A momentous day redux

Apparently, Margaret reproduced her accomplishment from last night at school today. So we may be on the downslope leading to the point where Papa stops paying attention to the sales circulars on diaper prices. At least for one of the kids.

A momentous day

As my lack of recent posts suggests, things have been pretty mellow over the last week. Margaret's vocabulary has been expanding by the day, and Teddy continues to work on the things that infants work on - rolling over, grinning, putting things in his mouth, etc.

But today, we had a whopper of a development. It happened when I took Margaret up for a bath. She and Abby had been watching the Oscars' red carpet show on E! and, after eating a messy dinner, we decided that she needed a bath. Rather than pull Abby away from her show, I whisked Margaret up for a bath. As we got prepped for the bath, Margaret asked to sit on the potty. We've got a little potty on which Margaret will sit on occasion, but her interest is sporadic and her sitting on it doesn't seem to lead to much. Sitting on the potty is just a way to pass the time, it would appear. And her request to sit on the potty tonight wasn't different from her previous, unproductive requests.

When I picked her up to plop her in the tub, I noticed some liquid in the potty. "Where did that come from," I thought. And then "Whoo-hooo, Margaret used the potty!" At least, I have to think that she did since I can't imagine what else happened. I called Abby and we spent five minutes or so praising Margaret in the tub for being such a big girl. Margaret just grinned. I suspect that she has only a vague idea of what she did, but this is one of those breakthrough moments when you can see the light at the end of the tunnel - no more diapers!

Now I naturally didn't take any pictures of the soiled potty, so I apologize to the photo fans out there. And some of you may wonder whether it's worth reading about Maggie's bathroom habits. But this is a big deal. At least in my book it is.

Another trip to Philly

We went to Philadelphia this weekend so that Margaret and Teddy could visit their cousins. Upon encountering a household comprised of a 4, 6 and 9 year old, Margaret's mouth literally dropped open in awe. She ended up yelling "Ann-dweh" or "Izzie" depending on who she was following at a particular point in time. We had a lot of fun, and Margaret was so sad when we left. Even after she woke up later in our return to DC - both of the kids were troopers, again, and slept most of the way there and back - she teared up a bit when we "talked" about Lizzie and Andrew.

Nuk nuk redux

As I'm sure I've mentioned at some earlier point, Margaret loves her "nuk nuk." That is, her "binky", her "paci", or, for those not accustomed to toddler lingo, her pacifier. The use of the name nuk-nuk reflects both her preferred brand of pacifier (Nuk) and the sound that she makes when using it (think Maggie Simpson.) Margaret has become pretty skilled in her ability to manipulate the nuk-nuk as she spins it in her mouth without touching it. And N-U-K is probably one of the first words that she learned to "spell" since when I ask Abby, "Where's Margaret's N-U-K?," Margaret immediately says "nuk nuk?" We have since switched to calling it her "comfort device." An open question is how long it will take her to catch on.

She used it in the infant room at daycare, but left it behind when she moved to the toddler room. In fact, the teachers in the toddler room were stunned when I told them that she still used it. But the moment we walk out of daycare, Margaret plaintively cries "Nuk, nuk?" (Incidentally, the teachers at daycare also don't think that Margaret fusses very much - hah! Such a scam this kid has going!) At this point, I don't resist - as long as she's going in the stroller. I figure the nuk nuk is a fair trade-off to avoid a meltdown when I'm trying to belt her in. Especially when I've got Teddy in the lower level of the stroller and he's fussing too. Getting double-teamed by fussy kids isn't pleasant, so I'm not going to put up a struggle just to make a point. Margaret does know that the nuk-nuk isn't a good habit to have. "For babies" she'll occasionally say, after pulling it out of her mouth. But right back it goes.

Until recently, Teddy showed little interest in the nuk-nuk. We tried to give it to him early on to calm him down, but unlike Margaret who was such an enthusiastic sucker that it stayed put, he always quickly spit it out. Recently, however, he's started to use it a bit. When he's napping, the best way to get him back to sleep is to stick something in his mouth for him to suck on. Now that works ok if it's me and have a bottle on hand, but it's less convenient when it's 3:00 AM. So Teddy is slowly, but surely, becoming a convert to the nuk-nuk. He's been using it when we walk home from daycare, and it keeps him blissfully quiet. As it did during our drive to and from Pittsburgh over the weekend.

Do I want another nuk-nuk addict in the family? I ponder this question (briefly) everytime I stick it in his mouth. But if nothing else, I've learned that parenting involves trade-offs. The need to pick your battles. Recognizing that there aren't many battles that you win. So, I suppose, I'm ok with Teddy and the nuk-nuk. If only I could keep his nuk-nuks separate from Maggie's.

