Flying a Kite

One of the TV shows Dominic watches had a bunch of kites on it and for a little while he was very interested in them, so we went out and bought him one. We actually looked for it in December, but as December is decidedly not kite season, I had a hard time finding one. I eventually found one at a Discovery Store, and better yet it was in the bargain bin at only $5! I picked out a nice dinosaur kite for him.

Well, it took us a while to break out the kite for Dominic. We’ve been busy and the weather has been somewhat lousy, I guess January and February are really not good kite flying months so I see why the only kites we found were in the bargain bin. However, one weekend we had one of our typical San Diego days, hot in the low 80’s, a small breeze from the north and very clear skies (ok, not so typical in the middle of the winter but they happen every now and then out here.) DominicsPapa Tom and Nana were still here and had a few hours to kill before their flight. We loaded up everyone into the cars and drove to a local park. Dominic got excited when we told him we were going to fly a kite. He watched intently as I assembled it and then he helped me carry it out to the field. Papa Tom helped me launch it and then it was in the air.

Dominic was delighted! He had an absolute ball when I gave him the kite string. He walked this way and that, holding the kite string in all different positions. At one point, the wind died and the kite started to fall to the earth. I yelled at him, “Run Dominic!” Of course, he took off running in the direction he was facing which was TOWARDS the kite! I had to yell back to him, “No Dominic, run to Daddy!” With this he turned around and ran screaming towards me as the kite continued its plunge to the ground. It was a great time!

A little later, he discovered how fun it was to let go of the kite string and watch Papa Tom or I run after it. Shortly after that, we put the kite away…

Dominic had a great time and he really was cute holding the kite. As a bonus, he got to play on the playground once he was finished flying the kite.

DominicsDad showing Dominic the rope.

Dominic develops his own style.
Not sure what he's doing here!
Dominic runs with the kite.

Video of Dominic running towards and then away from his kite. Sorry for the camera shake, I was moving and laughing too hard!

Dominic with Nana and Papa Tom.

Dominic and his kite.

DominicsDad

More Pictures from Joss's B-Day

Here are some more pictures from Jocelyn's birthday:

Nana and Papa Tom watch the festivities.

DominicsGreatGrandma Mema, Aunt Clair, & Grandma Pat.

"I loooove clothes!" Joss loves to play with clothes...
Dominic & Nana.
Dominic tries out his new Thomas the Tank Engine pillow.


"Can I have this too? Dominic won't miss it!"

DominicsDad

Baby Signs

When Dominic was around one year old, we taught him a few Baby Signs. Baby signs are a rudimenatary form of sign language that babys can learn and use to communicate before they are ready to speak. We purchased a book, Baby Signs, (apt enough name) and read up on the whole subject. It was not too difficult to teach him several signs and long before Dominic could vocalize the words, he was able sign simple concepts like "eat", "more", and "all done." We could have taught him more as there are many other signs, but we were lazy...

The last couple of weeks we have been trying to teach Jocelyn these same signs (and hopefully more.) We've enlisted Dominic to help out and he has been modeling the signs for Joss (with varying amounts of enthusiasm.) For quite awhile Joss has been pointing at things that she wants, but if she is pointing to food, we have stopped giving it to her right away and have begun to ask her if she wants to 'eat' or is she wants 'more' if she has already been eating. For the first time this afternoon she made the 'eat' sign! This evening she was pointing to the baby puffs (a snack food) and I asked her if she wanted to eat. Then she made the sign! I was very happy and immediately gave her some puffs.

Joss's little index finger is pretty cute as its always pointing at something - usually something that is Dominic's like one of his more treasured trains or his sippy cup. As we began to teach her the more conventional signs for 'eat', Joss tried to teach us one that she made up. Sometimes as she was sitting in her high chair, we would take a moment to prepare her food for her (and take a bite of our own!) Just like her mother, she is not a very patient little girl and so she would want to be served right away. Sometimes she would point to the food. If that did not get her point across, she has taken to pointing at her high chair tray as if to say, "Put the food here now!"

Here are some more photos of Joss at her birthday party:

DominicsDad

Bedtime Trials

Well, its 915pm as I write this and its 1 1/4 hours after Dominic's and Joss's bedtime. She's screaming her head off and he just finished getting out of bed for the 3rd time to pee.

For almost a year now Dominic has been getting out of bed in the middle of the night and crawling into bed with us. He's finally taken it another step and for the first time he's crawled out of bed, opened his door, and come into our bedroom. He's actually gone pee all three times and twice they were really respectable amounts - he had two full cups to drink at dinner. About 2/3's of the time, Dominic has been waking up in the morning with a dry diaper, so he's doing really well. Anything that helps him control his bladder through the night is worth doing.

