Friday Night with Liam

Liam was in a great mood when I picked him up today after work. I couldn't resist his requests to go outside, so after dinner we went to the park to play for awhile.

When we came home Liam went swimming in the tub. Because I didn't want our ugly shower tiles in the photos, I asked Liam to lay down, so the rest of the night when I turned the camera on he would lay down and be all cheeszy just like this...

Compliments of Uncle Tyler

I got this little number in my email today... Oh that Uncle Tyler and his art work...

Happy 18 Month Birthday, Liam!

Dear Son,

You are a year and a half young! Wow. I am thrilled at this landmark!

You’ve had a rough time this last month with ear infections and molars breaking in. I was so grateful last Tuesday when you came out of your trials. You were happy, giggly and joking with us again! It was as if I had been reunited with you after a long hiatus. Even though we are together every day, I missed that electricity you normally have. And I had no idea how much I missed YOU until you came back, you darling wonderful child!

This past month you’ve been waving good-bye and saying “hi” a lot. You started waving bye to me when I leave you at the sitter and you’ll also wave good-bye to Daddy as I take you up the stairs at bedtime. Last night I had layed you in your crib and I talked to you for a few seconds, kissed you and then started to walk out. I said, “night, night, I love you” and you waved and smiled at me. It was a sweet picture of you laying there with your pacifier and your feet lifted in the air, knees bent. You looked so snuggly with your soft blanket and loving smile. It’s at bedtime it’s difficult to say good-bye to you. You are so charming.

Your verbal skills are coming along slowly and surely. I know you understand much of what we say, but I do wish, at moments, that you could tell us everything you are thinking. You say “peez” and sign “eat” but that is about it other than animal sounds and signing “ball” when you see one. I look forward to you using more helpful and descriptive words soon. It will certainly save Mommy and Daddy on guessing what you need at any given moment. We are very proud of the animal sounds you are saying, though. I love quizzing you on the cow, cat, dog, chicken and duck. You really are so smart!

You can point to your mouth, eyes, ears, nose, hands and toes when we ask you. You can climb onto the kitchen table, no problem. You can drag chairs to climb other surfaces as well. Your favorite hang out place is the top of the recliner chair. You can take your shirt and pants off by yourself. You can bounce and prance like an acrobat in your very springy crib. You can carry full storage bins for me to open, grunting all the way. You can shoot toy guns with the best sound effects a boy can muster. You say “WEEEEEE” at anything that looks, feels or might be fun. You have a shoe fetish. You “read” books to yourself and you bring books to us to read to you as well.

You are a mighty eater as long as it comes from Daddy’s plate. You especially like to hover over him (worse than the cats) when he is eating cold sugary cereal. You love eating a whole banana all by yourself… cut up banana is beneath you… for babies. Any kind of ravioli is your favorite food… that and Trix cereal.

Every day is a learning experience for you, Liam, and I can see you absorb new ideas all the time. I am surprised at each new stage of your development and how pleased I am to move along with you to the next part of your life. I never look back wishing you were younger. I am grateful for that. Each new day for you is a blessing for me to witness. I appreciate your kisses, hugs, love pats and chuckles.

You are a delightful child that has made my life rich. I strive to be a good mom to you, even though this last month has been a struggle, I am acutely aware of my faults hoping I can overcome them in the months and years to come. Being a mother is a divine calling that I do not take lightly. It means so much to me that you’ve been entrusted to my care. The Lord certainly knows what he is doing, no doubt. Trusting in Him will get us through together.

I love you more than I can express, you brilliant little boy. Thanks for your patience and your unconditional love. There is certainly more learning that we’ll be facing together. I look forward to every moment of it.

Love you always,
Mom

A fun day for Liam

We went to a neighbor's 2 year birthday party this afternoon. They had beach balls all over, bubbles blowing and even a wading pool for splashing! Liam played with the beach balls for awhile then eventually migrated over to the little pool of water and really drenched himself. Each time he'd splash himself with the cold water, he'd get this look:



OR this one:

It didn't take long for the shivering to kick in. My friend went and got him a towel to snuggle in, so we could get the chills under control. Liam was swaddled like a tiny baby in my lap as we shared pinwheel finger sandwiches, fresh fruit and then birthday cake. He was cold enought that he didn't even try to break free from the towel to grab any food off the plate himself.

A little later I let him down to participate in the pinata activity and here is what he did as he watched everyone else have fun:

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

I scooped him up in the towel once again to warm up. Then he saw the candy fall to the ground and he got down to get his fair share...

I picked him up again until it was his turn to pin the tail on the donkey. He was 4th in line so he could figure it out by watching the other kids first. We didn't blindfold him like the others and he still was the farthest away from the donkey's behind!


