life with a new baby
All About Nathan
The race is on
Jan 23rd
Racing! I can’t help but smile every time I look at this picture. He’s just so adorable with his curly hair and legs that don’t reach the pedals. It won’t be long before he can play this for real without having to sit in his daddy’s lap. (Before I took the picture, he sat in Paul’s lap to race because Paul’s legs reach the pedals. When they were done, Nathan was content to sit in the seat and pretend like he was still racing.)
Oh the changes they go through…
Dec 9th
Wow. The past few days have been so busy around here. Nathan has been a bit of a pill with his tantrums and not minding lately— but as I suspected, he’s hit a few more milestones.
Take last night, for example. Part of his bedtime routine includes me singing to him before we say our prayers. When I finished singing, I started reciting The Lord’s Prayer (which he loves… When I’m reciting it, I’ll pause and Nathan will say the next word) when all of a sudden, Nathan started flapping around in my lap like some sort of fish being electrocuted.
“What’s wrong, Nathan?” I asked, perplexed.
“I MAD AT YOU!” he replied. Wow. He’s never articulated his feelings to me before.
“Ok. Are you mad at me because you wanted more songs?”
“Yes,” he said sullenly.
“I understand. I really do. You’re allowed to be mad at me all you want, but throwing a tantrum when you’re mad is unacceptable. We’re done singing. Now it’s time to pray and then bed. Are you now ready to say our prayers so you can go night night?”
“Okay. Yes,” he whispered.
And that’s not the only new development. Yesterday, my mom took us to look for Christmas gifts. We didn’t get home until around 3:30 or so. I anticipated taking Nathan directly to bed to nap but needed to change his diaper first. Nathan balked at the prospect and started saying “NO! Go pee pee in the potty!” I replied that it was nap time and we could try when he got up. When I went to change his diaper, I was surprised to discover his diaper was completely dry. So I ushered him into the bathroom, sat him on his potty, and LO-AND-BEHOLD he peed!!
That was the first time he’d ever told me he needed to go potty… and then actually went! He was so proud of himself that he jumped up from the potty and did a little dance. And I was right there dancing with him!
He’s also starting to really take off with his reading. He has most of his books memorized, so oftentimes I’ll have him “read” to me. The other night, he sat in my lap and read The Little Red Caboose to me. Paul peeked through the door and watched us as Nathan relayed the adventures to me. As he was watching, he noticed that when Nathan hesitated, his eyes would scan the page looking for a cue. Although technically Nathan doesn’t know how to read yet, he recognizes a lot of words, but that was the first time Nathan’s ever scanned a page to remember what word or sentence comes next.
My mom said I was the same way. I also started recognizing words and “reading” to my parents when I was really little. The funny thing is that I remember it (I don’t remember my age at the time, but Mom told me I was almost three). I remember my parents being so shocked and proud of me for reading… but I felt incredibly guilty because I knew I wasn’t actually reading. I didn’t know how. I just recognized a ton of words.
Of course, in retrospect, I see that recognizing words is one of the first steps to learning how to read. Nathan has an incredible memory, so I’m not surprised that he’s memorized a lot of words and knows what the word looks like when spelled. I’m super excited to nourish his love for reading so can hopefully continue to love books through adulthood.
My baby is growing up. And it’s happening alarmingly fast.
Rise and shine!
Nov 11th
Nathan is more of a morning person, very much like his daddy. Paul practically jumps out of bed in the mornings, jumping for joy and whistling. Yes, you read that correctly. He whistles in the morning. I, on the other hand, have to will myself to sit up and slowly crawl out of bed. I’ve never been much of a morning person. Instead, I am a night owl. I love to stay up really super late and then sleep in. But with a kid, of course, that is out of the question. Not gonna happen. So I go to bed early enough to get just enough sleep to satiate my body’s desire for rest, but invariably not quite enough to keep me from being a bit grumpy for the first little while.
Nathan’s mood varies in the mornings. Most times he wakes up all jolly and full of rainbows and lolly pops. Other times, he wakes up grumpy and irritable. Full of “piss and vinegar” as the saying goes. He’s hard to deal with on those days, and it usually takes quite a bit of playing and bribing with books to get him into a better mood. In the picture above, he’d had a great morning. (Fortunately he has those more often than not.) Look at his morning hair! I was sitting on the ground when I took it, so the picture looks like he’s a giant in a tiny little room.
