I Swear I'm Gonna Do This

Guest Post (Martin)

Hello bloggy blog world!

I took a moment to measure and weigh the kids today and was wondering where I should record it. Since we've recorded that info here before I figured we could continue.

2017-12-02

Arthur: 88cm, 13kg

Elsie: 107cm, 16kg

One of the reasons I wanted to get them measured is I was pretty sure Elsie has started gaining weight again, and certainly I've noticed she's gotten taller. Looking at the booster seat laws here in PEI, she's only got 2kg more to go before we can put her in a booster seat. 

Arthur and I continue our morning walks, though the weather is definitely cooling for the winter. In Merrickville last year there were only a handful of days we couldn't get out for the walk, usually because it was below -10C. I'm finding the extra wind here in PEI make for harder morning walks, it feels much cooler when it's -6 and windy than -6 and calm. We'll figure something out on those days. I may have to go back to the sling, but I'm not sure my shoulder can take that much weight!

Elsie has a friend! Here they are dancing together to The Music Man (Michael Pendergast) at a Christmas party last night.

Other than that, we're settling in well. I love being back, it feels like we're home. We still haven't sold our house in Merrickville, but we have a potential lead on that, and failing it, we have someone who is interested in renting it for the winter. Would be great to get that stress off though (and the capital we have invested in it back!)

That's all for now, Krista is heading out for lunch with friends so I'm on deck.

The First Sentence

On Thursday evening, Arthur spoke his first sentence. He was jumping on the bed and having a grand time when he said "I love to jump...and dance." There was a break of about 20 seconds between the two parts of the sentence. I immediately knew he had said something of substance because it was so long, but it was only after a bit of thinking that I realized he got every word in there. He does really love to jump and he's been doing line dancing since we've been attending the community line dancing event on Monday nights. His line dancing is walking forward, then walking backward in a jaunty fashion. I worked on some side stepping with him this morning too. 

Arthur's now able to say "yeah" and when we ask him "How are you?", he says "good". It all seems very conversational now. 

Tonight, before I turned out the light for bedtime, he was repeating "ambeeo" over and over (that's his word for ambulance or any vehicle with lights on top). I think he was working on getting an "l" in there because after a few repeats he was saying "ambeelo". I then proceeded to get all mushy on him and say "you know what Arthur, I love you." He looked at me very seriously (I'm hoping he is going to say "I love you" of course) and he says "boat" ... then "tractor". 

Okay then. Goodnight. 

Lights out.

Arthur Doodle Doo

Poor Arthur! It has been so long since I have written about you and now I am forced to recollect all of the things that I should have been recording. There is a very good reason for the gap in your records; the past five months have contained some monumental changes for all of us. We packed up our house and moved at the end of June and we have been slowly unpacking and building our lives in Charlottetown. Our summer was full of trips to the beautiful spots around the island that we had missed: Bonshaw, Canoe Cove, Orwell Corner, Brackley, New Glasgow. We visited so many of the playgrounds in Charlottetown and founds some favorites like Dino Park and Tree Park. Our yard was a haven from the hot sun, so we were able to spend a lot of time under the trees playing with the water table, bubbles, trucks and cars, and you loved hanging out in the shed. 

Arthur has shown his spirit of adventure and does not seem to have many reservations about new things or potentially dangerous things. He loves to climb, slide, run and is eager to be able to reach the ground on the balance bike. He loves to play chase still and shrieks and giggles, especially when Elsie runs with him. We found out that Arthur likes pushing his trucks in the sand at the beach and he seems to have learned about laying down in the sand from a fairly tame fox up on Robinson's Island. Martin and Arthur are still enjoying their morning outings and I am still enjoying sleeping in with Elsie. They go for walks mostly downtown to the harbour and then make their way back home, stopping at a park on the way. Luckily Arthur's been waking up at a decent hour (around 7:00), so they don't have too much time to kill before Elsie wakes up at 9:00. Arthur still takes a nap that was starting at around 10:30, but is starting to slowly migrate toward the early afternoon. 

Tractors, lawn mowers, four wheelers, trailers, cars, bikes, and planes and helicopters (since moving back to Charlottetown) are much the focus of Arthur's interests. Anything that moves, basically. He plays with his toy cars, tractors, and a toy train that Shannon got for him. Every now and then he has been playing more imagination games and I hear him babbling away with some toy animals. In this picture below, Arthur had been lining up all of the vehicles he found. He likes to mash play-doh and drop it on the ground, press the chalk into the chalk wall and make powerful lines, cuddle with the cats and Camber (he calls her Amber), and when he was about 17-18 months old, he started really wanting to be read to. The reading thing is interesting because Martin and I had really not concentrated on reading to Arthur like we did with Elsie. We didn't make it a part of bedtime routine, we just had the books out and about. He started bringing them to us and even flipping through them on his own. His favorites right now are Danny and Debby Hide and Seek, The Big Red Barn, Goodnight Moon, and the Cat book. 

