temporary insanity

I must have temporarily taken leave of my common sense at the grocery store last time. When I got to the applesauce, I saw that they had blueberry applesauce and I thought, hey, Dennis loves blueberries, I'll get that. What I forgot to take into account was that we are letting him feed himself with the spoon now and blueberry applesauce is a lot more vibrant in color than regular applesauce. To my credit, he did love it, but I don't think I'll be buying it again real soon. I'm sure you can see why.

We started the day out kind of puny, and I was afraid we might be catching Gran's cold, but it no longer looks like that's the case. By this afternoon, after some nice snuggle time watching movies and a couple of good naps, we felt normal again. Maybe we just didn't sleep too well last night. Today I shared one of my favorite cartoons with Dennis: It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown. Yes, I know it's not October yet, but my fall excitement starts every year about this time. I am already getting ready for the pumpkin patch trip and the pumpkin train ride and I'm looking for petting zoos and hay rides and demonstration farms... I LOVE all this stuff, and I can't wait to share it with Dennis. Maybe he'll like the season as much as I do. We'll be camping and visiting the mountains and trick-or-treating before we know it, and then (drumroll please...) it will be time to start thinking about (gasp!) Christmas!!! And this one should be even more fun than last year's. But I'm getting ahead of myself, big time. I do it every year.

We had dinner tonight at Grandmother and Granddaddy's house and all Dad's brothers were there. Dennis enjoyed playing with his older cousins (who are actually my youngest cousins) so much, and they are so good with him. He was so pleased with himself that the big kids were giving him so much attention. He ran and played and squealed and giggled, and sometime during all this he found Grandmother's Swiffer in the laundry room and then Swiffered her kitchen floor. I wonder if he liked it better than the broom...

We had a great day after all. And thank goodness we are feeling just fine.

A Top Ten List

Top Ten Reasons it's fun to parent a nearly 18 month old:

10. He's always glad to see us.

9. He can walk now, which is good since he's heavy.

8. We have an excuse to play with toys.

7. We get lots of kisses, some without lots of slobber!

6. He has learned how to give hugs.

5. Access to a neverending supply of cuteness...

4. There's nothing like the phrase "I Love You" in toddlerspeak.

3. His smile.

2. Night-night time cuddles are so sweet.

1. So much joy in our lives that wasn't there before.

Dennis and I stayed home today and cleaned house in between serious playing sessions. The funniest thing he did? After I pushed him around and around his room in his car, FAST, I got dizzy and had to lie down on the floor for a minute. He stopped the car, opened the door, got out, and walked over to me. Then he reached down and grabbed a handful of my hair with one hand and the front center of my bra in the other (how he found that through my shirt I'll never know) and gave a serious yank to try to get me back up off the floor to push him some more. Since he didn't cause me any pain, I nearly died laughing because it was so unexpected. I'm laughing now just writing about it. He joined me in laughing and then we decided to play something else.

Remember the movie Flashdance (not you, Ellen, you probably weren't born yet...)? That's how Dennis dances, like the Maniac song dance. We spent quite a while pushing the music button on his giraffe ball sorter toy and then dancing like maniacs to it. So I had a good cardio workout today for sure! Maybe I should try and teach him to waltz...

watch me play

I was pleasantly surprised to discover a mild temperature and nice breeze when I went outside around lunchtime. I fixed lunch for Dennis and myself and then loaded us up to head to the playground. Dennis is able to do more and more at the playground and I was so amazed to see him climb to the top of the highest slide and sit himself down and push off to slide down it. When he was at the top of this same slide, Gran and Pop showed up at the playground to see him play. He began giggling and grinning hugely at them as soon as he spotted them walking into the playground. He quickly plopped down on the slide and slid down to them, delighted as always to see them. He showed off all his climbing and sliding skills for them and they had fun catching him and then pushing him while he was in the swing.

He made a friend at the playground, another little boy who was a little older. He had an extra truck that he let Dennis play with in the sand, and he wanted Dennis to slide down all the slides either right before him or right after him. He also wanted all of us to watch him slide and climb on the play equipment. I guess he heard us praising Dennis for his abilities and knew that he could do so much more and wanted some praise as well! We were happy to comply.

