Robert's First Day of School

Robert's first day of preschool was Friday. He did great! When he first woke, he seemed a little apprehensive and said he didn't want to go, but as you can see, he was all smiles when the time came to leave for school. I told Clara to stay inside until I took his picture so she wouldn't distract him. You can see her peeking out the window.

On the way to school, he kept saying "I not cry." I thought for sure he would have a hard time when it came time for me to leave. But nope. He went straight to the cars but did allow me to take a couple of pictures. I showed him where the potty was in the classroom and said goodbye. He said "I not cry" again and I was out the door. Easy peasy.

I didn't really have a chance to miss him because Chris had taken the day off to help me get ready to go camping this weekend, so my day was full. It was absolute bliss to get things done without him underfoot. I love the boy to pieces, but I've been feeling very overwhelmed with the most basic of tasks for some time now. He just takes so much of my mental energy; I feel like I'm running all day, but getting absolutely nothing done. I think this is going to be just the thing to help me get back on track and get things in order around here.

And the best part? He loved school. I was a little worried he wouldn't like it, but he had a fantastic first day. He ate a good lunch, took a nap and was dry when I picked him up. His teacher said he tossed and turned for a little while when naptime first started and mentioned me, but all she had to do was remind him I would be there after he woke up from his nap and he said okay and went to sleep. When I got there, he met me with a smile and a hug and said, "Mommy! I did miss you!"

So we got home, moved his carseat to the Jeep and were on our way to Huntsville for the weekend.

"You Are My Shunshine"

Prepare to be overloaded with cuteness.

More Allergies

I got Robert into the doctor yesterday because I wanted to know if his rash was contagious. When he woke, it had spread all over his body and looked much worse, but he still didn't seem bothered by it.

Turns out it was an allergic reaction. So now we're trying to think back over the day or two prior to its onset to figure out what could have caused it. The only thing I can think of is we tried to get him to try shrimp for the first time at dinner on Friday. I can't remember if he even touched it. But even if that's all he did, it could have caused the reaction. That would round out our family's severe allergies. We don't have a shellfish allergy in the family yet. Yay!

He had a couple doses of benadryl yesterday and a a dose of steroids and he just woke up and it looks much better.

ETA: This picture is from Monday morning. His back was a little worse and he had more spots by the time I got him to the doctor a few hours later. After a couple of doses of steroids, they're mostly gone. The ones on his face are being stubborn, but even they have almost completely faded.

Yesterday

Robert and I went to playgroup yesterday morning at the inflatable play place (we've had sooooooo much rain here these last few weeks. It's been wonderful!) While we were there, I noticed he felt really hot and he started getting a little whiney. It was hard to tell if he was feverish or if it was just from all the running around.

We went to Schlotzky's with the group and he started acting pretty puny. I got him home and sure enough, he had a fever of 102 :( I just hate it when I unknowingly expose others to our crud. The nice thing was he went straight down for a nap. (He's been fighting them for a while now.) After picking Clara up from school, he just laid around like this for the rest of the day.

Poor little guy was miserable and he eventually fell asleep early on the couch which NEVER happens. He woke around 2:00 this morning fever-free. I was able to get him back down and he was back up at 4:00, chipper and ready to go! Unfortunately, I was not ready to be up and at 'em. It took some time to get him back down the second time and I had to sleep on his floor. So today, I've been the one dragging, letting him watch cartoons so I could slip in a nap on the couch. How did I do this up-multiple-times-each-and-every-night thing for almost a year again?

"Fye" Like the Wind

Sorry. I've been a bad blogger. The screen went out on my laptop and I've been having to dock it upstairs to Chris' monitor to put pictures up. And then Chris went and took my dock off and put his on, and well, walking all the way upstairs and then changing out the docks is a little more trouble than I've been willing to go to lately. Why yes, I am that lazy. I haven't taken too many pictures either. And we all know that no pictures = nothing to post about.

A few weeks ago, I was doing laundry and Robert kept coming up to me saying, "Up, kye". I could not figure out what he wanted. He was getting desperate and I finally asked him to show me and he pointed up to the sky. I then realized he had fairy wings that he was trying to attach to his back so that he could fly.

