Goober Day

I know, it's been quite some time since I have last updated. I really thought I was done for awhile, but now I have to share! Who knows, I could be on to something again!

J has had a rough couple days, first being sick all day on Sunday and then a complete grumpus the past two days. He certainly made up for it with all the things that made me laugh until the tears flowed.

*Me: Jules, what do you want for Lunch:
  J: No! The name's Julian!
  Me: You mean 'My name is Julian'
  J: Yea, OK.

*While supposed to be taking a nap, I see him (via video monitor) put his elmo doll on his bed and hear the following:
     "Elmo, you may sit in time out now. Wait for timer." *Moment of Silence* "You ready to listen to Julian, Elmo? Yea? Ok, give me a hug. I love you"

*Still while supposed to be napping, I see his face looking right into the camera of the video monitor and hear the following:
     "Hiiiiii! Mommy, I all done. I had nice nap! Goodmorning! I need kiss, please."

*Needless to say no nap, and I just couldn't resist going in to get kisses. We headed to Target and his favorite type of cart was nowhere to be found, so foolish me let him walk. We walked by the bras and Julian stopped and began rubbing the cups on one particularly large bra.
   -J: Mommy, what's that?
   -Me: It's a bra.
   -J: I like that! Soft!

While I failed, yet again, to find plastic training pants, he began playing with each and every toy in the aisle across from us. The following conversation took place:
    -Me: J, Mommy needs to go pay now.
    -J: *Waves* OK! Bye! I love you. *Blows Kiss*
    -Me: *Start walking in hopes he will follow*
    -J: Be careful, Mommy! *Turns to toys and continutes to play.*

*At checkout (finally!), J pulls out a little shelf thing near the conveyer belt.
    -J: What's that?
    -Me: The time out chair at Target
    -Man in line: Uh-oh, you better be good
    -J: *Holds up one finger* You be good too, k?

I believe J has officially inherited the humor of both his Daddy and his Grandpa.

No MacGyver Here.

I'm sad to say, it's true.  J. gave me an ultimate MacGyver test today, and I failed, resulting in me having to jump out a window. It all sounds so brave and exciting, I know.  Sadly, it was simply just a frustrating pain in the rear. Read on...

Setting up the toddler bed ten months ago resulted in the brilliant idea to turn J's doorknob around so that it locked from the outside. This was necessary for two reasons: 1. He often fights naptime and tries to escape and 2. I fear that he will become a sleepwalker just as I was when I was younger. In the beginning, I was smart to put one of the door keys on the inside of his room in the event he ever tried to lock us in. I applauded my geniousness about a month ago when he did just that. Locked his door and closed it on my while I was vacuuming his room. Unfortunately, I must not have put the key back, because when he turned the lock, came inside and slammed the door today, locking both of us and the dog in his room today, I couldn't find the key. I tried to use his animal flash cards to free the latch, I bent a hanger to try to turn the lock, but my MacGyver instincts just aren't there. (I'm sure all MacGyver would have needed was a piece of chewing gum and a match). My only hope was to jump the window and go across the street to C's house to get our house keys (since of course all my doors were locked) and let ourselves back in. Two problems: I couldn't tell if C. was home and I couldn't get the screen out of the window. After 10 minutes of committed effort, I finally freed us and to my great relief, C was home. We jumped the window (which is really two feet from the ground), got C's extra key to our house, and we were back in.

Honestly, who gets locked IN their own house!? Lesson learned, the key is back inside J's room.

No Respect!

My Dad has had Multiple Sclerosis as long as I can remember. He may have even been diagnosed before I was born, but I honestly don't know. He is the most amazing man I have ever known.  He has been the best father four girls could ask for, he is always available to talk to or vent to, and he is the funniest person I have ever come across. On top of all that amazingness, despite his diablity he works hard (too hard at times). He works hard at his job, hard in his gardens and bird houses, hard to keep his children and grandchildren happy. I guess we can just say he works hard at everything he does.

For love and honor of our country, in honor and love of his two son inlaws who served in Iraq and now Afghanistan, he has spent money, time and energy to fly an American flag at the center of his town. He gets up at dawn everyday and walks across the street to raise the flag (that he bought) on the pully and rope system (that he bought) and every day at dusk, he walks across the street again to lower it and take it in for the evening. He makes sure that it is always lit properly, he makes sure it is not flown in inclement weather, and he always puts it at half staff when it is called for.

