Seth is 3 years 5 months old

It really is hard being an almost 3 1/2 year old.  Wow – I must have forgotten from Andrew.  Thankfully, probably. 

Anyways, Seth is just having a hard time of things.  Adding to the whining (which actually might be slightly better than last month), the clinging is in overdrive.  An example, Seth, Logan, and I went to parent teacher conferences for Seth this week.  I casually mentioned to Seth that when we went in, he would go play in another room while I met his teachers.  I figured, no big deal because Seth has been 100% happy and loving preschool.  Well, it was a big deal.  He starts crying and clinging on the way walking in that he won’t leave me.  By the time we are walking to the room, he is in tears.  His teacher tries to take him over to the next room (his teacher who he loves, by the way) and his fingers have turned into talons clawing into me and he is sobbing.  His teachers are shocked because he has had 0 separation anxiety or anything. 

Anyways, the conference went well and Seth is “perfect” as they said over and over (which I thought was hilarious).  He is low maintenance and a good kid … but perfect.  Anyways, he participates in everything well and pretty much does everything he is supposed to, plays well with everyone.  They said he seems on top of academic things and is pretty smart, but they weren’t really evaluating that this time around. 

His only small issue is he is a huge rule follower.  He is good about being flexible when needed, but once a rule is set, you better not break it.  He apparently got very upset in preschool about yellow lights.  A girl in his class said it meant “Slow” and Seth was adamant that me (his mother) said it meant the light was about to turn red.  He was almost in tears about it until his teacher reconciled the two viewpoints.  I can definitely see that at home.  He takes everything that other people say very seriously.  We have to say the prayers just look they do at preschool (he is specific – we must not close our eyes, we must fold our hands, we must only say that prayer) – “God is great, God is good, let us thank him for our food” – so we have to say that prayer each dinner as well. 

Another funny anecdote that his teachers shared is that he is always listening.  They told him they were going to the storyteller’s that day and he said “I know.  I heard you talking about it.”  Which probably means we should be a bit more careful about what we say.

Seth is still loving dressing up.  Oftentimes, he is the last one to wake up in the morning (usually it’s me or me) and he will sneak out of his room quietly all dressed up –usually in his tiger Halloween costume, but sometimes other costumes as well.  One night, the boys were being naughty and not going to sleep and he had gotten into his tiger costume and slept that way the entire night.  At least it was warm!

Seth had so much fun with Halloween.  I feel bad that he was kind of sick on Halloween and had to come home a bit early from Trick or Treating because he was so worn out.  He just loves holidays.  He has made all kinds of decorations for Thanksgiving and we have read countless Thanksgiving stories over and over.  He will tell you all the details about the Pilgrims and the Wampanoags.  He also loves to wear the Indian costume they made and even wore it to the Thanksgiving parade.  He insisted on having food that the Pilgrims and Indians ate, so today for second thanksgiving (i.e., cooking our turkey since we went over to someone else’s on the real day), we made Indian pudding – a lot of work, but pretty good.  He has already started to look for Christmas decorations and loves to say “Christmas.  Christmas” whenever he sees some. 

Fun Things This Month:

