Anyone For Pie?

*I just found this in a file marked "blog", probably about a year old. Amazing how things change. Or don't.*

Roanen has been getting into EVERYTHING - climbing on the island, pulling stuff out of the cupboards, screaming ear-splittingly when something doesn't go his way or right into Tristan's face when he gets mad at him, drawing in pen on the wood kitchen table, cutting pages out of my books, throwing anything he can get his hands on at the baby, taking stuff out of the freezer, eating sand (not dirt, because that would be gross you know), throwing handfuls of ashes out of the burning bin and wiping his ashy hands all over himself, lying on top of Tristan, pulling Josey's ears, attempting to call China and/or 9-1-1, pulling all the wipes out of the wipe holder and scattering them around the house, standing up to pee in the tub just seconds after he gets off the potty insisting "It's not working!", stopping the washer mid-cycle without my knowledge (because although the controls lock, evidently "stop" isn't considered a control), standing on the top of the chest freezer, hammering dents into the wood coffee table, kicking the cat, helping himself to overflowing glasses of water in the bathroom, poking the snake with a toilet paper roll, unpotting house plants, taking all the cushions of the couch and pulling stuffing out of them, climbing up on the island and swinging the pots and pans so they clank around, and refusing, REFUSING, to have anything to do with the potty, underwear, or being without a diaper, tossing my engagement ring down the cold air return. Fortunately he makes up for it by doing things like announcing "That where Nonno lives" when we drive by any cemetery, asking "Why you mad at me?" very earnestly when he gets yelled at, gently grabbing our ears for a second as a part of his bedtime routine, open mouth kissing, giving Tristan toys to play with, eating all but the tiniest shred of core when he eats apples and pears, asking for "chicken on a bone" and eating until the drumstick is completely clean, letting Josey lead him around by the hand on "adventures" through the yard, running downstairs in the morning yelling "Mommeeeee! I had a GOOD SLEEP!" whether he was up 5 times or not at all, needing to be kissed in whatever exact spot he hurts ("No, ON my tongue!"), playing well on his own for long stretches of time, making me laugh every single time I walk into a room and hear "No, I'M in here!" because he wants to be alone while pooping.

In new news, Roanen has puked twice today. After the second time he (against my wishes) shovelled in toast and eggs, then asked for pie. When I refused to give it to him on the basis that he would probably just throw it up, he insisted that he needed it so that his throw up could be a new colour this time.

Let's Try This Word Out...

Roanen was helping me bring a pile of laundry downstairs to wash so I told him he was a very helpful boy.
"I s... su...suhtainly am"

So I'm Not Nursing Anymore...

Roanen: "Uh oh."

Me: "Uh oh what, Roan?"

Roanen: "Your boobs are all gone!"

Baby Steps

After a couple of unsuccessful starts in the last 6 months, I decided to buckle down and potty train Roanen over a 5 day period when Russ was home 4 of those days. Past attempts lasted less than 3 hours, in which a most resistant Roanen screamed whenever he was in sight of the potty and constantly peed on the floor, the furniture, and people.

We warned him days in advance that the new year meant no more diapers. These excited reminders alternately produced bored stares or proclamations of "Yes I AM wearing diapers", and bringing the potty out of the bathroom closet caused it to be immediately kicked back in.

The original plan was the "Potty Train Your Child in a Day" method, in which the child is given mass quantities of chips or other salty snacks for staying dry, and gallons of sugary pop to quench his thirst. I'm assuming this is to make the kid want to drink, but I forgot that Roanen, while definitely a chip lover, doesn't really like sugary stuff, particularly fizzy sugary stuff. He stayed dry the first morning, sitting on the potty for half a second before getting off announcing that it wasn't working, but shovelled in the chips like there was no tomorrow. Once he actually HAD to pee though, he would very cleverly inform us that he was dry and would like a chip, then would walk into the other room with it and pee his pants. If he was forced to sit on the potty he would scream like we were killing him, and only once did he actually pee, but it was uncontrolled and in the middle of a screaming fit so it was hard to muster up great enthusiasm at it.