It is all so honorable and respectful. But now onto the reasoning behind the title of the blog "No Respect!"

This weekend, my Dad went away to Massachusetts to train with a new service dog; a great dane named Georgia. Now, my Dad loves home, loves Maine, so when he has to leave to go out of town for a week he is always a little hesitant.  Of course, his new companion was worth all the trouble. He was so happy to be back in town with his 140 pound pup yesterday and he couldn't stop bragging about her. I couldn't get a word in edgewise on the phone yesterday, so you can understand my surprise when he called this morning saying "I'm so pissed! So pissed it brings a tear to my eye!"

He had high hopes of someone taking care of the flag while he was away, but when he walked across the street with Georgia to show her the daily routine, he learned that someone cut the rope and stole the flag!

Of all the pranks my father pulled as a child, of all the pranks my sisters and I pulled as kids, something like this would have never crossed our minds. It is the most disrespectful prank I can think of.  Was the thief proud enough to tell his friends, his uncles, his father what he did? Probably not, because it's guaranteed at least one of them is a veteran. So, why? What kind of attention were you expecting to get from this?

A was going to fly a flag in Afghanistan for him and send it home for him to fly in town. You can guarantee that town will never see that flag. The newspaper, columnists, and congress will certainly be seeing some strongly worded letters from a man who did nothing but the respectful and honorable thing for his town and country.

It's the little things...

It's almost September! Before it's even here, I know it is my favorite month (so far) this year!  A. will be home very soon, the countdown is almost in single digits.

Of course I look forward to the obvious things:

*Seeing his face.
*Hugging and kissing him.
*Seeing him with J.
*Seeing J with him.

...and the big things:

*Our vacation to OBX.
*At least one date night.
*A barbecue with friends.
*Not dealing with the dog.

...but it's the little things that I really miss and look forward to:

*Holding his hand in the car.
*Doing his laundry. (Gasp, it's true. I can't wait).
*Peeing with the bathroom door closed and a two year old on the other side of it.
*Showering without worrying what J. is doing.
*Showering without J. stripping down and jumping in.
*Testing my new recipes on him.
*Watching football together.
*Trading off bedtime duties.
*Eating without a sticky fork.
*Fighting over whether the sheets stay tucked in or untucked.
*Help keeping J. seated in a grocery store cart.

...and as soon as we get comfortable, it will be time for him to leave again. I, however, refuse to focus on that just yet. He will be in my arms soon, he will hold and play with his baby in no time, and that's all that matters for now.

Toddler Monitor

I don't know if it is normal to still have a monitor in your toddler's room, with the receiver right next to your ear at night, but I still deem it necessary. I am a heavy sleeper. I haven't always been, but college taught me to learn to sleep through drunken parties in the floors above and below you, drunken giggling girls outside your window, admittedly my own occasional drunkeness-see a theme here? Not to mention intense heat and cold spells due to the lack of air conditioning and lack of control over our dorm room temperatures. You would think nursing J in the middle of the night might have helped my heavy sleep habit, but my theory is, I am now catching up on that severe lack of sleep he earned me. I need a monitor. I would never hear him wake in the middle of the night crying for us, I would never know if he vomited in his bed due to a nasty bug (gross I know, but it has happened, more than once), I wouldn't hear him when he woke in the morning, ready to start his busy day.

Friends of ours passed on their video monitor to us and it was amazing. I never thought I would need one until I had one. And then it gave out on us, resulting in me resorting back to the $20.00 fisher price monitor we had originally purchased. And now that has given out on us.  I have to give it credit though, that $20.00 piece of plastic was good to us for two years. Now that I am (was) in the market for a new one, I hesitantly went for the investment. I went back to my old ways, I went with a new video monitor, and of course, I went for the handheld upgrade. 

And A, before you have a what in the world was she thinking moment, hear me out: I like to think of it as an investment.  We plan to have another child one day and with this particular model you can purchase a second camera for the second room.  Not only is it worth my piece of mind, I can also tell when J is pulling every single book off his bookshelf or better yet, pulling his poopy diaper off and trying to change himself instead of napping.  The only question remains is...how do I keep his destructive hands off of the camera and the handset? If only it had some sort of a minor electrical shock barrier surrounding it...