• Halloween
  • Trick of treating in CWE.
  • Trunk or treat at church.
  • Performance at school.
  • Trick of treating at the library
  • Watching Andrew’s school parade on his tricycle.
  • Trick or treating in neighborhood on Halloween.
• Voting at home – we held an election where we decided what we were going to eat for dinner for all the courses.  It was quite a bit of fun and Seth really enjoyed it – we loved our tortellini and lemonade and edamame.
• Hiking at Route 66 state park – We had a lot of fun. The boys enjoyed the visitor center where we saw all kinds of route 66 memorabilia. They even got to see real pictures of the real Mater. They liked hiking, but Seth got pretty tired and wanted to go in the stroller for awhile.
• Hiking at Elephant Rocks and Johnson’s Shut Ins – It was a long drive (almost 2 hours), but boy was it worth it. The rocks were so fun! The boys couldn’t wait to climb all over them and were so excited to see names chiseled into the rocks. They kept wanting to go off the trail and crawl all over the rocks and sometimes we obliged. It was a lot of fun. Seth fell asleep in the car on the way to Johnson’s Shut Ins, but I finally woke him up so we get the rest of the family from the visitor center.  We walked down the boardwalk to the Shut In’s. It was pretty and peaceful, though I think I would be nervous about the boys swimming there. Thankfully, the water is much too cold for that this time of year.
• Pictures – we went and got Seth’s pictures taken.  He was not very cooperative and it took quite a bit to get him to smile.  I was enticing him by reading him Froggy book.  But they ended up turning out really cute.  He was wearing his Halloween necklace in some, because we came straight from his preschool Halloween party.
• Grandparent’s Day – Seth brought our neighbor, Martha, who loved it!  We drove her there and back because she doesn’t drive anymore.  They got to see the classroom and take pictures and then went into the gym for the big presentation.  The kids sang and had made some special crafts for their grandparent.  Martha was so pleased she brought a Snickers bar for Seth.  Seth loved it.
• Meeting Santa – we walked to the Galleria mall when Santa came.  He came up in a carriage with horses which was pretty exciting.  Seth would watch, but didn’t want to get any closer to Santa to say hi or anything.  Then, we had lots of fun inside decorating cookies and making ornaments (for free!).
• 3/5/7 Shichigosan Holiday – This is a very big Japanese holiday you celebrate when boys are 3 and 5 and when girls are 5 and 7 (it is on Nov. 15).  So, both Andrew and Seth got to celebrate this year.  We had a busy morning – Andrew had swim lessons and then Katsu, Andrew, and Seth went to a local church to help make sandwiches for the homeless as part of an elementary school project.  Then, we went to the temple and took pictures of the boys in yokata (we only had one, so they took pictures separately).  The boys were not too thrilled, but after about 5 minutes, we left and went to the favorite and fancier Chinese buffet a couple cities away.  They were having live entertainment for some reason, so it seemed especially celebratory.  They had a dancer in a big costume that changed masks mid-dance, then a women playing a Chinese harp, and then a guy doing a dance with this watering can that almost looked like a sword.  It was pretty crazy.  The boys had a lot of fun and we got to reflect on how happy we are that they have gotten this far happy, healthy, and alive.
• Thanksgiving – we went to the parade in the morning.  Seth got bored after about the first hour (St. Louis parades are no joke).  But we stayed for the whole thing and even got some candy in the end.  Then, we finished our baking and went over to our friend’s, the Shumways, for dinner.  It was a really yummy dinner with tons of food and the sister missionaries were there as well.  The boys ate lots and enjoyed the little cornucopias full of candy.  They enjoyed playing downstairs with Elias and also watching the Snowman movie.
• Ice skating – we went to a party the day after Thanksgiving and Seth got to try ice skating for the first time.  The skates (the smallest they had) were a bit too big and the first couple times were rough going.  He went out in shoes only after that and loved it.  That plus tons of Krispy Kreme donuts (they said they order 1400 but maybe that was a joke) made it a great morning!  We put up the Christmas tree in the boys room after that, which Seth is loving!

Andrew is 5 years 6 months!

Our boy is 5 and a half!  Hard to believe.  This has been a good month.  I think we are finally into the school routine and used to life.  I have had a hard time transitioning to him in kindergarten (although it does make the time when he is at school much easier), but I’ve asked him.  And he always says “Mom, I don’t think about you at all at school.  I don’t miss you guys at all.”  So, I think it is good.  He doesn’t seem to think the day is long – the only issue is he doesn’t get enough craft/project/playing time.  Although, according to him he is all done playing.  We’ll see about that.  I love the afternoons where he just comes home and plays with Seth.  So nice.

School is good.  We love Mrs. Kay.  Andrew doesn’t tell us a ton about his day, but I think I’m figuring it out.  As far as I can tell … they are learning short letter sounds in reading, working on writing all their uppercase and lowercase letters in writing and working on writing stories and adding some words to their pictures and also on having a plan for their writing.  They are doing a unit about trees in science class (they study a tree outside their room during all the seasons, pretty cute).  They are getting together a personal history box to talk about history.  They are adding and subtracting in math (I think they call it take-away).   I have since volunteered twice in Andrew’s classroom and he LOVES it.  He gets so excited and counts the days down.  And then I get to sit with each of the kids at his table and talk to them about their stories during writer’s workshop.  I really enjoy it.

