, and so yesterday I decided it was time to return to eating a proper dinner. Last night she had a very hard time eating a few bites of tuna noodle casserole plus two green beans. She did earn a sticker though as although it took awhile and involved many tears, she did eat what I asked her to eat. I made spaghetti tonight so there wasn't any battle over that, and she actually ate 3 green beans without any ordeal. Whew. Paul prefers spaghetti and meatballs; so that's usually how I make it. Nadia won't eat meatballs (yet), but she'll eat sauce that has meat mixed in it. She rarely eats any meat so I made a meat sauce tonight instead of meatballs. Just two more stickers and we'll be making a trip to Friendly's for ice cream!

This morning Nadia told me my sock was broken. She meant there was a hole in my sock. LOL! I thanked her for pointing that out to me.

Another one of Nadia's favorite books is Olivia and the Missing Toy. I recorded her "reading" a portion of the book here. Enjoy!

Out of the Mouth of Babes

Nadia says things that make me laugh just about every day. Sometimes it's the way she pronounces something. I love hearing her say "M&M's." It sounds like "dem a dems." Two things which cracked me up yesterday morning:

• As I was putting her (green) socks on, she said "It's a green pastures day." LOL! Can you tell she has been working on Psalm 23?

• In a conversation I stated that I had two kids - Nadia and Ian. She said I have three kids - Daddy is the third one. HA HA!

Money Sense

Nadia washing Ian's back with a washcloth (her initiative!).

I've given a lot of thought to the pros and cons of various methods of teaching kids to be wise with their money. I don't want to pay our kids for every chore they do because I think it's important for them to learn that we all have responsibilities as a family. I've been leaning towards giving a weekly allowance, but then as she gets older giving her optional extra chores, which she can do for money. I was surprised to read in some places where moms said they started their children at the age of 2. Thus far aside from wanting me to buy lots of treats at the mall (a pretzel and ice cream and ride the carousel for example), she hasn't really been asking me to buy things. For many weeks prior to Christmas she didn't even give me one idea of what she wanted. It was only right before Christmas that she asked me for a Sweetpea stuffed animal, which thankfully I had already purchased for her.

I should have taken the picture at the beginning instead of the end.

I've been asking her what she wants for her birthday, and until this week all she had said was balloons, cake, and a present. When I'd ask her what present she wanted, she would say a balloon. This week she found a VeggieTales DVD insert which was advertising various things that they sell. Well all of a sudden she wants everything they are advertising (a watch, placemats, an umbrella, etc.). I asked her how she was going to buy the items, and she proceeded to get some plastic coins (from the Fisher Price pig). She handed them to me and told me that she'd use these to buy them. So I decided that it's time to start giving her an allowance in the near future.

I'm thinking of giving her 3 quarters a week. How does that sound for a 3 year old? I want to give her at least 3 coins because I want her to use this bank. We had talked about this one in one of the classes that I have taught. She can take the money she puts in the church part of the bank to give during Sunday School. I'm thinking that the store part can be to save up for something she wants to buy for herself, and the bank part can be to save up for gifts she can buy family members for Christmas. I think each year as she gets older we would increase the amount of her allowance, and as she becomes able to to do more chores, she'll have the option to earn a little bit of money through doing something more than whatever chores she normally does. I can't believe she'll be turning 3 in two months!

Cars and Cones

For a few weeks Ian has always been putting a person in the driver's seat of any vehicle he's playing with. If a person (be that a Little People or from the dollhouse or a Lego person) isn't nearby, he'll put any small random item in the driver's seat. It cracks me up! For example last night I put a Little People car on his tray when he was sitting in his highchair. Since I forgot to give him a person, he put a Ritz cracker that he had been licking where the person is supposed to go. LOL!

Ian's favorite toy at the moment is an ice cream cone. The ice cream part is soft and attaches to the plastic cone by velcro. He doesn't care which flavor is attached, but don't you dare try to take it out of his hand. He's been carrying it around most of the day for several days. I find it rather ironic given he won't eat ice cream much less a cone. Ha ha! Ian's food strike has ended, and today was the first time in about 10 days that any of it stayed down. Even last night he threw it all up all over the place (from reflux not from gagging). Nadia also threw her dinner up last night (yogurt). I'm not allowing her to have any dairy products today. So far I haven't had to clean any vomit today. That's amazing given I've been doing it all the time lately.

I'd appreciate prayers for Nadia and I to feel better ASAP. I can't remember what it feels like to breathe through your nose, and I've had a fever for nine days straight. Last week it was 99 or 100 degrees. The past two days it's been 100 or 101. I feel awful. I took 4 Tylenol yesterday morning when I first got up (I know that's the same as taking 2 Rx strength Tylenol), and all it did was lower my temp one degree (down to 100). Thankfully Nadia (who had a 101 temp yesterday afternoon when we got back from the park) hasn't had a fever today. She's still VERY fussy (everything, and I do mean everything is a tragedy), and she has no appetite. Ian seems back to normal aside from a little bit of a runny nose. I've had a killer headache the past few days. I absolutely love being a mom, but it's tough to not be able to have a sick day. By the time Paul got home at 6:35pm yesterday, I had "worked" a 13 hour shift (since Ian doesn't take naps in his crib). I went to bed at 7:15pm although it took me more than an hour to fall asleep because I felt like I couldn't breathe. I'm really, really, really ready to feel back to normal!

Happier news to report would be that Ian is walking very quickly. He's almost running at times. He hardly crawls at all any more. He can WALK!

I'm dreaming...

