aug052008

Originally uploaded by eropel.

This is Alex after learning how to open and shut the back door a few weeks ago.

He was opening the door quickly, trying to surprise me. Caught him with the new camera.

As you can see, this was before the big hair cut when he still had wild baby hair.

Actually, Alex is obssesed with music.

No that’s not right, he is obsessed with the band Weezer.

If Alex hears a song he enjoys, he will stop whatever he is doing and get lost in the music.  He will sway, rock back and forth or tap his feet and do a little dance.  He actually keeps time well, not bad for a 22 month old.

Alex enjoys the band Weezer more than anything.  When he hears the song Pork and Beans he will forget that anything else around him exists.  It’s entertaining and a little scary at the same time.

While nothing compares to his enjoyment of Weezer, he has a few other favorite bands right now including Arcade Fire, The Polyphonic Spree, Heart, Radiohead, a few Beatles songs and… MC Hammer. “Can’t Touch This”always gets him laughing.

Back to the Weezer thing.  I will usually play Pork and Beans for him a few times in a row because he enjoys it so much.  When I finally stop playing it, we go through a short round of crying and he gets pretty upset about it and the only thing that will calm him is an Otter Pop.

I’m not sure what kind of odd behavior pattern I am inducing by doing this.  Music off > Crying > Otter Pop.

Alex also enjoys regular kid music.  I have a bedtime CD that I’ve created with various songs from shows that he enjoys on Sprout and Noggin.  I also have the Baby Rock covers Radiohead songs on his bedtime CD and he loves the Radiohead stuff.  I close out his bedtime CD with What A Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong.    Quite the mix but it works.

He can understand most of the things we are saying in the house, but he wont say words to ask or describe what he wants.  He resorts to pointing or making noises to illustrate his needs.

Simple things like up and down are just not clicking with him.  He still resorts to his standard words like “light”, “No more”, and “dad” which is generic for either myself or Toni.

We are really worried about it, he has been a little behind the curve on most of his development and we don’t feel like there is anything wrong.  I just wish I could talk to him and understand him better.

I guess these things take time, and while I’ve learned to be patient with him I guess there is still room for me to learn a little more.

Potty training is in a dead zone right now.  He really shows no interest in using his potty and we have not pushed the issue.   He is coming up on 2 years old in October so it’s time we really start showing him what needs to be done and how to get there.

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I currently feel like I am at a crossroad right now.  Maybe it’s just the mid life crisi thing creeping up on me as I edge towards 40.  I’m not sure if I am happy with my career right now and want to find the right “fit” so I can finish my career in one place, doing something I enjoy.

I currently work a job that requires 24/7 on call every couple of weeks and it is starting to drain me.  When I accpted the job I honestly thought I would be able to handle it, I’ve done it before, but this just feels different.  Maybe the job wasn’t a good fit?

It’s difficult to explain.

I just don’t like the way it takes time away from Toni and the boys.

haircutday2

Originally uploaded by eropel.

Alex finally got his first hair cut. It took almost two years but he’s now a clean cut young man.

Alex was perfect, sat still for Toni the entire time she cut his hair.

While I was gone Toni left the back door open most of the day so the dogs could run in and out as they please.  I arrived home from my appointment around 2:15pm to find a turtle shell in the back room.  I thought it was something Toni bought for the dogs to chew on or something… then I took a closer look.

It was a real turtle.

The turtle was roughly 5 or 6 inches long and was pulled back into his shell.  The dogs found him in the back yard and decided to “play” with him, chewing on the shell and keeping him as their “pet”.

I picked the turtle up and inspected him.  No damage to limbs or head, and the under side was ok.  The damage was just to the top of his shell where the dogs had tried to chew.

I asked Toni why there was a turtle in the house and she flipped. :)  She was freaking out and wondering where it had come from.   We were both pretty concerned for his health as he’d spent some time being gnawed on by Comet and Niko, and niether of us have turtle experience.

We called the Pierce County Humane society and they advised us to look up a rescue group that would take the turtle or read up on turtle care if we decided to keep it.

No way we were keeping it, then Toni had an idea.  She wondered if it belonged to someone living in one of the homes around us.  After a few calls it turns out the turtle belonged to a friend of Travis that lives two homes down from us.

The turtle happend to be a “Russian Tortoise“, one of two that escaped two days earlier.  The owners found the other turtle but had been looking for “ours” ever since.   It was a somewhat happy reunionn witht he owner until she saw the chew marks.  She seemed upset with us, but the reality is that it wandered into our yard and the dogs were just doing what their instinct tells them to do.

Toni is going to pay the owners a visit today to see if the turtle is ok.

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Here is Alex running after Comet in the back yard. Comet is our pit bull mix and Alexanders guardian and protector.