Andrew had two school fieldtrips – one to Pumpkinland and one to sing to the residents at a nearby Assisted Living Home.  He enjoyed both.  He especially liked riding a bus, I think. 

Andrew also had his first performance at school.  They had it the night before Halloween and all the kids wore their costumes.  They sang a lot of songs – about 10 or 15!  They were about all the different parts of the school day – there was even one about proper etiquette in the library!

Andrew’s school focuses a lot on values, community, and helping others.  I really love it.  He is very into the Meramec 5 – which are the 5 values all the kids are supposed to have (kindness, etc.).  He also is getting pride in his country and likes to say the pledge of Allegiance and enjoyed voting.  Andrew has a family group that he belongs to with kids from all different grades.  His family group leader is the principal and it seems like they work on projects together.  Andrew’s school is focusing on helping others this month.  One day this week, everyone brought in a sack lunch which were all taken over to a homeless shelter.  They also did trick or treating for Unicef and are volunteering for a homeless shelter and doing a soup dinner fundraiser later in the month.  I love it!

Andrew is still busy in his projects.  He is enjoying writing.  We are doing this thing for Thanksgiving where we hide a turkey every day and it says something for us to think about being grateful for.  He likes to write it each day.  He also is always writing lists of one thing or another.  Lately, he has been writing lists of ideas for his stories for Writer’s Workshop.  He loves to uses black pens/markers/crayons and tape.  He is upset that we ran out of tape and is always bugging me to get more.  He spend a good day or two turning a panda mask into a mask of a red panda by taping on tiny pieces of red construction paper.  He loves that mask.

Andrew still loves nature and animals.  He has absorbed so much information about them and is always impressing people with his knowledge – we went to a few nature center places this month and he can recognize all different kinds of animals (like he can tell a barn owl from other kinds of owls).  He enjoys hiking with us as a family.

Andrew was pretty grumpy for a few days and always complaining about how he wished that we hadn’t gotten married so that he wasn’t born.  I was getting worried for a bit that maybe he was depressed, but that seems to have passed, thankfully.

Andrew doesn’t believe in Santa anymore.  I have no idea why.  It has been coming up here and there for the last few months.  I think he is just getting too logical for him.

Andrew finished up soccer and seemed to enjoy it.  He even sometimes joins in on soccer pick up games after school.  I am glad because he isn’t a super athlete and just doesn’t seem to have the drive to compete athletically compared to the other boys his age.  He never full on runs, for example.  So, he seems like he is constantly “it” at school when they play tag.  But he doesn’t seem to mind, thank heavens.  He does seem small for his age, but I think part of it is because the other boys in his class that he likes are already 6 and have been for a while.  Andrew started swimming again –he is slow going in his lessons, but he is getting less afraid of the water.  It is a small class (just 2), and with 2 teachers, so I am hoping he gets closer to moving up a level.

He is enjoying cleaning up and likes to do chores to help around the house.  His favorite is washing windows and helping vacuum with a mini-vac in the kitchen.

