You see a bear?

Dylan talked on the phone today with his cousins, Andrew and Dominick. Andrew is just 3 months older than Dylan and their conversation cracked me up. Dylan's comments seemed to be on repeat, because the conversation was circular like the skit 'Who's on First':
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Dylan: "We are besiding if we are going to come to Candyhouse's house or not. We may come and we may not. But we are besiding right now."

PAUSE.

Dylan: "Ohhh! You see a bear?"

PAUSE.

Dylan: "No. I mean, Do you see a bear now there at Candyhouse's house? Do you see it?"
(I have NO IDEA what he was talking about).

PAUSE.

Dylan: "We are besiding right now if we are coming to see you up there. We might and we might not. We are besiding if we will."

PAUSE.
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All the while, I'm certain Andrew was confused with who this 'Candyhouse' lady is that Dylan kept referring to and what 'besiding' really meant. Poor Andrew. Dylan's new word is 'besiding' despite our correcting him that it is DEciding. And he calls my mom 'Candyhouse Nandma' whereas Andrew calls her Grandma. Too funny.

And during this conversation Ryan and I were searching for flights for the kids and I to visit my parents up in Oregon later on in August. We eventually got some and the trip is set. I'm excited about spending some time up there with the kids again this year. I hear that August is a beautiful time of year up on the lake.

I think that Dylan was pretty confused with our talking about flights and such, because he refused to take off his shoes later this evening, saying he wanted to keep them on for the plane trip to Oregon. And he got his backpack all emptied out so he could start packing up snacks for him and Addie. It took a long explanation with the calendar to convince him to finally take off his shoes before dinner tonight. Poor kid.

Kids. Gotta love them.

Chatty Addie

Addie is definitely a girl when it comes to language.
While Daddy was gone one night at his LSAT class, Addie practiced saying 'dada' before bed.
She was also working on her standing skills as a side act.
And I'm glad she thinks I'm as funny as I do.



Note: those pajamas are 3-6 month sized. At 10 months I am amazed she still fit into them.
With how much this girl eats, you would be amazed too!

Bursting With Words

Again, looking at last year's calendar, I noticed that Dylan had spoken his first 3 word sentence just around his second birthday: "Water Truck Out" in reference to the firemen around the corner with their firetrucks one morning, practicing some water drill of sorts. Firetrucks and little boys = something worthy of a first real sentence.

And now, at 2 1/2, he's bursting with new words everyday. Just about a month ago, Dylan was saying 3-4 word sentences.

Tonight we counted one of his sentences: SEVEN words! Go Dylan!

And to think just a year ago, I asked my Speech Therapist friend if she thought Dylan was delayed at all...

"ABB's"

Dylan is very interested in letters. He loves his "ABB's" as he calls them. I found an alphabet wood puzzle for $1.50 last week and it's been one of his favorite activities since then. He knows nearly all of the letters, often surprising me with his verbal identification as he puts the pieces in their correct spots. He even has his favorite letters: the letters B, W, D (for Dylan), and A. I've told him that M is for Mommy and he often calls that one "Mommy!"
I'm working on getting him to sing the ABC Song with me, and he tries his best, but still struggles to put the letters together fast enough.

Guess who can use the potty?

(And I'm not talking about Ryan or I here... thank you very much!)

Yeah, that's right, little D-man has christened the potty chair today. His first official poopy on the toilet, followed by an arching pee across the room (I SO need to get that shield put on the seat so that doesn't keep happening to him).
Anyhow, we were going upstairs for his nap and I totally figured his sudden interest in us going in the bathroom was due to him trying to stall. I was going to change his diaper before his nap anyhow, so I figured it wouldn't hurt to let the little dude sit on the toilet for a minute or two. No big deal really.

When he announced "ahh nah" which is how he says all done, I encouraged him to sit for just one more minute (to work on his tolerance for the potty each time we try). He sits there. Sits there. Then PLOP PLOP PLOP he went.
Yes, Dylan can use the potty!

Now I wasn't prepared with any specific prizes or anything for him yet, but we did place a fun little phone call to daddy at work while he still sat up on the potty. A toilet call to daddy. Very fun stuff.

And then I finally let him flush the toilet all by himself (because despite all his interest in the potty, we've made him wait to flush the big potty until he actually USED the potty). Now THAT was a fun moment for him.

Now don't go away just yet because there's more. Seriously there is.
Ok, so then after his nap, he woke up with a dry diaper (surprises all around for us here) and so I whisked him over to the potty and after a bit of deliberation and a little reluctance, he peed again. Go Dylan!

THEN tonight just before bedtime I thought I'd offer the potty again just in case he wanted to give it one last go around...
He wanted to and to our delight actually pooped again. This time daddy got to see it and we all celebrated and Dylan got a hershey kisses for a treat. Big moment. He's totally psyched about that now. Now all I need is a bag of hersheys or other treat that I can use. Any suggestions? I hear M&Ms work good.

The Courtyard

Our little dude is a bundle of energy. So much in fact that I can't even bear to coop him up in the car to drive over to the park some mornings. As such, last week I decided to give the 'ol courtyard in front of our townhome another try and see how much energy Dylan can burn off out there. To my delight it actually worked and he took some nice naps afterwards. Usually we are destined for a long napless afternoon when we don't get out to the park in the mornings, so that was a nice discovery.

Our courtyard just outside our front door. It has a lovely little fountain and some grass and a lots of trees and flowers.

The trees along our patio are all in bloom. Normally I think those trees are too leafy and dark, but right now they are full of blossoms and really pretty.

Dylan loves to run around along the walkway, giggling and chasing after us.

Exploring in the grass.

We ran around, chasing each other. We played peek-a-boo around the trees. We blew bubbles. We ate kumquats off the trees.
He discovered berries on the bushes (and as you can see in the video that we'll post another time, he tries to put them back on the bushes after knocking a few off).

And all this time this little special space for us has been just outside our front door. Go figure.

p.s. The other night as we prayed together before dinner, Dylan held our hands as he usually does... then echoed our amens with a precious little "a-mahn"

funny words

Dylan has the most precious way of saying things these days. It's the pronunciations that make me laugh. Like for instance, when we get ready to go somewhere, he helps us gather his shoes, calling them his "jews." And when he points to his nose, he says "nooo" like the cutest little boy EVER. Then when Ryan asks Dylan to show him the sign for FOOD, dylan makes the food/eat sign on Ryan's mouth.
Ryan and I can't get enough of it.

This past weekend we bought Dylan a new car seat: The Britax Decathlon. After I got rear-ended, the insurance company agreed to pay for a new car seat and since he really shouldn't be riding in his old one anymore after the accident, we made the trip out to West Covina and got him a new one. This Christmas on our drive down to San Diego, then up to San Francisco and Napa Valley, I'm sure it will prove to be a good choice.