Mommyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

Kalin has been practicing saying "mommy" along with "mama". Except he likes to drag the "y" out so it sounds like "mommyyyy". We think it's really funny. I love when he starts almost chanting "Mommyyyy, Mama, Mommyyy, Mama" over and over. I don't know if I've mentioned it before but he says "Dada" and "Mama" totally different. "Dada" is spoken loudly and with great emphasis and excitement while "Mama" is spoken in hushed, almost reverent tones. This makes it quite amusing when he starts going back and forth between "Dada" and "Mama" because his tone changes each time. We're not sure but we think he might call himself "na-na" (short a sound).

A BIG GIANT THANK YOU to Sara Sandoval for recommending Baby Einstein DVDs to get Kalin to sit still for more than 2 seconds. He will sit for 20 minutes in the chair and watch this particular DVD. I got him the Baby Da Vinci dvd from Netflix which goes through different body parts. We watch it probably 6 times a day. Well, it's on about 6 times a day - half the time he's just using it as background noise while he colors or plays with some toys. I enjoy the downtime to sit with him and watch it. I am, however, getting kind of tired of this same one and look forward to receiving a couple more dvds before the week is over. We usually watch it during breakfast or snack time. We'll sit together in the chair with some Ritz crackers (a new favorite for both Kalin and I), a banana and Cheerios if it's in the morning, and his sippy cup while we watch the show. We haven't gotten to the point though where I can walk away and do something while he watches because he is still very attached to having mommy nearby. But that's OK for now because I am finding it quite enjoyable to sit with my little boy and watch him enjoy the show.

We got Kalin his very own potty. He has become so interested in the big toilet and loves to say "pee pee" while *cough cough* grabbing himself (he's going to thank me later on for putting that out there on the internet!) that we decided we might as well introduce him to the concept of actually going in a toilet. And this really is just an introduction - I'm not entering super-potty-training mode yet but I also didn't want his fascination with all things potty to pass us by. The only time he actually sits on it (without clothes - because he loves to sit on it with his clothes on) is right before his bath. We even tried putting his feet in a bucket of warm water before his bath to see if he would pee before his bath rather than during it. It didn't work but he did think it was pretty funny. I got a picture but I think I'll spare him that embarrassment and keep it for my eyes only (and maybe a few select family members).

Since the last post Kalin has gotten two new teeth - both bottom molars, one on the left and one on the right. So that gives us a grand total of 11 teeth - 6 on top and 5 on the bottom.

He's been asking more often to color. I used to drag out our coloring board and crayons when we needed something to fill our time but he is actually asking to do it. However, there hasn't been a whole lot of actual coloring going on. It's mainly taking the crayons out of the plastic baggy then putting them back into the plastic baggy and also matching up the broken pieces by color then looking for my enthusiastic approval. When he does color though it's mainly lines. He doesn't do a whole lot of scribbling. He enjoys drawing lines. We've recently been experimenting with coloring with our toes. He thinks it's funny.

Several times a day I'll look at Kalin and be amazed at how old and big he has gotten. In my head he's still 6 months old. Of course, I'm almost 26 and still think I'm 20. I guess that's just the way life goes.

Tidbits

Kalin has recently become obsessed again with playing on his pony. He goes through phases with this toy. For a couple months he won't go near the thing and then all of a sudden it's all he wants to do!! I'm glad that he's enjoying it though. I love watching him bounce, make the sound that the animals are making and then go crazy when the music starts up.

His new favorite words are "uh-oh" and "buh-bye". He has 3 or 4 different variations of "uh-oh". We walk Kasey out every morning on his way to work and Kalin likes to tell him "buh-bye" and wave. He also likes to say "buh-bye" and wave to the cars that pass us on our walks or to any car that starts up in the parking lot.

This past weekend (Father's Day weekend) was a major milestone for Kasey, Kalin and I. While I had spent my first night away from him back in April during a friend's wedding festivities, this was the first time I had left him for an entire weekend. Kasey and I went up to San Francisco to celebrate our anniversary. This was the first anniversary that we have been able to do anything special for. Our first year we had been flown out to San Jose for a job interview for Kasey and I was in the middle of really bad morning sickness. So it was kind of a trip but not a fun, romantic one and I was throwing up the whole way home on the plane. Sidenote: Morning sickness and planes don't do well together. Our second year we had a 5 and half month old so we weren't ready to leave him alone for any great length of time. I think we did make it out for dinner that year. So this year we decided to do something extra special. We had a really good time and it was refreshing to not be on anybody else's schedule but our own for 48 hours. I relaxed - for more than just a few hours at a time. I did surprisingly well. I never felt the urge to call my parents to see how things were going and I didn't really miss him too much. At first I felt a little guilty about that but I knew that he was in excellent hands and that I really needed this break. Of course Kasey and I still talked about him some. It was hard to go even an hour without mentioning some cute or weird thing that he does. But we had a really good time together being a couple - not just a couple of parents. I think we need to make this an annual thing.

