Bribery. . .

So after many false starts we're beginning to ramp up potty training. Unfortunately, now the little monkeybear is frightened of the potty. He doesn't want to pee in it. So last night I decided to see if he could hold a new concept in his head. . . bribery. Did I say bribery? I meant the sticker chart and rewards.

I asked him "do you want a new train for your train table?"
"New Thomas?" he asked back.
"Sure, Thomas or Rosy or whoever you want. Do you want a new train?"
"OK!"
"OK, if you go pee-pee on the potty 5 times we will go to Target and get you a new train!"

That's all it took, he ran for the door tugging at his diaper and went in to the bathroom. He sat down, peed, and said "I get Thomas at Target now?" I said "you have to go pee-pee 5 times."

As this was going on my wife found a piece of paper and some stickers. He put a sticker on the paper while eating his victory M&Ms.

I said "OK that's one time and you get a sticker, can you count the sticker."
"One" he counted.
"Good job. And if you get 5 stickers what do you get."
"New Thomas!"

So now we have a sticker chart to jump start the potty training process. At least it'll help get him over the initial fear.

I'm not above bribery.

Conversations with toddlers. . .

Mom: Are you a boy or a girl?
Toddler: Nuffin'
Mom: What about daddy? Is daddy a boy?
Toddler: No, he a BIG.
Mom: Daddy's big?
Toddler: Yeah.
Mom: Is he a boy?
Toddler: No, he a man.
Mom: Daddy's a man? What about you what are you?
Toddler: I two-and-a-half now.

A toddler never forgets. . .

As I get older, I forget things. . . a lot. Everything from the last name of a girl I dated briefly in college to where I put my keys (as the joke goes, the last place I end up looking for them). I think my memory is moving from me to my kid. He remembers pretty much everything. He remembers the name of the Friday's waitress that was nice to him, I forget to stop on the way home to buy milk. He remembers that one time at Target there was a Curious George puzzle in the bargain bin, I forget the capital of New Hampshire. He remembers that 8 hours earlier I promised to let him watch his favorite TV show, I forget that I promised to let him watch his favorite TV show 8 hours earlier.

He remembers several little tidbits of something from every experience. We drive by the local video store and he recalls that the Chipmunks poster that was there 3 weeks ago has been replaced by "a bwoo guy" from Avatar. He remembers that he and he once found a dead ladybug in the backyard. He remembers that when he and his mother pulled up to a particular stop sign she yelled "come on lady." All triggered by being again in a certain place at a certain time and all become the de facto thing that happens at that place and time.

I find it fascinating watch his little mind form memories. I listened to this show about memory, the first 20 minutes covers how memories are formed and recalled. The basic premise is that instead of recalling a memory—each time you remember it—you actually rebuild that memory. And when you do, you bring the emotions of the point of remembering and change the memory, weakening it. It makes me wonder how (or even if) the little monkeybear will remember what it was like to be this age. . . and it makes me realize that the more I lament on these memories myself the less pure the memories will be.

I know it's geeky, but it kind of makes me sad. Thinking back on him as a baby and realizing that I can never really remember what he was like because every time I do I change it a little. That the memory of seeing him for the first time will never be quite right in my head.

Toddler jokes. . .

The switch has been flipped. Our now two and a half year old has stopped speaking in one and two word fragments and started speaking in full sentences. One day it's all grunts and short smatterings of words the next a dissertation on the merits of wearing his pajamas all day and watching TV in our bed (great on weekends, a battle on weekdays).

Watching him gain his language skills makes me realize I took a completely wrong approach to learning Spanish a few years ago. I now understand how I should have approached learning a foreign language. I worried too much about verb tense and grammar when I should have just spoke poorly at first. Oh well live and learn.

He's also learning other things. He has been counting to 12 (sometimes with four 13's after it) for a long time. He's got his colors, he knows a lot of things. And he has a great sense of humor. . . sometimes. His running joke is to sit in the back seat at stoplights and trying to convince us that "red is go." This has expanded to "green is stop" and "orange is go too." It was funny the first time he did that a month ago, now it's like when my senile grandfather would yell "bingo" for a laugh. It was funny at first, then it became sad (mainly because if dissolved to "bay-go," then it was funny again for a little bit, then it was sad because he forgot about yelling "bingo" and we started to miss his joke.

I'm sure I'll miss the joke when it's gone.

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You know how it is when you catch up with a friend you used to hang out with and ignore the fact that it's been so long since you talked and just jump in and act like nothing happened? I think we should do that.

Dust ruffled. . .

I hate dust jackets. I find they get in the way and make nice books look cheap. So I normally remove them from all hardcover book that have them. I even did that with our monkeybear's books. They are sitting in a pile under his actual books. This morning he picked up a dust cover, brought it into me, and said "oh no, where pages go?"