Joss, well Joss has decided that she doesn't want to sleep without someone holding her. As soon as we try to put her down, she starts to scream. It now takes quite awhile to get her down in the evenings so that she does not wake up right away. She doesn't much care what time it is, 8pm or 3am, she wants to be held. A couple of times now in the middle of the night she's refused to go back to sleep and we've had to let her cry it out. Tonight is the first night she has woken up early and refused to go back down...fun. It's probably partly responsible for Dominic still being up, he can't sleep with all the screaming.

Ok, enough typing, I'm going to work on sorting through this weekend's pictures and I'll try to post more. Here's a really cute picture of Joss:

DominicsDad

Toilet Training Graduation!

Sunday afternoon I drove Nana and Papa Tom to the airport. Dominic tagged along with us in the car. On CA-163 in Balboa Park, we hit some bad traffic caused by an accident. As we came to a stop, Dominic announced that he had to go Pee. We were stuck in the fast lane and I could not get off the road to find a bathroom for us. As Dominic became more insistent with his "Dominic pee" announcements, Nana looked around the back of the Explorer for a plastic bucket that we used to keep in the truck. Unfortunately she couldn’t find it - I had tossed it a couple of weeks ago. We had a plastic water bottle up front so I dumped it out the window and handed it to Nana, but I had few hopes that it would work. Nana pulled Dominic out of his seat (we were stuck and not moving – so it was safe) and helped him pull down his pants. She held the bottle up to his pee pee and he let go! He filled it up a respectable amount and as traffic started to move, Nana pulled up his pants and placed him back in his seat before the police caught us and gave me a ticket.

So another check in the toilet training box! He's master all the basic toilet techniques (well almost) and has now moved on to more advanced toilet techniques! And we now know what our emergency toilet is for long trips…

So we dropped Nana and Papa Tom off at the airport OK, although Dominic did not want them to go and he was really sad. Once I got home, I became involved in pulling Dominic out of his seat and I left his ‘bottle’ in the truck. I forgot to warn DominicsMom not to drink the lemonade…maybe I better go get it while I have it on my mind!

In other toilet training news, Dominic goes pee all on his own. When he is playing upstairs by himself, we sometimes hear the little pitter patter of his feet as he runs to our bathroom. When we go to investigate, we usually find him finishing up and just needing some help pulling up his pants.

The other day we were at our local park when he told me he had to pee. I knew he wouldn't make it home in time, so I took him over to the bushes around the park, pulled down his pants and let him do his thing...(then had to repeat 30 minutes later.) He definitely got a kick out of peeing outside.

Also, Dominic is finally facing the right way when he poops. He's still hovering over the toilet seat, but now everything if falling where it is supposed to in a reliable manner. We consider him toilet trained, he just needs some polishing and for us to keep an eye on him.

DominicsDad

Feeding Joss

DominicsMom related this story to me:

Sunday morning DominicsMom was downstairs early with Joss and Dominic (it was DominicsDad’s turn to sleep in and I was taking advantage!) Penelope came down to bless them with her presence and Dominic decided to try and feed her by hand. He took one of her cat food pellets and tried to feed her, but to no avail as she soon moved back upstairs. Dominic was left with the pellet in his hand so he went back to sit next to Jocelyn on the couch. After a little while, he realized that he still had the pellet in his hand. He took a quick look at Joss and then looked down at the cat food in his hand. He turned to look at DominicsMom and a very mischievous smile came over his face as he started to move the pellet closer to Jocelyn’s mouth, all the while smiling at DominicsMom. DominicsMom said “No, don’t you dare!” before he could get it up to Jocelyn and tempt her with it.

DominicsDad

Jocelyn's Birthday Party

This weekend we celebrated Jocelyn’s first birthday! DominicsGrandma Nana and Papa Tom flew in earlier in the week, and DominicsGrandma Mama and Papa Frank came down with DominicsGreat Grandmother Mema. DominicsAunt Claire also came to the party. Jocelyn had a great time and received some great gifts. She likes her new pillow and she really liked her birthday cake.

Here are a few pictures, I’ll post more as I sort through them.

Joss's new pillow had cats all over it. She was crazy about it!

She really liked her cake too!

DominicsDad

Dominic gets a Treat

Dominic has been doing so well with his potty training that we decided to give him a big treat and I took him to Cold Stone Creamery on Sunday night (Ok, I haven't been there since I've been back and I was dying for a Cookie Doughn't You Want Some.) We both waited through a long line and then finally it was time to order. He decided on chocolate ice cream with a M&M mix-in in a waffle cone. He started to chow down on it while I ordered a Pecan and Cream for DominicsMom and I went for the Cookie Doughn't You Want Some in a waffle bowl. As we left, one of the other patrons said, "He's one lucky little guy!" Dominic thought so as he sat in silence the whole way home. I got a lot of "Thank you Daddy!" that evening.