Kidding....

Bottle Weaning

I have been debating whether or not to wean J from his bottle of milk since the day A left for Afghanistan...8 months ago.  The fact is, I can only fight so many battles, and this has just been one I have chosen not to fight. I was embarrassed at his 2 year well baby checkup to admit that he was still taking a bottle when he wakes up, before nap, and before bed. To my great surprise, his doctor (the one I love!) told me not to worry about it-as long as I was brushing his teeth after his bottle (which I am), then it's not worth the fight until Daddy comes home. On top of that, he goes to the dentist every 6 months for a cleaning, has beautiful, straight teeth, and if you've ever heard him speak, you know very well it is not affecting his verbal development or speech.

Lately however, I have had more and more of an urge to take it away from him, mainly because of pressures from other parents and the occasional dirty look I get for the rare times I give in and hand him a bottle in public (we all get desperate in the lines of wal-mart). I did some research today on the best ways to wean (and surprisingly, found a lot of "don't do it" comments). I ignored the comments, put my research together, came up with a game plan and hesitantly started wrapping my mind around the fact that this plan was going into action beginning at bedtime sharp.

And right when semi-panic began to sink in, my second voice called. KR is the closest thing I have to a sister in the south (and thankfully she is moving back here on Friday!) Sure, I have great friends down here, even best friends, but KR is different. She and her family are part of our family (we even named J after her husband) and I listen to my family. KR is nothing less than straight forward, to the point, and always tells it like it is. (My real sister D, who has never even met KR, has even said on more than one occasion "I need a KR in my life"). Anyway, KR told me what I needed to hear, from a mother's point of view, told to a sister. Don't take it from him, not now. At least wait until Daddy goes back after R&R (and he's settled and comfortable again). She reminded me that we are going to need a night out while he is hear (read: babysitter), J will need all forms of comfort right after Daddy leaves again, and frankly, it's ok to be selfish.

So that's it. It's not happening yet. It may sound like yet another excuse not to do it, but try your hardest not to judge me. And if you're going to, bite your tongue, because KR will be back in town this weekend, and you do not want to upset me while KR (or any of my sisters!) is around! She's a bit protective, and for that, we love her :)

Besides, who can say no to a face like this?

(Don't know why I can't get this pic to turn, but he's still so sweet. You get the idea).

Sucker

Life in this home has recently revolved around the vacuum. Julian is obsessed, addicted, whatever you want to call it, to our vacuum. This is great, in theory. But when tested, it turns out that his two and a half foot frame (75th percentile and all) just can't handle the height of the vacuum and his eensy weensy muscles can't handle much of the weight, leaving the vacuuming up to me. I don't mind doing it, but when he literally walks from his bed to the broom closet to get the vacuum out every single morning it becomes a little excessive.

After a little research, I found the perfect vacuum for him and due to his "commitment" to vacuuming, I felt like it was the best option for our little problem. The vacuum is identical to ours and it even sucks up a piece of dirt here or there. I accidentally bought the wrong size batteries for it, but even without realizing that it lit up or hearing that it made an obnoxious realistic vacuum noise, he was instantly in love. He played with it all day! I have compiled a list of reasons why I know I made the right choice in buying this new sucker.

You can't tell in the picture but J's vacuum even has the same "Reaction" sticker on it and "Dual Action" sticker on it

1. It is identical to Mommy's. J has pointed out several times that the little vacuum is his and the big vacuum is Mommy's.

2. After a straight 45 minutes of play, J had to sit for lunch. The vacuum sat on the floor next to him and he kept one hand on it at all times.

3. He had a meltdown at naptime and bedtime over his vacuum not being in his room. (He would never sleep if I let him have it in there).

4. After nap, we went to the store to get the right batteries. J insisted on bringing it in the car.

5. And he insisted on buckling it into the seat next to him.

6. On the way home, he pointed his finger at the vacuum and said "Be Good!"

7. He has vacuumed every room of the house 15 times and emptied the canister (yes it comes off) into the trash about 432 times.

8. He tried to feed it some of his dinner.

And the ultimate proof is in the pictures.