Two Years, Five Months

Dear Rachel,

This past weekend, you turned 29 months old. We've had a lot of ups and downs this month, but it certainly has been a fun journey.


First of all, I have to tell you how historic this month has been. You have no idea what our country has been going through over the past 8 years. You will probably not remember this election, or going with me to vote for the man who will be our first President of color, but you certainly did know who the candidates were. One night, I was sitting with my computer open on a news website, and there was a split picture of Obama and McCain. You came right up, pointed to each picture and said, "That's Barak-a Obama, and that's John MA-Cain." I hope that some day you'll understand just how significant this election was. I'm glad that you got to come vote with me.


You started going pee on the potty again this month (I think it's an appropriate transition - politics to pee), except now it's not going potty or going pee pee, it's "making the water tinkle." One night, when we were having a hard time getting you to even sit on the toilet, I asked if you wanted to go make the water tinkle for me, and you said "YES!" Ever since then, you've been going to make the water tinkle at least a couple of times a day. We still have to prompt you, but sometimes you will tell us that you're ready to go.


You're very quickly learning to play the system. Last month, we started making you do the things you refused to do when you got out of time out. Now, when you tell us "No" or "You do it" and we say, "Well, then, I guess you'll have to go to time out," you pipe up with "I forgot to..." and proceed to do the thing we'd been trying to get you to do in the first place. Do be do be do. For example, a few weeks ago, we had been playing outside, and your mother asked you to pick up your toys before you came in. "You do it." "If I pick up your toys, you're going to time out." "I forgot pick up my toys."


This past month was the first Halloween that you'll probably remember. You certainly got the concept after so not understanding last year. You were very excited about wearing your bumblebee costume, and when we practiced trick-or-treating at our own house, you were perfectly content to knock on the door all night and let me put candy in your pumpkin bucket.


Even with our practice, there was one thing we didn't anticipate: The first house we came to, I asked you to knock on the door ("You do it." "OK, I'll ring the doorbell for you."), they answered the door, you said "Tick or teat" and proceeded to walk into the house. I love the fact that you are not shy around people you don't know, but we need to teach you some good old fashioned fear. You said "Thank you" to everyone who gave you candy, then when we got home, you proceeded to eat a bunch of it.


Now, we don't usually give you a lot of candy, so all of this sugar in your system got you all drunk-like, and giddy. You stood outside with me, dancing with no music. Then you looked up. "STARS!" Dancing disco style, you continued looking up, pointing your fingers at the stars. "Dada, I dancing wif STARS!" You were up until 11 PM that night.


Part of the "terribles" this month was your starting to tell us not to do things: Don't look at me, don't talk to me, etc. For a couple of weeks, you were very vocal about it, but once we started putting you in time out for "being mean" you started trying to internalize it. Now, instead of shouting "Don't" at us, you'll whisper it, like we can't hear you if you whisper.


You're also really starting to understand when things are funny. There was one day when we were playing around, and I don't even remember what happened, but you started laughing hysterically, then stopped all of a sudden and said "That's funny!" There was another point this month when you learned our names, and at first, you were trying to pronounce your mother's name. You still have a hard time with some words, so it first came out as "Mon-Kia," which is funny to us because of a completely different story from another time, long before you were born, but when we started laughing, you got it. You got that it was funny, and that it wasn't really Momma's name, but it was close. You get that it's a joke when you call her that, so when you want to be funny, you'll yell out "MON KIAAAAA!"


Your Nanna and Dodd will be here in just a few weeks and will proceed to spoil you rotten for three months straight. We're also hoping they can help straighten out some of your behavior. We love you very much.

Love,
Dada

Yes, we did.

Enough said.

There's bees!

Chris, and maybe Dad, should remember that phrase well from our lunchroom duty days. And yesterday, no truer words could be spoken...

Vote early...

Jack

This weekend, we went to the church up the street from us to visit their pumpkin patch.





Rachel got one of her own...

And tonight, we carved them up...

and scooped them out



And when it was all said and done, I enjoyed the fruits of our labor.

