Rulers are our new fave

Recent conversations:


Elliott: Mom, where's my blue thing wis the numbers?
Me: Which blue thing?
E: The on wis the numbers.
M: What thing with numbers?
E:The blue one!
M: I don't know what you are talking about.
E: I'm talking about the blue thing!
M: What else do you use it for?
E: It's the blue thing....that measures...
M: Oh the ruler. It's on the back of the couch, wrapped in a sock.
E: Oh! There it is!

Stumbling out of his bedroom at 7:15 a.m.:
E: Hey mom, how long did you sleep?
M: I don't know, buddy, I guess about 9 hours.
E: I sleeped this long (holds up a ruler and points to the five inch mark). Is that a long time?
David: should we explain the difference between length and time?
M: oh, please not yet.

12 weeks

Today I had my second midwife appointment, and baby and I are both doing pretty well so far. I was officially 12 weeks along last Friday, and aside from a 24-hour bout of morning sickness, this pregnancy has been much easier on me so far. With Elliott I was super duper sick for the first five months or so, and I haven't really thrown up this time. I have felt very, very tired and lazy, and I get teary at silly things on the tv. I look more pregnant in the evenings than in the mornings, but so far I can get most of my pants to button up still.


Elliott seems to be pretty unfazed by the whole ordeal, although I am considerably less fun to play with because of the baby in my tummy. Sometimes he plays along and says he has a baby in his tummy too.


According to the pregnancy books and websites the baby is somewhere between the size of a lemon and the size of a peach. My only cravings are cheesy foods and cold snacks (popsicles, coconut snow cones, ice cream).

I decided not to use the hospital here and sought out another midwife, making the hospital I will deliver at about 50 miles away (yikes). I love the midwife and am happy with my decision, but have found that the hospital we had Elliott at was a lot more crazy-hippie-friendly than the hospitals in Tulsa are. I toured our hospital's labor and delivery floor and immediately outed myself as a weirdo, I guess. When the nurse who gave the tour explained that about an hour after birth they take the baby to the nursery for a bath and normal procedures I immediately objected.

"I don't want my baby taken out of my room."
"Oh, well we just normally clean them up and get you settled in the post-partum room..."
"I understand, but I don't want my baby taken away from me unless there is a medical need. Can't you do the bath in our room? Or just wait?"
"....(uncomfortable look)...We'd have to check."

Apparently no one really questions hospital protocol here. Of all the hospitals in the Tulsa metro area, this one is the only one with a tub to labor in (a proven method of coping with labor pains) and the lady said in all the time she had worked there she had only seen two people use it. In Ann Arbor, the rooms with the labor tubs were so coveted that they recently remodeled the whole labor and delivery unit so there would be more tubs available. Aside from that, the unit was lovely and I think we can make it work (so long as I can survive the drive there).

We just picked up some fresh eggs from a neighbor. I thought it would be an interesting experience for ell. But this is not about the eggs. Our story picks up in the car on the way home from buying the eggs, when Elliott tells me in a steadily rising voice, "Oh no, where are my flowers?"

I, of course, have no idea what he is talking about. " I picked some flowers and put them in my pocket but they're gooooone! And they were ( his little hands covered his mouth in horror) for yooooouuu!". I tried to reassure him that it was such a sweet thing to do and that we can find some more, but he was still starting to cry a little. As I pulled into our parking space, I notice the park by our house is full of dandelions, and he was pacified by those. He ran over to where the were growing, plucked two, and handed them to me.

"Thank you Elliott!. They are beautiful. Let's take hem inside and put them in a vase."

He takes them back from me and says, "no, let's put them in my pocket.". And that's where he shoves them, and where they still remain.

Concentration

This has been happening all day. He says he is mowing the grass. What he is actually doing is cutting strips of paper over and over, only taking a break to grab a tissue and blow his nose. The only thing you are missing is the loud mouth breathing that happens when he is really concentrating.

