Underpants

Isaac wore underpants for five hours today.

Yup, underpants -- no diaper. And we didn't just stay safely at home, right nearby a familiar toilet -- first we went for a walk in our neighborhood, and when that went well, we drove to Oakland and did some shopping.

Isaac had pooped in the toilet every day for a week straight, so it seemed like he was getting ready to make a leap forward in toilet training. A few weeks ago Craig had bought Isaac some training diapers (the kind that teach awareness by not wicking away moisture), but he was very resistant to wearing them. So yesterday Craig went shopping with Isaac and they bought some real underpants. Tiny, adorable underpants, but real ones!

They were an experiment, meant only as a gentle introduction to the concept of going diaper-free, but it turned out that Isaac was very excited about them. He wore the underpants around the house for a few hours yesterday evening, including the jubilant session of jumping on his bed that you see pictured here. (In his right hand he is holding pink and yellow socks, which he also picked out while shopping with Craig.)

When Isaac woke up this morning, he wanted to put on the underpants again. (He wore the socks today, too -- one pink, one yellow.) And everything went perfectly until we got back home from shopping. As we were relaxing before lunch, Isaac suddenly said, "Don't know why I peed." And after that, he kept asking, "Why did I pee in my underwear?"

- - - - -

And was he overly upset by this mistake? Not really, despite my impression that he's got perfectionist tendencies. After I cleaned him up, he even chose to put on another pair of underpants!

I'm glad he believed us when we told him that Mama and Dad don't mind when he makes mistakes.

New pictures

Do we still take pictures of Isaac? Of course we do! We take a lot of them, as you may have gathered from this photo I took at Easter -- Isaac finding an egg, and his doting father and aunt each taking a picture documenting his discovery.

So where are all these pictures? They've remained safely in the camera for the last two months (it's a long story involving the demise of our backup hard drive), but I've just uploaded 34 of the very best of them to a brand new album. Yep, if you look over at the sidebar, you'll see we've moved on to the sixth six-month grouping of photos, which will take Isaac right up to the age of three. (I also rearranged the albums so that the newest one is on top.)

The new photos document our trip to visit Craig's parents in South Carolina, our Easter celebration at my parents' house, and me as a blonde.

No nap

No, he is not ready to give up his nap. Oh, no. Not ready. Oh, no, no, no. Not if today's terrible behavior was any indication!

For many months Isaac has taken an afternoon nap starting at about 2:00; we wake him up after about an hour and a half. In the last 30 days he has missed this nap nine times, much more than usual. For the last two weeks, he has even been following a pattern: two afternoons he'll nap, the next afternoon he won't. Actually, the "two on, one off" pattern began nearly four weeks ago, but those first few missing naps were skipped on purpose by me! See, first there was an Easter party, then I took him along as I shopped for shoes, then my cousin got married ... I had no idea I was sowing the seeds of destruction.

It's usually not a big deal when he won't nap. Even when he is clearly tired and in need of a nap, he seems to rally, and all afternoon he continues to be a pleasant, happy child. Although he might get a little wild by bedtime, the payoff is that he falls asleep early and easily that night. It's really not a problem.

But what if he misses two naps in a row?

Our Trixie Tracker shows that this has only ever happened twice. The first time was in January of this year, and the historical record is silent on the result. The second time was today, and I can tell you that it was a total disaster. Isaac became an entirely different person, and since he's usually perfect, it wasn't an improvement! He was simultaneously exhausted, hyperactive, destructive, anxious, defiant, and frightened. He couldn't control himself at all, and he didn't understand why.

I think I handled it all pretty well, but at 5:00 p.m. I finally gave up, put him in his car seat, and resorted to driving around aimlessly. I figured that even if he didn't sleep, at least he would be safely restrained where he couldn't, for instance, try to hit the dog with a belt or knock objects into the toilet. And I could listen to my audiobook instead of his random sobs and shrieks.

He did fall asleep, though, so I let him nap for 30 minutes, and he was a little happier when he woke up.

- - - - -

On the plus side, he wore underpants for over six hours today with no accidents. He even used the public restroom at the park!

Sharing

"Why didn't Max want to share his shovel?" Isaac keeps asking.

On Wednesday our playgroup met at the Little Farm at Tilden Park, and we stopped by the playground on our way out. Sam and Max's mother was smart enough to bring their sand toys, including a realistic shovel with a two-foot high handle. (As an aside, I never bring toys to the park. For one, I like to travel light, but also I think that being at the park should be entertainment enough. But a sandbox is more fun with sand toys. In fact, without toys, a sandbox is just a desert wasteland.)

At any rate, Isaac was standing around the sandbox aimlessly, so I suggested that he use Max's shovel. (Max was not playing with it, by the way.) But as soon as Isaac's hand moved toward the shovel, Max swooped in and grabbed the shovel himself. As usual, Isaac didn't grab it back. He did, however, look very confused. Max's mother eventually convinced Max to let Isaac use the shovel "for just one minute," but of course as soon as Max relinquished the shovel he no longer cared how long Isaac used it. He never cared about the shovel, anyway. He just didn't want Isaac to have it. Totally normal two-year-old stuff.

Except Isaac is still confused by it, which is why he keeps asking why Max didn't want to share. I asked him, "Do you ever want to keep all your toys for yourself? Does it ever bother you when your friends play with your toys?"

"No," Isaac said, and I think he really meant it.

So he's trying to process the situation through play. He hugs a toy to his chest and announces, "The little boy doesn't want to share his toy." Or sometimes he says, "Mama really wants to play with my toy." Both of those are invitations for me to ask if I can borrow his toy for a little while, so I obligingly ask. Naturally he always says, "No! I'm still playing with it." But we've also done some role-playing, at his instigation, where we successfully swapped toys with each other.

I don't know if he's finally developing a sense of possessiveness, or if he's just trying to understand Max's point of view. But he has started to answer his own question with one of my answers. It's funny to hear him say to himself, "It's hard for two-year-olds to share."

- - - - -

Shane, another playgroup friend, threw a tantrum when it was time for him to leave the playground. Isaac has been asking about this as well, saying, "Don't know why Shane was crying." (He has also expanded this question to "Don't know why people cry.")

I said, "Shane didn't want to leave the park. Sometimes you don't want to go home either, right?"

Isaac looked a little doubtful, like he thought there must be more to it. "Yeah," he said.

Gosh, I sure hope he doesn't start play-acting tantrums in the process of trying to understand them. Or, worse, figure out that he can also throw a tantrum when he doesn't want to stop playing!

"Hard time sleeping"

Tonight I was sitting in Isaac's room as he was trying to fall asleep. For the most part he was lying peacefully and talking to himself, but after about 15 minutes he grew conscious of the fact that he wasn't yet asleep.

"I'm having a hard time sleeping," he said. "I need help!"

This announcement can signal the beginning of trouble. Often when Isaac has trouble falling asleep he begins to make requests for various items he believes will help him, such as a cup of milk or his father, but all they do is distract him and delay the process of falling asleep.

So instead I decided to provide reassurance. "You're doing a great job," I said. "It just takes time to fall asleep. All you need to do is lie there and wait. You are doing just fine."

Apparently my reassurances worked, because a little while later I heard him say quietly to himself, "I am doing a very, very good job falling asleep."

And he was right!

Cradle to grave

"Am I going to be a baby again?"

Isaac has asked me this a few times recently. It's hard to tell if he's relieved or disappointed when I tell him he will never be a baby again. I think he's somewhat disappointed, even though I tell him he can do many exciting things that babies can't do.

He is fascinated with being a baby. Many times a day he snuggles up to me and announces "Mama still has a little baby." Then he likes me to hold him like I was cradling an infant. And how little is he pretending to be? Yesterday he used his friend's two-month-old brother as a point of comparison and said, "I'm smallest than baby Wilder." (He meant "smaller," of course.)

I always tell him that he is only going to get bigger and bigger, older and older, until eventually he will be a man. Today, however, he had another question for me: "What happens after you're a man?"

I told him that after he's a man for a long time, he'll become an old man. Luckily he didn't ask what comes after that. Anyone else want to handle that question?

Cradle to grave II

He must have been thinking about my answer from last night, because he asked me this morning: "What happens after I'm an old man?"

