Old Blog Posts: March 2009

Will continues busting out the words, phrases, and correct pronouns with such an astounding rate that I’m considering cancelling his second speech assesment.  This morning, to Nic:

“are you go downstairs to play Mario Galaxy?”

And the pronouns get more correct by the day!  So much so that I can’t even keep track of his most common saying, which morphed from:

“he’s not trouble, you’re a good boy”

to “I not trouble, you’re a good boy”

to “I not trouble, I’m a good boy!”

(The root of that one was that for some reason a couple of weeks ago Will started saying “he’s trouble” several times a day.  We finally figured that he meant himself, as in, “I’m in trouble.”  So I would always reply, “you’re not trouble–you’re a good boy!”

Every day it feels like he gets a little closer to having those pronouns correct.  Every day he’ll stick “I” where yesterday a “he” would have gone.

The gender thing is still not there, but we have so few interactions with girls to practice with (the same is true with preschool–there are many days when there won’t be a single girl in the room, and when there are, the most he has is 2–it’s a 9:1 boy:girl ration in there), and it seems like all of his books have only boy characters!  I’m thinking I need to arrange more playdates with Taylor girl to practice!

We got a new video camera that makes sharing videos online 1000 times faster, so I am going to be a little better about keeping that part of the photo site up to date!  I just uploaded a video of Will hard at work on one of his drawings. 

 We can’t help but notice that if you try to get Will to do something he doesn’t want to do he shouts “STOP!  WALK AWAY!”

I asked at preschool this morning and it turns out that they teach them to say that to the other kids when the other kid is doing something they don’t like.

When I give Will something he says “OH THANK YOU MOM-MY!” in the sweetest most excited and surprised voice in the world.  I want him to do it forever.  I know it will last about a month, though.  And then it will vanish.  So I hope I can catch it on video to have forever.

So I’m at the post office/bank about to do a bunch of errands and as Willie and I walk in the door I remember that I forgot to write down the serial number of one of my lenses for a Nikon thing I’m signing up for.  So I tell Willie “hey–mommy forgot something, we have to go back to the car.”

And he looks at me (holding my hand so sweetly) and says “Okay, Mommy!” in his sweet little voice.

So we go back to the car and I’ve got myself halfway in the trunk trying to read the serial number from the lens in the bag and the trunk comes down for some reason and whacks me on the head twice.

It hurt.

So I shout “FUCK!”  loudly enough for Jesus to hear.  And as I try to dislodge the trunk from the back of my scull I hear Will’s little voice:

“Are you hurt, Mommy?”

“Yes, buddy–I hurt my head.”

“Come here” he said, reaching up to pull me down to him.  Then he kissed me on the head, patted my head, and said “It’s okay, Mommy.”

And it was.

This is our last month before our world comes crashing down and “The Season” begins.  We’ve got three weddings in April, five in May, and NINE in June…and then it just says crazy until October.

We took advantage of this crappy economy and are booking a crazy great deal to Disneyland at the end of April.  Along with my carefully earned Disney Dollars (I put almost every cent the business spends on a disney rewards card), the specials made this vacation way too cheap to pass up!

Will and I will be in Seattle for a week at the beginning of April for my cousin’s wedding.  Because the flight times were so ridiculously inconvenient and he only would have been able to be in Seattle for something like 50 hours, Nic is staying behind.

We incorporated Real Photography last month (we’re now an Inc), and the resulting re-set-up of a bunch of my accounting stuff has taken up a lot of time.  Even with our accountant doing 90% of it, it’s been a giant pain in my butt.

I launched a new boudoir website and coordinated with a Denver hotel and make-up artist to put together a boudoir photography event in May.  We sold out in two days!  (And then someone dropped out so now I have a space…but the initial selling out in two days was pretty rad!)

I’m doing a senior portrait photography “fair” in May.  A bunch of photographers in a high school gym basically.  But I’ve got some ideas to make sure our booth is incredible.  But if we have any sort of response at all, Real Photography is definitely going to have to expand.  I’m already outsourcing the accounting, and will be outsourcing a lot of the image processing starting next month.  I’m hoping to hire a customer service person to answer 99% of our email/phone calls this summer.  If we get a bunch of seniors, we’ll definitely be doing that.  At this point in the business I can basically do what I’ve been doing for the last month or two and just turn down opportunities to stay at a size that I can hope/pray to handle myself, or I can start outsourcing more and more and GROW.  Since I’m reading The E-Myth right now, I’m opting to grow. 

Will has his second speech evaluation next month, and I’m hoping he’ll pick up enough of the 3-3.5 year old stuff in mean time to make it the last we have to think about any sort of speech therapy!

