Quiet Book

As many of you have already heard, Eddie is a menace when it comes to sitting through sacrament meeting. I am sure most kids his age are, but from my observation, he is worse than most of the kids in our ward. For months, I have been considering making a Eddie a quiet book for church as a way to keep him entertained without having anything to chuck at the people sitting behind us. I have done a lot of research on different kinds of quiet books. I found one that we could purchase, but thought that many of the pages were too advanced for Eddie. So after church a few weeks ago when we took Eddie out of sacrament meeting a record 6 times, I decided it was time to do something. That is when I found this amazing idea: A Pot Holder Quiet Book.

The next day, Eddie and I made a stop at the dollar store and bought some fabulous holiday pot holders and some felt. I got right to work. I wanted to make pages that Eddie could have fun with at his current stage of development. So I did some more research and made a list of potential page ideas.

Eddie likes numbers (especially twos and nines), so I decided to start with counting.

First, I cut numbers 1-9 out of black felt and stitched each number onto a square of red felt. I sewed a second red square to the back of the first to hide my stitches.




Next, I sewed all sorts of little doo-dads onto squares of black felt. Each section corresponds to the number that will cover it -- two lady bugs under the 2, five baseballs under the 5, etc. Then I sewed the black felt onto a piece of blue cotton fabric that was large enough to cover my potholder.


Next, I sewed the blue fabric with attached doo-dads onto the potholder. The fabric covers the lame design on the front of the potholder, so it really doesn't matter how ugly the pot holders are. You only end up seeing the trim and the back. Since I was using white thread, I didn't use the sewing machine because I didn't want the stitches to show on the back side. If you have the right color of thread, you won't have this problem. Just turn the edges under and stitch all the way around.

Last, I sewed the number flaps on top of the corresponding doo-dads. Voila! The counting page is complete.





The next page I decided to do is shape matching.

First, I cut shapes out of green and white felt. Then, I pinned the shapes to my red fabric and stitched with white around the outside of the shapes to create an outline of each shape on the red fabric.




Next, I cut out the shapes again so I could create a double-layer. I sewed a small piece of velcro onto the back, then sewed the layers together so the stitches are hidden between layers. Last, I sewed velcro into the center of each shape outline on the red fabric.

Now all I need to do is sew my red fabric onto my pot holder and this page will be done.

Care, who writes the Obsessively Stitching blog deserves all the credit for this idea. She has tons of cute crafty ideas, so be sure to check it out. I plan to make more pages in the quiet book as I come up with ideas. The book will be bound with some sort of ring through the loops on the pot holder, so I will be able to expand it as Eddie learns to do new things. If you have any ideas for future pages that a kid like Eddie might enjoy, please leave a comment!

Strep

I am thinking of starting up a regular feature on Eddie's blog about all of his diseases. At the rate he gets them, it could be a weekly post! In this week's edition: Strep Throat.

I feel pretty bad about this illness because not only is Eddie sick, but we also exposed almost everyone we know over the Thanksgiving holiday. In our defense, we didn't know he had strep until Friday or we could've avoided exposing the entire Barton family and the friends we had dinner with on Wednesday night.

Wednesday night, Ed started getting congested and developed a little cough. Thursday he had no appetite (he had crackers, toast, more crackers, and pie for Thanksgiving). Friday, he awoke from his nap in a pile of vomit and threw up 5 times in the next two hours -- including twice while we waited for the doctor to see us in the exam room at the Instacare. Due to Eddie's history, I thought these symptoms meant another ear infection. The doctor looked into his ears and didn't see any problems. Then she tortured him by sticking a tongue depressor in his mouth to get a look at his throat. She swabbed it and did the test and it came back positive for strep. So apparently, Eddie throws up whenever he has any sort of infection. Who would've thunk?

Since she made him so mad, the doctor offered to bring him an Otter Pop. I wasn't having that until she gave him some anti-nausea meds (because the last thing I needed was more throw-up in brighter colors). So they brought the anti-nausea medicine in and we force-fed that to him. Then he got his Otter Pop and was happy. Luckily, he got on antibiotics at the right time so that 24 hours later, he stopped being contagious -- before he could expose Dax & Riley at dinner on Saturday.