I said cheerily, "Then you're all grown up! Then you can play golf, or drive a tractor, just like Grandpa and Opa! And you'll be a man for a long, long time."

"And then I'll be dead," Isaac said.

Breakthrough

Today Craig and Isaac did what they always do on the day that I work -- they went to Whole Foods. They have a nice routine together. Before they begin to shop, they start out at the cafe. They each select a pastry, and Craig gets a cup of tea while Isaac gets a cup of milk, and they sit at a little table and eat together.

Then they proceed to do the week's grocery shopping. But today while they were were in the produce section, something different happened. Isaac turned to Craig and said, "I need to poop."

So they went to the bathroom, and Isaac peed in the toilet.

Yes, Isaac was once again wearing his new underpants. I mentioned about a week ago that he had worn underpants to the park with me, and that he had successfully used the toilet there. (In fact, he used the toilet there two times.) That was his first time using a public toilet, although it was on my suggestion, made over his protests that he didn't need to pee.

Nor was today was not the first time he has successfully noticed that he needed to pee. Over the past week, sometimes while he's at home he will announce that he needs to poop (although he just needs to pee, so I guess he mixes up those signals). But it doesn't happen that often yet, and it seldom happens in the middle of a lot of activity, so I still think today's announcement was a breakthrough.

Although he did pee a little in his underpants later on, once they had gotten back home.

Quotable

Last night Isaac had some nightmares, so when he woke up slightly after midnight, he ended up sleeping in the big bed with me and Craig. Even then he kept crying out for me in his sleep.

But when we woke up together at 7:30 a.m., he was very cheerful. The first thing he said was, "We woke up in the morning!"

Then he looked out the window, and he said, "Now it's tomorrow!"

- - - - -

Yesterday afternoon I told Craig that Isaac had just pooped on the toilet. Isaac corrected me. "I pooped in the toilet," he said.

I told him he was quite right, but that I meant that he had sat on the toilet while he pooped. He thought about this for a moment.

Then he smiled wickedly, and he said, "I sat in the toilet and I pooped on the toilet!"

- - - - -

Yesterday Isaac and I pruned the lilac, which has just finished blooming. As usual when I prune, I went at it with enthusiasm. Eventually I stepped back and said aloud, "Okay, that's probably enough. I need to stop before I kill the poor thing." But of course I went back in for a few more cuts.

Isaac, who had been putting the branches I had pruned into the greenwaste bin, stepped forward and began to tap me on the hip. Still gazing at the lilac, I absently asked, "Yes, my dear? Is there something you need?"

He continued to tap me until I looked down at him, and then he said, "Mama, Isaac will help you stop."

Sunshine and roses

Before you start to think that life with Isaac is all sunshine and roses, I had better share an anecdote or two about his darker side.

At the end of last weekend, which we spent working in the yard, Craig and I thought we would take a few moments to relax and actually enjoy our garden. It had been a hot and blazingly sunny day with temperatures in the high 80s, but by 6:00 p.m. the sun was finally filtered through a big oak tree, a breeze was blowing off the bay, and it was very pleasant. Craig poured us each a glass of chilled white wine and we set up the lounge chairs side by side on the lawn. The light was slanted and golden; the whole yard smelled of roses.

As we leaned back in our chairs and sipped our wine, I read aloud from Easy Hiking in Northern California in preparation for our upcoming camping trip to Yosemite National Park. I think the reading, which Isaac found incredibly dull, is what pushed him over the edge. For a little while he played nearby, pretending to garden. Then we became aware that he was playing with the hose.

"Is that still turned on?" Craig asked a little nervously.

It was. Isaac carefully set the nozzle to "jet" and began to vigorously water the lawn. We watched in uneasy silence. We knew we couldn't tell him not to spray us, because there's no greater temptation to sin than being forbidden. We could have leaped up and turned the hose off at the spigot, or even taken the hose from Isaac's hands, but for some reason we were frozen in our seats. Perhaps we were hopeful that the worst would not come to pass.

But it did, and Isaac turned the hose on Craig.

Craig was furious, of course. While he went inside to change his clothes, I sat Isaac down on the lounge chair and gave him a brief lecture: No, no, no, you cannot spray anyone with the hose. Does Isaac like it when the sprinkler gets him wet? No. Does he like to be sprayed with the hose? No. Well, Daddy doesn't like it either. I also turned off the water at the spigot.

Craig came back out, and we made the mistake of trying to resume our reading. A bigger mistake, in retrospect, was letting Isaac continue to play with the hose -- especially because I hadn't drained the water that remained in it. Moments later, Isaac turned the hose on Craig again, and although there wasn't that much water left, there was enough to get Craig wet.

Craig was even more furious, of course. Later he told me that he felt a little bad about how angry he had gotten, but I said I thought he was allowed to feel angry, and I found it admirable that he hadn't done anything hurtful or destructive with his anger. I also reminded him that seven months ago when Isaac turned the hose on me, I didn't control my anger very well -- I returned fire!

- - - - -

Yesterday as I was watering, Isaac began systematically tipping rocks off the edge of our stone wall. After he had pushed over three of them, I asked him to try to control himself. He stopped for a moment, his back still to me, and I could see his muscles quivering as he eyed one of the last big rocks.

He finally turned toward me and said, "But I don't want to control myself."

So I set down my hose and went over to help him.

- - - - -

Yesterday he also drew all over his arms with orange marker. I stood by and watched him do it. I figured if I swooped in and grabbed the marker out of his hands, it would become a fascinating forbidden activity, one he was sure to attempt every time he picked up a marker.

It was a washable marker, anyway. Plus it was pretty funny to watch him carefully draw on his arms, from his palms on up, although I hope I kept my face impassive. The best part was after he had set the marker down, when he was admiring his handiwork.

"I forgot my elbows!" he exclaimed, and he carefully turned his arms over so he could color the pointy tip of each of his elbows. After he had completed the job, he once again examined his arms, and declared that he now had tattoos.

- - - - -

Lessons learned?

1. If your kid sprays someone with the hose, don't let him play with the hose any more.
2. If your kid pushes over rocks, help him stop sooner rather than later.
3. If your kid colors on himself with a marker ... well, try not to laugh. Actually, I washed his arms very throughly right after he was done coloring, which he didn't like, so I think I provided a suitably discouraging experience.

Gross out

No one is immune to gender stereotyping, but I do try to rise above it.

One stereotype is that boys think gross and violent stuff is funny. I know that when Isaac enters elementary school, he and his buddies will feel compelled to adhere to this stereotype, and that's just fine.

But where do these stereotypes initially come from? Isaac, otherwise a sensitive and aesthetic child, is already showing an affinity for the gross and violent. He doesn't watch television or movies, so he's not exposed to the media, and he doesn't have biased books or toys. Perhaps all children like gross stuff, but girls are actively discouraged from expressing their interest?

At any rate, here are three of his recent jokes. In every case, the punchline was delivered with a wicked grin.

Isaac: Would you like a cup of mucus?
Mama: No, thank you.
Isaac: Would you like a cup of skunk mucus?

Isaac: I'm going to smash the old cars with a monster truck.
Mama: Oh, yes?
Isaac: I'm going to smash them with a pickaxe!

Isaac: What are those red things?
Mama: It's cherry vanilla ice cream, so they're cherries.
Isaac: Are they blood?

How do I respond? With amused disgust, just like he wants.

- - - - -

You might ask how he even knows about monster trucks if he's such a media innocent. Well, we looked up pictures of monster trucks on Google Images, and most of them are smashing cars. Hey, at least it wasn't YouTube.

- - - - -

He actually seems a little concerned about the superficial gender roles he has noticed. Several times he has asked, "Why do mostly women and girls wear tights?" Perhaps it doesn't seem fair to him that men and boys are excluded? But I let him put on my lip gloss when he asks, although I do point out that it's mostly women and big girls who wear makeup.

As far as more damaging gender roles, he still accepts it when we tell him that women can work at any job, although he'll soon realize that real-world examples of female construction workers and truck drivers are few (politicians and CEOs will come later). Thankfully he has a wonderful example right at home demonstrating that fathers can take good care of children.
.

