Daley Ponderings

Combine shorts/shortsleeves with pricker bushes and concrete and childhood exploration.  Jonathan takes care of himself now, and Noah does sometimes, but I've been doing lots of bandaging for Faith.  She's pretty good about leaving them on, but when they fall off she is insistent that a new one goes on right away.

4/19 - Faith adds new words all the time now.  "Dit" means sticker, this is often accompanied by pointing to the back of her hand (put a sticker there, please.)  "Niw" or "miw" for milk, accompanied by the milk sign.  She sounds like a little kitten when she says it!  "Dide" or "ide" for outside or inside, depending on circumstance.

We have lots of violets in our backyard.  Jonathan calls them butterfly flowers.  I used to remind him that they are called violets, and then I read that their scientific name is viola papilonacea.  It means "butterflylike violet" - so Jonathan was right!  He's just speaking English and not Latin. (:

4/22 - Jonathan, sniffing deeply, "Broccoli makes my nose thirsty."

4/23 - Faith was helping me unload the dishwasher.  If she picked up an item she didn't know where to put she asked me, "Doh?"  ("Where does it go?")  One time she picked up a small mixing bowl and put it in the low cabinet where it belongs.  Later, she picked up a larger mixing bowl, and very carefully took out the previous one and stacked them according to size before replacing them in the cupboard.

Last night we visited our friends who have a farm and Faith several times repeated "dat" and "dod" for cat and dog.  She was afraid of all the animals except the cats.

Last night was a bluegrass jam session and it was such a blast.  Jon brought his guitar, though he'd not done bluegrass before.  People sat and stood around a circle, playing away.  It was fun to listen to and sometimes sing along if I knew the words.  Young and old together, great players and medium players.  Jon plucked around on a banjo for a while.  There was a bass fiddle that got passed around to whomever wanted to play.  The kids who were not playing instruments ran around the farm, in and out of the garage where the music was. It was a blast.  Mom, you would have loved it!  One of the girls led some fiddle tunes and the banjos and guitars jammed along with her.  It reminded me of Janet's fiddling days and I thought of that lion-headed fiddle.  They played Red River Valley, Cotton-Eyed Joe, and Rocky Top among many others.  Amazing Grace, I'll Fly Away, and other old gospel hymns.

Noah and Jonathan got covered with farm dirt and bruises; Jonathan stuck a turkey feather over one ear; Noah carried a cat around for a while.  Faith stuck with me the whole time, but did ride on a tricycle a bit with me pushing.

Here are my notes from when Jon was in the Dominican Republic:

Saturday - first dinner with Daddy gone - When Faith saw that Daddy was not in his chair at the table, she looked for him in the computer room.  The next morning when I got up first, Noah commented that usually Daddy is up first.  I asked, "Do you remember where he is?"  Noah says, in an "of course" tone, "In his bed!"  When I replied that he was not, then Noah remembered "minihan public."

They were really good in church, except for Noah during the sermon, wiggling and lolling.  After church they were exceptionally well behaved.

Jonathan helped Noah get to bed on nights when I had to take care of Faith.  Jonathan often helped me by putting on Faith's diaper and pants.

We had a relaxed pace for everything except getting to Faith's checkup appointment on time.  One of the reasons Jonathan was looking forward to Jon being gone (that he was unable to articulate for a while) was that he was excited about having more of my time, that I would not be spending any time with Daddy so I'd have more time for him.  This spurred me to make a special time for Jonathan more often than we had before.

I realized if something needed to be done, it was me who had to do it, so I might as well do it now since there's no point in waiting to see if someone else does it.  That was not as tiring as I thought, and I thought that I should just do those sorts of things anyway even when Jon gets back. 

God poured out much grace and I poured out lots of prayer.

Spring really helped - everyone was cheerful and excited and we could play outside a lot.
--End of Daddy Gone Notes-- (More)

3/19 - Mommy asks, "Where are all those hiccups coming from?"  Faith responds by opening her mouth wide and pointing down her throat.

2/23 - Faith said "I love you" to me!  It sounds rather like "hello" with three syllables.  She also tries to do the sign, and ends up with just her index finger up.  She does this when leaving my presence (yes, she's started doing that more and more!) - she waves and says "bye-eye" and waits for me to respond, "Bye, I love you.  See you later!"

She now clearly and more often says "no" and "uh-huh" and "doh" (don't).  She also said "aye-dow" when she wanted me to hold her upside-down yesterday.

She plays with her brothers without me a lot now, even outside.  They take such good care of her.  They have even been known to put on new diapers and clothes for her!

They love each other so much, it is so fun to watch them interact.

I am working on teaching Faith how to use the stool to climb up onto the closed toilet so she can reach the sink to wash her hands.  She can do this now, and we're working on getting back down, which is harder.  Very soon we'll do her potty-training day.  I know it will be different than it was with Noah - she'll need more of my assistance - but it will be very nice to be done with diapers for the moment.