The plan for day 2 was a little different. We weren't going to reward him for simply staying dry. We weren't going to make a big deal about it. However, we were going to have Josey pee on the potty and get marshmallows every time he peed. While this elicited a "No, I'M going to pee on the potty all day and get marshmallows!" out of Roanen, when we actually put the plan into effect he couldn't have cared less about what Josey was doing and wanted to sit on the potty even less. He had one more forced, screaming pee before I nearly had a nervous breakdown and stopped. I was really at my wit's end, but was afraid of going back to diapers after all the fuss. I resigned myself to pee puddles for the next 6 years or so and lamented the fact that there are no potty training experts to hire. I would have gladly paid someone else to do this for me.

Then, a breakthrough.

On the second night, just after tossing him in the shower for the 16th time to wash pee off his legs, Roanen asked to watch the Cars movie. (sidenote - this child is obsessed with the Cars movie and we watch it at least once every day. Thankfully I don't get sick of it either.) Russ told him that if he peed on the potty he could watch it. And. He. Did. Just sat down and peed a little. I left his pants off at this point, put on the movie, and told him that if he peed on the floor the movie went off. Amazingly enough, after a few minutes he said he had to pee again, sat down, and peed. Um, seriously? This happened once more I think, then he went to bed. The next morning I kept his pants off again and he asked to pee on the potty about every 3 minutes. Shockingly enough he stayed dry all day, except for one accident just after Russ came home. A weight was lifted, but unfortunately there was still one problem. Despite the fact that it was obvious that he occasionally would REALLY have to poo, he kept those little butt cheeks firmly clenched and hadn't pooped in 3 days. Absolute refusal. We pumped him full of prunes and mineral oil and were rewarded with an 11 PM wakeup call to change a fist-sized rock o' poo in the pullup. Sunday was another poop-less day, albeit with one frantic poopy dance in the evening that he probably wouldn't have given in to even if we kept a continuous loop of Cars movie on a mini-TV strapped to his body. Pee-free, though, which was like a dream come true.

On Monday it finally sort of happened. I say sort of, because it involved him telling me that he was pooping in his pants, and I whipped them off so the tiny turd that had escaped Colon-catraz could drop into the potty while he screamed and tried to get up. Again, hard to be enthusiastic, but we faked it bigtime and rewarded him with prunes, fruit gummies, a lunch at the Dixie Lee, a huge car transporter, and a chocolate "severed finger" I found in the freezer that was leftover from Halloween. We had promised way more, but he didn't seem to remember or care about the other things... Anyway, he also had one pee accident that day, but other than that he's been super good for telling me when he has to go, and holding it long enough that I can get him on the potty. Each day there has been a little bit more progress, to the point that yesterday he sat on the potty twice and let the poop that had already mostly come out drop into it, and just about an hour ago he actually dropped a chunk into his pants, but then pushed a huge poop into the potty, complete with his usual "Get out of here!" while he was going. Oh, and he even stayed dry all night, something that Josey has yet to accomplish.

I'm absolutely amazed with how it all happened, and while the first two days were hell, overall it went waaaay more smoothly than I expected, and it was much easier than training Josey.

Two down, one to go.

*******

I know I haven't been blogging lately. It's not that I don't have anything to report; on the contrary, I have many stories about sleeping, teething, school, and evil 4 year olds throwing pretzels at the doctor's head, then destroying the doctor's office while trying to steal suckers. Another time. I feel guilty enough taking time away from cleaning or studying to write this.