Of the day, hopefully later this week, when the kids and I are feeling better. I've had a fever for a full week now. My nose is running nonstop. Nadia didn't have a fever yesterday morning so I let her come to church with me. We only stayed for Sunday School. I would have stayed home, but since I'm teaching Sunday School I felt I needed to at least go to Sunday School. I wasn't going to take Nadia, but she was crying and begging me to take her to church. I took her temperature several times in the morning, and since it was always normal I thought it would be okay to take her to Sunday School. Unfortunately Ian chucked during Sunday School. When I picked him up at the nursery he was wearing a pair of pjs (which didn't fit him) instead of the sweater and corduroy pants he had worn to church. I had forgotten to pack an extra outfit in the diaper bag. All three of us are going through a million tissues a day. Nadia and Ian have both been coughing up phlegm. Nadia's fever did come back yesterday although it was more similar to what mine has been (under 100 degrees). I went to bed at 8:45pm, but I should have gone to bed right after I put the kids down. On Saturday and this morning Nadia woke up at 5am. On Saturday she didn't fall back asleep. Yesterday we gave her Tylenol at 2:30am, and she got up early because Ian started crying at 5am. Thankfully she did fall back asleep this morning and got up at 7:10, which was much later than the time she had gotten up the previous two mornings. She hasn't had much of an appetite so I haven't been working on getting her to eat vegetables or rice or meat. We'll wait on that (and the sticker chart) until she's feeling better. Usually after you've had a bug for a week you start to feel at least a little bit better, but I have to say I feel much worse today.

I'm also dreaming of the day when I can be in bed and not hear any crying between the hours of 10pm and 7am. That hasn't happened in almost 16 months. After Nadia weaned herself (January 2009) until Ian was born, Paul used to give me one morning a week where he'd get up with her, and I'd stay in bed until 7am. I nursed Ian for his first feeding until he was 14 months old; so it only hit me last week that I should ask Paul to let me stay in bed one morning a week again. I'm up with Ian sometime between 5:30-5:45am every day, whereas on a typical day Paul and Nadia are in bed until sometime between 6:45-7:15am. Ian usually sleeps in my arms for one hour after his first sippy. After he wakes up I go up and let Nadia get up and change Ian's diaper. I asked Paul on Sunday morning to get up with Ian at 5:45 (Ian had been crying since 5:00), and he did, but there was no way I could sleep as I could hear Paul singing to Ian, Nadia carrying on, etc. He hadn't been able to get Ian back to sleep like I do, and Nadia got up earlier than usual. I got up at 6:15 and was bummed because for several days I had been looking forward to staying in bed until 7am. Since then I reminded myself that it's much better to get up at 5:30am every day because I have a 15 month old than to be sleeping until 7:00am. This season of life will pass all too quickly. I'll have plenty of years to get an adequate amount of sleep. We had talked about going away for an overnight around Valentine's Day (Paul's parents had agreed to watch the kids) as we haven't had a night without kids since June 2008, but then since Ian was waking up many times a night following our cruise, we didn't feel it was fair to ask them to spend a night at our house. Since then we've been talking about going away for a night or two in August for our 10th anniversary. I am really looking forward to that. I want to get LOTS of sleep during that weekend!

Fevers

Paul goes years without having a fever. He is prone to heartburn and such but not fevers. Aside from when I'm pregnant, I don't get heartburn. I am very prone to fevers, headaches, sore throats, etc. I was hoping that the kids would be like their Daddy and not get fevers very often. That was true for Nadia for a very long time, but lately that hasn't been the case. Yesterday after her nap she wasn't herself. When she refused to eat peach yogurt for dinner (one of her most favorite foods), I took her temperature. It was 103. Poor girl! She threw up during breakfast yesterday and today. She ate a big lunch yesterday, but otherwise she has eaten hardly anything the past two days. She had a fever all day today, but it wasn't nearly as high as yesterday. She has a little bit of a runny nose, but that's pretty much a constant condition for her. I hope she feels better soon! I've had a slight fever all week. Earlier in the week my throat was really sore. Today I had a splitting headache. I hope she's feeling back to normal tomorrow. The last time she had a fever it went away pretty quickly. I also noticed after her bath this evening that her privates are red - almost as if she had diaper rash, but of course she doesn't wear diapers. I put some diaper cream on her to see if that would help. I have no idea what it's from, but she was complaining about it, and it did look uncomfortable.

Ian hasn't had a fever, but he's been congested for the past week. This has meant he's been throwing up all the time. He threw up twice on the carpet at the church nursery on Tuesday morning. I felt badly about that. I am used to cleaning up carpet and flooring all day long, but I felt badly that someone other than Paul or I had to clean up after him. I usually wear my pjs several days before washing them, but I've had to wash them every day lately because he throws up during his first feeding (prior to 6am). I've been trying to feed him solids at least once a day. He's still resisting more than he had been a couple of weeks ago, but it's going better than last weekend. The reason I haven't been trying to feed him more than once a day is because he throws up after I feed him solids (every single time) so it seems pointless. I feel badly for him. I can't wait until his congestion clears up because when it does, his up-chucking should calm back down. I've had to do a lot more laundry than usual because Ian and I are wearing several outfits a day. Prior to having kids I hoped that my kids would only throw up when Paul was home so he could handle it. The smell of it used to make me feel sick to my stomach. I've come a long way. I don't enjoy cleaning it up, but I'm fairly immune to the smell of it now. If you do something this many times a day for months on end, I guess you're bound to get used to it. Have they ever featured something like this on that "Dirty Jobs" show on the Discovery Channel? HA HA!