A Breakthrough

(Maybe).

Ben finally seems to be making some progress with his occupational therapy sessions... at least, it seemed so this morning. He is still nowhere near being able to copy most letters/numbers/shapes without help, and most of his chalkboard drawings this morning still looked like jellyfish. But on the bright side, he seemed to settle on using his right hand almost exclusively this morning (although when I commented on it to the therapist he gave me an impish grin and immediately switched to his left hand). Also, she had him do some pencil activities using a pencil with a small pencil grip on it to facilitate holding the pencil correctly. He held the pencil perfectly using the pencil grip, did not complain about doing the work sheets, and paid careful attention to his work.

I ordered some of these pencil grips for him just now on Amazon -- they are smaller than usual pencil grips and have patterns on the sides to help him know which finger goes where. I hope I will be able to fit some onto his crayons so he can practice the proper grip at home doing coloring activities.

He also seems to enjoy doing connect the dots activities so I am going to see if I can find a workbook of connect the dot drawings for him to do. Not only does it help him practice his pencil skills, it also helps with number recognition and counting, as you must connect the dots in the correct order. I was surprised and pleased to see that he could do this with no help this morning, properly recognizing double-digit numbers (10,11 etc) to connect all the dots in the correct order. You go, Ben!

Becca at 15 Months

I remembered it's time to give an update on Becca's milestones. Except I'm too lazy to look up how I did it before so this time just freeform....

As previously noted, she started walking without assistance at about 14 1/2 months. After a couple of weeks of practice, she is toddling all over. She is still wobbly but usually doesn't fall down spontaneously anymore -- though a strong breeze might be enough to do the trick ;)

She is getting pretty good at feeding herself with a spoon, and very stubborn about it. She will rarely let me feed her anymore, and prefers using a spoon over her fingers even when using her fingers would be easier. This makes mealtime a bit annoying and results in a lot of food ending up in her lap. On the bright side, she now has 4 teeth (almost - the top two front teeth are finally coming in now). Ben had I don't know how many teeth at 15 months but I have a picture of him munching on a whole apple at 15 months so I know he had a lot more than four.

She still does not have many more words than at last report, though she now says something that sounds a whole lot like "Look, see?" when she points at something. So we'll give that one to her. She is starting to "talk" constantly though -- a very conversational-sounding stream of babble that I have no doubt will one day soon resolve itself into some recognizable words. Especially now that she's getting some more teeth to make different sounds with ;)

That's all for now I think... will update again at 18 months.

A Long, Long Weekend

I see I'm being chastised for not posting since Thursday. So here's the rundown:

Friday - very annoying. Ben was off, I was supposed to work, and Becca's day care was technically open but there was only one other kid there who was leaving at 1 so I also picked Rebecca up at 1 so that the staff wouldn't have to stay all day just for her. Needless to say I got maybe an hour of work done, and then had to spend 3 and a half hours working Friday night after the kids were in bed.

Saturday - Better. Went to the mall and got some half priced shirts and a dress at The Lucky Brand Jeans Co,, drank a bottle of wine after the kids were in bed.

Today - Tired. Went to the gym, watched a lot of (very improbable) football. Ben decided he would root for the Cowboys just to get under Joel's skin, but after it became evident that he wasn't going to get to do his touchdown dance anytime soon, he retired to the bedroom to watch Krypto the Superdog.

Chanukah - Over. Ben connived two presents out of me on Friday when I had him home with me while I was trying to get work done, so we gave him his last present yesterday. He liked all of his gifts, and enjoyed playing with most of Becca's gifts also. Becca's favorite still seems to be the stuffed Santa, and her least favorite is definitely Tickle Me Cookie Monster (he made her cry).

To sum up, after a four day weekend, two days of which Joel was at work all day, I am almost looking forward to working tomorrow.

A Christmas Snake

It was unseasonably warm today, even for here. I think it was in the upper 60s, and mostly sunny. It was so warm in fact that one of the numerous grass snakes around here must have decided it was springtime. I know this because as I was taking the kids outside to go over to the JCC to play basketball, Ulysses trotted up onto the porch with the snake in his mouth.

