Papa Tom & Nana's Visit

I’m still way behind on my blogging – lots of pictures to post and stories to write. DominicsMom took the weekend to go see DominicsAunt Laurie, DominicsUncle Andy, and DominicsCousin Jake. To help me out, DominicsPapa Tom and DominicsGrandma Nana flew down from Portland (although I think they just wanted to escape the nasty storm that blew and knocked out everyone’s electricity.) Everyone had a good time and there were a couple of funny stories:

One afternoon, Nana and I were trying to put Dominic down for his afternoon nap. Of course, he wanted his ‘baby pillow’, the small blue pillow that DominicsAunt Rebecca had made for him and that he cannot fall asleep without. But it wasn’t in his room. So while Nana tried to keep him quiet, I looked all over the upstairs, then went and looked all over the downstairs.

Couldn’t find it.

Having a vague memory of Dominic taking it with him into the car that morning, I checked both cars (and had some horrible visions of the pillow falling out of the car at the local grocery parking lot…)

Not there either.

So I checked upstairs again, looking under every bed and in every closet.

Then the cars again.

Then downstairs under the couch.

About this time, DominicsPapa Tom, who was sitting on the couch and watching the Redskins vs. Saints game asked, “What are you looking for?” I described the pillow to him and the necessity of having it so that Dominic would sleep. Papa Tom stood up to look around the living room... Yep, he was sitting on the little blue pillow. There was some great rejoicing (and some muttering under my breath) and little Dominic was able to take his nap.

And an achievement:

This weekend Dominic was sitting on his Thomas the Tank Engine scooter and Jocelyn wanted to join him. Not wanting to share Thomas, he grabbed another walker for her to use. This one has a big happy face on it and it plays a very catchy little ditty every time it’s touched or it moves. Joss was enchanted. She played with it for a bit and pushed it around a little and would then crawl after it. At one point I picked her up and set her down behind it in a standing position while holding onto it. I rolled it slowly while holding on to her so that she walked behind it. Joss seemed to be agreeable with this and we went across the room a couple of times. The third time, I got her moving and then let go. She kept walking for 6 steps on her own! She had a great time and was laughing when she sat down. I turned the walker around for her and she crawled up, held on to the walker and then stood up on her own. She then pushed it and walked behind it for four more steps! This was a first for her and we all laughed and clapped for her, she was really excited.

We had another first this evening. Dominic was given a time out as he was rough housing too much with Joss, so we put him on the stairs (and had to listen to him whine for 3 minutes). Joss must have quickly forgotten being man-handled by Dominic because she moved up to the landing below the stairs to be nearer her big brother. At that point I turned to talk to DominicsMom. When I turned back she was three stairs up and working on her fourth one and was just below Dominic! Both DominicsMom and I were very surprised! I'll now have to rig the child gate...

I'll post some pictures a bit later.

DominicsDad