Sunday, June 27, 2010

Eli's second birthday, and other updates


On the train at the zoo


Riding down the big slide at the carnival with Pappy


Eli and Daddy watching the parade


From here down are from his birthday party


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Well, every time I post, I say I'm going to update this thing more regularly, and every time, I go several months before the next update. Eli is now 2 years old. He turned two on the 11th and we had his birthday party on the 20th. It was a fire truck party as he is obsessed with firetrucks! We were even able to get the local volunteer fire department to drive a fire truck down to his party!

He hasn't been to his 2-year-old well-baby checkup yet, so I'm not sure of his weight and height, but it seems like he's been getting a little taller and looking more like a little boy and less like a chubby baby these days. He's quite the picky eater, but some of the things he likes right now are pizza, hot dogs, FRIES, GRAPES, cereal, toast, and ice cream. But who wouldn't like those things? Other than fire trucks, he likes any kind of vehicle--helicopters, trains, boats, school buses, motorcycles.... He loves books too. I'll often go to check on him to find him sitting in our recliner with a huge pile of books on his lap. He enjoys looking at them himself, but prefers to be read to. He will let you read to him for hours.

Some of the other things he loves: His cousin "Baby Toey" (Chloe), dogs, his Aunts, Uncle, and grandparents, Oscar the cat. The moon-he is always looking for the moon at night. He'll ask me, "Mommy, the moon at?" And I'll say, "I don't know Eli, where is it?" He'll usually either say "up in sky" or "hidin' tees," which means "hiding behind the trees." He's been doing very well at communicating and puts together simple sentences on his own. The other day I was surprised by the way he answered me when I asked who made a mess: Daddy did. Not just "Daddy," but "Daddy did." He also said something in the past tense not long ago: I saw it. The little guy's clever!

He's been starting to sing a little bit. He won't sing if asked, but I'll often hear him when he thinks no one is listening sing "bitsy bitsy spider" or "twinkle twinkle hittle star." Sometimes when I'm singing him to sleep at night, he'll sing the next line to me if I pause.

The terrible twos are here, but for the most part, Eli is a very well-behaved kid. The only time he really misbehaves is when he is tired. And then he really likes to throw around the words "no" and "mine." Boy, do I hate "mine!" Speaking of tired, the sleeping schedule is just as crazy as it's always been. Most days, I can't get him to go down for a nap, so he falls asleep around 7 or 8 and then gets up at 9 or 10 and won't go back to bed until after midnight. Then of course he sleeps in the next day. It's something we've been trying to work on for a long time, but any time we seem to make progress, things somehow manage to go back to this schedule. I was hoping to have him on a more normal schedule by the time his baby sister gets here, but it's not looking like it's going to happen; she is due in less than 7 weeks. If this were my pregnancy with Eli, he would be a month old already. It's really hard to believe!

Thursday, April 1, 2010

a List.

I've been meaning to do this for a while. This is a list of all of the things Eli says now, at 21 1/2 months. If his pronunciation differs from the real way to say something, I am going to put it in parentheses. I don't want to ever forget the way he talks now!

Mommy
Daddy
babe, which he sometimes impatiently calls Daddy!
honey, which he often calls Mommy
dog/doggie
kitty
duck/ducky
fishies (sishies)
cows (tows)
Brutus (brutus or bru-ass)
Zeke (heke)
hay
frog/froggy (srog)
baby, and also baby cows, baby ducks etc
truck (tuck)
firetruck (siretuck)
sleep (feep)
Peek! I see you!
up
down
please (peez)
thank you (day cue, day coo)
you're welcome (alcommm)
drink (dink, deek)
bite
eat
cereal (seer-ull)
fries (sies)
candy (tanny)
M&Ms (Ems)
cookie (tookie)
chip/chippy (pitchy)
apple
Bri (B)
Mic (Bic)
Pappy
Grammy (Bammy), also calls her by name, Jody
Sierra (Si)
Baby Chloe (Baby Toey)
Brandon (Bandon)
Uncle Jeremy (Uncle, although he often gets confused and calls him Brandon)
Terry (Tury)
Susan
Oscar (okker)
Todd
Hunter
Parker
house, and also So-and-so's house ie. Si's house
ball
block
book, sometimes bookie
phone (sone)
box
bye/bye-byes (byes)
night (hight)
nice (hice)
outside (side)
walk (hawk)
no
eyes
ears
ice
milk (hook or ilk)
juice
stars (sars)
again
all done
sorry (sawwy)
bath (bas)
empty

That's all I can think of for now. I'm sure there are at least a few more. If I think of them later, I'll edit this!





