Halloween

Once again, I have failed miserably to update this blog and Jonas is growing so fast and doing so much. I will never remember unless I write it down. Halloween has come and gone; too bad, I am a fan of the costumes! Jonas wanted to be Russell from Up, and we spent a lot of time making his costume. Julie & Nicole helped me make all of the merit badges out of puffy paint one Friday evening. Lots of the badges were the ones he actually had, but there were plenty we made up as well. Nicole is the undisputed puffy painting master-- Julie and I started throwing out challenges for her as the evening progressed; "I bet you can't write with it!" (she did... "Team Edward" of course), "Oh yeah, well make the Mona Lisa!" (she did... but with less detail than the original). It was good times. Brandon made his little bolo and pin, as well as helping on other elements of the costume, and I made the stuff that was left, basically just sewing patches, and a book bag. He was so cute! My dad dressed up like a very good Mr. Fredrickson and carried balloons. I think people recognized him more than Joe-- but it was super cute nonetheless. We ended up going to Green Street's fall festival, then going trick or treating in the neighborhood with the Charles'. There was some church that was doing a black light puppet show, which I thought was pretty neato. Jonas certainly seemed to like it. Afterward, we went to Allie & Seth's house to visit for a few minutes and see cute little Jensen's guitar costume. Jonas did pretty well on his candy consumption. He ate a couple of pieces, then he got a pack of nerds and ate them one at a time... which took him about 45 min.

Also in the news, dad finally caved on the no swing set thing and purchased a giant swing for Jonas and a regular swing for the rest of us to replace the rope swing. it's pretty much amazing. Jonas spent at least an hour swinging in it when he spent the night last week.

Now, for the "things Jonas says" segment. Last week he and I were eating dinner-- or rather, I was eating and he was picking and talking. I told him we might need to stop giving him an after school snack. Not missing a thing, he said "Yes, you will starve me so that I will eat my dinner." He agreed that it would probably be a good idea. We'll see how he feels once we implement this change, though.

Last week, he went to the zoo with Grandma Lisa. Brandon was questioning him about what he thought he would see at the zoo. "I will see a lion at the zoo, and he will shut his mouth like this [snaps mouth shut]!" Brandon: "what? why will he do that?" Jonas: "Bedause, that is what the lions do. Daniel sees them and they shut their mouths, snap!" Brandon then realizes he must have learned about Daniel and the lions den at school. Everything is clear now =)

I think the biggest change I have seen in Joe in the past month since last blogging is his reasoning. Like in the example above, I didn't tell him why he shouldn't eat a snack after school, he just put it together himself. It should be interesting adjusting to this newer, smarter Jonas.

Rearranging

Today we rearranged the living room. The idea was to prevent the cat from being able to get onto the kitchen counter by moving the chair across the room. In the process, we had a bunch of extra space in one corner that we converted into a dedicated "play area" for Jonas. He was thrilled! He was so excited about his play area, that he actually requested that I take pictures of him... unbelievable!

As we worked on the house, we (naturally) found goods that we did not need, so we made a trip to goodwill to shed ourselves of them. On the way back we stopped for a hot-n-ready pizza for the boys. I ran in to get it, and when I got back, I was told of the happenings while I was gone (a total of maybe a minute). Brandon had the following conversation with Jonas:
Brandon: (Looking in the mirror watching me in the store)
Jonas: Daddy, what you doing??
B: I'm looking in the mirror for mommy.
J: No, you doing this. (Makes a big "O" with his mouth) Why you doing that daddy?
B: Because I was looking for mommy. (leaving out that he was just making a dumb face to see in the mirror)
J: Oh, ok. (makes the dumb face and starts shaking his head around). I am looking for mommy too!

So cute. I hope he continues to do this when he looks for someone!

In developmental news, Jonas got his pajama bottoms on completely by himself this evening... like they were laying on the floor, I went in the bathroom to retrieve something, came back, and he was just finishing pulling them up over his pull up. wow-- he's so close to being able to dress himself... that's just craziness! When did my little toddler become a little boy?

Why?

...is the question we now hear a zillion times a day. Yes, officially in the "why" stage. There are other stages he is now in that we are more excited about. The "doesn't want to get his pull-up wet at night" being at the top of the list. He's decided he wants to stay dry all night, so he will now get up in the morning and come pee instead of wander the house and refuse to do so. Excellent!

Another phase he has started is a new class at school. He is now a proud member of the "older twos" class, which as far as I can see just means he is pretty much potty trained. Very good! He's also seemed to develop the ability to use conjunctions and the word "to". For example:

Me: Joe, do you want to go to the park or go walk down to the water?
Jonas: I want to walk to the water and then go to the park!

Sadly, this means that he gets upset when these events do not unfold as he describes to us. Oh well... at least he can tell us about his woes now!

Brandon told me when they were leaving this morning, Jonas looked down and saw his trains on the ground. His reaction: "Oh no! My trains are out. I will pick them up!" Whaaaaat? Um. Awesome?! Yes. I hope that trend continues!

This evening as I put Jonas to bed, he asked me to "sing 'la rain song", which is needtobreathes "washed by the water". So I did, and he decided to sing along. Now, like most two year olds (I guess) his idea of "singing" is yelling every important word. He decided it would be best to grab hold of his bed rail and jump along with it as well, so we got something like this:

Even... RAIN FALL!!
Even... Flood Risin' and I play in it (he added this last bit)
Even... durm dums (storm comes)
I is... Washed By WADER!!
Earth feet
... dum dum me! (he never can say "turn around and crucify me... so he just yells incoherently and ends with "me")
Let down!
I WONT FALL! I WONT FALL!!
You is 'round me!

It was super cute. Brandon poked his head in and asked if that was the song he thought it was... it was =).

After his "singing" he asked me to "please please please stay with me in my room". Well, how could I refuse that? So I laid there with him a couple of minutes and pretended to be asleep while I listened to him whisper to himself...
"i have a russell costume
russell costume russell costume
russell costume. russell costume! I like my russell costume! where is kevin?"
after a couple of minutes, I told him I was leaving gave him a kiss on the cheek. as I leaned over to give him a kiss, he ever so gently rubbed his hand through my hair, then stopped and said "Mommy, you can not leave." "why not?" I inquired. "Bedause, I have your hair. You can not leave now bedause I is holding your hair." wow. He sure was, too. He wasn't pulling, just holding very tightly... I told him I could leave if he let go, to which he responded "Die (try) to leave mommy. die it." I started to move, but he had my hair still. "see mommy, you can not leave, i has your hair!", says he, delighted. I got him to let go of my hair pretty quickly, but I have to admit, his logic was solid there!

Reasoning

He doesn't just accept everything we say now. He thinks about it. Three examples from the last couple of days:

1. Jonas was sick for the past few days (more to come). He spent a full day with Brandon, which naturally meant that they watched a LOT of movies (also more to come). Brandon had gone into the bedroom to check his school work for a while, and Joe wandered in, his movie still playing.

Jonas: "Hey daddy, what you doing?"
Brandon: "I'm checking my email. Are you watching your movie?"
Jonas: "No, I'm talking to you!"

touche', thought Brandon... touche'.

2. The three of us were on our way to Jensen's first birthday party yesterday, and it was very sunny in the car. Jonas spotted his sun screen for the window laying on the floor.

Joe: "I need that on the window to get the sun out of my eyes. Help! Help! Help me stick it on la window!"
Me: "We can't help you right now, we're driving."
Joe: (instantly answering) "Mommy, you're not driving, daddy is driving! Help me! Help help!"
Me: (realizing I had been defeated) "Ok... I'll try..."

3. Tonight as we were saying prayers, Joe said he wanted to pray for him pushing Christina. So I said something like

Me: "Help Joe to stop pushing Christina, we don't want that to happen"
Joe: "Why?"
Me: "Because it hurts Christina, she doesn't like being pushed"
Joe: "Why?"
Me: "Because she doesn't like to get hurt. Do you like getting hurt?"
Joe: "No!"
Me: "Well, christina doesn't either. That's why we don't push people".
Joe: "I don't like push Christina. I push Christina, I get time out. Christina push Jonas, she has to sit in time out too!"
Me: "Yeah, time out is no fun! Do you like time out?"
Joe: "No, I don't like it!"
Me: "Ok... so you don't want to push Christina then, huh?"
Joe: "No!"

I should also qualify this conversation by saying that Jonas tells us every single day that he pushed Christina and got in time out. We are fairly certain that if this happened every day, we would know about it, so we are pretty sure he is usually making it up. Still, this is the first time he has asked "why?" that I recall. And he thought about his feelings... oooh he's getting too big!

So, besides reasoning, Joe also had another first this past week... his first stomach bug... yaaaaay. Lucky for us (well... in its own way) he first got sick at Grandma's house on Thursday morning. He was just sitting, and then he projectile vomited across the living room-- gross! Lisa told him the next time he needed to throw up to go use the potty to throw up in.

Brandon and I both had to work this past weekend (my first convention week-- exciting!) and Lisa volunteered to keep Jonas most of Saturday, and we could get him at baby Jensen's 1st birthday party. I got a call around 2 from Brandon explaining some of what happened earlier that morning. Apparently, Jonas had woken up crying for milk, which he proceeded to do for the next 45 min. Lisa finally got him some milk, only to find him fast asleep on the kitchen floor! She concluded he was still sick =). Joe slept in her lap for another hour or so, then got up and they started to watch a movie. At this point, Joe jumped up from the couch, ran into the bathroom at top speed yelling "I NEED GO THROW UP IN LA POTTY!" And he did. Lisa said she heard gross sounds coming from the bathroom, and he had, indeed, thrown up in the toilet.

Needless to say, none of us made it to Jensen's birthday party.

Joe was still sick Sunday, but only had a mild fever. We still didn't want him around people, but my mom had wanted some help cleaning out a room, so we went over there for the day. Mom asked if she could keep Jonas for the night, and after some convincing I decided that would be ok, so Joe stayed all of Monday at "young Granny and papa dave"'s house (yes, he calls my dad papa dave usually). I guess they had a big time... I was hoping to catch a glimpse of Julie before we left, but no luck-- she was still out of town.

After we got home and ready for bed, I did hear from Julie, and she came over to visit-- YAY! I love my sissies!

