A little bit of karma

My dad can't keep the women in his life straight. Okay, that sounds kind of bad. What I mean is that his daughters, wife and sister have for many years been resigned to the fact that we all get called by each other's names. Liz has been "Katielizzy" so often that she'll answer to it without arguing any more. If I'm around for more than a day or two, I suddenly start getting called "Susan," while my mom has only to spend few days at the cottage before she starts being called "Joan." We make fun of Dad all the time for this little eccentricity of his.

And now I'm learning that I really shouldn't have given dear old Dad such a hard time about this, since it's genetic. With three boys in the house, we've hit some critical mass and for the life of me, I can't stop getting them mixed up. I've repeatedly asked Chris to feed Alex his dinner while I head downstairs to nurse Jonathan, or mentioned that Alex did a really good job picking up his toys today. Which is impressive because he is still at the stage of waving his fists in front of his face. Yesterday evening was the last straw, however. Chris was sitting in the recliner, holding Alex, while Jonathan drove his fire trucks on the table. I went out to the dining room to get Jonathan a Kleenex. I came back, bent over, and found myself about two inches away from wiping Chris's nose before I realized what the heck I was doing. Chris about peed himself laughing at me.

Sorry, Dad! I owe you one.

Safety First!

Grandma Kwon came down Saturday and we took the kids to the Dogwood Festival. We skipped the parade but made it to the fairground with all the rides. Chris bought a sheet of tickets and we set off to find which rides among the rather dusty and rickety collection looked suitable for Jonathan.

Right away, there was an obvious split. One category was "Totally fascinating but absolutely NOT!" Jonathan loved to watch these. The swings that go up in the air and whirl around, the cages that flip and spin, the mini roller-coaster - he pulled on our arms and asked "Dat one? Dat one?" The other category seemed to all follow a simple form. Take a metal plate. Put some form of vehicle on the plate: boat, car, truck, motorcycle, elephant. Place kids in vehicle. Rotate plate and repeat.

One of the rides had a car theme, and sported both a red AND a blue fire engine. These weren't getting much play, so Jonathan had his choice. His first ride was in the red fire engine. He grappled with three steering wheels, two buttons to make the bell ring, and another set of steering wheels in the seats behind him. He had a great time. We picked him up at the end and went to find some funnel cake. Chris stood next to Jonathan as he rode the carousel. We still had a few more tickets to use up, so we asked Jonathan what he wanted to ride next.

After vetoing the motorcycles, we suggested another spin on the carousel - it was right there and had no line. Jonathan said, quite distinctly, "I don't like the horsie, Mommy! I want the BLUE firetruck!" So back down the hill we went.

This time, Jonathan selected the blue fire engine. There was only one other kid on the whole ride, so he spread out across the front bench of the fire engine. The seatbelt was meant to accomodate all three spaces at once and fastened with a plastic clip. Still, the ride only wheezed along at two miles an hour, so we buckled Jonathan in and waited to take some pictures.

Once again, he was steering and honking and staying quite busy. All of a sudden, though, the belt popped open. Jonathan immediately looked down and started grabbing each end. The ride operator stopped the ride and walked over to him, saying "Okay, little buddy, let's get that fixed!" But he stopped and laughed when he got there, because Jonathan had already clipped himself back in. The guy made his way back to the start button, but Jonathan had decided the ride must be over and started to get out - so the ride started and stopped again. Once again Jonathan righted himself before help arrived. The belt popped open twice more and Jonathan was on it both times right away.

We gave away the last few tickets.

Second Child Syndrome

"Poor Alex," I remarked the other day at dinner. Jonathan was sitting in his new chair at the table, picking out the green pieces and eating his meat and rice. Meanwhile, Alex was smiling and content on the playmat in the living room. He'd managed to reach up and grab the giraffe foot and was waving it around. Chris and I realized that this achievement would have warranted Jonathan a full blog entry, but for Alex, it was simply dinner table conversation. So, in the interests of parity, I'll describe how our little snugglebug is doing these days.

1) Sleep. Alex was born, apparently, with an innate timer set to go off between 2:30 and 3 AM every night. It doesn't matter what time we get him to bed - 11:30 PM after "Lost" on Wednesdays or 9:30 PM if we're feeling particularly tired. No matter what, he's awake at 2:30, ready to eat. We are trying to keep the late-night fuss to a minimum - low lights, no cooing or playing - but so far that wake-up call hasn't budged. He still gets wrapped in the baby straightjacket every night but he's in the crib now - he's outgrown the cosleeper.

2) Motor milestones: Alex hates tummy time unless he has a pillow or blanket wedged under his chest. So he's not doing a lot of pushups yet. On the other hand, his head strength is getting better and better. He sits upright on my lap for his nebulizer treatments (a legacy of his hospital stay that we're hoping to get rid of soon) and rarely needs me to pull his head back up. He's definitely right-handed and loves to look at his fist. The grabbing of the giraffe is new but now that he knows what to do, he loves to watch his mobile and the toys in front of him, planning how to get hold of them as well.

3) Social milestones: Alex is so happy to see Jonathan, and the fact that they're now spending all day together puts him in a great mood. He also seems to really want to talk. The grunts are subsiding (though he's still a startlingly noisy baby) and when he's happy he will coo in the most delightful manner possible. His smile is a huge open-mouthed toothless grin than lights up his whole face.

See, Alex? We're paying attention, we swear!

Mind like a steel trap (and fingers too.)