Fun Things This Month

• Finished soccer.  He got his own ball, too.
• Started up swimming lessons again. 
• Play dates with Colin, Tate, and Leo at our house.  It mostly seems like he gets super silly and hyper and then they are just running around and jumping off the furniture.  I do not enjoy them at all, but he seems to have fun.
• Zoo with Seth and Logan while Katsu was out of town. We had a lot of fun checking out the Halloween decorations. They had a lot of fun in the reptile house this time, especially.
• Pumpkinland for a birthday party and his school field trip. Andrew stayed together really well with his buddies on the school trip, but wasn’t too keen with buddying up with Seth when we went for the party, but he did when I insisted. The boys had so much fun running through the mazes, going down the slides, and playing on the pirate ship – all made of hay bales. The hay ride was fun, too.
• Halloween
  • Trick of treating in CWE.
  • Trunk or treat at church.
  • Performance at school.
  • Parade at school on Halloween.
  • Class party on Halloween.
  • Trick or treating in neighborhood on Halloween.
• Election Day – Andrew got to vote in school.  He voted for Obama and liked to say it over and over.  He also voted for Claire McCaskill and (I think) Dave Spence.  He mostly say he just voted for whoever he thought.  But he wanted to make sure not to vote for Akin since I said he was crazy.  I told him he could vote for whoever he wanted to, but he was insistent about that one.  He was excited that we mostly voted for the same people.  We also had voting for dinner at home.  The boys and we voted.  We had (by popular vote) tortellini, pink lemonade, watched a movie, and edamame. 
• Hiking at Route 66 state park – We had a lot of fun.  The boys enjoyed the visitor center where we saw all kinds of route 66 memorabilia.  They even got to see real pictures of the real Mater.  They liked hiking, but Andrew was disappointed that we weren’t closer to the water so we could see a snake.
• Hiking at Elephant Rocks and Johnson’s Shut Ins – Andrew was bored driving over (it is a long drive, almost 2 hours), but boy was it worth it.  The rocks were so fun!  The boys couldn’t wait to climb all over them and were so excited to see names chiseled into the rocks.  They kept wanting to go off the trail and crawl all over the rocks and sometimes we obliged.  It was a lot of fun.  Andrew was a little more worn out at Johnson’s Shut Ins, but enjoyed the visitor center with Katsu and talked the lady’s ear off.  We walked down the boardwalk to the Shut In’s.  It was pretty and peaceful, though I think I would be nervous about the boys swimming there.  Thankfully, the water is much too cold for that this time of year.

Logan’s 1 year stats

Height – 31 1/4 in (95%)

Weight – 26 lbs 6 oz (98%)

Head Circumference – 48 cm (95%)

Healthy, except for possibly some low iron.  We need a blood draw to check on that.

Guess who’s One!?!?

Logan turns one tomorrow and it’s hard to believe it’s been a year.  Wow – that was fast.  We took him to get his pictures taken this week and he looked so old in the pictures.  Crazy that my little boy is not a little baby anymore.

Logan is on the move!  Just like last month, he is into everything and anything.  He walks a lot better than last month.  He has pretty good balance and at the park loves to walk up and down hills.  When he falls, he usually catches himself and doesn’t fall on his face.  He can walk holding balls and larger things.  Quite large actually.  He can walk, stoop down to get something and then keep going.  He is still trying to run but isn’t quite there yet.  But he can walk pretty darn fast when he wants to.  He is finally starting to get the idea of going off of couches or down stairs on his belly, but he really goes sort of on his belly, half head first.  He tries to use the stair rail to go up and down stairs. 

Logan still loves balls.  He is getting pretty good at throwing the ball to me and also likes to kick the ball around like soccer.  He definitely knows the word ball and will go get it when you ask … if he feels like it, that is.  But he usually is pretty obedient.

Logan is pretty cheerful and smiley.  We get lots of comments on it.  He has been having a really hard time whenever his teeth come in.  He cries and cries and drools and lately has his hands in his mouth.  He is always trying to rub things against his mouth to get some relief.

He also bites sometimes.  Not when he is nursing, thank heavens.  Usually to get my attention or if his teeth are hurting.  He also has started trying to hit and I also saw him shove Seth today.  Ay ay ay!  Hopefully it is a short stage.  He also loves to wrestle with the boys.

Or actually do anything with the boys.  He LOVES Andrew and Seth.  He just thinks they are the coolest thing ever and wants to play with them all day.  He makes a beeline to their room whenever the door is open.  He especially likes to climb up the car bed and then slide down.

Logan enjoys playing at the park.  Mostly he likes walking around and climbing up the stairs using the handrail.  Sometimes he likes to go down the slides – often headfirst!  He mostly likes exploring.