He dropped it, and since I could see it was still alive, I herded Ulysses into the house and hoped the snake wasn't hurt too badly. When we got home from the JCC a couple hours later, the snake was gone. So I said, "Oh good, it looks like the snake got away."

"Or maybe," Ben said, voicing my unspoken thought with uncanny accuracy, "it just went away to die somewhere else."

A Perfectly Wasted Day

About once a year -- if I'm lucky -- I will have a company holiday that the kids don't also have as a holiday. Today was my day. I'd been looking forward to it for weeks, wondering what I would do with a whole day off from work without the kids... I had thought of lots of things I might do, all of which I had a lot of trouble remembering this morning after I dropped the kids off.

I also still didn't feel very well from my recent brush with the flu or whatever it was, and I actually did have something I needed to do for work. So to recap: a) didn't feel well, b) had work to do, c) couldn't think of anything to do.

After watching The Food Network for a while I suddenly remembered that Joel had mentioned wanting peppermint bark from Williams Sonoma so I decided since I had nothing better to do I might as well go see if I could get some. So I went to the very crowded mall, on Christmas Eve... only to discover that the mall in question did not have a Williams Sonoma. That's odd, I thought... I could have sworn I'd seen one around here somewhere... So I decided to drive (against my better judgement) to another mall. Where I got stuck in loads of traffic because that mall entrance is a clusterf*ck even when it's not Christmas Eve. No Williams Sonoma there either. So I came home -- two wasted hours later -- and checked online (which of course I should have done to begin with) and discovered that the Williams Sonoma is across from the first mall I'd been at, but not actually in it, hence why it was not listed on the directory. I did not entertain the idea of going back there, so Joel's peppermint bark will arrive in 5-7 business days ;)

Not exactly the relaxing day I had envisioned. Oh well... there's always next year.

Chanukah, continued

I meant to post last night but the daycare germs struck again and instead I spent the night throwing up a lot. The kids are not sick (yet), but I blame all germs on the day care so I expect one or both of them will get sick at some point in the very near future.

Nanny and Papa took Ben to see a play of The Velveteen Rabbit yesterday, which he enjoyed very much by all accounts. He was well-behaved so got his Chanukah present from Sunday plus his present from Monday, so he was happy. His Sunday present was a Vtech laptop from Nanny and Papa, and his Monday present was a scooter (which he proceeded to ride around the living room since it was too dark and cold to ride outside). Tonight he got a camera, which was also a big hit.

Here is a picture of Ben with his scooter, and Becca, whose favorite present so far (ironically) seems to be a stuffed Santa that one of her caregivers at the day care gave to her.

Just One More

Since I didn't get to post a picture of Becca with her first Chanukah present, here is one from this morning.

Happy Chanukah

For most of us, that is. Ben's Chanukah, at least the gift-receiving aspect, will begin tomorrow because despite countless warnings he refused to behave himself tonight. The most disturbing part was that upon realizing that he wasn't getting a present, Ben did not throw a fit. Oh, he whined a little bit, but in the end he really didn't seem to care all that much. My conclusion is that he gets so many presents anyway that Chanukah is not all that special. So I am currently mulling over a no-presents-unless-it's-Chanukah-or-your-birthday rule.

Ben wasn't poorly behaved all day; in the morning we baked cookies (and made a thorough mess in the process) and in the afternoon he went to his friend Maya's Chanukah party, where he was for the most part well behaved and consumed large amounts of sugar. Once we got home though it was all down hill, and by dinnertime it basically seemed like he was provoking us on purpose so that he could see just how far he had to go before losing his present. When I finally sent him to his room, he seemed glad to go.

Eventually he sidled back downstairs and watched the assembly of Becca's present, a cool play house thingy with lots of levers and buttons to press, from Joel's parents. Becca was too tired to play with it by the time I finished putting it together, so she'll have to check it out tomorrow.

I did get a few pictures throughout the day - Enjoy. Happy Chanukah!

Saturday Update

For those of you suffering through the snow in the Northeast I would helpfully like to point out that the current temperature here in Charlotte, at 9:30 PM, is 60 degrees. (But it is raining).