Monday, March 22, 2010

Yet again, I've succeeded in neglecting this blog! I've recently started to get involved in the March for Babies, as well as some online message boards supporting women who also had pProm (preterm premature rupture of membranes), and it made me realize that it's time for an update!

Eli is now 21 months old. It's hard to believe that he'll be two in 2 1/2 months. I'm so proud of him, and I love to tell his story to those struggling with pProm. Eli started taking steps back in October. He was about 16 months. He now runs and walks well, and loves to push the stroller instead of riding in it.

Speaking of pushing a stroller, Eli will be getting a little sister! I'm 19 weeks pregnant now, due 8/13. Actually, today I'm 19 weeks 3 days, and that's exactly 4 weeks farther along than I was when my water broke with Eli. My new OB and her team are amazing! They tested my cervix at 9 weeks for a bacteria that has been associated with pProm. I tested positive for it, and received antibiotics to kill it. They retested me last week, to make sure it was gone and ease my paranoia a bit, but I don't have the results yet. There is another new baby around, too. Two actually! My best friend had a baby boy, Braxton David on March 9, and Seth's sister had a baby girl, Chloe RaeLynn on March 13. Chloe was also premature--4 weeks--but thanks to God, had no complications! Eli seems to like her, but doesn't really know what to think just yet. He calls her "baby Toey."

Back to Eli! He says so many words! I'm going to estimate that he says somewhere near 75 words (this includes people's names) that he uses well, without prompting, or with little prompting (like for thank you, I usually have to say "what do you say?"). There are other things that he will repeat, but doesn't use frequently. His newest language improvement is 2-word phrases/compound words. He most often uses this skill to show posession, i.e. Brandon's truck, Daddy's drink, Mommy's phone. He also says big truck, firetruck, Peek! I see you!, thank you, baby cows, and baby duckies, but no "baby sister!"

His favorite things right now are rubber ducks, dogs, cows, and fire trucks. He has loved dogs and duckies for quite some time. He often sleeps with several rubber ducks, and carries them around all the time. He also has some of those zhu zhu pets (hamsters) that are popular right now, and loves them. He got two for Christmas and we named them Rosey and Hammy. He called them by name and took good care of them. When we got two knew ones, they also became Rosey and Hammy, so now there are two Roseys and two Hammys. He is absolutely obsessed with cows! He takes about cows morning, noon, and night. My Mom and her husband have a dozen or so cows that Eli loves to feed when he visits. We feed them produce when it starts to go bad, as well as leftovers and kitchen scraps (as long as it's not meat or onions!). Eli then goes and tells people "Cows, eat, apples, Brutus, hay." He also loves to visit the new babies, aka "baby tows."

At Eli's 18-month visit, which was actually just last week due to weather and other scheduling issues, he was on the charts for size. He weighed 23.4 lbs, which was down a little from the last visit, but he had also just gotten over being sick. That put in him between the 20th and 25th percentile for his weight. He is only 31 inches tall, which puts him at the bottom of the chart, but Seth was always short for his age as a young kids, and is now 6-feet, so I'm not worried by that.

Here are some pictures that have been taken since the last update. I don't have many recent ones on the computer, though.

Daddy (Seth) with Eli, meeting his cousin Chloe for the first time.


Playing in the tub, about 19 months


New toy box for Christmas, hand-made by Uncle Todd, with help from Pappy Edgell


Daddy, Mommy, and Eli on Christmas Eve


After his first haircut. We distracted him with ice cream :)


Recovering from the surgery for hypospadias repair.


Holding his stats at his 1-year corrected-age developmental checkup at Children's Hospital back in September


Playing on the front porch last fall, when he was beginning to become very mobile


Not so happy to be having a photoshoot in the leaves.


Halloween 2009-biker boy!