One time during school Faith made a nice design with pattern blocks that resembled a sun.  She likes writing and playing with the blocks, cuisenaire rods, and balance scale.  Usually, all the pieces are on the floor by the time I'm done with the boys' school.  But she is good at helping me clean up afterwards.

Faith is such a joy to have in our house!

It got up to 67 F outside this afternoon.  We had a picnic lunch and then spent a long time outside enjoying the sunshine (kids absorbing lots of vitamin D) and playing with rocks.  Jonathan cleaned and filled the hummingbird feeder.  I filled the regular bird feeder.  I put away shovels and cleaned up the yard a bit (rocks from the paths had gotten shoveled into the grass with the snow).  Hooray for spring!  I even opened up the windows to let some fresh air in.  It only lasted for about an hour because the outside temperature started dropping, but it was very nice.  (More)

2/23 - Faith repeated the Church of the Ascension doorbell, singing exactly on pitch.

2/24 - Noah was working with Jon on pronouncing "sure" correctly, having trouble with the "sh" sound at the beginning.  Finally, he said to Jon, "How 'bout I just say 'mm-hmm'?"

3/4 - Faith was exploring her reflection in the convex mirror of the mixing bowl.  She looked up and down, made faces in it, looked from the right and left.  Very fun to watch.

Faith is running now, working hard to keep up with her brothers.

Faith is using the toilet sign often now, and more than half the time, she goes.  Often she'll keep a diaper dry for hours.  I got the Toilet Training in Less Than A Day out from the library again and I think I'll do a session with her soon.  Then she'll be in underwear!  I'm debating about waiting until 20 months, which is their recommended starting age, but they do say some kids are ready at 18 months.

Today is clear and sunny and we had a picnic lunch out front, with an old shower curtain under the blanket to keep off the damp. Jonathan made a few games for us so it was kind of like a carnival!  He also made us lemonade, using three cups of sugar in a gallon of drink, so it was pretty potent.

I've been enjoying the snow and wintery weather (remember it did take a long time for winter to come this year!) but there just is something about the sunshine and warmth that's really nice.

2/11 - Noah, as we started school for the day, "I have my gun in my pocket in case any bad guys try to interrupt school."

2/13 - Faith says something that sounds very like "all done" when she is finished eating or going to the bathroom.  She also says "doe" for toes or nose.

2/20 - Faith is now consistently using the toilet sign (it looks like she's shaking an invisible pencil).  She does not use it every time she needs to go, but when she thinks about it, and sometimes at diaper changes.

Noah's work with putting the /g/ and /k/ sounds into his regular speech is coming along great!  Many words now come out correctly without him thinking about it, many more come out correctly the second time.  Since he is now listening and paying attention to how he is speaking, he has also improved other words, such as "seven".   It used to be "eh-uh" even though he can say /n/.  Now it's "eh-un."  /s/ and /v/ will come later.  I just ordered the second Speechercise cd and am looking forward to working on these new sounds with him.

Jonathan made a Lego olympics, with figure skaters, speed skaters, and luge riders.  He even made the bench that the figure skaters sit on with their coach while waiting for their scores. (:  (One of his sets of figure skaters are Han Solo and Princess Leia.  Their coach is a droid!) The ice rink was a flat base turned upside down.  He and Noah had two zambonis.

Jonathan has been reading up a storm.  He found a Star Wars book and has been steadily working away at it.

He had been having trouble with the fact that we solve math problems from left to right no matter where the unknown is.  For example, if the problem was [ ] = 9 - 5, he would write -4 in the blank spot.  "Five minus nine equals negative four."  He was quite frustrated with this for a few days, but the last time I gave him a worksheet with that kind of problem, I simply reminded him that the problems read from left to right, and he did fine.

2/1 - Jonathan, munching on dried cranberries, "I would have a happy life with air, cranberries, a Bible, and chips."

2/2 - Faith followed two-step directions:  go get her shoes (from the other room) and put them in the shoe rack.

2/4 - Jonathan, "Life is so fun, I can't resist it!"

The last several days, Noah has been spontaneously saying words with /k/ and /g/ sounds, and coming up to us to show us that he can do it.

The boys have been praying for another baby sister.  Recently, Noah thought he'd ask for two.  Then he commented, "Then we would have three!"  Noah can add!

I got a video of Noah showing me the bits.  If he didn't know one, he'd say, "hobo" or "hada" or some such made up word.  It's hard to catch what he says if you don't know it, so I'll write what he does say, "American Flag" (amehuhu a), "potato", "carrot" (eh-huh), "orange" (it's really a grapefruit, but you can't blame the mixup), "green grapes" (een ape) and my favorite "strawberry" (ah-bee-beh-hee).  I'd been wanting to record him saying strawberry for a while.