Lazy, But Competitive

Every night after bath Josey and Roanen are supposed to clean up the zillions of books that they have spread around their room before coming downstairs for a snack. A few nights ago I walked into their room during this time to check on their progress since it was suspiciously quiet. I found Josey sitting on the floor reading with Roanen holding on to his earlobe and peeking at the book over his shoulder. I asked whether they were planning on finishing the job and Josey got up to grab more books to put away. Roanen jumped to his feet, looked at me with a pained expression, and said, very dramatically, "It's too hard! This book is just too heavy!" He picked up a book and, bending over like it weighed 40 pounds, held it by the fingertips. "See? It's just too too heavy for me!" The book dropped out of his fingertips. "Oh! I just can't hold it because it's TOO TOO HEAVY!" Josey raised his eyebrows, bent over, picked up the book and put it on the bookshelf and Roanen immediately screamed "NO, I WANTED TO PUT THAT BOOK AWAY!", grabbed it off the shelf, then gently put it right back on the bookshelf.

Well Hello!

I've been seriously delinquent in my blogging lately, so much so that I've probably lost my readers, all 2 of you. To make up for it I've glued the older boys to the TV and left Tristan screaming on the floor in order to treat you to "Our Summer...In Photos!":

The summer started off with Roanen's eyes getting more and more wonky, to the point that a lot of the time he would close one eye when looking at something.


This always made me feel guilty. But not guilty enough that I couldn't take pictures.

While we waited for the surgery date, Josey started playing in the local soccer league. He started out very enthusiastic, but chasing after ball-hogging 6 year olds got old after the first few lessons. He finally ended up spending soccer nights picking grass and eating clover flowers when he wasn't rolling into the fetal position in the back of the net. The coach also found soccer a little tiring so he only showed up about 3 times. Way to teach dedication, Coach!


I'll stand here in front of the net, but only because you're giving me a freezie when this is all over.

Roanen got his first real haircut and went from baby to boy. Sob.


Big boys don't smile Mommy.

Fortunately Roanen's surgery was scheduled for early in the summer so we could (hopefully) get his eyes straightened out. He was happy playing with the toys at CHEO until he was made to put on some of the cutest pyjamas imaginable.


Or is it that he's the cutest pyjama-ed child imaginable?

Either way, he was unimpressed with the whole situation and proceeded to lie in the middle of the corridor and refuse to participate in any of the fun waiting room activities. That is, until he got some funky sedative that is evidently equivalent to a few beers.


Hey Mommy. This is waaaaay funny. If only I could sit up without falling over...

Despite being told that Roanen would be perfectly fine after the surgery he was pretty cranky. And also not very pretty to look at.


You'd be cranky too if you had stitches in your eyes.

A week later we had a real emergency.

And the next day we headed down to Niagara Falls. We had a great time on the Maid of the Mist boat.



Picked up some souvenirs...



And went to Marineland, which turned out to be a lot of fun for Josey:


For me too:


Look at the size of that caramel apple! Refrain from looking at my pasty pale legs, my hideous running shoes and the fact that my eyes always look messed up in pictures.

But evidently not so much for Roanen:


Daddy looks impressed too.

Note to people travelling to Niagara Falls with kids - the Imperial Hotel and Suites (I can't seem to find the link right now) is a super inexpensive, super nice place to stay. It's right near the main tourist street and within walking distance to the falls. The suites have separate bedroom and living areas, mini fridges and microwaves so you can bring a lot of your own food if you're like us and don't like torturing restaurants and their employees and customers with your children's presence. And did I mention cheap? Like 80 bucks per night cheap. It rocked. Don't pay any attention to the horrible reviews on the review websites (although do read them because they're hilarious).

Back to us.

Just a couple of weeks after we returned home Grammie and Grampa decided to take the boys on a little vacation. So I invited myself and Tristan along, because I'm like that. We drove down to Toronto to spend the day at Canada's Wonderland. At the hotel Roanen made friends with a very bold dove who invited himself to breakfast.


The bird ate mostly scrambled eggs. How very, very creepy.

Roanen loved Wonderland almost as much as Marineland.



A $5 bag of tiny donuts made it all better though.

