…now it’s “Mommy”!

Today Connor started to say “Mommy” instead of  “Mamma”.  Victoria laid him down for his nap today and he cried for a couple of minutes.  He soon stopped and then said “Mommy….Mommy”.  So she went to see him and decided to lay down with him in our bed and sleep the rainy afternoon away with her son.

This evening we were heading out the door to go to the store.  Connor and I were heading to the garage to get in the car while Mommy was still in the kitchen getting some water for the ride.  Connor stuck his head around the corner and said “Mommy!  Mommy!”  Mommy soon appeared from the kitchen smiling so proudly.

We think we have heard the following from him lately:

Mimi, Daddy (more like Addy), baby, shoes, more, clock, alarm, light, Goofy

I say “we think we have heard” because we can’t get him to repeat things on command.

Over the past few weeks, Mommy and Daddy have had a break as Grandma and then Mimi/Granpa had Connor spend the night over their respective houses.

From all accounts he had a wonderful time.

When he returned home from Mimi/Grandpa’s house, he fussed quite a bit when they left.  He made such a fuss that I called Grandpa and told him that he left a crying baby at our house.

He also does this when we leave Grandma’s house as well.

He is really getting attached to and loves being with Grandma and Mimi/Grandpa.  What a difference from the days of his separation anxiety!!!!

The doctor recommended that we start to wean Connor off of his pacifier.  So, after he spent the night at Grandpa and Mimi’s we stashed all of his pacifiers in the cabinet out of sight.

The first 4 nights were a little difficult as he did not want to fall asleep without his pacifier.  So, to help him go to sleep we brought him into bed with us until he fell asleep and then moved him back to his crib.

The last 2 nights he has done an exceptional job and has fallen asleep in his crib without his pacifier.

He has asked for it a few times and it just breaks our heart the way he asks for it.  He looks at us with those beautiful blue eyes and then points to his mouth a couple of times.  We simply tell him that we do not have it anymore and then direct is attention to something else.

So far so good…as of right now, it is not nearly as bad as I thought it would be.  Granted he was not one to always have the pacifier in his mouth, but in recent weeks he was definitely becoming more dependent on it.

GREAT JOB  CONNOR!

We had a follow up visit with Connor’s surgeon to see how successful the surgery was.  Unfortunately things have not progressed as we had hoped and he has to have minor surgery (about a 15 minute procedure) to remove some scar tissue that has formed.

Daddy and Mommy were very disappointed and darn right mad at the doctor this afternoon.  She noticed he had some baby powder in his diaper this afternoon and stated that the scar tissue was due to the baby powder being in contact with the area that was “still healing” from surgery.  She stated that she should have told us not to use baby powder.  We were clearing instructed that after his 12 week bathing and ointment treatments he could return to normal activity (ride’em toys, pools, and no ointment).  We were not told to treat the area any differently.

Of course we were not thrilled to hear this at all because we were assuming everything was fine and that he was going to get a “clean bill of health”.  We were so upset that I needed to sit down and I asked Victoria to sit down with me.  We just did not want to hear that he had to have surgery again.  This procedure will NOT be nearly as difficult as the original procedure but it will require that he be “knocked out” so they can operate.  We will have to give him 3 baths a day for 6 weeks BUT there will not be a catheter this time.  Supposedly only 3 stitches this time instead of the 300+ stitches he received last time.

This whole process has made me lose faith in the medical field.  Communication between the surgeon, the nurse, and the pediatrician has been lacking (to say the least) and that left us in the dark.  I called the surgeon soon after we left her office today to tell her that I was irritated about the outcome and the lack on communication.  She listened and helped calm me down by explaining things to me, but I still am furious as I write this posting.  I feel no parent wants to have their child go through a surgery, regardless of how minor, especially when it might have been prevented.  All she had to do was tell us not to use baby powder and we WOULD NOT have used it.  AAAAGGHGHGH!!!!!

