The Fish, The Gup, and The Scoot

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Desmond's 15 Month Checkup

Desmond had his 15 month checkup today, 10 days before he actually turns 15 months old. All is well with our little guy. His stats are as follows:

Height = 32.75 inches (90th %)
Weight = 23 lbs, 10.5 oz (50th %)
Head Circumference = 19.5 in (95th %)

In other news, Desmond has been consistently telling us when he poops by saying "poop" after he does the deed. He has been doing this ever since Christmas. Let's hope that this trend continues all the way to potty training!

Monday, January 12, 2009

Suit Up! Go Steelers!

The kids donned their Roethlisberger jerseys today in an effort to root on Dada's favorite hometown team...the Pittsburgh Steelers! It worked b/c the Steelers won. Now all they have to do is win next week against the Ravens and the Steelers will be going to their seventh Super Bowl!

P.S. This is the first time Stella is wearing her Steelers jersey (she always refused before) since Dada got it for her this past summer. It is still way too big on her (it comes down to her knees) but is the smallest kid's size jersey they sell.

Thursday, January 8, 2009

All the Songs He Knows

Desmond seems to have a propensity for music and singing. And why not, his Dada is an accomplished musician. The following are all of the songs he knows. Even though he doesn't know all the words to all of these songs, he definitely knows their tune and will definitely sing it in the right tune, using his language. He will sing these songs sometimes when he is put down for a nap, or if he hears it in the car, or if he hears us singing it around the house.

Wheels on the bus go
This old Man
Ring around the rosies
Old McDonald had a farm
Row row your boat
Where is Thumbkin?
BINGO

Mama thinks his favorite is "The Wheels on the Bus" and he will do some of the motions for this song [i.e., "the babies on the bus go wha wha wha" (he will rub his eyes with his fist and say "wha wha wha"; the mommies on the bus go hush hush hush (he will put his index finger to his mouth and say "shhh, shhh, shhh"].

He also loves to sing "This Old Man" because that is the song we sing to him anytime we put him down to sleep...so he's heard that song everyday of his life thus far =;)

P.S. How do you like them cheeks in the above picture?!?!

Mr. Manners!

Desmond said thank you to Mama yesterday when she gave him a piece of cheese. It sounded like "thunk ooo". It was totally unprompted and so very sweet. This is not something we have been teaching him to say...so he just picked it up by observation.

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Stella Still Loves to Read

Stella has been getting better and better at reading at a very fast pace and can read 10-12 page books all by herself on the first try. When we were driving back from NJ after the holidays, we had stopped to get some food from Wendy's and was eating our meal in the car. Across from the Wendy's was a Texaco station and from the view from our car, the "C" in TEXACO was partially covered, making it look like a "G" to her. Stella looks over at the sign and says "Texago"!

Before that, when we were getting ready to exit off of the freeway, Stella looked at the road sign and read out aloud "exit" perfectly. Mind you, these are not words that we have taught her or have come across in our Hooked on Phonics or BOB books. She is learning to sound out the words in her head.

The most recent example that amazed us occurred at the Home Depot. We were there to buy new door knobs for our house and were stopped in the aisle deciding which ones to buy. Stella was in her stroller and looked at the door knobs that was at her eye level and says out loud, "Mama, that says Kwikset." And she was indeed correct. Kwikset was the brand name of the door knobs she was looking at. How she knew how to pronounce this without even sounding it out aloud is beyond us. But we are more than happy with her excitement for reading and so very proud of her accomplishments!

Boys Will Be Boys

What has Desmond been up to? He's been a mischievous little boy lately. He thinks that since Xmas is over, he doesn't have to be a good little boy anymore =;)
His favorite thing to do right now is to go into the bathroom and shred toilet paper and place them into the toilet. For this reason we keep our bathroom doors closed at all times. If, at any time, the bathroom door is opened, no matter where he is, Desmond's sensors go off and he will drop whatever he is doing to follow right behind you into the bathroom. Some how Mama telling him "no" or "stop it" doesn't seem to have any effect on him.
He also loves to draw with crayons and will say "dwaw" pointing to the crayons over and over. Mama has found him drawing on the kitchen floor and on the fridge with crayons at which point, Mama quickly takes the crayons away from the little man. That often leads to tears. Poor little baby, life is so unfair=;)

Thursday, December 25, 2008

Merry Christmas 2008

Today is Christmas day and Stella and Des had an absolute ball opening all of their numerous gifts under the Christmas tree this morning. We didn't think that Des would be interested in opening gifts, but we were wrong. For every gift Stella opened, he made sure he opened one too.

"Hmm, I wonder which ones are for me."

Ommy and Poppa were thoughtful enough to send Stella's & Desmond's stockings to NJ since we weren't spending Christmas with them. So we started off the Christmas morning festivities with the stockings first.

Here's Stella with her homemade stocking (it's pink with panda bears on it) that her Ommy made and filled for her.

Stella opening her first gift...

...a giant Play-Doh set that came with 20 different jars of colored play-doh as well as 45 different molds, cutters, and shapes. This was Stella's favorite gift by far and she played with all week long during the remainder of our stay in NJ.

Desmond opening his first gift...

...a Doodle Pro. This was Desmond's favorite toy from Xmas. He actually sat still for awhile playing with it, drawing & erasing, over and over! That is pretty amazing considering that this boy doesn't sit still for more than a few seconds for anything.