Tuesday, Jonas woke up with a fever AGAIN. Geez! So Brandon and Joe had a big movie day and watched Up 2.5 times, monsters Inc, thomas the train, the Bolt, and (I am embarrased to say) star wars episode 2. To be fair, Brandon only put it on because Joe was begging to "see aliens" and it was the only movie he could find that had aliens Joe didn't think were "deh-wee!!(scary)" I AM embarrassed to say that Joe went to take a nap with an hour left on the movie, and Brandon still watched it to the end... yes... for shame, hon, for shame!

Tuesday was also Jensen's real 1st birthday, and since we'd all missed the party, we got invidted to his 2nd birthday party at La Ha. We told Dayna that Joe was still sick-ish, but she said as long as they didn't share food, she didn't care... so we came. Goodness, that little boy is growing! He is sooo cute, but he's not the tiny little guy he was... Buuuut that's a good thing. =)

Today afetr work I got Joe at the disc golf course, and we went to see the Carter's house. Joe has been very concerned about it, so we go every few weeks to look at it. We ran in to Nick while we were there, exciting! Joe then insisted we go see old Granny and try to find Aunt Jill and Uncle Tim at "la new house, la clean house". So we went over there for a few and visited with Granny and Alicia.

It's been a very busy past week for Brandon, Joe and me, but life is good and there's nothing to complain about!

A Date with Jonas

RoooOOOOOWWWLLLLL! ROOOoooOooOOOWWWWWLL!

RUDY! SHUT UP!!

Is how my morning started. Our dog is small in stature, but terrifying in volume. I don't know what he saw, but he wanted us to know about it. It was about time for me to get up anyway, so I rolled out of bed and managed to dress myself in my dog-walking clothes while maintaining a state of half-asleepedness. The surprise came when I walked out to get Rudy's leash on him, and there stood Jonas, holding all of his blankets, and looking like he wasn't sure what was going on. We stared at one another for a moment before he said, "Hi Mommy, what YOU doing?" I explained that I was headed out to take the dog on a walk before it got too hot, and he asked if he could come. "Sure!", I said, and went to the car to get his stroller.

It was nice to have somebody to talk to on our walk. Jonas is well into the stage of talking out every single thing he does or sees, and this morning was no exception. He kept up a string of conversation that hardly paused for a breath...

"Oh, mommy, I see some birds flying up high in the air. Mommy, what is that? Where is the garbage man? Is he coming around the corner? Uh oh, Rudy is walking in the grass... mommy, he is pooping in the grass. You are cleaning it up. I want help! Can I help, mommy?? Eweewwwwew! That is stinky poop! hahahaha that is funny! Rudy is funny!"

...and so on. We stopped to inspect a small cicada, which Rudy licked, so it flew away. This thrilled Jonas to no end. I let Jonas hold Rudy's leash for most of the walk, during which it was clear Joe has paid attention to what Brandon and I say when we all go on walks together (mind you, it's been several months since we all went on a walk together, since it's been so hot). At one point Rudy lagged behind sniffing something, and Joe tugged the leash and said "Rudy! Hurry up, you is stuipd dog!" Ah... yes, Brandon and I do occasionally say this to Rudy when he is doing something like trying to eat dirt. Clearly Joe got the idea.

Anyway, we had a wonderful walk in the morning.

After I got off of work, I headed over to the disc golf course to pick Joe up and figure out what the rest of the evening was going to look like. I asked Joe where he wanted to go, and he replied "I want go home." "are you sure you don't want to go visit somebody? We could go see old granny, or grammy and pappa, or maybe even aunt nicole?" "No, I want go to Joe's house." So off we went towards home. I asked about Joe's school day, and as usual, he said he got a time out because he pushed Christina. I have no idea if he has ever gotten a time out for this or not, but it is the story that he tells us every day when he gets home from school. I asked him about the drawing he had brought home (labeled "fruit"). I said "what's this?" "A painting." "oh, I see. What's it a painting of?" "Ummm... colors!" Of course, colors! He is very good at coming up with correct answers that don't really answer your question. He likely would have answered the question "colors that make what" as "things that I drew." Crafty kid! Anyway, I told him I loved the painting, to which he replied "I love it too! You can't love it mommy, IIII Love it!" I told him we could both love the painting. "No! I love it. you no can love it." "ok" I conceded, "can I just really like it", "oday."(okay).

As chance would have it, this conversation caused me to forget where I was going, leading us to miss our turn onto 311. We decided to go down main st. to get home, as I had vague thoughts of getting some fast food and letting him play in a playplace somewhere on the way home. This is the point where Joe spotted the hospital and exclaimed, "MOMMY! It is la hospital!! I want go see la babies!" For some reason I was in a good enough mood that I thought that would be fun-- after all, it was only 6:15. I turned the car around, and we went to the hospital with the goal of seeing some babies. After making up to the 5th floor (Jonas jabbering about how the babies might be hiding behind the blinds the whole way), we were disappointed to see that the babies were hiding behind the blinds. Sad day.

Defeated, we were about to leave, when Joe said "I am hungry, I have some french fries please?" Well, as we were at the hospital, and we DO love us some hospital food (no lie, that stuff is delish!) We headed down to the cafeteria. Immediately I get concerned about how I am going to work out having an excited 2.5 year old in an open cafeteria, but Joe was a good as gold. He didn't grab any of the food off of the tables, and waited while I built my sandwich. He even carried the drink to the table and got us a seat while I paid!

Dinner was quite enjoyable. I got us a chicken sandwich with fries and a drink (and ketchup and mustard for dipping). Joe did not seem to understand the concept of sharing a meal, though. The first french fry I took, he said "hey mommy, you took my fry. don't take my fry, they is mine!" He wasn't really upset, just letting me know what's what. I tried to explain that we were sharing, but the next time I took a fry, he did the same thing, but this time he interjected that "mommy is mean! that is mean!" I asked him why I was mean, and he said "because you took my fry. you is mean. you stole it from me!" Again, I told him it's not mean to take a fry if we are sharing. He wasn't convinced. He decided the best way to get around me taking his fries was to just give me some, so he started taking a bite of his french fry, then dipping it and asking if I wanted a bite. I'd take a bite, and he would giggle and continue eating. Sometimes he would say "here mommy, you want a fry?" and just hand me a fry. He didn't want to exclude anybody, so Mr. Mano got to eat some fries too... and of course Mr. Mano fed Jonas a fry or two as well! We had a great time feeding each other french fries and laughing at Mr. Mano as he tried to talk with french fries in his mouth. It was a most excellent dinner, even if it was super unhealthy!

We decided to try the babies again before we left, and boy were we glad we did! There were two brand-spanking new little babies right in front of the window, and three more off to the side. Joe was beside himself with excitement. Again, he babbled furiously about the babies...

"Hey! That baby is a naked boy, he is sleeping, no, he is crying! what is that, mommy?"

"that's a stethescope so the doctor can listen to the baby's heart"

"yes... like at the doctor? I like that baby, I love him! Mommy, we taking that baby home? I want hold him!"

There was no shortage of excited grandparents and parents to tell Joe all about their new additions, either. Several other people were crowded around the window and were having a fabulous time answering all of Joe questions, "that is your baby?" "why baby is naked?" "baby is sad-- is baby sad?" One exuberant parent walked up in full scrubs and exclaimed "look, that one is my baby!" Joe didn't disappoint... he squealed and said "I like her! I want hold him!" (gender confusion...) We probably stayed and looked at the babies for an hour. One lady we were next to was a doula, and was explaining her job to me. The next minute, a nurse came over and gave one of the babies a bath and checked his temp. Joe said "what that doula doing?" Laughing, I told him she was a nurse, and the other lady was the doula. Naturally, Joe agreed with a "yeeeees..." like he totally understood =) too cute!

We finally left the hospital, and on the way home I interjected between Joe's babbling that I had a fun date with him. he said "what is that?" so I told him, "A date is when you and a girl that you like go and do something fun together, just the two of you." "Yes," he replied, "I have a date with mommy at la hospital!" And a very good date it was indeed! =)

Totally Losing It

I'm pretty sure Jonas woke up this morning in a bad mood. Brandon usually wakes Joe up around 7:15, after I'm out of the shower, and gets him ready for the day. This morning, however, the first words out of Joe's mouth were whining ones. "Where is mommy? I want mommy come get meeeeeheeeeheeee" (remember, whiney, not laughing). Brandon, very reasonably, said that I was getting ready for work and I couldn't come get him out of bed, but that Joe could come find me and say good morning. This was the start of the meltdown of the year. Joe totally lost it. he started screaming and crying and insisted that I come and get him. Well, at this point, I couldn't go in there, because then he would learn that he got his way when he pitched a fit, so Brandon counted him. This was to no avail. Joe got to 3 and got his spanking pretty quickly. This made him more hysterical (usually, it is quite the opposite).

Since the whole ordeal had taken about 10 minutes, I was dressed and ready to go. Joe had quite forgotten why he was hysterical in the first place, and had changed his mind to simply saying that he did not want to leave his room. Brandon was starting to get frustrated, as would you, were you in a room with a very angry 2.5 year old. So, I started to count him from the other room. He alllllmost decided to listen, but then blatantly disobeyed... so he got his second spanking. At this point, Brandon and I are both in the room with him, and he is laying on his bed kicking and screaming "I NO WANT LEAVE MY ROOM!!"

I told Brandon to go ahead and get his other stuff ready and I would take a shift, since It was clear this wasn't going to blow over. I got Jonas calm enough that I was sure he could hear me, and told him he had to come out of his room before I counted to three, or he would receive his third spanking of the morning, and I would remove him from his room anyway. I got to 2 before he, crying hysterically and muttering, waled to the door. He stuck his foot into the hallway, then covered his face, and ran behind his door screaming "I NO WANT LEAVE MY ROOM!". Well, it killed me to have to do it, but I gave him his third, yes, third, spanking of the morning, and carried his flailing body into the main room. At this point, he was so hysterical that I sat on the couch with him and held his little body firmly so that he couldn't move anywhere, and whispered quietly into his ear "I love you little boy, calm down". Eventually the flailing stopped, and we were just left with a sobbing child who continued to mutter over and over "i no want leave my room."

