Zoo Atlanta with Dendi and Ba-Pa

Today, we went to Zoo Atlanta with Scott's parents: Dendi (Grandma Diane) and Ba-Pa (Grandpa Tom). We have season passes to the zoo, so we've been several times in the last six months and this morning started like any other zoo day -- heavy on the rides, light on the animals. Except this time, instead of insisting on riding the train and the carousel with me, Eli wanted to ride with Dendi, which was nice for both of them and allowed me watch and take some pictures.




The other thing that made today's zoo visit special, besides having the grandparents with us, was that Eli was really into looking at the animals. He seemed the most interested in the large cats and primates. And, he was especially adorable watching the animals with Ba-Pa. But, he still doesn't have a very long attention span for each animal (neither does Ba-Pa for that matter) and he lets us know he wants to move on to the next one by saying "bye-bye". Surprisingly, we actually got to see most of the animals at the zoo before he requested going back to the train -- a very unusual and welcome change.





On the other hand, not surprisingly, Eli was interested in looking for signs. Eli has been fascinated with signs since he was a tiny baby. In fact, they were one of the first things he ever noticed and pointed at in public. He used to look for Exit signs in every business we went into. And, one of his first words was sign -- "nine". So, between watching animals, Daddy and Eli went on a sign hunt. Eli pointed out all the signs and Daddy would read them if they were too far away, or if they were close enough Eli could touch them.




After looking at many signs and animals, it was time to head back to the train for one last ride of the day. This time Eli wanted to go with Ba-Pa. He probably would have been fine, but he was very late for his nap and he sat for quite a while on the train. He started getting really upset, crying and calling for me. Luckily the engineer let me jump on and ride with Eli and Ba-Pa -- problem solved.




We had a nice day and besides that one little episode on the train, Eli was extremely well-behaved. Additionally, there's one little fringe benefit to going somewhere with others -- getting pictures of the three of us.

A Farm, New Tools and This Old Man

This morning we made a GREAT find -- Two Doves Farm. It's a local, family owned, organic farm. It's about ten minutes from our house and they are open on Fridays from 11:00 to 2:00 to sell their fruits and vegetables. We bought corn on the cob, green beans, carrots, green bell peppers, strawberries, raspberries, and a potato. I made a yummy stir fry with a lot of the veggies and a huge fruit salad for dinner tonight. We will definitely be going back.

They have a few animals at their farm too. They have chickens, so they sell free range organic eggs, which we will try. We didn't need any today. We couldn't see the chickens, but we did see their horse. Eli was fascinated with him right when we got out of the car. So, I walked over so we could watch him. He was very interested until the horse brought his huge head up towards us and kind of snorted and snuffled. Eli was definitely not interested in the horse anymore.




Then, tonight after our yummy fruit and vegetable full dinner, Grandma Diane (Dendi) and Grandpa Tom (Ba-Pa)came over to give Eli a new tool belt. As I think most male toddlers are, Eli is fascinated with tools. Scott's been putting up new shelves in Eli and the extra room's closet and Eli has been very interested. He's been playing with everything, especially the tape measure. So, Scott's parents decided that he needed his own tool belt. Needless to say, he was really excited.




Later, after Scott's parents left, I unintentionally made up a new game with one of Eli's Bob the Builder wrenches and his alphabet and number floor puzzle. We were listening to "This Old Man" and I was pointing to the corresponding numbers with the closest "pointer" available -- his wrench. It stuck. Then, he decided to take over. He's such a little copy cat right now, we are VERY CAREFUL about what we do or say around him.

Choc Choc High

Scott has been intending to make chocolate chip cookies for a while now. He has this great recipe that his mom created by tweaking the Toll House recipe. I can make them, but I'm not nearly as good at it. I guess he hasn't made them since Eli has developed his chocolate obsession, because Eli was so excited about the cookies that he didn't take a nap. **Interesting side note -- I've heard from other women that whatever you crave, or can't get enough of while pregnant tends to be your baby's favorite. It definitely held true for me. I couldn't get enough of Turtle ice cream from Bruester's. Turtle ice cream is chocolate with caramel and pecans. I think Brian (my brother) and I went almost every night during my ninth month (we had a lot of gift cards.)

We only give him a very small amount of chocolate after dinner if he asks, but since his nap schedule was all off today, Scott said he could have a cookie after he took his nap. While I was trying to put him down for his nap he kept talking about them. "Ewi want choc choc now." I said to him that he had to take his nap or wait until after dinner. Then, he told me that he wanted dinner now. Finally, at one point he sat up and said, "MMmmmm choc choc in Ewi's room, choc choc in Ewi's nose." I thought that was a great way of telling me that he could smell them -- they were in the oven.