Then the holiday fun was all over. But not for long! Russ found an ingenious way to get out of having to work that involved chicken poop, kerosene, and the old oil tank we use as a burn barrel. Sneaky, and oh so graphic.


That's only one leg. The other one, as well as both arms, his fingers, and a bit of his face got it too. He was dead sexy, I tell ya.

I got to take care of the chickens, the kids, and Russ for two weeks which was pretty stressful, but for the following two weeks Russ was up and able to do pretty much anything except go to work so it felt like holidays all over. Unpaid holidays, but holidays nonetheless.

Now that he's back at work, the boys and I are back in our (lack of) routine and trying to enjoy the rest of the summer before September hits and I have to send my baby to school, something that I'm alternately dreading and looking forward to. While I'm not as freaked out as I used to be, it's still going to be traumatic.

In other (pictureless) news, Tristan is crawling! Actually I meant to post that 4 months ago. Nowadays he's taking 6 steps at a time and coming very close to not needing to cling to my legs constantly.

And finally, the reason I haven't been blogging lately is because I felt like my plate just wasn't full enough and signed up for a 2 year distance education program in natural nutrition. So my "not studying" guilt has been stronger than my "not blogging" guilt and I've been hitting the books instead of regaling you with tales of my existence. And right now my "Tristan is yawning and exhausted and the boys are trying to murder each other" guilt is taking over so I'll sign off for the next 2 years or so. But not really so keep checking :P

The End Of The Wonkiness...Maybe

On Monday Roanen got his eye surgery. Everyone at CHEO was really great, especially the male nurse who gave him his sedative along with some blowing bubbles, which greatly amused him until he got too buzzed to do anything but flop on Russ, giggle at his stuffed lamb and inform the nurse in a slurred voice that he got a sticker. Other than sleeping for an inordinate amount of time in recovery (we were told 15-20 minutes and he slept almost two hours) everything seems to have gone pretty well. The outside whites of his eyes are bloody red with a couple of stitches each (ew), and now instead of sliding outwards he's a little cross-eyed, which is temporary and apparently desirable according to the doctor. Now we just have to wait and see whether the strabismus was fully corrected. If it's still wonky the surgery will have to be repeated which would really suck because he's been miserable and freaking out, especialy when I have to put ointment on his eyelashes. Awesomely gross "after" pictures to come as soon as I can upload from my camera.

Roanenisms

A couple of things I forgot when writing about Roanen...

-Lately he has been paying more attention to Tristan, and will regress into baby talk, but only so Tristan can understand the conversation too. He loves making him laugh and always imitates him through dinner which works well to keep him from screaming bloody murder.

-Whenever I'm knitting he'll come up to me and say "That a screwdriver?", referring to my knitting needles. When I say no, he always slyly says "It BE like a screwdriver" and tries to take it away. Not only is he good with regular english, he's evidently mastering ebonics as well.

-When I started putting him on the potty to pee he would always get up after an unsuccessful attempt and say "It's not working", referring to his penis. Now everytime he actually pees he yells "It works!"

In Honor of St. Patty's Day I Give You O'Roanen, Our Irish Child

(you know, as in the frustrated exclamation of "Oh, Roanen!" that is so often heard around here)