It had been about 45 min. since he woke up. I was late, he was late, it was no good. I really needed to eat, and Brandon volunteered to take him back, at which point, he decided to start freaking out again (no surprise). I ate as fast as I could, and gave both my boys hugs and kisses, and left for work, feeling guilty that there wasn't more I could do. I could hear Joe's enraged screams of "MOMMY, DON'T GO AT WORK!!" as I sat in my car outside.

Brandon called me at 8:15 to give me the report of how the rest of the morning went. He said that he determined that Joe had wanted to go in his room to calm down (a tactic we have used in the past), so he let joe walk back to his room for about 3 min-- the longest he could wait to get Joe to school before breakfast. As soon as he came to get the now calm Jonas, Joe starting to totally lose it again. Having no choice, he wrestled Jonas into his clothes, the whole time kicking and screaming. The ride to school was more the sobbing and muttering than screams, thankfully. Brandon said as they entered the school, Jonas decided it was time to be clingy and make nice with daddy. Brandon told the teacher (Ms. Keisha) what was going on, and Ms. Keisha smiled and said "ok, Joe, let's go to breakfast!" Jonas loses it again. This time in a "NO WANT GO WITH MISS KEISHA, WANT DADDY!" sort of way. Brandon said you would have thought he'd dropped Joe off at a concentration camp as crazy as Joe was acting. Ms Keisha was carrying joe away, but Jonas was reaching over her shoulder for Brandon like he'd never see him again... the whole time screaming and puffy eyed from his hour or so of crying and screaming.

Oh, the joys of parenting!

Of course, when I got home Joe was perfectly fine, as if nothing had happened. I didn't think about it till I mentioned the tantrum at work, but somebody said it must be because of the full moon-- and I bet he's right... Joe does seem to go crazier when the moon is full!

Warning Fail

Tonight Jonas was playing in the bathtub when he decided to stand up, then jump to a sitting position. He does this pretty commonly outside of the tub... I guess it doesn't hurt his butt like it would mine. Either way, I told him he was not to do it again, because he could get hurt really really bad. He didn't seem convinced, as he began to test this new limit by squatting in the tub. I told him he could fall and hurt his head, and that would be terrible! HE stared at me, and said
"I need medicine?"
"yeah, you might"
my inner dialogue thought as I pondered my words...
"If you fall and get hurt, we might have to go to the hospital"
"go to the ho-bi-doh? see la babies?"

"they might give you a shot"
"I like shots"

"do you know what shots are? its a sharp metal needle they poke you with"
"POKE! POKE! hahaha!"

Letter to Netflix

Jonas loves the movie Up. We finally resorted to a bold faced like the third time he wanted to watch it this weekend, and told him that Netflix stopped streaming it. He requested that Netflix start streaming Up again, and Brandon suggested he compose a letter to Netflix with his complaint. Below is the letter:

Subject: Kevin

Dear Netflix,
Do Kevin.

Short, and to the point. Nice!

Cantaloupe Nightmares

Friday night, we went over to grandma & grandpa's for dinner as usual. Lisa reported that earlier (much earlier) that morning, Jonas had a nightmare. She ran in to his fitful screams, and comforted him as you would expect. She got him calmed down some, and he he managed to get out through his sobs, "No want Cantaloupe! Want Watermelon!" Ah, to have the problems of the 2 year old...

Saturday we spent the day helping the Charles' move in to their new house. The Reichs' watched all the kids in the morning, so that was nice! When we dropped Joe off, we stayed ove rthere for a few minutes, where I witnessed Jonas's first (to my knowlege) conversation with a peer. Evan walked in with his firetruck, and the following conversation happened:
J: Evan, what IS dat?
E: dis is my fire fruck.
J: What you doin' with it?
E: I'm moving the ladder.

Yes, it was short, but still... I am so accustomed to repeating everything Joe says, it took me off guard that these two little kids could talk to each other like real live people-- they are getting so big!! It was super cute =)

This was the first day since Jonas was probably 6 months old that he did not take a nap... it definitely started to show after a while. However, towards the 5pm mark, he was so tired that he didn't even know what to do. He just walked around with a blank stare muttering to himself "I want help... I want tooo help". Bless his little heart, I guess considering he didn't get a nap, he did great all day. We ended up leaving their house at 10pm, and Joe was STILL awake, and running, laughing, screaming, and crawling around under the beds when we left... I guess he caught his second wind! Of course, he was out before we got home... and he slept till 9:30 the next morning... we actually woke him up! Sunday we just rested... all three of us were pretty tired, and it was super nice to just have a day off.

Monday, I got home to a story Brandon told about picking Jonas up at school. He said Joe was completely hysterical lying on the floor crying, screaming, and mostly incoherent. The teacher said "He was fine 5 minutes ago, and I said I was going to the dentist, and he completely lost it." Sure enough, as soon as she said "dentist" Jonas let out a wail and could be heard screaming "NO GO TO DENTIST!! NOOOO" Well, you can't help but laugh at that. The teacher asked Brandon if Joe had been to the dentist, or had some bad experience, and he (naturally) said "I don't even think he knows what a dentist is..."

Just to see, later that evening, I casually mentioned the dentist again, and while he didn't get hysterical, he emphatically said "NO go to 'la dentist!" I asked him what a dentist was, and he said "They give me a tooth-brush." Well... apparently someone is educating him!

While I was playing with him last night, he pulled down one of his trash trucks. He started looking for the trash cans that go with his set and he said "Where is that... no... where are they?" Goodness, he just surprises me every day, and today it was correcting his own sentence. He realized what he was saying wasn't correct, and then changed it to what it should be. I've heard adults that still can't do that! Aww, my smart little boy =)

So, up to today. Joe is a fan of the medicine. If he thinks of it, he will tell us about anything to get some. Tonight was no exception. He was sitting on the potty, and turned around to see a bottle of Tums on the counter, the following occurred:
Jonas: Mommy, what is that? Is that tynanol? (yes, full, near-clear sentences)
Me: Those are tums.
J: I 'ave one, Please?
Me: Ah, no, sorry buddy, that's medicine for your tummy. You take it when your tummy hurts to make it feel better.
J: (naturally) Oooh, my tummy hurts! I 'ave one now?
Me: Joe, I know your tummy doesn't really hurt.
J: Yes it do-'s! oooooh my tummy huuuurt! I need one!
Me: Joe, it's not going to work buddy, I know your tummy doesn't really hurt.
J: (stops, thinks for a moment) **SMACK** (he hits his stomach pretty hard). Now it hurt! I 'ave one now??

Well, at this point, I was laughing pretty hard at his cunning. I think I told him something about "not that kind of hurt, when it hurts from eating something you shouldn't have". Defeated, he decided to instead hide behind the curtain and play peek-a-boo. Win!

watermelon
evan conversation
no dentist
conjugating verbs
hurt stomach
4th of july

The Golden Shower

A couple of weeks ago was was the 4th of July weekend, during which the Kennedys (and Manns, of course!) came down for a visit. It was so good to see everyone again, even if it was a Jeff-less weekend =(. We had a big time just hanging out and catching up most of the weekend. A bunch of people went to play disc golf one day, and the rest went to the farmers market and got all sorts of yummy treats. Of course, there was flying involved as well... Uncle Tim took us up over Kernersville where we could clearly see the Kennedys' house thanks to "lake awesome", and then flew us up and around Mt Airy... very cool! Farkle was played, kids had a big time running around, playing in the water, painting, and all sorts of other things.

We went to a parade one of the mornings in Kernersville, and it was not the best parade I've ever been to, but they sure made up for it by throwing as much candy as you could get on Halloween! Jonas decidedly did not like the parade. He told us "I didn't like it! It was Loooud! The trucks are loud!" He calmed down from his crying about wanting to leave after Brandon got him some Ice Cream, and the entire time Kyndahl was enchanted with all the cool old cars, but not Joe, he just wanted to leave.

I'd say one of the highlights of the weekend was getting a big box of NC fireworks and setting them all off. The "finale" was one poorly-named "The Golden Shower". I mean, really... who named that?? Once again, Jonas was not a big fan of the fireworks. They were too loud, and it didn't help that he tried to touch a sparkler. Amazingly, this did not appear to burn him, but it certainly scared the crap out of him. He talked about it for days "I got burned on 'la fiah-wook. it hurt my 'and! I don' like them. (vigorous head shaking)". He was better with the professional fireworks that he watched on the rooftop, but he still wasn't sold on it. I think he was mostly excited about being on the roof.

Max's guinea pig, Deuce, went to a better place. He and his friends gave the poor little guy an excellent sending off, and with that ended the reign of pets in the Kennedy household.

Another fun activity we discovered was getting out the graphic TMI childrens' book "where did I come from?" and laughing as Amanda, and then Erin (both pregnant) learned about the birds & the bees from the book. It was pretty priceless. That book floated around all weekend... goodness, it's just very awkward... yeah.

Anyway, all in all, we all had a great weekend this 4th!

The Snipe Hunt

Jonas officially has a favorite movie, and it is "Up". As far as childrens' movies go, this is about as far at the top of the barrel as you could hope for, so we're cool with this being his favorite movie. This movie gets watched in part or in whole every day for the past 2 weeks at least, and while Jonas does not acknowledge that it is called "Up", he asks to "see Devin" and "see Row-douu and Devin!" (russell and kevin... he's pretty far off on his "Russell" for the while.) Brandon and I have concluded that we can, in fact, watch this movie daily, as we have done so for 2 weeks and still laugh at Doug and various other scenes. Anyway...



Yesterday after dinner, we went over to see our long lost neighbors who had finally returned from their nearly 2 month trip to the Dominican Republic. Jonas was ecstatic. He had eaten his dinner fast and shot outside with us babbling the whole time "I want see Deenee, I want see Obi! I like Deenee, I like Obi! I like deenee a lot... I like..." and then he saw their shrubbery. They have several of those zebra-striped hosta looking plants in front of their house, and Jonas, without even a second thought to what he had been doing moments before, diverted from the path and walked straight over to the plants. He bent over, looked under them and said "Snipe, where aah' you??"
And so began the first of what I expect to be many Snipe hunts.

Jonas continued to putter around the plants, babbling the entire time:

"'nipe! 'nipe! **clap clap clap** where aaaaah' youuuuu? I have cho-co-late fuh you! Sniiiiii-iiipe! (yes sometimes he pronounces the "S") **commmmme ouuuuut! see Jonas.... I nice."

