Today was a good Keegan day! I've now mastered the backcarry in the mei tai with him and it makes getting errands done around the house so easy. I even had him on my back for a walk after dinner. He alternated between looking around, giggling and cuddling in closer to mommy!
Another good way to get things done is send daddy upstairs to take a nap with Keegan. Everyone wins. Two of my boys are rested from their late afternoon catnap and I was able to get dinner made and on the table with the help of my little cooker extraordinaire, Xander!
Our little man loves his service vehicles. I think part of his fascination with everything construction is due to where we live. Since we were one of the first families to move into the neighborhood, he’s had the opportunity to see quite a few back hoe’s (also called diggers) and concrete mixers, tractors and what I call “sprinkler trucks” – which spray water for dust control here.
I’m assuming it’s because I grew up with all sisters, but, according to my dear hubby I had (or still have) an embarrassing lack of knowledge about all things construction related. For instance, I called back hoe’s, diggers. After some teasing though, we found that much of the children’s literature on construction refer to them as such. Little boys will cure that lack of knowledge in a hurry. We now have read a multitude of books on the subject and regularly converse about how many tractors, diggers, etc we get to see each day.
Our favorite has to be the concrete mixers. For some reason Xander calls them “Geat’n, eat’n, eat’n’s”. He does this cute little head bob thing and depending on his mood will say “eat’n” anywhere from 2-5 times when he sees one! (See video clip below)
So for Christmas, he received a set of construction vehicles. He loves his dump truck, back hoe, payloader and eat’n, eat’n, eat’n.
He is also obsessed with garbage trucks! (What little boy isn’t?) For his birthday, his Omama and Opapa bought him this garbage truck that even has a button to move a garbage can up and dump its contents into the garbage truck.
This video clip is from August where Xander was identifying trucks from one of his books for MiMa!
Discovery! I love learning and discovering new things. Now I have the privilege of watching Alexander begin the same life-long pursuit. Not much tops watching his face light up as he uncovers some new piece of information or masters a new concept!
Alexander, along with two of his friends, Caden and “the other” Xander started what we are calling “Learning Day” last week. Each Friday we get together and one mom coordinates the morning’s activities.
Last week was the maiden voyage. It was held at my house and we learned about the weather. Since they are still only 2, attention spans were quite short, but we had fun. One of my highlights was taking the boys outside after reading a book about clouds. I handed each boy a cloud (cottonball) we talked about clouds. Then I told them (in a hugely oversimplified way) that when the clouds fill up with water they get heavy and it rains. We then proceeded to fill up our clouds with water, talk about how heavy they were and then make rain! The weather outside that day was cold, windy and raining, so it worked out perfectly. When Xander woke up from his nap that afternoon, we went outside to play in the rain. He immediately pointed to the sky and jabbered about the clouds and rain. He then turned to me and in a serious voice said, “Clouds - HEAVY, raining”. Ahhh yes! He gets it!
Here Erin and Chris are helping Caden and Xander add clouds to their rainbow paintings.
The boys showing off their masterpieces!
We didn't have time to get to this activity that morning, so Xander and I put this together after his nap. It's a weather chart where we update can update what the weather is like each day. I forgot my camera today when we learned about spiders and ladybugs, but hopefully I’ll get some soon from Erin so I can share them here.
I keep this quote in the kitchen where I see it everytime I get bowls or cups down for my two little boys and thought I'd share it here...
"This is the thought that should be uppermost in all you do for your children. In every step you take about them, in every plan, and scheme, and arrangement that concerns them, do not leave out that mighty question, 'How will this affect their souls?' ...the chief end of their lives is the salvation of their souls."
J.C.Ryle, The Duties of Parents
What a glorious thought to remind me of what really matters in this life.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
We discovered one of Xander’s new skills this morning. We have a sudoku board that has tiles to go with it and lately, Rich and I have become slightly obsessed with playing – well maybe REALLY obsessed. Ok, ok – obsessed to the point of being so distraught over not being able to figure a particular one out that I couldn’t “handle” the idea of cooking dinner and we had a frozen pizza instead. But I digress…
Xander loves to sit next to whoever is working on a board and pretend to do one too. Xander knew he was picking up numbers and was saying numbers randomly as he placed the tiles. So today, Rich asked him to put the #4 tile on top of another 4. Low and behold, he did it. We proceeded to give him several more and he matched them all up perfectly. It was so cool to watch him match up numbers that looked similar. Now we realize that he doesn’t quite have the hang of which numbers look like what yet, it is still amazing (to us as his parents at least) that he is able to match them up!
For some reason, the 14-20 week period is REALLY hard for me. I feel like a horrible mommy and my patience runs really thin at this age. It doesn’t help that with both of my boys, this season starts the week or two before Thanksgiving and continues until just after Christmas. I used to think it was because they were just naturally more fussy and couldn’t sit-up yet and play. But I’ve discovered that at this age, they have left that “sleep anywhere” phase and are in desperate need of some kind of routine. Once we settle into one, everyone is much happier.
While I’m much more relaxed and experienced with Keegan, I’m also much busier. I have a toddler to run after and a business that I’m trying to keep afloat when my kids are sleeping. So when we hit that ‘fussy, in need of some kind of routine stage’, I had a hard time slowing down. Thankfully, I was able to clear the calendar somewhat in December and worked with Keegan on finding the routine that he needs while balancing that with the needs of our family.
So re-enters the book Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. I discovered this wonderful book during this same difficult phase with Xander. I'm really into using my mommy instinct in parenting and this book proved to be a life-saver in that it taught me how to read his sleepy cues and get him down for a nap BEFORE he gets overtired, crabby and unable to settle down. It helped me to get Keegan to fall asleep according to his internal clock and has tons of helpful resources for developing healthy sleep habits from birth up to the teen years. Since I’ve now checked it out on several occasions, I think it merits being permanently added to our personal library.
As I re-read it this time, that same feeling returned – as if I was coming up for a breath of fresh air. Once I slowed down, it was astonishingly easy to read my little guy and get him down when he needed too. He now goes down without a fuss for each nap and I no longer have to second guess myself or stress out each evening because he just doesn't want to settle down and go to sleep. I discovered that I was keeping him up too late. Apparently at this age, he needs an even earlier bedtime than Xander did. So he’s been going down between 6 and 6:30. His schedule is still pretty irregular, so his bedtime at night varies, but it is no longer a battle. Keegan is also SO much happier and loves to giggle, laugh and play. I’m so thankful for this resource that has given me practical advice so that I can help him learn the important skill of falling and staying asleep! Next time around, I’ll plan to slow our life down before we hit that stressful stage. I’ll let you know how it goes when we get there…