Arthur can say or try to say so many words. My favorite word he says is "Elsie", because he loves her so much and I love that she is special to him. Here's my attempt at a vocabulary list: train, airport (apo), jet, helicopter (hecop), ambulance (ambeeo), boo, moo, fish, bowl, cup, juice, puppy, goat, eggie, up, "look up", moon, light, white, green, yellow, purple, brown, blue, orange, gold, cookie, cracker, jump, hop, Mama, Papa, doll, bear, boopie (he pronounces it beepie and I'm fairly sure he thinks he is saying boopie), sleep, poop, pee, shoe, coat, hat... you get the picture. There've been a couple of times that I thought he has said "I want that", but he doesn't use sentences yet really. There are currently a lot of babble stories, like when he was pointing to the spinning wheel and telling me a lot about it and I was hearing the occasional "no" and "don't don't" in his story. He had an experience recently in which I had to tell him "no" and "don't touch that" because he broke a piece of the spinning wheel. He definitely remembered it. 

Martin weighed Arthur over the Thanksgiving weekend and he was 27 lbs. I don't remember how tall he is, but on the growth chart he is just a bit over the 50th percentile. He seems big to us and people tend to comment about how tall he is, but apparently he is actually average size. He had his first dentist visit about a month ago and his teeth are healthy, with only 4 more molars to come, I think. 

We really appreciate Arthur's easy going nature. He laughs easily, gives great hugs, and loves to snuggle. We're so happy he's a part of our family and we're even happier that he is growing up into a little boy. He's 21 months old!

 

 

And There's More

Okay, Elsie, I've got my tea, had my bath, got recharged and now I'm ready to take on the task of writing about your life as a three year old. 

When you were three you had to keep learning how to be a big sister. This was really hard, but you've also been having some fun teaching Arthur how to jump on the bed and playing with him on the slide in the backyard. I think the worst part of having a baby brother, so far for you, has been the change in what we've been able to do together. We've been planning our days around Arthur's naps, so that means we don't get to go to as many playgroups. It's been difficult for you to adjust to being quiet and finding quiet things to do while I'm putting Arthur to sleep and even while he's napping. This means a whole lot of show-watching, which you really enjoy, but which leaves me feeling guilty for not coming up with other things for you to do.

That leads me to thinking about how it's been really frustrating for you to try new activities when you know that you won't be "good at it". The concept of practicing to achieve competency is not something you have very much patience for. So, we try to work with this to avoid overwhelming you with frustration, but also to keep you open to things that may bring you joy. For example, you are often in the mood for making really expressive paintings that look like parties, but if we try to color in a coloring book you tend to find the pressure of the lines a bit dampening. Also, you are just so great at riding your balance bike, but you are fairly uninterested in your new pedal bike (which you have been asking for, I remind you). So we don't talk very much about your pedal bike and hope that you'll get the urge to master it someday. 

One thing about you that persists through the years is that you have an amazing imagination. You play so well and happily with your stuffies, figures, and ponies and you create long stories with them, but if you catch us listening in you get shy and tell us to go to another room :)
You often ask me to play with you and I do generally have dedicated play time with you once a day, but I often feel like you play so much better without me. I usually don't play with the toys just the way you want me to and you get upset about that. There have been a lot of meltdowns related to this problem. For some reason, Papa doesn't bother you as much when he plays with you. I think it's because he waits for you to do all the story making and then tries to say as little as possible. This suits you better and I am trying to do this more. 

You've discovered user-produced content on YouTube that features ponies having pool parties and people opening new toys and playing with them. This is so "up your alley". You will often get so many ideas for playing with your toys from this and sometimes even try to make your own videos. Right now, you speak too softly for the camera and we haven't got a good zoom lens, but it's certainly something we can keep working on. You also really loved watching Masha and the Bear when you were three. Papa and I decided that you couldn't watch it anymore because you seemed to behave differently (not in a good way) and treat the animals poorly when you watched it. We explained this to you a few times and said you could watch it again when you were older and could understand that the way Masha behaved was not something to copied. Today, you were having a sick day (and you are 4 now) and you asked to watch Masha and the Bear. I said it would be okay and you did watch for awhile. After a while you didn't want to watch it any more and I asked why. You said that you were feeling like if Eeloo walked into the room, you would pull her tail. So, maybe we'll wait until you're 5 years old. 

Last summer, you played a lot in your playhouse that Papa built for you. I would take Arthur out and lay out a blanket in a shady spot. It was hard for me to play with you and keep an eye on Arthur, but we worked it out. You found much of the summer too hot to be playing outside. Hopefully, our new house will have more shady spaces for you to play in and it doesn't get as hot in Charlottetown as it does here. 

