David, Week 7

I think I'm on week 7...

David's had an up and down week. He's asking now very specifically for which pajamas he wants to wear to bed each night. Sometimes it's the syaurs (dinosaurs), which are various shades of green, and other times it's spom-bob (sponge bob)...if he doesn't volunteer anything, I put him in the white ones with little wrenches and screw drivers...he likes those, too.

Wednesday night was a difficult and scary night. He had a terrible cough that wouldn't stop no matter what I did: gave him cough medicine, which usually does the trick, didn't work. I put the vaporizer on in his room with the Vicks camphor in the water, and he finally quit coughing after midnight. He went down without much fuss, interestingly. But then coughed and coughed and coughed...so I gave him a nebulizer, which did help a bit, because it slowed his fits down some, and made them less dry. I called Amanda about this, and she gave me some tips on dealing with it. I wasn't sure if I needed to take him to the emergency night pediatrician...but it proved not necessary.

The whole potty training thing has me perplexed. I ask him if he wants to go potty, but he rather than just saying no, or ignoring me, he screams NO PO-YEE! I don't know why it's such a bad thing...I've figured out his rhythm, but getting him to go is the hard part.

Last Sunday he did something very funny. I sometimes try to imitate things he says which are unclear. Sometimes I understand by doing this, and other times, I'm still clueless...so anyway, I get frustrated once in a while and just say total blather at him, and he got upset at me and blathered back. I wish I could repeat this in a way that you can hear, because it doesn't work in print...I also took him to the store and on the way he points out every truck he sees, and because there are a lot of them, he was repeating over and over...so I just said trucktrucktrucktruck...and so now he sees a truck and says guckguckguck! He still doesn't produce consonant blends, which is why they are gucks...He's really imitating many many things. FOR EXAMPLE: he got some great cards for Valentine's day (from Frank, Nancy, and Marissa) with one a dog, and the other a cat, and the lips were chocolate. I kissed the lips of the cards, just to try to get him to do it...and now he just wants me to kiss the cards, and he won't. So I put them away. He loved the chocolate though. Love it loved it!

And every night when we get home, he wants to blow bubbles...he whispers at me, like we're in church: bow bubbos...

Last Saturday I cooked some pizza in the oven. He's figured out that it's okay if it's hot, as long as it's not too hot! But he was so much wanting a piece of pizza that he was confused about waiting for it to be cool enough, or eat it too hot. It was something to see!

And David has a new baby sitter. Her name is Rhiannon, she's 14...I spent some time with her at her house, talked to her father, let David wander around her house...she has a brother and sister who are 8 and 6, I think, so she's had some experience with younger kids...David likes her, which is good. She can either keep him there, or here at my house...by the way, David knows that this is my house, and his house, but "our" house is still foreign to him...David asked me to take a walk with him, but instead I had him walk with her, and says to me, "BYE!" as he leaves. I like her better than the girl that lives across the street, because Lexi, the girl across the street, tends to hide things, and doesn't strike me as trustworthy, though we did leave David and Colleen with her...but David can't report things to me the way that Colleen could. Rhiannon's dad is better about making rules, and keeping up with her, which makes me feel better. She's also more down-to-earth, too.

Tonight David had me get the vaccuum cleaner out of the closet and do the floors...not sure at all what prompted that. I think that some kind of alarm went off in his head...

Finally, our walks to Dot's house are turning into me carrying him everywhere...I guess it still works out, because I'm still walking, and running...with an extra 30 pounds in my arms. David still points out the cars, trucks, and school busses that go by. He likes playing the "up down" game, where he directs me either up off the road, or down in the road. He thinks it's great fun.

I'm beginning to have to limit the books that he reads before laying down, because he will want to read all 6 of them, since they are there. And of course, this takes 30 minutes or more, because he wants to play during and between books...I realized that this wasn't good bonding, because he's just keeping awake, not sleeping, keeping me in there...