By the way, Teddy went to his 4 month check-up today. The doctor said that his sleep patterns weren't ideal since an infant of his age should only be getting up once a night. Tell me something I don't know! And how do we fix this? The pediatrician suggested that I (Papa) should get up and help him get back to sleep. Yeah, like that's a good solution.

But for those of you keeping score, Teddy is tall (90th percentile in height) and moderately chunky (75th percentile in weight.) She also unequivocally and emphatically said that he was clearly, undoubtedly the smartest, most talented baby that she'd ever seen at his age. But of course! (As you might naturally suspect, this particular pediatrician had never examined Margaret.) Apparently, he was also constipated and had a massive blow-out when Abby got him home (for Teddy, we started to refer to it as a pooplosion.) Luckily, Papa didn't attend this visit to the doctor. If he had, he certainly would've had something to say about her "expert" advice on how to deal with his nighttime sleep issues.

Potomac Primary

Teddy and I voted in the Potomac Primary today. Neither of us were registered, so we were hoping for some dispensation that would allow us to register and vote on the same day. The poor woman behind the table, faced with a long line and a fussy Teddy in the Baby Bjorn, stuttered and said "Well, sure. You can submit a provisional ballot. Would you like to register as a Democrat or a Republican?"

Now, as a first factoid, the DC primary is closed so that you can only vote in the primary of your declared party. Next, DC is so heavily Democratic that there's absolutely no point in voting any other way in a general election (the ultimate example of throwing your vote away is voting for a Republican in DC.) The result being that the only meaningful election for any race in DC is the Democratic primary.

My political adversaries out there (and you know who you are) will be pleased to know that Margaret and Teddy's papa is now a registered Democrat. As a longtime independent, I hesitated for a moment and then blurted out "Democrat, I suppose" in response to the pollworker's query. However, in my "defense", any other affiliation in DC is a waste of time as I noted earlier. And for those of you who know my political positions (again, you know who you are), it's not clear where someone with my odd political positions should reside (in a recent online test, I matched up best with Ron Paul - who ironically wants to fire me.)

Teddy and I got two special envelopes, filled out our ballot, and dropped it in the special box. The gentleman who monitored our vote gave us a heartfelt "Thank you" which, if nothing else, made me feel good for exercising my civic duty (something that I tend to be very cynical about.) For whom did we vote? I won't say except to note that in anything other than an extraordinary election, I wouldn't have voted (again, I'm typically a cynic.) Teddy voiced minor complaints the whole time (a cynic in training - or perhaps he objected to my choice), but people in line grinned at us as we left the polling site.

Ironically, our vote may not have counted anyway since when filling out the provisional form, I signed it with a date of 2/13/08. What the heck? Am I a moron? Perhaps since that's the type of thing that would get a ballot disallowed when the vote counters go through them. So much for introducing Teddy to representative democracy. But we did get an "I voted" sticker that he wore on his way to daycare. He seemed to drool on it a lot.

Here, then, are some photos from the last week. Including some from our weekend trip to Pittsburgh. Where it was cloudy and cold (as befits a trip to Pittsburgh - amazing how the weather changes as soon as we pass Breezewood, PA where we get on the turnpike) and Teddy met a puppy named Bailey who seemed to really take a shine to him.

Another sunny Sunday

Discover Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers!

So we were watching Tom Petty play at the Super Bowl half-time show (Margaret and I missed most of the first half while making dinner), and I turned to Abby and said, "This is a great half-time show, perhaps the greatest I've ever seen. After all, who couldn't find this music appealing on some level?" They played "American Girl" - one of the greatest rock songs of all time - and "Free Falling" - another great song. Who could be so jaded that they wouldn't tap their toes to those songs, or at least tolerate them (unlike many Super Bowl half-time shows - recall the Janet Jackson/Justin Timberlake debacle and other shows of that type)?

I felt that my logic was impeccable. Great, melodic songs - who could argue with that? As the set wound up, Abby essentially agreed with me, but then asked: "Do you think it just reflects our age that this music appeals to us?"

