Archives

Liam just fell asleep while I was changing his diaper.  You’d think that it would make changing a messy diaper much easier, wouldn’t you?  It turns out that thoroughly cleaning someone whose limbs are something akin to limp noodles isn’t really any easier than thoroughly cleaning someone who is fighting you tooth and nail the entire time.  Hmmm.  Who’d ‘a thunk it?

Since there’s no way to tell what Liam’s first word was/is/will be we’re settling on the cutest thing he’s said so far.  I mean, there was the time we were trying to get him to say Obama and he looked at us and deadpanned “Barack,” there are the times (daily) when he’s upset and begins screaming “Mamamamama” (which is, of course, his way of calling my name), there was the instance when he finally put his musical block in the right place and he looked at Matt and said “Good,” there was even the time when we were in the doctor’s office recently and he looked at the ceiling, pointed, and said “light” (that one was even confirmed by a medical professional), but his most recent “Oh, Wow!” exclamation is by far the most regular, and more importantly, the most adorable.  He says it when he turns the pages of his book (each new page gets an “Oh, Wow!”), he says it in a somber way while pointing out the window when Matt leaves in the morning, he says it when he continually opens the toy box to find all the toys he had momentarily forgotten were in there (you know, since 30 seconds earlier when he gave it the previous “Oh, Wow!”).  We’ve got one hilarious kid (and of course, I’m totally objective).  Oh, Wow!

I cannot think of a “more perfect” (to steal a few words, appropriately I think, and grammatically incorrect though they might be, from the preamble to the Constitution) way to have ushered in what I hope will be a new era of tolerance, peace, and respect for all people than to listen to Aretha Franklin sing “My Country Tis Of Thee,” followed shortly by an arrangement by the man who wrote the piece of music to which we left our wedding ceremony of a song that was sung at the same ceremony, all the while holding my son in my arms as he snuggled up against me and watched intently.

Liam, at almost 13 months old, has made the decision to be a vegetarian.  I say be because he’s not becoming a vegetarian since he’s never eaten meat.  It’s not like the other things that he won’t eat in their original forms, the best example being bananas, which he happily wolfs down in massive quantities if they’re pureed but even touching them in their whole form on his plate causes a face that would make an outsider think I’d laced the thing with rat poison.  He has a texture issue for which I take sole responsibility since Matt will eat pretty much anything.  He will eat most veggies and fruits as long as they’re pureed.  I’ve tried giving him shaved deli meat (of course it’s the hormone-free, grain-fed, yadda, yadda, yadda, stuff) because I know I prefer this texture to the sliced deli meat which I’ve also tried, we’ve given it to him in pureed form (although our doctor told us that if he had to choose he wouldn’t feed him that stuff — he’d just wait until he was able to eat the real thing), I’ve tried giving him bits of meat off my plate (everything’s tastier off Mom’s plate).  He won’t touch any of it.

This is a problem.

This is not a problem because I have an issue with my son being a vegetarian — if he was, say 12, and came to me and professed that he wasn’t going to eat meat anymore — I’d gladly figure out ways to feed him in order to get him enough protein without meat (it’d certainly be cheaper than feeding a boy that age meat anyways — and I’ve gotta respect the conviction although I don’t think I could do it myself).  My problem is that I refuse to feed a 13-month-old child enough beans and legumes to get him the protein he needs when I’m still changing his diapers.  In fact —

NEW RULE:  You may not decide to become a vegetarian in my house until you are potty trained.  If this means that you potty train yourself at 13 months, that’s absolutely fine, I’m just not going to change 5 really nasty diapers per day because of your personal food choices.

So maybe Liam’s nickname is having adverse effects…

He still refuses to walk (and for those who think I’m just being dramatic — please be assured that although I am prone to sweeping dramatic statements for maximum effect — this time I’m just being descriptive).  If you put the kid down on his feet without his cart or in reach of something to push or cruise against he sits down immediately.  Matt spends considerable time putting him on the ground on his feet and trying to coax him to take a few unaided steps and it’s not for lack of ability, but Liam will not do it without support.  He stands unaided just fine and more than a few times he’s taken steps without holding on to anything — but he’ll only do it when he’s distracted enough not to realize that he’s doing it.  If you proceed to make a big stink about it he snaps back into consciousness and determinedly sits down.  I personally don’t care if he ever walks — he gets into enough trouble on all fours, thanks very much — but if I have to endure months and months of people trying to coax him to do it and then sighing “ahhhh” in an exasperated tone when he eventually sits down or goes to get his cart I might pull all my hair out (see — there’s your sweeping dramatic statement for maximum effect).

Last night as Matt was playing with him in the living room he watched as Liam used his Lego bin as a stepping stone and climbed on top of the ottoman that was sitting beside it.  This morning I watched him do the same thing.  He has now climbed the stairs from the family room from bottom to top several times in very short order (we were right behind him) as well.  He only walks on all fours, he climbs furniture and stairs, and he’s mischievous.  Has he become a monkey?  Erving Goffman warned me about this…

…Brown Bear, Brown Bear!

I just finished reading this book to Liam 6 consecutive times.  This brings today’s total up to 14.  When he moves on to The Hobbit – it’s up to Matt.

Today, as Matt was changing Liam’s diaper we experienced our first instance of a sailor jumping ship, so to speak.  He (or she since females can do anything that males can do) lept off the edge of the upper deck and straight into the water.  Matt uttered a word that we hope doesn’t turn into Liam’s first word.  The only thing I could think to do to help was to look down on the situation and loudly exclaim “Poop Print.”  I’m extremely helpful that way.