wee techie

On the way home from Grandma's house tonight we talked with Andy. We reminisced about his earlier days when he first learned to give commands. His tendency was to hold out his cup and say, "Take it!" Or to reach for a toy and say, "Grab it!" Or to ask for a Popsicle saying, "Have it!"

So we merrily rambled off a list of Andy's favorites:

"Take it...Hold it...Grab it...Snatch it...Yank it...Have it...Eat it...Pick it...Kick it..." And laughed ourselves silly.

Suddenly Andy chimed in with, "Google it!"

I don't remember him ever saying that one.

my poor plant

I sat on my patio and watched Andy molesting my new jade plant. He broke off one of the leaves and was playing with it.

I said, "Andy, did you break off a piece of my jade plant?"

"No."

"Then who did?"

"A monster."

nudie

On Friday morning Andy slept until 10am. This hasn't happened in over a year. I tend to enjoy it and get excited and wonder how long he'll actually sleep. Then later I totally regret it because it interferes with his nap. Such was the case on this day.

Shawn was home recovering from his meniscus removal, so I took Andy upstairs and put him in bed at nap time, around 2 or maybe a little thereafter. It was hot so I let him lay down in just his diaper. I came back to the couch and for the next hour we listened to Andy trilling (rolling his tongue) and chatterboxing in his bed. On and on it went. We waited for his energy to expire.

Suddenly at 3pm he started crying. This sometimes happens right before he goes to sleep on these kinds of days. We let him whine and whimper for about 15 minutes and he didn't calm down. Finally I decided to go up and see what the problem was.

When I opened the bedroom door, there was Andy standing up in his crib, completely naked. His diaper was on the other side of the room lying on the floor.

I asked him what had happened to his diaper.

"It came off all by itself, Mommy."

"Oh really? Did the diaper also fly across the room all by itself and land in the corner?"

Tearfully: "Yeah."

I put a new diaper on him and within 5 minutes he was dead asleep.

falsely accused

Andy was watching "Dora" this morning when the program cut away to a black screen for this week's test of the Emergency Broadcast System.

He took one look at the screen and at the top of his lungs, screamed, "WHY DID YOU TURN OFF DORA MOMMY?"

just now

"What the hell, Mommy? What the hell?"

Followed by:

"Where the hell are my trains?"

gross

Grandma Diane came down for dinner tonight. She stayed a while, and when it was time to go, she helped Andy clean up the basement. Shawn and I helped too. We had our backs turned for a while.

When we turned around Diane was gingerly chewing something orange in her mouth. She said, "Andy and I are having some snacks."

Her grandson had reached into a tub of "Pupcorn" and was sharing a doggy treat with his unsuspecting grandmother. They both had orange teeth and bacon breath.

appreciation

I did a good thing, today. I took my beloved child out of his bed this morning, packed supplies to last two weeks into the car, including GPS, DVD player, food for 12, change of clothing, and an array of toddler survival items. I loaded him up in the pouring rain and drove him miles and miles through Pittsburgh traffic to reach our destination: the Pittsburgh Zoo. We had a really good time. I showed my son everything. I showed him endangered snow leopards and baby African elephants. I talked to him about fish and the aquatic life cycle. We watched the severely-threatened polar bear playing in his new PPG Aquarium habitat. He crawled through a stingray tunnel and watched a scuba diver in the tank containing huge Amazonian rainforest fish. He touched fingers with a Mountain Gorilla through the glass.

When the day ended I fought my way back through 4pm Pittsburgh traffic, risking life and limb to get my progeny safely home to West Virginia. I even stopped and bought him a caramel sundae at Sarris candy factory.

As we were leaving the zoo, tired, happy and environmentally educated, I asked said, "Andyboy, we saw a lot of really neat animals today. We saw baby elephants and penguins and lions and sharks....what was your favorite thing we saw?"

He said, "The train!"

I show him the rare and beautiful world of nature and his favorite part is the broken down diesel parked along the Allegheny River.

extras

For my 30th birthday my aunt and uncle got me an awesome garden cart for all of my big backyard needs.

The best part about getting a present like that is that it comes with a gift of its own: the privilege of dragging Andy Roberts around in circles over uneven ground at a high rate of speed. So far the garden cart has been the gift that keeps on giving.

i wish

Meme: Andy, who's birthday is it today?