I will now curse us by announcing that Roanen has actually slept through the night IN HIS OWN BED WITHOUT WAKING UP for 12 out of the last 13 nights. It will now never happen again. Actually it was 11 of 13 nights, but one of the wakeups didn't count because Tristan was screaming so loud at midnight that he woke him up. Anyway, this started one night after we finally had the area's version of "Nanny 9-1-1", the Phoenix Centre (for "troubled" children and families) pay us a visit at Russ' request. Basically we're getting an assessment done by a therapist and we'll have an in-home worker help us out with Roanen's freakout issues. The main problem we were going to address was his fighting bedtime and the nightly trip into our bed (because those are the issues Russ has with him - I don't particularly enjoy his fits but they don't make my life miserable either) and now Roanen decided to partly fix that on his own. The problem now is that when the in-home worker comes to help us she's planning on basically using the Ferber method to get him to fall asleep on his own (much to my anti-crying-it-out dismay) and I'm worried that if he gets upset at bedtime he'll regress in the middle of the night. I was ok with the idea when it was first presented, but the more I think about it the more sick I feel about it. Since it will be a while before the worker is able to come in the evening, I'm hoping to try some gentler methods in the meantime to get him to sleep without someone being with him, kind of like we did with Josey. I'm desperate to avoid the crying, especially since the reason we originally asked for help was because we knew if we tried something like that he wouldn't stop crying. I would honestly take having to sit with him for a while at bedtime over hearing him get upset at being left alone in his bedroom. Ugh. I'm depressed thinking about it.

Also filed under "happy" - he has peed on the potty several times, mostly in the morning. I'm not full-out training him because that would be ridiculous at this point between Josey's preschool and Tristan being Tristan, but we've taken the potty out and every once and a while I ask him if he wants to sit on the potty and get a jellybean. Unlike Josey, he doesn't seem to pee much at night so if I catch him first thing in the morning he'll usually have a mega-pee that somehow manages to flood the floor around the potty. Whatever. So what if I have to soak up a huge puddle (one-handed, of course, due to Tristan freaking if I put him down) every morning. He's peeing. I'm happy.

Taking after his father, Roanen has earned the new nickname of "Chatterbox". He pretty much constantly has a monologue going, usually consisting of things like "That's a-MAZING!", "Wook at that! Oooooh, that's WEEWY WEEWY PWETTY!" and "That's a taw biwding. What a bootiful biwding!" Almost as cute as Josey's exclamations of "Wow Mommy, that's weewy wuvwy!" My boys appreciate beauty. That's why they like staring at themselves in the mirror :)

Wonky Eye

I searched through my previous posts and only found one little mention in passing of Roanen's "lazy eye", around his first birthday. The doctor had checked out the alignment of his eyes and found them to be good, but I still noticed his right eye sliding outward every once and a while when he was tired or when he looked into the distance. It was hardly noticeable - even my mother who saw him all the time had never seen it happen - but it bothered me enough to take him to the opthamologist about 9 months ago just to get things checked out. It took the opthamologist about 2 seconds to shine a light in his eye and diagnose him with exotropia , a form of strabismus in which his eye slides outward. He assured me that it was purely cosmetic and that it wasn't affecting his eyesight. The only way to fix it was with surgery, which wasn't necessarily successful, and could only be redone 2 or 3 times before they had used up all the space to try to fix it. The surgery could be done anytime, but people who do get it usually wait until the early teens, when having "one eye chasing bees" (as Russ calls it) affects them socially. Being painfully aware of how cruel kids can be I didn't really want to wait that long, so at his follow-up appointment 3 months ago I asked for more information about the surgery. We were referred to a pediatric opthamologist in Ottawa and drove in yesterday to find out more.
As it turns out, he actually has a severe form of strabismus in BOTH eyes. In the link it's the rarer form called "alternating exotropia" although his eyes don't go quite as wonky as the kid in the picture. The doctor had him looking across the room, and as he covered one eye at a time the uncovered eye would "jump", then slide outward. It was kind of disturbing and cool at the same time to see it just happen at will when you would just see it by chance before. When the eye slides out he gets double vision, and it will affect his depth perception if it's left untreated.
We also found out that it's always genetic, so somewhere in the family someone else must have it. Our other kids are also at risk, although Josey seems to have avoided it since it usually appears before they're 2 or 3.
So the only treatment is surgery, and he's already booked for June 16th at CHEO. The muscles holding his eye have to be loosened under general anesthesia, and although it sounds complicated it's day surgery and the only care afterwards is a little cream over his eyelid. No patch, no temporary loss of vision thank goodness. There's a chance that since the strabismus is on the severe side, we might have to repeat the surgery within a year to further correct it.
The only thing I'm annoyed at is the fact that the original opthamologist was wrong about it affecting his vision. If we had decided to wait until he was a teenager to get the "cosmetic" surgery he may have had problems with things like coordination that I don't think I would have associated with his vision (since the doctor seemed so sure). See, there is an upside to being shallow :)

New stuff - yay!

