"Kid" talk

In the last week or so, Camille has learned to open bedroom doors!  Good & bad comes with that, of course.  We had hoped that since we transitioned her crib to a "big girl bed", combined with the new door-opening talent, we wouldn't be waking up anymore to a shrill "Mommy!!  Mommy!! Mommy!! Daddy!! Daddy!! Daddy!!".  We envisioned her helping herself out of bed, opening the door and coming down the hall to our room to peacefully wake us - that's how it went with her brother, at least.  Well, she still prefers the old method - so for now, we go in her room upon our alarming awakening, and tell her that she can get out of her own bed, which she does, once we arrive.
In addition to her new door-opening skill, she and Paul are both starting to talk pretty well.  Camille talks in 3-5 word sentences at times and Paul can pretty much hold a conversation, though we still don't quite understand all of their word pronunciations.  But, we're getting quite good at translating. For example, Camille's word for "milk" sounds like "noch" - not sure why, since she makes mostly all of her letter sounds pretty well, especially the beginning "M" sound as found in "Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!".
One of our favorite "Paul words" is his version of "goof ball" in which he says a perfectly enunciated "douche ball".  We laugh every time. I have a feeling that's going to get us in trouble one day if he decides to call an unsuspecting and unaware victim, "goof ball".  Also, he calls, Superman, his favorite of the super heroes, "Du-ka-doo".  That's the sound he started making when he heard the Superman theme song..as in "Du-ka-dooo-doo, du-ka-dooo-doo, du-ka-doo-doo-doo-doo".  He's finally starting to say "Soo-ah-man", but for the most part, the nearly-invincible super hero now has the ever-intimidating name of "Du-ka-doo".

An almost-pleasant morning awakening

This morning, while we were in bed, we heard the kids get up on their own, and all was well for a few minutes.  "Wow, how nice this is", we thought.  The kids can get up and entertain each other now while we spend a few minutes more lounging and getting up the energy to roll on our of bed...well, we hardly had time to complete that thought before the yelling began.  So, that got us up and snapped us right on out of that daydream.  When we went to find them, they were sitting on the floor in Camille's room and had appeared to have previously been playing - it was really cute - other than the fact that they were arguing with each other, of course.  However, it was the first time Camille woke up without crying or whining for us to come in and get her, even though her bed is converted to a "big-girl bed" and her door is cracked so she can get out.  So, I think there is hope of that daydream of ours coming true one day; we just have to work on getting them to play nicely unsupervised for more than 3 minutes at a time.

Night #2 in Camille's Big-Girl Bed!

This is night number two for Camille in her big-girl bed, and she is sleeping WITHOUT her pacifier!  She hasn't used her pacifier since Monday night; today is Wednesday - so that makes 2 naps and 2 bedtimes without it!  She's only asked for it one time, at nap at school today, but the teachers just ignored the request, and she didn't press it, so they didn't give it to her.  This is huge!  Paul had his for pretty much exactly 2 1/2 years, so according to that schedule, she's almost a year ahead of time - so, going by that time table, maybe potty-training will be next month!  I guess I should start thinking of a new name for this blog, since "another day another DIAPER" will be out-dated once that happens - woo-hoo!

Paul is having his own milestones, too!  He is getting smarter by the minute.  I've been making them some Montessori printable "work" from online websites and today I printed some pictures of  different constellations.  They're basically a black sky with the tracing of the stars that form the different shapes.  Without being told anything about it, Paul said it was pictures of stars.  It doesn't look like OUR night sky - since we see a lot fewer stars for one thing.  Not to mention, Paul is never up late enough to see it that dark in the sky anyways.  He's also conquered most of the preschool level work I've made so far, including a coloring by number, where 5 batman logos all had a number in them, and at the bottom of the page, a color was spelled out in it's own color.  So, he had to look to see what color each number corresponded with, and color accordingly.  Pretty smart for a just-turned 3 year old if you ask me.

In addition to being incredibly advanced and smart (hey it's a blog about my kids - I can brag all I want), these days, when the kids are in a sweet mood, they really do love to take care of each other.  Camille will always go and get Paul's shoes if it's time to go somewhere, and Paul will go and get toys or other things for Camille, because he pretty much always remembers where everything is if we can't find something.

Oh, and a funny story from last night - I went to check on Camille a few hours after I put her down - since it was her first night in the big-girl bed.  And, I found her in the middle of her floor sound asleep!  I picked her up and put her back in the bed, and she just kept on sleeping.  Hopefully she'll stay in there tonight.

A big night!

Today I converted Camille's crib to a toddler bed, or "big-girl bed" as we proudly call it.  So, now she can crawl in and out of it on her own.  Tonight will, of course, be the first night she gets to try it out.  It's been about two hours since I put her in there, and so far so good - though, just in case, we have the pillows lined up at the opening, for the likely chance she finds the floor in the middle of the night.  She never was one to be patient about getting out of the crib upon waking, so hopefully now, instead of screaming or whining for us, she'll let herself out and come find us in our room in the morning - we'll have to get Paul to teach her this.  We'll see how it goes!

(This picture was right after I converted the bed; big brother is looking a little more excited than the owner of the bed...or maybe he's just more of a ham in front of the camera!)

It's almost Christmas and I don't think I've written since the summer!

So, it's been a while...

Let's start with Camille - She is one smart little cookie!  She will repeat nearly every word that we say if we ask her to.  She also "reads" a lot of her board books to us.  That is, she points out the pictures and says what the objects or people are.  For example, she will say "mermaid" for Ariel in the Little Mermaid book, she'll say "Nemo" for Nemo or any other sea animal for that matter, she even says "Eugie" for Snow White - Eugie is one of her aunts and she is absolutely tickled pink that Camille has (on her own) associated her with the Disney princess.  Camille also will go through her ABC animal book and name animals in there by herself - even ones like Moose and Newt.  She is also doing well learning to drink out of an open-top cup (and glass) and sometimes eats with utensils - but usually just her hands - which is OK too - at least she pretty much feeds herself now.  Also, she will answer questions, too - even if she doesn't know the answer - in which case she'll put her hands up in the "I don't know" manner.  It's so cute.  She is really becoming a "real" person, so to speak.  She will get things that we ask her to go get - like her shoes, for example.  She also enjoys brushing her teeth.  One of the biggest changes lately is that on October 16, her 16 month birthday, we stopped nursing!  She's strictly on "real" food now!  She eats well if she's in the mood, but we do give her her daily Poly-Vi-Sol vitamin drop just like we did for Paul at that age.  

Speaking of Paul - it's time for an update on him.  He's becoming quite the big boy these days.  He is talking up a storm - he'll say 3-4 words at at time or even more sometimes.  He's not always perfect on pronunciation, but we can usually tell what he is trying to say - which is a long way from where he was just a few months ago, when he didn't want to talk.  He is in a "Superman" phase currently and even calls himself "Paul du-ka-doo"...as in the theme song for Superman goes "du - ka - dooo - dooo - du - ka - dooo - doo - du - ka - doo - doo - doo - doo" at least in his interpretation - so that's why he calls Superman "du-ka-doo".  He hasn't mastered the actual word "superman" yet - but he's getting there.  He is also in to trucks of all kinds and Bob the Builder.  He loves seeing construction sites and trucks on the road and learning about what each of them does.  He is also FULLY potty trained!  The only help he needs is turning on and off the bathroom light and wiping for #2.  The rest, he can do himself.  We started training right before the school year this year in Mid-August and he's really picked up on it fast.  He even goes at school without any problem.

And on the topic of school - the biggest change around here is that Camille and I are now joining Paul at school!  We all go to Kinder Haus now on Monday, Wednesday and Friday!  Camille is in the Toddler class, Paul is in the Preschool class, and I work at the front desk from 8:30-11:30 on MF and from 8:30-3:00 on W.  I don't make quite enough to cover Camille's tuition, but that's okay.  It's fun for us all to be there together and for Camille and me to get out of the house.  This just started right before Thanksgiving and is going well so far.  Paul cried the first time I came in his room while I was working because I think he wasn't quite used to it even though I had explained it to him.  But, now he's fine and I think (or hope) he likes that I am there when he is.

While I am not working, I attempt to get crafting done and have started some new projects I will soon post about in my crafting blog at junebuggydesigns.blogspot.com once they are complete - and once I give them to their owners at Christmas.  

Well, that's a quick summary for now - hopefully I write again before the new year - I know I've been slacking lately!  

My kids talk & tee-tee on the potty..they're turning into real people!

Over the last couple of months, Paul has finally decided to start talking!  The last few weeks, he's significantly increased the number of words he says and he even puts 2-3 words together, like "Daddy  Go" or his favorite "No! Mine!"..used mostly on Camille.  But, hey I guess we have to be glad he's talking.  Camille has also been repeating a lot of words and even communicating with words herself.  I can't even count how many words the kids use, things like Mommy, Daddy, Nanna, Papa, Meenee(for Mandy - that's Camille's word).  Paul says a lot of colors (purple, yellow, green, blue) and nouns like plane, car, cheese and Camille says puppy, apple, juice, cheese.  She also will say "more" and bring us her empty plate or cup.  She also will repeat what we say, like just now I said "That's Mommy's paper" and she said "paper" over and over.  There's a lot more words they use that I just can't think of right now.

On Sunday, we started to potty train Paul.  We have taken away his regular diapers and he wears either underwear or pull-ups.  For Sunday afternoon, Monday and Tuesday, we pretty much sat him on the potty every 15-20 minutes and most times he would tee-tee.  He still hasn't poo-pooed on the potty, just in his pull-up, but I hear that takes longer anyways.  Once, he started to tee tee in his underwear and then went quickly to the bathroom with me trailing and another time, he took himself.  Today he's at school for the first time since starting to potty train so we'll see how he does.  I am taking him today so he can pick out some big boy underwear for himself.  When I take Paul to the bathroom, I usually take Camille, too and set her on the little child potty while Paul sits on the regular potty.  She actually did tee-tee on it once each day and today, too.  I think she's starting to automatically go to the bathroom first before getting her diaper changed even if she doesn't quite grasp why.  

Those are the big milestones taking place right now, but I'll end this with a little story about Paul and one about Camille.  

Last night Paul was trying to be funny during story time at bed time and we were going through a picture book and naming all the objects and once we got to the page with the cheese on it, everything there after was cheese, too - the plane, the car, the kite, etc.  It was pretty funny and he was just laughing away.  

Camille has a favorite board book that has a different baby on each page and she'll bring it to us and flip through saying "baby" for each page which she's been doing for a while now.  Then yesterday, we were looking at a little 101 Dalmatians board book and she was flipping through it and saying "puppy" for each page.  It was super cute - she wasn't even guided to say it.  

Our kids are just too smart! :-)

Kids Update June/July

As fast as my kids are growing and changing, I really need to be better at updating my blog about them.  I feel like they are almost new people since the last blog last month.

Camille is a lot more interactive and understands so much more now.  She even shakes her head no when we ask if she wants something (like more juice or snacks, etc).  Or she'll go to wherever it is that the thing is that she wants.  If she does want more juice, she walks right to the refrigerator.  She also says a variety of words - Mama, Dada, (Sometimes Mommy, Daddy), bubba, Meenee (That means Mandy), Pops, cracker (sort of), juh (for juice), and some others I am sure I'm leaving out.  She is still quite the little monkey and wants to climb on anything she can reach.  We are fearing some injury related ER trips in her future.  But, as strong as she is, I think she'll be some sort of really great athlete, too.  My guess is either soccer or gymnastics - time will tell I suppose.  While she is quite whiny at times, she is also very affectionate and will come to sit in our laps just to cuddle.  It's very sweet.  

Paul is finally really starting to come out with some new words.  He says the names of several colors (yellow, pink, blue) and says ball, bat, Tia, Mama, Dada (sometimes Mommy and Daddy), cheese, there's quite a few more, I just can't think of them all now that I am trying to list them.  He will also answer yeah and no to questions we ask - in words and sign language - his favorite response is, of course, NO.  LOL  He also makes a lot of sound effect noises for his actions - his favorite is "pa-kow"..that's right..not KA POW like most people would say..but his own take on the phrase.  He also says noises like psssheeww, for actions he tries to demonstrate or when he is make believing like with his airplanes and such.  He has also grown quite a bit these last couple months.  He's fitting in to 3T shirts and some 2T some 3T shorts.  He also still loves to take apart and figure out how everything works.  He also is getting really good at building with his mega blocks.  He makes a pretty good airplane all on his own.  His other hobby lately is working puzzles.  We have some old board puzzles from when I was his age and he figures them out in no time - even though the age on them is 3-6.

It's been a challenge this past year to have two kids under the age of two for a while, but now that Camille is a year old and can play by herself, it's getting a lot easier and more fun.  We have been on a few outings lately and they can both run around and have a good time.  They even play together at times.

Well, I'm getting distracted by the ones I am speaking of, so I must run - more updates in a month!