News & Notes

There's probably a bunch of stuff I've neglected to mention while I've been talking about my solo weekend, September 11th, and the change of seasons...so here goes...

- Jacob had his (belated) two-year well visit back in late August, and he clocked in at 33.4 pounds and 38-1/2 inches tall.  He's right around the 50th percentile on both counts.  His weight has ticked up steadily but he's still pretty skinny.  But wow, has he gotten taller.  I tried on the last handful of pants from what he was wearing last spring, and holy cow were they short.  Like, an inch above his ankle.  And that's without the extra bulk of a diaper.  Between hand-me-downs, sale purchases a while back, and a few purchases today, I think we'll be ok on pants as long as I can match shirts to the potty-friendly windpants and sweatpants.  Jeans are usually my default because they look cool with anything.  We'll see.

- Potty training is still so-so.  We're not even close on nighttime, and even naps are a stretch, but during the day we're doing okay.  Not great, but okay.  Most of the time he comes home dry, but once in a while we'll have a bag of wet undies.  It's rare to have a hardcore accident, but wet spots on the front of his undies are pretty common.  He catches himself, but sometimes not soon enough.  Fortunately we're still utilizing the plastic pants, so the wet spot doesn't mean the pants are done...but at least he feels the wetness.  We try to keep him going potty when we can, and if we do, he's fine.  It's when he gets caught up in playing that it doesn't go well.  Oh, and we have the challenge of ill-timed pottying--dinnertime, after bedtime, etc.  One of these days...

-  Last Saturday we went mini-golfing at our local course for the second time this summer.  We had a lot of fun, and once again Jacob had a couple holes in one and beat us on a couple holes.  He had one hole in one that I sort of missed (I'm obsessed with taking pictures of cool flowers, what can I say?), but it was apparently an amazing shot...over one obstacle, banked off the back of the metal boundary, and into a hole on a slope.  Awesome.  He did well, and we even had a couple that got us $5 worth of tokens in the arcade, so that was fun, too.  It got a little dark to take great pictures, but I like this one...

As you can see, we have extra obstacles to deal with!

- Friday morning we went to Jacob's first dentist appointment.  I tried to psyche him up for it by explaining that he had to open his mouth wide and sit in a cool chair.  When we got there he wasn't too sure about the chair.  He quietly refused to get into it, so I had to get into it and let him sit on me.  Unfortunately, that meant I couldn't take a picture of him.  Boo.  After that, he did great.  He talked to the dentist, opened wide, and laid still.  He did great through the whole thing, even the tooth polishing, which I thought might have freaked him out...not just because of the noise the tool makes, but also because they use the water squirter and saliva sucker to rinse, instead of having him rinse and spit.  He did great....until they whipped out his new toothbrush to brush on the fluoride (in the form of foam).  He absolutely refused to sit still or open his mouth, and ended up screaming bloody murder for about 20 seconds.  Ugh.  He had a hard time picking out a prize (we ended up with a superball--shocker) and wouldn't stand still for a post-visit picture with his goodie bag.  This was the best I got:

He wouldn't stand in front of the dentist sign. 

He got a clean bill of health, though, and the freebie toothbrushes are much better nowadays than they were in my day.  His has a clear handle with fish in it!

- We're still having a hard time with Jacob's defiance.  He is constantly distracted, constantly saying "no", constantly doing whatever it is that he shouldn't.  He's still not getting that when you finish going to the bathroom, the next steps should always be to pull up your pants and wash your hands.  Nor does he put his pants on the right way...ever.  Backwards every time, no matter how many hundreds of times we go over it.  However...amidst all of the defiance, I know there's a good kid in there somewhere...as evidenced by a day like today, which I'll blog more about soon.  I know he's not going to be a perfect angel, but days like today totally confirm that there's a difference between normal frustrating behavior and infuriating behavior.  And luckily we got the normal stuff today, totally manageable enough to let the fun shine through.  And a lot of times there just isn't enough fun because his behavior makes it impossible.  But today was good.  Even the non-fun stuff was good, and it reminds me that it is possible to enjoy spending time with my child.  No, I shouldn't need a reminder, but sometimes I do.  It's that hard some days.  I always love him, but it's hard to willingly put yourself in the position to be yelling constantly.  Still, good to know it can be good.  It gives me hope.

Have a nice weekend, everyone...