Caleb is continuing to make progress talking. He's starting to try singing too. Today he did something so cool that I had never seen before. First off, I've been letting him go upstairs and play on his own. I go up and check on him every so often, just to be sure that he's not getting into anything he shouldn't. He's always up on the couch looking at his books or playing at the train table (I really couldn't ask for an easier kid). Anyways... today, he decided he was done playing downstairs and went up to play in his room- Grandma Walsh is visiting and has brought lots of new books from her library. After a little while, I went up to make sure he wasn't getting into trouble and as usual, he was looking at his books. I went to turn and go back downstairs and saw that he had picked up one of his books that had a picture of a cow, a dog, a rabbit and a cat on the back of it. I watched him look at the pictures and then say "mmm, wff, eow". Grandma Walsh and I now think this crazy boy is going to be reading before he's really talking.
He's also started trying to discipline himself. We've been working on getting him to stop throwing his toys. This is something he does mostly out of frustration and with Sadie starting to crawl around more and more on the floor, it really needs to stop. I've been doing time outs with him and those usually work pretty well but as we enter into the more rebellious twos we've had to try more consequences. First time I'll warn him and often try to redirect him. Then we get a two minute time out. Finally, sometimes when he's just not getting it, I've started smacking his fingers- a small swat on the hand that did the throwing. This has been working and it isn't often that I have to do that. Andy was watching Caleb the other day and saw him throw a toy so he gave him a warning. Caleb turned and looked at him and then hit his own hand and then went to sit in his time out spot.
Caleb also has some favorite songs now...
Old MacDonald- he'll make the animal sounds if you ask him "what's a _____ say?"
Itsy, Bitsy Spider- he tries to do the spider motions
If Your Caleb and You Know it- a variation of "if your happy and you know it" he claps and stomps his feet and dances in between.
It's Our Time to Sing Together- a kindermusic song
The Wheels on the Bus- he does the motions for this song
Finally, I feel bad because I've been writing so much about Caleb but he's just doing so much right now and I'm trying very hard to keep a good record of his achievements especially since I've been so anxious for him to talk. But we're really excited that Sadie is trying so hard to stand on her own and pull up and crawl. She also clapped her hands together for the first time today. (No tapping the knees like her big brother did) She's getting better and better at feeding herself cheerios and fruit puffs and of course, she holds her bottle on her own and has started holding and drinking out of a sippy cup.
These two keep me so busy. It's nice having an extra pair of hands this week with Grandma Walsh.
Okay, this isn't the video that I promised (Caleb doing his new animal sounds) but it is video of Sadie's first time rocking on the rocking horse in the backyard. She did very well on it but you have to watch- she doesn't really understanding balance and will just fall over if you're not watching.
Also, since I just took this yesterday, there is some video of Caleb's boo boo. And the update on the injury is that he's doing fine. He slept all night and has been playing happily all day today.
Yes, Caleb had his first ride in an ambulance this morning. A little too much excitement for me but I guess it was bound to happen sooner or later. First of all, before anyone panics, the boy is alright just had to have a few stitches. Both Caleb and Sadie are taking long naps right now which means that I can take a few minutes to write this out and hopefully process it myself.
Here's what happened...
Sadie was down for her morning nap and Caleb wanted to play outside so I thought I would take advantage of the the time and get some yard work done. I had finished mowing and was doing some trimming while Caleb was scooting on his little bike up and down the sidewalk. I heard him cry out as he fell over on the front steps and went over to help him up 'cause he looked a little tangled. When I picked him up blood was coming out of his forehead- more blood than I had ever seen before.
Adrenaline kicked in and I ran into the house to grab a towel to stop the bleeding. I kept thinking over the first aid directions I had been taught when I worked in day care... "apply pressure. okay, doing that. elevate... well, he's standing so that's about as elevated as I can do. call for help." Here's where I ran into a problem. I was not going to be able to get him inside to call for help, while also trying to keep him calm and stop the bleeding. The neighbors were gone. Andy was at work. I didn't know what to do. Then I saw the mailman just up the street. Of course, I don't know his name (the neighbors call him Stretch) so I just yelled "Hey, Mr. Mailman, could you please come help me for a minute?" Well, he saw me holding Caleb and ran down to see how he could help. I explained what happened and he ran inside the house to call 911. While we were waiting for the ambulance, he also called Andy to tell him to come home quick. Poor Andy, can you imagine, getting a call at work, with a strange man saying that your spouse and child have had an accident. The mailman tried to explain what happened but I know Andy's mind was racing with all that could possibly have been wrong.