Motor Mania

Isaac has never cared much about his clothes, but that's beginning to change.

It has been coming on gradually, beginning with pair of pajamas with tractors on them that his paternal grandparents sent him for Christmas. He immediately loved them, and at first even refused to take them off.

But even though I have long suspected that Isaac would love wearing clothing entirely covered in vehicles, I still avoided buying it. I figured that until he began to actually express a preference, I was going to continue buying him the clothes I thought were cool.

This took longer than I had expected, perhaps due to his easy-going nature. Many of his playmates, both boys and girls, began caring about their clothes before they turned two. Some of the kids are fashion plates, insisting on changing outfits multiple times, and some are idiosyncratic, only wearing certain types of clothes -- always boots, or dresses, or sports themes.

And the clothing preferences of many of the kids are defined in opposition to whatever their parents suggest. (This probably continues long after the Terrible Twos are left behind!) But Isaac only suffers from garden-variety opposition, and he doesn't waste it on clothing selection. Perhaps he would still prefer to wear his tractor pajamas every day, but after I explained a few times that we only wear pajamas to bed, he easily gave in.

However, one morning last week, out of the blue, Isaac said, "Let's go to the kid store today and buy a race-car shirt."

I could have easily distracted Isaac from this request, but I thought it would be interesting to see what it was like to shop for clothes with a child who really wanted to buy something, let alone something in particular. So we went to our favorite second-hand store where for the first time ever, we looked at the shirts together -- he usually heads straight for the toy section.

And there was, in fact, a race-car shirt! Unfortunately it was a set of matching NASCAR overalls and t-shirt, and it was absolutely hideous. So I lied and told Isaac it wasn't his size, and happily he took it in stride and didn't insist on buying the shirt anyway. Thank goodness for that easy-going nature.

- - - - -

We did buy two vehicle t-shirts, though. One shirt is blue and orange with a yellow VW Bug dune buggy on the front, very cheerful and cute and perfect for a toddler.

The other shirt, pictured here, is bizarrely inappropriate for a small child. It's pseudo-vintage, so the black was artificially faded, and the fabric is thin and soft like a old t-shirt. As you can see, on the front is a late 1960s muscle car with tendrils of smoke coming out of the souped-up engine. And the smoke? Click on the picture to get an enlarged view of it. Yep, the smoke takes the form of Jimi Hendrix playing the guitar!

I found it so preposterous that I just had to buy it. Although Isaac doesn't care. He now calls it his "race car shirt."

- - - - -

Isn't that a terrible smile on Isaac's face? It's getting hard to get him to pose for a picture.

New pictures

We went camping in Yosemite National Park two weekends ago, and I've just added some pictures from our trip to the album.

Here, for instance, is Isaac's first experience with snow!

Bear bell

I think Isaac enjoyed our trip to Yosemite, which was his first camping experience. We stayed in Housekeeping Camp, which has tent-cabins with beds and electricity, so it wasn't true camping, but it was a good first step for all of us.

I checked out a few kids' books about camping beforehand, because I like to be prepared before I try anything new, and I think Isaac feels the same way. A great one was Ashley Wolff's Stella and Roy Go Camping. In the book, a bear knocks around Stella and Roy's bear barrel, where all their food and toiletries are safely stored, but can't get into it. We told Isaac that since we were car camping, not backpacking, we would put our belongings in a big bear box. Just like in the book, bears might be attracted by the scent, but they wouldn't be able to get any of our stuff.

We made other preparations for bears. We bought a "bear bell" to fasten to our backpack to alert wildlife to our presence. I took the car to be detailed, including having the carpets shampooed, to remove all the food that Isaac has dropped on the floor. We also packed a tambourine -- I figured we could play it as we sung around the campfire, but it could also be used to frighten off a bear in the middle of the night.

But on the drive up to Yosemite, Isaac began to get upset. "I don't want to go camping," he wailed. "I want to go back home." After a bit of investigation, it turned out that he was scared of bears. At first Craig tried the rational approach, telling Isaac that it was very unlikely that we would see a bear. No good. Then he tried the optimistic approach, telling Isaac that we wouldn't see a bear. That was no good either. Isaac would calm down for a while, but then he would begin to wail again.

I began to think about my own anxieties and the strategies I have found helpful in dealing with them. Optimistic denial has never worked for me, and it clearly wasn't working for Isaac either. So I tried my own version of pragmatism -- assuming the worst will happen, and having a practical strategy in place for dealing with it.

"What will we do if we see a bear?" I asked Isaac. He looked nervous. I said, "We'll ring the bear bell, we'll shake the tambourine, and we'll tell the bear, Get out of here!" He looked hopeful. "And what will the bear say?" I continued. He looked intrigued. "He'll say, Bye-bye, these people are too loud for me!" He looked thrilled.

Talking about our bear-repelling strategies really helped him. We had to repeat the sequence several times over the course of the drive, and again when we got to Yosemite itself. But he wasn't just scared any more -- he enjoyed hearing it, especially when the bear said "Bye-bye."

- - - - -

We didn't see a bear, thankfully, so we never had to put our strategies to the test. But Isaac's fear of bears has followed us back home, now applied more generally to "the animals in the woods." I'm having a harder time defusing this fear, perhaps because I don't share it, or perhaps because I just can't work up enthusiasm for being afraid of deer or squirrels.

We do have a large amount of open space behind our house, and there are no doubt a number of animals living up there. Recently Isaac has been having nightmares, waking up upset, and asking desperately, "Are the animals going to stay in the woods?" The honest answer is no, of course -- deer, raccoons, rats, voles, squirrels, hawks, vultures, owls, turkeys, bats, coyotes, bobcats, skunks, foxes, and opossums all live nearby, and they are bound to be wandering by our house.

Before I can figure out how to deal with this fear, I need to discover exactly what is frightening him. Sometimes Isaac tries to reassure himself by repeating things he has heard Craig say. Isaac will say things like, "The animals can't come inside the house. They don't have hands. They don't have thumbs." Sometimes he even says, "The animals aren't going to hurt you." But I don't think these statements help, and I don't even know if he really is afraid of the animals coming into the house, or of them hurting him. Those might be just our interpretations of his fear.

He does enjoy acting like an animal -- he pretends to be an animal rustling in the bushes, and I act startled when I see him -- so maybe more role-playing is the way to go. Yesterday we were pretending to be two little foxes snuggled in our den. I also tried suggesting that when he sees an animal he doesn't like, he can just clap his hands and shout, and the animal will run away. Unfortunately he tried this when he spotted a squirrel through the window, and naturally the squirrel didn't hear him and simply stayed put. "It didn't work," Isaac said.

Or maybe I should take him for a walk in the woods. As long as we don't see a bear!

Camping

If the bears were the part of camping that Isaac liked least, what part did he like best?

While we were in Yosemite someone we met asked Isaac that question, and he answered, "The mountains." But if I answered for him -- and I can do that, you know -- I would say it was a tie between throwing rocks into the river and wearing fleece "footy pajamas."

Throwing rocks was a huge hit, and Isaac could have done it all day long. He got warmed up for this activity back home -- there's a little wooded area outside of his music class, and every week we throw sticks into a little creek there. But the creek is shallow, and we always have to hunt for appropriate sticks, so the gratification is minimal. The Merced River, on the other hand, is full of water, and the beach is covered with toddler-sized stones.

I'm not sure why he liked the pajamas so much, except that it tied in with his pretending to be a little baby.

Boasting

You know that I'm pretty pleased with just about every aspect of Isaac. (He could improve his ability to fall asleep on his own, however.) In addition to writing about his all-around coolness, I thought I'd sum up a few recent cool things he has done. I don't know when these things are supposed to happen, developmentally speaking, but they are cool anyway!

• He is fundamentally toilet trained. It was all voluntary, very smooth sailing, beginning when he got his new underpants. He still wears a diaper to bed at night, and sometimes during his nap, but the rest of the time he wears underpants. I knew he had succeeded in making the transition when he began asking, "Am I wearing a diaper or underpants?" With this new awareness, he hasn't had an accident for many weeks.