Ok, now I can record stuff as it happens in something better than point form :)
Roanen may have turned a corner in his seemingly unhappy existence and has been quite content to play on his own and around Josey for the last couple of days. He still gets fussy once in a while, but I can actually get stuff done without him crawling after me and clinging to my leg, crying constantly. Knock on wood, but I finally feel like things are a little more normal. I can't wait for him to start walking so I don't have to lug him around everywhere, especially outside.
Josey's behaviour is also better, which I've decided is a reward for not killing him last week when he was a complete demon for 7 days straight. I had a horrible guilty mom moment at my mom's, though. Josey hit me, so he got a timeout on the landing going down to the basement (he won't stay in the corner so I have to put him down there and close the door. It's glass so he can see out - I'm not mean enough to just toss him somewhere where he can't see anything...) I waited an appropriate amount of time, then opened the door and asked him why he got a timeout (our usual ritual to make sure he understands why he's being punished) and he refused to answer me and screamed wildly for me to let him out. I told him he could come out when he calmed down and told me why he was having timeout, then closed the door again. This repeated itself several times, until he finally calmed down and told me why, then got a big hug. As usual when he gets really upset, he said he wanted to go to sleep and snuggle with me, so I took him up to our bed and lay down with him. After a couple of sniffles and sighs, he turned to me and said "Mommy, I sorry" and gave me a hug, then proceeded to say "My don't like myself". How's that for awful self-esteem in a 2 year old. Of course, he was his happy old self again in about 3 minutes so hopefully he doesn't have any serious issues, particularly none that were caused by me ;)

Some of my old notes - finally!

Josey - approx. 10 months

• says "Dadadadada"
• wrinkles his nose, smiles, and breathes in and out of his nose really fast
• loves bellies! Sticks his fingers in belly buttons, and will grab around waists and suck or zerbert bellies
• loves grabbing faces and necks and putting his mouth (or teeth now that he's got some) on them
• very charming to strangers; will stare at them until they smile, then will put his head on my chest and smile, pretending to be shy. He then leans way around me and plays peekaboo with them
• as soon as he sees the nursing pillow or me lifting my shirt he starts grabbing at me saying "heh heh heh"
• likes standing up against things and slamming his chest, chin, or both on them. He also likes banging heads, especially with Dad
• he's a real ham and will do anything for a laugh or a reaction; he even goes so far as to slap himself repeatedly in the head and laugh each time

Josey - 13 months

• has stopped breastfeeding and is now sleeping through the night most nights now that he's in a toddler bed
• drives cars and trucks around and makes very realistic engine noises

Josey - 14 months

• gets very excited when dad comes home - will wave with both hands at the door until he sees him, then shrieks "Daddy!"
• loves smiling at strangers and trying to get them to pay attention to him
• loves walking on his own in malls or outside. Daddy has taught him that sticks and puddles are fun
• has decided that he hates getting dressed and will cry like he's hurt whenever I try
• practicing his mad look - sticks his lips out and wrinkles his forehead, which is really funny to see
• loves putting his head down on the cats
• gets stuck climbing the gates and screams bloody murder in frustration, then gets right back up when I take him down
• says "cheese", "hot" (whispered "hot-ee), "Daddy", and can sign "hungry" (chews on a finger), and "again", and waves and blows kisses
• puts his pointer fingers and thumbs together to make be sing "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and puts his hands together and rocks for "Out comes the sun"
• one morning after I asked him if he was hungry, then got distracted, I found him in the kitchen eating a stack of bread that he had pulled off the counter