By the time the ambulance got here, the bleeding had stopped but I could tell that the cut was deep and kept it covered for fear that it might start bleeding again. Caleb had calmed down a bit but of course, he still wasn't happy that Mommy kept putting a towel in his face. He did manage to ooh and ah and point when the ambulance pulled up. The EMTs were very nice but Caleb wanted nothing to do with them. They could see that the bleeding had stopped and that Caleb would need stitches so there wasn't much they could do on site. Andy made it home shortly after the ambulance got here and he and Caleb went for a ride to the hospital. Sadie slept through all of this, of course.
Shortly after lunch, Andy called to give an update and Sadie and I went to go pick them up. Apparently, Caleb was very good for the doctors and nurses as long as they weren't touching his head but he did require a bit of entertaining while they were stitching him up and "Itsy, Bitsy, Spider" seemed to help. He has three stitches and a bright orange band aid as well as a new sippy cup from his trip to the ER. We're thinking that tonight we'll take a special trip to Target to get a special ambulance for him for being such a brave boy through it all.
Overall, I think I was more traumatized by the whole incident. There's something about seeing your child hurt and not being able to fix it. I knew fairly quickly that he would be alright but I was still upset at seeing him hurt like that. Andy said it was good that I stayed with Sadie instead of going to the ER with Caleb. I don't think I would have done very well with all that. I'll probably still be a little weepy about it for the next day or so but we are so thankful that he wasn't hurt worse. And I'm so thankful that the mailman was willing to come and help me out and that Andy works so close to home.
After all this, I think I'm ready for a nap myself. I'll have to post some pictures later on. God Bless
Well, we've returned- we meaning me and Andy. We were off for the weekend traveling out to a wedding in Pochahontas, Iowa. For an idea of where that is, look at a map of Iowa and basically the town is some where in the middle of Sioux City, Fort Dodge, Des Moines, and Omaha Nebraska. It was quite the trip but worth it to visit with some good friends.
Now where were the kids during all of this?
They spent Friday evening and Saturday at home with Aunt Betsy who was kind enough to fly out from Philadelphia for a weekend of babysitting. (They would have never been able to make the trip with all the flying and driving) Then on Sunday morning, Grandma and Grandpa Bush showed up early to take Caleb and Sadie to Idlewild park for the day with their Aunt Jackie and Chris. Then I picked them up Monday afternoon and brought them home. It was quite the busy weekend for us all.
Sadly, I don't have any pictures of their day at Idlewild but I'm hoping to get some soon. Caleb rode just about all of the kiddie rides and had a blast. He even gave Ricky Raccoon a hug. However, he did not care for Raggedy Ann and the Old Woman in the Shoe in StoryBook Forest. But Sadie liked them and happily sat for pictures. We're thinking that he's fine with people dressed up in big animal suits but he doesn't like them in other costumes- then they're just strangers and he's been getting very shy around strangers.
Being away from them for a weekend was very hard especially when at the reception we discovered that Betsy had called. I quickly found out that Caleb was running a little fever. It seems that his molars picked this weekend to decide to try and push through. This made the little boy very uncomfortable- not wanting to eat and having trouble sleeping. But Tylenol seemed to save the day or at least make it possible for them all to get a little bit of sleep. Sadie did really well over the weekend but seems to be going through a growth spurt. The little girl is constantly hungry and loves to eat. She also cut her first tooth on the bottom left. No more chewing on our fingers- she has quite the bite and loves practicing by biting the spoon when you feed her and not letting go. She is also very close to crawling- getting up on her hands and knees and then rocking back and forth. It won't be long before she's toddling after her big brother.