Noah is doing great at his speech practice.  When he thinks about it, he can do /k/ and /g/ sounds at the beginning, ending, and middle of words.  Examples: "big pig" "good guy" "duck"  I'm so encouraged!

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Faith can crawl downstairs now, and off chairs and couches.

1/14 - Faith finally signed milk.  She still only does it with prompting, but it's a start.

1/13 - Noah said broccoli with prompting "bwah-kuh-wee"

We've been working hard on /k/ and /g/ in school.  On 1/15, he said "gum" correctly and fluidly.  This is a major accomplishment!  (Normally he leaves the tricky consonants off entirely.  When concentrating, he can say the sound with a space before the next sounds, like "c--at".  He can do a few sounds like "ca" and "kuh".  Then "kuh--t" (cut) but not "cut".  So this "gum" was a breakthrough.

Other things Noah says which I think are more normal mistakes are switching some consonants.  He says "wordl" for "world" and "mintuh" for "minute".

Some Noah quotes:

1/14 - He crashed when standing on a cchair and leaning over the back.  He seemed a bit shaken but did not cry.  I asked him if he needed a kiss.  The reply: "Superbats always okay when them fall over."

1/16 - At lunch, I asked Faith to "bite down."  Noah commented, "Or bite up."  Right.  Our lower jaws go up when we bite.  Why do we call it biting down?

We spent two weeks in New Hampshire for Christmas.  It turns out that Faith doesn't really like snow.  She looked at me like I was from outer space when I offered her some to eat.  Hopefully this aversion does not last.  The boys, however, have a blast playing out in the snow.

Over the time we were there, Faith learned to say, "no" and "down"  which she pronounces without the "n".  She says "dow" to mean both up and down.

Jonathan and Noah got two sample karate lessons.

Jonathan went on a New Year's overnight with Grammy and her youth group to First Night in Burlington, VT.  He had "the best time ever!"

My wonderful mother-in-law (but I don't need a law to tell me to love you!) took me out to breakfast all by ourselves one morning.

January 3, Jonathan lost his second tooth.

When we got home, I rejoiced to see that God cares about the little things and prevented any mice from visiting my kitchen while we were gone!

1/6 - I discovered Jonathan and Noah using their new Christmas Nerf dart guns to play a geography game, shooting at the world map and seeing where they hit.

1/7 - All the kids were playing Rescue Team.  "Our number is 9-1-9, so if you need us, just call 9-1-9 and we'll come to the rescue!"  Pretty soon I had an emergency (there were bad guys locking the silverware drawer and I needed the forks to be rescued and put on the dinner table) and they came running.  The boys had their First Night bracelets on and their Nerf guns.  Faith had the play goggles on her face and a pencil in her hand.  She triumphantly stepped into the room, holding her pencil out and saying, "tada!"  It was priceless.

Noah has added a syllable to his pronunciation of Jonathan's name: "Ah-huh"

12/11 and following - My aunt gave us some plastic prisms and we have had a lot of fun playing with them in the kitchen (which is the sunniest room in our house.)  The rainbows come out quite nicely and the all the kids love to touch them and play with them. (More)

11/7 - Noah discovered the two cube puzzle that has pictures of six different vehicles and plays the sound of each when the puzzle is completed.  He was having trouble with it, which seemed strange to me at this age.  He kept getting the wrong sounds playing.  I told him to match up the pictures and it would work.  After a while, I took my attention off of Faith to watch Noah and see what the trouble was.  He was matching the pieces face to face instead of next to each other! (More)

I'll start with most recent and then go to my pocket notes.  Jonathan and Faith both had well child checkups yesterday.  As much as it seems like it would be easier to have two checkups together, it really isn't.  I'll go back to scheduling them separately.  It wasn't too bad, but a bit hectic and it took a long time. (More)

10/23 - Jon said, "Ask Jonathan an addition problem with two digit numbers that sum to a multiple of ten."  I asked him 53+17, and Jonathan figured out loud, "the seventeen goes to twenty, the fifty three goes to fifty...seventy!"

I signed Jonathan up for the Pizza Hut Book-it program and the way it works now is that you set your own goals.  We set a goal of thirty books a month - one a day.  He didn't really need extra motivation to read, but it's fun to get free pizza. (:  Some of the books he's read recently include The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham, Curious George, and Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel. (More)

Jonathan has created a new superhero.  Actually, a team of superheroes.  They are the SuperFire team, made up of as many different colors as you would like.  Super Orange Fire is the captain (that's usually Jonathan.)  Noah is often Super Blue Fire, or Super Green Fire.  I'm sure I'm forgetting details, but some of the features are that they can turn into fire and they can shoot worlds from their arms.  They have capes that can separate into wings.  The theme song includes phrases from the Ride of the Valkyries.  (More)