After we had Zachery open his gift early, we headed home to warm up. Liam immediately stopped shivering when I put him in the hot car. Ah, I am sure that felt so good!

Experiencing Spring Rain

I took Liam out of the car when we got home yesterday and he booked it for the driveway... It had just started pouring down rain and I asked Ian to go grab him before he got drenched. Ian said to let him play and go get the camera.

So we let him experience rain and he was having SO much fun. I didn't get any smiles on camera, but he was darting everywhere and raising his arms to touch the rain drops.

In other news... I picked Liam up from the sitter this evening and he was a completely different boy. I was given the report that he ate his lunch and the fruit I packed for him! Liam has got his appetite back! Woo hoo!

Tonight he was so sweet and darling and BACK... he's back! Yay! I missed him very much!

Ear infections, Molars & Weaning OH MY

It's been a rough week in Liam's World... just miserable.

Liam's runny nose and whining has been a real fun-sucker the past few weeks, especially since Wednesday. The fact that he can't communicate his feelings/needs has been even more frustrating than the fun-sucking alone.

That whole "asthma" thing was, in my summation, a bad night with a molar breaking through. I found that pearly white a couple weeks later and had an AHA moment! You'd think the pediatrician would have checked his mouth when we went in for that "asthma" deal... not that I thought he had trouble breathing, I just had a relentless sobbing/moaning child for 15 too many hours... SOMETHING was WRONG! I guess being in that much pain and crying for that long with the right level of snot and congestion from teething can really mess one's breathing up!

Anyway, before I found that molar I was to the point of taking desperate measures to get rid of the high levels of snot and slime. I got a tip that dairy is a monster product that can really mess with histamine levels... furthermore that too much soy milk can effect my child's hormone growth... and even more horrifying that I have been pushing that soy milk so much so that I may have caused an allergy for my poor baby! My mind was twirling. I was so sure I needed to find a natural path to get him feeling good again. Teething shmeething, it had to be more than that!

WRONG!

After no dairy or soy for a week, a chiropractic adjustment in the middle of that week, natural immune boosters, creatively healthy and BORING diet choices... Liam is the same.

Then 3 days after that (Wednesday, April 11th) he has a temperature (won't eat, super irritable) so I take him to the doctor again suspecting his first ear infection. Tadah... Infections in both ears actually. Kids at that age with that much snot for this long can't drain it all properly, so it gets infected. Now I know. What a treat...

My poor kid was beyond miserable, flushed and zombie-like prior to getting to the dr. office and the same afterwards. In between though, while at the dr. office, absolutely ballistic! Liam would NOT calm down. He knew what that place was. I was so desperate to calm him that I nursed him (something a mom weaning a 17-mo-old should never do, I have since learned). I did feel fortunate that I had something to comfort him with, though. Liam cannot take meds orally... He. Will. Throw. It. Up. That said, a big needle was anticipated to be coming to a toddler leg near me... I prepared him by bearing his leg and nursing him until the nurse came to stab my child. All would be well until he felt the prick. He went nuts once again, but I was able to calm him down again.

So the aftermath of nursing a distressed and weaning child... it ain't pretty.

With more than the 3 additional molars breaking through, the ear ache and hunger pains, I think Liam is most upset at the fact that I am not nursing him in the day time (because of this one incident of me giving in). We have been down to one 5 or 6am feeding for quite a while now. Yes, there is the occasional feeding at earlier hours of the morning when he awakes and WILL NOT go back down without drinks, but I was only letting him nurse when he was basically asleep... the most opportune time for me to do it (so I get more rest and because alert/day time feedings are a real and literal pain when you have a writhing monkey attached to sensitive body parts).

Anyway, he wants to nurse so badly that he will get in my lap and literally beg me with "Peez, peez, peez"... it is a pathetic sight. What's worse is when I have said "no, I am sorry" more than once, he will throw the biggest and wildest fit you ever set eyes on! He does this sort of thing in the middle of the night, too, when he doesn't get what he woke up for. It's so so so sad! And since he had full access to me all of Saturday and Sunday, the fits and pleadings were amplified by like 100. I was at my wits end. I just didn't know what to do. I still don't.

I do know this, though. We took Liam back to the dr. this evening because he still isn't eating like he should. (He may be on a food strike to show mama that her milk is the only way to go.) The dr. said his right ear is completely clear and healed and his left ear is 90% clear. So the dr. checked his mouth and confirmed that most irritability was probably related to those dang molars.

In closing, I haven't blogged for over a week. Simply because I haven't had anything real sweet to say. I only took four photos of my darling snot box in a week's time. How odd is this for Liam's mom? Odd... very strange. But hopefully things will start looking up soon. Oh golly, it's got to get better!

