What Does a Mama Do?

Posted on May 2, 2009 by steph

Caleb has loved playing house with his Little People house and car lately. It has a dad, a mom, and a baby. He keeps them very busy. They all use the potty and then take a bath afterwards. The baby goes night-night frequently. And then he loads them all in the car and drives him to our door that leads to the garage. When I ask where they are going he exclaims, “Grandpa! [horse noise]”
Today he was holding the mom doll when I was changing him for bed. I asked him, “What does a mama do?” After his first response, I continued asking him, “What else does a mama do?” Here are his responses, in order:
“Kiss!” (then proceeded to kiss the doll many many times)
“Hug!” (hugged the doll)
“Baby eat.” (give food to the baby)
“Baby drink.” (give a drink to the baby)
“Book.” (read books)
“Kiss hand.” (he had a splinter in his hand recently and I kissed it frequently.)
This is the stuff that warms a mama’s heart.

Caleb Goes to the Emergency Room

Posted on April 1, 2009 by steph

On Monday, Caleb and are were hanging out eating breakfast. He started showing symptoms of a cold on Sunday afternoon, but nothing past your runny nose and being tired. At night he started coughing. And, by our Monday morning breakfast time, he started showing signs of being worse. He started coughing a “barky” cough while clutching his neck and crying. Then, he started wheezing and I wondered if he had something lodged in his throat. I checked and he didn’t. He kept asking to nurse, but when I would try to nurse him he’d grab his throat and cry and say, “No, no.” So, I’d stop, and he’d ask to nurse again. The wheezing got worse, so I called the doctor.
There were no regular appointments left, so I took him to urgent care. The triage nurse checked his vitals and he had a slight temperature, but his oxygen levels were too low. He was still wheezing and coughing the “barky” cough. The nurse decided to send us to emergency, so we went there. His oxygen levels were checked again and they were still too low.
The doctor came in and ran some tests, then heard his cough and diagnosed Caleb with croup. The wheezing and low oxygen was due to narrowed airways. He was given a steroid, and within a couple of minutes was breathing normally and his oxygen levels returned to normal. They discharged us with some home care instructions.
Since then, he hasn’t shown a scare like that one, although he is still fighting this cold. He seems much better this evening. I think I caught his cold too, but it’s not effecting me as much as it has him. Also, I turn into obsessive hand-washing home-disinfecting lady when stuff like this goes down. So, hopefully Josh won’t get sick.
I also learned fascinating things about how Tylenol Cold is like cocaine for babies, and that I should never give it to my children unless directed by a doctor. The doctor gave me a nice lesson on it’s use (and seemed pretty bitter that it is still being sold over-the-counter). So, at least I had some mommy-building knowledge going on while in the ER. Pondering the profit-making of over-the-counter drugs helped me to stay strong so I could better support Caleb while there (instead of turning into a crazy, worried, emotional basketcase of a woman).

Drawings for Caleb

Posted on March 24, 2009 by steph

I like to set up little art activities before I go to bed so that when Caleb wakes up in the morning he wanders over to his little table and engages in the activity. One of my favorites is to do drawings in sharpie on paper that I then tape down to his drawing board.
For the record, I strongly suggest that you use drawing boards with kids. They make the paper more stable and less likely to rip. Oh, and you can move the drawing board around the house or outside easily. I’ll tape several different things down including blank paper, pages from coloring books, magazine prints, etc.
This drawing is of Daddy, Grandpa, and Ella. When he came out to this, he kept shouting, “Grandpa! Dada! Ella!” as he worked. Here I let him “paint” with water. Later he added crayon and then some watercolor paint. To finish, we cut out pictures from an old magazine and Caleb taped them on the paper where he wanted them. We finished it with some tempera paint. This whole process takes about a week and I love that he gets to see something slowly progress into something bigger.
I’m trying to think of some good ways to display his finished artworks. Currently they go on the fridge or on the surfboard clips in his bedroom. I’m thinking up some ideas using old picture frames and clips that I think could be cool, but I’m not in a hurry. Maybe I’ll get inspired to that end this summer!