The only thing that has calmed us down is the fact that she informed us (prior to surgery) that there is a 1 in 3 chance that a second surgery maybe necessary.  Her rate of second surgeries is about 1 in 10, so we were feeling we had the “best surgeon” for the job and the likelihood of needing a second surgery would be small.  So, that is the only thing that is making us understand and accept the outcome of the first surgery.

Anyways, enough rambling about this…please keep Connor in your thoughts and prayers.  Surgery is scheduled for September 14th.

Connor, Mommy, and Daddy paid a visit to Uncle Danny up in Richmond.  He hadn’t seen Uncle Danny in a while and Connor remembered right away who he was.  Daddy and Uncle Danny worked on his back porch for a couple of hours while Mommy and Connor walked down to the local park.

We all went out to Panera Bread for lunch and that is where Connor had a GREAT time.  (Uncle Danny — send me that video so I can post it online.) For now, I will describe it and hopefully we can get the video online soon…

We are finishing up lunch and Uncle Danny begins to play with Connor from across the table inside Panera Bread.  Uncle Danny raises his arms and makes an “arrrgh” sound as he flexes his muscles.  Connor watches this for a little bit and then kind of throws his arms up and then lets out a shriek as loud as I have ever heard.  Quickly, Mommy, Uncle Danny, and Daddy are all telling Connor to “shhh”.

The best part was that most of this was caught on camera!  Look for that soon.

For now, here are some pics of Connor and his Uncle!

Connor spends a lot of his time doing the following:

• attending the playgroup in Hampton
• listening to story time at Barnes & Noble
• listening to story time at the Newport News Public Library
• spending the night with Grandma and then Mimi/Grandpa
• spending entire Saturdays with Mimi, Grandpa, and Brenna
• visiting Grandma’s house with Daddy
• going to the park with Daddy
• attending gymnastics class on Fridays with Mommy

He has just discovered the TV and seems to only pay attention to it when he gets tired in the evening.  Usually around 8:15 he does the following:

1. takes one of us by the hand and walks us into the kitchen.
2. points at the counter (where his pacifier is) and then makes a gesture about putting it in his mouth.
3. we give it to him.
4. he heads over to the couch and slaps his hand on the cushion a few times.
5. we help him up and then he points at the TV as to say, turn on the cartoons and lets chill.
6. we then sit there for about 10-15 mins watching cartoons.
7. then upstairs we go, brush his teeth and do the nightly routine.
8. off to sleep he goes.

Favorite foods:

1. Ketchup
2. Mustard
3. fudgesicles at Grandma
4. Grilled salmon
5. ice cream/frozen yogurt
6. peas
7. corn
8. pancakes and french toast
9. turkey bacon
10. milk
11. water
12. grapes
13. pepperoni

Connor had his 18 month checkup today.

Here are his “stats”:

21lbs 13oz

31″ tall

Today was the last of his shots until he heads off to school which is good as he was getting a harder to control when they were giving him shots.

We asked the doctor about all sorts of questions and he reassured us that we are doing everything right.  I think he said we “are perfect parents with the perfect son”.  (Or maybe I was daydreaming at the time.)

Anyways he says to be prepared for the talking to increase over the next 4-6 months.  He says the sign language is great and is helping with his development and recommends we continue to do it and continue to verbally say the words as well.

He mentioned we should get him off of his pacifier (oops, I guess we are not “perfect”).

Not sure what happened to the sound…but enjoy the video at least.

Here is Connor giving Daddy a “drive by kiss”…

—————————————–

Bath time:

—————————————–
This one shows our little “Spiderman”.  I think he has learned a little too much at gymnastics class.  😉

Over the past couple of weeks, Connor has learned a few more signs to help him communicate with us better.  Victoria has been great in teaching him this stuff.  I must admit, we fell prey to those books and DVDs that you see in the baby stores and we purchased one or two that claimed your child could be signing by a year old.  We watched them a couple of times but never watched them with Connor.  As most of you parents already know, a lot of that stuff is just not worth it or you learn to adapt your own “training” in your day to day activities.

Well, we have continued to voice and sign certain things to Connor (Victoria has been better than me at it) in the hopes that he may pick a few things up.