Making little boys happy

Tonight Ell asked for dessert, and the remains of the pumpkin cake that we had last nights were polished off by the dog (who steals food whenever he can). So I remembered a trick I read a long time ago on a website called Pinterest. For people watching their weight or sugar, you take a frozen banana and some cocoa powder and blend them together and voila! Chocolate ice cream! David doesn't hate it, but me and Ell are big fans. I've seen it with a little vanilla extract too, but it tastes pretty banana-ey.



We demolished it. Yum.

When he knows I'm only halfway paying attention

Earlier Elliott and I sat down and he water painted while I messed around on my computer. I was pretty engrossed in whatever I was reading, and I could tell instead of narrating his painting, he had apparently asked me a question that I hadn't heard. "my eyes are beautiful, momma? My eyes are beautiful?" Now, Ell has very pretty blue eyes, and he has been told this a time or two and has started to comment on other peoples eyes lately, so I thought nothing of this comment. If I'm honest with you, I said "Mmhmm" without looking up at all. That was a mistake, however. "my eyes are beautiful, momma! My eyes are beautiful?" then I finally looked up at him, perhaps a bit exasperated. And I see this.

Randomness from ell

Lately, these are how all of Elliott's goodbyes go:

Elliott: "Okay, Mom, I'm leaving. See you later!". Shuts door for .25 seconds then opens it again. "Bon appetit! Bon appetit, mom! Bon appetit!"
Me, finally: "okay, buddy, Bon appetit!"
Ell: leaves

I couldn't begin to tell you where this came from or why he thinks it means goodbye.

Elliott's contribution

We are getting in the Christmas spirit here. This is ell's contribution- which I swear I didn't coach him.


The star on the top is my star shaped cookie cutter. Daddy did help him reach the top though.

This boy

A couple of things that make me smile:
Toddler ingenuity. Elliott really wanted to ride this stuffed horse, but whenever he sat down on the horse it wouldn't budge. So he stuck it on a school bus and rode it around that way. There, I fixed it.






His love for his " shows". This one was wonder pets. He needed to wear the backpack for some reason. He also dressed himself in too-small backwards sweatpants and house slippers. Comfort is key around here.





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Happy Halloween, y'all

Elliott chose his own costume this year, and then I helped him modify that choice into something I could actually pull off. You see, there is this random man who rides around downtown (like through the streets of the business district) on his horse for some reason. We see him all the time, and one day we went over to say hello and show Elliott the horse. We found out that the horses name was Topaz, and after refreshing Elliott on the whole costume/trick-or-treat thing, he told me he wanted to dress up like Topaz. Now, I do realize you can buy those horse costumes where the kid is the cowboy and wears the horse part like a pair of pants with suspenders, but so far I have made Elliott's costumes and that is a bit beyond my scope of things. So after some subtle redirection, we decided he would go as a cowboy. Thanks to Aunt Lizzy, we had most of the stuff already, so I made him a vest and a hobby horse (which we abandoned after a dry-run at the church trunk-or-treat, because I had to carry the dang thing around).

Anyway, Enjoy!

Settling in

We are finally finding our way around Bartlesville, and have even had the chance to meet the new pediatrician since ell is under the weather this week. Since things are pretty quiet this week, here are some of the few pictures I remembered to take.


When we brought home Loki, we brought this crate with us. It took a lot of convincing someone that it was for the dog though. I guess it is just his size.


He loves the new bathtub, except when it is draining because I made the mistake of reading him "the tub people", which is a story about a wooden toy getting stuck down the drain. I had to show him several times that he is too big to get sucked down the drain.


And here is the little bit of time he felt up to working, where he colored a sheet about the letter "c". I am trying to start to work on letter recognition with him, but I am trying to learn the Montessori way to do this. I found a great app on my computer that does this, and I am thinking about ordering some sandpaper letters for him too. Out of seemingly nowhere he knows " w" and points it out all the time, so I am going with it.


