This weekend, he was feeding my father’s dogs their cookies.  The dogs are a bit taller than him, and much heavier, and still quite young and excitable. There is a lot of action going on.  But the boy still wants to do it.  He even makes sure to feed each of the dogs.  Feeding just one isn’t acceptable - he wants to make sure they both get a treat from him.  To the point that he’ll deny one dog a treat, which is a little risky given their relative sizes.  But things worked out okay.

Right - the language part.  We’ve taught him “all done” as both a sign and now he says it as well. But it’s something that has always been conveyed by him about his feeding time (he’s all done) or by us, about something he wants (watermelon’s all done!)

Though, over the weekend, with these dogs running around him wanting more treats, and in the center of their tornado, he was in the middle shouting “cookies all done” and making his sign for “all done” as well.  It was nice to seem him shift his point of view for the phrase…though, the dogs didn’t really get the message.

I helped me realize how good these “look and find” books are. There are just a lot of things going on on every page - that there are endless conversations one can have about the page. And that’s the beauty of the book. Sometimes I’ve found it difficult to strike up a conversation with Sal, as I don’t feel as comfortable with the one way communication.  Though this book has enough things going on in it that it is really easy for me to feel comfortable talking to him about the pages.  Let’s look at the juggling bugs or the dinosaur floaty and how that can help when swimming or let’s count the ladybugs on the page.

It also is crazy to see how perceptive he is. There is a parade page and many things are going on. There is a lady with a fruit hat - that has bananas in it. So we’ve talked about her crazy banana hat in the past. But one day, when I was asking him where the banana was, he found a guy on the street watching the parade, eating a banana. Turns out there’s a bunch of bananas on the page - and discovering them is part of the joy of re-reading this book over and over again.

Counting. Colors. Animals. Activities. All covered in this book - and it has been a fun process watching Sal develop different interests as we’ve been reading the book. Today, he pointed out that me and Grover both wear glasses and we talked a bit about that.

But even better, I’m looking forward to what comes up next time we read the book…or, since Amazon’s having a buy 3 get 1 free sale - we’re getting more look and find books. Cars, Finding Nemo (I’m figuring that will have lots of sea animals in it - which should be a kick) and well, Batman seems a little too early for the guy, but there’s a Dora look and find as well as a Disney friends one. Though he hasn’t seen the movies Cars or Finding Nemo, we figure the books will be interesting enough on their own.

Bet he will think so too.

Tags: parenting,, child, development

We’re trying to slow play his number knowledge - bringing it up when he seems interested, stopping when he’s lost interest, figuring out what motivates him like games like hide and seek and having him count off before we fly him up in the air. He seems to learn things on his own terms - and we think that’s the way it should be. He’s surprised us up to now with what he’s picked up by this - no reason to stop this now.

Until then though, our nanny’s found work around. She’s taken “field trips” to the Ranch 99 market near our house.  It’s an asian market.  Lots of live seafood available. And well, they let him play with the clams and he loves watching the crabs climb all over each other…

We play the game where something is hidden in one of my hands and he needs to guess which hand it is in.  Quickly after that, he was willing to play the part where he hides something in his hands.  His little joke on the game though, is sometimes when I guess the right hand, he shows me the empty hand and laughs. Okay, he’s a little crazy already - but that was expected.

What wasn’t expected was one morning when we were playing, he hid the items behind his back, instead of having both hands out front.  I asked my wife. She didn’t teach him that. I asked the nanny when she came by - and nope, she didn’t teach him that either.  So that was kind of interesting.

Then two days later, he added some flair - as he’d rotate his hands around - sort of like a disco dance move or a false start call in football. I’m guessing this was meant to confuse me - as to which hand would have the treat.  Again, no one taught him that move.

It is a beautiful thing, seeing his creativity blossom.  But I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t a little bit scary too.

I had heard from other moms that it’s a good idea to put a tent on top of the crib - even before they start climbing - so that it can be encorporated into the bed time ritual and that they’re used to it even when they get to the age where they might start trying to climb out.  We waited despite the good advice.  As Sal grew older I noticed he was a climber so  I bought one - but never got around to putting it on.  Well - it’s on now.  Wish we could have warned Sal’s friend too.  The crib tents are pretty straight forward to put on and add a great peace of mind.  It’s worth the money and the time to invest in - one of those safety things that just doesn’t get as much press for child safety.