• He can sing in tune. This ability developed so gradually that I can't remember a time when he couldn't do it, although apparently it was less than eight months ago. I didn't even realize it was remarkable until his Music Together teacher pointed it out, sounding rather impressed. She was singing a few notes in call-and-response form as the kids put the instruments away, and Isaac was absently copying her. (I don't think he knew he was doing it, because he doesn't usually sing in class.)

• He can rhyme. If I give him a word, he can provide a rhyme or two for it -- cow and plow, duck and truck, pig and big rig. (Yes, those are all vehicle-related. Welcome to my world.) I think a lot of the rhymes are examples I've previously provided for him, but he definitely understands the principle -- once he runs out of real words, he can make up a nonsense word that rhymes. (That strikes him as even funnier.) And if we're reading a book with a rhyme in it, he points it out.

• He can tell a story. Previously when I've told him a story, I've prompted him to fill in a few key aspects -- what color is his new Prius, for example, or where does he want to drive it? But recently I was telling him the story about the new Prius, and when I asked him where he wanted to drive, he hijacked the story completely. He told me that he drove the Prius to Yosemite, where he put on his footy pajamas and threw rocks into the river. He looked mighty pleased that he had made up this narrative all on his own.
  

And what about his physical accomplishments? Clearly I'm not as tuned in to those. A few days ago, he voluntarily climbed into a wading pool for the first time ever, but I guess that's more of a temperamental accomplishment. I really should pay more attention to his ever-improving running, jumping, throwing, and so forth.
.

Relax, it's not boarding school

We toured a preschool today.

I impulsively called the preschool last week, feeling pretty confident that their enrollment for fall would be closed. The usual application period is in February, and it's a popular school. (A friend of Isaac's was wait-listed last year.) So I was expecting to hear about the waiting list, or about opportunities for mid-year enrollment. Instead the director told me that they had openings in September in their three-year-old class. Perhaps due to my long-term preschool ambivalence, I wasn't sure if I thought this was good news.

Despite being uncertain at the very idea of sending Isaac to preschool, Craig and I went on the tour. We feel sad at the idea of losing two precious mornings with Isaac every week. He would attend Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9:00 a.m. to noon. That's six hours a week that could no longer be devoted to hanging out, or pulling weeds, or random playdates. We have a regularly scheduled playgroup on Wednesday mornings, and I work one day a week, but if we drop our Monday morning music class, I guess that still leaves us with three unstructured mornings. (Sure, afternoons are still free, but they're not as cheerful or relaxed as the mornings.)

The preschool turns out to be great. We liked their philosophy, the physical set-up, the staff, the vibe, the location, and Isaac liked their toys. (He actually had a great time there.) The school is a co-op, so there are always four parent volunteers in the classroom along with the five regular teachers, and we like the idea of being closely involved with the school. I glanced at their parent manual, and I approve of their strategies for handling both conflict and praise.

I guess we'll go ahead and fill out the application and submit our nonrefundable $60 application fee. But I keep thinking that we don't have to send Isaac to preschool yet -- we could wait until he turns four, and he would still get one year of preschool (assuming he starts kindergarten the September he turns five). I can't tell if I have garden variety "my baby is growing up too fast" cold feet, and I'll be fine once school actually starts, or if I would really be happier preserving our private and minimally-structured lives for as long as I can.

The librarian's son

Last night, as he was falling asleep, Isaac announced, "Both warthogs and wildebeests snort." Then he asked, "Do warthogs breathe?"

"Yes," I told him. "All animals breathe."

"Do even little babies breathe?"

"Yes," I told him. "We all need to breathe to stay alive."

"Why?"

"You know what, honey?" I told him. "I'm not sure why."

"But we can look it up!" he said cheerfully.

New shoes times two

You may recall that I wasn't that happy with the last pair of shoes I bought for Isaac. Initially I disliked what I saw as the lack of style, but I quickly grew to hate the laces, which required double-knotting to stay fastened. Isaac didn't like them either -- he couldn't get the shoes on or off on his own, which frustrated him. And it wasn't that convenient for us, either!

So even though the hated sneakers still fit Isaac, today we bought another pair of new sneakers, this time with Velcro fastenings. His feet measured as a size nine, which means he has grown one size in the past five months. We bought another pair of Vans, because even though Isaac's old Vans had gotten too small for him, he still wanted to wear them. So he is once again wearing skater shoes that were popular when I was in junior high school in 1982. I'm pleased. (The new Vans are a size nine, which apparently corresponds to a size ten, according to the saleswoman.)





And, as you can see, we bought new sandals as well, also in a size nine -- I didn't want to buy these a whole size too large because I didn't want a repeat of last summer, where we bought sandals so big that it was the middle of winter before he grew into them. What's the point of that? These super-cool Keens also have Velcro fastenings -- in addition to being sturdy, closed-toe, waterproof, and a fabulous flaming orange color that isn't conveyed by this photograph.

Know-it-all

"Which is the only planet that hasn't been visited by spacecraft?"

No, Isaac isn't an astronomy prodigy. We went to a party yesterday where we met a talkative boy of about seven years of age, and he was the one who was interested in outer space. I found him irritating, especially because his space-fact recitations tapped into fears about Isaac that I didn't even know I had.

I didn't know the answer to his question about the planets, but my fellow party guest was more than happy to inform me that it was Pluto.

"I thought Pluto wasn't a planet any more," I said with more satisfaction than was appropriate.

He looked stricken and mumbled, "This was from before they decided it wasn't a planet."

Later I recounted this interaction to the boy's father (a scientist, by the way), and he told me that they have a talking toy that recites facts about the solar system, and it does predate 2006, when Pluto was demoted to "dwarf planet." He told me that the previous day his son had played with the toy for two hours straight, which begins to explain why his party conversation was mostly comprised of facts about outer space.

But "conversation" isn't the right word. Several times I tried to discuss outer space with the boy, but he didn't want a dialog -- he was more interested in lecturing me while I nodded politely. I don't think he was autistic, either. I think he was a know-it-all.

I recognize this because, as they say, it takes one to know one. I'm not sure I was the type of child who cornered strange adults at parties and overwhelmed them with a recitation of facts -- I think I was too shy, and more likely to just bring a book. But something about this boy's behavior seemed chillingly familiar. Perhaps I am only a know-it-all with people I already know?

- - - - -

Isaac has picked up several of my more pedantic expressions, which makes me afraid that he could be heading into the same know-it-all territory:

• Actually ...
• In fact ...
• You know ...

Because we recognize it as a problem in our own lives, maybe Craig and I can provide Isaac with social skills coaching if we see him turning out to be an irritating know-it-all. The problem is that we may be blinded by love -- everything Isaac says is fascinating to us.
.

Preschool application questions

How would you describe your child? What are his/her greatest strengths/needs?

He is verbally expressive, calm, even-tempered, and easy-going. He is cautious but curious, reserved but amiable, slow to warm up but ultimately adaptable.

What are his/her major interests/choices during free time at home?

Toy vehicles, blocks, being read to, pretending to do real work (cleaning, using tools), imaginary play with adults.

What kinds of responsibilities does your child have at home? What are your expectations of him/her?

Few responsibilities -- sometimes clearing own dishes, picking up a few toys. We expect him to be polite and nonviolent, and not to whine.

Does your child have any special learning or counseling needs? Please describe.

He is sensitive and cautious and is easily impressed by warnings from adults -- too many "be careful"s overwhelm him and make him retreat from the situation, so a gentle touch is needed when explaining potential dangers.

Does your child have any fears or anxieties we should know about? Please describe.

He is nervous around things that might make a loud noise, like vacuum cleaners and hand dryers.

What are your expectations of us during this coming year?

We want Isaac to have fun and feel cherished.

Not my best day

The exact circumstances and details don't matter, but yesterday I was so tired and so ill-tempered that parenting an equally tired (although not nearly as cranky) toddler was a challenge. Unfortunately, I completely failed to meet this challenge.

In fact, I failed to meet it repeatedly, and with a kind of sadistic relish. I think I yelled at Isaac more times yesterday than I had in the previous two years and nine months of his life. And I mean really yelled, too, sometimes for no real reason.

Which one of these situations do you like best?

1) When, after Isaac climbed on a chair to reach the kitchen counter and hungrily reached out for my sandwich fixings, I said angrily, "Don't touch my ham!"