He bent over, tried to balance them on his back and kept saying, "wings, fye, wings, fye, WINGS FYE!" Then he said, "Two, one, bas (blastoff)!" and jumped in the air. Nothing was working. It was soooo sad. He wanted so desperately to fly and couldn't figure out why the wings weren't working.

Here he is making his rocket ship noise, but alas, even with the proper sound effect, his feet never left the floor.

He eventually gave up on flying and tromped around in Daddy's shoes for a while.

No Peeking Robert!

I thought I'd put a couple of gifts under the tree last week to see what Robert would do. He wasn't too interested in his birthday gifts and never touched anything last Christmas so I thought there was a chance he would leave them alone. Yeah, not so much.

The Great Communicator

Finally. Finally this boy is starting to communicate with us.

Our bedtime routine usually involves a story and rocking while singing a couple of songs. Lately though, he's been pretty uninterested in either and sometimes just points to his bed when we walk into his room and we forgo all bedtime formalities.

Tonight was different though. He wanted a story and rocking and singing. After we said his prayer I said, "Night night Robert". He responded with, "Mama, wok, see." So I rocked and sang a little longer. I told him night night again and he got worried and said "wok". As his eyes were getting heavy, he continued to say "wok" every 3o seconds or so. When I tried to get up a second time, he really got worried and kept repeating "Wok! Wok! Wok!". So I said, "No more rock" and then he pulled out the big guns and said, "Peas!" Oh man, how could I not sit there another few minutes? This time I just rocked while he lay there, eyes closed, with a look of utter contentment on his face. Every 30 seconds came a little "peas."

So I felt like mother of the year when, after about 15 minutes of this, I finally decided he needed to go down so I could help Clara with her homework. He screamed "Peas! Peas! Peas!" for several minutes before finally calming down.

Robert is 2!!

I asked Clara to make a sign for the front door to greet our guests to Robert's racecar birthday party.

I didn't put a whole lot of effort into this party. Just a spray painted car, a couple of friends and some pizza, but it was the perfect low-key party. The car was missing a steering wheel (which many partygoers made sure to mention), but it still made for a fun photo op.

The cake. I spent roughly two and a half hours decorating this bad boy and do you know what Robert's favorite part was? The wheels. He wouldn't touch the cake. When Chris put some on his mouth, he promptly spit it out. The other kids kept asking for more wheels too.

We could not get those two boogers to look at the camera at the same time. Here Robert is watching Grandma and Grandpa. See them? They're sitting in front of Clara. They skyped in for cake and presents. Oh man, we totally should have held the screen up so they could be in the picture.

Singing "Happy Birthday" to the birthday boy.

And just a few more pictures of all the fun.

A Couple of Birthday Pics

The kids and I are leaving for Pecos early in the morning, so I don't have time to do a whole birthday post, but here are a couple of pictures from Robert's race car birthday party last night.

Too Quiet

Sometimes when Robert is being too quiet it's because he's creating art on the floor with markers (which then requires mandatory clean up by the perpetrator).

And other times the masterpiece appears on the wall in another of his favorite mediums, crayon.

But occasionally the little tyke surprises me. Quiet doesn't always mean there's a mess to clean up. Sometimes quiet is good. Sometimes quiet makes me smile.

More and More

Robert has continued to add several words a day to his vocabulary. Yesterday I went to the mall and when I got him out of the car and he saw the stroller, he said "walk" for the first time. Then tonight he started doing the wheels on the bus hand movements and said, "wheels bus". He's also started saying car (instead of just making the noise), more, ball, book and backpack (pack pack) when talking about his backpack or my purse.

He won't usually try to form words correctly when you ask him to though. For instance, if you ask him to say watermelon, he says "da da da da"; table is "da da". He always uses the sound "da" and just gets the number of syllables right.

Oh, and I forgot to mention his newest thing. I have to try really hard to keep a straight face when he starts doing it. He's started telling people off. When someone takes his toy, sits in his spot or commits some other terrible injustice, he gets an angry look on his face, points at the perpetrator and starts punching in their general direction while angrily spouting gibberish like "DA BAJOE, PAKOE BAAAAA!!" You don't want to see him when he's angry.