Gran treated us to some seriously decadent chocolate ice cream from Publix this afternoon after we picked some pears from our tree to take to her. It was a pretty good exchange. The poor pear tree is weighed down, some branches nearly to the ground, with pears (Bartlett, I believe), and many of them are not quite ripe enough to pick. The ones today were very close and Gran confirmed their deliciousness. I am overrun with the things since I didn't even think about pruning the tree. Some farmer I am! This happened with my tomato crop years ago and I had more of them than I could have eaten in two years. Since we are planning a big fall garden for the greenhouse this year, I am going to have to learn to care for the plants properly! I am looking forward to teaching Dennis about gardening. We have a giant greenhouse and will be able to garden through the winter. His apple tree is growing well but is still too young to produce fruit. He loves flowers and points them out to me whenever he sees them, and he likes to touch different plants and flowers to see how they feel. So far we've managed to avoid poison ivy and its nefarious cousins, thank goodness.

Of course we spent time in his room playing with the cars, and he helped Daddy clean up his room tonight before bed. He watched Mommy cook dinner and clean in the kitchen until his Daddy got home, and he heard David get in the shower. He ran back to the bathroom laughing, saw that the shower was occupied and in use, shouted "Da da!" and ran to the shower door and slid it open. It's a good thing he shouted a warning or David might have been in for a rather rude surprise!

Our quest-to-be-greener has been going well. We stopped at Whole Foods last week and got paper towels and trash bags made from recycled materials. This was too expensive to be feasible before, but now Whole Foods has their own brand name and the products are equivalent to the Seventh Generation ones in biodegradability and use of sustainable materials. We especially like the diapers. They are bigger than the Seventh Generation ones and leak less. And more of them come in the package, so they are cheaper. All of the Whole Foods brand products are very reasonably priced, and I didn't pay any more for the trash bags than I would have for any trash bags. The paper towels were a little bit more, but still very reasonable. The only problem is having to drive so far to get to Whole Foods! We try to combine all our northbound errands into one trip now. I really like the new Clorox GreenWorks products as well. We had bought them for the camper so that we wouldn't be polluting the campgrounds, and now I am using them at home as well--they work well, have less chemicals, and smell pleasant. This is especially good since Dennis likes to 'help' me clean now, and he likes to spray the bottle and wipe as well. It's nice that these cleaners are not as toxic for him as far as touching is concerned, not that we're going to turn him loose with the cleaning products for several years yet. His favorite cleaning tool is still the broom--he loves to sweep it through the house, even though it's twice as tall as he is and then some. It will be a few years yet before Dennis knows or cares about the environment, but we are hoping to set a good example for him and keep him healthier by choosing organic foods and natural products whenever we can. He happens to like this planet pretty well!

hot for Hot Wheels

The boy is passionate about cars. He talks about them, he looks at them, he rides in them. He would eat them if they were edible. He spent the entire day playing with cars except for a brief moment when he pulled his Ugly Dolls down from the shelf, but then he loaded them in his Little Tikes car and took them for a ride. If it's got wheels, he's interested.

We spent the majority of the day in his room and he was pretty happy about it. Since we'd spent some days at the lake, he hadn't gotten in all his car-rolling time. He made up for it today. Again today he was extremely happy and chatty. I feared it wouldn't be so when he woke up crying at 11:30 last night and we couldn't discern the reason. We cuddled him and played with him and decided it was tooth-related (we're getting tooth #14 in now) and gave him some medicine. He went back to bed happily and slept peacefully. This morning while we were playing he brought me his bottle of ibuprofen and the medicine dropper from his diaper bag, so I wonder if the tooth was still bothering him today. I quickly put the medicine out of his reach, but it was cute watching him try to manipulate the bottle that actually proved to be childproof (thank goodness). He tried to poke the oral syringe down into the bottle but that pesky lid kept getting in his way.

David asked him who he wanted to take his bath with tonight and he proclaimed "DA DA!", so David and Dennis took a nice Johnson & Johnson lavender scented Bedtime Bath. I have an aromatherapy husband tonight! We should all sleep peacefully!

It was slimy

Like many good southerners, we spent today at the river. Gran, Grandma, and Bob fished and caught a mega load of catfish and sometime soon we'll have a good fish fry. Boats were everywhere and Dennis enjoyed watching them and waving at them and saying "boat" whenever they went by. We did not get out on the water, though. It was windy and rough, our prequel to the hurricane spinoff weather that will be coming through this week.

Dennis watched the action from the screened porch for a while before walking over to the door, pointing one finger at it and insisting "side!" (which is Dennis-speak for 'outside'). He cried, full pouty lip and red eyes and big tears, when we wouldn't let him go out, so pretty soon I was lugging the pack and play down to the dock so he could visit outside with everyone. He had fun watching the boats and skiers and tubers going by, and he shouted encouragement to the fishermen. When Grandma caught a baby largemouth bass, I took Dennis over to see it. He was fascinated and reached out to touch it, so his Grandma immobilized the little fish in her grip. Dennis reached out a finger to touch it and then touch it again. He laughed and then watched as we let the fish go. He saw it flip around on the dock for a second before she put it in the water and it quickly swam away. He was pleased with his fish-touching experience, and now he's officially had fish goo on his hands like the rest of the family has. What an initiation!

It got hot down there on the dock and I took his little shirt off. He helped me undress him, giggling the entire time. He thought it was hilarious when he was down to his diaper and he grabbed at it and nearly got it off as well before I stopped him. Naked babies are not offensive to most people, but I didn't care to clean the results of a naked baby out of the pack and play. We played a strange game with the side of the pack and play. He smashed his face into the mesh side and made me laugh, so I got down on my hands and knees and smashed my face into the mesh as well. He giggled hysterically, and we repeated this for quite a while. My lip still feels like it's smashed into mesh--perhaps I overdid just a little...

Once the weather turned bad, Dennis began walking around in the cabin and saying "bye bye", so we loaded up and left. As it turns out, his Daddy was headed home from his job site then and we arrived home at the same time. Dennis was thrilled to see him and even more thrilled to play cars with him while I cooked supper. It was pizza; I didn't spend any time slaving over a hot oven (just in case you might be mentally applauding my nonexistent domestic skills).

Dennis was sleepy all day today. He repeatedly walked over to the pack and play and said "night night" and I let him take two naps there. He was still sleepy, though, and said night night again when we arrived at the house and went into his room. We kept him awake through supper and for a few minutes of play afterward, but he was rubbing his eyes and heading to the crib. When I picked him up to kiss him goodnight, he put both of his hands on the sides of my face, leaned forward (for what I thought was going to be a very sweet kiss), opened his mouth, and lightly bit the end of my nose. Taken by surprise, I couldn't help but laugh, so he laughed too and tried again. When I resisted, he removed my glasses and waved them about and then put them back on my face. He took them off and said "eye" and poked me in the eye, but I couldn't really fault his thinking process. After all, he did correctly (if painfully) identify my eye. He went happily to bed right after this and when I went in to check on him after 15 minutes, he was still awake in the dark, talking to Froggy. Lucky for us he still likes to go to bed. It may be that he is starting to enjoy his alone time because he did the same thing when I put him down for his nap. He talked for a few minutes to himself or Froggy and then went to sleep. It's very cute to listen to, much nicer than crying to get out of bed as soon as we put him in it, but I don't kid myself that we won't have to face that one day as well!

It was a very nice holiday weekend, and we are all getting to know and like Bob very much. He certainly has the Dennis seal of approval! Now the weekend is over and Dennis will have to be content with lots of Mommy time again. I hope he won't be too disappointed. He has loved being around everyone the past few days.

playing with my cars

I awoke this morning (way too early) to the sound of a little voice calling "hellooooo" over and over. I don't know if he was calling me, his Daddy, the dog, aliens... But I'm the one who responded, and as soon as I walked in the door, he said "Hey. Car." And then he pointed to his car. He wanted to get up so he could ride in his car. Since it was STILL DARK OUTSIDE, I changed his diaper, kissed him, and put him back in the crib. He cried two measly little cries and then fell back asleep. He didn't wake up again until almost 9:45! This time he woke up saying "EAT EAT!", and we went in there and got him up and fed him breakfast. He dawdled over breakfast (and so did we) so long that we didn't make it to church this morning. After breakfast, he got to play with his cars, which he happily did for an hour or so. He climbed in the Little Tikes car and backed it all over the room and then climbed back out and rolled his Hot Wheels and Mega Blocks cars down the ramp his Daddy helped him build. I think he could roll cars down that ramp all day if given the opportunity. He loves it, and he says "yaaaayy" when they roll down. He is only 1, though, and sometimes the poor cars skid all the way down the mountain on their sides instead of on their wheels. Still working on those fine motor skills...

Speaking of wheels, we had a lesson about them this morning. I identified the wheels on his toy cars and then on his big car and showed them how they spin around. He touched each wheel and spun it himself, then said something that sounded very close to the word wheel. Gosh he loves cars. And trucks, too, as he let me know when he saw one on a poster today, pointing vigorously and saying "truck, truck". It sounds a little more like "kwuck", but we know what he means.

He helped us grocery shop today, and he was very very sweet. We let him ride the little automated put-2-quarters-in-it-and-sit-in-it-while-it-rocks-and-goes-nowhere car in the arcade after we were done. He liked it okay, but really preferred the actual sit-in video games. He climbed up in the seats and steered for all he was worth. His favorite was the 18-wheeler type game because it had the biggest steering wheel. He had to stand up to steer, which he thought was hilarious and he giggled the whole time.

We had dinner at the lake with Gran and Pop and Becky and Bob, and we enjoyed ribs and Boston butt, peas, rice, potatoes, rolls, carrots, and German chocolate cake. Dennis ate himself silly again and was in such a good mood after dinner that we just enjoyed watching him. Gran and I took a short boat ride and returned to play with Dennis. He kept putting our shoes on our feet for us, and after a while started marching around the room and saying "bye bye" and waving. We got the hint and packed him up and brought him home. He stayed awake for the long car ride back and joyfully headed for his cars as soon as we got him into the house and into his room. We let him play for just a second before getting him ready for bed, and he went right to sleep. I suppose I should find pajamas with cars on them so he'd get excited about putting them on. Today he wore his overalls that have the blue and white stripe pattern like a train engineer's. He chose them because he wanted to wear his engineer cap and was pleased to see that the overalls matched. He looks good in overalls, just like an all-American little boy, and the hat was just too much cuteness. He mostly liked putting it on and removing it, so I didn't manage to snap a photo while it was on his head. I did catch him playing with his cars, though...

What I forgot to mention yesterday: We ate lunch at Shoney's and our waitress/server/whatever came by to refill our drinks, and she picked up first my glass to fill it and then David's. Dennis watched with big eyes while she took our glasses, and he stealthily but quickly grabbed his sippy cup and hugged it to his chest while warily watching the waitress. We assured him that she wasn't going to take away his juice, but he wouldn't let go of the cup until she was well out of sight. He didn't even take a drink from it until he was sure she was gone, and even then it was a while before he put it back down on the table!

Pretty soon it will be time to go in and check on him and put the little blanket over his legs while he sleeps (my favorite nighttime activity). He doesn't look at all like a baby anymore except when he sleeps. It's then that you really notice the sweet curve of his cheek and those long, long eyelashes resting on it. He sleeps hard and every night in a different position so I never know what to expect when I go in. He doesn't often sleep with his little butt in the air these days, but sometimes he still does and it always makes me smile. I can't imagine how that's comfortable, but he must think it is! I love going in there and watching him sleep. He's so peaceful and happy, and some nights I can hear him laughing in his sleep. Watching him just makes my heart fill up with love for him. I still can't believe I'm a mom sometimes, but sometimes I can barely remember life before. I wouldn't have it any other way now.

feed me constantly

Supper tonight was a real treat--homemade spaghetti and meatballs, chocolate drizzled pretzels, rice pudding... Bob worked hard to cook some incredibly delicious food, and he may be sorry he let us know that he could cook so well! The dinner company was nice as well, with Becky (Grandma) and Bob hosting us at the lake house and we were joined by Gran & Pop and David's Uncle Kenny and Aunt Wanda. The weather outside was stark humid misery, so we all squeezed in and ate in the nice air conditioned cabin. Dennis was in a state of food-induced bliss for much of the evening. He loves spaghetti and the mess it creates, and this was exceptionally delicious spaghetti, and he ate 3 baby helpings of it. Then he enjoyed rice pudding and pretzel cookies and garlic bread, as much of it as he could coerce from the other diners.

He really performed for us tonight. He laughed and talked to us while in constant motion. He opened the cabinets and pulled out the tupperware canisters, which he set in a line on the floor. Then he took turns sitting on each canister, plopping down and staying for a few seconds before moving on to the next canister, like musical chairs except that it didn't ever stop. Bob taught him how to walk in Grandma's shoes, but he only managed to master walking with one of her shoes on at a time. He would take a step with his bare foot then drag the shod foot forward to meet it. For some reason, the height of entertainment for him tonight was to push the kid-sized plastic outdoor chair back and forth and all around the cabin, which he did for at least 20 minutes while we all watched. The height of hilarity for us was when Dennis opened the bathroom door while his Grandma was in there, knowing he wasn't supposed to open it and giggling maniacally the whole time. He also learned to open the refrigerator all by himself, a skill I was hoping wouldn't manifest itself for a long time yet.

He was certainly in party mode all day long, and I'll bet he sleeps extra hard tonight. Having been fed so well, I'll be we all sleep extra good tonight!