Comet is the “nanny dog” and is wonderful, patient and tender with Alex.

Still trying to find my way around the new camera, but am happy with the results so far.

More photos are available on my main Flikr page.

I wake up at 5am, he wakes up at 5:30 just after I am out of the shower.  From that point until I walk out the door we are quite the morning tandem, kind of like a warped super hero and his mini sidekick.

A few months ago I started “classic shaving” with a safety razor using old fashioned shaving cream with a mug and brush.  The best shaving experience of my life and I wish I had started earlier.  Alex enjoys the routine that goes along with this and is eager to help.

I am currently using a lemon-lime shaving cream that Alex goes crazy over.  The minute I grab the tub of cream he let’s out a shriek of glee.  He likes to hold it and smell the container and will do this for several minutes.   He also enjoys watching me make the lather with the brush, and even wants a dab of it on his hand or cheek.

After that we move on to the tooth brushing phase of our morning and like a good sidekick, Alex is at the ready.  I grab the tooth brush and he grabs the toothpaste, enjoying his turn at applying it to my tooth brush.  As you can imagine, it usually ends up all over both of us.

When I am ready to get dressed for the day, Alex is right there with my shoes and socks.   He runs into the bedroom and grabs them for me with a big smile and a little scream while running out of the bedroom.  His willingness to help is awesome.

Alex likes to help out whenever he can.  It’s an amazing thing to watch him force his way into helping and I hope it continues as he gets older but that is probably wishful thinking.

One of the things I have tried to do more of is getting down to his level while showing him something or talking to him.  It’s one thing to stand up and try to talk to him while towering above him, and a whole new experience when I crouch down to his level.  His reactions are like night and day.  As we get older and colder, I think we sometimes forget what it was like to be small and not have things on our level.  His entire world is what he can reach while standing on his tip toes, so bringing the “big boy” world to him is important.

At 21 months, Alex is more like a little boy than my “toddler” or “baby”.  It is hard letting go of the baby stage because I’ve enjoyed that more than I ever thought possible, but I look forward to what lies ahead.

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Wild baby running lose in the back yard. He was running from me while I tried to take his photo. Caught him at the right moment, was a lucky shot.

I have a couple of Linksys routers and they support both B and G wireless modes, and the default settings allow both modes to be used.

My PSP network setup would find my home network, allow me to get as far as entering the network config including password, but would fail to connect EVERY SINGLE TIME I tried to test the connection.  An amazingly frustrating experience for a new PSP owner.

I tried opening ports on my router, disbaled the firewall and more and nothing worked.

Here is how I fixed my PSP wireless connection problem.  Finally as a last straw I disbaled the G mode on my router, setting it to B only.  I went throught the network setup on the PSP again and this time it passed the test.

It appears the PSP doesn’t like any wireless environment with G mode enabled.   Hope this helps anyone else that runs into the same problem because I couldn’t find information on this anywhere online.

Spent Friday night at the Rainiers with Travis, just the two of us.  Had a great time!  We didn’t get any foul balls even though Travis had his mit.  We usually have at least one foul ball enter our area each game but wouldn’t you know it, the time we have a mit with us none of the foul balls come our way.

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Alex is 21 months old (well 21 and a half) and he is 100% boy.  He has figured out how to make himself fart and is using this new found skill to entertain and disgust the family.  Toni blames me, and she probably should.  What can I say, I think it’s funny.  I guess it wont be so funny then he pulls this trick in line at the grocery store.

Alex picked up another trick all on his own.  When I ask him “Where is poopers peepers?” he smacks the front of his diaper.  I did not teach him that one, he just started doing it.  I assume he picked it up from our potty time books.   Still trying to get him started on potty training but it’s a slow go.  He is going to be a late bloomer.

We have a new nightly routine where I take him upstairs with me when I get ready for bed.  I put him in the jumpy while I take a shower, then we head off to the “big bed” and watch TV and play games until he gets tired enough to fall asleep.  It’s good bonding time.

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Mom turned 60 yesterday and we spent the day at the Mariners game.  Thankfully, the Mariners pulled out a rare win and a good time was had by all.  Saturday we surprised mom with a party at the Harmon Hub in down town Tacoma.  The place was empty and the food was great.

Toni had what she considers some of the best fish n chips ever while the boys rolled through plates of smoked salmon.  I had a custom created pizza that was probably the best tasting pizza the Tacoma area has to offer.  Seriously, I have no idea why this place was not packed.   Great food, great drinks and excellent service.  The only knock is the lack of parking in the area.

We are teasing mom that she can qualify for the senior discounts now… she is not amused.  I have no room to talk, I’ll be hitting the big 40 this year and I am told it’s all down hill from there.