Dive

There were several head first dives by the miniscule man of the house last night. The first happened during a wild session of table dancing. I'm not really sure what happened, but he must have gotten to close to the edge and over he went head first. Luckily, he didn't land squarely on his head, it was more of a roll. He still knew it hurt though. I picked him up off the tile and attempted to comfort the miniscule man, but all he wanted was his momma and to rub the pain in his head away.

The second dive took place during miniscule man's nightly water cleansing ritual. We installed a slip prevention device (peel and stick strips with traction) so this wouldn't occur. This has greatly improved the miniscule man's ability to move and stand in the tub. While standing against the side of the tub, he leaned a little too far over the edge. He tipped over like the heavy end of a see-saw and almost went head first into bath mat. Luckily, I caught him before the damage was done. He cried a bit because he was scared. I would cry too if I saw a wet purple bath mat coming at my noggin! He was fine after a few seconds and got wrapped up in a towel and was ready to play again. Of course, he didn't care if he was naked or not, the toys had to be played with!

Tooth Update:
Ollie definitely has 2 more teeth. 2 molars have poked through on the top. I wasn't able to see if the ones on the bottom have poked through because his tongue was in the way. The top ones aren't all the way out yet, so I'm sure more pain is coming!

Routine

Not much changes during the week.  Occasionally, we'll get a new Ollie trick.  The past few days have consisted of the usual routine of running around, investigating something, running more and reinvestigating the same thing 5 seconds later. 

Ollie has recently begun to investigate the real phones.  No longer are the play phones good enough, he has to imitate his parents perfectly with the real phone.  Only problem is, he holds the phone facing the wrong way and talks into the back of it.  We learned quickly to unplug the phone line or he might have called China.  He got a hold of his Aunt Annie's cell phone a few times and called some of her friends by pushing buttons.  They took it in stride, even early in the morning. 

A break from the routine happened Monday night.  For some reason Ollie thought it was hysterical to pick up a water bottle and throw it down.  He laughed and giggled like crazy.  It had to be the funniest thing ever, though I don't know why.  This went on for at least 15 minutes, then he slipped back into his normal routine of running around, investigating and running around again. 

Weaned

It's been 5 days and counting without a bottle.  Ollie has officially been weaned.  He did pretty well this weekend about taking his nap and going to bed for the night, except on Sunday.  He was tired for both (as was evident by his 2.5 hr nap).  He fought them and ended up getting a temporary reprieve for each, only to be put back in 30 minutes later.  This may be due to another molar coming in.  He was drooling like crazy and chewing on his fingers to help the pain.  He made it through the night without any problems. 

Saturday we went to outdoor mall.  We had lunch and walked around the stores, played in the hobby store with toy trains.  Played in the play area and Ollie made a Karate Koala at the teddy bear stuffing factory.  He got it stuffed and fluffed, washed and dried, dressed and pressed.  Now Mr. Miagi has a home next to all the other stuffed animals.  If only he could Karate chop the kitties into order.

Bottle Free

Ollie went to bed without a bottle last night and made it through the night without as much as a whimper.  He did wake up once before we went to bed, but with a little coaxing (rocking by his mama and his vacuum CD) he went back to sleep for the night.  He went to bed a little earlier than his usual 8 pm sleeping time, so he was up early.  Not too early, he got up at 6, while I was still in bed.  His mama got him up and had him dogpile on top of me.  That'll get you going in the morning! 



He also brushed his teeth this morning (it is more like chewing on the toothbrush).  He loves the bubble gum flavored toothpaste and usually drools all over everything.  Usually you have to fight him over the toothbrush.  He doesn't like to give it up unless he has something more pressing to play with.  At least he has good teeth hygiene.

Changes

Since Ollie's last few teeth problems have subsided, a few other things have changed.  Ollie has started to fall asleep on his own.  We go to lay him down, he rolls over and falls asleep with only a minor whimper.  This is a wonderful new development.  We usually feel like crap when he squalls about going to sleep.  Apparently, he's learned when he's tired he should go to sleep.  With this new activity, we are going to break him of his last bottle.  it really hasn't been putting him to sleep lately anyways.  We'll just have to make sure he has a snack about 7 so he doesn't get crabby to early.  He's been sleeping better as well.  At least 10 hrs plus a nap during the week and sometimes 11 hrs plus a nap on the weekends.  Now if only he could shake this minor cold.

Comprehensible words are on their way.  He says things that sound like words and can repeat them.  "Cracker", "all gone", "ha ha", "uh oh", "Kitty", "Hi kitty" and a few others.  Yesterday when I picked him up from the sitter's he waved hello to me.  The waving has been missing when he is around familiar people for a while.  This morning when I dropped him off at the sitters, he wanted down almost immediately to go play with the baby.  He walked a few feet, stopped and came back and gave me a hug before taking the sitters hand and going to see the baby.  Ollie is changing faster than I can count, I hope I don't blink and miss something.

 

Truckin'

While on vacation, Ollie got to play with a giant truck.  It was giant for him anyways.  It was one of the battery powered toys, without the battery.  That meant that Ollie had to rely on people power!  He would hop in and contort himself in some strange manner in the seat.  He tried sitting on the floor board, but it was only an inch deep.  He climbed in and out, stood and made minor attempts at steering.  He also fixed the engine with crackers!  As you know, they are the best power provider.  Even if it did have a battery, he wouldn't have been able to figure it out, just doesn't have the motor skills yet.  So, here's to the little trucker, hopefully he has many miles of road left in him.

A Whale of a Tale

When we went on our trip over the 4th, Ollie got plenty of pool time.  He was in, out, in and out on several days.  Overall he enjoyed the pool.  He still knew how to splash, blow bubbles (Ollie's version is to swallow water) and he even started kicking on his own.  He spent most of the water time in his whale.  Not the Moby Dick kind of whale, the inflatable kind. 
 

 
Watch out for the spray from the whale.  Maybe this fall he will be able to swim better in class.
 
 

The Leader and The Follower

In our home, we have a leader and we have followers.  The leader leads and the follower is expected to follow.  If the followers do not comply, the leader gets angry and sometimes cries.  The leader is a man of many inquiries.  He must be followed to satisfy help satisfy his inquiries.  Such as, open this door for me, take me outside, why can't I get into the a/c vent and can I have 20 teddy grams in my mouth at once and still talk?  The followers must follow, answer pleas and provide satisfactory assistance. 
 
The journey is sometimes a long one.  It begins with the leader grabbing a preferred follower by the finger and leading the follower to the destination.  Sometimes this is the shortest route, but most of the time the leader takes the long slow route, just for torture and to make the followers miss more of their activity.  If you are lucky, the leader will get distracted by something along the way.  The leader will then release the follower to their previous activity.  unfortunately, the leader rediscovers the activity later on and the trek continues. 
 
The leader also likes to be on the other side of the gate.  As you know, the carpet is greener (or browner in our case) on the other side of the gate.  It also contains more dangers for the leader, which he is willing to take without much thought to his well being.  The leader often is rejected by the followers only to cry and then get distracted by another object.  Fear not readers, the leader soldiers on to his conquest and has the control of the heart strings of the followers, so all is well.

Monkey Boy

A usual breakfast for Ollie consists of cereal, pop tarts or a banana with something to drink.  Ollie is able to eat an entire banana.  He usually tries to get the whole thing in his mouth.  So far he has been able to get about 1/2.  When he's done eating the banana, he squishes any leftovers in between his fingers.  Then the flailing of banana covered limbs begins.  Of course banana goes every where.  Then you get to clean off sticky banana hands with cereal stuck to the banana pieces. 
 


 
I almost forgot the best part!  If Ollie wants a drink while his mouth is full, he will promptly open his mouth and take it out and hand it to you, take a drink, then put the food back in his mouth that he just gave you.  Gives new meaning to the word recycled.

Teeth Update

Ollie has the fever again associated with teething. It goes in a cycle. This time is no different. He doesn't have one in the mornings, but he gets one in the afternoon and it lasts until the morning. In the past it has occurred for 3-4 days. The Motrin works wonders though. It is great that it lasts for 6 hours too. Once it kicks in, he's pretty much back to his normal self. This is the beginning of day 2 so if we can get a look in his mouth, we might be able to see a white cap soon. It has been harder lately to take a peak in his mouth without getting bit.

Another interesting thing happened the other night. It was about time for Ollie to go to bed. His mom gave him his bottle and started feeding him. If Ollie isn't quite ready to go to bed yet, he'll get up and play for awhile. This night was a bit different. He got up from his and took his bottle with him...right over to me! So, I picked him up and gave him his bottle until he fell asleep. We had a good laugh, but that was the first time that ever happened.

I had another post written in my head, but after a nights sleep, it is long gone. Guess I should write them when I have them.

Lemon

Last night we went to eat at Old Chicago for dinner. While we waited for the appetizer to come Ollie taste tested his first lemon. He got a small taste of the lemon and seemed to like it. He kept getting small tastes of the lemon and everything was going along just fine. Then he took a large bite out of the lemon! We then saw the most sour face on a baby that has ever occurred. It was similar to the "Bitter Beer" commercial faces. He then proceeded to spit the chunk of lemon out of his mouth and tried to spit the juice out as well. He kept rubbing his mouth as if he was trying to get rid of the taste. Eventually he returned back to normal.

Afterwards we walked along the river for a little while. Ollie got to see boats, barges and ducks all go by. He was interested, but not interested enough to stay very long. Unfortunately, they don't have a park for kids to play in downtown. He had fun investigating things nonetheless.

