Wishing for Spring

We've been pretending it is Spring around here, but really it is too cold for that. Crocuses, daffodils, snowdrops and the like are up. Early cherries are starting to bloom. I wanted a good little folding table and chairs in Zane's size for art on rainy days, and I found the perfect one! Most tables have a soft top or are expensive wood, but this one is actually made to be an art table. It has crayon/pencil trays, clips to hold paper on, a white board, and a chalk board. Best of all, it wipes off totally clean with water and a rag. Zane loves it! We tried it for meals, but for some reason that was vetoed.

Here he is being a bit silly during some art time. I decided to experiment with talk bubbles to translate some of his mumbling.


We have been doing a lot of art lately, and one day when I went to wake him up from nap he kept his eyes closed and said, "I want to keep drawing. Drawing a picture." Do you want to keep your eyes closed to finish drawing? Nod. "I need pink."

It's not rainy every day this winter, so Zane has been getting out on his yellow balance bike most days. He can really zoom now! In the fall I was back-breakingly bending over to keep him upright. A trip around the block was excruciating. Now he zips around on his own! Seattle is hilly, so for half the trip he zooms downhill with his feet just tapping the sidewalk lightly. One time I saw him actually lift both feet and try to coast! For the second half he pushes himself up no problem, and doesn't ask for help. I'm really pleased. It is so much more fun to get him out for exercise when I don't have to do most of it.

For some reason Zane has been talking about what is real and what is not. I think he may be confusing it with "alive", but we're working on that. It's pretty fun to hear him start listing things. "You're real. Daddy's real. Jo Jo is real. My mouth is real. The door is not real."

He still has some baby talk that I hate to correct because I love it. Sometimes his words are just better.
Fire extinguisher = fire squisher
Blueberries = bluebelellies
Remote control = moku

My trip to Maine ended up being very successful. Zane and Michael were totally fine together. While Zane did ask for me and talk about me, he had no trouble with me being gone. He's so calm and flexible! I had a great time, too, with lots of sleep and uninterrupted adult conversation and food. I visited with my Grandma every day and felt really recharged. I brought back a huge puzzle from my Mom that Zane's cousins Ian and Julian used to love. It was a hit with us, too!

Unfortunately, Zane peed on it the first day we had it out, but it seems to have survived. I've been doing a very casual approach to potty training. It's kind of like pre-training. Every morning that I can, Zane is sans diaper for a few hours to air out. Then as part of the getting dressed routine we do at least one minute of toilet time. Zane gets to put a star on a chart just for sitting there. That part is working out pretty well, but unfortunately we have had no actual success. Just getting used to toilet sitting. Sometime in warmer weather when I have a holiday weekend I'll have to ply him with drinks, put on no diapers, and make frequent trips to the toilet to try to get some success. I know he is getting ready because he will ask for a fresh diaper at night if he has peed in his night diaper (while I know this is a bedtime stall, it is also true that the diaper is wet). He will also pause in the day and then say "I peed." He will also ask whether or not he has a diaper on when he pees or is about to pee. So, the awareness is building, which is all I ask for right now.

One problem we have been having, though, is with chronic constipation for Zane. It's getting really bad with some nights of pain. Poor guy. He eats lots of fruit and gets plenty of exercise, but his liquid intake is not great, and he is mostly off vegetables. I've been working on that, and we are hoping things will be better.

We are heading to Hawaii soon! I can't wait! I'm starting to worry that I am looking forward to it too much and I will be disappointed somehow. What a worry wart. There is some bad weather there this week, but hopefully it will literally blow over by the time we get there. I want to take Zane on the Sugar Cane train, a mini-submarine trip, and to the aquarium. Other than that it will be sand, surf, and sun!

Since I seem to be a blogger slacker, there will probably not be another post until we come back.

Aloha!

Boys and Girls of Summer

We've had a pretty nice week with a number of really nice days. The first day of summer was actually a super beautiful day. We all went down to the beach for the morning and had a great time. As we walked towards the water we noticed several people with Styrofoam coolers; they were taking big crabs out of them and tossing them into the water. We walked up and watched and from what they were saying gathered that they were Buddhists doing an act of kindness on a day that was considered extra powerful for such acts. The kindness would come back to them manyfold. Zane was fascinated and even touched the back of one that a lady held for him. Later when Michael and I held out tiny crabs we found, he refused to touch them and kept telling us to put them back. It always seems like we have to leave the beach too soon. One of these days I need to get my act together and get down there early enough to stay for several hours before nap time.

Later in the week, on the way to daycare, Zane had a bunny in his lap (not Bob), and he pointed out its tail. We had a conversation like this:

J: Does JoJo have a tail?
Z: Yeah!
J: Daddy doesn't have a tail, and Mommy doesn't have a tail, and Zane doesn't have a tail. No tails!
Z: Pesis!
J: Yes, you have a penis! But that's not a tail, it's different. Daddy has a penis. Zane and Daddy have a penis, but Mommy doesn't have a penis.
Z: Glasses!
J: Yes, Mommy doesn't have a penis, but she does have glasses!
Z: Boobs.
J: Zane and Daddy have a penis, and Mommy has glasses and boobs. That's right!

We seem to have come to another big leap in language. It's not so much that he has a bunch more words, but that his sentences have become a little longer and more complex. One really noticeable thing that he's been working on this week is his/hers he/she him/her. He's been experimenting with them, so I've been using them a lot more, too.

I also was super impressed with him this week on fine motor control. We got a theme kit from the library that had big beads to string, and after I showed him how once he managed to do it himself after just a minute or two!

A had to work this weekend, and on Saturday morning Zane and Michael went to the zoo. They got the super bonus of seeing an elephant pee and poop an enormous quantity of stuff. You just can't beat that. Sunday I put Zane on my bike and we went to a small park overlooking the sound. Zane loves to look at the boats from there. Afterwards we got Michael and went out to brunch and to the Farmers' Market. We saw our neighbor Gavin who took this really nice photo:I don't have a lot of photos of Zane and me, so I'm especially pleased with it.

Mom/Grandma is coming! Only a few more days -- I can't wait. She'll be here for all of July, and we will almost immediately take off for a week of car-camping at Fiddle Tunes. We're leaving on Sunday, so I may not be able to get another blog post in for a while.

A New Verb!

Monkey boy reminds you to floss. The only photo I took this week!

Zane has many many noun words, but for a long time his only verb has been "up" (and maybe "out"; I'm not sure if that is a verb or noun for him). I keep asking him, "When are you going to get another verb?" Well, he has one now, and boy does he use it a lot! I'm already kind of tired of it.

"I want! I want! I want!" Actually, what he says is something like "Iant" or "aunt" (not pronounced ant), while madly opening and shutting his outstretched hand. It has largely replaced his point. Things like this that we haven't worked on show up all of a sudden, and I think they come from daycare. Like calling a phone "call" instead of "phone", or saying "No, don't!" Hmm, now that I think of it, "don't" is a verb, too!

Saturday night I got to be a big girl and go out to see a play with Sabina. We saw "Dancing at Lughnasa," and it was really wonderful. I was out way past my bedtime, but I never once looked at my watch. Michael and Zane had a nice evening together, and Zane even went to sleep in his crib without Mama! Bravo to them both!

We had fun earlier in the week when Michael brought out the "thumper" for his sore back. Zane was instantly smitten. The video is a bit long, but has a lot of silly bits.