Logan is eating pretty well when his teeth aren’t bothering him.  He eats dinner faster than Katsu can cut it up for him.  When he doesn’t like something, he throws it on the floor.  I find the cleaning up after him especially tedious.  One of the few negatives of this age.  He likes meat, chicken, fish, fruits, carrots, parsnips, cheese, sweets.  He likes to drink out of any cup, but can really only manage a cup with a straw by himself.  He wants to try to feed himself with utensils, but just gets whatever is on the spoon all over the floor.

Logan still likes nursing a lot, though it has cut back quite a bit to just 3 or 4 times a day (plus he still wants to feed once at night).  I am still not sure what I’m going to do about weaning him – I’ll see what the doctor thinks.  He calls nursing “ba”.

As far as speaking, he says “Mom” very clearly and “Dad” sometimes somewhat clearly.  I think he is trying to say more.  He makes lots of noises and was so cute making excited noises when we were out trick or treating last night.

Logan has started pointing.  At first, he used his whole hand, but now he just uses one finger.  He loves to point out food, trees, trains, planes, cars, balls, and animals.  And also ceiling and lighting fixtures – he is still fascinated by those.  I think it thrills him to be able to communicate better.

He still loves Joe and is much better at being gentle.  He mostly hugs Joe now with huge big body hugs.  He seems to like animals.

Logan loves to look through books and is probably his most favored activity (after exploring and making messes).  He has gotten surprisingly adept at turning pages in non-board books.  He likes to look through Andrew and Seth and even my books.  He will throw them all out of the library basket.  He also will pull all the kids books out of the shelves.  He loves books with flaps and things to touch the best.  He thinks that “Peek a Who” is hilarious and it is probably his favorite book.

Logan also likes to play with the Little People sets and make them make noises.  He likes to knock down block towers.  He likes to play with cars.  And he likes to play with balls.  He loves to push things around, too.  And he is very very interested in the tricycle though he is way too small for that.

Logan still gets into everything.  Everything.   I have to be careful what is in reach on the counter when he is in his high chair because he will pull all that down too.  He still gets into the dishwasher multiple times per day and also pours the cat’s water on the floor at least once a day (as well as sampling the cat food) – and I try to keep that off the floor whenever he is awake.

I’m very curious to see how big Logan is because he seems to be slimming out.  He is a size 4 diaper and is in 12 or 18 month clothes, though some of the 12 month clothes are too short.  He still seems pretty tall to me for his age, though it’s hard to tell because he isn’t around kids his own exact age that much.

Fun Things this Month:

• General Conference – Logan didn’t pay too much attention, though he liked the music and trying to get into the boys’ bingo cards.  We had to keep the computer in the pack and play so Logan wouldn’t get into it.
• Zoo with everyone while Katsu was out of town. We had a lot of fun checking out the Halloween decorations – Logan gets excited and makes excited noises when he sees decorations.  They had a lot of fun in the reptile house this time, especially – there and the monkey house, I let Logan walk and he was pretty excited.
• Pumpkinland for a birthday party.  Logan loved walking around everywhere and especially pushing around the little tractors everywhere.  He had fun walking along all the hay bales.  He even enjoyed the hay ride, though I think it made him a little nervous at times.
• Botanical Garden – twice – and it was tons of fun! Logan is easier to contain in the stroller, but the last time, I let him walk around.  He figured out where the slide is and I let him go with me and then he just wanted to do it again and again.  That kid could just wander around there all day long.
• Pictures taken.
• Halloween party – he freaked out, but in the end, he had fun wandering around their house.
• Trick or treating in the CWE – Logan had fun watching everything and walking along the street while eating pizza and watching the dogs in the pet parade.
• Trunk or treating at church. 
• Seth’s Halloween performance – Logan sat pretty still and watched. 
• Andrew’s Halloween performance – he sat still and watched really well for the first half, but then he was restless and walking along the back of the gym.
• Trick or treating at the library – Logan got hold of a Kit Kat and mauled the poor thing to bits, wrapper and all.  He was covered in chocolate.
• Watching Andrew’s costume parade – he LOVED the bag piper and was fascinated by the whole thing.
• Trick or treating –he was super excited watching all the kids going up the walkways to all the houses.  So much for the baby carrier – he wanted to walk, too!  Not really interested in grabbing candy, though.