The other big lesson that was learned by our friend’s family was what a difference going to a children’s hospital vs. a regular hospital makes.  For anything serious where time is of the essence and decisions need to be made quickly - it’s best to go to a children’s hospital or a pediatric emergency department where they will be able to act quickly and know what is best for a child rather then treating it as if it were the adult equivalent.  Sal’s friend got outfitted w/ a hard cast.  Later they found out from the pediatric specialist that this put him at risk for nerve damage, and trying to remove a hard cast will be another danger for futher injury -it’s a scary thing for anyone to go through - but hard to explain to a toddler that they will be ok and they need to stay still so that he doesn’t hurt himself more.  Kids are different, and when they’re hurt it’s an even scarier thing to go through since they don’t understand everything that’s going on - only that they hurt.   A children’s hospital will know what to consider, and be a lot more kid friendly to ease some of those fears.

So seriously - take some time to figure out where your local children’s hospital is.  Note the contact information.  If you’re in the ambulance - tell the driver to take you to the children’s hospital.  All of this were some hard earned lessons and could save you a lot of unnecessary grief that our friends went through.   

We started classes when Sal was about 6 months old.  He was starting to really engage in the world, could sit and starting to crawl and explore - it seemed like a good time to be able to get into classes.  One of the first classes I searched for was a music class.   People typically look a little confused on why I’d bring such a young baby to a music class, but once I explain it is really more for the exposure, movement, and time together - people seem to understand I’m not looking for Sal to come out of the class to be a music virtuoso.

Still, you’d think all classes are about the same to someone this age.  They’ve got a teacher, their songs, some simple instruments, and a bunch of children.   Children’s programs seem to love to throw around a couple buzz words about cognitive development, bonding, motor skills.  I’ve gotten so used to it I pretty much skim it quickly to see if there is anything outside the ordinary.

Today, instead of reading first about the class - I experienced it instead.  We had previously taken Sal to Kindermusik.  He enjoyed it well enough, got familiar w/ the songs, loved playing on the instruments, but I always had a slight discomfort with the class that I couldn’t quite put my finger on.    Today we tried Music Together, and I felt like this class, taking similar elements, had a couple key fundamental difference that I really appreciated.

The class was a mix of ages.  There were babies and kids all the way up to 4 year olds.  Kindermusik had us sectioned by age - which - although I can see how it may feel like you can “specialize” for the age, I think it left a lot to be desired as Sal grew a little older for the baby group.  I like the Montesorri approach of mixed ages - Sal seems to find fascination in both kids younger and older.  I think he gets a chance to pick stuff up from the older kids as well.  This was a nice change of pace. 

Since we were in a mixed age class, I think it was easier to keep to a philosophy of not forcing the children to participate by moving them for them.  For once, we were in a music class where we weren’t trying to force the kids to do certain movements.  The teacher was clear on just modelling, and allowing the kids to choose on their own what they wanted to do.  Some kids chose to watch, some kids chose to mirror the actions, and some chose to run around.  In all cases it was fine.  The movements weren’t overly complicated either - no complicated dance steps that a lil’n, if they so chose to follow, would have a hard time encorporating.

And the music - all catchy, repetitive songs.  Not all of them had words, not all of them had rhythms.  By breaking down some of the elements it made it easier to focus on those elements.  The songs w/out words but just sounds like “la la la, ba ba ba” were a lot easier for Sal to participate in. 

Afterwards - I read some more of the classes literature.  Instead of just using the standard jargon - it actually had some words about children picking up music.  I liked that.  It also talked about how parents are the most important role model - and watching and listening to the parents participating was the strongest reinforcer - more then doing the movements for the child.  Made sense. 

I don’t know if my experience of Kindermusik is representative of it or not, but just going by the materials and the thought that went into it - I can say I prefer the philosophy of Music Together and it looked like Sal did too.

A debate that I notice that comes up on the board every couple of months is what happens for gifted vs. hothoused kids.   Hothousing commonly refers to tactics that parents use to push their kids to learn early - unlike gifted kids who’s natural curiousity and brightness helps them pick up on many advanced concepts.  The mom’s on the board are clearly against hot housing, some relishing in the fact that hothoused kids typically lose their ”advantage” when they get to 3rd or 4th grade.

It’s an interesting line - when are you encouraging your child’s development vs. when are you artificially pushing them to “recite” concepts that they are not ready to understand?   I struggle with this since I want Sal to meet his potential and I know the area we live in is intensely competitive, yet,  when do you cross the line?

Right now we try to let Sal decide what he wants, but we definitely influence his choices and what he gets exposed to.  

We never really used flash cards. Couldn’t seem to capture Sal’s attention. We completely agreed with the statement of “stop before they get bored” and that seemed to be pretty much instantaneously w/ Sal. Every kid’s going to be different. For Sal - there were a couple things that clicked for him.