I thought it was really funny how different this Father's Day present was compared to last years. Last year I made a digital book of pictures from Kalin's first 5 months for Kasey to keep at work. It was a nice, sentimental type of gift. This year I bought him 3 different kinds of hot wing sauce from our favorite wing place, Buffalo Wild Wings. I couldn't come up with anything sentimental or creative so I decided to just give him something I knew he would be excited about. We loved this restaurant when we lived in Ohio and Kentucky and there just aren't very many out here so we never get to go. He really was excited about the sauces. I was really excited about them too and had a hard time keeping quiet about them for the 3 weeks they were hiding in the house. I did have Kalin make Kasey's Father's Day card. It's a bunch of scribbles on a sheet of printer paper that I then folded in half and wrote "Happy Father's Day" on the front of. I made sure Kalin knew that this was for Dada while he was coloring. Since Kalin was with my parents on Sunday morning he went to their church nursery. They had the kids make a special thing for their fathers. It's a poem for the dads and then they had the children put their foot prints on the paper. I thought it was a neat idea. I was surprised at how big Kalin's feet look. I need to compare them with his newborn feet.

For those who care - it appears that Kalin has weaned himself. It's been 8 days now since he last nursed. For the two weeks before his last nursing he had only been nursing once every 3 days. So I was prepared for it. "That's kind of sad" was Kasey's response when I told him last night. And I immediately said, "Not really!" I was ready. Kalin was ready. It was time. It worked out well this way. It wasn't traumatic for either one of us. We just let it happen naturally.

I am happy to announce that Kalin has gained his appetite back. For 5 or 6 days he barely ate anything. He was drinking his milk and juice and water just fine but would only take 2 or 3 bites at each meal. It was making me nervous except for the fact that he was acting completely normal and just fine. He wasn't acting sick or starving. Then all of a sudden he was back to eating normally again! I guess these are just the ups and downs of toddler-hood.

I was so proud of him today!! We were sitting on the kitchen floor coloring and I noticed that pretty much all of our crayons are broken. So I would hold up one part of a crayon and ask him to find me the correctly colored missing piece. 3 out of 4 times he picked up the correct colored piece!! He had lost interest in the little game by the fourth time. It showed me that he can follow direction well and that he can match colors together (and also that he isn't colorblind).

He appears to have gotten a new tooth. I don't know when. I have it marked on my calendar as last Wednesday because that is when I found it but I'm pretty sure it had already been there for a couple of days. He doesn't let my finger in his mouth to explore very often anymore. So that makes 6 on top and 3 on the bottom. He's a little lopsided.

So there a few tidbits of news from the last couple of weeks.

Ok?

I know. It's so bad. It's one of the things that you're not supposed to say to toddlers and young children. But I have found myself, in spite of my knowledge and resolve not to, ending sentences, requests and commands with "ok?". Lest you think me an inadequate parent, this habit is not so bad that I throw it on the ends of sentences or commands which are meant to keep Kalin out of harm's way or about rules which are set in stone. You won't hear me saying, "Kalin! That's hot! Don't touch, ok?" or "Do not throw food on the floor, ok?". It's more the small, seemingly insignificant things that the "ok?" gets tacked onto. "We're not going outside now. We'll go outside later, ok?" "Eat one more bite of veggies before you have another piece of bread, ok?" Thankfully, he has yet to catch on that my words are implying that he has a say in the matter. I realize that sometimes the "ok?" could be used to make sure the words are being understood by the listener, but I have a feeling that, the majority of the time, this won't be the way it gets interpreted by a young child. Sometimes, even as I'm saying the sentence I'm telling myself, "Don't do it, Lindsey. Don't let that word slip out.", and then I hear myself saying "ok?". It's frustrating :-) Don't worry, I'm not really beating myself up about this. I realize that it's just one of those habits that most people have and Kalin is just going to have to learn that even if it sounds like I'm asking for his "ok" about a situation, I'm probably not.