He's doing much better now that he is not contagious and there is nobody new to expose. So, if you get strep this week, you can blame us... and I apologize in advance for it.

Here are some silly photos from last week. We emptied our trash can in our office and Eddie found a new toy. He climbed in:

And then this happened:

To answer your question, no, I didn't catch him in time.

Did Someone Call for a Hero?

One of Eddie's favorite places to hang out these days is in our bedroom. This is mostly because of the ceiling fan, but also partly because of the big bed. He comes up next to it and says, "seat!" so that we will lift him up. Then he stands on the bed to look at the fan. He gets excited because can see himself (and the fan) in the mirror on the other side of the room. Since he loves it so much, most nights after his bath, we'll put him in his jammies and let him run loose in our room for a while before he goes to bed. Here are a couple of photos from the other night in his new Buzz Lightyear jammies:

He was running all over like a crazy person and wouldn't hold still long enough for a photo.

The one shot where I got him to stand still for 2 seconds and sort of smile. Luckily he happened to catch his reflection on the front of the camera, so he paused to take a look.

Ed-Word

Eddie's vocabulary seems to be growing by the minute. Since my last post about his words, he has learned several more. Here are the words that we hear most frequently these days:

Fan

I should be careful what I wish for. In my last post about Eddie's words, I said that I wanted him to learn the words "fan" and "light." Now those are the words we hear most often and some days, it really drives me crazy. Plus, anything that a similar shape is also a fan, such as stars, the letter "X," and even the new Walmart logo.

Candle

Eddie loves to look at our candles when they're lit and he finally started to say "candle." It sounds more like, "tan-doo," but every once in a while he gets the "c" right.

Juice

Up until very recently, Eddie didn't drink much juice, mostly because I never gave him any. But he has learned to love juice and will ask for it by name. At first, he would call it "joo," but now he can say it quite clearly.

Pizza

Eddie has a favorite food. It is pizza. I'll open up the fridge to figure out what to make for his lunch or dinner and he stands there, looking in, and says, "pizza?" Or I'll ask what he wants, and he always says "pizza!" He doesn't really understand when I tell him that we don't have any pizza... so we've started improvizing with whatever ingredients we have on hand.

Come On

Eddie likes to repeat things we say sometimes. Just this weekend while Dave was playing the PS2, something upsetting would happen and Dave would say "Come on!" So Eddie started saying, "Mon!"

Good

This one cracks me up. Every day when Dave gets home from work, I'll say, "how was your day?" And Eddie will immediately respond, "good." He never uses it in any other context, though, so I'm fairly sure he has no idea what he's talking about.

Wait

I tell Eddie to wait a lot. I tell him to wait when he tries to escape mid-diaper-change. I tell him to wait when he demands more fishy crackers while we're driving on the freeway. He has started to say "wait" when he knows that it is what I am about to say. Just the other day, I told him to wait for fishies in the car since we were almost at our destination and he exclaimed, "NO WAIT!" I think that qualifies as his first full sentence (unless you count "Wazzat?"), plus it sums up his personal philosophy.

"Dirty" Words

Clock

Eddie likes to point out clocks almost as much as he likes to point out fans. However, he hasn't yet learned the "cl" combination, so he always leaves out the L. Dave and I can't help but feel a little embarrassed when he shouts this word out in the middle of sacrament meeting.

Sit

Here's another word that frequently has embarrassing results. He hasn't quite figured out how to do just the "s" without adding an "h" in there. He can do it when he says "seat," but not when he says "sit."

How many of Ed's words can you spot in this photo?

A Nerd in the Making

In general, Eddie is not terribly interested in watching movies or TV. I am glad about this - to a point. While I am bummed that I don't have one of those children who can be plopped in front of a cartoon for 30 minutes and stay entertained while I do my own thing, I am glad that he does not yet know Elmo, Dora, Builder Bob, etc. The one character he does know (besides Batman) is R2D2.

On Saturday, while I organized our linen closet, Dave and Eddie started watching Star Wars: Episode IV. Dave chose that particular movie because of R2's prominence. This thrilled Ed. I could hear him all the way upstairs saying, "D2, D2, D2."

When I came downstairs, this is what I found:


Just a kid, enjoying his favorite movie with his daddy (a kid who will probably hate me in about 13 years for posting this photo of him).