Of course, the entire time he is clapping, and crouching over, and looking back to us to explain things with the occasional head nod.... these really made the snipe hunt entertaining... such as when he would be talking about the chocolate, he would look over at us and say "Snipe like cho-co-late. Row-douu have cho-co-late he feed snipe! I feed snipe cho-co-late.", the whole time nodding as if to say "I've remembered correctly, right?"

Finally, Jonas decided he saw a snipe. He screamed "I SEE HIM!! I SEE DEVIN SNIPE! I DASE (chase) HIM!" at which point he took off running with his arms out to catch the snipe. He finally stopped running and turned to announce his capture "I HAVE DEVIN! I HAVE 'NIPE! I TID-LEL-NING HIM! TID-NULL TID-NULL TID-NULL" (making tickeling motions in the air, and bursting with pride at his capture).

Jonas decided to let the snipe go, and then hunted him again. At one point in his hunt, he stopped and looked off in the distance and said "uh-oh, oh no! the beh-dos duming!" we were confused, as i'm sure you are reading this. he said it again, this time more panicked, starting to grab his face and bounce with panic. Then we put it together.. he was saying the bad dogs were coming, which (naturally) happens in the movie. He turned and said "RUN DEVIN! RUN! THE BEH-DOS DUMING!!" So cute! He probably snipe hunted for about 30 min before we made him come inside. Note to self (or brandon): remember to tell his teachers about snipe hunting. He may try to do it at school...

Big Bad Wolf

The past week, this story has captivated Jonas. Brandon said he went to get Jonas at school, and he was hiding in the corner. when asked what was wrong, he said "the big bad wolf come get Jonas!" all of the other kids were playing into this and telling him the wolf was "over here, come see him!" and such. This did nothing to calm Jonas down, although he did step out tentatively when Brandon went over to scratch behind its ears and tell him he wasn't so bad after all, he just like bacon! Either way, Jonas spent the evening telling us he "no like big bad wolf!"

Fast forward a few days. We picked up jonas at lisa's last night, and apparently lisa had read him the 3 little pigs book as well. now he was interested in re-telling the story. if you say "big bad wolf" now, its like he's been brainwashed to say "heeee huuuuf annnd RRROOOOOOAAAAA!(hands go to mouth, then out... blowing). He is very into this demonstration. It's pretty cute.

He was very excited this morning to see the "Big Bad Wolf" at the natural science center. It may have been his favorite exhibit (except the train table, of course).

Jonas need Ty-na-nol

So Jonas is thinking up snarky answers to questions that are really clever, albeit smart-alecy all at once. The best example was from about a week ago. Here's what went down:

Jonas came home from Grandma's house last week all excited about "ty-na-nol" or... as he was sometimes prompted to call it "ah-da- ma- ma-finnn" (acetaminophen). I guess his teeth were hurting so Lisa gave him a tylenol chew tablet, which he LOVED. Now we aren't sure when he is really hurting or just wants tylenol. He spent several days saying "Owie owie, my mouf hurts. I need tynanol!" and when we would say "no, you just want tylenol. i don't think you're really hurting". Unabashed, he would continue:
J: "ooooow, my head hurts"
Parents: "No it doesn't"
J: Ooowieee, my throat hurts! ... my eyes hurt! my nose hurts!
Parents: "wow... that is a lot of stuff to be hurting you"
J: Yeah. (smiles)
P: you're still not getting any Tylenol. we can't just give it to you anytime, it's not candy.
J: (realizes his lie has been seen through, begins to pitch a fit, crying kicking his legs, etc)
P: sorry buddy, we know you like it. But we don't know when you're lying, so we're only going to give it to you if you have a fever. (pause... does he know what a fever is?? better ask!) Do you know what a fever is?
J: It's what I have when I get tynanol!

well, we can't argue with that! we then said that was true, and it's also when your head is really hot. He accpeted this and life went on.

Visiting Old Granny

Granny has been in the hospital for the past week, and we have gone to visit her several times. To keep "Granny" and "Grammy" separate, I have just started calling them "Old granny" and Young Granny". Jonas has accepted this. anyway... Jonas is a big fan of the hospital. He was very excited about the magic bed, using their water fountains, the elevators, the automatic hand sanitizers, their "hamburders and foo fise!", and most of all, their babies.

He had a big time playing with Old Granny or whoever else happened to be at the hospital, but be would always end up asking to go see "la bebies". We would oblige, and of the 3 nights we went, we only saw babies on one night. This baby was not the one that stuck with Jonas. There was one night we went down there, and they had the blinds drawn, but there was a very unhappy baby in the back you could hear crying.
Joe: uh oh, oh no! the baby is sad!
Me: yes, he does sound sad, he probably wants his mommy.
Joe: yeeees... mommy, where is la (the) baby? I can' (can't.. yes, it is confusing.) see him.
M: he is hiding behind the blinds.
J: haha, the baby is hiding and he is sad. (nodding) he wants to see his mommy!
(at this juncture, the door opens, and the baby is trundled out down the hall to (presumably) his mommy)
J: ***huge gasp** mommy! It's la baby! He's coming out! He's not hiding anymore! (as the cart trundles away, joe's excitement turns to concern, as the baby is not getting closer) Where is la baby going? oh no! Mommy, follow him! Follow him!!
M: (shocked that Jonas knew the phrase "follow him" just stands for a minute. Then we started to follow, but we were too far behind to really follow.) I think we lost him buddy, i think he went to go see his mommy. see? we don't hear him crying anymore.
J: yeees. He not crying anymore. Baby is happy! Baby is with his mommy! He is happy!

This story was recounted for days to everyone that would listen. It went like this:
"see baby at hah-bi-doh (hospital). Baby is crying, baby is sad. Baby hiding behind blinds. oh no! baby is hiding behind la blinds! Baby want see mommy. baby see mommy. baby is happy! we follow him. uh-oh, oh no-- where is baby? hahahaha!"

It was pretty adorable. Jonas cried half the way home that night because he wanted to take a baby home. I told him that wasn't happening unless it was our baby. He replied that he wants to have a baby so he can take it home with him. Too cute!

Now every time we mention the hospital, he perks up and says "Joe want to go hah-bi-doh! Want see le babies, uh of babies is hiding. no want babies is hiding!" I believe this roughly translates to "I want to go to the hospital and see the babies, but I don't want them to be hiding behind the blinds this time."

Meeting Mr Mano

A couple weeks ago, we were driving home from Brandon's parents, and Jonas was in a whiny mood. Understandably, as it was late, but that only made it a little less frustrating to deal with. If only we had a toy or something to keep him entertained. But wait! Suddenly, in a flash of inspiration from Ellen Feild, I remembered "the toy that is always with us"... Mr. Mano! It was easily the fastest turnaround he's done ever. Well... maybe not ever. but it was a fast turnaround. He was crying and whining, and the next second, he was screaming and laughing at his new friend, Mr. Mano. (for those of you who don't know, Mr. Mano would be a hand puppet. and no, i don't mean a cloth puppet. I mean that I formed my hand into the standard "snake shadow puppet" and made him talk.) The speed with which Mr. Mano became a part of his existence was maybe 10 seconds... just long enough for him to take in that a hand was talking to him and accept this reality. The rest of the ride, he addressed "mi-der mado!" and requested that Mider Mado do things for Jodis. For example "Mider Mado, where are you?" (hand held up in confusion). Mister Mano would pop out from somewhere around my seat and say "boo!" "you dared me mider mado! hehehehe!" "Mider Mado, What Yoooou doin'?" Mister mano would usually reply in a snarky and inexplicably spanish (spain spanish) accent "I am hiding! What YoooOOOou doin??" and so on.

Now, Mr. Mano was a pretty great idea, however, he did have his down sides. For one thing, Jonas wanted to "please hold mider mado?" Which he did get to do, but a week later when Jonas went on a 2 hr. car trip with the in-laws, he held mr. mano for 1/2 of those hours. Lisa is very patient. However, this, and Jonas always wanting "Mider Mado, come play with Jonnnnis!" seem to be the only downsides. We showed Joe that he had his own mister mano, to which he was boundlessly thrilled, and I won't say that Brandon's mider Mado and my mider mado have not had a couple of hand-to-hand verbal arguments... followed by much hand to hand makeup-makeouts.

My favorite thing about Mister Mano is that Joe listens to him. For example, I asked Joe to go use the potty before we left. "No! I don't need go potty!" "well, we need to try anyway before we go in the car." (whining). "that's a 1" "Noo!" (enter Mr Mano) "Hullo Jonas!" "HI MIDER MADO!!" (now Joe is giggling and bouncing with delight) MM: "You shoudl probably use the potty before we leave, huh?" (Jonas stops,,, thinks) "Yeeeess... I go use potty now!" (notice, he says "yes" not "ses" now. progress!). In conclusion, Mr Mano has helped us out a lot. Of course, it is a 2 way street...

I drive Jonas to work every Thursday morning, one morning of which, Jonas pulled his shoe off. The following conversation occurred:
Jonas: uh-oh! Oh no! My shoe is off! Mommy, mommy I need 'elp!
Me: Sorry, buddy, I can't help you while I'm driving. You'll have to make do on your own.
J: please mommy help Jodis put my shoe on (notice, the 1/2 use of 1st person. sweet!)
M: Jonas, I can't help you when I'm driving, please don't ask me again until we are stopped.
J: (silence for about 20 sec). "Mider Mado, I need 'elp, my shoe is coming off. 'elp, 'elp mider mado!"
M: (stifling laughter for his seeing this loophole) Sorry buddy, mister mano is helping me drive right now. He caon't help you either.
J: plllllease mider mado?
Mister Mano: "Hey! I have to help your mom drive! you'll have to wait!"
J: **squeals** siddy mider mado! (silly mister mano!)

Stuttering

So, about 2 weeks ago, Jonas --completely out of the blue-- started stuttering. BADLY. I mean, the child just couldn't spit out anything. "Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa Iwa (takes a breath) Iwa Iwa I want a bop dote. (pop tart)" He gets worse with tireness or frustration, obviously. However, it has been very difficult to not make fun of him for his stuttering. Brandon cracked one morning when Jonas was requesting the poptart... or trying, over and over again. We didn't have any and Joe kept asking. brandon was getting agitated and replied "Well t-t-t-t-t-t-t-ttooooo bad!" I told him that was mean, and he apologized... not that JOnas was phased at all.