It seems like Kalin has been picking up more words in his vocabulary in just the past week. I may not be able to remember them all as I sit here. He definitely LOVES to say "mama" now. Although, I'm afraid that with all the hugs and kisses he gets awarded with for saying "mama" so much, he might back off for fear of getting smothered :-). He tweets when he sees a bird and says his version of "bird". I think I mentioned in the last post how so many objects in his world start with "b" so lots of things sound the same coming out of his mouth. He points to the window and says "tee" which means "see" as in "I would like to see what is out the window, please.". He's becoming better at saying "up" and "down" and is starting to imitate us more. I even get him to say "poo poo" and "pee pee". I'm not sure if he connects the meaning of the words yet but we're working on it. I figured now would be a good time to get him used to those words in preparation for potty training. He likes to pull the handle that makes the recliner on the love seat pop up and when he does it I yell "pop!!" and he copies me. He has found that having the recliner part up helps him get onto the couch all by himself. I am much more confident in his abilities now to get down from the couch or chair properly that I will actually walk away to get something from the kitchen or to check my e-mail while he hangs out on the furniture. When he wants your nose to make a funny noise (a fun game of ours) he'll now reach out his hand to push your nose and say "beep!". Just yesterday, while we were hanging out in Kasey's office waiting for him to get off work, a car alarm started going off in the parking lot and Kalin imitated the beeping.

Since Kalin received his little car from my parents for Christmas, it has stayed inside since we don't have a real yard to go play in. But this weekend we decided to take it down to the parking lot and see how it would do out on the road. Kalin had a blast! It's a much bigger area to ride in than inside the house and, since he can push himself on it now, had so much fun rolling around. For those who have been to our parking lot, you know that it's on a bit of a slope, so we decided that it would be fun to let Kalin go downhill with somebody just a few yards away to catch him. He had so much fun!! It went a lot faster than either Kasey or I had expected and we both realized that if we ever do that again, Kalin needs a helmet. One little bump in the road and he would have taken a rough tumble onto the asphalt. We have video but Kasey doesn't want me to post it online for fear that somebody will come across it and call CPS on us because of Kalin's lack of a helmet :-)

Kalin has started pretending like he's cooking. We gave him a spatula to play with and he'll grab one of my pots and start stirring. Then he'll take a lid and put it on the pot, then take the lid off and stir some more. It keeps him entertained for quite awhile.

He's been waking up earlier than usual for the last week. We thought we had the problem fixed but that lasted for only a day. He'll wake up around 6 now which is too early for us. I'm wondering if maybe we do need to try a one-nap-a-day schedule. Maybe he's getting too much sleep during the day so his nights end up shorter. I don't know. We'll see how this week goes. We try putting him down again after he wakes up and sometimes it works - for about 20 minutes. A couple mornings ago Kasey got up with Kalin at 5:56 and put him back down with his pacifiers and came back to bed. I had slept through this and didn't know that Kalin had already been awake, so when I heard him at 6:25 I went in and did the same thing. I'm surprised now that he didn't cry since this had already happened to him once before that morning. He managed to stay quiet (I don't know if he slept) until 6:45 when Kasey's alarm was about to go off. It's so reminiscent of Kalin's first 10 months of life when it seemed like this is what we did all night long. Then even after he finally started sleeping through the night, he would wake up at 5am and we would be trying to get him down again for another couple of hours. So either we need to cut out a daytime nap or I need to learn how to become a morning person. I'm not really sure which option sounds better to me right now.

Random Videos

This first video is of Kalin sitting in his high chair watching my dad work on the computer. We had him show us different body parts. It's kind of just a video of Kalin being Kalin.





This second video is to give you an idea of what I hear all day long. We don't understand 99.9% of what comes out of his mouth but it's usually pretty entertaining.

Aunt Jessi is here!!!

Today we went to the San Francisco airport to pick up my sister, Jessi, who has flown in from China for the summer. It was Kalin's 3rd trip to an airport and his second time to make the trip to greet his Aunt Jessi. The timing was such that Kalin's only morning nap was 5 minutes in the car before we arrived in the parking garage at the airport. I had hoped that he would sleep most of the way to the airport. I had even given him his pacifier and blanket but he wasn't able to calm down enough until we were almost at our destination. I guess I still expect him to sleep the way he did when he was in his rear-facing seat and was reclined. We haven't taken very many long trips with him forward-facing yet but he definitely does not sleep as well. He did surprisingly well today on only his 5-minute nap and we made it home in time to get him down for a good 2-hour afternoon nap. He did end up being really cranky this evening so we put him to bed much earlier than normal - I hope he doesn't wake up before 6:30 tomorrow morning.








