Chase's New Things

Friday, 11 July 2008

I stopped by the classroom after I dropped Chase off at the Halsalls, but noticed that the custodians have not started moving my stuff yet (and by the end of the day, when I stopped by again, they still hadn't moved anything). Chris and I worked hard Wednesday night to get things packed up, and I finished the rest yesterday. Guess I won't be setting up my classroom this weekend.

I spent the morning writing thank you notes for Chase's presents (next year, that'll be his job -- ha ha!). I cut paper with my fancy scissors, which was a mistake. My wrist and forearm are hurting now. I tweaked it even further moving boxes in my closet tonight. Now my hand is tingling. Not good.

We kept Chase out until about 8:30 pm tonight, way past his bedtime. Mommy and Daddy were a bit selfish and spent a couple of hours shopping at the Oakley sample sale. Chris is an Oakley junkie, thanks to his part-time job at McCully Bike. I'm not much of one, but for some reason, I always manage to find something to buy. 5 bucks for a shirt here, 20 bucks for a bikini, 25 bucks for a bag...well, you know, it just seems to all add up. Found some good buys and chatted with a lot of his bike friends.

Chase was fussy by the time we got home - nursed him and went straight to bed.

He's been so funny and energetic this week. He's into pointing at things with his pointer finger, especially when he wants something in particular. Tonight, when I was feeding him, I said something about Grandpa, and he waved. Then he pointed towards the living room. I asked, "Are you saying hi to Grandpa?" And he waved again. He kept pointing. Who knows if he really saw him?

His new "words":

"done" ...If he starts throwing food or is rubbing his eyes, I'll tell him he's "all done", and I'll sign "done" and he'll say "done"
"down"....I guess I ask him a lot if he wants to get down from his high chair after he's done eating, and he'll say "down" if he wants to, or even if we're playing up high on the couch and he wants to play on the floor, he'll ask to get "down". (odd I know, when he cannot even say "dad" yet.)
"buh"...He still calls his bird friends "buh".
"duh"....for duck (He loves playing with and sucking on the rubber duckies in the bath.)

His favorite pasttimes:

* blowing bubbles when drinking a glass of water or milk
* throwing balls (Today he had fun rolling a ball down the stairs and throwing it up the stairs to Nana and Popsicle)
* watching birds
* swimming and splashing in the water
* pointing and smiling and saying hi/babbling to babies in photographs (our friends' kids all over our refrigerator) and even babies in magazines and on the YoBaby containers

His favorite foods at the moment:

* bread (including bagels)
* crackers
* cheese (He loves the Cabot snack cheese.)
* yogurt
* noodles
* cheerios

His favorite toys at the moment:

* a pair of shoes (He loves to stack shoes on shelves and play with them, but only in pairs)
* a monkey stuffed animal (He loves how soft it is and will lay his head down on it...so cute!)
* pinwheels (He loves holding them and watching them spin round and round)
* little stuffed animals he can hold in his hand (We got some of these from IKEA and he just loves them because they fit right in the palm of his hand)
* any kind of ball
* nesting blocks
* The Tiny Tadpole book - a Scholastic Little Readers picture book I bought from a school book fair this year (He just loves when Daddy reads it to him and after he gets to the end, will take the book and hand it right back to him to read it again!)

Finally, this week, he has begun sleeping through the night! WOO HOO! (It only took a year!) He's just so energetic and so darn tired. Sometimes I'll nurse him before bedtime, but not always. He's in his crib by 7:30 - 8 pm, and he wakes up at 6 am. The only thing is he used to wake up and play in his crib for about half an hour. Now, he wakes up and just protests and wants to me to come get him right away to nurse. Guess he's hungry. We've noticed that we need to feed him earlier for dinner, starting at around 5:30 pm. He's like me: he'll graze and take awhile to eat but he will eat a lot. He'll sleep better with a full tummy of course. If we feed him too late, and he's too tired to make it through the meal, he'll just go to sleep hungrier. And then he'll wake up in the middle of the night, and I'll have to nurse him.

So, we're still learning, but at least I know that he IS capable of sleeping through the night. Just give him a full tummy and tire him out and he'll be good till morning.