New Words

Robert has had an explosion of words this last week. He seems to learn new words when he goes off of his medication. He was sick again a couple of weeks ago and on the breathing treatments for about a week and has been off of them for a little over a week now. Today he said "bus", "stop" and "rock" for the first time. This weekend he learned "eyes" and "teeth" and last week he started saying "night night" (nye nye), "outside" (ouse), and "bye bye".

This is his ornery face. It's one of my favorites.

I don't want to give the false impression that he's a perfect gentleman when he's not on breathing treatments. He still has his moments. Like when it's 100 degrees outside and I'm wearing pants and I don't want to chase after him while he chases a mama duck and her ducklings who are swimming across a lake.l]
]

"<]\

\

Or when he bangs on Mommy's keyboard while she's trying to write a blog post.

He's Still Got It

I just wanted to allay any concerns there might be that Robert's curiosity has been stifled by the recent lock-down. Unfortunately, not everything in our home can be nailed down.

Update on the Big Boy

Robert and I are enjoying our one on one time now that Clara's in school. We've started going to storytime at the library. Last week the librarian read two stories about monkeys and then passed out these monkey masks at the end.

He's gotten over his illness and has been off of the pulmicort since last Monday with no other symptoms. It took about a week and a half of breathing treatments and he never had to have an antibiotic or steroid! His behavior went back to normal a day after stopping the medication again, so now we'll just wait and see how long before he gets sick again and hopefully the breathing treatments will work next time.

He's getting used to being locked out of everything in the house and it's been much more pleasant now that I'm not telling him "no" all day long. There have been several times he's screamed bloody murder in the next room and I've run to him only to find that he's discovered another inaccessible area of the house. He's doing much better with it now though.

I don't remember if I ever updated on Robert's bedtime progress. He now goes down without a problem almost every night. We ask him if he's ready for bed and he actually says "yes" (well, technically he says "dah"). We never thought we'd see the day that he would willingly stay in his bed. Occasionally he cries for a few minutes before falling asleep but he stays down and sleeps through the night every night. He's also adjusting well to his new earlier naptime due to Clara's school schedule.

All in all, things around here are much more tolerable now that were finally starting to get that boy figured out. He really is a sweetie and I'm so excited to see his real personality finally shining through.

Doing a Bit of Robert-Proofing

Oh Robert, Robert, Robert. What are we going to do with you? If it's not yours, you want it. If it's in drawer or closet or cabinet, you want it. If it's within 12 inches of the edge of a counter, you must swipe it. If it's on a table or a flat surface of any kind, you want it on the floor. If it has water in it, you want to play in it no matter how unsanitary it might be. If it belongs upstairs, it must be brought down (and vice versa). If it's Clara's, you want it 10 times worse than if it isn't Clara's.

If it's in the dryer, you require it be removed immediately so that you can have a cozy spot to read.

If it's a choking hazard, you want it in your mouth. If it's trash, it's good eatin'. In short, you have an impulsive need to cause disorder in your home by whatever means necessary.

Because of that, we were forced to take drastic action. Since you are able to open doors with child-proof locks, this made the task a bit more difficult. Your daddy was up for the challenge though. You don't know how to unlock regular locks yet, so a trip to Home Depot for some new doorknobs was in order. Now the pantry locks from the outside, as well as the laundry room and downstairs closet. There are no longer knobs on the television cabinet. And Clara is just giddy about the new sliding lock that's been installed on her bedroom door that can only be reached when she stands on her tip toes. Now Robert can't go digging around and pulling everything out of her room when she's not in it.

Daddy's drawer that holds all of his sundry items now boasts a lock as well.

You've been a bit dismayed at this recent change of events, but it's been absolutely glorious for the rest of us. You know what they say, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Sleep Eating

I took this video a few weeks ago when Robert was sleep deprived during his toddler bed transition. I tried uploading it a couple of times since then but it just wouldn't work. Third time's a charm I guess. He rarely falls asleep anywhere but his bed, so this little episode was cracking me up. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did! I've watched it half a dozen times and it still makes me laugh.