Damn. Another reminder of how old I am. I could write a whole bunch of thoughts about how it's become apparent that I'm getting old. For example, I still think of Nirvana as "hip" music. But Nirvana is 15 years old which makes it equivalent to the Beatles when I started listening to them as a kid. And the Beatles were ancient at the time. Even worse punk, in my view, still has an edge even though it's, omigod, over 30 years old. Facebook? What the heck is that? I now realize how people get stuck in the culture of their youth and have problems keeping up as the world moves on. I recall having conversations about music with my Uncle Mike in the 1980s. He knew all the "old" bands of the time (e.g. the Who, Rolling Stones, etc. who had managed to survive from the '60s) and the "newer" guys like Bruce Springsteen, but was much less informed when I asked him about the new "hip" bands (e.g. Madness, Dexys Midnight Runners, etc.) At the time, I didn't really understand why he was starting to lag in his "hipness" (Uncle Mike with his Bitchin' Camaro - an inside joke for those fans of the "cool" Dead Milkmen - being the coolest uncle I knew), but now I understand. First, there's an extent to which the culture of your formative years just dominates all of the silly new stuff. This new stuff is just crap! Then come other obligations, most notably work and kids, which make it difficult to keep up with what's new and cool. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, apathy. At some point, it just doesn't matter if you're hip or not, perhaps because you realize that it's a futile struggle. I'm starting to reach that point, but I still hold out hope that my flannel shirts will come back in style when grunge makes a comeback. Alas, I suspect that's sort of like a hippie who is still wearing his tie-died shirts 40 years after the '60s.

In any case, we went to Great Falls in Maryland today. I carried Margaret in a back pack (or "pack pack" as she calls it) and, despite her best attempts, she wasn't able to fuss enough to ruin the trip. Here are some pics (and a hip, new - albeit 10 year old - remake of Dexys Midnight Runners greatest, and to date only, hit):

Discover Save Ferris!

Hoya saxa

To begin with, a few updates:

• Teddy has grown a lot over the last month or so. He's no longer a "newborn" at all. In fact, he's not only outgrowing all of his 3 month clothes (at a bit less than 4 months), but his 6 month clothes are also getting pretty tight. I do not like this development, especially given the drastic change in weather that DC will experience between now and May-June, but if anyone out there is thinking about sending any clothes Teddy's way, I'd seriously consider choosing a 6+ (or perhaps even 12) month size.
• Margaret has similarly started to outgrow a lot of her size 2 clothing even though she hasn't hit that milepost yet. So the same caveat applies for anyone looking to contribute to Maggie's wardrobe.
• Margaret is starting to employ substantially more complex word structures. Rather than simply saying two or three syllable words, she's starting to put together combinations of words into multi-syllabic phrases. We have things like "Papa's shirt" or "On the bike", these types of statements. It's especially fun since we've entered the stage where there's a lot of interpretation required to figure out what she's saying, but we're the only ones who can decipher most of what she says.
• Initially, we thought that Teddy's hair might end up being quite a bit darker than Margaret's hair. At this point, Margaret is about as blond as the come - we've only run into a few kids as blond as her, and most of them look like albinos. Teddy, on the other hand, seemed to have slightly darker hair when he arrived. But he hasn't had much hair in general, and over the last few weeks, he appears to have shed most of his hair with the new hair coming in pretty light. Perhaps not as light as Maggie's hair, but I suspect that we'll have another serious tow-head on our hands.
  

Today, Margaret and I went to a Georgetown basketball game at the Verizon Center. We met some friends of mine from college and sat in a luxury box during the game (really, nothing fancy, but we knew the people who had the tickets so we were able to get them.) At this stage of Margaret's life, a box is the only way that I'd take her to a game since she didn't sit still at any point, and the box provides a nice way to confine her. When we first got to the game, the band was playing, the scoreboard was pulsating with pictures as scoreboards tend to do these days, and we were generally bombarded by lots of noise and people. Margaret's mouth dropped open and she spent a few minutes just staring at the whole scene. She especially liked the band, particularly the drums. Then the lights dropped for the intro of the Hoyas, and Margaret was completely stunned by all of the hoopla. As the game progressed, she got into certain aspects of it, but never seemed to catch onto the fact that the players on the floor were doing something interesting. For example, during breaks, she liked to watch the cheerleaders and, as before, liked to watch the band. (Hopefully, the latter will take hold more than the former in the long run since I can handle a "band geek" a lot better than I can a cheerleader.) She also caught on to the free throw ritual of raising her hands before a free throw as I'd draw her attention to the student section which she would subsequently mimic, but she didn't seem to get the distinction between waving her hands during a free throw by an opposing player and the still solemnity that accompanies the free throw of a Hoya. And she didn't seem to grasp when she was supposed to drop her hands (and clap, or not) after a free throw. Most of the time, she wiggled around my seat while I tried to track of her with a hand in one direction while talking with my friends in the other. At the end, Georgetown won, but Margaret didn't seem to register that fact. Instead, I loaded her into her stroller and, since the game had pushed right through her naptime, she fell asleep by the time we got out of the stadium.

And some random pics from the last week: