Tuesday, July 3rd, 2007
My son is developing a love for books. He is almost 2 years old now (23 months) and his favorite two books are brown bear and, some other book (bad dad, bad dad). Everyday he runs to one of these two books, usually brown bear, and turns the page until he finds an animal he actually knows the name of. He then runs to either his Mom or me and repeats the animal name. It’s amazing to see kids learn knew things and I love to watch him learn. It does get stressful sometimes when I’m trying to work from home and he comes running screaming “purple cat, purple cat” but I try my best to always acknowledge him and address his growing vocabulary. Sometimes I lay them both down, Haylee (6 months) and Hugh (23 months) and read Brown Bear to them both. Hugh is excited to hear the story and Haylee is excited to watch Hugh’s excitement. I hope he keeps this thirst for knowledge throughout his life. I found a great article on Baby Center (http://www.babycenter.com/refcap/toddler/toddlerdevelopment/11545.html) about reading. It’s worth checking out.
Wednesday, May 9th, 2007
My son repeatedly gets sick. He was fine at home but after he started daycare, he had the sniffles and was congested almost every week. We took him off of cow’s milk and are now giving him soy milk which seemed to help with the congestion but the cold’s kept coming. My wife found a product by Enfamil called Poly-Vi-Sol which is a vitamin supplement for infants/kids. Well we started giving him a dose with his breakfast and his immune system seems to be much stronger. The soy milk and vitamins really make a big difference and although he occasionally brings home a few sniffles from daycare, he wards off most bad colds.
One negative note about the Poly-Vi-Sol. After starting him on regular doses every morning, his little teeth became discolored. He had some pretty little pearly whites and the became a little darker and stained. After noticing this negative side-effect, we started mixing the vitamin dose with his morning oatmeal and problem solved.
Thursday, April 19th, 2007
It’s funny how everyone thinks there kid is the smartest, sharpest, most atheletic, kid in the world. When I hear stories of 9 month babies walking and 16 month toddlers talking (real words), I can’t help but think of my own children. My son walked around 14 months. Dominique, the wife, would cringe when he tried to walk but gave up. She would think of all the younger baby’s who were walking and wondered why our son was still crawling. Well after his first step, he never looked back and for a short while we wished he would re-gress to crawling. Babies are all different and they develop at there own pace. I’ve learned not to push my son pass his comfort level and I’ll follow the same practive with my daughter.
Tuesday, February 20th, 2007
Hugh, my 18 month old loves the swing at the park. Everytime we go to our neighborhood park, he cries to get on and cries to get off. He doesn’t care for the slide, the vibrating horse or the jungle gym. He does like to run on the grass, watch the grown kids play basketball and point and laugh at the sky but his number one favorite thing to do is get on the swing. Well, being the lazy person that I am, I went to target and purchased a swing that you hang from a tree. Pretty decent buy. I did have to go to Home Depot afterwards and buy some chains to extend the short rope the swing comes with. If you are planning to hang this from a low bearing branch, hopefully a strong one, than you will not need to buy anything else but the swing. If your tree has branches/limbs that are pretty high, you really should measure the distance and buy some sort of extender. I did not want any hazards to occur so I opted for a pretty think chain link from Home Depot and it works well. The only complaint is that the chain rubs against the bark of the branch and makes a squeaky noise as well as reduces the motion (number of swings) very rapidly. I think if I buy a peice of leather or other material and place it between the bark and chain, it will remedy this problem.
Tuesday, February 20th, 2007
My son, Hugh, had a pretty rough weekend and he is now taking steriods with his ibuterol treatments via a nebulizer. He was given oral steriods previosly but the taste was so bad, he often threw it up, and anything else in his stomach. The only good thing about him vomitting is, more often than not, a good amount of mucas/flem would come out as well. The steriods he is now taking delivered through the nebulizer machine along with the ibuterol treatment. I asked the doctor’s if these treatments would develop into something his little body depended on and was assured that dependancy is not a side effect of the above mentioned medications. I was also told that the mucas/flem build up along with the associated breathing problems usually come to pass and most kids out grow them. I have sleep apnea, so does my dad. My wife has sever sinus issues and we all snore, though I’m the reigning champ. I pray this whole breathing problem, ibuterol/steriod involving saga does come to pass and that it skips my newborn Haylee.
Wednesday, February 14th, 2007
Hugh, my 18 month old, could hardly breath. His little abdominal cavity was working overtime and, after 2 nebulizer treatments, his heart rate was 150 beats a minute. After a few hours of obversation and hoping his breathing would improve, I found myself driving to the emergency room at 11:30 pm. My wife stayed home with our newborn and called me 3 thousand times on my way to the hospital. It took about 45 minutes to see the doctor. He was given back to back Nebulizer treatments with steriods and around 4:30 am his breathing finally showed significant enough improvement to be discharged.
