Enough About Me - Some Stuff About the Boys

So many Gabe-isms to catch up on.

In addition to saying "actually" all the time, he's also become rather fond of saying "just." We called Grammy this afternoon to tell her the big news, and as he was telling her all about it, he said "I just watch Toy Story."

Another popular phrase is "Let's get goin'!" The other morning, we were getting ready for swimming, and of course he needed to know where we were going after swimming, so I told him we were going to the Farmer's Market, and he said "Oh. Where we goin' after the Farmer's Market?" And as I often do these days, I answered "I don't know," and he said "We goin' to bookstore after Farmer's Market?" And I said "No." And he said "Well. Ok. Let's get goin'!"

Two of his favorite books right now are this one and this one. In Jamberry, there's a line that reads "Rockets shoot by." Well, every time that we read that line, Gabe takes his arm and points it at the ceiling and shouts "ROCKETS SHOOT BY!" with such enthusiasm that spit flies out of his mouth. In fact, he looks forward to this one line in the book so much that when I was reading it to him last night, he started flipping ahead to that page, and when we got there and I started reading, he got himself into position - his arm was poised and ready to go, and he looked at me anxiously as I read the preceding line, and as soon as he heard his cue, he jumped in with the pointing and the shouting. And the spitting. It's pretty hysterical how they can get so fixated on something like that.

And in The Very Quiet Cricket, the cricket keeps rubbing his wings together, but, as the book says "Nothing happened. No sound." And when we read those two lines, which are the last two lines on nearly every page of the book, I read the part that says "Nothing happened," and then Gabe chimes in and says - with sad puppy dog eyes - "No sound."

In addition to the success we're having with potty training, we seem to have FINALLY gotten it through Gabe's head that he has to remember to use manners when he asks for something. It's only taken about a year......  But the other day he really threw me for a loop when he walked over and said "May I hug you?" I told him that a hug is something he never has to ask for - they're always there for the taking!

And he cracked me up at the park the other day - there were some kids in the way of where he wanted to go, and he very politely said "May you excuse me?"

Then there are the times where he uses his manners, but still doesn't get it quite right - like Friday, when we were checking out at the grocery store and he grabbed a package of stickers and instead of asking me, he asked the cashier "May I have these, please?"

And two other little Gabe quirks - he really enjoys reading the Lillian Vernon catalog. He calls it his "magazine." Go figure. And he doesn't like to drink plain water from a cup (we give him water with a splash of juice), but he will drink plain water from a water bottle. So I'm going to be encouraging the water bottle from now on!

As for Dante - he is apparently getting an entire mouthful of teeth all at once. The poor kid is miserable, and is constantly gnawing on his hand. I feel so bad for him. We're giving him Tylenol to try to help him feel a little more comfortable, but I just want these teeth to come through and be done with it.

He's actually been so uncomfortable and so unhappy that he's been very fussy about eating, and is not eating as much as he usually does, and he's also taken morning naps the past few days; something he hasn't done in a long time. He still naps in the afternoon on those days, too, so I think it's just that being in pain is really wearing him out. I wish there was more we could do for him.....

In between all the mouth misery, though, he's doing well. Have I mentioned how much he loves water? He could splash in the wading pool all day if we let him. And he takes buckets of water and just dumps them all over himself.

He is getting far too proficient at climbing - this morning I caught him attempting to climb over the armrest of the couch, which of course would have ended with him falling onto the floor. And he was laughing the whole time he was doing it. He's going to be quite the daredevil, I think (and fear).

He also has a favorite book - this one, which we took out from the library a few weeks ago, and which I'm going to be sad to return, because he loves it so much. As soon as he sees me take it out, he smiles. And as soon as I open it up and start reading, he starts giggling, and comes running over to snuggle with me and sit in my lap. He just LOVES this book - it's so cute to see how happy it makes him. I think it's mostly because he loves animals so much. Any time he sees an animal - in a book, or on tv - he smiles and laughs and makes little cooing noises.

And speaking of animals, we had a fabulous time at the zoo yesterday with Greg and Diana and HR and Mason. We were there for almost 2 1/2 hours, and the kids all did really well. We packed a lunch, and stopping to eat about halfway through the zoo was a nice break for everyone. I was pleased with Gabe, too - he did really well with getting out of the stroller occasionally to walk, but then getting back in when we asked him to.

We're trying a new trick now, too - when we want him to stop, we say "Red LIght!" instead of "Stop." I think he just gets tired of hearing "No" and "Stop" all the time, and I can't blame him - I get tired of saying it. So far, "Red Light" is working pretty well, so hopefully that continues.

It was a busy, busy weekend, between swim class, the Farmer's Market (we went to a new one, and it was awesome - it was right at a farm on a hill overlooking the ocean, and they have a lot of great vendors, and you can walk around and check out the farm animals, too. We'll definitely be going back there again!), the race on Sunday, and then G, D, HR, and M visiting Sunday afternoon and Monday. We were all pretty wiped out today.

But when your weekend is busy with all fun stuff, it's not so bad to be tired.

Comments

[Special Mommy Teacher]

Wow... your boys sound a lot like mine. Matt and Jon will be four in Sept and they have a lot of little quotes - "Are you sure about that?", "Come on light.", "mommy/ daddy, I miss you."

Chris is almost four months and I think he is trying to push a tooth through already... he chews on everything and is constantly drooling.

Does Gabe have a concept of either yesterday or last week? Whenever the boys are telling a story of something that happened, they would always say yesterday no matter when it happened. I started correcting them with last week instead and now when they talk about the past, if it didn't happen yesterday, they automatically change it to last week.