And for those of you who do not know Victoria that well, she has a cochelar implant that she received about 10 years ago.  As a child, she went through speech therapy and was “mainstreamed” in schools that hearing students went to.  This has enabled her to develop such a wonderful ability to speak, listen, and read lips.  She uses all of these senses to communicate on a regular basis.  So, she does not communicate via sign language but she does know some sign language.  (I know a little too, but mainly just the simple stuff and the alphabet.)

So, to make a long story short…communicating with Connor (and me) is not primarily done via sign language but will supplement our communication.

The reason we are teaching Connor sign language is that it helps him communicate with us when he is unable to speak.  So, it is merely another for of communication.  For those parents-to-be or parents of babies/toddlers already…here is an interesting article.  And for those that might worry, it does not prevent them from learning to speak and it does not slowdown the process either (according to all the research).

To get back to the title of this posting…

Connor has learned to sign his own version of  “down”.  He actually makes the sign when he wants to get out of his high chair or if something is out of his reach (for example the remote control was on the dresser and out of his reach) he will sign for it to be “down”.

He has learned to say “thank you” (looks more like him blowing a kiss) but he does this in response to saying “thank you”.  He doesn’t quite know what “thank you” means yet…but will sign upon request.

He knows the sign for “more” and signs this when he wants more food, milk, or water.  Usually this is when he wants more of a tasty snack he has finished.

He knows the sign for “sorry”…again, I don’t think he understands why he would sign this but he signs it in response to someone saying “sorry”.

The big one that Victoria taught him without me knowing it and he displayed to Grandpa and Mimi tonight was “baby”.  Mimi says she heard him say baby and then he signed “baby”.

We keep getting those one words out of him but then he doesn’t repeat it when asked to.

For example I think he said “shoes” the other day, “baby” with Mimi tonight, “apple” with Grandma a month or so ago, and I think he said “Brenna” (at least something close to it) when looking at a picture of his cousin Brenna with me the other night.

Anyways, signing is a part of Connor’s development and something that has definitely exploded here in the past few weeks.

Connor and Mommy — keep up the good work!!!!

Connor,

Don’t get me wrong…Grandma, Mimi, and Grandpa have always been pretty technically savy and have been using email and the Internet for a long time.  Heck, Grandma was the one who bought Daddy and Uncle Danny a Commodore 64 back in 1983 and actually wrote a few programs (from reading a book).  And Connor, just so you know the 64 stood for 64K as in 65,536 bytes.  That is all the memory a computer had in 1983.  As I am writing this posting I am using Mommy’s MacBook Pro that has 2GB as in 2,147,483,648 bytes.

Grandma has been slow to adopt the cell phone not because she technically challenged but because she does not like to be that person talking on the phone in a car or in a store.  (Understandable as I don’t like talking on the phone in a store either and I will NOT do it standing in line.)

Grandpa and Mimi (who use the cell phone quite a bit) have been slow to adopt the text and picture messaging of the newer phones.

Well a first for both sides this week and all because of you my little “buddy”.

First Grandpa and Mimi bought new cell phones and figured out how to text and send pictures via text messages as well.  They have taken you out the last couple of Saturdays and send Mommy and Daddy a picture of what you are up to lately (namely dipping french fries in mustard).  First, tell Grandpa it should be dipping french fries and secondly is that organic ketchup and mustard he is feeding you?  (Mommy, might get mad.)

Secondly, Grandma called Daddy today while she was in Target.  Wait, did Grandma move her house phone to Target??!?!?!  Daddy was all confused and Grandma was talking with a softer voice and much quicker than her New Jersey heritage normally allows.  Why was she calling Daddy from Target???  Was something wrong, was the car not working, was she not feeling well??!?!!?  Well, she wanted to see if you already had a toy that she wanted to buy for you.

So, Connor…you are bringing the Grandparents into the future.  When they start blogging and twitter’ing (or is it tweet’ing) then we will really have a problem.

Love,

Daddy