And Caleb has learned a new animal sound thanks to Aunt Betsy. I can't begin to describe it so you'll just have to wait for the video clip- here's a hint though... What sound do you think an octopus makes?
So it's been awhile since I last posted. We've been very busy lately. Right now Andy and I are getting ready for a trip to Iowa to see a friend get married. The kids can't make this trip so Aunt Betsy has stepped up and will be baby-sitting for the weekend. She comes in on Thursday and then Friday afternoon we'll leave for Iowa. Caleb and Sadie also will be taking their first trip to Idlewild on Sunday with Grandma and Grandpa Bush and Aunt Jackie. I'm a little bummed that I won't be able to be there but we'll be taking another trip later this summer.
This past Saturday, we took the kids to a little church fair over in Greenfield. We walked around and looked at the booths and listened to the music. There were some carnival rides set up for the little ones and Caleb rode the carousel all by himself. We also had him on a moon bounce and played the duck pond game. He didn't exactly want to pick up a duck. He was so happy laughing at them coming out of the tunnel. They had people dressed up as Tigger and a CareBear walking around and Caleb gave them both hugs. We even went down into the church basement and listened to the polka band for a little bit. He really liked the music but was a little scared of all the people trying to talk to him.
Caleb has entered into a bit of a shy stage. Any time strangers or even people he's just not sure about approach him, he hides his face and won't talk. It's been an interesting change in his personality because he's always been so friendly to everyone. Sadie on the other hand, has always seemed more cautious about different people.
Caleb's also expanding his animal sound vocabulary. He now says "da" for "quack", "eee" for a monkey sound, and "baa" for a sheep. He loves the book The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle and at the end of the story will say "ssss" and whisper because the spider goes to sleep at the end of the story. It's really cute and has been helpful keeping him quiet when Sadie's sleeping. We've also caught him saying "I see it" when pointing to different things. He's really interested in numbers and cars and trucks. His favorite book this week is Construction Countdown, which we read several times a day. He's also getting more into Bob the Builder because of all the construction vehicles.
Sadie is working hard at trying to stand up and is able to get around a bit on her tummy even though it's not really crawling. She's had a couple of close calls almost tumbling off the bed. She's trying more and more food but still no teeth. And she loves Caleb so much. She spends much of her day just watching him play.
so that's it from here- we'll see how they do this weekend
Not a lot to report this week. Had an uneventful weekend which was nice since we have some busy weekends coming up (family pictures and a trip to Iowa). The rugrats tried out the wading pool on Saturday afternoon. Sadie seemed to enjoy just sitting in the water watching everything that was going on. Caleb wasn't so interested in swimming. He preferred to sit out on the front steps and watch the cars. I've been wondering if he's not sure about getting his bathing suit wet. I also tried to get him to try a popsicle but he wanted none of that. He did enjoy sharing bites of my twist-in-a-cup-with-rainbow-sprinkles.
On Saturday morning, Caleb and I went to Barnes and Nobles for a storytime with Spot the dog. He really liked it and wasn't afraid of Spot at all. He gave Spot 2 hugs without me even having to push him into it. It's a nice little thing they do over there. They read a couple of stories. Then the kids get to meet the character. Then they have cookies and get to color a picture. We met Elmo there in February and I think the next one is in August.
We tried to go swimming out in Derry yesterday but the weather wouldn't cooperate- of course, the day we try to relieve ourselves from the heat, it finally rains and cools everything off. Still, we had a nice visit and Caleb had a blast watching Grandpa's trucks.
Caleb is trying out more animal sounds. We can get something that sounds like "meow" for the cat and if you ask him what a duck says, he says "da". He's also started saying "way, way, way." We don't know what that means but he says it a lot. He's also saying "yes" almost as much as "no." It's nice now when we ask him a question, we can more often then not trust him to give us an answer. But there are still times when he says no to a cracker but still comes running for it.
Sadie is trying to stand a little. She can't quite pull herself up but if you stand her next to something she can hold onto, she'll stand there for a while. On Wednesday, we go to the doctor's for a weight check so we'll be able to see how much she's grown since starting on formula and baby food.