Here is our tiny vulture mooching "Da Da's" VERY nutritious Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Liam would only eat "Da Da's" Trix the past few days. Don't judge me for feeding my kid sugar packed and color dyed cereal!
Seriously, he will not eat anything else. Sick indeed!

Easter Fun

I have been planning for weeks and weeks to take Liam to Thanksgiving Point for their Easter Eggtreme. I was anxious to take photos of Liam hunting for Easter eggs and treats, etc. Yesterday I still hadn't found anyone who could accompany us to the event. Ian stated long ago that he wasn't interested in going, so I had casually mentioned it to a few friends hoping in the end one may be able to go. Ends up NONE were able to go so I hung my head and sulked a bit. I talked to Ian and told him I would be going alone with Liam. He said he would go! I was so excited. Out of all my friends, Ian was the one that I really wanted to go with us!

So we got up early this morning and headed out the door a little after 8:30. We arrived to a congested Electric Park! I honestly didn't think it would be too bad and THAT crowded, but alas, Ian was right about his fears. Luckily I bought our tickets ahead of time, so the will-call line was MUCH shorter than the mile-long one for everyone else. Liam's age group was to hunt for eggs at 9:30, but when we got through the ticket gate we saw how many people were over there certainly ready to run our little guy over. We passed on the egg hunt (yes, all my photography visions of grandeur were crushed).

We took him to get a balloon animal then decided to have the clown make him a sword instead. Not 5 minutes later it was deflated. Daddy salvaged it a bit, but it surely wasn't the same.

We beat the crowd to the farm area of the park. The first thing we came upon was the duck pond and Liam immediately started saying "quack" all on his own. We were both so impressed that he knew what the duck said with no verbal que from us! Same story when we came upon the chickens... he started going "bawk, bawk" all on his own! (Thanks Baby Einstein!)

Ian has a talent for razzing the turkeys whenever we visit. He got his gobble impression going and the male turkeys were getting very irritated to protect the females who didn't seem to notice the competition in the air. Liam and I were laughing at Daddy and anyone who witnessed Ian's talent just smiled and/or laughed along with us.

After admiring and cooing at the baby goats and feeding the mama goats, we went inside to the dairy exhibit. Ian quickly steered Liam's attention to the mock milking station and proceeded to spray me as I took photos. I love the expression on his face in this photo!

We had a great morning over all. We decided to set up an egg hunt for Liam in our own yard tomorrow. That way Uncle Drew can be here to enjoy Liam's reactions and take photos too.

Bo Bo makes a new toy!

I ordered prints of quite a few photos awhile back when I was being creative making/buying toys for Liam. One suggestion was to make a photo album that was just for him, so he could see every day things he does in a photo and also to teach him names of our family members pictured in the album.

I have quite a few photos of Daddy (as I am the only photographer that lives here), two of me, one of each of the grandparents, one of his cousin, a couple of his uncles and two of Jesus. I also included photos of the cats, the front of our home and other toys he plays with.

When showing him the album for the first time this morning, he attempted to say Jesus, puzzles and grandpa. I can't replicate the Jesus and puzzles, but "graw graw" for grandpa was very clear. I was so impressed!

I think the cutest reaction this morning was his longing for "da da" when he recognized him so many times in the album. He started to whine for "da da" which was very sweet. He realized that he missed Daddy very much. (So we of course gave him a call at work.)

I took this photo of my boys after we got home from work yesterday. ~Liam sharing his sightings (and snacks) with Daddy~ Liam LOVES to climb the chair and perch at the window for long periods of time. I think it's sweet that Ian takes the time to savor what Liam thinks is fascinating (you know, barking dogs and an empty street with the occasional cat crossing).

Random doings this past week...

• When shown how to give himself two thumbs up, Liam puts both fists in front of him, his thumbs hidden inside. He examined them and laughed that this was the best he could do.

• When shot at with his dad's finger or any other object, Liam will quickly look up from what he is doing and shoot back (pow) with his finger and, just as quickly, go back to what he is doing.

• Now that Liam has been exposed to two kinds of melon and the customary way to eat a slice, avoiding the rind... he does this with any wedged fruit. Dad had to show him that it's okay to eat the skin of a plum.

• We purchased a Mr. Potat0 Head for only 6 bucks yesterday. Liam had WAY too much fun with this toy. I wish I could have gotten all the footage of his delight as he made funny faces and gave high fives to Mr. Potat0 Head. And the kicker... he insists on wearing the tiny yellow glasses as he puts his new friend together. (My mom will especially appreciate this photo, as she took one of me at this age with the same attire.)

• And finally... When we ask Liam to say Mama... he responds with... {drum roll please}

"BO BO!"

Nice.

All I need is a clown nose and said name will fit me nicely.