Lastly, here is some of his latest artwork, and I am convinced he is a budding artist. This is his drawing of drums (bottom left), a guitar, a trumpet (top middle, the lines are the keys), and the yellow curvy line is a saxophone. He just doodled this and showed me his band. Also, he will turn 2 1/2 next week. Crazy.

Loki

This is our newest family member.


He is trouble. Especially combined with Elliott.

Interview

I just found a cute idea to interview your kid at different ages, and to my delight Elliott actually had a few answers for me. I present to you, an interview with a two and a half year old

What is your name? Elliott Timothy (pronounced Eyyitt Timafee)
How old are you? Two and a half
What is your favorite color? Blue
Who is your best friend? Aunt Charlee
What is your favorite animal? A zebra! And a lion, too.
What do you want to be when you are all grown up? Two and a half.
What is your favorite movie? Lion king (we just watched it for the first time a few days ago)
What is your favorite book? Where's Dave? (surprising)
What make's you happy? David makes me happy
What makes you sad? I don't know, Mommy.
What is your favorite thing to eat? A sandwich. (also surprising, but I think he said this because I had a sandwich yesterday for lunch)
What is your favorite song to sing? Baa baa black sheep.
What is your favorite game to play? Mikalaylee (ukelele, which he ran to go get and play as he said this)
Can you write your name for me? (while saying Timafee, Timafee, Timafee... He drew basically this:)
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Recent conversations

David and elliott are walking down the street in town to go get breakfast. David notices that Elliott is walking strangely due to the fact that he has put his own flip flops on and they are on the wrong feet.

D: Your shoes are on backwards, buddy.
E: No, I doubt it.
D: no, but they are. That's why you are walking funny. They are on the wrong feet.
E: Mmmm, I doubt it.
D: No, I'm telling you that they are on backwards.
E: (Thinking) Maybe a little.
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Elliott is eating oatmeal and I sit at the table with him to have some tea.
E: You eat with me mommy?
N: I sure am, buddy.
E: You eat lunch with me?
N: Yes sir.
E: Lunch with Mommy and lunch with God!

He seems to be adjusting to our new life in Oklahoma pretty well, although I can tell he is thrown off by all this. He has been quick to have meltdowns out of frustration and several times has sent himself to bed for being tired, even though he just woke up. I think he will start a morning preschool program this week so that he can socialize and settle back into a routine. I just have to take care of a few details and try to weasel ourselves into more than one day a week, which is all the program that I like can offer us right now. I visited several on Friday and felt a little snobby going into a few of them. I guess his last school set the bar very high, because I found myself thinking "TV time? I can do that at home", and sizing up the teachers I met. To my own defense though, at one school the teacher ignored a child completely while talking to me, and stood by as a couple of little boys started wrestling and then biting each other, and then started yelling at the biter in front of me. Not being firm, but yelling. Yikes. Anyway, the school we settled on is very nice, and emphasizes letting the children be independent, which i like. I even met his potential teacher, who seemed very nice and good at her job. I'll keep you posted on how all that goes.

E's first recognizable drawing

On the left is a drawing of a kitty cat, with eyes, a mouth, tons of whiskers, and hair (?). On the right is his abstract drawing of a trumpet. The cat especially makes me believe my child is a genius. I may also be biased.

Serious about his stickers

As I mentioned, I have been working hard to keep Elliott from the tv lately, and it seems like art projects work out the best. After combing through the internet to get other moms' ideas of activities for two-year-olds, I made a list and set out for Michael's (craft store). I found several little things to add to my bag of tricks, and this afternoon while I was putting away the groceries, I put a few of them to the test.

After a disastrous attempt at stamps (he ended up falling off his chair somehow- I have no idea), and markers, and crayons, we finally landed on these foam stickers I found. I gave him a piece of construction paper and a pile of stickers and showed him how it worked. He has been quietly for about 10 minutes now, and we have gotten more stickers twice. I went to sit at the table with him and watch him create.

E: "I'm working."

N: "Yes, I see. You are working very hard."

E: "No, go 'way. I'm working."

I see how it is. But I walked away and am leaving him be. I'm learning it's best not to mess with a quiet, busy two-year-old.

Time out

Elliott just came up to me and pointed to a toy school bus in the corner.

"He's in time out. He pushed my motorbike. He's in time out."

I asked him if he was going to go tell him why he was in time out.

"He have no eyes. He have no face. He's not a big boy!" Well, obviously. My mistake. And after a minute, he got the bus out of the corner to ride again.

He just returned the bus to time out though, because "He not listening again. He's sad."

And we're back.

I can't believe how fast this summer has gone by. We will be moving to Oklahoma in 3 or 4 weeks, David is about to become Dr. Ingram, and Elliott is getting bigger and smarter every day. We started out this summer going outside, having playdates, going to summer festivals, etc. Then one day it was oppressively hot and I decided to let Elliott watch several pbs tv shows. It took 5 minutes for him to become a full blown TV addict (I wanna watch Cars! I wanna watch Eh-mo! I wanna watch Go GO GABBA!) and then we had to reel it back a bit. So as we crept closer and closer to moving day, I made a "bucket list" of things to do in Ann Arbor (which David apparently finds cheesy, but I guess I'm pretty cheesy sometimes so whatever) and we have steadily crossed things off. We took him canoeing, to the petting zoo, to the water park, and to several outdoor summer concerts. I bought water paints, washable markers, and made playdough in an effort to give him things to do instead of watching tv. It's a slow process, but he's currently making up a song called "Where's the little girl?" because he can't find the girl from his playmobil farm set. I count that as progress.

Elliott constantly amazes me with his imagination, and each day I find myself adding something to my mental bank of things-he-has-figured-out-early. When you ask him why something is happening (like why he is in time out, for example), about half of the time he can tell you why ("Acause. I spit out my food in a floor." or "Acause. I threw Daddy's toy.")

Are you sad? "No. I grey."

He wants to see just how much you will let him get away with. He likes to go to the "big pool" which is the city pool, but he does NOT want to get in lately. He'd rather stay on the s

ide with a toy and make you play fetch, or find a random stranger to go hug- which can be pretty awkward. New people moved in next door and he greets them by saying "Hi Neighbor!" When he hugs me, he says "Oh Sweetheart, I love you too." If you ask him a question, he either answers with, "Yeah, I think so" or "No, I don't really think so." Earlier, I spelled a phrase I shouldn't have said, and Elliott said "Don't say that mommy" (I don't think he can spell...). I was looking through my archives a few days ago and Elliott is just as I imagined he would be- a insatiably curious chatterbox.

My two year old

Elliott has had several developments in the last month or so. The first of these is a little "girlfriend", another talkative, bossy two year old cutie pie named Willa. They play together almost exclusively, hold hands, help each other put their shoes on, eat snack together, and hug and kiss goodbye. It's a trip for sure, but it's funny to see him trying to imitate David and me.

The second development is a bustling vocabulary. He talks and sings nonstop, and has added lots of fun phrases, such as:

"Why? Why? Why?" (ad nauseum)

"Whatt?" (which I write with two "T"s, to emphasize how short and crisp he says it)

"Your choices, mommy." (which means, pick one- these are your choices, mommy)

Also, he refers to himself as buddy when he is trying to talk himself through something. The other day he was trying to put on his pants, and managed to get two feet in one leg. He said, "Wrong hole, buddy," and then corrected himself.

"Stop Mommy"

"No Talking! SHHH."

"Goodbye. I go a hospital!"

As soon as my camera and computer cooperate, I'll post some videos. Sorry!

Happy mudda's day tew you!

A song from the cute blonde kid- better late than never?

Also, the shakiness is due to the fact that I was just pointing the camera over my shoulder hoping I was aiming in the right direction. I was stopped at a light when he started singing, and of course the light turned green right after he started. I assure you that I WAS paying attention to the road though.