Today I took Ben to a birthday party here, where after I threatened him with no Chanukah present tomorrow, he behaved himself perfectly and participated in all of the activities with enthusiasm. (He's had a little problem with participating in group activities at birthday parties lately).

We met friends for dinner here, which was very good (first time we'd been).

Ben and I made cookie dough this afternoon, but haven't had a chance to bake the cookies yet (dough in the fridge). They are chocolate crinkles, or as I have always called them, dog dirt in the snow cookies.

Tomorrow we have a Chanukah party to go to (which means probably I will have to threaten Ben one more time so that he'll behave himself), then we will celebrate the first night of Chanukah with Joel's parents. And watch the Eagles game, of course. Full day.

Class Chanukah Party

Here is a picture from Ben's class Chanukah party, as promised.

Odds & Ends

There's not much going on, so just a few random updates:

Ben's class Chanukah party was yesterday at lunch, consisting of pizza, salad and cake. No latkes, which was disappointing to me. When the designated picture-taker emails the pictures she took, I will post one or two. Though I am not sure when that will be since I am pretty sure her son, who unfortunately sat next to my son at the lunch, came down with strep throat yesterday afternoon.

Ben met with his Thursday occupational therapist, Michelle, for the first time this morning (since we had to cancel his first Thursday appointment last week because Ben was sick). He took to her right away, and was very impressed with her office, which had loads of toys, christmas lights and other interesting distractions. Key word being "distractions." He performed with his usual high level of boredom, frustration, and as the therapist put it "a self defeating attitude" during the drawing activities she did with him. For example, he began scribbling all over the page when she asked him to color a picture, and did not even try to color inside the lines.

What can I say about Rebecca... she has not injured herself since her injury-prone weekend, but she has an alarming tendency to sprawl flat on her face at any given moment with no warning. She did it this morning but fortunately there was nothing around for her to hit herself on. I was packing her diaper bag in the kitchen and I heard a THUD and when I went to investigate she was still lying sprawled on the floor, not hurt or upset just taking her time to get back to her feet. Sometimes I could swear she does this on purpose.

I ordered her a new diaper bag, from Baby Sherpa -- after watching the video demonstration, I was sold! I ordered the Short Haul variety. Her current bag is too small and has a rip in it. I also finished up my Chanukah shopping for the kids. Ben's I did mostly at Target and Rebecca's I did mostly online (after doing Ben's and not wanting to repeat the crowded-toy-aisle experience).

This weekend is shaping up to be busy, with Ben having invitations to a birthday party on Saturday and a Chanukah party on Sunday, dinner plans in the works for Saturday night with friends, and Joel's parents coming over Sunday night for Chanukah.

My Future Zoologist? Maybe Not.

I saw Ben's future career as a zoologist go down the tubes this morning:

BEN: Guess what animal I'm thinking of. It's brown.
ME: Does it have fur?
BEN: No. It's a kind of bug.
ME: A worm?
BEN: No.
ME: A spider?
BEN: No.
ME: An ant?
BEN: No.
ME: I give up. What is it?
BEN: A hedgehog!

Tis the Season

The neighbors are starting to bring over holiday goodies. Ben helped us eat cookies over the weekend that one of our neighbors brought over Friday night, and tonight Becca graciously helped us out with a Moravian sugar cake that appeared on our doorstep courtesy of the neighbors across the street. The scrape on her chin is from accident #3 of the weekend - she smashed herself in the chin with a basketball while trying to duplicate big brother Ben's dribbling skills. (Note to self: Doodle is too short to dribble. Do not let her play with a basketball again).

The Dangerous Sport of Walking

Rebecca could use a football helmet. She has split her lip open twice in the last 18 hours. First was yesterday afternoon when she tripped in the bathroom and hit the left side of her face against the bathtub, resulting in a puffy cheek and a bloody bottom lip. Then this morning she tripped in Ben's room and hit the right side of her face against the bedrail, resulting in further injury to her bottom lip, on the other side. Her screams robbed Joel of his morning to sleep in. Poor Doodle and her fat lip.

Cuban Food

Tonight Joel and I were introduced to Cuban food, which was delicious. Joel ate a plantain for the first time and professed to enjoy it (some of you may be shocked at this). He also was a big fan of the fried steak (though who wouldn't be).

Ben was a big fan of his new babysitter, who is one of the nurses Joel works with. He was quite happy to usher Joel and I out the door and have her all to himself. He convinced her that he sleeps with his lamp on and his door open, so when I went to check on him there he was, sound asleep with the light on and the door open. Taking advantage of babysitters is a skill learned early I guess. He tried to convince his last one that I let him have sugar mixed into his Pediasure. I am sure he will get more creative as time goes on.

Zero to Sixty

I've been waiting and waiting to be able to post a video of Becca's first steps. She's been "cruising" for a couple months now - walking holding onto furniture, my hand, or pushing her walker toy. But whenever you tried to coax her into taking a step on her own she'd either get down on her knees and crawl, or stand there and start crying.

But I'd been getting pretty suspicious over the last couple of weeks that she was perfectly capable of walking and was stubbornly choosing not to. Her balance seems great - she climbed up the baby slide at Monkey Joe's the other week and went down all by herself. She climbs on and off her rocking horse all by herself. But she stubbornly refused to walk.

Until today. So the moment you've all been waiting for... Or at least I have... Here she is without further ado, at 14 1/2 months, taking her first steps. Yes believe it or not, I had never seen Rebecca walk until about five minutes before this video was taken:

Bored to Tears

Ben, that is. He is victim number 3 of the stomach virus that's been making its way around the house. His is a milder form and consisted of nausea and diarrhea but no vomiting. The diarrhea seems to have subsided by now as well. I kept him home from school today and for the morning he was quite content to lie in my bed watching TV while eating saltines and drinking ginger ale.
This afternoon, once he started feeling better I presume, the boredom set in. At one point he looked at me forlornly and said, "Mom, I am so sad. I just want something to do."

Ben's boredom aside, having him home today was not nearly as bad as some other times he's been home when I've been working. He's been pretty mellow and has allowed me to get a lot of work done today.

Ben should be all set to go back to school tomorrow, and now my only worry is that Joel will come down with the virus just in time for dinner Saturday night (we have a babysitter lined up and are going to a Cuban restaurant with some friends).

More Free Stuff

I started my holiday shopping by digging out a bunch of gift cards I'd accumulated over the last year or two and never used. I had two $25 Best Buy cards, two Babies R Us cards (one $25 and one $15 that was actually given to us when Ben was born by the realtor who sold us the house in Blackstone) and a $5 Barnes & Noble card that Joel produced from somewhere. I ordered two DVDs for Ben from Best Buy (still have about $10 left on one of the Best Buy cards), a music table/activity center for Becca, and a book for Joel. All told it was about $120 worth of stuff which I had to pay about $30 out of pocket for.

Not stopping there, I also redeemed 10,000 American Express rewards points for $100 in Cheesecake Factory gift cards (Joel and I had been planning to go shopping and to dinner at The Cheesecake Factory sometime soon).

I also got a free meatball sub for lunch today. Yay me :)

Day Care Germs & Jellyfish

I caught Rebecca's germs. I had convinced myself she had no germs and that her throwing up was a fluke (gag reflex maybe or something) but of course I was fooling myself. I woke up yesterday morning feeling nauseous. I dragged myself out of bed and got the kids dropped off and then spent the rest of the day in bed. Today I am feeling moderately better but still not great.

I took Ben to his occupational therapy appointment this morning. I'm still not quite sure what to make of it. Pardon the expression but he tends to enter retardo-ville when we walk through those doors. Today for example he was crawling around on the floor for no apparent reason. The therapist now has him help her make a list on the chalkboard of the 5 activities they will do during the hour. She helps him make the numbers 1 through 5 (having him trace her numbers) and then asks him to draw a picture of each thing they are going to do. The only problem is that almost any time you ask Ben to draw a picture of something he draws a circle and then draws a bunch of long lines coming off the bottom of it. So today for every picture he was asked to draw that's what he drew. If he'd been asked to draw a jellyfish I would have considered that precocious, but jellyfish was nowhere on the list.