2) When, after Isaac refused to pick up his toys so that our cleaning people would be able to vacuum the floor, I said bitterly, "Well, if you don't help me pick up the toys I might just have to take them all away, and then you'll have no toys at all! How would you like that?"

3) When, after Isaac stuck his head into my room where I was resting instead of playing quietly by himself in his own room as I had instructed, I said coldly, "Go back into your room and close the door and don't come out until Mama comes to get you!"

Of these three, only situation number one actually made him cry. When I looked down at him, I saw that his lips were quivering and big tears were running silently down his cheeks. Number two struck him as an interesting proposition, and he actually suggested it might be a good idea if I did take away his toys. That's an excellent reason to not use such a ridiculous ultimatum with a two-year-old -- you get backed right into a corner. The terrible thing about number three was that I repeated the sentence over and over, drowning out whatever he was trying to say to me, until he gave up and left the room.

And those were only three of yesterday's many examples of bad parenting.

So I'll write this embarrassing and shameful post as a reminder to myself -- whenever I start feeling smug and overconfident as a parent, I can come back and read about my behavior yesterday, and that will bring me back in touch with reality. Parenting is hard, and I need to be prepared to work at it, and yesterday I just didn't try hard enough. Poor Isaac.

Rhythm

We only have three classes left in our Music Together session, and I'm considering signing up for one more session after this. I doubt we'll keep it up once Isaac starts school two days a week in the fall, however. (Yes, we took the plunge and enrolled him in the preschool!)

I think he enjoys the music class, although he alternates between smiling widely and burying his face in his hands. When he gets really overwhelmed he even hides in my lap! Only certain activities seem to trigger the hiding response -- not plain old singing, but nursery rhymes and chants, especially those with exaggerated facial expressions and gestures. He loves to watch the teacher recite these, but as soon as she looks his way, he needs to hide.

But playing rhythm instruments is by far his favorite part of class. He gets very excited! When the teacher got out the box containing the sticks that you see in this photo, Isaac leaped to his feet and was at her side before she even set the box down in the middle of the room. He was the first one to grab up a pair of sticks, and then he was the only one to stand up while playing them.

He always stands up and sways back and forth while he plays, whether he shakes a tambourine, rattles jingle bells, or hits a resonator bar with a little mallet. He seems to have rhythm -- but only while he's playing an instrument. When it's time to dance around with a scarf, for example, his enthusiasm wanes. In fact, instead of waving around his tie-dyed scarf during the dancing part of class, he usually uses it to pretend to clean the mosaic windows you see in the background of this photo.

Disadvantages of early literacy

My parents were visiting recently, and my mother brought an apple pie. After we finished lunch I wanted to get Isaac settled down for his nap, and I wanted to warn my parents to not start eating the pie in front of him. But I knew the very mention of pie would be disruptive, so I used an age-old parental technique: spelling.

I asked my parents, "Would you please wait until later for the p-i-e?"

Isaac looked at me intently, and asked, "What does p-i-e spell?"

Busted!

And of course I told him the truth. What kind of parent lies to their child about spelling? That seems counter-productive in the long run.

Hair

Instead of outgrowing his interest in my hair as a comfort object, Isaac seems to be getting even more interested. We've tried several times to substitute nice soft objects, but he hasn't responded. He likes to stroke my hair when he's sleepy, worried, sick, hurt, or just feeling especially affectionate. (Unfortunately my hair doesn't put him to sleep -- he seems to enjoy it so much that he stays awake to play with it, so I have to forcibly remove his hand when I want him to drop off.) He's gentle, but sometimes it's a little annoying, especially when he grabs my bangs and rests his forearm right down the middle of my face.

Is he ever going to outgrow it? Quite a few months ago he said, "Even though Isaac's not a little baby anymore, I still like hair. Even when I'm a man, I'll still like hair."

How will this enthusiasm manifest itself when he's a man? Last night I got tired of putting him to bed, so I told him I was going to leave his room to get a drink of water. "Then Daddy can come in," Isaac said, "and I can play with Daddy's hair." He thought about it for a moment, and then added, "Daddy's hair is too short. I don't like men's hair. I like women's hair better."

I guess I know what he'll be looking for in a girlfriend.
.

Pronunciation

I guess Isaac's pronunciation is slowly improving, but there are still a few sounds that he doesn't pronounce. He truly can't say R (which is very common, I guess) or W when it starts a word. He finally can say F, S, and V, but usually doesn't, frustratingly, especially when they start a word. My theory is that because he learned to talk early, before he was physically capable of pronouncing every letter, he learned to say many words using substitute sounds. Now he'll have to relearn them.

We've started to remind him that he knows how to pronounce these letters, since otherwise it appears he'll keep using the substitute sounds (usually an H). His parents can usually understand him, after all, so what's his motivation? Well, other adults can't always understand him, which doesn't bother me that much, especially when they are polite and patient enough to figure it out. But now Isaac is beginning to talk more to other kids, and they aren't polite or patient. One of his playmates recently turned to me and said simply, "I can't understand what Isaac is saying." This made me feel really bad for Isaac.

We were at my cousin's baby shower yesterday, and Isaac was talking with a little girl a year or two older than himself. I overheard her say indignantly, "There are no cows in the garage!" Isaac looked confused, so I stepped in and explained to her that he had probably said cars. "No," the little girl insisted, "he said cows. There aren't cows in the garage!" (I've had the same problem with this pronunciation, in fact.)

He doesn't like having his pronunciation corrected, of course -- who does? We currently just try to correct words that should begin with F and S, using two different methods. One method is simply repeating the word emphasizing the correct pronunciation, and the second involves pretending we didn't understand the word. Isaac usually ignores the first method, and the second irritates him. Sometimes he'll correct himself, but more often he'll (1) rephrase his statement using words that don't contain the problematic letter, or (2) substitute an even less understandable letter as a joke.

Here are examples of his two approaches:

(1) Isaac, hoping dinner is over, asks Craig, "Are you full?" He pronounces full as hull, so Craig pretends not to understand. Isaac rephrases the question and asks, "Are you done eating?"

(2) Isaac asks me when the figs will be ripe. He pronounces figs as higs, so I pretend not to understand. Isaac gets a roguish expression on his face and asks me when the pigs will be ripe.

- - - - -

He has a few other lingering weird pronunciations, like the substitution of PE for SM -- smell is pe-ell, smash is pe-ash. And CH fills in for SN, so snuggle is chuggle.

- - - - -

His pediatrician did say that if he isn't making progress with his pronunciation by age three, we could consider speech therapy. I think things are improving, although I bet a speech therapist would have some fun games that would readily inspire Isaac to try harder. It's not much fun or motivation when your parents are obviously only pretending not to understand you. We'll probably just end up giving him a complex, or a stutter.

We miss Daddy

For a while now, we've been sick around here. I first started feeling under the weather two Wednesdays ago, and now, almost two weeks later, I'm still tired and congested. Craig returned from a business trip that Friday and promptly came down with it too, to the extent that he actually stayed home from work for three days last week. Isaac finally succumbed over this past weekend, but thankfully only seems to be a little bit sick (although unfortunately it manifests itself as irritability and clinginess).

It was nice to have Craig at home, honestly. For one, it took the combined energies of two sick adults to cope with one healthy toddler. But even when sick, Craig is an incredible caretaker -- he still grocery-shopped, cooked, cleaned, and rocked Isaac to sleep. What a man!

After spending six days in a row with both parents at home, Isaac was a little disappointed to find Craig gone this morning. As soon as he woke up (in my bed) and turned his head to see Craig's vacant pillow, he asked me, "Where did Daddy go?" After I explained that he was at work, Isaac said, "I don't like that."

Me neither.

Frisbee

Last month I resolved to pay closer attention to Isaac's physical development. Well, here's something new: he can throw a Frisbee like nobody's business.

Actually, it isn't even a Frisbee -- it's a plastic bucket lid, which probably makes it harder to throw well. But he can send that thing flying hard, often for 30 feet, without a wobble. Yesterday he threw it about 25 times in a row, laughing each time as he ran to retrieve it.