Our winter was filled with music videos and dancing. If you were feeling blue, I could usually blast "Feel Better When I'm Dancing" and that would get you dancing and feeling energized. We listened to just about all of the Walk Off the Earth songs, Kinley Dowling, OK Go, Pentatonix and some Bruno Mars songs, but not the one "with too many bums". You like to hold hands when you're dancing and I wonder if this solves the age-old question of what to do with your hands. Do three year-old kids already have awkward hands?! 

So what else did we do when you were three? We baked, with you stirring the ingredients but mostly only stirring the stuff at the top. Your favorite craft is making cards with stickers and paint, so we did make a lot of cards. We passed the time by visiting the thrift store so often that you came to think of it as a routine procedure. When we go into our town, you nearly always want to stop at the coffee shop for a brownie. Sometimes you eat the whole thing, but there are also times when I get to have the leftovers. You learned how to actually play hide and seek, so we had fun with that. You're still a little fuzzy on the rules for tag, in that you always want to be it, but you also always want to get chased. We did a little bit of travelling to Elliot Lake and New Brunswick (and the camp, of course). 

You still say "gank you" which is so sweet to our ears. This evening you said you wanted "banilla" ice cream from the store and I said that I didn't know that "you had wanted vanilla ice cream", to which you replied, "I said banilla". Like I had made the mistake and like there actually is a banilla flavour. You are recognizing written words as there have been quite a few times when you've said what was written with no possible way of having had a contextual clue ("spooky stories" is one of the recognized phrases). 

The toughest part of the last year for me and Papa, has been trying to navigate through your emotional roller coaster. There has been a lot of loud screaming that seems to send us into fight or flight mode. You are sensitive about so many things that we don't know how to relate to, so we need to really stretch ourselves to understand how you may be feeling. This is the stuff that makes us feel worn out. I think you are dealing with a mixture of boredom, frustration (knowing what you want to do but not able to execute the plan), and you are sensing the murmur of anxiety that we are feeling regarding moving and selling our house. 

Ultimately, we love you so much and just want you to be able to do "normal kid stuff" and have fun and smile. I think the time will come where we understand you better and we can all work together to make the good things happen. 

(This was written in June 2017 but only published in October 2017)

4 Year Old Muscles

This is Elsie's "cheese" smile. She turned 4 years old 5 days ago. The affair was subdued, with Arthur sleeping through supper, cake and the opening of presents. Martin had firefighter training (his last meeting before we move) and so Elsie got to show her new toys to her babysitter in the evening. Like all of her 4th year before it, her birthday was a mixture of loveliness (there was a very bright rainbow in the sky and Elsie was so thrilled with her birthday presents) and frustration (her babysitter kept insisting that she say "please" after every request so Elsie told her that she didn't want to play with her anymore). 

Elsie posed like this while Martin was taking a video. She told him that he had to take a picture of her like that :) She is an excellent director. 

This was the second birthday cake, as the first was a strawberry cake (as requested) while Martin's family was here the weekend before. 
Last year, at Elsie's 3rd birthday party - the one she had "kid friends" at- I remember thinking that I wanted to concentrate on maintaining some of her preschooler friendships and really focus on making new friends. Somehow, that did not happen and even some of the kids we knew last year have drifted much too far socially to justify inviting them to a 4th birthday party. So, I did a terrible job at expanding Elsie's social circle this past year. I am so looking forward to our upcoming move for many reasons, but one big one is that I want Elsie to be in a place where there are more children with whom to make friends. We will have access to more library programs, art classes, day camps, many play structures, etc. without having to drive from town to town. Ultimately, Martin and I both feel that it may be difficult for Elsie to grasp the art of friendship at this time, but I'm sure it will come with guidance and patience from all sides. 

We are happy to be moving out of three, I think. I may postpone writing a recap of three year old Elsie at this point simply because I am exhausted. I want to write fairly and with the last 2 months being both difficult and most recent in my memory, I fear I would capture a negative slant that I may later regret. I need to look over some pictures and videos of the last year to refresh my memory and get a better feel for the whole Elsie. I *know* she is wonderful and funny and imaginative, but I want to write about it when I feel that knowledge.

We bought a house at the end of April and we've been trying to work hard to prepare for the big move to Charlottetown. But, despite our attempts to minimize our possessions, Martin and I both got a little overwhelmed when we came to fully appreciate the "situation" in the attic today. It's so full of stuff that we are just not sure of. And we realize that other people don't really want our stuff that we are not so sure of - this weekend's yard sale was not a bust, but not a success either. This means many trips to the thrift store donation centre may need to be made. Martin and I both attempted to get some handyman-type jobs completed today with some success but not nearly as much as we'd hoped for as Elsie is sick and Arthur is teething and likes to take risks when we're not looking. So, all in all, our energy is being fully consumed with house stuff and basic child care activities. 

Dear Elsie, this does not suffice as a "goodbye to three, hello to four" entry. I will come back to it, because you definitely deserve something better!