The problem with the list is that the "fun" stuff - trampoline, swing, scooter board - all seems to end up at the front of the list, and the writing activities end up last. With all the fun stuff out of the way there's not much incentive to coax him to sit down and practice his writing skills which as far as I'm concerned is the whole point. He either goofs off or gets downright obstinate. Today he was obstinate. I narrowly resisted pointing out to him that my copay for these visits is $20 a session so he damn well better do what he's told. Hopefully Thursday's appointment will go better.

How Do I Look?

Okay so I am fully aware that babies are not able to recognize themselves in a mirror until around 18 months old but I swear this is what happened: Rebecca draped one of Joel's ties around her shoulders, then crawled into the bathroom, climbed up on Ben's stool, and checked herself out in the mirror.

Sick Day

Becca's sick day was pretty uneventful. She was very well-behaved, and work was very quiet, allowing the day to go smoothly. She discovered Sesame Street and Barney which she enjoyed very much - jumping up and down in her Pack N Play (which I set up next to my desk so I could keep an eye on her and attempt to get some work done) and pointing at the TV screen. I am not sure if I should feel bad for letting her watch so much TV today, or bad for the fact that she's barely ever seen any Sesame Street or Barney until today since Ben monopolizes the TV with Power Rangers: Jungle Fury and Ben 10: Alien Force. At any rate, she was happy. I was happy. There were no more vomit incidents.

Jinxed

A couple of days ago I was marveling to myself that it has been so long since the last time Becca has been sent home sick from day care. I think it has been a good three or four months, which in germy-daycare-baby terms is just forever. Her immune system must be getting so strong, I mused.

Well, clearly I jinxed myself because today I got the daycare call - she'd thrown up everywhere so could I please come get her? She considerately waited until 4:15 pm to do her upchucking, so it was not a great disruption to my day... except that the 24 hour rule (must be vomit-free for 24 hours before being allowed back to day care) means she has to stay home tomorrow. Even though her vomiting does not seem to be accompanied by a fever or any other symptoms.

Tomorrow will be an exercise in multi-tasking.

Cute and Cuter

Our alarm system is set to chime whenever one of the three doors (front, back, garage) opens and Becca is now trained like Pavlov's dog. Whenever She hears the door chime she says "Hi! Hi! Hi!" before she even sees who it is. Her little head will be swiveling towards the door to look to see who's there but she's already saying "Hi! Hi! Hi!" She'll do it even if she is in a different room and can't see the door. So long as she can hear it she says hi. It's very cute.

Joel drinks a glass of lemonade a day now because it is supposed to prevent kidney stones from forming. The other day Ben kept asking for lemonade and Joel finally asked, "Why do you keep pestering me for lemonade?!" And Ben said (with a sheepish look on his face) "Because I don't want to get a kidney stone!"

A Quiet House

Abby, Mike and Charlie left for home late this afternoon. I am sure Ben will miss having his cousin to play with. They played very well together -- for the whole long weekend I don't remember having to break up any fights over toys or anything. Ben did not bat an eyelash at having all his toys strewn all over the house -- he loves company. I think he probably is happy to have his room back to himself though. Becca moved in with him for the last four nights so Charlie could sleep in her crib. She seemed to sleep pretty well in her Pack N Play in Ben's room and the one morning she woke up early (today) and cried, Ben did not wake up. That kid sleeps like a rock.

Abby and I took one last trip to the mall this morning (I took the day off since they were not leaving till late afternoon). We both upgraded our cell phones to the new EnV. It is very nice. My old phone was 3 years old and bought from a friend who claimed it took crooked pictures. As a matter of fact it did take crooked pictures so it's nice to have a phone that takes straight pictures. It is also nice to have a qwerty keyboard since my texting ability on a regular phone keypad is abysmal.

After shopping, lunch and playing with our phones, I took Abby, Mike and Charlie to the airport and then went to the gym which was very crowded from everyone trying to work off their Thanksgiving dinners. Now I'm spending my evening trying to get the house straightened up and mentally preparing for going back to the grind tomorrow...