The only problem is that Isaac has no aim. He can't even predict whether the Frisbee is going to fly in front of him or behind him. He throws it like a discus, spinning around, but he releases it at varying points during the spin, which makes the direction utterly unpredictable. The poor dog and I had to stay alert to avoid being decapitated. (And unfortunately that made Walt a lot less interested in helping to retrieve it.)

Considering that Craig and I are lacking in sporting instinct, I'm curious to see how Isaac's athletic ability develops.

We need a nap

If you take a look at the recent sleep data on Izzy Info, Isaac's baby-tracking site, you'll see something new: four days in a row with no nap.

Although this is the longest he's ever gone without a nap, I've seen it coming for a while now -- it has been about three months since his naps were nice and regular. That's when he stopped dependably nursing to sleep at naptime, and since then I haven't been able to get him to nap unless I drive him around in the car. I should have paid more attention to those books that advise helping your child develop multiple "paths to sleep." We had one good method, and it always worked, so I never bothered practicing any others. It should have occurred to me that he might need to keep napping longer than he would want to keep nursing.

But why isn't he napping? He still needs a nap. He's tired in the afternoons, and he's exhausted by bedtime. He actively fights his naptime sleepiness, though, so I guess it's just more fun for him to stay awake even if it doesn't feel good. He has been making up for his lack of naps by going to bed earlier (and easier) and sleeping longer at night, so it's not a total disaster, but it's certainly not ideal.

After a few weeks of driving Isaac around to get him to fall asleep, I've decided to stop doing it. I mean, what kind of life is that for either of us? It's time-consuming for me, and he's not even learning how to fall asleep on his own. Plus then I have to lift him out of his carseat and carry him in from the car, and he's heavy -- and sometimes he wakes up anyway.

But I still put him down every afternoon, because I keep hoping that a consistent naptime routine and enforced quiet time will eventually trigger sleep. Sometimes I sit by his bed and help him stay lying down for 15 minutes or so. Sometimes I put a childproof cover on his doorknob and make him stay in his room by himself for 30 or 45 minutes, even though he gets out of bed and plays. When Craig is home, he rocks Isaac in his arms until he grows very sleepy, then puts him into bed, but even this works less and less frequently.

I just wonder what the chances are, at this point, of Isaac learning to fall asleep for a nap lying down in his own bed. Is it too late for an almost-three-year-old to learn new naptime skills?

Art

Isaac has been doing a lot of painting lately. We bought paints and brushes for him about two months ago, right after his enjoyable painting experience at Studio Grow, but he didn't get to use them until last week when I moved his easel outside.

I guess there must be a way to let a toddler paint inside the house, but the idea makes me nervous. Nearly every time he draws at the easel with markers, he concludes his art session by coloring on the floor. It's how he lets me know he's finished. The markers are washable, and our floor is sealed concrete, so it's no big deal. The paints are also washable, but what if he decided to paint on something that can't be washed, like a book? Or the walls (on which the architect insisted we use flat paint, and which therefore don't take well to washing)? I don't want to have to watch him too closely. That doesn't facilitate the artistic process!

When he's a little older I'm sure I'll get more comfortable with indoor art, but right now I'm enjoying kicking back outside in the shade and watching him make a mess I can easily wash away with the garden hose.

Actually, there's little mess, as he's a tidy painter. I put an old t-shirt on him as a smock, but he almost doesn't need it. Maybe he'll loosen up the more he paints, but for now he seems pretty restrained. He frequently steps back, examines the page from a distance, and asks, "How does that look?" Sometimes he even asks, "Is that good enough?" -- which sends a chill through my own perfectionist heart. Talk about hindering the artistic process!

- - - - -

Although on Friday he was working on a painting for Father's Day, and and it was pretty cute when he stepped back and asked, "Is that good enough for the Father's Holiday?"

- - - - -

Today he made one of his first unprompted attempts at representational art. In the past he's done things like make circles for wheels when I suggested he paint a tractor, but this time he came up with an idea all on his own. I had just mixed up some pink paint at his request, and he painted a long vertical line with it. "It's a worm," he said. He added a blob at the top of the line and said, "There's the head." Then he added two little lines at the bottom and said, "And there's the feet!"

Yeah, he was making a joke.

Aminal game

"What kind of animal could we be?"

That's the question that prefaces Isaac's new favorite game, although he pronounces it aminal. (The seeds of the game were planted last month when he became concerned about the animals living in the woods.) It's a sedentary game, as he usually insists it be played while we are sitting on the bed or the couch. He likes when the animals have a den or a nest, which we usually make with pillows and blankets.

I suggest a variety of animals -- deer? foxes? coyotes? -- and he chooses one. Then we snuggle together in our den until it's time to eat. Then we venture out to seek appropriate food, be it leaves or rodents. Most often we are foxes, and we hunt for voles and moles (usually represented by wooden building blocks) and bring them back to the couch to nibble on them. The snuggling is important, but the game is mostly about eating.

It's kind of a boring game, honestly. Once you've discussed the food chain and animal diets, there's not much to it. Although after we're done pretending to eat, we do get to pretend to sleep.

- - - - -

Yesterday Craig and Isaac went to the Lindsay Wildlife Museum, where they got to see the actual fox get fed. To make it more interesting for the fox, its food was put in a box, then in a bag, then hung from a branch via a bungee cord. This fascinated Isaac. I wonder if it will change the game?

Reunion

My 21st high school reunion was held over the weekend. I opted out of the "elegant dinner-dance" on Saturday night (I didn't think I could stand hearing too much music from the late 1980s), but Isaac and I went to the casual picnic on Sunday afternoon. I saw a few old friends, and it was more fun than I had expected.

One thing that surprised me, although it shouldn't have, was the wide variety in the ages of my classmates' children. They ranged from infants to college students -- well, of course, as there was at least a 20-year span -- but for the most part they seemed to be aged eight to 13. Isaac was one of two toddlers there.

And as I cut up Isaac's hot dog into choke-free pieces, pushed him on the kiddie swing, and tried to prevent him from coating his hands with mud and smearing it on the side of the picnic kiosk, it did briefly occur to me that if I had done things differently, I could be done raising children by now. But even as I took him home, desperately overtired, and failed to get him to nap, I didn't regret a thing.

Eating

One side effect of the not-napping is the not-eating.

Sometimes at lunch, and often at dinner, Isaac is simply too tired to eat. This isn't the first time this has happened -- remember back in November when we put him on a strict sleep schedule because he was having a lot of trouble sleeping long enough at night? Back then he was so tired that he couldn't control himself long enough to eat. But he was barely two years old then, and at least it made some kind of developmental sense for him to throw his food on the floor (or on himself). Now that he's almost three, that kind of behavior is a surprise to me.

Yesterday he completed his lunch by smearing egg salad on both cheeks. It's clear that he is radically overtired.

Last night we went to a family gathering at my grandmother's house, and Isaac refused to eat any of the following items: a bean burrito, an enchilada casserole, a piece of avocado, a tortilla chip, potato salad, and a fresh pea pod with dip. He usually likes all of these foods. Although he did express some interest in food -- he told me, "I want something chocolatey and yummy." I refused to give him anything sweet until he ate at least some dinner. (Later on I discovered that my mother had given him half a chocolate-chip cookie.)

I'm not actually worried about Isaac's eating habits or his diet, per se. I believe that my job is to offer him appropriate food choices, and that his job is to decide what and how much to eat. And I know he won't let himself starve. But I don't like seeing the changes in his behavior that I suspect are triggered by sleep deprivation -- these include picky eating and playing with food.

Nursing

I forgot to note that yet another side effect of the not-napping is the not-nursing.

This past Sunday was the first (and only, so far) day that Isaac didn't nurse at all. He had slept just eight and a half hours on Saturday night, and he didn't nap Sunday afternoon, so he was out-of-control with exhaustion by bedtime that night. Even though I asked him if he wanted milk, he chose to go straight to bed. (He was feeling contrary enough that I think he would have declined anything I offered, no matter how desirable.)

I guess if he can get too tired and wild to eat, he can also get too tired to nurse. This never would have happened in the past -- if he was exhausted he would have found nursing a pleasant comfort, although he might have fallen asleep as soon as he started -- but things are changing. He is almost weaned.