Finally, we gave up, and realized that he probably wouldn't be napping. Scott watched Eli while I took a little nap. The joys of having Daddy home! When I got up a half an hour later they were eating dinner, even though we had eaten lunch less than four hours before. Scott said that Eli stood on his little stool in the kitchen. When Scott asked him what he was doing Eli said that he was going to make Za Za Noodles so that he could eat his choc choc. So, they ate their noodles, veggies and finally chocolate chip cookies.





No nap and chocolate make for a very wound up baby. Luckily, considering the fact he hadn't napped, he was in a very good mood all evening. And, he did go to bed earlier than usual, but not before deciding that he wanted to jump on everything: the couch, his bed, our bed and Daddy. Maybe the jumping helped to tire him out.

Daddy Time

Tonight, while I was making dinner Scott and Eli were reading. Cat in the Hat and Cat in the Hat Comes Back are Daddy's books. I'm only occassionally allowed to read them. Have I mentioned that Eli is slightly opinionated? We also have Mommy's couch and Daddy's couch, I'm the only one who's allowed to change his poopy diapers and his spoon and fork need to match his bowl or plate. Pink plates and bowls are for "Me-mes" and yellow plates and bowls are for noodles. But, I digress...

Anyway, Scott was reading his Daddy books to Eli while they were sitting on the rocking chair. When we read to Eli he turns the pages. He's insisted on that since he was physically able to turn the page, for at least a year now. Sometimes he's fairly good about it, and sometimes it turns into a race, and we can barely get a sentence out before he turns the page. The Cat in the Hat books are long. So, a lot of times Scott will insist on holding the book and turning the pages. Tonight he had an ingenious solution. Eli could turn the pages as long as he waited until Scott "dinged". When they started doing it I could hear it from the kitchen and they sounded exactly like one of those old school books that came with my Mickey Mouse record player. It was pretty hysterical. But, it seems to have worked. I was even able to "ding" tonight and successfully read him some of his other long books.

These are a few of his favorite things

Eli loves...

- Books, books, and more books.

Today we read to him for two hours. I only know that because I'm counting for the Summer Reading Program at the library. I figured we might as well get some free stuff if we're reading anyway. It got so bad a while ago that we were encouraging ANYTHING other than reading books. We felt like very bad teachers -- discouraging books.



- "Za-Za Noodles."

Za-Za is Eli's current name for Grandma Sallie and he calls plain white macaroni and cheese "Za-Za Noodles." It took me forever to figure out what they were. I've been pureeing spinach, cauliflower, and/or broccoli and putting it in his noodles since he expressed interest in pasta. Then, about a month ago we went out to dinner to Outback with Grandma Sallie and he had plain noodles, no pureed veggies, so we figured out that's what he wanted, no sneaky veggies. Of course, now he just has to eat them on the side now, which thankfully he still does.


- "Me-mes" and "Bake-bake."

His favorite meal besides noodles is pancakes and bacon. In fact, he loves it so much that we served it to our "lucky" family for his second birthday party.


- Driving his ride on toys all around the house.

He has a "Cozy Coupe" and a little "quike" (a bike with four wheels) that he likes to ride all around the house, especially now that we got hard wood floors. He says, "Ewi go fast, Mommy."




- Maisy, Elmo, Mickey Mouse, and Winnie the Pooh.

Some of his favorite books are Maisy books, we spend a lot of time at the bookstore reading them, and we always borrow them from the library. He loves his stuffed Elmo and wants Elmo to read and play with him (murder on our vocal chords.) We went to Disney World in February and ever since then he loves anything with "The Mouse" on it. We have a stuffed Mickey, Mickey clothes, Mickey crocs, and one of his favorite songs is "The Mickey Mouse Club." He calls it "bum, bum, bum, bum" (his interpretation of the beginning of the song.) The recent addition is Winnie the Pooh.



- "Choc-Choc."

I think he would eat chocolate every hour of every day if we let him. He hasn't been introduced to many other sweets, and the ones he has he hasn't shown much interest in. He asks for chocolate, we ask him when we have chocolate. He says, "after dinner."


- Mommy.

He is definitely a Momma's Boy right now. Daddy is his second favorite, but at times it seems a pretty distant second. Poor Daddy, I'm sure he'll have his time, too. I think part of the attachment is that I'm still nursing him, and he definitely likes his "nummy-nums", especially when he wants to go to sleep.


- Duplos (Legos for Toddlers), Trains and Lincoln Logs.

These are his favorite Daddy toys, and they play with these constantly. I can play too, but I'm a very poor, unimaginative substitute.




-The "Boofstore."

He loves the bookstore. They have a Thomas the Train set and lots of Maisy books. It's like going to a play group that we don't have to arrange. He also loves to go on speaker and sprinkler searches outside the bookstore through the outdoor shopping mall.


- His number and letter floor puzzles.