Andy: It's Mommy's birthday!

Meme: And how old is Mommy?

Andy: She's two and a half!

he still demands it

This evening I made a serious effort to get Andy to eat dinner. I have no idea why he wasn't hungry but you can't force a toddler, as I already well know.

I gave him a variety of options and finally just said, exasperated, "Andy! What do you want for dinner?!?"

He shouted, "Respect!"

(I said, "Andy, you can't eat respect." He said, "Okay, I want respect in my sippy cup!")

gag me with a trout

This morning Andy got up and I got him ready for school. We're still having potty trouble most of the time. It's not that Andy can't go on the potty. He has proven many times that he has full control of the required muscles and knows exactly what to do and when to do it. He just plain doesn't want to, and I think it's because I do want him to. One little way he can have control over me.

It sucks.

One of my little potty trick tools is Potty Trout. Potty Trout is a 12-inch stuffed rainbow trout that Uncle Davey brought back for Andy from some gift shop in the west. When Andy was actually having genuine difficulty on the potty (as opposed to the current power struggle) I'd go fetch the fish and call him 'Potty Trout'. Andy would hold Potty Trout and talk to Potty Trout while he sat on the potty and tried to make progress. And often Potty Trout's presence helped a lot. So Potty Trout started spending an inordinate amount of time in the loo.

This morning Potty Trout made an appearance at the breakfast table before school. Andy brought him downstairs and set him on the table while he ate. I'm no dummy; I know what germs are probably lurking on a stuffed animal that regularly gets taken into the bathroom and tossed on the floor beside a peeing toddler. But it's a kitchen table and I have Clorox wipes. No need to completely freak out. If Potty Trout is Andy's buddy, more power to him.

I poured myself some coffee, set it on the table and went downstairs to let Nugget out of her box and out to pee. When I came back up, half of my coffee was gone and it was splattered all over the table. I asked Andy what had happened and he just held up Potty Trout, who's head was now a warm shade of mocha and he smelled like Amaretto.

I said, "Andy, did you dip Potty Trout into my coffee cup while I was downstairs?"

He said, "Yes."

He dipped his toilet fish into my coffee.

in the car

It was pouring and I had all of my focus on the road. I wasn't saying much and Andy was mildly offended in the backseat.

"Mommy, can you relax and I'll sing a song?"

Then he started humming the ABC's.

hoarf

Andy, sitting on my mother's lap while she reads him a book: hack, cough

Meme: Andy are you okay?

Andy: Yeah. I'm just barfing up a hairball.

nooo!

I'm having a terrible problem with my back of late. Just awful pain. And while our mattress wasn't the culprit, it certainly wasn't helping the problem much. I used to wake up pain-free and then as the day progressed fall into agony. But lately our pillow top mattress (which cost considerable monies) has begun to compress under the weight of our bodies until it was punctuated by two Grand Canyon-sized pits in which we lay all night. And naturally I started waking up in pain, which caused me to lose the two good morning hours I used to have pain-free.

Where is this going? Well, Shawn and I felt the problem (aka the mattress pit) was getting so deep that we went out and bought a $2200 Tempurpedic mattress. (Yikes!) It's a lower-end model and it still cost us that much. We're reassured by the 20-year warranty and the 30-day trial period after which we may return it for a refund if it doesn't float our boat.

So at 8am this morning the truck pulled up with our expensive new purchase. Andy was super excited, bouncing on the old one for a last few minutes before they took it away. (I explained to him that the new mattress wasn't bouncy at all, and he was disappointed to learn I was exactly right.) I stripped the old bed, all the way down to the waterproof mattress cover we bought when we realized our doberman had a leaking problem when she'd fall into a deep sleep.

When the men had set up the box springs and the new mattress and had me sign the forms, they left. I spoke briefly to the manager at the store to confirm that my new purchase had arrived safely and was properly assembled. As I spoke to him I reached for the waterproof mattress pad. I wanted to get it quickly on the bed before any paws or chocolate milk got on it, potentially voiding my warranty.

It was too late. As I hung up the phone, Andy pointed to my new, $2200 bed and said, "Mommy, I put a booger on the new bed!"

If I have to return it I can only hope they don't notice the green slug trail on the lower right corner where my son wiped his nose five minutes after it arrived. At least it was on Shawn's side.