18 Months Old

Today, Eddie is officially 18 months old. To celebrate, he got to go to the doctor. Yay.

Eddie has been to the doctor a lot in the past month. First, he fell down and had his seizure, so we took him in then. Then he went in to get his flu shot. Then he had a dentist appointment. Then he got his H1N1 shot. Then he got croup and went in just last Thursday. Now he seems to expect the worst when we walk into the exam room. Today, we arrived at the doctor's office pretty early, so we took the stairs to avoid the terrifying elevator. That was my work-out for the day (4 flights carrying a 22 lb. kid and a fully loaded diaper bag). They got us right in and took us to the exam room so I could strip Ed down for his weigh-in. That is when Eddie lost it.

Despite the writhing and screams of terror, we did manage to weigh and measure him. He now weighs 22.16 lbs., which puts him in the 8th percentile. He is 31.5 inches long, which is the 27th percentile. So he's skinny... but we already knew that. Once they were done measuring him, I was able to calm him down a bit for the pediatrician. She checked him out and said he seems to be doing great. Since he is sick, he got lucky and I convinced the doctor to postpone his shots until we go in again. I was hoping that one shot-free visit would help ease his fears. Of course, the next time we go in, he has to get two shots.

His next well-child check-up is at 24 months. Of course, with Ed's track record, we will be back in the office at least 6 times between now and then. But here's hoping we aren't.

Here is Eddie last week before the croup hit

Nursery Newbie

Today was Eddie's first trip to nursery. After splitting time with Kristen and I out in the foyer during the second half of sacrament meeting, we were skeptical about how well Eddie would handle this transition. Since Kristen was once again substituting in Primary, the task of taking him fell to me.

When we first arrived in the nursery room, Eddie was hesitant to let go of my sweater vest. For the first few minutes, he sat on my lap and watched the other kids play. But then, his eye caught hold of a shiny blue toy tambourine. I took him over to it and set him down. He quickly picked it up and began shaking it to his heart's content. I returned to my seat and observed for a few more minutes. He was soon comfortable interacting with the other kids. I told one of the nursery leaders where to find me in case there was trouble and quietly slipped out the door without him noticing.

Much to my surprise, no one had to come and retrieve me during the duration of Sunday School and Elders Quorum. When I went to pick him up at the end of the meetings, I found Eddie completely comfortable with his surroundings, standing in the middle of the nursery room joyfully thrusting his pelvis to and fro, a move he usually reserves for when music is playing. He even initially resisted when I tried to pick him up and take him. As we were leaving, one of the leaders handed me the page he had "colored." I think you will agree—the kid has a gift. The red arrows indicate Eddie's subtle artistic touch.

Time Out

Today, Eddie experienced another first—his first time out. Dave and I have been discussing the whole "time out" thing for a while, trying to decide how and when it should be implemented. We've had a hard time deciding. Lucky for us, Eddie is making our decision easier every day.

Eddie has started throwing temper tantrums. I have heard from both of Eddie's healthcare professionals (his pediatrician and his physical therapist), that it will only get worse before it gets better. In light of this horrifying knowledge, Dave and I have been trying to think of ways to manage Eddie's rage issues. In the past couple of weeks, Eddie has developed a new tactic during these moments of insane anger—if you're holding him, he arches his back and throws his legs and arms back, making it virtually impossible to hold him. If you try to set him down, he remains arched, which puts him into a nice back bend, using his knees and head for support. Generally when he is in one of these fits, he won't let you hold him and he won't let you set him down. The only solution we had found thus far is to scramble around trying to figure out what he wants and give it to him.

I realize that this is only rewarding the terrible behavior, so today Eddie drove me to trying a new tactic. He started his temper tantrum and, when I couldn't get him to settle down, I put him in his crib and left the room to let him calm himself down. I decided that I would stay out until he stopped screaming or for 5 minutes, whichever came first. After 3 minutes, he was quiet, so time out was over.

This left Dave and I wondering again about the best way to handle these situations. So, loyal readers, we turn to you for help. Do you put your kids in time out? If not, how do you control your kids? If so, how early did you start? What exactly do you do and how long does the punishment last? Unfortunately, we have not been able to find an Anger Management course for toddlers, so we need your help! We await your comments...