These are his new favorites, at the moment I think we spend the most time playing with these. They were another great thrift store find. We take them apart, put them back together. We hunt for letters, Elmo finds letters, we walk over them and recite them. It goes on and on. It's gotten to the point that I suggest other activities, and yet again I'm suffering from teacher guilt. He now knows about 20-26 of his letters and his numbers from 0-10. And, we truly haven't been trying, he's obsessed.

Potty

So, we're currently having a very interesting situation where Eli seems, or I should say seemed to be trying to potty train himself! It all started a few months ago. Getting his diaper changed has never been one of his favorite activities, as I think is true of most toddlers. So, I would explain to him that if he wanted to start going to the potty like mommy and daddy then he wouldn't have to get his diapers changed anymore. Now, I wasn't very serious, I never thought that he would potty train anytime soon, I read that the average age for boys to potty train is 39 months(that's 3 years and 3 mos. for those of you who don't want to do the math)! But, if nothing else it was a distraction when I was changing his diaper and then he would say, "No, potty, Eli have diaper" or something to that effect. Well, in April, he started actually wanting to sit on the potty, usually after our diaper discussions, nothing happened, and it would usually satisfy his curiosity for a while.

Then, at the beginning of this week, everything was different. He wanted to change his diaper IMMEDIATELY after going to the bathroom. Now, I attribute some of this to teething. His two year old molars are definitely threatening, and over the weekend the whole experience seemed to have trashed his stomach. So, I think his little bottom might have been sore. Then, Grandma Sallie brought over some potty books that she had found at the thrift store, and Eli decided that he wanted to hear them while he sat on the potty. We did that a few times on Tuesday, nothing happened, but it was awful cute. Also, he has been dry through the night quite a bit lately.

On Wednesday morning, he woke up and decided he wanted to do "potty" again with his potty books. This time, the second his little bottom hit the potty chair he started peeing! Scott and I clapped and clapped, which of course stopped the flow, but he kept peeing once our celebration was over. That day he went potty four times in the potty and once was even on a regular toilet at the pool. Thursday was a similar situation, I couldn't believe it!

But, then I started to realize, to quote a book, that I was the one potty trained, not him. He had only initiated going to the potty a few times himself (if at all). I was asking him and encouraging or even prompting him. According to this same book (Toddler 411) and my common sense agreed with it, he needs two things to be able to potty train. #1 He needed to be able to identify the urge to go, not the idea that he had already gone. #2 He needed to want to be clean. It seemed like he wanted to be clean, at least he did at the beginning of the week, but as the week has stretched on that has only continued to apply to poop. Additionally, I was pretty sure he had only initiated using the potty once himself, and that could have merely been that I had just gotten home from the Allergist, and he associated me with potty. So, in short, Eli has backed away from the potty chair, I don't think he went once yesterday or today and I'm not pushing. My plan is to wait for him to give me another sign. After all, according to what I read, we have at least another year until we need to really think about it.

Our Summer of Bikes, Parks and Pools

Today is the first day of my blog. I'm creating this blog to chronicle our lives, but most especially to create an intricate baby book of sorts for Eli, or more realistically for me. :) So, this blog will be shamelessly devoted to memories, pictures and stories of Eli.

We are having a great summer so far. Scott has taken the whole summer off from his Master's program, so we have at least 8 weeks with all three of us-- heaven! Our favorite thing to do this summer is to ride our bikes. Peachtree City has over 80 miles of golf cart paths which makes bike riding ideal.

On a typical day, we have an easy morning: sleep in late, play around the house, read lots of books or generally do whatever Eli wants to do. Then, after lunch and his nap we bike to our favorite city pool which has a fairly large 1 ft. deep baby pool which Eli loves. After we play in the pool for an hour or so we ride our bikes to the "Jumping Bridge Park" (our name for a park that has a bouncy suspension bridge). We eat a picnic dinner then Eli gets some time to play. His favorite thing at the park to play on is "Blastoff" (the space ship). He has invented an intricate game where we count down... "10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1... Blastoff!" Then we ride to the Moon, he gets off and goes to touch a sign. We repeat this game at least 5 times so that he can touch each sign. At about 7:45 or so, we ride our bikes home and occasionally we will stop at Lake Peachtree to throw a few rocks in the water and then we ride our bikes home.

The thing about our bike rides is that we are riding Wal Mart specials from about 8 years ago (we bought them right after we got married) and have never ridden them much. They served our limited purposes before, but now we are riding about an hour a day. So, today we went to CLT (The Clothes Less Traveled), the thrift store that my mom works at and we found a $20 bike for me that is normally sold for nearly $300! With a few switched out parts from my other bike (a seat and pedals) and some TLC from Scott (thanks, baby) I have a new fabulous bike to ride which I think we invested about $35 in. Whoo! Hoo! We went for a shorter than usual ride tonight after a dinner at home, since Scott needed some extra time to fix my bike, but it was my most enjoyable ride yet.