Jonathan's shown us two outstanding feats of memory recently. The first one thwarted a little joke Chris was hoping to play on him. Chris finally found the missing puzzle piece to Jonathan's transportation-themed puzzle! It's been missing for several months. Jonathan's moved on to bigger puzzles (this one only has a measly twelve pieces) but he still holds it in great affection. So when Chris found the missing piece, he called Jonathan over to do the "schoolbus puzzle." Chris broke the puzzle up and carefully mixed in the recovered piece without showing it to Jonathan. He thought it would be a nice surprise when Jonathan completed it and all twelve pieces were there. Jonathan's too wily for Chris, though. He picked up the piece right away and said "Missing piece!" without even having started the puzzle.

We continue to read to Jonathan throughout the day, and his bedtime routine of three books never varies. "Olivia and the Missing Toy" has been in heavy rotation recently. I noticed last week that Jonathan has been speaking the words along with me under my breath as I read. He was always a half-step behind, however, so I figured he was just repeating after me.

Bedtime is full-on "Jonathan do it!" time - he gets his stepstool, brushes his teeth, and closes the door "slowly and quietly, Mommy!" So when Jonathan went to the bookcase and picked out "Olivia" - again - I asked him if he wanted to read it to me. He said "Yeah?" and held out the book for me to begin. I gave it back to him and asked "Jonathan do it?" He lit up and sat down next to me. I recited the first line: "One day, Olivia was riding . . . a camel. . . in. . . " and he chimed in "Egypt!" And we were off. Jonathan turned every page and recited most of the book from memory. He dropped out the prepositions and some of the details, but his level of recall was amazing. He was so proud of himself and I was flabbergasted. We went downstairs so he could read to Chris and Alex, who were equally impressed.

He's all set to read to his nanny this morning. Jonathan's needing the extra attention because Alex is now staying at home with Jonathan and Cara. Daycare was okay, but there were too many germs and it was getting hard to hear him cough and wheeze the whole time. We've got three carseats in the nanny's car - Alex in the middle, rear facing, with Jonathan and Cara on either side. Yesterday they went for an inaugural outing and Jonathan scratched Alex in the chin. The nanny gave him a talking-to and made sure he had a soft toy to play with on the ride home. Jonathan asked me hopefully last night "Alex go to daycare tomorrow?" But Alex is wily in his own right - he's going to get Jonathan two more "Olivia" books in an attempt to win him over to this new arrangement.

Two month checkup stats: Alex weighed in at 14 pounds, 9 ounces, moving up to the 90th percentile. He's 24 inches long, which makes him 80th percentile for height. Can we make some linebackers or what?

More like the Thiefster Bunny

Jonathan, Alex and I went to Rock Point for Easter with Grandma and Grandpa. I brought the Paas dye kit and mom boiled up a dozen eggs. Fortunately, we had a gallon of vinegar meant for crab boils, so we didn't have to go driving to the store in the unseasonable snow. Jonathan really liked dropping the tablets into the cups and watching the colors fizz and bubble. Auntie Iz added the water and we brought out the eggs. As each egg went in a cup, we used the dipper to check on its progress every fifteen seconds or so. There was a lot going on, so we were able to distract Jonathan and let the eggs get really brightly colored. Finally, we would dredge up a neon egg and Jonathan would declare emphatically "That's done!" We set them in the little box to dry. The kit came with some stickers and Jonathan made sure every egg had some. He placed them all in his Easter basket and after he went to bed, Mom and I hid them all over the room.

When he woke up the next morning, I told him the Easter Bunny had come and hidden all his eggs. He was a little confused and wanted to see Grandma and Grandpa and have some juice. Everyone had gotten up early to make sure to witness Jonathan's egg hunt, including Aunt Doreen and Uncle Danny. So it was a big crowd that greeted Jonathan. He saw his empty egg basket and everyone was encouraging him to go find his eggs, which were balanced on various shelves and ledges in plain view. Jonathan picked up his basket and went behind the couch. He looked at me with a few tears in his eyes and I could tell his feelings were really hurt. I said "Oh sweetie, it's okay. . ." and he started to bawl. We showed him where one of his eggs was sitting on the bookshelf but he was having none of it. Finally, Grandpa fed him some applesauce and Grandma cuddled him to calm him down.

He was in a bit better mood after that and gamely picked up his eggs. His interest was piqued when, at our urging, he opened the CD cabinet and found an egg. He decided that was a much better place for eggs than a basket, and transferred over his collection. Unfortunately, most of the eggs rolled right off the shelf as soon as he walked away. They'd fall to the floor and Jonathan would say "Oops! Smash!" and go put them back. It was a dozen well-loved eggs that finally were put aside to allow breakfast to begin.

Later in the day, Auntie Iz tried to get him to part from one particularly disintigrating specimen. They walked over to the trashcan and she held it open, telling Jonathan it was time for the broken egg to go bye-bye. He threw it out, but remorse hit directly afterwards and he started to cry again. He needed some more cuddles, but eventually decided he liked throwing out the broken eggs. Amazingly, two of them survived for a trip home in the basket to show Daddy.

And in an Alex update, the baby is growing amazingly. He's wearing a nine months size in some of the smaller brands. I am hoping he will give up one of his late-night feedings soon. Alex is all grins and coos these days, especially after he's filled up his diaper and gotten it changed for fresh. Jonathan still gets most of the smiles, but he was happy to twinkle a little at Aunt Doreen this weekend as well.