Different Kids

The intervening 3 years have dimmed many memories of Ethan's habits as an infant, but one remains clear: His need to be held while falling asleep.

Enter Edward. I've heard stories about how different your children's personalities are, and how you'll see that they're different right from infancy. But honestly, most of the eating, sleeping and pooping as been the same. Until now.

Now that Edward is weaned, he's actually been getting enough to eat. This has made a big difference in his attitude and routine. It's also started to show in his sleeping pattern. We've been putting Edward to bed in his Moses basket and longing for the day to get him into the crib. But he used to wake up too much in the evenings, require too much holding, and occasionally he would just scream for an hour or two. The difference that we are noticing now, is that he doesn't want to be held when he's tired.

Let me say that again, he doesn't want to be held while falling asleep. We put him down in his crib (while Ethan is out with Grandpa Gibson) and put a blanket over him where he can grab it and snuggle it. Even if he's still awake, he just lays there quietly and drifts off.

Mia and I are not fighting it. If that's how Edward wants to express his unique personality, we are not going to fight it.

Missing Ethan

Ethan is out in Albany for the long weekend. While it's a nice relief for Mia and I, apparently it was a bit of a concern for Ethan.

When he and I were talking about it yesterday he got a very sad look on his face and asked me "Daddy, will you miss me?" And to Mia he said "Momma will you miss me when I'm gone?"

This was a bit of a surprise to us because normally he asks it the other way when I go to work. "Daddy, will you miss us when you go to work?" And I always tell him yes I will. And I mostly do ;)

But this time, we could both answer honestly that we will miss Ethan while he's gone. In fact, when I got home from work today I was a little sad that no one ran shouting to meet me at the door.

We have the cutest kids in the world (sorry, everyone else) and I wouldn't give them up for anything. Though I might loan them out for a weekend (and miss them).

Mother's Day Gift

I know that Mother's Day was last Sunday and I've been meaning to write this post since then but I've been busy job searching. Fortunately (?) Edward woke up at 5:30 this morning so I've got some time now.

This year I decided to give Mia something special for Mother's Day. Don't get me wrong, I still got her the Godiva chocolate she asked for, and Ethan helped me pick out some roses, but those were just trappings. The real gift was spending the weekend (while Mia worked) weaning Edward.

Weaning is something we've talked about for a few weeks now because Edward has been eating every 1.5 hours (if not more often) and wasn't able to fall asleep without nursing. We knew he wasn't getting enough to eat, which accounted for the frequency, and assumed that being hungry was also a factor in his incredibly short naps and constant wake-ups at night.

One of the hardest parts of weaning is taking the attitude that your child will take a bottle when he gets hungry enough. The time before that happens can be quite miserable. Especially if he screams when you try to give him the bottle. On the bright side, using sleep as a defense mechanism against eating from a bottle does provide some relief.

But, I stuck to my plan, and even when Mia was home we kept pushing the bottle. At 2AM he wouldn't be comforted back to sleep by nursing but by getting a bottle from Dad. Finally by Monday, we had him doing pretty well with taking a bottle and he was starting to drink more at each feeding. This was a key part of the change so we were glad that it materialized according to plan.

This morning, as I write this post, I'm tired but got a solid night of sleep. Uninterrupted sleep. It's like Nirvana. So while I am still groggy, at least I'm not frustrated.

And it looks like he's just about done with his playmate. He might be getting sleepy again himself. That would be nice.

Best. Purchase. Ever.

Mia just bought the best thing in the world from Ikea this week.

A clock.

Yep, a clock. A simple, digital clock with big red numbers. But, it's not really the clock that is so fantastic. It's the alarm.

While, I really just wanted an alarm, this one has the feature of allowing you to record your own voice as the alarm.

But, it gets better! Ethan had been coming into our room at about 6-6:30 every morning and it was just a little too early for me. So, when we got the clock, we told him that he had to stay in his room until 7:00AM when he heard his alarm.

AND IT WORKED! On the first day, he didn't come in until 7AM. Needless to say, it's the little things that make us happy these days.

Singing

Ethan loves to sing. And he learns the words to songs pretty quickly. And if he can't quite get the tune right, he makes up for it with volume.

We have a tape of primary songs that he sings in the car. He's getting to know pieces of most of the songs. It's cute to hear him join in when it's playing. He'll sing all the way to wherever we are going.