Sick

Well, Robert's sick. He made it about a week and a half after coming off the Pulmicort before coming down with something. He started getting a runny nose several days ago and then the night before last he coughed a couple of times so I immediately started the Xopenex and did them (roughly) every four hours. Then last evening he started in with the pitiful sounding barking cough so I started him on Pulmicort too. I now know to start the Pulmicort when his nose starts running and Xopenex as soon as the coughing starts. (As always, these are just notes to myself for future reference.)

I was prepared for an awful night last night and even went to bed early knowing I'd probably be up with him after a few hours. Sure enough, 12:30 rolled around and I heard a few coughs and then he woke up. I did another treatment and then it took a loooong time to get him back down. Thankfully the coughing stopped, he just wasn't tired, wouldn't let me lay on his floor and sleep and eventually got up to play. I figured I'd just let him until he got tired. I guess I dozed off and woke up when I heard "Vroom vroom" coming from downstairs. Whoops. He had mozied on down and started playing with his cars in the dark.

Finally around 4:00 I left him in his room to cry, praying that his crying wouldn't exacerbate his cough. He only cried for a few minutes before falling asleep and his cough never flared up. And then he was awake by 7:00.

He's been acting fine the whole time, playing, no fever and he just had a slight cough this morning, but I decided to try and get him in to make sure his lungs weren't infected. I normally wait it out a day or two but with it being Friday, I didn't want to wait.

Both the doctor and I were amazed that his lungs were clear!! I am elated! The doctor was sure he would hear wheezing and even felt weird sending me away without a steroid and antibiotic. This is the first time he hasn't needed both, but he felt like he really didn't need them this time. He also didn't want me to have to deal with Robert on steroids. For that I am appreciative. Of course, he may get worse, but his coughing is almost non-existent now, he isn't congested like he was and I've heard no more barking. I'm to call the doctor at home this weekend if he goes downhill.

I am so, so excited at the prospect of being able to control his asthma by starting the meds only when he's sick since during illnesses is the only time he's ever wheezed. After being on the Xopenex for 24 hours, he was biting and hitting all day yesterday and the fits have started back up. I haven't missed that stuff. I just pray this keeps it under control and we can avoid the daily maintenance. I guess only time will tell.

My Sweet Boy

I've spent a lot of time talking about Robert's behavior these last few months. It all started at the beginning of the year. The first couple of months I blamed teething for the awful behavior. And then I just happened across a website where people posted stories about adverse reactions to medication and I typed in pulmicort in toddlers just to see.

The stories I read were describing Robert to a T. Mainly flying into rages at the slightest thing and completely unpredictable behavior and loss of appetite. When I thought about when his fits started and went back and read my blog, it was about 1 to 2 weeks after starting him on the medication.

Some of you may wonder what I'm talking about because you've been around him and never witnessed these fits. He tends to do ok when we're at church or playgroup. A lot of times they happen when I'm putting him in the car, going to a store, in restaurants, when it's time to come inside, when it's time to stop playing at a friend's house, or when you take something away from him. But then again, we can do some of these things and he's perfectly content. That's what I mean by unpredictable. There are times that it takes me 5 minutes to get him buckled into his carseat. Or he'll do it when I'm checking out at the grocery store and just starts thrashing and screaming and I'm getting "the look" from everyone in the store. Those are the times that I just get in buckled in the car and have a good cry because it's mentally and physically exhausting to deal with one of them.

At his last checkup, I asked the doctor about taking him off of the pulmicort to see how he does. After all, I never intended to put him on a drug for the rest of his life and never attempt to see if he even needed it anymore at some point. When I suggested it, the doctor seemed very hesitant. Yes, Robert has not been sick at all since starting the medicine and for that I am thrilled. But how do we know his problems aren't seasonal and maybe he just needs to be on drugs certain times of the year? How do we know he hasn't outgrown the ear infections that seemed to trigger the wheezing? How do we know he needs it if we don't ever take him off to see?