Take That, Ella!

Posted on February 1, 2009 by steph

Caleb and Ella, our miniature dachshund, are best buds. They are pretty much always by each other. They play fetch with Ella’s toys, he gives her dog treats, she comes when he calls her (sometimes), they sit by each other and cuddle under a blanket when we’re on the couch together. Sometimes Caleb will even go inside of Ella’s kennel (“Her kennel, where she goes night night.”) and shout, “Woof! Woof! Ella! Ella! Woof!”
Once the weather got really cold, I had to re-potty train Ella. She was like, “I’m not going out there!” and would go hide under blankets until her bladder was about to explode and she’d go somewhere out of sight from me. So, I was watching her very closely, looking for signs that she had to go outside, re-teaching her how to show me that she had to go outside, catching her doing the naughty in my house, and praising her when she got it right.
Okay, enough with the lead up exposition and on with the main story.
I was changing Caleb’s diaper and I saw Ella slink off into our bedroom. I could tell by her slinking that she was going to go to the bathroom. So, I set Caleb down on the floor (naked at this point) and went into my room where Ella was in the middle of peeing on my bed(!). I scolded Ella and put her outside, only to realize that Caleb was gone. So, I ran around looking for him and finally found him sitting, naked, in Ella’s kennel. And you know what he was doing? Peeing.
Take that, Ella.

Caleb is Funny

Posted on December 18, 2008 by steph

I love seeing Caleb’s sense of humor develop. Though he’s always loved to laugh, I can see him starting to find humor in more things and he is even trying to make his own jokes. His early humor was physical, he loved being tickled, kicking his legs, swinging around, and anything else that was very motor oriented.
Toward the end of summer, he started finding humor in things like hiding under a blanket or in the closet and laughing like crazy when we finally found him. He also put a hat on Ella and thought that was very funny.
About a week ago, I was reading him The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats (a fantastic book). There is a part where the boy hits a snow-covered tree with a stick, causing snow to fall on his head. I signed to Caleb and pointed to the picture, “SNOW fell on his HEAD!” He burst out laughing. He kept turning back to the page and signing that snow fell on his head, and then he’d fall over and laugh and laugh. Later in the day, I would say, “Snow fell on his head!” Caleb would sign “head” and laugh some more.
Today, Josh and I finishing dinner, Caleb decided to start a little sideshow to entertain us. He was attempting to throw a can in the garbage can for awhile. Then, he made the sign for “eat” and then pointed to the wall. He immediately started snickering so hard he had to cover his mouth. Josh said, “Eat the wall??? That’s silly!” And that unleashed Caleb’s laughter. Eat the wall indeed.
I can’t wait to hear more of his jokes. What a happy little boy!

What Does a Bunny Rabbit Say?

Posted on December 8, 2008 by steph

I literally spat cereal out of my mouth today because Caleb was so funny. I tried getting it on video (he did repeat himself), but I can’t find where my Flip ended up after our trip to Branson. Hmmmm…
Anyway, this is what happened. We were looking at the Noah’s Ark snow globe and making all of the animal sounds. I have been trying to teach him that a bunny wiggles it’s nose instead of making a noise (the only rabbit noise I’ve ever heard is it’s death cry and I’m not about to teach that one to my kid).
So, I said, “Caleb, what does a bunny rabbit say?”
He looked at me, shoved his finger far up into his left nostril, then exhaled through his nose, causing a HUGE snot bubble to form from his right nostril (we’re talking golf ball here). He held the pose and grinned.
And then I spat out the cereal, which I think he took as encouragement… Oh, the wonderful joys of parenthood!

Fiction for Geek Children

Posted on November 17, 2008 by steph

Or should I say, “Literature for the children of geeks?”
Recently, I was looking over Caleb’s Wish List with Josh and asked him his opinions on books or other Christmas gifts that would be good for Caleb at this point in his life. He couldn’t really think of anything so I asked, “Well, what are the children of geeks reading these days?”
Initially, nothing came to mind. Then, he said his buddy gosnat had suggested the book Ping, a book about a duck crossing a river. And it’s geeky because it’s about pinging.
That being said, we laughed heartily at one of the customer reviews of the book left by John E. Francisco. This was our favorite part (which explains the book and is also hilarious):

Using deft allegory, the authors have provided an insightful and intuitive explanation of one of Unix’s most venerable networking utilities. Even more stunning is that they were clearly working with a very early beta of the program, as their book first appeared in 1933, years (decades!) before the operating system and network infrastructure were finalized.
The book describes networking in terms even a child could understand, choosing to anthropomorphize the underlying packet structure. The ping packet is described as a duck, who, with other packets (more ducks), spends a certain period of time on the host machine (the wise-eyed boat). At the same time each day (I suspect this is scheduled under cron), the little packets (ducks) exit the host (boat) by way of a bridge (a bridge). From the bridge, the packets travel onto the internet (here embodied by the Yangtze River).
The title character — er, packet, is called Ping. Ping meanders around the river before being received by another host (another boat). He spends a brief time on the other boat, but eventually returns to his original host machine (the wise-eyed boat) somewhat the worse for wear.
If you need a good, high-level overview of the ping utility, this is the book. I can’t recommend it for most managers, as the technical aspects may be too overwhelming and the basic concepts too daunting.

Moving on, we felt sad that the great, vast, and powerful geek community had no children’s books that we could think of besides this one (which, by the way, was published in 1933. Seriously. If that’s not total hardcore old school 1337, I don’t know what is).
I continued by googling “books for geek children,” and the search engine immediately asked me, “Did you mean: books for greek children”? We also found this to be hilarious. And sad. It was both hilarious and sad.
We did find a few notable things. The first being the Geek Parenting site, which listed 10 Superhero Comic Books your Kids should be Reading. Most of these were Marvel comics (Fantastic Four, Hulk, Spider Man, etc.). Some could say that comic books are more on the “nerd” side of the line than the “geek” side, and I know there are lots of people who straddle the line quite gracefully, but I’m not here to hold the nerd vs. geek debate. (Note the funny conversation between daughter & father on the Geek Parenting site — Daughter: “Daddy, what’s a multiverse?” Dad: “It’s a plot device for lazy writers.” LOLZ.)
Back to my conversation with Josh. We recognized that many geeks are totally into comic books and that they are a fantastic genre. But, in this case we were instead looking for books that taught about geek topics of interest like net neutrality, digital privacy, digital rights management, intellectual property rights in the digital age, topics considered by the Electronic Frontier Foundation… you get the idea.
(Sidenote: We then stumbled upon a link to the still-funny Children’s Books that Didn’t Make It. We came up with a few of our own and enjoyed the general hilarity of it all. But that is a huge digression from the topic at hand.)
In the end, our search was mostly fruitless and disappointing. With so many great and interesting topics swirling around the geek community these days, there has got to be something that our children could enjoy right along with us. The wheels are turning. I’m not promising anything, but the wheels are turning. So far there is a boy and a bird….

Back to Cloth

Posted on November 10, 2008 by steph

Well, today marks our transition from disposable diapers back to cloth. We initially started with a mix of disposable & cloth, but decided to go to all disposable because of the whole move across the country, live with my parents, search for a house, buy a house, move again thing. Now that we’re nice and settled, I figured I’d switch back.
I’m using cloth diapers with the Bummis covers. We have both the Super Brites and the Super Whisper Wraps. They worked great for us before and I’m hoping they’ll work great again this time.
I will be using my front-load high-efficiency washer (which has a special setting just for diapers!) to wash them myself instead of doing a diaper service (I don’t even think they’d do that in the boonies where I live!). I think it should go pretty smoothly, but we’ll see!
Before the change back to cloth, Caleb had started notifying me when he needed a new diaper, usually by going into his room and getting a clean diaper out of the cabinet. I think this communication will make it easier on him to use cloth since he can tell me when he’s wet.

Houdweebie

Posted on November 6, 2008 by steph

Josh’s parents have often spoken of Josh’s childhood in terms of “Houdweebie” stories. They are basically odd things that Josh would do to escape situations and pretty much just be the weird kid that he was.
Here is a recording (from Josh and Kevin‘s college radio show Mission Control) of Josh’s mom sharing some Houdweebie stories about Josh:

Well, I think those wonderful genes have been passed down to Caleb.
First, Caleb has escaped the church nursery (out the first gate only) twice. TWICE. How many other babies have I known that have escaped even once? None. I haven’t even seen another child consider it. But, Caleb has learned to sit very very quietly near the gate (while feigning interest in a toy) and pay close attention to adult movement. When he sees an adult reach for the gate, he quickly slips in step behind them. Luckily, the second gate is not as easy to get out of, and he has just cried and banged on it, which alerts people that he escaped (again) so they can put him back in the nursery.
I have since had people in the nursery, upon finding that I was Caleb’s mom, say, “Oh, he’s the escape artist.” Indeed. He’s our Houdweebie.
On a similar note, although not a story of escape, we have found that Caleb has also developed excellent slight of hand skills. In the nursery at our church, babies are labeled on the back so we know who they are and if they have any special needs. So, every baby has a name tag, and some babies have special instructions (usually “diaper rash,” “spits up,” etc.). Recently, while I was working in the nursery while Caleb was in there, another volunteer pointed to an unidentified child and said, “Who is that baby?” It was at this point in time that we realized that not just that one, but FIVE babies did not have nametags on their backs to identify them. This baffled us since all of these babies had nametags when they came in.
Well, I didn’t have to look any further than my own son, sitting quietly in the corner playing with five sticky nametags. Though we were all playing with the babies, none of us noticed Caleb’s little collection spree.
The next time I picked Caleb up in the nursery, besides having his own name stuck to his back, he had another identifier “Escapes. Steals nametags.”
So, already at 14 months of age, Caleb has begun racking up his own Houdweebie stories. But, now he’s going to have to up the ante because we’re all on to him. I hope his next attempts include something cool like a top hat and a small flock of doves.

My Little Lion

Posted on November 3, 2008 by steph

Caleb’s Lion Costume 19, originally uploaded by StephLewis.

Caleb was a Lion for Halloween this year. I made this costume for him out of fleece and ribbon. I made it a little big (with room to let out) so that he can still play in it over the next couple of years. He loved being a lion and even got the hang of roar-ing towards the end.

First we went to Grandpa & Grandma Whiting’s house and trick-or-treated there. They loved how cute he was with his little tail. Then we went to visit the Peterson & Lewis families in White Bear Lake. We trick-or-treated with Elise (a clown) and Maia (Robin Hood). Andrew & Karina (superman & wonderwoman) joined us for the first house, but then stayed back because we party to hard for them. So, Jon & Emily and Grandpa & Grandma Lewis all came with us trick-or-treating.

Caleb was confused at first until one of the houses had a dog. He was excited and stood at the door looking at their dog. I think after that he thought trick-or-treating was so we could look for dogs in other peoples’ houses. Once he realized a house didn’t have a dog, he seemed disinterested. If a house had a dog, he would get excited and stand at the door bouncing up and down. (Note: I think I would actually prefer Halloween if we went from house to house admiring other peoples’ pets. It would be way better than candy.)

When we were finished trick-or-treating, we went to Trinity Baptist where we played some games. Caleb enjoyed jumping in the giant inflatable dog, and also spent quite a bit of time pointing at the giant inflatable dog making “woof” sounds.

All in all, we had a fun night out!

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