This weird stuttering went on for about the past 2 weeks, and then it stopped as suddenly as it started. as I am backdating this entry, I can say that it hasn't come back yet. Weird.

I ate mouse. and zimmy-zonga

A few minutes ago, as I laid JOnas down for bed, he made up a story. I will try to retell it to the best of my ability:
Me: what else do you want to pray for?
J: Miss Keisha.
Me: ok, pray for miss keisha... what about her?
J: Miss Keisha has mouse.
Me: she has a mouse?
J: Miss Keisha hold mouse in hand. (he cups his hands to demonstrate). Miss Keisha put mouse in Jodis (jonas) hand. jodis hold mouse!
Me: Miss keisha gave you a mouse to hold?
J: Miss keisha put mouse in jodis hand! Jodis hold mouse. Jodis EAT mouse! (puts his hands to his mouth) **whooom!** (eating sound)
Me: you ate a mouse?
J: (chewing) mouse in mouth! jodis eat mouse in mouth. jodis spit out. (he holds his hands up and pretends to spit something large out of his mouth). Heeeah (here) mommy. you eat mouse.
Me: ok... (I pretend to eat the mouse).
J: i want see in mouth!
Me: (opens mouth)
J: there is mouse in deee-uh (there)!
Me: Yup! I ate the mouse!
J: eww, mommy eat mouse! mommy, spit it out! Jodis want eat mouse!!
Me: (pretends to spit it out and give it to joe.)
J: (pretends to eat the mouse. this time with exaggerated chewing. he whos me his mouth) mouse in jodis mouth!!
Me: I see it in there! how did that mouse get in there?
J: I put it in dee-ah! (points to self)
Me: oooh.
J: (frezes, stares. makes a BIG pretend swallow, smacks his lips, and smiles big) Jodis saw-yo mouse!
Me: You're silly!!
J: (laughs and screams)

Since I am writing a blog, I guess I should update the weekly happenings. The most important of which is that Brandon finally got his graduation/father's day gift sunday: a kitten. My requirement was that it must have a Harry Potter name. It's name started as Catface Meowmers... we decided eventually that "catface" which is what we all were calling it, just wan't good enough. More names were discussed. "Marvolo", "Digory", and "Norbert" were in the running. I got home from work today and Brandon said he really wanted to name it Ronan. I am pretty sure there is a centuar named Ronan, so I think ol' catface is now named Ronan. Luckily, Jonas can say this name very clearly. Ronan is an orange tabby, and appears to be very sweet. Not being a huge cat person, this is important to me.

We took Jonas to the pound on saturday to look at the kittens, and he was pretty much a devil child. Even though he hasn't had any accidents in weeks, he decided it was time to break the tradition about 1 minute after we got there. He promptly peed all over brandon. This is not why he was bad,,, i mean, it's just an accident... but it didn't help that we forgot clothes for him to change into, and that he had ANOTHER accident 20 minutes later. He was mostly being a huge butt because he was trying to scare all the animals, and was refusing to listen. He was running, jumping (yes, real jumps, his new skill), screaming, and throwing cat food that he found on the floor at every animal he could. It was not a pretty scene. Defeated, we left early.

Sunday, we went back and got the cat that brandon wanted, then took Jonas immediately to the doctor because his eyes had been nasty. Jonas was AMAZING at the doctor! I couldn't believe he was my son. He calmly walked in the office by himself, didn't pitch a fit when we didn't get to the waiting room to see the fish, stood on the scale like an old pro, walked in the waiting room, and sat calmly waiting for the doctor. The doctor came pretty fast since it was Sunday, and Joe complied instantly like an adult to everything he asked (can you look this way? can you open your mouth? stick your tongue out? lay down? hold still?). It was totally crazy. I don't know what made him decide it was ok this time (usually it's a scraming fit to get close to the building) but i'm glad it was different!

Anyway.... joe had to stay with brandon monday, and they had a good time. Brandon did IM me at work to say that he suggested they make something fancy for lunch. Joe say "ses, madt(make) something fan-tee!(fancy)" brandon suggests lasagna. Jo says "No want make zimmy-zonga!"
A W E S O M E !

Nicole and Ivan came over last night to meet the kitty... we had a good time! I wish we lived closer to everybody... it would be sooo nice!

Surprise in the trash truck

Tonight Jonas and I were playing with some of his trucks, when he pointed into one of his trash trucks and said "uh-oh, oh no!" I looked in the front seat of the trash truck, and sure enough, there appeared to be some brownish stain in the bottom of it where the driver would sit. I also noticed that one of the stickers looked like it hat undergone some trauma caused by a liquid or something. I figured Jonas had tried to pur his juice in there... awesome.

I don't know what posesed me to do it, but I stuck my pinkie finger in and smelled a sample of the mostly dried liquid. It was definitely NOT juice. I said, "Jonas, did you pee in your trash truck?" (pause... ) "...ses." Gross. Although this does explain how he managed to wet the bed last week. His pullups have never let us down on the bed wetting front, and he doesn't even wet his pull ups sometimes... he must have thought this was a good idea. At any rate, we told him not to do it again, and he seemed to agree it was a bad idea!

Ugly Bug!

Jo, the past couple of weeks have been a tremendous improvement in Jonas. We started a zero-tolerence spanking policy, wherein once Jonas gets to 3, he gets a spanking always. This has worked wonderfully. He has maybe had 5 spankings in 2 weeks... this is a huge improvement from before where it was more like 2-5 spankings per day. He has almost completely stopped pitching tantrums (for more than a few seconds), he actually is listening, and while he still whines, he is getting MUCH better! Glorious! And to top it all off, I heard a bit on NPR a while back that was talking about a research study of children who were spanked (not beaten... spanked) and they did MUCH better in school, were better adjusted, played better with other children, and were all around better. the only down side was they said some children who were spanked after the age of 12 were sometimes slightly more aggressive... well, that makes sense!

Jonas has been working hard at the "me" "you" "I" concept. He is starting to get it. We are trying to teach him how to not-speak-in-third-person. He still says "Pick You Up!" all the time, and we say "Pick ME up?" "sees, pick ME up!" (of course, he doesn't say his "c,k,g" sounds... they're all "t" sounds now.) He does have some wins, though... he said "I want musit!(music)" yesterday, and occasionally he throws in another "I" statement correctly.

Tonight we have the best-smelling toddler in the USA. We took a bath, and Jonas wanted to use "daddy sam-poo". "Ok", I thought, the bottle was empty... so he couldn't use much. Brandon has some AXE body wash that he got a long time ago because he wanted a rubber duckie with devil horns that AXE was giving away with the wash... anyway.... SO I shook what I thought was little shampoo down to the bottom of the container and squirted out onto Jonas's waiting hands enough body wash to easily cleanse Brandon, Jonas, Rudy, and Me. He was delighted-- and what'd not to love? it's BLUE! In conclusion... Jonas smells very, very good. and of course, he had to put on deodorant after he got out of the tub. He loves-- check it. LOVES putting on brandon'd deodorant. He probably puts it on twice a day. I don't mind. It smells good! Anyway.. yeah-- good smellin' little boy!



Now, before we got in the tub for a bath, I usually grab mine and Brandon's basket full of body wash and shampoo out of the shower, but tonight there was one of those ugly bugs that for some reason are in our shower about once a month... they look liek a cross between a centipede and a camel cricket... a disturbing combination. Yet, I have grown soft to these atrocious little creatures, as I feel like they're pretty pitiful when they get hit with water. They aren't very hardy like ants or beetles... they get wet, they flail for about 3 seconds, and then they just go limp and wash down the drain, dead. Anyway.... yeah. they are kind of pitiful in that way. Point being, there was an ugly bug to dispose of. I got the toilet paper, while Jonas watched with interest and interjected his comments, such as "Oo no! udee bud in bad-det (ugly bug in basket)." I got the bug and said I was going to throw him away, and so I did, into the toilet. I then proceeded to clean out the bathtub while Jonas continued his ugly bug commentary "udee bud fall down in wa-der (water). Jodis see udee bud. OH NOO! Udee bud craw (crawl) out! Udee bud comin' out! MOMMY!" Sure enough... I thought I squashed the bug, but apparently not. He had started to crawl out of the bowl but couldn't get completely out. I flushed him. Jonas continues, "Mommy flush udee bud down podee (potty), bug going bye bye, bye bye udee bud!"
It was pretty cute! =)

So, when JOnas goes to bed we usually do prayers... usually, Jonas will just point at stuff to pray for, but tonight he prayed for super cute stuff... we prayed for(in this order): Obi & Dee-neey (danny), Mimi, mimi sat! (grammy, grammy sad) Old mimi! Old mimi sat! (old granny, old granny sad) old mimi's house. un-doe dim, ann dee-oh (uncle tim aunt jill), Summer (yes, pronounced correctly). Precious =)

The Moon is Spicy

I will try to get this story right, as it came from Brandon’s POV.

Yesterday, Brandon and Jonas were outside playing, when Jonas spotted one of his favorite things to spot: The Moon.

J: MOON!! MOON!
B: yeah, Joe, that’s the moon!
J: Reach moon! (stretches arms over head)
B: Well, I don’t think you’re tall enough, buddy.
J: (looks a little miffed, but recovering quickly) Daddy reach moon!
B: (stretches his arms up) Nope, it looks like daddy isn’t tall enough either.
J: Daddy pee-up Joedis (pick up Jonas). Reach moon! Touch Moon!
B: Well, I can, but I think we’ll still be too far away.
J: (now slightly defeated, changes his mind and points to his chest.). Joedis Eat moon. (now reaches both hands up and brings to moutn several times)
B: Oh! You want to eat the moon?
J: seees (yeeees)
B: What do you think the moon tastes like?
J: hmmm (taps finger on mouth while contemplating). Moon pice-dee! (spicy)
B: (laughs) You think the moon is spicy, huh?
J: ses! Need te-up (ketchup) eat moon!
B: Oh, you need ketchup? Well, that will make it less spicy.

Now other stories from this week. On Tuesday, Brandon (as usual) got Jonas from school, where he was told that Jonas had pooped in his underwear at nap time, and neglected to tell anyone about it. Mrs. Michelle, his teacher, had a stuffy nose and didn’t smell anything, but as Joe was walking around, apparently a turd fell out of his pants and that was when they realized something was amiss. Hehe, poor kid!