I like to think of it as child-led weaning, but that's not true, I guess, because although when Isaac was younger I truly did nurse him on demand, I eventually began to manipulate the relationship. He was encouraged to night-wean around the time he turned 20 months old, and at the same time we began nursing on a schedule: morning, nap, and bedtime. It was actually very easy to set a schedule. He was never one of those toddlers who demanded milk at inconvenient times, and I never had to deal with my shirt being yanked up in public. He was perfectly content to wait until we got home and the announcement that it was time for milk. (In fact, if I hadn't kept offering, I wonder if he would have weaned a lot sooner.)

He dropped the morning session on his own when he was 26 months old, and he also chose to let the naptime session fall by the wayside over this past month (along with the nap, unfortunately). So now we're left with nursing at bedtime, but there's not much to it. In fact, Trixie Tracker reports that at his current age of 33 months, Isaac's daily nursing average is 5.6 minutes; his seven-day average has been 4.1 minutes.

Actually, I'm in total denial if I think this was "child-led" weaning, because starting in late April I began purposefully shortening our two remaining nursing sessions. (I started by trying to keep the daily total under 20 minutes.) At first Isaac was disappointed, and the first few nights when I stopped him he said sadly, "But I wasn't done."

But now, two months later, he never complains when I stop him from nursing. And, increasingly, most times he stops all on his own.

- - - - -

He does still say, "Yummy milk, Mama."

Should I be worried?

"I would like to cut off your head with a saw so I can play with your hair all the time," Isaac said this morning, not for the first time.

Yikes. I sure wish he had adopted a comfort object that wasn't me.

Then later on he said he was going to put a lampshade on me (or just my head? I was scared to ask) so I would be his night-light, and he would keep me in his house, and he would read books with me.

At least he will be a literate psycho.

A small improvement

I don't want to jinx myself by saying we've got the nap thing all figured out, but there has been a small improvement. Previously I had never been able to get Isaac to nap without either (1) nursing him to sleep or (2) driving him in the car. Just putting him in his bed at naptime was a total joke -- no way was he going to fall asleep.

But the last three times I attempted to get him to nap in his own bed? It actually worked!

So what made the difference? Well, first, black-out curtains. (Or, to be more precise, an opaque blanket nailed over the window.) Second, lying down in the bed next to him until he fell asleep.

You don't have to tell me that this isn't ideal. For one, he sleeps in a toddler bed, and it's a mighty tight fit for the two of us. Also, I'd like to get myself (and my hair) out of the comfort object business. It was already bad that he insists I stay in his bedroom for 30 to 60 minutes while he falls asleep at night -- adding another 15 to 25 minutes of hanging around waiting for a small child to fall asleep is a drag.

But not as big of a drag as the not-napping!

A small step back

I should have added a third point to the new and improved nap plan I detailed yesterday: ensure that child has visited the bathroom before lying down for the nap. I just dedicated half an hour to lying next to Isaac listening hopefully to his sleepy babbling and yawning only to realize it was all ruined when I heard his sudden announcement of "I need to poop."

(He sometimes wears a diaper during naptime, but he doesn't use it.)

After spending 15 minutes in the bathroom, it's unlikely he'll be able to get back to his previous sleepy state. Better luck tomorrow!

- - - - -

Edited to add:

I was wrong! It took another 30 minutes, but he was willing to lay there and give it a try, and now he's asleep!

Fish and chips

Thanks to a dinner of greasy fish and chips, I had a stomach ache tonight. As I was moaning and groaning about my gas pains, Isaac asked, "Will you still be able to take care of your child?"

He didn't seem concerned -- just curious. Naturally I assured him that nothing would prevent me from taking care of him.

This isn't the first time he has remarked on his own need for care, though. Sometimes when I just announce I'm leaving the room for a moment, he asks, "Who will keep an eye on Isaac?" Again, he doesn't seem worried -- he just wants to know what the situation will be.

He's not insecure or nervous about it. But is it normal for an almost-three-year-old to be so aware that adults are always watching out for him?

The three Rs

Don't get too excited -- Isaac isn't actually reading, writing, or doing arithmetic yet!

Reading

It turns out that Isaac can spell his name aloud. The first time I heard him do it, he sung it to the tune of "B-I-N-G-O," something he has heard us do before, so he had clearly memorized it. But he can also do it without singing, and as he has been able to recognize the individual letters for a while now, all he has to do is put those two pieces of information together to actually read his name. How exciting!

Writing

For a long time, Isaac preferred writing to drawing. For example, he got a John Deere tractor coloring book at a friend's birthday party in December, and he insisted on calling it his "writing book." (I'm happy he has finally expanded into art.) It was pretend writing, of course, as he never wrote anything that resembled an actual letter except for I and O (which he would be sure to point out). Lately he has been pretending to write checks, driving directions, and construction plans. He is a very practical-minded writer.

(Even though he doesn't pretend to be a creative writer himself, he does understand that books are written by people. When we read a new book, he wants to know who the author is.)

Arithmetic

He's working on counting to 20, which is also done strictly by memorization and recitation. If he's counting actual objects, he can only count accurately to three -- if there are more objects than that, he loses track of the ones he's already counted and doubles back to count them again until he reaches five. When he's reciting numbers he can get to ten accurately, but usually misses one or two of the teens. The number 20 is often called "twenty-teen." And after that comes "twenty-teen one," so he does understand how to build numbers.

Vacation

Isaac and I aren't going anywhere this summer. Craig, however, just spent two weeks working in Europe -- the first week in Amsterdam and the second in a fishing village in Portugal. We originally considered making it a family trip (last summer we flew three places -- New Mexico, Minnesota, and Montana) but with the extraordinary rise in the cost of airfare, it just didn't seem possible.

Actually, Isaac and I did go somewhere while Craig was in Europe. We drove to my parents' house, about 100 miles away, on two separate occasions. (After the first four nights we had to go back to our own home for a few days to take care of some business, but we returned as soon as we could.) Out of the 13 days Craig was gone, Isaac and I spent 11 days with my folks, only sleeping in our own beds three nights. Now that's a vacation!

I'm not kidding, either. A friend of mine, when I told her my plans, wondered how long I would be able to "stand" staying with my parents. I told her that wasn't a concern at all. My parents are always a pleasure to visit, friendly but undemanding, and they strike the perfect balance between socializing with me and being involved with their own projects. I'm not sure how long they would have agreed to put up with just me (I was a pretty lazy houseguest, seldom helping with meals or doing dishes, although I did buy some groceries and wash our bedding) but I came as a package deal with the real reward -- Isaac.

And my parents and Isaac really enjoyed each other. Isaac didn't even want to come back home! Opa and Oma read books to Isaac, invented crazy new games with him (anyone for Hide the Mallet?), and took him on long walks around the property to visit the tractors and the pond. We were there long enough for Isaac to get very comfortable with both of them as caregivers, and for all of us to develop new routines and habits as a family, and it made me realize that with small children, quantity time can be as important as quality time.

- - - - -

That's one of the things that makes me glad I'm able to stay at home with Isaac -- nothing says "I love you" like a hundred thousand instances of just being there, whether to pour a cup of milk or share a joke or give a hug. I guess as he gets older it will be increasingly important to make sure that we also do special and significant activities together, but sometimes all Isaac wants is to snuggle in the big bed and pretend to be foxes. (Jeez, I'm sounding a lot more sentimental than usual!)

- - - - -

Unfortunately we don't get to see Craig's parents very often, since they live on the opposite coast, and I feel bad that Isaac is missing out. But we talk about Grandpa and Grandma, and we look at pictures, which I guess is the best we can do right now.

Nearby

"I love you so much, I want you to stay nearby always."

A touching sentiment, yes, but not what I want to hear at bedtime when the goal is Isaac falling asleep by himself. He said this last night as he flung his arms around my neck and tried to clasp me to him. It wasn't even like I was leaving the room -- I was just trying to get out of his bed so I could sit in the chair instead.

As an aside, at least it's finally comfortable for me to lie in his bed, because yesterday we dismantled his toddler bed and moved a double bed into his room. The bed used to be in the extra bedroom used by my brother Joel, but it has hardly been slept in since he moved out. (We still have two guest rooms, dear readers, including one with a queen bed, so hopefully our hospitality will not be impaired.)