I think the first thing that clicked for him was his letter factory dvd. Seriously the best 8 bucks we’ve spent. Immediately Sal was imitating the letters and although we’d limit his watching - he was eager to see more of his pal Tad. The dvd is really well done, perhaps a little repetitious - but great for a lil’n. Even when he wasn’t watching the DVD, he’d have a great time sitting in the car or while we went on walks singing the letter songs together as he supplied the letter sounds.

Whenever we go out to a store - we try to keep him entertained by finding things that he likes. Amongst those things has been letters. Any grocery store is filled with all sorts of items we can point out, look at letters, pictures to talk about - it makes for a better trip if he’s engaged rather then getting antsy. Not that it always works - but it’s one trick we’ll use. It’s also what we end up doing when we go out to eat and he’s reached his sitting down limit. We end up taking turns walking around outside. The bright neon signs are fun to point out and Sal seems to get a real satisfaction in identifying things (not just letters).

Another fun activity for Sal has been playing on the computer on starfall. Since Sal’s seen us on the computer so much - he was bound to be curious and we’ve found this to be one of his favorite sites. We even have to negotiate the number of letters that we will do. Sal’s favorite phrase right now is “one more!”. This site does an amazing job of teaching phonics. We haven’t progressed pass the letters portion, but I figure as he gets older we’ll be hitting the other parts of the site.

A bonus find for us that turned out to be fun for Sal was our letter puzzle mat. I mainly put the mat as a padding for his play area in the kitchen. It helped w/ cleanup - although - it’s big and bulky and Sal loved taking the letters apart. The maintenance can be a bit of a pain, having to take apart the mat to properly clean under it - but we recently found out that Sal’s great at helping to put the mat together by asking him for the letters. Since he’s a toddler - he loves to walk over - pick up a big letter and bring it back. It combines some of his favorite activities - identifying, and carrying things that are big (but luckily not heavy). So - although it’s a little bit of a pain to clean up under - it’s turned into another activity that Sal enjoys.

And finally - the refridgerator magnets. We got the LeapFrog Refrigerator Magnets as a gift when he was 1 year old. At first - they were just fun to stick up on the fridge. We’d play the magnets for him - and he’d smile and play with the buttons - but that was about it. The fridge magnets have grown with him as he’s learned to play the magnets on his own - each a little song about the letter sung by his pal Tad.

We’ve tried not to push him or to spend a lot of his time for letter learning - really just encorporating little bits here and there through the day in things he enjoys. It’s amazing what they can learn with some fun and some time.

That said, I sometimes take her comments too lightly.

But then, weeks later, I’ll realize what she was talking about.

Last trip, he was just starting to walk. And he’d stumble around, and was learning how to turn. He’d teeter and wobble quite a bit too. She liked his progress and asked if he was walking backwards. We said a bit. Because sometimes, as he stumbled around, he’d take a step or two back. She said that’s great. It’s a phase all kids go through, and its fun.

We just nodded and went on.

Now, a month and a half later, our boy’s walking around backwards. That is, he’ll leave the room backwards. He’s going to places backwards. And he used to turn his head and check often. But it’s gotten less often. He’ll use the door frame to realize that he’s in the hallway and that it is time for him to turn. And now I realize what our doctor was talking about.

So instead of us thinking this boy is nuts, we know it’s just a phase he goes through. Hopefully, it’s helping him build his spatial maps & abilities. But it is probably just a bunch of fun. Tracey Morgan was talking about walking backwards last week on 30 Rock.

She also mentioned, the Goodnight Moon book - and how that was a phase the kids go through too. Saying goodnight to everything. Which was educational for me, because I didn’t realize that was the point of the book, but it makes sense now. Anyway, Sal’s not too into saying good-night or going to bed even. But he is saying good bye to everything on his way out.

Part of it is a stall tactic. Which I guess is also what the book is about. But it’s still cute.

Tags: parenting, walking backwards, goodnight moon

As I was looking through their online catalog for where to buy gifts this holiday season, I saw their gift certificate section. We don’t normally give gift certificates, but after I saw that Old Navy was on there, I though maybe I should buy a gift card for myself.

We buy a lot of our kid’s clothes at Old Navy. They’re cute and cost effective. He also likes shopping there because they have big super bouncy balls for only a quarter. We’ll buy him one, and he’ll chase it through the store. It suits all our needs pretty much. So I know we’ll be spending money there.

The epiphany came this morning when I thought - why not spend money off a gift certificate? Upromise will put 3% of the gift card purchase into his college fund. We’ll use the gift card ourselves, because over the next few years, he’ll be going through clothes at a good rate. It is just another win to shopping at Old Navy.