Two years, four months

Dear Rachel,

This past week, you turned twenty eight months old. This month seemed a lot longer than recent months, and I think it's probably because we've had so much going on.

You're becoming more and more independent, and most of the thing we used to help you with, you're starting to do yourself. When we try to help you get undressed, get out of the car, sit on the potty, we hear, "My turn, my turn."

We decided to take the rail off of your bed this past month, so now you've got a real big girl bed. We were worried about you falling out of bed, but so far you've been sleeping through the night without rolling out. What we should have been worried about was you getting out of bed. You're already figuring out how to be sneaky, since now you can get out and back into your bed. I'm sure there have been nights where you're just partying away, quietly, in your room. The only way we know that you're out of bed is if one of your noisy toys gives you away, or we find you with a bed full of toys, clothes, or both in the morning.

You are making more and more abstract connections in your brain every day. My favorite one this past month was when you asked me about a song. Your mother has this song called "Shake shake" on her iPod. I'm not sure if that's even the title of the song, but that's what you call it. One day, we were driving in my car and you asked me to play Shake Shake. I told you that I don't have Shake Shake on my radio, and you came right back at me with, "Only in Mama's car?" I almost ran off the road.

Your Nanna and Dodd came to visit again this past month, and now you've started calling them by their real names. I think it's pretty cool that you now say Grandpa Rick and Nanna Connie, which is probably what you'll call them from now on, but you've also set the naming convention for all future children. Until all the kids can say Grandpa Rick and Grandma Connie, they'll start off as Nanna and Dodd.

We're starting to figure you out a little better, and understand why you throw such big fits at times. We have stopped trying to battle with you and now just send you to time out when you tell us "no" or refuse to do something. The change we've made, though, is when you're done in time out, we try again. The other day, you threw a piece of mail on the floor. When I asked you to please pick it up, you said, "No. You do it," which has been pretty much the theme this month. I sent you to time out, you threw your little fit, and when you came back out, I asked you to pick it up again, to which you said, "No. You do it." Wash, rinse, repeat. After your third time in time out, when I went back to get you, said looked at me and said in your most cheerful voice, "I go pick up paper now." We also figured out that most of those tantrums come when we're not paying enough attention to you.

I'm glad that we're starting to understand you better, and you're starting to understand us. It is so much fun to watch you grow and learn, and as always, we can't wait to see what this next month brings.

We love you very much.

Love
Daddy

Talk the talk

Rachel has been talking up a storm for several months now, and while most of you have heard the wonderful singing part, you haven't heard much of her actually talking. It goes on incessantly. ALL. DAY. LONG.

So I thought I'd share.

I was showing her the pictures in her monthly letter the other day and she just started telling me what she was doing in each of the pictures. I went back to the beginning, started recording, and got her descriptions of all of the pictures.

Nope

What a difference a few days makes.

Three days ago, this was the forecast for Hurricane Ike:



And that would be San Antonio, right in the middle of the path that was forecast. We stocked up on supplies, local weather guy was predicting 100 MPH winds, and it was general doom and gloom us.

Of course, we all know how difficult it is to predict the track of storms, as has been evident by all of the doom and gloom that just didn't come true this year.

This is Ike's current track:



At this rate, it looks like Mom and Dad may get more rain out of it than we will. I've been watching the skies all day, and we've had some beautiful high clouds, but that's it. No rain, no wind.

I hope we get some rain tomorrow, but with as far off as the forecasts have been all week, I won't be surprised if we get left high and dry from Ike. It's a lot like Rita a few years ago...pouring rain in Houston, just three hours east, and not a drop of rain here.

Two years, three months

Dear Rachel,

Yesterday, you turned 27 months old. It's been yet another busy month, and it's going to get pretty hectic this weekend as we prepare for what might be a really big storm, and no, I'm not talking about a temper tantrum you're going to throw.


Your big thing this month has been the use of pronouns. About three weeks ago, you looked at me after I'd gotten off the phone and said, "Dada talk to Mama on he phone." While it wasn't exactly correct, it was a start. Since then you've been calling everything "he," "she," "her," "hith," etc. You're still trying to figure out gender on some things, like you called your cabbage patch baby, Kinzie, "him" when you went to bed the other night. I guess it's because we don't talk about Kinzie as much as we talk about Andy, so you didn't quite know what she was.