He was on it twice a day in the beginning and I'm pretty sure he would still be taking it twice a day if I hadn't asked the doctor if we could try lessening the dose. He assured me that this drug wouldn't cause the behavior I was describing, but he reluctantly told me that if I wanted to take him off, that summer would be the best time. I wanted to wait until we were back from Pecos because the kids tend to get sick every time we go.

Once we got back, Robert climbed out of his crib, or more accurately, threw himself out and landed with a thud twice. We turned his crib into a toddler bed and we had the worst week ever last week trying to get the child to stay in bed. We were sleep deprived for several days there. Nothing we did worked. Staying in the room next to him, rocking him to sleep, sleeping next to his bed, leaving him in the room, putting him back into bed over 100 times in a matter of 15 minutes, spanking........ It was awful and we repeated the scenario every time he woke during the night. He was livid. I pulled almost everything out of his room because I knew he'd throw everything out of his drawers and toy bins. I have his dresser anchored to the wall, but he pulled two drawers out and bent the pieces that allow them to slide in in the process. Chris went in one time and the glider was balanced on top of a small toy bin. We have no idea how he managed that. He was in a complete rage. It was awful and we repeated the scenario every time he woke during the night. Friday night was the worst; he woke three different times, the last time screaming from 3-5 am.

I think Thursday or Friday night was the last time I gave him his treatment. Saturday night he went right down and slept through the night, same thing Sunday night and the next two nights. He had a harder time last night, but nothing like last week. He just needed us to stay in there a little while longer.

And lest you think it was just going to happen regardless of stopping the treatment, he also has not thrown one of his terrible uncontrollable fits since then. He's eating more than 2 bites at every meal. In fact, he's eating everything on his plate some meals. I don't remember when he's eaten this much. He's smiling more, he's giving hugs all the time and is sooooo happy. He just runs to Clara and throws his arms around her for a hug. He's more complacent about sitting and learning things. He's interacting more, trying to talk a little more and he's just all around more pleasant to be around. Chris has noticed the difference too. He still has normal 20 month old moments as I would expect, but those I can deal with, and more importantly he can deal with and work through. I can't tell you how relieved I am to have my sweet child back and to know that it's the drugs and not him. And it just breaks my heart that he's been living with this and unable to communicate how it was making him feel.

So now the question is, what do we do if he gets sick next week? I hate the prospect of having to choose a between a sick child and an absolutely unbearable one. I just hope the doctor is willing to work with me and experiment with dosages and treatments because just saying "the drugs make him crazy and we just have to deal with it" is not going to cut it.

Nursery Tour

I was gathering pictures for Robert's baby book when I realized I never took photos of his completed nursery. I figured I should probably go ahead and do that before it's turned into a big boy room someday :(

All of the furniture was Clara's when she was a baby. I repainted the little bookshelf and covered the lampshade. The rocking lamb, little armchair and Radio Flyer car were hers as well. His name, the owls and birds are vinyl clings I got online. I had intended to add more to the corner with the rocking chair but never got around to it, so the birds are just kinda random.

Funny story about the little critter above his changing table. I saw it at Babies R Us and thought the little fox would be a perfect addition to the nursery (If you remember, Robert's middle name is Fox). I got it home and as I was hanging it on the wall I thought "Wait a second!" That sneaky little fox morphed into a raccoon on the way home!

I decoupaged the two star pegs next to his door and it's proven to be the perfect spot for hanging his towel. The little lullaby lamb hanging on the other one was the first thing I bought for him before he was born.

And this here is my most favorite part of Robert's nursery. I think he coordinates well.

19 Months - A Little Late

I had every intention of putting up an 18 month post about Robert, but here we are at 19.5 months, so a 19 month post it is.

Robert is wearing 24 month and 2T clothes and some of his 18 month stuff still fits. He's in size 4 diaper and I just had his feet measured last week and it turns out he's size 7 wide but I've never bought him wide shoes. Oopsie. I'm sure his feet are thanking me for his new, wider sneakers.

He is a wonderful sleeper and usually goes down without a fight. His nighttime routine starts with a breathing treatment (on his own as of this week) while watching Pink Panther, bath, story and in bed at 7:30. He usually wakes between 7 and 7:30. Naptime is around 12:30 and he sleeps 1.5-3 hours.

