growing baby

Mateo has been saying “beautiful” a lot these days–this is a “beautiful song” etc.  My favorite was Mateo looking in the toilet and admiring the result of his endeavors: “I have a beautiful poopy.”

And speaking of beautiful, Roan is now a beautiful four months old and sits, well, almost beautifully.  He can sit on his own for a few minutes before he topples over.  What beautiful kids, if I do say so myself!

Today was Mateo’s first day at the Discovery Center (Hill and Dale’s bigger-kid branch located in a different part of town).  Mateo had a great day today–he said goodbye to Ilya easily and the teachers report that he had lots of fun (played, used the toilet, slept well for nap).  In fact, when I arrived to pick him up, he didn’t want to go home–I had to tell him that he could come again to the Discovery Center tomorrow before I managed to tear him away.

Saying goodbye to the Learning Center (Hill and Dale’s babies and toddlers branch) was harder than I realized it would be though.  While I was/am so excited to have Mateo move on to new adventures, I’d so grown to depend on Jessica and the other teachers advice and thoughts and encouragement that it was hard to let that go.  I keep reminding myself that Roan will be heading there in another year or two and that I’ll get to see the teachers at other Hill and Dale events.

Anyway, even though today was Mateo’s first day at the DC, he’d been preparing for it for a while.  For one, he’s in the third (and last) batch of kids moving from the LC to the DC this summer, so he’s seen his friends go through the process before him.  Also, three weeks before transition, Mateo and the seven other kids in his move-up group started eating lunch outside in a different area.  There they discussed, with a teacher, the Discovery Center, what it was like, who would be there, what kinds of toys they had, and so forth.  Then last week was transition week.  On Tuesday the kids went to the DC for snack (I drove four toddlers in my car–it was a total toddler party bus and they loved it!) and on Thursday they visited the DC from snack through lunch (and came out literally jumping with excitement, all of them).  Then this past Saturday all the transitioning families went to the Learning Center to say goodbye to the teachers (and toys), pick up the kids stuff from their cubbies, drive to the Discovery Center to meet the new teachers there and put all the things away in the cubbies there.  So Mateo felt really comfortable with the environment when we started today.  Let’s hope the rest of the week goes just as smoothly!

Toddler Party Bus

The kids in Mateo's Move-Up Group

Thank you, Jessica, for being a wonderful Special Friend. We miss you already!

I’ve come to the conclusion that toilet learning is truly about learning for Mateo, but it’s really about training for me.  Mateo’s doing a wonderful job of using the toilet–he’s fussing less when we call him, he’s willing to use toilets in other places–so the few times he’s had accidents this week have been more about me.  He only had three accidents this week–two were actually in the bathroom, but we dilly-dallied too much (choosing a book etc) before getting him onto the toilet; one was tonight where I got distracted by a conversation and didn’t realize poor Mateo was pooing in his pants.  So I need to train myself better–no distractions and rapido onto the pot!

But, still, we’re a good team.  And Mateo is holding up his end wonderfully.

Roan is rolling over!  He’s been making good attempts for the past several days (rolling over from his back but then getting one arm trapped under his belly), but today he freed his arm!  He’s mostly sleeping on his belly or his side now.  It’s funny that he still doesn’t like tummy time so much even though he’s happy on his belly when asleep.  I’m really glad that rolling over doesn’ t seem to be interfering too terribly with his sleep.  He is waking up a bit more, but definitely has fewer wake-ups than Mateo did when Mateo started rolling over.  So yay!  He’s also starting to wobble-sit a bit–he’s still super floppy, of course, but he can kind of wobble in a very slightly supported seating position for a minute or two.  It’ll be fun when he can really sit–I remember it being a game-changer when Mateo could sit and play with the toys in front of him.

These days Mateo loves to count.  He can count to 100 + in English and in Spanish.  He’s also getting the concept of thousands (though he can’t count up there singly.)  While Mateo likes to ask what number comes next, it’s clear that he already knows the answer.  I figured this out when he was asking what came after 59 (in English).  I gave him the answer in Spanish (sesenta), but instead of switching to Spanish, Mateo just kept on counting in English (saying sixty, sixty-one etc.).  The same happened for 70, 80, and 90–I gave him the response in Spanish but he counted in English.   Mateo loves him some numbers.  This leads to some less-than-fabulous applications (like when he is walking on a brick fence and counts each brick as he steps on it–it takes forever to go anywhere) but also some cute moments.  For instance, every night we ask Mateo what number we should count to as we brush his teeth.  Tonight Mateo said 100.  When Ilya complained that was too much, Mateo said 99.  Finally Mateo laid down the law at 98 and wouldn’t budge from there.  So he’s learned to negotiate by counting in reverse, heh heh.

Mateo had his toilet-learning conference this past Monday.  Basically that involved the site supervisor and Mateo’s teacher (or Special Friend) talking to me about toilet-learning while Mateo wandered all-around the room playing with the toys (the meeting area is in the same general space as the toy storage–it’s like taking him to a forbidden toy store).  Basically, Mateo’s school (and thus us as well) does toilet learning without prizes (no candies, stickers, or other kinds of rewards).  Instead we’re supposed to encourage Mateo to learn how to take care of his own body and take pride in his accomplishments.  As part of that Mateo undresses himself before the toilet and dresses himself back afterwards.  (We’ve slacked on this at the home front–Mateo can do it but it takes a lot longer–he can practice this at school, hee hee.)  After the toilet conference, we went to the toilet where Mateo changed into his underwear for the first time and then Mateo gave all his old diapers to one of the school’s infant teachers for the babies.

So Mateo’s been in underwear for a full week now, including naptime.  (He still wears diapers at night.)  Here are the results:

Monday (first day in underwear): three accidents at school, two accidents at home.  He actually didn’t have an accident during naptime.

Tuesday: no accidents at school, a mini-accident at home (he started peeing and then stopped).

Wednesday-Friday: no accidents at school or at home.

Saturday: one spectacular accident, peeing all over a restaurant chair and dripping a trail of pee to the bathroom.  Why on earth did we take him to a restaurant?  I blame a hunger-and-baby-brain toxic mixture for bad decision making on our part.  That plus we were lulled by a false sense of security since he peed in the toilet right before we left for lunch and he’d been accident free for three days.  Poor guy started crying as soon as he started peeing in his chair.  We calmed him down in the restaurant bathroom by showing him the mural they’d drawn on the wall.  And at least we’d had the foresight to bring along extra clothes/underwear.  (Should have brought extra shoes too, oops.  His crocs were full of pee–thank goodness they’re plastic and totally washable.)

Sunday: we stayed home ALL day.  No accidents.

Pretty darn good, huh?!  He has also been totally dry during naptimes even at home where he often naps for about three hours.  Mateo, my dear, you are learning how to take care of your body beautifully!

Roan slept straight through from shortly after 8 pm to 5:45 am last night!  That’s right, no wake-ups for feeding for 9.5 hours! And then he slept a few more hours until 8 am!  Hallelujah!  It’s time to dance around like a crazy person!  And then it’s time to write my book proposal with a happily refreshed mind.

Happy three-month-day, Roan!

Lots of new stuff happening with the kiddos.  Mateo’s teachers told us that he’s ready to go on to the Pre-K program instead of staying another year in the toddler program, so Mateo will be transitioning to the new school in August (still Hill and Dale, but in a different location).  We think it’s a good thing–most of his friends are moving forward, so even though Mateo will be the youngest there, he’ll be able to stay with the kids he plays with most.  Also, Mateo wants to go–he’d been asking when he’d get to go to the new school too.  In preparation, Mateo will need to be potty-trained (or toilet-learned as his daycare program says)–we’ll keep you updated on how that goes.  Also, Mateo went on his new balance bike for the first time yesterday!  He straddled it and walked with it.  Soon, we’ll teach him how to sit on it and walk–and then he’ll be running with it and cruising in no time!  (Or so we hope!)

Roan’s also been growing!  He’s already twice his birth weight at approximately fifteen pounds.  He’s outgrown his bassinet, so we converted it into a playpen and put it into Mateo’s room.  Ilya also dissassembled the crib and reassembled it in our room (it wouldn’t fit out of Mateo’s doorway otherwise).  The Hill and Dale teachers said we should keep Roan in our room until he could sleep through the night–that way we don’t disrupt Mateo’s sleep.  Also, Roan’s started drinking from the bottle!  It was a battle at first, but the Hill and Dale infant master teacher was sweet enough to give tips and she Roan the first bottle he didn’t scream at–in fact he took to the bottle as if he’d always loved it when she offered it (I guess 25 years of experience teaching in the infant room and raising more than 300 babies really helps!).  (Roan’s not at Hill and Dale, but the daycare teachers have been wonderful about answering questions about his care as well.)  Roan’s also started rolling to his side and now that’s his new favorite position to sleep in.  In fact, he’s become quite the wiggle worm, rotating to all different corners of his crib as he sleeps.  Also new: Roan’s been holding on to my thumb as he breastfeeds and he’s got a good grip!  I’ve been trying to substitute his elephant lovie’s nose instead of my thumb while I’m feeding him, though, that way he learns to associate the elephant with comfort.

Mateo just told me I love you for the first time!  (It only took a few weeks after he said “I love you, Nemo.”)  We were in his bed as he was getting ready for nap and Mateo turned to me with a hug and said, I love you!  So sweet!

Mateo’s also been doing some very unique translating these days: he’s started taking words in one language and translating them to another, but with funny results.  For example, the Russian word for spicy also means sharp, so Mateo said that something sharp was “picante” (spicy in Spanish); Mateo also took the Spanish word for “to crawl” (gatear, which sounds kind of like gato–spanish for cat) and then tried to ask me to crawl to him by saying “mama cat here.”

Roan’s also growing quite strong.  He’s turning to his side and can rotate a full 90 degrees while he’s on his back or his tummy.  He’s got some strong legs, that one!

Mateo reading.

[qik]http://qik.com/video/41608723[/qik]

Roan is two months old today and he celebrated with a trip to the pediatrician and three vaccines!  Oh the joys of babyhood.  Today Roan weighed in at 12.5 pounds (jumping from the 25th percentile at his one month appointment to the 70th percentile today) so he gained a bit more than a pound/week last month–given how much he eats, I can’t say I’m surprised.  He’s also now 22.5 inches long (remaining steadily in the 50th percentile) with a 38 centimeter head circumference (I think that’s on the smaller end–10th percentile?–but staying on track from last time as well).  Most importantly he’s a healthy pie–lungs, eyes, hips, and “the goods” (as the doctor says) all look just as they should.

Happy second monthday, Roan!