However, back to the request that I be "nearby always." We are trying to gently communicate the concept that even when Isaac is alone in his room, we are always nearby. Whether he likes it or not, however, we are going to have to start leaving him alone to fall asleep, because he's becoming increasingly distracted when I am in the room. First he tries to talk to me, which can go on for 15 or 20 minutes.* When he finally realizes I'm not going to engage in conversation, he becomes emotional, which can go on for another 15 minutes. Recently he has ended up crying because I refused to get out of the chair to give him yet another hug. When he gets that upset he often wants me to leave his room, even saying "Mama leave!" rather bitterly. Then he cries in earnest until someone goes back in to calm him down.

Basically the entire system has broken down. Despite our best efforts, he clearly doesn't feel safe, or emotionally supported, or happy about sleep. On eight nights in the past two weeks it has taken him 45 minutes or more to fall asleep.

Is there hope for change? Well, for a two-week period in September 2007 he was happy to fall asleep with no one in the room with him, but it hasn't really happened since. We managed it then without ever leaving him to cry-it-out, so I hope we can ease our way into it again.

- - - - -

*What does he talk about when he's supposed to be falling asleep? It's not the charming spontaneous stream-of-consciousness stuff he used to say, unfortunately. Recently his subjects have been pretty cleverly selected to delay and distract: Daddy put my diaper on too tight. I think my diaper's twisted. I don't want to sleep in a yucky pee diaper. Help me take my pajama top off. These aren't the pajamas I meant to choose. I don't like it when it's this dark. What's that shadow? Do garbage trucks really burp? Do garbage trucks really have eyes? Hey, I'm asking you a question: do garbage trucks really burp?

Okay, maybe some of it is still charming.

- - - - -

I'm back to complaining about night time sleep because the naps are working out so well. In the past two weeks he's only missed one nap, and that might have been because he slept in until 8:20 that morning. So things aren't all bad.

Isaac delivers some news

Isaac talked to his Opa and Oma on the phone this evening. The very first thing he said to them was "We have a new baby." My parents, who have known this for a while, pretended to be surprised, and Isaac went right on to say, "He's a girl."

We don't actually have the new baby girl yet, but she is indeed on her way. I am just over 12 weeks pregnant, due in mid-January.

Today was the first time Isaac was told about it, officially speaking. But we've been talking about it behind his back for three months now, sometimes not so subtly, and I think he might have figured it out on his own. In fact, Craig and I were just getting ready to tell Isaac this afternoon when he brought it up himself. He said, "We could have a new baby at our house." He has often said things like, "We could give the bouncy seat to a new baby," but he usually means someone else's baby. This was the first time he has mentioned that the baby might actually be one that lives here with us.

We saw a window of opportunity, and Craig told him that yes, our family will have a new baby coming to live with us sometime after Christmas. Then Craig asked if we could give the baby Isaac's old crib. Isaac immediately said, "Yeah. And we can put it right here, next to Isaac's new bed!" We told him the baby would be a girl, his little sister. Then he wanted to continue reading books.

Based on his reaction I assumed that Isaac wasn't that impressed by what was, after all, fairly abstract news about a distant event. (Even I find it a little hard to imagine!) He obviously wasn't upset, but mostly he didn't seem to care. But after he so readily announced it to my parents, I've reconsidered that position. It's definitely on his mind.

I guess the next few days (and weeks and months and years) will give us all the opportunity to gauge his emotional reaction to gaining a sibling. Although, based on my own experience of having siblings, I imagine Isaac will have several reactions, probably opposing, and perhaps simultaneously.

Mine and ours

"Isaac made a cobbler with my Oma!"

Isaac did enjoy making an apricot cobbler with my mother on Monday, but the unusual thing about this statement was his use of the word "my." I think it was the first time he claimed ownership of a person. As soon as he did it, I think he realized he really likes saying it that way, because now he's almost completely switched over. Previously he would have said, "Opa has a new tractor," but now he says, "My Opa has a new tractor."

It can sound a little funny when he's talking to one of us. "I want to snuggle in the big bed with my Mama," he'll tell Craig. Well, of course -- who else's mother could he mean? But he continues to practice his specificity. Sometimes he even says "my Mama Nicole," just to make it perfectly clear.

His cutest use of the possessive so far is when he hugs my belly and says he's hugging "my baby" or "my baby sister." Sometimes he generously includes the rest of us and says he's hugging "our baby." (He also says "our sister," which I haven't tried to clarify yet.)

"Our" baby

Today after lunch Isaac and I were sharing a lounge chair in the shade at the edge of our lawn. He was in my lap, facing me, with his head resting on my shoulder. He was getting a little sleepy, so I jokingly asked him if he wanted to have his nap outside.

"Could we sleep out here all night, too?" he asked.

"Sure," I said. "We can stay out here all day and all night, just like this."

"Then after Christmas when our baby is born, we can come right back out here, just like this," he said.

"We might need to make room for our baby on the chair too," I said. "She'll need someone to hold her."

Isaac considered this for a moment. "My Daddy can hold the baby," he said.

Ah. "Our" only goes so far, I see.

New pictures

I've finally gotten around to adding the last two months' worth of pictures to Isaac's latest album.

Here he climbs (well, sits in) a very cool big tree. Isaac claimed it was a "tree train truck," however -- anything can be a vehicle if you try hard enough.

More birdwatching

Today as Isaac was looking out my bedroom window, he said, "There's a bird on the fence. But I don't know what kind."

I was in the bathroom brushing my teeth, so I told him I couldn't see it.

"It looks like some kind of junco," he said. "Or maybe a chickadee."

When I was done brushing, I came out and took a look for myself. It was a black phoebe. And you know what? As far as the other birds that Isaac can identify, a junco was an excellent comparison for it.

- - - - -

a phoebe








a junco







- - - - -

See here for Isaac's earliest efforts at bird identification.

Antibiotics

Exactly two weeks after he had his last breast milk, Isaac had his first antibiotics. Coincidence?

Well, probably. He had been tapering off for months before that, and for two weeks before he stopped completely he was only nursing for one or two minutes a day. That's probably not enough to have any protective effect. I still wonder, though! But I'm also just plain grateful that he almost made it to three years of age before getting sick enough to need antibiotics.

The poor kid developed some kind of infection on his (as my father described it to my grandmother) private parts. It was very painful, although apparently not unusual or a big deal. Through the magic of antibiotics, which he has been taking for less than 48 hours, he says he feels nearly normal now.

It started on Sunday morning when we were out of town visiting my parents -- because no kid ever gets sick during regular office hours, right? Based on the phone advice of the on-call pediatrician at our usual office, we took Isaac to a local urgent care facility.

It went pretty smoothly, although Isaac cried hysterically during the actual examination. The doctor barely touched him during the exam, since it was so clear that it was painful, but I guess the anticipation of being hurt was pretty frightening.

As soon as I got Isaac's pants pulled back up, he turned to the doctor. "You can leave now," Isaac said firmly.

- - - - -

Isaac loves the antibiotic, which is strawberry flavored. I think it smells revolting, but I'm glad there's no problem getting him to take it. Since this is his first time taking prescription medication, this was also my first time using the Trixie Tracker feature that lets you schedule doses of medicine in advance. (We have often used the feature for tracking stand-alone doses of over-the-counter medicine, like Tylenol for teething pain or fever.)

It's pretty cool, like all of Trixie Tracker. I can see at a glance when the prescription started, when it will end, how long ago Isaac got his last dose, and in how many hours his next dose is due.

- - - - -

One benefit of the infection is that it has given us plenty of chances to discuss good hygiene. Germs are still pretty abstract, like anything you can't actually see, but at least Isaac now knows they can have a real (and painful) effect.

"Bacteria," Isaac said reflectively as he lay in bed on Sunday night. "Bacteria. What is front-teria?"

- - - - -

Last night my parents and I were discussing dessert. My mother asked, "Is it time for p-i-e yet?"

"What does that spell?" Isaac asked, apparently not having learned it last time.

I gestured toward the kitchen counter where the apple pie sat, and asked him, "What starts with the letter P?"

"Penis!" Isaac shouted.

Well, it has been on his mind a lot lately.