Josey - 15 months

• gives kisses (sometimes with tongue) when he's feeling generous
• loves boy things like trucks, cars, and blocks
• tried to make some animal noises like horses, cats, dogs, cows, horses, pigs, ducks
• has very good fine motor skills like removing marker caps and putting them back on, and placing very small objects in little holes
• takes kleenex and "blows" his nose making a honking sound

Josey - 16 months

• knows which key starts the car and can put it in the ignition
• can climb up cut out steps in the side of the play structure and likes to go down the slide backwards on his tummy
• starting to be much more vocal and uses different sounds
• can point out different animals in books

Josey - 22 months

• strings words together: "Daddy's big broom", or my favourite: "Hand Poo On"

Josey - 24 months

• saying broken sentences "Bambi on Grampa's wall"
• still loves his Little People, reading books, tools, helping Daddy do stuff
• getting very defiant - will watch your reaction as he's doing something bad like coming near the baby after he's been told to leave him alone. Tries to hit or kick Roanen if he feels like we're going to take him away from him
• likes watching shows or movies on tv, like Poko or his Berenstein Bears DVD
• sings Twinkle Twinkle Little Star:

"Teeko, Teeko, Eeta Ta, How a wunna a-a-a, Up-a Up-a Up-a Up-a Up-a...(this can trail on indefinitely until he remembers there's more to the song) Ky" Repeat all over and over

• knows most of the alphabet, especially if someone else is singing it he'll sing every couple of letters and mouth the rest
• loves going to Toybus and plays really well with other kids. He especially loves singing time and watching the other kids do the actions to songs he doesn't know
• is now in his new bedroom and bed. We had some trouble getting him to start sleeping in the bed at night because he was constantly asking for "old bed", but is ok with it now, especially since he helped daddy take apart the old bed - "old bed gone"

Josey - 27 1/2 months (this is out of order)

• acting up a lot, throwing tantrums and not being happy with anything that is done for him or to him
• doesn't like getting his diaper changed, especially if it's poopy, but does not want to go on the potty except to pee once in a awhile
• says "please" and "thank you" although he needs to be reminded sometimes
• getting comfortable with other kids, but expresses it through hugging, grabbing, and flailing his legs at kids
• does not want to play on his own much
• likes smiling at Roanen to make him smile back, but still gets aggressive - kicking him or covering his face, etc
• has a good bedtime routine: bath, pjs, stories, snack, brushing teeth, then a song, but still needs someone sitting in his room until he finally falls asleep (which sometimes only happens after a lot of fooling around)

Roanen - 3 1/2 months

• hates the car! We had to stop 5 times on the way to Ottawa because he was screaming hysterically
• has slept through the night (9 hours straight) a couple of times, but mostly gets up once to nurse then goes back down to sleep easily
• naps very well during the days - sometimes sleeps up to 3 1/2 hours straight in his crib
• crying peaked at about 3 months, then slowly lessened. He's still quite fussy around dinner time, though
• loves when his legs and arms are moved - "dancing", especially when Russ does it, and will stop crying just about every time for it
• very happy and smiley - coos a lot and blows raspberries

Josey - 25/26 months

• speaks very well, but still signs "hungry" and makes a kissing sound for "thirsty"
• likes doing "Cheers" with everything that is the same - drinks, Rice Krispies, feet. He had his first bath with Roanen and was very excited to see that Roanen also has a penis: "Cheers penis!"
• has started saying "thank you" after every time he says "no", whether it's appropriate or not
• loves playing at Toybus, especially playing and singing "Sleeping Bunnies"
• sings his ABCs, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Baa Baa Black Sheep, Head & Shoulders, and knows a lot of words to the Grampa song and others
• likes sitting beside Roanen on the big chair and says "One Two Boys!"
• gets on the bed in an arch and says "Tunnel!" - tries to go over top of Roanen and says "Roanen in tunnel!"