Also this morning there was a light dusting of snow on the ground. He didn't like that. He wanted it to go away. He even asked me to clean it up and despite my explaining that I couldn't clean it up he keeps asking.

Every day a new fun interaction. Despite the tantrums, I like two.

First big accident. . .

A week and a half ago we had an incident. The short version is our little MonkeyBear fell out of the cart at Target. The long version? . . .

Target trips are normally fun for our whole family. We get to walk around and look at stuff, we're not big impulse shoppers so we just browse and pick up the usual stuff (fabric softener, deodorant, birthday cards), and the little guy gets to see the demoed talking and walking dinosaur and some other toys. Often he'll want to walk with me and push the cart, once he gets bored with pushing he'll ask to get into the cart.

Normally we just put him in the regular seat like we should, but the past couple trips I had decided to try him in the main cart part. He's getting a little too big for the seat and well I don't know why else. . . I guess because I see other kids in the basket and they look so much happier and I thought "why not."

So on our weekly Target trip two weeks ago I went ahead and let him ride in the main part. He had stuck his arms out a few times to touch things and while we were stopped he stood a couple times, but he seemed to get the concept that I wouldn't move the cart unless he was sitting. We offered to move him to the seat and he fought. He won the battle, we were tired and gave in when we shouldn't have.

Part way through our trip, he stood up, I stopped the cart, he had leaned over the front, and my stopping (to make him sit down) flung him out of the cart. He literally flipped end over end, bumped his head on the cart on the way down, and hit the floor.

I ran and picked him up (as I did I thought I should have checked for neck issues first). He started to cry. My wife ran over too. I didn't see his head. She did. When I did look, above his eye the skin was dented in and blue. I thought for a moment he had crushed his skull. A woman looked around the corner and said she heard everything. She told us to go get ice and snapped us out of our shock.

We went up to the Target snack bar and got ice (in a rubber glove) and started to ice his head. The dent was just on the skin and a few moments after we applied the ice it started to look normal again. We asked him some questions and figured he didn't have a concussion. . . I have to pause for a moment to mention one question we asked. We asked him how old he was and the Target employees who were sitting with us we confused when we were relieved that he answered by saying his name. Until yesterday that was the only way he would answer how old he was.

So we took him home (all the way home he kept saying "I scare mommy daddy"). Once home I called the nurse hotline and, based on our description, we agreed that he seemed fine.

The next day he looked and acted just fine. We needed to finish our half trip to Target. When asked if he wanted to go back to Target he said "no," but once there he was singing his Target song. . . what, your kid doesn't sign a song for Target? His eye bruised a few days later and only looks completely normal now (10 days later).

He doesn't seem to have learned his lesson (he wanted to ride in the main part of the cart on the return trip), but we did. No more riding in the basket of the cart.

Between the sheets. . .

About a month ago I decided it was time to introduce at least a top sheet to our son's crib. For those uninitiated, with a baby you're not supposed to put anything in the crib but the baby. OK and I suppose whatever the baby is wearing.

But there comes a time when you presumably learn to sleep under the covers. Most people do it, but it's something we have to learn at some point. We wanted him to learn that before we even thought about getting him a non-crib bed.

First we went on a quest for sheets of blankets and found nothing. Since a thing called a toddler bed exists and that toddler bed is a crib mattress in a bed frame there has to be someplace to get them, but we never found that place. So I improvised. I took a sheet from my bed, folded it in half and tucked it in so he could sleep under it.

He does just that most nights. But some nights, like last night, he plays in his bed before falling asleep. So when we go to bed he's laying on top of the sheet instead of under it. He's not getting the concept.

Peanut Butter Jelly time!

The MonkeyBear had his two-year checkup last week. He's doing all right in the normal places. He still has a big head. . . he gets that form his mother.

But more importantly we got the go ahead to try peanut butter. So over the weekend we gave him some peanut butter with his normal pancakes—makes my mouth feel dry just thinking about that. We watched and nothing happened for 10 minutes or so. We felt good.

I decided that since we were having peanut putter I'd go ahead and make myself peanut butter and jelly for breakfast. And after the little man had finished the pancake he looked at my peanut butter and jelly with wide eyes. . . so I gave him a bite. A few minutes later his cheeks starts to get a light redish rash. For a few moments we thought we were in trouble, then it hit me. . .

I gave him strawberry preserves.

In the past, he's had a mild reaction to strawberries, but nothing bad enough to be concerned about (strawberry allergies are typically mild). So I don't normally think about it. We gave him peanut butter again the next day with no reaction at all, so we're cleared for PB&J. . . just not if the "J" has strawberries.