You've started calling us by different names this month as well. One day, you just started saying "Mommy" and "Daddy" instead of "Mama" and "Dada." I guess that means you're growing up a little more.


Your other big thing has been your sentences. My God, can you ever string the words together. It's funny to listen to you try to sort through everything. I'm sure that, in your head, you know exactly what you want to say, but your mouth just doesn't quite keep up with your brain. You'll start sentences two and three times just to get the right conjugations and plurals/non-plurals on words. The great thing is that you realize when you've made a mistake, and you'll start over so that you can correct it.


You have been using your pink stool all over the house, and getting into all kinds of things that we don't necessarily want you getting into. For a while, it seemed like every time we asked you to come join us, you'd have to go get your stool first: "Dit my pink sool?" A couple of weeks ago, you got your stool and stood up on it to see the biscuits that Mama had taken out of the oven. Then you reached out to grab one and burned your arm on the hot pan. Since then, we've made you keep your stool in the bathroom so you can use it to brush your teeth, but nothing else.


Speaking of brushing your teeth, what is up with you lately? Sometimes you'll happily stand there brushing your teeth, and other times it's like pulling teeth to get you to brush them. You started this thing where we'll hand you the toothbrush and you'll stand there with it, waving it in the air, and when we take it from you and try to brush your teeth for you, you hold your hands over your mouth. Then even other times, you'll stand there and ASK us to brush your teeth for you. I have no idea what's gotten into you, and we never know if it's going to be a happy brushing day, a mommy and daddy brushing day, or a fighting to the death brushing day.


Another thing you've started to do this month is to get out of bed. When we converted your crib to a toddler bed, we went out and got you a soft gate to keep you from falling out at night. That soft gate doesn't completely cover the side of your bed, and you've figured out how to shimmy your skinny little butt around the side so you can get out of your bed. The problem is that you shimmy over a short wooden rail, but it's too high for you to get back into bed, so when we come in your room to scold you for playing when you should be sleeping, you can't get back into bed without our help. There have been a couple of times in the past week when we heard you out of bed at 10 PM, when we're getting ready to go to bed. Staying up that late doesn't make you the most pleasant person to be around the next morning.


There have been plenty of times this past month when we've been ready to sell you to the lowest bidder on eBay. Your terrible twos have come on full force, with all of this wonderful screaming and crying, and in spite of that, we still love you. Just know that when we punish you, it's because we want you to grow up to be a wonderful, well adjusted, polite human being, not a Republican.


We love you very much. Please don't make us sell you.

Love,
Daddy

You say it's your birthday?

Today, Monica turns 30 for the second time. When I put the banner up for September, she looked at me and said "That looks like way more than 31 candles."



You see, that's what happens when you get old. Your eyes start to go, and you think you're seeing things. There are, in fact, exactly 31 candles on the banner.



It's been a heck of a year. Here's to decades more birthdays together. Happy Birthday, Moni.

EDIT: Fine, fine...I'll admit, there were actually 33 candles in the banner, but that's hardly "way more" than 31. It has been appropriately photoshopped so there are now EXACTLY 31 candles. You didn't even notice the difference, did you? But at least my wife can now get on with her life knowing that, once again, she was right. Are you happy now?

Strength

I'm not going to go into details here, because it's really not my place to do so, but just know that our good friend Maria needs all of the prayers and good thoughts she can get right now.

We're all pulling for you, girl, and we hope you get well soon.

Next stop: Mickey Mouse Club

Two years, two months

Dear Rachel,

Today, you turned 26 months old. As you can tell by the title, I've decided to stop referring to your age in months because I once worked with a woman who referred to her child's age in months and her child was 10 years old. It was a bit annoying. And a little creepy.

We did some more traveling this month, and I'm glad that we did. You need to get used to taking trips during the summer because we'll probably do it a lot, especially as you get older. And the older you get, the better you travel. For the most part. If
the trip is short.