I'll post some pictures in a couple of days.

In other news, Jocelyn's birthday is coming up! I cannot believe that she is almost one year old! We recently went to a local photo studio (Ok, Sears...) and had some shots of her and Dominic taken. When we get them, I'll scan some in and post them.

DominicsDad

Report Card!

Dominic’s First Report Card

Dominic actually received his first report card back in November, its just taken me this long to scan it in. He is doing really well, having learned most of his letters and all of his numbers! Click on the image below to see a larger version so that you can read it for yourself!

It took me such a long time to scan his report card because I’ve been having problems with my current scanner, so with a little bit of our tax refund (we don’t have it yet, but we are getting a little back), I bought a Canon MP600 multifunction printer, scanner, & copier. It’s a neat machine that has received many good reviews. I’ve made some great scans with it with really good results, much better than the previous scanner, an Epson. DominicsMom and I have only printed one document, but it looks pretty good.
DominicsDad

Toilet Training & Using Public Restrooms

Toilet training continues to go well with Dominic. The little guy was sick and miserable all last week, but he did not let it affect him and he only had a couple of accidents. He often goes over to the potty on his own, pulls down his pants and pee’s into the potty. This usually means he completely strips off his pants and underwear as he usually doesn’t like to pee with them on (they tend to restrict the movement of his feet), but he can do it all on his own now. We sometimes have to remind him, but he’s been doing well!

He is getting to be such a big boy!

It is one thing for him to go wee at home, but out in town is another story. Here, one of us has to take him into the bathroom and we are not too wild about completely stripping him down…but we do what we have to! He usually stands on the toilet seat and does his thing. Well, the other day I was at Target and we were looking at the Thomas trains (of course!) He started to wiggle a little bit and then he announced that he had to pee. So I put Dominic back into the cart (to move quicker) and then walked halfway around the store looking for the public restrooms. When I finally found them and went in, both stalls were occupied, so it was wait or use a urinal. I pull down his pants and underwear, but left them on and then I picked him up and let him stand on the lip of the urinal (they looked like they had been recently cleaned, thankfully Target has clean bathrooms!) He leaned forward and went pee without any problems, his first use of a urinal!

I was proud of him and so he was proud of his accomplishment.

Dominic has had one big failure out in town. Last weekend we took him to a toy store, the Toy Depot, which bills itself as “Totally Thomas” and they did have the largest selection of Thomas the Tank Engine toys and paraphernalia that I have seen outside of the Day out with Thomas toy store. They had Thomas puzzles, books, lunch boxes, party favors, and of course trains. Dominic was having so much fun with the two train tracks in the store that he pee’d his pants a couple of times. It was very trying for both DominicsMom and I, but we all survived…

Now some photos:

Jocelyn drinks from a cup! "Look, no hands ma!"

Happy girl!

"I did that?!?"

"Yep, I did it!"

DominicsDad

Catching Up

Here are some recent photos of the kids.

Dominic learning to bat. We are still working on his form...

A high pop-up, but at least he put wood on leather, or at least plastic on plastic.

DominicsMom and Jocelyn.

Joss smiles for the camera...
DominicsDad and Joss. She has my smile!

"Ahh caan't do it."

When Dominic intones this phrase, he draws out his ahhhs and it sounds a bit like a British accent to us. It comes through a bit here as he drops his spoon and asks for help.

Potty Training Update:

The little guy is doing well. Today was a first as he managed to poop into his toilet, instead of around it. So cleanup was a lot easier this time. He still needs to stand to get in the proper frame of mind, but he's progressing nicely. He had an accident at school the other day, but made it through the rest of the day ok. He also did well this weekend. His biggest problem is when he is having fun and he either ignores the urge to go or does not feel it in his excitement. We just have to ask him if he has to go pee a lot, and then sometimes pry him away from whatever he's doing to sit him in front of the potty...

DominicsDad

Dominic the Meerkat

You may remember, but Dominic likes Meerkats. We hit all three Meerkat exhibits at the zoo on Christmas Eve and he enjoys watching Meerkat Manor on Animal Planet.

He has a new game he likes to play and today he wanted me to join him in his new game and play meerkat with him.

"Daddy play meerkat."

"What?"

"Daddy play meerkat!!"

"What? What's wrong with the cat?"

DominicsMom - "He wants you to play a meerkat!"

Dominic was quite hilarious, hoping and crawling around the room on all fours. Then he would stop, rise up on his knees, and assume the 'sentry' position (as meerkats will do to protect the rest of the colony.) While in this position (hands tucked in close to the body & nose slightly raised), he looks around in short, sharp movements. Sometimes he dances while on his knees, we are not sure what he's trying to do here or what behavior he's imitating...

So the Lion King is no longer a lion (or tiger), but is now a meerkat...

DominicsDad