Animal Sounds

I have been trying to go ahead and teach Jackson animal sounds and to recognize the animal when he sees it.  It amazes me how fast kids learn! I was giving him a bath the other day and decided to start with the duck since I saw it in the bathtub.  I said "duck", held it up, and said "quack, quack."  I repeated it a few times and then did the same thing the next night.  He picked it up right away and said "quack, quack."  I will say duck throughout the day and he will make the "quack, quack" sound.  I love it!

Brush Them Everyday

Tyler at this point definitely does not brush his everyday! He fights us all the time so it became exhausting to do it. He really did well when he was a baby because well...he was a baby and did not care about that. As he got his independence, he fought us more and more. Steve and I both have to hold him down and go as fast as we can. A miracle happened last night though! He actually let us brush his teeth without kicking in screaming. We were shocked. We can only hope that he has gotten over fighting us about it because I worry about his teeth. I definitely don't want my kid to have rotten teeth!

Surprising Words

I love when Tyler surprises me with words I did not know he knew as well as phrases. I am always like "how does he know that?!" I am amazed and pleased at the same time. For example, the other day we were looking for something and he said a few things when we were looking for it and then threw in "it disappeared!" I was like, yes, it disappeared...in total surprise. Another example is when he was drinking some water and when he finished he said "it's delicious!" It must have been really good!

Bedtime

Last night, it was way past Tyler's bedtime and he did not want to go to bed (as usual). He was playing with the Christmas tree lights, as he has done before, and went to turn them off. When he did that I said, "oh, the lights off means it is time to go night-night..." He immediately walked back over to plug and turned the lights back on. Hilarious! Steve and I were trying to hold in our laughs, but it was way to funny.

Potty Training - Day 1

Yesterday was Day 1 of a 3 day potty training technique that I am trying. I have put off potty training because 1. I wanted to make sure Tyler was completely ready (I have heard the horror stories if they are not ready) 2. I wanted to be ready myself. Now that he is three and we have a little one on the way, now is as good of time as any. With this 3 day training, you pretty much are secluded to the house until the three days are over. It is having to be close by at all times in case it is time to go. They said the first day was the most difficult, so I prepared myself as best I could.

We started out by going to the store and picking out the big boy underwear. I ended up getting tons because I had no idea how many we would go through. I also picked up one of those seats to put on the toilet so they don't feel like they are going to fall in. We got a Toy Story one. We have a another one that is a potty chair that does not go on the toilet, but I wanted him to practice on the big potty too. I bought several chocolate rewards for when he went in the potty and also lots to drink throughout the day. After that we were ready to go!

When we got home I was still hesitant. I have no idea why, I think was just worried on how it was going to go. I finally put that first pair of big boy underwear on him and told him that diapers were gone...no more diapers! I told him to tell me when he needed to go potty and we would go in the big potty. Of course, since this was new to him, I did not expect him to do it right away. We had three accidents, including a #2 one. On the second accident (the #2), I knew he was about to do it because he goes off by himself when he is about to go, like he is hiding. I took him to the restroom, but he did not want to sit down. He was mostly finished before I could finally get him on, but he did go a little in the toilet.

By the fourth time, all of the sudden he came to me and said "it's coming, it's coming!" and was holding it. We ran to the bathroom together and sure enough he went! Not only was I so proud of him, but he was so proud of himself and was smiling so big. I was going crazy with excitement letting him know what a great job he did. He got his chocolate treat and we called daddy right away. The next time around, same thing..."it's coming, it's coming!" We ran to the bathroom again and he went again! I was excited...he was excited yelling "I did it!" Crazy as it sounds, it was a such a great moment. I knew he was getting the hang of it and he did too.

This continued the rest of the day with only two other accidents. One just happened at some point during the day and the other happened when he fell asleep on the couch before I could have him go the the restroom one more time before bed. I knew that one would happen because he was asleep and he had had something to drink not to long before he passed out. The total for Day 1 was 8 successful and 5 unsuccessful. The fact that he caught on so quickly with only a couple of accidents afterwards made me really happy. He way surpassed my expectations and I was relieved. Day 1 was not the nightmare I believed it would be.

I loved hearing the excitement in my baby's voice when he did it. I think we definitely fed off of each other in the excitement department.

Animals Sounds

Tyler is definitely getting the hang of the animal sounds and which sounds go with which animal. He cracks me up when he does his pig snorts and grunts. We were looking through one of his animal books that is really more of a "touch and feel" book than a reading book because it has no words, and as we went through each animal he was able to make almost all their sounds. Then we read one of his favorite books "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" and once again he was making the sounds of all the animals. I am impressed because it is not just a dog and a cat, but horses and sheep, etc. He did get stuck on the fish but that is probably because mommy has a hard time coming up with a fish sound.

He just learns so much so quickly and it is fun to see and experience...

Newest Words

Tyler's newest words this weekend were "wait" and "mine." We all went for a walk on Friday night - daddy, mommy, Tyler, and Monty. It was really nice just to get out and enjoy the pleasant night. Sometimes I feel we just are so busy that we don't take the time to just relax and wind down at night, so it was great. We had almost finished our walk and Steve was a little ahead with Monty. All of the sudden Tyler says "Way (wait)" and put out his hand. He said it several times so that daddy could hear him. So daddy stopped and waited with Monty for the two of us =) and then we all walked next to each other again. He did it again later on this weekend when we were at the Greek festival and Mimi and Abue were a little ahead of us. He put out his hand and told them to "way." Aparently, they were going to fast...so cute.

I think Tyler has been saying "mine" recently and I did not realize he was saying it until this weekend. He actually says "me" but he holds things close to him while saying "me," so I am pretty sure he is saying "mine." Today we went back and forth and I would take some things near him and say "mine" and then he would take it from me and say "me." We played this game for a while laughing at the same time. I only hope that he does not start his not sharing with other kids thing. I know it happens but hopefully I can teach him sharing earlier enough that wanting to keep toys to himself is minimized. We shall see...