Relay for Life

Just a quick reminder that the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life is happening in my community one week from today. We're gearing up for our fundraisers that we'll be doing at the event. Each team has a book theme this year. I have joined a team called Team Hogwarts (Harry Potter). We'll be camping out all night. Hopefully the boys will let me sleep the next day. If you'd like to make a donation to this worthy cause, please visit my Relay for Life page. Thank you!

In other news, Bob is traveling home tonight. He's been gone for a few days. But we've been spoiled since we had him home for a while. He's traveling a couple days next week, too. We talk to him on the phone before Glenn goes to school and again in the evening. Although, Glenn doesn't always want to talk to him, but does get excited every time the phone rings.

Alexander was standing while holding onto one of the gates today. He realized he could stand on one foot. He was laughing hilariously and would pivot a little. Too bad I didn't get the video camera out quick enough.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Post nap hair:

Early Morning

So, what am I supposed to do when I'm up for the day at 4:30 am? Blog, I guess. Alexander has been sleeping through the night, however he usually gets up between 4:30 and 5:30. I feed him and then usually he goes back to sleep. However, yesterday he woke up at 5:30 and today at 4:30 and couldn't go back to sleep.

Alexander has found a new talent- snorting instead of laughing. It's so funny. He concentrates so hard when he wants to do it over and over.

Here are some pictures:

Watching "Letter Wheel" (Wheel of Fortune) just before bed:


Cutie baby in pjs that are too small (can't snap all the snaps):


Alexander had a hard week last week trying to fall asleep for his nap. We discovered that he has 3 molars coming in all at once and they look horribly painful. Bob gave him some teething gel to help numb the gums and he went asleep almost instantly. You can seen his reaction to the latex in his socks from 2 weeks ago around his left ankle. It's taking a long time to go away:


Maybe blueberries weren't such a good idea...:


Strong teeth:

I've been working on editing videos the past couple days. They are from March through last weekend. There are more of Alexander than Glenn because Alexander is learning things so quickly.

Here's Glenn when we got home from school on St. Patrick's Day:


Here's Alexander from mid March through early May learning to walk using his push toy. Notice he crawls through the exersaucer. I had put it there to keep him from going down the hallway. We didn't put a gate there because Glenn still needs to be able to get around the house. There's also a clip with him outside. I put him in the exersaucer outside when Glenn's riding his bike out front. We had the bubble machine going. Alexander didn't quite know what to make of it.


Here's more of Alexander walking with his push toy on Sunday. I tried to get him to stand for a while and get it on video, but what you see is the longest we got on video. He was too busy doing other things.:


I've been doing a little bit of sign language with Alexander. He finally did his first sign this past week. It's a combination of "more" and "eat". But he only uses it when he wants more puffs (like cereal). He's so cute. The other day, we were grocery shopping, and he started signing he wanted more puffs. Of course I couldn't give him any since we were in the grocery store. But he had the biggest smile on his face.

Alexander has been standing for up to 5 seconds. I think he realizes he's actually standing by himself now. Whereas before, he would stand for a couple seconds if he was near something, but I don't think he knew he was standing unsupported. So, I'll bet that before his birthday, he'll be walking. He also likes to hold on to his push toy and walk with it. As someone else put it, it looks like he's walking with a walker because he'll push it then take a few steps and pushing again. Although, sometimes he will walk while pushing it. He still does not want to walk if we're holding his hands. He looks too little to be walking. Glenn was a late walker (16 months old), so it seems strange to think that this little baby might be walking soon. He is also becoming a climber. He can climb into one of Glenn's little chairs and has been trying to climb on the leggo table (it's a little to high, but he's getting close).

Alexander has had a red ring around his leg from his socks for a week. This happened before and the ring lasted 2 weeks. Since the socks are from when Glenn was a baby, the elastic could be touching his skin a bit. I talked with the pediatrician's office today. They said that there is probably latex in the elastic and that we could check the packaging at the store. But the socks are so old, I don't know if they make them the same anymore. But she said that if we think he might have a latex allergy, then we should just assume he does. So, whenever he gets medical care, we have to let them know he has a latex allergy.

Glenn is sporting a watch these days. It's a potty watch that sets off an alarm and vibrates at set intervals to remind him to go to the potty. It worked really well the first day, but since then, he tends to put it behind his back when it's going off so others around him won't know it's going off. Of course we can hear it and send him off to the potty. He's been doing a lot better, staying dry between times that we send him, but he just won't go on his own. It's been frustrating. But the doctors told me that he'll just get it one day. He's already staying dry through the night. And actually 2 nights ago, he got up and went by himself. I went to wake him up in the morning and he didn't have a diaper on since he had taken it off in the middle of the night. That's progress.

We have been saving on diapers, though. He uses reusable pull-ups at school or when we go out and is in underwear at home. So, he only wears diapers at night, which I'm tempted to stop since he's doing so well at night. Alexander is in cloth diapers except when we go away on vacation somewhere or are going to be gone all day. It's nice not having to buy diapers all the time- they are expensive. And I just sold Alexander's old cloth diapers for more than half the price of what I bought them for. Now he's in a size that he should be able to wear until he's potty trained. It's also nice to know that we're not adding mountains of diapers to the landfill.