The Things We Do For Suckers

This afternoon, Eddie and I had a scary experience. We went to the neighborhood park to play on the slide. The jungle gym in this park is set up so that the slides are on one side, then on the back side, there is an open ledge. Usually, Eddie will climb up the stairs and go straight for the slide. If I let him go down the slide unassisted, he shoots off the end, so I usually wait by the slide and slow him down as he slides. Today, he climbed up onto the platform and started coming for the slide, where I was waiting. Then he said, "no!" and started backing up the other way - towards the open ledge. I yelled "stop!" which generally makes him stop what he is doing. Unfortunately, I was too slow. By the time I ran around to the other side, he had fallen about 4 feet to the ground and landed flat on his back.

His eyes were open and he let out one little cry, so I scooped him up. Then he stopped breathing like he was preparing for an extra loud scream... except he was silent for longer than ever before. I started saying, "breathe, Eddie, breathe!" Then he arched his back and gasped, then started shaking like he was having a seizure.

Obviously by this point, I was freaking out. I hurried home to find my phone to call the pediatrician, all the while trying to get Eddie to look at me or to respond in any way. I couldn't find my phone (I learned later that Eddie had hidden it inside his shape sorter), so I had to run to the neighbor's house to call Dave. By the time I found my phone to call the doctor, Eddie was acting perfectly normal. The pediatrician told me to bring him right over, so as soon as Dave got home, we went to the doctor.

The doctor checked out his reflexes and his pupils and asked me all sorts of questions. She toyed with the idea of sending us to Primary Children's to get a CT scan, but luckily let us decide what we wanted to do. She was fairly confident that if something were seriously wrong, Eddie would have more symptoms occurring within a couple of hours. So with that assurance, we decided to keep an eye on him and then if anything more happened, then to take him to the E.R.

The doctor told us that she suspected he had a "breath-holding spell," which happens a lot with toddlers. I guess a kid can get really mad or hurt and will involuntarily hold their breath long enough that it makes them pass out, or in some cases, have a seizure. She told us that if that is what it was, it will probably happen again, but if it starts happening too often, we'll have to have him tested for anemia (which can cause seizures, too, I guess).

Now, it is two hours later and Eddie seems to be doing perfectly fine. He didn't have much fun at the doctor's office, but he came out of the ordeal with a sucker which, apparently, he likes so much that he doesn't want to ruin. He just likes to hold it.

Zat?

As mentioned in an earlier post, Eddie can now ask, "What's that?" He does this constantly. No matter where we are or what is going on, Eddie always has to know, "Zat?" He will point at different things and ask. I try to be good about answering him so that he can learn what things are. However, he will also point at nothing and ask. Or, he will point in one direction, look in another direction and say, "Zat?"

He is especially fascinated by lamps, lights, light fixtures, and ceiling fans. Every room we walk through, he points at every source of light -- whether illuminated or not -- and asks, "Zat?" Needless to say, it is getting a tiny bit old. It seems to me that it would be easier for him to learn to say "light" or "fan" so that he could stop the endless questions.

Despite this, he is learning new words. Of course, they are not the most useful words. Here are the two we discovered earlier this week:

Dee-Too

Thanks to Dave's love of Star Wars, Eddie is quickly becoming indoctrinated. Dave found a box of his old Star Wars toys for Eddie to play with, so now Eddie has an R2D2 toy. Also, whenever we enter our office, he sees the Return of the Jedi poster and asks (you guessed it), "zat?" I will hold him up to it to see who he is pointing at and it is almost always R2D2. And so, he can say "dee-too."

Pointing at the fan, asking "zat?" while holding R2D2

Purple

Of all the colors to learn, I thought purple would be amongst the last, right up there with orange and chartreuse. However, as I tried to convince Eddie to color with our new markers instead of sucking on them, I used the word "purple" and Eddie instantly picked it up.

Like I said, not the most useful words, but I suppose they're better than nothing!

In other news, Eddie suddenly got three teeth this week, so he has been a complete lunatic. And he got his second haircut last Friday in preparation for Barton family photos. His hair is so short now that it doesn't matter if we comb it or not. Of course, it is also so short that you can see his crusty cradle cap right through it. Quite the trade-off.

Eddie's response when I asked him to show his new teeth.