And see the mess behind him? Well, every night before he goes to bed, we clean up his room. And the first thing he does in the morning is drag his toys back out to play. I’ve really been working with him on cleaning up after himself. He and I always clean his room before he goes down for his nap. I set out some baskets, and we sort the toys. Legos here, cars there, blocks in that one, books in this one. Most of the time, he gets distracted and wants to play with the toys we are cleaning up, but I tell him we clean up first and THEN he can play with his toys again. This seems to work well. Just yesterday, he brought a basket filled with over 50 Hot Wheels and dumped most of them onto the coffee table. He played with them for a while, and when he was done –get this– he put them all back into the basket and carried it to his room!
Good work, son.
I know I say this a lot, but I have to say it again. I can’t believe how quickly he’s growing up.
Naps… soon to be a thing of the past
Nov 8th
Nathan is slowly moving away from taking naps. As of now, he still naps when he’s really tired, but it’s getting more difficult to get him to fall asleep. I’ve been co-sleeping with him (during nap times only) since he was 11 months old. At first, I welcomed the rest and the naps. Here lately, probably because I have more energy from losing weight and being more active, I don’t nap with Nathan all that much. I’ll usually lay down with him until he falls asleep, and then I get up.
Every so often, however, I really look forward to a nap. (How lucky am I that I still have the opportunity to nap? VERY.)
Today I wanted to get some rest. Nathan’s agenda for today, on the other hand, did not include sleeping. I laid with him for over an hour as he played with his hands and the blanket. When I finally told him to go to sleep or I would put him in his own bed, he pouted and pulled the covers up over his face. I laid there and watched him for over five minutes. He laid perfectly still, and the only reason I knew he was not asleep was because his breathing wasn’t deep and regular.
Pretending to be asleep for over five minutes is an ETERNITY in toddler time. I had to give him credit. He tried damn hard to make me think he was asleep. He didn’t twitch, didn’t talk, and he didn’t move at all. He was perfectly still.
I know adults that aren’t capable of pulling that off.
So finally, as I watched him, he slowly reached his hand up to the blanket that he had pulled over his face. His fingers carefully grasped the edge of the blanket and ever so slowly, he pulled the blanket down, exposing his wide-awake eyes.
“HI MOMMY!” he exclaimed when he saw me watching him. There was not one ounce of sleepiness in his voice.
“Go to sleep,” I responded. “Mommy’s tired but I can’t sleep unless you sleep.”
“No nap, Mommy. I sorry. Mommy TIRED. No nap. Get up?” he said as he sat up in one swift motion.
“No not yet,” I said as I pondered how it could be humanly possible for someone to sit up with such speed. “Seriously, I’m tired.” Then he plopped back down beside me and nestled his arm under my chin. I couldn’t help but kiss it.
“Get up? Ready get up?” he implored.
Fine. How could I say no? The kid laid as still as a statue for OVER FIVE MINUTES.
“Okay we’ll get up,” I sighed. Before I could finish that short sentence, however, Nathan was clamoring out of the bed and racing into his room. “BUT!” I called. “Since you didn’t nap, you’re going to have to play in your room for a while rather than roaming the house. Understand?”
“Okay, Mommy!” he said as he dove into his toys.
My baby boy is growing up and naps are starting to become more scarce. I don’t think he’s going to give them up entirely just yet because there have been plenty of times where he’s been so tired that he could hardly hold his eyes open. But it’s definitely heading in that direction. Hopefully, he still has a year or two of napping, even if it is sporadic. I can get so much done when he’s sleeping… not to mention, some time to myself is always nice.
Just another reminder that they don’t stay little for long…
Recent Comments
Aww thanks, Tina, it was good to see you too! I wish I could have talked to you more... I ...
I'm sorry you all had a rough go yesterday, but it was good to see you both :) I have ...
Thank you, I appreciate that. It's so cool to hear people say that we look alike... I've been told there ...
Awww... what really nice photos! You two look so alike, especially with the way you smile.