You got to meet almost all of the Laleman side of the family this month, and while there were quite a few people you already knew, there were also a bunch you'd never met before. I'm glad that we got to go - you had a great time, and I remember how much fun it was for me being at large family gatherings like that as a child. I hope we get to do more of those as you grow up.



You absolutely loved going to the beachswimming in the ocean when we went to Corpus earlier in the month. It was so weird though, because when we went in the fall, you had no problem walking in the sand, all over the beach with me, but this time, you wanted nothing to do with the sand. In fact, you made us carry you almost everywhere, even into the water. But the swimming, you couldn't get enough of. In fact, when you woke up Sunday morning after being at the beach Saturday afternoon, the first thing you said was "I go simming in bid oh-sun?" So we went to the beach Sunday morning and went swimming.



When we came back from the coast, you came down with what we thought was a nasty cold and sinus infection. You were all snotty and stuffed up to the point that we had to give you a pillow to sleep on to keep your head elevated. We thought you had caught something terrible from the ocean, or had gotten sick from our hotel room being so cold, but about three days after you got sick, we noticed that you were chewing a lot on your fingers. One day at dinner, I noticed you really gnawing on your fork, and it clicked - the runny nose, the chewing on your fingers and anything else that you could jam back into your mouth...I stuck my finger in there and felt your top molars coming in! Your bottom ones came in without us even noticing, but the top ones you had a lot harder time with. I'm glad that we're finally done with all the teething.



You learned to jump this month, and much to my dismay, you discovered that jumping on the bed and other furniture is really fun. So now starts years upon years of me being a dad and yelling at you for jumping on the furniture, or even standing up on the couch, when what I really want to do is join you in jumping on stuff, but I know that if I try it, we'll be buying new furniture really soon.



We converted your crib to a "big girl bed" this past month, meaning that we took the sliding rail off the side of it, lowered the mattress so you can climb into it by yourself, and put some smaller, non-sliding rails on each end. You loved climbing in and out of it, and the first night you got to sleep in it, you promptly fell out. Three times. Evidently, the space between the small rails is just what you needed to wriggle your way right onto the floor. At about 3 AM we both heard a thump, then heard you moan once, then nothing. I went in to check on you and found you sound asleep on your stomach on the floor. You didn't even wake up when I put you back into bed. The next day, we went and got you a movable rail to help keep you in bed.



You have become quite the little tape recorder, and now your mother and I really have to watch what we say around you. In fact, just today, someone hit my car in a parking lot and as I was kneeling down inspecting the damage, you came over and asked me what was wrong (which was very sweet), and as I continued to look at the scrapes, I must have muttered something under my breath because the next thing I knew, you were touching the scrapes just like I was and saying "dammit...dammit...dammit." Whoops. Earlier today, we were watching the US Women's volleyball team on the Olympics and you started in with "Yeah! Nice!" just like your mother was saying whenever there was a good shot.



You've also started singing to yourself. You know a bunch of songs now, and every once in a while, we'll hear you singing loudly and way out of key, but it is very cute. A couple of weeks ago, we were putting toys away in the garage and you broke out with "Please, please, please do not goooooo" and it was actually in tune. I was very impressed.



We are constantly amazed at how smart you are (or at least we think so). You know almost all of your colors, and identify things by color all the time (boo car, purple butterfly and so on). You can also count to ten all by yourself and even know quite a few of your numbers and letters by sight. Along with working on those, we started trying to get you to say your whole name this month. So far, it comes out "Way-shul Eeesa Mon-ez Ma-nen." But you're working on it.



As always, we love you very much, and can't wait to see what new things you learn in the coming month.

Love,
Dada

Why, hello there!

Yes, yes, I realize it's been almost a month since I posted anything.

I managed to be at home for three weeks and not write a thing, and then when I had to go back to work, I've been working 10 hour days and just haven't had the energy to do much of anything when I get home.

So here I am, back again. It was incredible to see everyone this past weekend. We're really glad that we and so many others decided to make the trip.

Pictures from the weekend are up at Flickr (you can see them over there on the right), but I'm going to post a few of my favorite.