Plants

Ollie had a relatively stress free weekend. I don't know when he doesn't have a stress free weekend. It is his parents who stress over what he is eating. This weekend it was more rocks and dirt. At least he had the brains to spit the dirt out this time. He didn't get a chocolate looking face this time around.

He is getting better at traversing difficult terrain. He pretty much walks up our steep hill in the back and was able to walk all the way underneath the deck covered in our new rocks without difficulty and without bending down like his parents have too. He will eventually have to duck like normal people. Now if he can only get rid of his waddle.

More pictures coming soon from the 4th of July weekend.

Middle of the Night

Ollie's Mamma is very tired this morning. He went to be about 8 pm as usual. He got up about 12, Tresa tried to put him back to sleep, I tried to put him back to sleep, but without luck. She got up with him about 1 to play. At 3 he finally went to sleep. This morning he is tired and crabby. His Mamma is tired, his Dada gets the next bad night.

Ollie will also be 'helping' clean this weekend. He has already been such a big helper. He plays and throws things into his Mamma's scrubbing water. He dunks the feather duster in the water. He 'sweeps' up all his messes. Actually, it's more like him pushing the broom across the floor horizontally. Last night he was able to open the door and get the broom out. Guess we are going to have to start locking certain doors.

Now if only we can get him to sleep in a big bed, eat with a spoon, talk, stop making messes and clean up the ones he does make, we'll be set. I think I'm still dreaming from last night.

Swing Swing

For the first 9 months of Ollie's life, he had gastric reflux. A lot of movement and he would projectile vomit his milk all over the room. Unfortunately, this meant no swing for Ollie. This past weekend when we went to the parks (as in 4 or 5 parks), we were a bit surprised when Ollie wanted to do swing the entire time. On one trip he even spent 30 minutes in the swing straight and loved every minute of it.

We would occasionally take him out of the swing to try the slides or bouncy animals, but he would always go back to the swings and reach for them. All the other play things were for larger kids, so he wasn't to adept at playing on them. He tried to go down head first on one slide and that was the end of that fun. He just kept going back to the swings. The higher Ollie went the happier he was. He even enjoyed us pushing him from the side. If we are lucky, he won't try swinging from the trees.

The 4th

Long weekends make you want to come back home. This last long weekend made Ollie want to come home early. He had his typical trip meltdown on Sunday night. Ollie was well behaved for the entire weekend. He was just tired and out of sorts. So after screaming at the top of his lungs for 1/2 an hour and not settling down for the night I got him up. He cried and cried until he got his mama. Since it was the fourth he went outside to watch the fireworks. He liked the sparks and light from them, but hated the noise. Granted he was tired, upset and crabby at this time, so he was sensitive to things. After a little while he was able to settle down and go to bed.

At about 4 am he awoke and wouldn't go back to sleep, so his mom got up with him while his grumpy dad tried to go back to sleep. About 6 I got up and Ollie took a nap on the couch while we packed and got ready to leave. He woke up when we finished loading the car and was fairly good the entire way home.

He was just as good on the way down. He had a few fits from being tied up in his car seat for almost 5 straight hours. For the most part though he just played with his toys and occasionally stared off into space during the car rides.

He had fun the rest of the time and was nice to everyone. He took to the pool without a problem. He let you know when he wanted in and when he wanted out by pointing. He even went swimming a couple of times on Saturday. He tried to blow bubbles (swallowed water), splashed, kicked and played with the pool toys while the adults jumped off the board and made fools of themselves. The only thing he didn't really like was getting splashed in the face, but who really likes that?

Ollie also got to meet a 18 month old boy named Keaton. They played around, shared crackers and raced down the driveway. They both ended up with scraped toes, but neither seemed to mind. Ollie also had to investigate the cars in the driveway. He opened and closed the gas tanks several times, played with the license plates and pounded the sides. At one point he went to the front of the car, then Ollie head butted the Plymouth! Right in the middle of the Plymouth symbol. Luckily it was round and flat or Ollie might have an imprint of a boat on his forehead.

All in all, Ollie had a good time and was well behaved. Other than his 1 bad night, he hardly fussed. Unfortunately, any other trips we may take will have a bad night as well, but at least we know it is coming. Guess we'll see on our next trip.

The Emperor Has No Clothes

Emperor Ollie's clothes are not packed for his 4th of July weekend get away. His highness will be staying in a posh residence with a swimming pool. He will get to sip a sippee poolside while looking down on the peasants below. The emperor will be fed foods designed only for him (and millions of other babies). He will have a special bed and a special chair for eating. Fortunately the jewel encrusted (more like food encrusted) high chair will be staying home. He will leave his current world behind chauffeured in the emperor's graham cracker encrusted vehicle. The emperor will be gone for a week, so no posts until Tuesday.