Robert got teeth number 15 and 16 right at 18 months and just this week has started working on his two year molars. He hates having his teeth brushed but doesn't mind sucking all of the toothpaste off of the toothbrush.

He is still a poor eater. He loves his milk and most any fruit but everything else is hit or miss. Some of his favorites (when he's in the mood) are pasta, chicken, olives, pizza without the cheese, crackers, raisins, smoothies, waffles and wow, I can't think of anything else. That's just sad. We've got to work on getting more food in him. He's starting to refuse some of his favorites now because he's eaten them too much. There are plenty of meals where he only eats one or two bites of anything. He's lactose intolerant so that means no cheese or yogurt and we're holding off on peanuts until he's older.

He was 25 pounds at his 18 month checkup (which was a month late) and they didn't measure him so I have no idea how long he is.

Robert is starting to talk a little more. He says dee dee (drink), hot (tot), tractor (tacktuh), fish (shhhh), dog (dot), duck (dut), Clara (Clala), giraffe (jaff), shoes (shoosh), socks (tocks), shirt (um, 'shirt' without the 'r') and we hear thank you (cah-coo) on occasion. He just started saying "cheese" for the camera and says, "uh-oh, dot" when he drops something. He no longer says "nah nah nah" at all and instead says "uh-uh" anytime you ask him a question. "Uh-uh" means yes and no so I never know what the kid wants. For everything else he just pitches a fit until you figure out what he wants or give up. I'll be pleased as punch when he learns "I'm hurting", " I'm hungry", "no, I'd rather not nap thank you", "my diaper is soiled" and "please return the car you took from me dear sister".

He can tell you what a dinosaur, lion, tiger, bear, elephant, bird, monkey, car, firetruck, and train say. A dog says "dog, dog, dog" or he just started panting when you ask him and a duck says "duck, duck, duck".

He can point out most body parts, but doesn't say any of them yet. He doesn't point out his eyes and mouth though. When you ask him where his eyes are, he flutters his eyelashes quickly and puckers his lips when you ask where his mouth is.

When he hits or bites any of us (including the dogs), he has to tell us he's sorry. He comes over, pats our head and says "ssssssss" and then gives a hug. And then usually hits again because it's a fun game. Hit, pat, hug, hit, pat, hug.

Robert has absolutely no interest in numbers or letters. He flat out refuses to repeat things when you ask him. When you ask him how old he is, he says "two". When you ask him to repeat numbers, he says "two" after every one. He does love to read though. He pulls all of his books off the shelf and just sits in the pile looking through all of them. He especially loves books about dinosaurs and cars and trucks. At bedtime, his favorites are "How Does a Dinosaur Say Goodnight?", "Goodnight Moon", and "Llama Llama Red Pajama".

His favorite toys right now are cars and trains. His absolute favorite toy that usually goes with him wherever he goes is the die cast Mini we brought him from London. He also likes his double decker bus and London taxi, his Little People school bus, Clara's pink shopping cart and that's about it. If it doesn't have wheels, he's really not interested. I take that back. He loves to pull each and every toy off of the shelf. That's great fun in his book. He also loves blankets. He doesn't have a single security blanket, but when he remembers, he pulls all of the blankets out of his drawers and carries them around the house, just snuggling them, burying his face in them and laying on the floor with them. His face just lights up when he finds one.

Robert gives the best hugs and kisses, opens doors and child-locked cabinets, loves to climb onto the kitchen table, still comes running when I open the dishwasher, is a screamer when he doesn't get his way, throws lovely fits and runs until he finds a wall to throw himself against and cry on, will not stay out of the dvd cases or tv stand cabinets, is drawn to remotes and electronics like a moth to flame, loves to eat dog food, hates people food (unless it's in the trash, then it's good eatin'), walks along behind me all day long pulling things out of their proper place and depositing them on the floor, has eaten dog poop, loves to be outside and adores tormenting his sister. In other words, I need another vacation!

He may be a ridiculous amount of work, but he's still a cutie and can melt my heart with his little smile. I feel very blessed to be his mama.