Last night, after Jonas wanted to eat the moon we went out to eat. We’ve been trying to go to this new Japanese hibachi grill near our house, but it’s been too crowded every time we’ve tried to go. Jonas has been very disappointed every time. He was very excited about the “foo fies! Hambadurs! Ra-a-not!” (French fries, hamburgers, restaurant). Since we couldn’t get in, we settled for Mexican. Jonas insisted on sitting in the booth with us, and to our pleasant surprise, he was a very sweet little boy there. He got a booster seat and enjoyed his chips with pice (spice). He decided he needed some salt and pepper on his chips, and (like any other kid) proceeded to WAY overload them. We felt this was a learning moment and let him try his chips... he did not care for them. =) He shortly thereafter wanted Brandon's lemon.. and what parents would we be if we didn’t give him the lemon?? Also hilarious. He screwed his face up, eyes closed, and shaking… it was awesome.

NO write a title!

As I have mentioned before, Jonas has been ridiculous. Here are some recent examples:

Sunday, Brandon and I are talking about which way to go back from church that most easily passes the grocery store. Brandon asked if we should take West Market Street, I agreed. Jonas, however-- Jonas decided to chime in "NO date West Mardet Deet." (no take west market street!). Brandon and I simply looked at each other as if to say "did that really just happen?!"

Now for Monday...(this is Brandon writing this paragraph) Jonas started the day off a little sick, so we spent the morning on the couch watching The Mighty Ducks, got some Wendy's for lunch, and then he took a splendid 3 hour nap. he woke up, we went for a walk and called grandma to see if she could get on Skype for a video call. she had to eat first so while she went off to do that, jonas asked for a pb&j sandwich. he had been good so i obliged. i figured grandma was gonna call any minute so i asked him if he would like to finish his sandwich sitting at the computer. he said yes so i got him out of his chair and set him on the floor. i grabbed my can of soda walked to the computer telling jonas to follow me. meltdown. he started screaming "daddy, pick up" over and over. i told him "no, i can't pick you up, i have a drink in my hand." (sure i could have put the drink down, but he was just being ridiculous. besides, he is perfectly capable of walking the 20 feet to our bedroom) i sat at the computer and waited for him to come in. he made it to the corner, just far enough for me to see him from my chair, and screamed louder "daddy, pick up". i told him i would pick him up when he got to the chair. "daddy, pick up right here". i then ignored him, he knew the deal, but after about 4 minutes of hysterical "daddy, pick up right here," i started to count him. his scream changed to "daddy pick up right here. no three spankin." needless to say, he got to 3. he then ran in the opposite direction (proving that he was capable of moving on his own, by the way). i caught him, took away the remains of his sandwich, administered a spank, and put him in his room. i told him he could come out when he was ready to quit being ridiculous..........5 minutes of screaming later, i hear his door open and close. i asked if he was coming out and he calmly answered "yes". he then proceeded to walk to the bedroom door and say "daddy pick up right there," and pointed to the spot he had been standing in for earlier fit. i said no, and he started to lose it again. this time he stopped when i got to 2. he said he had to pee so i took him to the bathroom. he finished, we got his pants up and i started to head back to the computer. this time he asked very calmly, "daddy, pick up right here pleeeeaaaasssssse." so i said, "yes, see how much easier that is when you ask nicely without whining?"..."yyyyeeeesssss". then we talked to grandma but it was more like jonas ignoring her and trying to get into everything on the desk...anyways, the kid is ridiculous.

Bite marks and sticker residue

Let's begin with a story from this past Friday, where Jonas was, as always, at grandma's house. Lisa has a bunch of foam letters that are used for making posters. They have some heavy duty sticky-tape on the back if you can peel off that backing. She had given some to Jonas to play with. A few minutes go by, and she hears Jonas asking for help (nee 'elp!). Since he asks for help ALL THE TIME, she mostly ignored him, only to hear cries of "NEE 'ELP!! BALLS NEE 'ELP!! Pee-nis nee 'elp!!" Well, THAT got her attention! =) She ran in to see that he had removed the backing to a letter "N" and had promptly decided where it needed to be placed. Not wanting to half-heart it, he had pushed it on there REALLY well. Well enough that she had time to locate and turn on her camera (2 minutes-ish) before he finally managed to pull the thing off! Yes, there waqs a video, no I will never post it... I think we've already deleted it. Hilarious!

Today Jonas came home from school with a perfectly round bite mark on his forearm, and an "ouch report" along with it. Now, I know what you're thinking... and it would make sense: he got bitten. NO- this is not the case. He, in fact, decided it would be a good idea to suck on his arm for the better part of the afternoon today, despite being told to stop. result: hickey with tooth marks. Lovely. It looks pretty bad-- like, to the point that a parent at the park saw his arm when he was on the play equipment and commented that it looked like he had a good bite mark there. goodness... i don't think they believed me when i told them it was self-inflicted!

Brandon and I are slowly trudging through Jonas's "terrible two's". And yes, they are terrible. Let the record show that while I generally update this blog with all of Joe's cuteness, it's not because he's nothing but precious. That child is SUPER whiney, testing every chance he gets, actively defiant, etc. Oh my goodness, these are certainly the days of wondering why we thought kids were a good idea. I've come to the conclusion that God must have made children adorable so that they wouldn't be killed at a young age.... yes. this makes sense to me! Anyway, there's always good sprinkled in there, and even when he's at his most obnoxious, we can usually look back and laugh. For example:

On saturday, Jonas was running around outside and fell and scraped his knee. Yes, he is a real boy now. Anyway, the actual abrasion was about the size of a thumbprint, and the area that made it through enough layers of skin to draw blood was no bigger than a small paper cut-- so anything but dire. You would have thought the child had been drug through the town behind a chariot or something! I mean, ok, I expected the poor guy to be upset when he first fell, but he went way above and beyond the call of duty for "hurT nee!" theatrics the rest of the evening.
He walked around without bending his leg (when he remembered he had fallen, that is), he even crawled around without using his knee for a while when he saw his band aid again. The child even LIMPED around the house for a while after his bath because he could see his band aid again and was reminded of the tragic knee-scraping incedent of '10. While we were taking a bath, he would dig his finger into the band aid and scream "KNEE HURTS!!! HURT KNEE!" to which we would respond "well, you are hitting your knee, that probably does hurt." Poor kid. we finally decided the band-aid was coming off so we could stop the theatrics. That worked perfectly. He hasn't had a problem since. Of course, now i'm scared of what his drama skills will be when hes older if he's this bad at 2!

Ok, I admit, I know that was supposed to be a "funny later" story, but it was really pretty funny at the time.

This reminded me of his stalling yesterday. He got in trouble playing outside because he ran away and refused to come back-- getting closer and closer to the road. Obviously, this didn't fly, so we told him he could either walk himself back to the house for time out, or we could carry him back for time out and a spanking. Needless to say, he chose to take himself. To stall his punishment, he (of course) walked as slowly as possible, which we sped up by counting him; and he also walked in as many zig-zag's as possible by walking by ever single tree or bush, sticking out his hand and saying "moo-me tee" (excuse me, tree!), "moo-mee l'l'l'l tee!" (excuse me little tree!), "Sozzie bush, moo-me" (sorry bush, excuse me) and so on. **sigh** well, i guess that's points for creativity at least! =)

An april miracle!

This morning Jonas woke up and was totally dry! OMG! this is a win.

A bad cough

Jonas has had this terrible cough the past week. It sounds like it hurts him a lot, but he's only said it hurt once in the past week. We've been giving him children's Robitussin, which seems to be having little to no effect on him whatsoever. He does, however, complain that it is "spicy!" and makes a hilarious face when we give it to him.


The past several days Jonas has run out of the house yelling that he wants to "dive dar!" (Drive car!). His new favorite thing is to sit in the driver's seat of the car and play with all of the buttons, fix the a/c pretend to turn the wheel, etc. It's super cute, and keeps him well occupied. He has gotten pretty upset that I wouldn't give him the keys and let him actually dive the dar. Poor kid.


Yesterday when he was diving the dar, he decided Rudy needed to come in too, so he opened up the door to call him... of course, as you and I know, car doors have a couple of preset openings, and Jonas failed to let go once he started opening the door, so he got dragged out of the dar by the door. Luckily (ish) I saw what was happening and tried to stop it by grabbing his shirt. All this did, however, was slow his descent to the pavement. He still sloooooowly fell face first on the pavement. Sure, he didn't really get hurt, it just scared him... and was hilarious.


Yesterday Jonas also decided to give me his Taggie for me to take to work. Brandon was trying to get him comfortable with the idea that he wasn't going to be able to take Taggie with him to school anymore, and he suggested that maybe mommy needed it more than Joe did. So he thought it over for a minute, then ran into the kitchen holding out Taggie and said "Take Taggie, Mommy, take Taggie." It was sooo cute, so I had to take it! It kept my feet warm all the way to work.


Today is picture day at Joe's school... I wonder how that will go... wow, speaking of school, he has been doing so well using the potty at school, and at home, actually. It's been super! Last Thursday, Lisa picked Joe up from school, and told us about a story he told her from his school day. I will do my best to remember it verbaetum:


L:Joe, did you play with your friends today?

J: seeees. (yes)

L: Cool! Who did you play with?

J: Christina. (yes, he did pronounce it properly)

L: Christina? What did you and Christina play?

J: My toy! My toy! No! MY TOY!

L: Did you have a fight over a toy with Christina?

J: seees.

L: Well, what did Christina do?

J: Peeees (please)

L: and then what did you do?

J: sair toy (share toy).

More adoreableness.


Work is going ok. I may have some work to do by tomorrow... but I'm not holding my breath for it.

Job transition and milk sniffing

The past couple of weeks have been all kinds of craziness. I went in to sign paperwork for MA, and for the third time asked about my current MLM ties, and was finally told what I suspected, that I would have to stop working for any MLM's that were direct competitors... so I have spent the past two seeks scrambling to get some serious changes made to the current system I had and making some stuff at least quazai-standable standards of code. But, now it's all done, and thank goodness-- I don't know how I wuld have handled burning the candle at both ends.... or all three ends I guess! If you ever think you could be a work-at-home-mom, DON'T. You can't. Well, you CAN, but you would just be bad at both jobs... and that's no fun. Anyway...