Kalin had fun in the airport playing with my dad and running around. He wasn't quite sure what to think of his Aunt Jessi at first but he warmed up to her. He liked to look at her a lot.




He is still very "talkative" but we don't know what he is saying most of the time. He says "ding" when the toaster oven dings, says "ra ra" to imitate a dog barking, says "ah ah" to imitate a monkey and, aside from the other words that I've mentioned in previous posts, says "ba" for just about everything else. I've realized though that there are quite a few things in his world that start with either "ba" or even just a "b". Tonight he was singing my praises as he just kept repeating "mama" over and over again. That makes me so happy :-)





As with most infants and toddlers, Kalin is fascinated by other people's shoes. He loves to put them on and try walking in them.














He still amazes me every day with the things he understands. Kasey asked him this morning if his feet were cold and if he would like some socks - he signed pleased then went to his room and grabbed his socks off the floor. I was looking all over the house for his milk cup and finally asked him if he knew where it was - he walked right into his room, opened the cupboard on his dresser, and pulled out his sippy cup. I keep having to remind Kasey and myself that we need to be really careful now what we say around Kalin because he is understanding a lot more than we realize.


He is still a funny funny boy who can also be really really frustrating. I'm doing my best, with only the help God can provide, to make sure that I spend more of my days in laughter than in frustration. Some days I don't do too well but more and more I'm finding a patience within me and wisdom I didn't know I had to approach each situation in the most productive and loving manner. I love the moments when I'm successful in remembering to look at Kalin and see that precious little baby I fell in love with and the active toddler who is so full of life and eager for experiences instead of the sometimes willful, tantrum-throwing, rebellious little boy he can be. This is all part of growing up, right? This is the stage we're at right now and I know with some patience and wisdom we'll come through this just fine. We truly are loving this stage of Kalin's life (I think I say that about every stage) and look forward to whatever lies ahead.

17 Months

Kalin has another tooth!! My dad was the one who found it. It wasn't where I was expecting one. It is an upper right molar - maybe. I'm not 100% sure that it's a molar and he doesn't let me get my finger in his mouth very often to explore so I'll have to wait a bit to find out which tooth it is. So that makes tooth #8 and I'm expecting a couple more to show up sometime soon.



Kalin had his 15-18 Month check-up on Thursday. I had originally thought that they called it just a 15-month check-up but apparently it covers 15-18 months so we were still within the range. He is 32 inches (78th percentile) and 25 lbs. ( 63rd percentile). I'm not completely sure how accurate the weight is though. Our doctor's office hasn't gotten their new digital scales yet so they're still using the ones with the slider (I'm sure there's a technical term for them) and Kalin was not happy about being put on it so he was crying and moving and reaching for me so I think the nurse got an estimate and just went with that. It's only a few ounces more than 3 months ago but he has been eating less and they say that this is when the weight gain really slows so who knows, it could be accurate.

Sadly, I think Kalin is starting to recognize the doctor's office. A few seconds after we walked into the examination room he started looking around and getting fussy, like he knew the horrible things that go on in there. He did get 3 shots and handled it just about as well as we had expected. He did keep trying to take the band-aids off afterwards until we put his shorts back on him. The nurse said that it happens alot because the child thinks it's the band-aid that it causing the pain. Thankfully there hasn't been any reactions to the shots. And we were told that we don't have to go in again until after Kalin's second birthday!! Of course then I remembered we'll probably have to go in October to get his flu shot. But still, that's 7 months without a check-up appointment!! I guess I'll have to measure him and weigh him myself now.

Overall he appears to be doing quite well. The doctor once again mentioned that he has a nice, big head and also commented on his strength. Kalin was not happy about the doctor coming close with the stethoscope and kept pushing his hands away. The doctor also called him a brute. Kasey and I had a good laugh over that.

The only question I had at this check-up was to make sure that his verbal skills are where they should be. I wasn't really worried but wanted to make sure I wasn't missing anything. Now, I know that you're not supposed compare babies too much and especially between genders. But when my niece, who is a month younger than Kalin already has, like, 20 words in her vocabulary that she pronounces quite clearly and can already say people's names while Kalin still doesn't call us "mama" and "dada" frequently and his 5-10 words aren't understood by anybody other than his parents - it made me wonder if he should be farther along. The doctor was very helpful and reassured us that as long as he's understanding what we're saying and has a few words that he uses for things then he's doing just fine at this age. 5-10 words is normal at this age and boys are usually about 3 months behind girls in verbal expression. He also told us that as far as pronunciation and understandability goes the norm is for 50% of what a 2-year old says should be understood by a stranger, 75% for a 3-year old and by 4 years a stranger should have very little trouble deciphering what is being said. This put my mind at ease. Kalin is slowly but surely figuring out how to say things and he most definitely understands what we say. I still have many days though when I wish he knew how to say more. It would cut down on a lot of frustration. Many times he'll just look at us and start signing "please" and we have no clue what it is that he wants. Then he gets frustrated that we don't know what he wants. Sometimes he'll be able to point in the vicinity of the desired object and we try and figure it out from there. But I would love for him to say, "Excuse me Mama, may I please have some Cheerios?". Ah well, that day shall come. As with all developmental things, this too cannot be rushed. I'll just keep naming and labeling everything for him, talking to him and reading to him. Little by little, object by object, we'll figure out how to communicate better with each other.

Climbing, Praying, and Teething

Kalin has become a little climber over the last couple of weeks. He still needs our help sometimes but has mastered climbing onto the rocking chair and ottoman in his room. It's pretty amazing that he can do that by himself because they both rock as he's climbing up there, but somehow he manages. The couch and recliner in the front room are still difficult for him though. He needs a boost from us to get up there. He loves sitting up there though and playing with his helicopter or reading a book. The downside to this is that when he's sitting on the couch or chair, one of us needs to be right there with him. He hasn't mastered getting down from the chairs by himself. We're working on it though.

He's learned our routine at dinner. I didn't really know we had a routine but apparently we do the same thing often enough that he's caught on. I'm usually the last one to the table as I'm grabbing last minute utensils, beverages, condiments, or napkins; I finally sit down, we hold hands (Kasey grabs Kalin's) and one of us prays. Kalin waits for the moment I put my bottom in that chair then thrusts his hand out towards his dad with a big grin on his face. He knows the routine!! He even caught us off-guard on Saturday morning. We don't usually have breakfast together, even on the weekends. So this Saturday we decided to have french toast and even set our table up so we could all eat together. We decided to just eat the pieces of french toast as they came off the stove instead of keeping them warm until they had all been cooked. Kalin was already set up in his high chair eating, and Kasey had already started in on a piece or two by the time I had one for myself. As soon as I sat down, Kalin grinned and stuck his hand out. Kasey and I just started laughing and thanked Kalin for reminding us that we should also pray for our breakfast - even if some people had a head start on eating. We'll hear him mumbling sometimes during the prayer, or he'll even bow his head and mumble after we've prayed but before he eats his first bite. It's way cute and makes us smile :-)

He's teething again. I think it may be a molar this time. While I know there's some controversy regarding teething causing fevers, I believe that was Kalin issue on Thursday night and Friday. He was not a happy camper and had no desire to be put down. I ended up carrying him most of the day (he's so heavy now!) or even just sitting with him in the chair and rocking. The fever is gone now, no tooth has erupted, but he still isn't very happy and keeps gnawing on his finger. He's also decided not to nap these past two days. He napped so well on Friday when he had the fever (even taking a 3-hour morning nap!!) but these last two days we haven't gotten more than 1 1/2 hours total out of him. It made me a little nervous to drop him off with our friends, the Meyers, on Saturday evening while Kasey and I went on a date. But I also figured that the different faces, different environment, and 8-month old Luke would probably keep him stimulated enough. I was right. It was a positive report when we got back to pick Kalin up. He was a little loopy but hadn't had any meltdowns. By the time we got home and put him to bed, he had been awake for 9 hours!! Thankfully our nights haven't been bad. It's just been the naps during the day.

Kalin has started to say "mama" a lot more often. It makes me so happy :-)

We have a doctor's appointment coming up this week. It's supposed to be his 15-month check-up but since we're running late it's actually a 17-month check-up. I really hope they don't need to do a finger stick again for blood. The shots I can handle...the finger stick I cannot.