Then, when we are at home, Ethan will also start just singing at random. Today he was climbing on the couch singing the "Follow the Prophet" chorus (over and over) at the top of his lungs. Then, on occasion, he would mix in "I lived in Heaven" to the same tune as Follow the Prophet. It took me a few times before I realized what words he was actually using.
Of course, he didn't care. He was just happy to be singing and dancing.

I love that he likes singing so much. I hope he gets his mother's talent for singing too.

News from the frontlines

So, I've been told that my blog has been neglected of late. And I can't deny it. However, today, I will not be parading around the same tired excuses with their threadbare rags tenuously clinging to their dead-horse-beaten bodies.

Instead I have a fresh new batch of excuses, still shiny with new-car smell. These I will present for your reading pleasure with the expectation that you will not question them or look under the masks.

Excuse number 1. Life is hard. There, I said it. Life is just hard, and as the blog is a all about me anyway, I'm elevating that selfishness to my frequency of posting. Sorry if this demolishes any preconceptions I have may presented over the last four years about my blog being a place to stay current on the happenings of our family.

Excuse number 2. Raising kids is hard. And, while you might think it only gets twice as hard with two kids, well, you'd be silly for thinking that. Rather, the second child is more like an exponent, squaring the level of difficulty and space required for childrearing. Our apartment that has been roomy enough for us to live in for 5 years has suddenly shrunk, seemingly overnight, until we feel that we're living in a hotel room rather than an apartment. There is no space in our house that, if not entirely consumed, is not laced with the paraphernalia of children. (Also, every trashcan in the house has a dirty diaper in it.)

Excuse number 3. Looking for a job is hard. In case you haven't heard, or been confused by Mia's post, I'm still just in the looking phase. Te first place we decided to look was North Carolina. Oddly enough, a few people we knew from Boston have moved down there. And some others here in Boston came from there. So, apparently there's something to the place. I've found a couple of jobs that are right in the field I'm looking for (haven't landed any of them yet) so it's got work I could do.
If North Carolina doesn't work out, I may look in such exotic locales as Austin, Denver, and Portland.

Excuse number 4. I've got a bigger, better blog now. Well, I don't know if it's better but I'm getting some attention on a professional blog that I've started. It's giving me a space to think about marketing, the Internet, and social media. I'm starting to carve out my career in this space, so I like having a place that I can posit on ideas that I wouldn't normally get to deal with at work.

And if you buy all those excuses, then I've also got a nice bridge we should talk about. ;)

Killing time

Things you can do while your infant son takes a 4.5 hour nap... in your arms.

1. Watch a session of conference.
2. Catch up on your RSS feeds
3. Eat a snack
4. Read a fair chunk of Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury
5. Take a nap yourself

Yes, you can do all of those things and more in just one nap session. If you want to try it for yourself, come on down to our place. We'll set you up.

They Live!

Some of you have been wondering if the boys are still alive considering the recent lack of documentation. Well, I've finally got something for you.

First, are the recent uploads located on Flickr.

And here's a little video that I uploaded to YouTube. (It didn't work when I tried to upload it through my blog.) So, if you've been wondering what Edward is up to, here is his latest accomplishment.

Movie Quotes by Ethan

Ethan watches a couple of movies over and over. No surprise for a 3-year old. And because of that, he has some favorite movie quotes. Here are some samples:

Toy Story: To Infinity and Beyond.
Toy Story2: Not today Zerg. *motions to arm for laser and makes shooting sounds*
Incredibles: I'm Dash.
Cars: Ka-chuga, ka-chuga.
Blue's Clues: I skeedoo'ed into the picture.

And, then, just yesterday we got an unexpected one. He was holding the folded poles to his tent, one in each hand, he turned to me and said, "Say hello to my little friends."

WHAT!?! Where did he pick that one up? We certainly haven't been letting him watch Pachino movies. It must have been a reference in one of his other shows but it still caught me off-guard. Not to mention, carried much different connotation for me than he intended.

Forget the Easter Bunny

We have a new favorite Easter animal in our house.

When we came out in the morning, I found in my basket a very cute, cuddly looking plastic cow. When you push him down, he poops out a jellybean. A brown jellybean.


The first time I did it, Ethan just stared at it for a few seconds. Then he said, "That cow made a poop on the carpet." The cow was really calling into question his reality because poop on the carpet usually gets a bigger reaction from mom and dad.

So, I told him that it was just a jellybean like he got in his eggs. But, he didn't want to eat it anyway.

Fast forward to me coming home from work today. One of the first things Ethan said to me when I walked in the door was "Do you have the poo-poo cow?" He wanted to see it make another poop.

Of course, he still says he doesn't want to eat it afterwards.