I remember my mother struggling with my breathing growing up. The cool mist humidifier was always on and never far from my bedside. I now struggle with sleep apnea and my wife has severe sinus issues which sometimes effect her breathing. I wonder if we may have passed any of this down to baby Hugh. The weather has changed from hot to cool (10-20 degree changes) several times this week. When the weather makes that many changes in that short a time, it usually has a negative Hugh’s breathing. I am praying this is a phase that he outgrows.
Thursday, February 8th, 2007
Dominique, the wifey, has successfully stopped her milk. It was a painful experience for her. It took about a week and it was painful for me to watch. For any women who are looking for a way to stop her breastmilk flow, there is a wealth of information out there on the web. We searched several websites and they all pretty much say the same thing. Here are a few helpful tips that actually worked for us, well for the wife.
1. Place cold cabbage on your breast. Placing cold cabbage compresses against your breast will ease the engorgement and help with the pain. Dominique changed the cabbage slices every 2-3 hours.
2. Eliminate one pumping session each 2 to 3 days. Do pump all of your breastmilk out. Pumping all the milk may send triggers to the body that more milk is needed.
3. Take something for the pain. Ask your Doctor what he/she recommends. Dominique took Motrin(regular strength), when needed.
4. Do not bind your breasts. She never tried this, thank God. But we read that it can lead to a plugged duct and or a breast infection. (ouch)
Thursday, February 8th, 2007
Don’t you just hate ear infections. My son has had three ear infections and a throat infection since he was born and he has been scratching at his out ear lately. It’s time for another check up. Experts say, experts being my parents, that boys are more prone to ear infections then girls. He has been off the bottle for quite some time now and he sits up when drinking from his cup. It’s frustrating because he pulls at his ear from habit and it may be a false alarm but it’s better safe then sorry. I hate ear infections and so far Haylee, my 6 week old baby girl, has not shown any signs of having one. I remember when I was young, 8-12 years old, my dad had a ear infection. I watched him make a funnel, stick the small end into his ear and lite the large end on fire. The fire burned slow and the smoke and heat traveled up the funnel and into his ear canal. He claimed he heard perfectly after doing that. Carribean style medicine. lol.
Wednesday, February 7th, 2007
The 6 weeks your suppose to wait after having a baby, aka “dark six”, aka “don’t touch me”, before having sex is so aggravating. Haylee, my newborn, is officially 6 weeks old and the barrier has been lifted. Unfortunately, the mood, fear of another pregnancy, and exhaustion has created a new barrier. She is beginning to sleep throughout the day so it’s easier to track her schedule and find an opening, no punt intended. My son Hugh is easy to control as he is a Wonder Pets fanatic and we can schedule Wonder Pets sex, a version of Barney Sex, pretty easily. I’m afraid of another pregnancy and now we are trying to decide which birth control we will try. Condoms are irritating, pills make you gain weight, etc. Self esteem has proven to be a barrier as well. Finding ways of making the wife feel pretty has proven to be a huge undertaken. Any compliment I give her is disregarded and believed to be made for the simple fact of me being her husband. All the post 6 week sex aprehensions definately make the act more scientific than emotional but we’ll find our Mojo again. lol.
Tuesday, February 6th, 2007
What would life be without the wonder pets. Well simply put, chaotic. My son, now 16 months, started watching baby einstein, dora, and barney when he was just months old. These t.v shows never really interested him and he gave them very little attention. One day a show titled “Wonder Pets” aired on Nickelodeon and became an immediate his immediate favorite. I think he was 3 or 4 months at the time and when this show would air, his face would glow with excitement. A close friend gave me a Tivo for christmas and if you check my saved programs, you will see that 90% of programs saved is a Wonder Pets episode. Now when he comes home from daycare he runs to the television and screams “Wonder Pets”. If the remote is within reach, he will grab it and attempt to start the show on his own. He loves this show so much that I tried to find Wonder Pets games and toys for christmas but Nickelodeon has not released any as of yet. Some people like this show and others are subject to torture since their kid(s) love it and they don’t, see blog. I particular like the show and find myself watching it almost as intensely as my son.
About the show:
Wonder Pet is about the adventures of three singing classroom pets. Linny the Guinea Pig (leader of the trio), Ming-Ming Duckling and Tuck Turtle. They travel the globe helping other animals, usually baby animals, out of a jam. The show features “photo-puppetry animation”. It looks similar t to clay-mation but very unique. The show currently aires on NickJr and Noggin.