Jonas occasionally asks me to draw pictures for him during bath time. Recently, he has been asking me to draw a "bebe" (baby) in a "bath" with a "mommy bee-side bebe". Easy enough. Sometimes he will attempt to copy, and it's usually pretty cute. A few days ago, though, he asked me to draw him a "ms keisha" and a "ms keisha" beside the first ms. keisha, and a "ne-ed bebe" beside that ms keisha, and a "ta-eeh (towel) fah-ded (folded)" beside the baby. He pitched a gigantic fit because the towel didn't have a hood, though. So I drew a hood and he calmed down... whew!

Brandon and I have gotten really into the olympics this year... especially curling! I suppose it's because we have both had the whole two weeks at home while jonas has been at school. Not that we've not been working tirelessly, butthere's been some kind of olympics on in the background. MAN, I don't know what it is about curling, but we watched it for hours and hours and weren't bored. I totally want to try it now. I hear there's a place in Raleigh... hmmmmm...

Jonas is doing much better in school. He still wakes up and says "no doo!" (no school... why he pronounces it this way is beyond me...) but he's been going fairly happily, and usually wets 0-1 outfits a day, so pretty good. He always talks about hte stuff he does there,,, usually involving some sort of sport. Oh, what will we do if he is good at sports? We are sooo not... oh well, I guess we'll manage!

Jonas is becoming increasingly difficult... yes, the classic "terrible twos". He (naturally) throws fits over just about anything, from insisting he wants to burn his mouth, to always being a ne-ed boy, to "need" ing candy, wanting to be held all the time (or never), changing his mind in a split second, you name it, he's probably pitched a fit over it. He is also a stubborn "i'll PROVE i'm right kind of kid too. I imagine brandon and I were both the same way, i don't know. for example:

A few days ago we had some old milk jugs that we had neglected to throw out. Jonas was playing with them, banging them together to make noice, kicking them and saying "aaaah- doosh!", etc. He decided he wanted to take off the lid at some point. I told him "Let's leave the lid on buddy, it's stinky in there." but no, jonas insists we take the lid off. so I said "Fine, but if you take it off you have to smell it, ok?" "yes!" The lid comes off. He takes a deep whif. Instantly he stiffens and pulls the jug away from his nose, his face goes blank but his eyes are telling-- they're watering at the sides with restraint. Holding back my laughter I asked him if it smelled good. He didn't say anything, but instead just nodded "yes" stiffly. So I said, "do you want to smell it again?" to which he gave an even slower and claculated nod. "Ok, then smell it!" well, he was in his little game now, he had to see it through, and sure enough, he lifted that disgusting thing to his nose and "smelled" it. what he actually did was hold his breath and wiggle his head a little to make him look like he was sniffing. he announced "mmm!" and then sat the jug down and walked away... ah, to be young and stubborn!

The Beginning of Daycare & 2 years old

So, last week I went in for my second interview with market america, and, being told to expect an offer, Brandon and I immediately started paperwork for Jonas's daycare. Little did I know how quickly that would happen. Jonas and I stopped by on Monday to drop off paperwork for him and, when asked when we'd like to start, I jokingly said "what about today?" to which they replied "well, we have all your paperwork, you could start today!

Well jump up high and call me lester-- I left the kid there! I figured I would stay for a while and let him ease into being in class, but he took off and didn't look back to me for a second, so I went ahead and left him. I came back around noon to see how he was doing with sleeping on a mat. It turns out he doesn't do so well. I was watching him through the 1-way lass trying to communicate what he wanted with the teacher... she's sitting by him rubbing his back and soothing him, and he is saying over and over "miss ru-ru, miss dah-dee, mommy pee-up, miss mommy!" Or some combination of those. Translation: he wants rudy, he wants his taggie, he wants his mommy. adorable, but he can't have them, and the teacher doesn't understand what he's saying because taggie sounds exactly like daddy. When I went to get him that afternoon he was sitting on the floor crying. His afternoon didn't go awesome... poor guy, he never is much good without rest!

Day 2 of daycare: Jonas wakes up and begins to repeat "no doo! no doo!" while shaking his head over and over. (this is "no school! no school!"). He cries all the way to school, he cries when I drop him off... miss keisha said it would probably be better to just give him a hug and a kiss and go than dawdle around, so I did. So sad, poor little guy! When I went to get him that afternoon he was once again crying at the top of his lungs, AND he had a busted lip. We found out that in the absence of Taggie, he had decided his heavy winter coat would be an acceptable substitute, and had completely refused to part with it all day. If he couldn't wear it, he drug it around the room with him, slept with it, everything. As he was dragging it around the room, he tripped over it and fell and hit his lip on the table. They requested he please bring his Taggie.

Along with Taggie, day 3 of school went very well... he was happy for most of it (although he still adamantly requested to "no doo!" and cried when we left. On top of it all, he had NO accidents! YAY! He's so big!

Preschool day 4: Jonas wakes up with a fever of 104.2... I have never, NEVER seen him so sick and pitiful. He just wanted to lay and/or be held.... which even sick Jonas's of yore didn't want to do for too long. Luckily, I was more than happy to oblige. I get an appointment at the doctor for him and the child was so sick he didn't even protest being at the doctor. I actually read him a VERY long 45-page poem about some kid that gets really tiny and explores all of the different body systems in his body to find out why he's sick. and he listened to it all... unreal, it was even boring to me! Anyway, at the end of it all, they said they were pretty sure he had strep (even though his test was negative... only 80% accurate apparently).

Well, he made it to the last day of his first week of preschool... which was his 2 year birthday. I was so sure he was going to still be sick, but he woke up Friday morning smiling and happy and still proclaiming "no doo!" as if Thursday had never been. yay!! Lisa came and got him for some of the day, and then we went over and celebrated his birthday with a bit of cake from his birthday party that was supposed to have been that night (canceled-- we thought he'd still be sick).

Ah, I am so glad he was better for his birthday! Annnd I forgot to mention that even though Joe was upset when we picked him up from school, he told us all about how much fun he had as soon as the car door closed! He said he got to bounce balls, and play with crayons, and "chase" (which I think means they played tag??). He said he got to eat a muffin for breakfast too! Well, I'd say it was a sort of rough week for Joe, but it definitley ended on a high note-- yay!

I can't believe my little baby is 2... he's not a baby by any measure anymore! I have had to stop referring to him as such. This has been difficult, but oh well-- whatever helps him feel big. It's still surreal, even after two years to realize I have a son... who is 2 nonetheless. When did I become an adult?? =)

L'"L"L Bit?

So, more Jonas stories. Man, do I ever need to post here every day!

Yesterday Brandon was watching Jonas in the afternoon so I could get some work done. I didn't get any work done, because I was too busy enjoying listening to Jonas's exploits. He asked Brandon if it was Friday, and of course, it was only monday, so Brandon said no. Then the following conversation occured (no, this is not perfectly quoted, and yes, Brandon was perfectly calm and holding back laughter)
j: "mama's house??"
b: "no, it's still not friday".
j: "Go mama's house!"
b: "ok, fine. go ahead and go... bye!"
j: (smiles, runs over to a bag on the floor that he packed several days ago. it contained 5 diapers, a small boucing ball and a pair of pants.) "bak bag!"
b: yeah, you should probably pack a bag. what are you going to put in it?
j: "this!" (jonas begins to putter around looking for things to pack. he settles on his pig pillow).
b: ok, it's time for you to go, bye bye!
j: (gets distracted and starts talking about all the things he's going to do at grandma's house). see Lilly! see ke-en (kerin) see Max! see gima (he now says' the g in grandma)! see deuce! ...no see fish! (he shruggs, bends over and looks around, pantomiming looking for a fish) "where fish? no fish!"
b: (laughing hysterically but silently) yeah, no fish, the fish is dead, huh?
j: (unabashed, continues to rant about what he will do and who he will see) cImb wall! push swing! papa play he-e-o-op-ter! numnumnumnum! Wheeeeee! (he has moved to onomatopoeia in his excitement and is now just running around pantomiming how much fun he is in for).
b: ok, well, you had better get going then... bye bye!
j: (waves) bye! bye daddy! bye Ru-ru! bye ru-ru's house! bye daddy's house! bye baby george bush! (thinks it over... grabs baby eric george bush, starts over...). bye daddy! bye ru-ru! bye ru-ru's house, bye hair brush! bye dash duck (trash truck)! (thinks it over, grabs the trash truck). Bye daddy!
b: bye.. you'd better get going! it's getting dark!
j: (runs to the door... opens it ans stands half in half out) bye house! bye Obi! bye miss darleen! bye ru-ru!
b: i don't think you're really going, you look like you're stalling!
j: huh?
b: you aren't really going are you?
j: daddy. (points to brandon) dive.
b: you want me to drive?
j: (nods and smiles)
b: no, i'm not going to do that. you'll have to get there on your own...
j: (looks downcast, but determined) bye bye daddy!
(he says more bye byes, but i cut them... eventually he got out the door. this was a 20 minute ordeal. Brandon called me in as soon as he left the house).

We watched as jonas continued to babble excitedly and attempt to corral his overnight bag as he walked out to the cars, and decided to take brandon's car. you could hear him saying "daddy's car!". he tries the door... no luck. "KEYS!" he is running back to the house in no time chanting "keys! keys! keys!" and of course, his bag is getting tangled up, so he's struggling there. he gets back inside and asks brandon for the keys. "nope, sorry, i don't think that would be a good idea... you should probably walk." jonas agrees, but starts to seriously stall and eventually the whole thing peters out. regardless, it was pretty amusing for us all!

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The Penis stories:
rudy was sitting on the couch one day and was just a little excited about something. Joe took notice.
"Daddy!!"
"what?"
"RU-RU!"
"what??"
j: "RU-Ru pee-is!"
b: oh, yep, that's Rudy's Penis.
j: "a l-l-l-l bit pee-is?" (a little bit of penis?)
b:(laughing) yep, just a little bit of penis, good talkin' joe.

one night sitting on the couch reading, jonas stopped and pointed at himself and said
"Joe. "
me: "yes, that's Joe!"
j: Joe, pee-is.
b/me: yup, Joe has a penis.
j: (points at brandon) daddy. pee-is.
me/b: yes.
j: (points at rudy) "ru-ru, pee-is."
me/b: yes. rudy has a penis.
j: (points at me) "mommy. Noooo pee-is." (shakes his head and waves his arms).
me/b: nope, mommy doesn't have a penis.
j: HAH! no pee-is! mommy no pee-is!

i could go on... oh, so many more stories, but this will do.