They have a lot of stores signed up for their gift cards and the % savings varies from merchant to merchant. You can check out their list here. Nordstrom’s, Home Depot and Panera are other places we might be getting ourselves gift cards for.

If only they had gas station cards. Or Visa/Mastercard cards.  I’ll keep my eye out for them though.

Tags: parenting, upromise, gift certificates, saving for college

It is a collection of little acrobats, with magnets in their chest and hands and feet. So they “stick” to each other in a variety of ways. There are balls that have magnets in them too. And the base of their carrying case is also metal, so that they’ll attach themselves to the circus ring floor too.

We’ve had it for a year or so now. He’s gone from not understanding the guys at all, to pulling a chain of them apart (and when he got down to the last acrobat, he tried to pull its limbs off - cute in a savage sort of way). We’re starting to put them together as the other one takes them apart. The fact that they kind of reach out and grab each other makes this an easy game to play.

I’m looking forward to the day where he starts figuring out how the various magnets react (some attract and some repulse) and how to create the strongest formations of acrobats. Then he’ll tell stories of the acrobats and put on little shows.

But for now, we’re really content with him just being amazed at how they can stick to each other on opposite sides of his tent.

Tags: parenting, stacrobats review

But patience is not our strong point.

To be fair, the balls in the game are a choking hazard, as our boy has already tried swallowing one. So you gotta keep your eye on the little ones while playing the game. Really. Keep an eye on them.

But, if you can do that, then there is a fun little game to be played.

In “beginner” mode, there are 18 doors with various cards on them. The cards all have a word that starts with A, B or C on it. There is a picture of the word above it (Boat…) and the picture is in a certain color - Red, Green, Blue or Yellow. And then there is 1 to 4 of the copies of the item on the card. Oh - and they are wrapped up in shapes like circles or triangles or squares. Whew. Lots of dimensions.

Then, you choose a “playing” card. Say it comes up Red. You get to match red with one of the doors and open the door. Under 1/3 of the doors, there is a ball! You get to pick the ball up and put it into the magic river. Once 6 balls are in the magic river, the treasure chest opens up.

You’re supposed to take turns and such. But our little guy was just getting into the concept of using the key to open the door and then sometimes finding a ball. He was really happy when he found the ball. And opening the treasure chest? Lots of fun. The downside was that the gem that’s revealed in the treasure chest, well, it is glued to the chest. Our boy wanted to take that out and play with it.

Anyway - so we’ve gone through the board a few times, lots of doors opened. Over time, we figure he’ll get more into the rules of the game - matching colors, or numbers, or letters, or shapes. Then we’ll learn how to take turns. And how to compete!

Once we get through this mode though, there is also an “advanced” mode. Where there are 1-10 objects. And the clue cards go from A-Z. When you pick a letter, you can open a door as long as the word contains the letter (instead of starts with - so a Y card can open up the “bicycle” door). So we figure this game can scale pretty well over the next couple of years.

As long as we don’t break it too much. Still, it’s a great first game for us.

Tags: parenting, games, cariboo, cariboo review

Tags: parenting, car-seat-id-tags

One really can’t figure all that out in a 45 minute interview.

Turns out the nanny we were hopeful about didn’t seem as “warm” as others, by mom’s standard. I felt okay. But mom’s got instincts I don’t have. And maybe I’m not as “warm” either, so it seems alright. We did find a “warmer” nanny. I felt she could have used a bit more sophistication, but she wasn’t going to hang out with me, so that didn’t matter too much. At 16 months old, Sal wasn’t going to complain about a lack of sophistication.

But he didn’t seem to warm up to her. And he’s going to have to spend time with her. We’ll see if we can get a trial day for them to see if they can’t get along a bit better.

There is another one too - one that he is warmer with, who seems to be a real good fit. Just that she’s $18 an hour, wants the 10 national holidays paid, and 2 weeks of paid vacation. Another family is interested in her too. They’re willing to give her all that, plus, when they take a vacation, they’ll pay her too. That way, she’s not out of work while they’re on vacation. Very generous. We matched that offer, figuring, well, after paying her $18 an hour, we won’t be doing much vacationing anyway.

So - at first it seemed it would be hard to find the right nanny. Now we’re reminded, that when we find one, they’ll be the right nanny in many people’s eyes, and we’ll have to bid on their services.

What’s going to be our next surprise?

Tags: parenting, nanny

• Shape sorter.
• Plenty of different blocks.
• Lights.
• Sounds.
• Things that rattle.
• Things that move (hood and dumper)
• Things that spin.
• A realistic stop sign on the side of the bus
• A random apple (lots of our toys have random apples - I don’t know why. But it seems to be a key item.)

