Allergic

From Nicole:

"Well, as we approach R's first birthday, I was feeling more and more pressure to ensure that she was eating all the foods that she is suppose to be eating.

"Unfortunately, we have had some set-backs. About a month ago, I realized that a lot of her little symptoms - acidic bowel movements, congestion, black circles around the eyes - may have all been related and potentially due to food allergies.

"I'm sad to report that I was right. Random went to the doctor on Wednesday and of the 16 things that they tested for, she is allergic to most with the most severe being peaches and eggs. Fortunately, her allergies aren't severe but definitely something to keep an eye out for in case you're with her."

Confidence

So we have had a Painter here the past couple of days. His name is Phill and he and Gamble would talk frequently while he was here. Anyway, Gamble had thought his name was something other than Phill. He called him Vill or Pill. Nicole corrected him to tell him that the name was Phill, he responded with, "Oh! Phill with an 'F'... Got it!"

Score one for confidence!

Halloween

Gamble and Mommie were driving in the car the other day when Gamble piped that he had his costume picked out for Halloween.

Surprised and excited (because she put a lot of effort into Halloween costumes), Nicole asked him what he wanted to be.

"I want to be a Brutha."

Mommie thought, "Hmmm. Where do I go with this one?" Out loud, she offered, "A brutha, huh?"

"Yeah, Mommie, I want to be a Mario brutha."

Silly Mommie thinks, "Oh, well, of *course*." To Gamble, "Which one?"

"I want to be Mario because he flips over and bounces."

That, and Luigi doesn't have the same screen presence...

Printing Receipts

Random is such a different baby than Gamble was. Everything about her - the way that she plays, her demeanor, her curiousity - is different.

Gamble wasn't very curious as a baby, and he didn't play with toys the way we assumed "normal" babies played with them. He didn't get into things he was supposed to stay out of, and he didn't try to, say, put those yummy ends of the mop strings in his mouth. He also didn't play with the really small baby toys. He bypassed them and headed right to the more advanced stuff. I was always kind of disappointed, like we were cheated out of watching him learn.

Random, however, does play with baby toys, and seems fascinated with them. This is fascinating to me. Combine that with her natural happiness, and she's a joy.

But the getting into things she's not supposed to? Well, she's keeping us on our toes.

For example, yesterday Nicole walked into her bedroom after letting her play in her crib for a while. Nic found most of Random's dirty laundry (that she could reach) in her crib! She'd reached out into her hamper, which was pretty full, and started rescuing her clothes. The other day, Nicole found in her playing in the garbage can that normally resides in Random's room, but was in the hallway. We put the garbage can in the hallway when it has dirty stinky diapers in it. And little girl was curious about dirty diapers.

Just yesterday, I came home from work to find Nic slaving away in the kitchen with Random sitting in her high chair. In her concentration, Nicole hadn't noticed that Random had leaned out of her high chair to grab a bunch of Wendy's coupons. She had one pretty chewed up.

"Honey!" Nic exclaimed. "Sweep her mouth and get that paper out of there."

"Whoops! Sorry. She swallowed it. At this point you're more likely to see a receipt out of her!"

Defeat

Having divested my son of many of his cute sayings, I finally decided to let him keep them as long as they stick around. Not all of them, probably, but certainly a few.

Like now. He's so into video games that he's always talking about defeating bad guys, but most of the time, that's not what he says.

"I'm going to make him defeat."

I can't bring myself to break him of this one. He sounds like a bad Japanese translation, and on him, it's cute. Whether he's pretending he's Sonic talking about defeating "Eggman Nega" from Sonic Rush, or whether he's yelling, "Get ready to be schooled!" Or even "Daddie, want to watch me do a boss fight?" he's having some kind of internal battle.

Of course, he talks all the time still, but now someone else is learning to do the same. Miss Random is now chattering and squealing all the time. Lots of strings of babble, mostly, but we're getting Dadadadada and Mom-mum-mum-mum all the time.

In fact, one of her recent patterns is that she'll say Ma-mum-mum-mum Ba-ba-ba-ba. You have 10 minutes to get her a bottle before she goes thermonuclear, and she occasionally does just that. She had a fit the other night and started slapping and kicking at Nicole for no great reason other than she wasn't happy about going to bed or somesuch.

I just want to know, when they finally start talking to each other, who will get made defeat?

Bump

Gamble's working on being strong. But that's not how he says it.

He says he wants bumps on his arms. Meaning biceps.

I asked him to help carry the baggage in from the car this evening, and he said, "Oh, of course, Daddie! This will help me get bumps on my arms."

Next stop, dumbbells.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, everyone!

Well, Gamble and I are home. We left a little earlier than Mommie and Random, and we got out in front of a little more snow than they did, so they're stuck, bored and missing us, in a hotel room off the interstate in Indiana. It was almost whiteout conditions when we went through, and by the time Mommie pulled off, it was really bad out.

So we have a little while to make the house a little more livable for Mommie and to get a few chores done that maybe I forgot to do before I left.

We wanted to thank everyone who made time to see us while we were out. It was probably our longest time in Ohio since we lived there, and it really helped us see so many people that we don't ordinarily get to spend time with!

Cheers, and Happy New Year!