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Jonas has definitely reached the terrible two's age. He is smart. He is crafty and passive aggressive. He has been spanked a lot.

After getting potty trained, he's decided to weaponize this and simply pee his pants as often as possible so that he can remain a "ne-ed boy!" (naked boy). not. Good.

He has refused to obey many times, and therefore has gotten a time out. he has to sit in time out until he is ready to obey. last night, for example, he got a time out jumping on rudy. he sat on the ottoman and then got off. we asked if he was ready to obey. "no." he then proceeded to go sit back on the ottoman for a minute. repeat 3 times. finally, "yes obey." the end.

Obviously, he gets a spanking sometimes. some times are more ridiculous than others. for example, a few days ago brandon asked jonas to help clean up. naturally, he said no, and brandon told him he was not going to grandma's house until he put awa his blocks, brandon would do the rest. now, there were only 3 blocks out. jonas opted to sit in time out until the room was clean (minus the 3 blocks). Brand told jonas he needs to clean them up, or a spanking will result (we use the 1-2-3 and a 3=spanking, so each of these "spankings" was really a count to three and a spanking). jonas refuses. spanking. jonas touches the blocks, walks away. another spanking. jonas throws the blocks towards his room, and stops doing anything. another spanking. jonas moves the blocks to the bathroom. brandon threatens another spanking with the 1 count. jonas moves the blocks to the hall closet. 2 count. jonas finally gets the blocks into his bedroom closet. win. ridiculous.

jonas spent much of yesterday complaining that his foot hurt. did it? no. he fell over and stubbed his toe that morning, was fine, but every time he looked at his foot and was not getting what he wanted he would whine and say "foot hurt! foot hurt! pick up mommy! (or daddy)" **rolls eyes** it took us most of the day to figure out he was faking... pretty slow. that kid!

Potty Training

Last wednesday, Lisa watched Jonas for half a day, and when I arrived to pick him up, he greeted me completely naked and (as usual) half heartedly as he knew this meant he would soon be leaving the beloved "mamas house". Anyway, Lisa said she made a deal with Jonas, that he could be naked, but only if he used the potty, and he agreed. Since he is apparently perfectly capable of regulating his bodily functions, and halfway to potty trained in 4 hours, I decided we should probably let him stay naked the rest of the day, much to his joy.

At the end of day one, Jonas was doing very well. He'd peed in the potty handfulls of times, and only wet one diaper during his nap. Yay! The next morning I got him up, and he asked to be "ne-ed bie!" (naked boy!) again, so sure, why not? Again, no problems, he even pooped in the potty (an enormous turd for such a small kid... is his colon even that big?!) anyway, he was thrilled, i'm thrilled because i've only used 2 diapers in the past 2 days. sweeeet!

So, later that day we went to wal mart. Now, Jonas has been doing awesome at this potty thing, so I decided to not puncture his pride, and let him wear underwear to the store. This was a mistake. I expected to possibly have an accident, so I (naturally) prepared for 2 in a 20 minute period. Accident one: before we got out of the car (a 2 minute drive). He did pretty well in the store. Then "uh oh, pee mommy, pee!" by the fish tanks. great. I prepared extra clothes, forgot about something to clean up with. So I carry my soaking son through the store to the bathroom. we change, we sit on the potty, I grab a gigantic wad of paper towels to head back to the fish to clean up the pee. we start back. we get 20 yards from the bathroom when jonas says he has to pee again... uh oh. we run back... nothing. at this point I rendezvous with brandon and he is unable to take joe as his arms are full of stuff. I decide to head back to the fish. I get there, there is a wal mart associate and several others on the usually empty asile getting fish. awkwarddddd... we decided to just let it go... water on the floor near the fish tanks is no big deal, and (of course) jonas is struggling to get free by now. we make it to the car without incident. by the time I get home, accident #3 has happened, poor guy. I got him out and put him to bed for a nap, and he was naked boy the rest of the day. from this, we gleaned that perhaps he was unaware one needs to control bodily functions when wearing clothes, so we pledged to work on it.

Friday came and went quickly. Lisa got Jonas in the morning, we got some work done, I went to a horseback riding lesson that beat my butt into shape, we went to the Kennedys for dinner, we came home. Jonas' potty training adventure was still going well.

Saturday. We started introducing pants. Oh, and I should mention for when I read this in 10 years, the past few weeks have been the coldest weeks in 25 years in NC. Like, bearly at freezing if that, and since we are poor, we've kept our heat down... so this kid has been happy and naked at 65-70 degrees. way too cold for me. Anyway... pants. It went ok-ish. I thought we should try seeing how he did with underwear for his nap, and I have to say, he didn't wet himself. However, he did do something hilarious and disasterous....

I heard him fussing in his room so I went to see if he needed to pee. I kept the light off to keep him from waking up any more than necessary, but when I put my hand on his bed, there was something sticky on it. "oh, no, he's pooped everywhere!" is my first thought. *flick* the light is on.... no poop. but there is something there. my son is shining like he just ran a marathon, his hair is sticking up like he's at a punk rawk show, his shirt looks wet, his pillow and most of the bed also look wet, so I thought he must have peed... no, that doesnt make sense. Oh, no. He got into the vasoline! Yes, he did. and there were 2 GIANT globs on the handle to the drawer containing the vasoline, where he had returned it (most likely to keep me from noticing, lol!). It was way to funny to be upset. Luckily, Julie was there as well as Brandon, so we all came in and laughed at Jonas, who was by this time crying his eyes out. We got him as clean as we could with him bawling, and I comforted the poor embarrased little guy. I asked him what he needed, and he told me "butt ow". "did you want to put some on your butt to make it feel better?" "Saaas!"(yes!) (he immediately stopped crying to tell me this.) Ok, this makes sense. of course, he got it everywhere BUT his sore butt... poor thing. too funny!

Later that evening, we had girl's only (over 2) night... Julie, Nicole, Dayna (and Jensen) and Obi came and we watched a movie.... then we had fun chatting and trying to figure out what eachother were saying. The boys (Brandon, Danny & Nathan) got back from poker around midnight, and then we all stayed and talked for another hour or so until Brandon and I were too tired to do anything but sleep. As this is mainly a journal about Jonas, I won't bother with many fun details, except that Jonas thought it would be a good idea to show Jensen his butt. He did an about face and exclaimed "BUTT!". Jensen did not look like he cared much for Jojo's butt. odd...

Jonas did ok on sunday.. he peed 5 times for Ellen, craziness! He is doing so well! Today, however, we began the power struggle. As we are tired of "ne-ed bie!", we started to insist on clothes. Jonas protested by having "accidents". I bet we went through 10 pairs of clothes... probably more, actually. As soon as he would pee and we would try to get his pants off in time and on the potty, he would stand up from peeing and say "no pats, mama, ne-ed bie!". We would keep putting more pants on him though, and he finally got angry about this and decided to play in the pee. I then told him he had to get showered off because that was yucky. He was thrilled. Awesome, it backfired again. Or did it? I totally used cold water. He has not peed in his pants since. Win!

Jonas Stories

Well, the past 2 months have been a whirlwind. I feel like I've hardly had time to breathe, but it's been good nonetheless. Among the highligts were Christmas, aquiring new friends that live only 2 doors down (yay De La Cruz!), resolving to start bike riding (thanks to some bikes), finding out Evan's gonna be a big brother, and about 100 hilarous stories scattered throughout. As I have no hope of remembering these stories in the coming years, I will have to record them now. Let's begin.

Between Brandon and Jonas just minutes ago:
Brandon asked me about Wednesday...
Jonas: Wah-Day!
B: wednesday?
j: saaas (how ye says yes when he draws it out.)
b: what comes before wednesday? do you know?
j: {blank stare}
b: tueadsy!
j: {holds up 2 fingers} two wees!
b: what?
j: 2 wees!
b: oh! 2 weeks?
j; {vigorous nods} saas. ("yes")
b: what about two weeks?
j: ni-night!
is that how long the caterpillar sleeps?
j: SAAS! SAAS! {nods vigorously}.
--Apparently he was referencing the very hungry caterpillar... who sleeps for 2 weeks.

he spent the night at "mimi's" house after christmas, during which we put away the christmas tree, rearranged some furniture, assembled some toys, and cleaned up the house. The second he walked in, he started pointing at everything that was different and yelling "NEW!". He was very thorough... NEW TAYS! (toys), NEW TA-AA! (guitar), etc, etc. very clever boy! He even noticed stuff that wasn't his, where we'd just rearranged. Sigh, he's too smart. Smart boy.

Jonas got a roller coaster from grandma. He LOVES it, and when he rides it he says "Wheeeeee! WHEEEE!" just like he's supposed to =)

He now tells dogs what to do. He will say "NO Ru-Ru!" when he gets food he doesn't want Rudy to have. Or he'll say "No yick te-te!" (no lick, cookie!), or "NO DIR RUDY-- geh back! (no sir rudy, get back!); or "Dow!" (down!). It's awesome.

he's so much better at communicating what he wants or thinks, it's just mindblowing that all of the sudden you realize you have a person that can recall things from ages ago, think about them and have an opinion.

Another story. before christmas on my way to cell, jonas started asking if we were going to "mamas house" (grandmas houise, which he asks to go to incessantly). I said no, we're going to cell. "Noooo!" this continues. For some reason I put up with it. he starts naming anywhere but church to go.. papa's house, feetball, dada, mimi, ju-wee, meowww (nicole, who is meow). I finally said, "NO we are going to play with Evan and Chase and Daniel." Now, jonas loves these three people, so I didn't expect this reaction: "NNNNOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! NONONONONONONO!!! NO! NO DASE! NO EVAAA! NOO DEDA! NONONO!!!" this continues until about a minute after daniel played with him. i don't know how daniel got him calm, but i'm super clad he did/can! it was pretty hilarious in retrospect.

He knows about batteries. He walked up to brandon with his dead train and said "Newww ba-ah-eees! new ba-ah-ees! Die!" he got his new batteries. poor dead train!

more to come, I hope!