At the beginning of May we’ll be heading to Delaware to photograph Nic’s friend’s wedding.  We’ll be staying on the beach, so I think Will is going to have a great time.  Will needs more Daddy-Will time.  After just three months back at work, Will has already resorted to the “mommy must do everything or it’s just not right” way of thinking.  Like MOMMY must go down in the morning and turn on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.  If DADDY does it, it’s not right.  Even though DADDY does it nicely and MOMMY says murdurous things the whole time cause she stayed up too late working.  I’m pretty sure when Will is 15 I’m gonna be like “Will!  Will!  Will!  Will!!  Will!!!”  And finally he’ll say, “WHAT?!”  And I’ll say “Come get drinks.”  And he’ll say “But that’s Baby #2s job.”  And so I’ll just say “Will do it!  Will do it!  Will do it!!” and whine and cry over and over and over and over and over and over until he wants to shoot me in the face.

And then we’ll call it even.

On the same day as Will’s speech assessment we also had his first parent-teacher conference with Miss Heather.  It was a good conference–they really love him and say what a sweet boy he is.  A couple of funny/interesting things:

– for “takes pride in accomplishments” he was marked at “most of the time” (one of the only ones to receive this highest mark).  She mentioned how he gets that giant smile that just melts your heart when he’s proud of himself.

– his best friend is named Norv.  Those parents should be shot.  Quinton is another buddy.  WHAT IS WITH THESE 2000 NAMES?!!!!  I HATE THEM ALL!  There is a girl in his room named True.  (running off to grab the barf bag.)

– they are working with him on confidence.  (This seems funny to me.)  She said that sometimes she or Miss Grace will see Will just sitting sadly, not doing his work or playing.  When they ask him what’s wrong, he’ll just point at the offending child.  She said they’re working with him on telling the other kid that whatever the kid did wasn’t nice and hurt his feelings.

– he got marked down for “awareness of others’ personal space.”  This is one that I’d like to mark him down on, too.   She said that the boys play spiderman and wrestling a lot during recess, which is fine, but when one of the kids says “stop” the other kids know to stop.  All except Will.   She said he isn’t being mean–he’s just playing–but they’re working with him on understanding that when people say “stop,” you have to stop.  I told her we’re working on this at HOME, too. 

–  she said he LOVES his color “work” and his practical life “work.”  The color work they do is matching colors and arranging the colors (all greens together, all reds together, etc) as well as arranging from darkest to lightest shade, etc.  She said he really likes that.  He also likes assorting sizes–biggest to littlest, etc.  The practical life work that he most enjoys is anything to do with water–lots of pouring from one container to another.  We definitely see this at home!!

– he knows Texas, Idaho, and Washington states.

– she said she’s so glad he’s in her class.  that he’s a very loving sweet boy.  (but that could be just cause I pay her.  you really can’t trust any school you pay $500 a month to tell you the truth.)

Will’s language EXPLODED last month.  We are now treated to delights like “there she is!” “i so hungry.  tummy.  tummy.  hungry tummy.  i so hungry.” “this is fun!” all perfectly articulated.  I love “good night mommy” every night and “good morning mommy” every morning.

About a week before I went to Vegas I got a few speech therapy books and “diagnosed” the sticky spots in Will’s speech.  He was dropping consonants in the middle and end of his words.  I took a peek at my own speech and in my hurry to get to the next word the ends often blur together.  So I made an effort to slow down my speech with Will and made a MAJOR effort to slow down bedtime stories to a crazy speed, enunciating every last sound.  I also played the “you’re a chuB” (which now includes “you’re a mommy daddy house” and “you’re a stinky daddy dog” when Will “gets back” at me) with him.

Within two weeks his speech totally exploded.  I’m not sure if it was just a coincidence, or if that had really been his obstacle to more full on talking, but even our friends have commented how suddenly it happened–they now understand him!  At any rate, when I took him to his first speech therapy evaluation last week, they said that he did great with that part of speaking–some of the last sounds were incorrect (which is usual for kids that age–substituting easier sounds for harder ones) but that they were there.

At his evaluation they said he had all the things he was supposed to have by 3, but only a few that they want kids in the 3-3.5 range to have (which is what I’d been seeing, too).  So they have us coming back for another appointment next month, but he might be totally up to speed by then since he was only 3 years and a few days old at that first appointment.

Things we’re working on?  Pronouns–if they say “touch his shoes” and there’s a picture of a boy and girl, Will should touch the boy’s shoes.

Sidebar:  This is something I’ve noticed that’s really funny among the language development set–they make a BIG deal out of gender differentiation.  At Will’s 3 year well child check up they asked him if he was a boy or a girl.  I told them that we hadn’t taught him that and they said “it’s something you should be working on” DEADLY SERIOUS.  Like we should practice every day saying Will is a boy and mommy is a girl.  And since they don’t show pictures of NAKED boys and girls in the his/her speech therapy test, apparently I’m supposed to teach him to tell the difference from: length of hair, whether it’s wearing a skirt or pants, and whether it is holding a bear or a doll.  I wanted to launch into a whole diatribe about how that’s not REALLY on my “working list.”  I think the whole “count to ten” thing is way more important (which he can do and they didn’t ask).  Or you know, ABCs (also working on those).  Cause it’s not like “boy” and “girl” are the only options.  If he’s transgender (which I doubt, but you know, he COULD be), I’m okay with that and I’m not going to make it my life’s mission to be like “YOU’RE A BOY!!!!”

Anyhoo…aside from their close-minded-Republican-Focus-on-the-Family-are-you-a-boy-or-a-girl-and-please-wear-a-skirt-so-we-know agenda, they also have us working on vocabulary (not all items of fruit are “apples”), and verbs.   As in answering the question “what do you do with this?” (while pointing to a coat) with something more than “shirt.”

I found it interesting to see at his evaluation what I’d noticed at home–if he doesn’t think he can say something, he just says “nope.”

Like “can you say apple?”  “APPLE!”  “can you say [insert hard word here–I can’t think of any at the moment]?”  “Nope.”  He won’t try–he just says “nope.”

One of the 3-3.5 things he DOES have is the idea of quantity.  The therapist said that it isn’t important that they answer the question “how many apples are there?” correctly, it’s just important that they know they have to count.  Which he did.  And he did exactly what he does at home…counted them “1.  2.  3.  4.  TEN!!!!!!”  (Anything more than three is TEN!!!!  Which I thought was really dumb until I realized that to me, anything more than 50 is like a million.)

I woke up this morning to a boy who now calls me Mommy.  He really does change overnight!

Will started saying that yesterday as I leave the room for naptime/bedtime.  It is the cutest thing I’ve ever heard.  So sweet.

His three year well child appointment was today–he’s 41 inches tall and 38lbs.  That puts in in the 98% percentile for height (which means he’s the size of a four and a half year old) and the 94% for weight.  “Goodness, you’re a tall boy!” as the pediatrician put it!

While writing that last post I was dealing with a disciplinary issue called:

Pain in the ass Will.

He does this thing where he asks for something, you give it to him, he says NO, so you don’t get it to him, then he cries, says “Sorry!” and you give it to him and he says “No” and then you rinse and repeat.

Today he asked for chocolate milk.  I gave him the spoon to stir it (which he insists on doing) and he said “no.”  I put the spoon in the sink.  He cries for it.  I say “too bad, you missed that opportunity.”  And now he refuses to take the chocolate milk.  So I put it on the counter and go sit to write on this blog.

While typing he is crying and asking for the chocolate milk.  I tell him it’s right there and he can get it.  He says “MOMMA chocolate milk.”  This is very normal for him.  He gets it in his head that *I* have to *give* him the object and then he makes our lives miserable until I do.  I decided that we’re done with this.  So I sent him to his room.  He calmed down, then came back and started whining for it all over again.  Back to his room, then more whining.  Fast forward 30 minutes.

Literally 30 minutes.

I’m sitting on the floor thinking that it’s entirely possible that this child has more strength of will than I could ever hope to have.  So I close my eyes and lean up against the pantry and pretend to be asleep or dead.  On The Discover Channel, this works all the time. Surely he will give up and go eat another bunny instead.

Instead he continues whining for chocolate milk.  And he’s pushing me toward the counter where the cup is.  I am sitting there totally limp, so I fall over.  I’m not laying on the ground.

When I feel little hands tug at my arms.  He is trying to drag me across the floor.

This doesn’t work very well so he switches to pushing my body across the kitchen.  He stops when we get to the counter.  He drags my arm out, and lays my palm up to the sky.

I think I know where this is going, and now I’m wishing I’d rigged up a camera to capture this psychology experiment.

He gets the cup from the counter and puts it in my hand.  I let it rest there–I’m not holding it, it’s just laying there.  He pushes me up to a sitting position.  My eyes are still closed.

Then he says “chocolate milk, please.”  And the cup disappears from my hand.

I sneak a peek and find him standing there contently, sipping his chocolate milk.  I burst out laughing and he smiles at me, then gives me a hug.

This kid is a force of nature.

Last night I was reading to Will and did am impression of a gorilla thumping his chest.  Will laughed, leaned over, gave me a kiss on the cheek and said “funny mom.”

I think he likes me.