BUT…(you could feel that coming, huh?) the toy itself sucks. This toy, on paper, sounds great, but as I’ve played with it I’ve gotten real disappointed. I can look past the fact that there is no “story” behind what you’re doing. No proper workflow. Okay. That isn’t a requirement. I can accept that. The dumper serves no purpose. Fine. It just might be fun for fun’s sake.

But when you put things through the sorter, they jam the sorter and then you need to move them along, to put another item through the sorter. So sorting isn’t an enjoyable experience - it is a chore. You can’t just put shapes in and in and in. I can’t put two triangles through in a row. Need to do one, then lift the panel, move it out of the way, then put in the next. Jeez - to play with the sorting panel, I need to do all this other stuff…why?

Plus the main sorting panel doesn’t include the square. The square is on the side of the bus. Why? I don’t know. Maybe to justify putting a little stop sign on the side of the bus? Anyway, what I know is that the main sorting panel does include a large hole with trimmed corners. But it is so large that any shape can fit through it. Putting a block through here plays music. The one hole which fits any of the blocks is the one that plays music? Why would one learn to sort shapes when you can use the catch-all hole that plays music?

I feel the product manager had a checklist for what sorting toy should have - and it was just a list of features, without any associated behaviors. Without the child’s experience in mind at all. Just checking off items in a list: 3 types of holes (check!), a hole with music (check!), a thing that spins (check!), a freaky apple…etc.

Though they’ve satisfied their list of requirements, the end product is nothing more than a smattering of features with no synergy or cohesiveness. I’m looking for toys that will engage my son and his imagination - not something that is feature rich but useless.

He is in enough classes (swim class, pre-pre-school, gym class and music class) that we feel he has enough socialization opportunities. Also, play groups spin off from those classes, so there are other little group activities besides the regular 4 classes a week. So we want a nanny that will be enthusiastic about his classes.

Since he’s also using sign language (and more verbal words too) we want a nanny that can continue his education in both signing and speaking. And his mish-mash in between (where he’ll say “woof” and then sign for eating to signal that he wants to feed our dog).

And we’re looking for more than just an adult playmate for him. Sure - lots of the learning he is doing now is play related, but there are some games that exercise the mind more than others. We want a nanny that will pay attention to the small differences and look for ways to engage our boy in fun, learning activities. We also want someone to help us with our next hurdle, which seems like it will be discipline. Another playmate won’t be much help for that challenge.

Basically, we want better versions of ourselves. Professionals, you know. Which is making the search a bit difficult. Some nannies just want to feed the baby and play and don’t mention much about education during the interview. Others are taking English on as a new language and that makes things difficult for us. If Spanish was their native tongue, we’d probably look for ways of splitting the difference, but so far, that hasn’t been the case. Others like to play up the duel role of housekeeper/nanny. Which sounds like a nice thing - but in the end - we prefer that the nanny focuses on our boy and not the house. He’s much more valuable.

One nanny does look hopeful though. She knows sign language. She mentioned she reads child development books while the baby naps. I’m looking forward to sharing books and discussing their points of view with her if we do hire her. Not as just a way to follow-up on whether she is actually reading - but to engage with others about specific points around our boy’s development. I think she was a bit taken aback, as most of the points she probably typically uses to “wow” the potential parents with (sign language, child development background, etc.) were things we were just using as requirements for the position.

She did impress me with her photo album though. I realized, looking through it, how it really was more than just a scrapbook, but an advertisement of her abilities. How the kids looked genuinely happy - no fake smiles. How they were in a variety of settings and how she handled a variety of children. Those pictures actually helped me feel much more comfortable with her - beyond all the small talk about child rearing philosophies.

We’ve still got a few more to interview and references to check out. But the references I’m sure will be fine. It’ll just take time to get used to trusting a stranger with our baby. That’s why we are still flying the grandmothers out for a while.

And cause there’s that housekeeping issue still up in the air…

Tags: parenting, nanny

I started doing a little research online today about toddlers who head bang and came across an article that’s made me feel better. The big relief was that Sal’s unlikely to have or develop autism. Dr. Greene gave 3 signs to look for before 18 months. If your kid does these things - Dr. Greene says that the chances are very slim that your child has or will develop autism.

1. Does the child point
2. Does the child follow your gaze
3. Does the child engage in pretend play

They were simple enough signs to look for to give an indication if concerns are meritted. Simple signs. I needed that since it’s easy for me to fly off the handle with concerns.

Dr. Greene also writes on how the child will not hurt themselves or be able to hurt themselves at this age. And that was a big relief too.

If you’ve got a head banger - I’d recommend reading Dr. Greene’s article. It helped me out a lot.

Tags: autism, concerns,