Roanen - 7-8 weeks

• gets very fussy and cries pretty much inconsolably
• will not nurse if he's not hungry, unlike Josey, so he can't be settled down that way
• sleeps on his own for 20 minutes to an hour in the AM, then 2-4 hours in the afternoon
• goes about 3 hours at a time for the first ocuple of stretches of night sleep, then 1.5 to 2.5 hour stretches thereafter
• very smiley when he's in a good mood, which usually doesn't last very long - does not like being put down very much when he's awake and will fuss even in the swing

Roanen - 8 months (yes, I failed to record a large chunk of his infancy - it was pretty much a blur of not sleeping and lots of screaming)

• having mostly short naps (around 30 minutes) but will sometimes go 1 or 1.5 hours
• eats TONS of food of varying tastes and textures - generally has no problems with new foods
• likes flirting with people now and everyone in public remarks that he's such a happy baby
• can sit on his own quite well and is starting to pull himself up to standing on things
• army crawls very well and pushes himself up on all fours and rocks
• will play by himself for longer periods of time, especially if he's outside on the deck, but becomes very agitated if Josey starts harassing him, or if he decides he wants to be held
• has developed a really annoying whine
• likes jumping on laps or in his exersaucer
• wakes up a lot at night (4-8 times) and needs to be nursed back to sleep - ends up in our bed most nights
• wakes between 5 and 6:30 in the AM
• says "A-dadadada"
• gets very excited when he sees Daddy and loves being rolled across the bed
• loves looking at himself in the mirror or in photographs - makes out with his reflection in the mirror, tongue and all :)

Josey - 2 1/2 years

• saying lovely things like "Hey cat! Come see that friggin' baby!", "How my get that friggin' sock on?", and "Oh Twap! (crap)"
• plays pretend a lot. For example, a dialogue between two grapes:

Grape #1: "Oh no! One monster gonna get me! He gonna eat me! You run away!"

Grape #2: "Ok, my run away!"

Grape #1, being eaten by the Josey monster: "Aahhh! He eat me!"

• uses nail clippers like a cell phone
• exhibiting obsessive compulsive behaviour like starting completely over from the beginning if he has a problem with something, and lining things up in perfect rows
• really likes Duplo and makes "tractors"
• pays very close attention to his food and notices when he has eaten it into the shape of something (Roanen's teething cookie into the shape of a bone and his toast into the shape of a dog - and they actually do look like them)
• mostly toilet trained. He only wears underwear (doesn't like training pants and will pee in them) and tells us when he has to poop and almost always when he has to pee - he'll have one or two accidents a day

Josey - 2 yrs 9 months

• telling us every time he has to pee and poop! (from about a month ago). He's still in a diaper at night, though, and it's usually pretty soaked in the AM
• starting to go to bed on his own without someone in the room - his naps have been like this for a while and as of Oct. 14 he has gone to bed on his own 3 nights in a row and gets better at it each night
• says "Nice day outside!" at least once a day regardless of the weather
• getting very good at his "please" and "thank you"s and is starting to figure out "sorry" and "excuse me"
• not very interested in colouring or playing with playdough for any extended periods of time , although he will make "faces" now when he draws. He makes a circle with two little dots for eyes, a big smile, and sometimes a forehead or hair.
• loves being active and playing outside
• still quite agressive with Roanen. He'll grab, kick or squeeze him, but will also sometimes hug him very gently or play nicely and share

Roanen - 9 months

• loves finger foods, especially Cheerios, and gets mad if there isn't something he can eat himself on his tray
• pulling himself up to standing and starting to cruise
• might be trying to say "Kitty", and sometimes says something similar to "Teddy".
• screams extremely angrily if something is taken away from him, or if he's in a bad mood and Josey dares to walk by him
• crawling on all 4s very well now
• gets very excited to see Daddy and hugs him tightly while pumping his legs as a greeting when he gets home from work
• eats mass quantities of food and is now over 20 lbs.