The questions stage

Okay, Colin has now started the "questions stage". Which I really thought wouldn't be that bad. I mean, it would be cool to answer some to the basic questions that really make you think. And it's gotta be better than the "I want, I want, I want" stage!

So the questions have started and I gotta say, it's really driving me nuts. No one told me that the questions would be the same ones, over and over again. And questions are about stuff that I think he already knows! For example, "What is that", pointing to a banana.

Additionally, the "I want" stuff hasn't gone away completely either!

Switch hands

Something that Nathan is doing recently reminded me of what Colin did. I have no time frame of when Colin did this, but I thought it was a lot sooner. Doesn't the first kid always do things a lot sooner when you don't write it down!

Anyway, when dressing Nathan and he has something in his hand, I will put the hand without the toy into the shirt first, then say "switch hands" and he will put the object into the other hand so I can put that hand in the shirt. Nathan's only 12 months and a little bit right now. I've said this before, but it's really amazing what they understand.

The "that's better" button

I'm not sure when I realized this, but a while back (maybe 2-3 months ago after we moved to the new house), I was watching Colin play with the radio. Colin would push the volume up button and say "loud" and then push the volume down button and say "that's better". It was then that I realized that he thought the volume down button was called "that's better". He was just reiterating what I would say everytime the volume was too loud and he would turn it down, ... "that's better"!

Colin's airplane sign

A couple posts ago, I was talking about Nathan doing sign language. Well, it reminded me of something that Colin did when he was only 1 1/2 years old.

We were in Omaha and Bob was working on his laptop with Colin. Colin saw the Delta logo (being in Atlanta we fly almost exclusively Delta), and Colin did the sign for "airplane"! It's really amazing what kids associate even at a young age.

Nathan's standing!!

Today I was in the kitchen and Nathan was in the playroom playing with the garbage truck. This truck plays music to the tune of the "Lone Ranger" and says "To the dump, to the dump, to the dump, dump, dump". It's really cute. Anyway, Nathan's playing with this toy and stands up, unassisted, all by himself, and starts dancing to the music!! I was hooting and hollering for him, "Yeahhhh Nathan!" I mean, he was bending his knees and swinging his arms for a long time (like 15 seconds maybe).

Bob said that he saw Nathan standing unassisted for a good length of time a couple of days ago, but this was the first time that I saw it!

New signs & the gundy bear

Nathan has picked up two new signs, cat and sleep. The cat sign is his all time favorite, every time he sees one of our cats, he just goes nuts! Unfortunately he seems to have forgotton the other signs, so gotta work on reminding him about those.

So just yesterday, Nathan found this big stuffed Gundy bear in Colin's room, and laid his head down on it. Then he looked up at me and signed "sleep". Nathan just woke up from a nap, so I'm sure he wasn't saying that he wanted to go to sleep. I think that he was saying that he wants to sleep with this big soft bear! So last night I put the big Gundy bear in his crib with him.

C.O.L.I.N.

During the winter break from Colin's school, Colin was finally able to get together with some of his old playgroup friends. We met at Leslie's house, and Donna was there with Aiden and Gracie. Charlene was also there with Alex, but they had to leave early. Anyway, the moms were sitting around, and Donna was telling us how Aiden was learning how to spell his name. Aiden, being a typical 3 year old was not cooperating in showing off his new skills (we sometimes forget that kids are not trick dogs and don't perform when you want them too!) Colin came in the room, and I was curious if Colin could spell his name. I've never asked him before, but I knew that we spell it a lot with him. Much to my surprise, Colin says "C .. O .. L .. I .. N". I was amazed and also felt bad. It was not my intention to try and out do one of the moms. I'm sorry Donna!

Where Colin sleeps

As mentioned in the previous blog, Colin sleeps where ever he wants, as long as it's in his room. When he first moved him from the crib to a bed, he slept in the big boy bed really good. And as I recall the first time he slept in a strange area was the night before we moved to the new house. His room was all packed except for the bare essentials, like some books, his bed, some clothes and some toys. Later that night, Bob peeked in to check on him and he was not in his bed and not on the floor of room. Lo and behold, Colin went to sleep on the floor of his empty closet. Colin also managed to pull the closet door shut most of the way! A little unnerving walking into Colin's room, and he isn't anywhere in immediate view.

So once we moved to the new house, he really started sleeping in all sorts of new places, like the boppy, the small bean bag, and in his sleeping bag. Then for his 3rd birthday, Grandma & Grandpa GG (my folks) gave Colin this massive tent structure. It's 1 huge tent, 2 smaller tents, and 2 tunnels that you can use to connect the tents. So for about 2 months, Colin's new favorite place to go to sleep was the various tents! Sometimes it was the big one, and sometimes the smaller tents.

I'm okay with him sleeping wherever ... in his room. As long as he sleeps and doesn't sleep in our room!

Sleeping like an angel

Another flashback ... when Colin was little, every night before going to bed, Bob and I would check up on him as he slept. It was just the sweetest thing to see him sleeping in the crib like an angel. We did this a long time, like every night since he was 4 months old (and finally sleeping in his crib) til 1.5 years or so. There was only once that we regretted doing it, when we had a little bit to drink and was a little too noisy going into his room. He woke up (grumpy) and it took 2 hours to get him back to sleep!

Well, Nathan is such a light sleeper that we do not do this routine at all! It's impossible! Just last night I wanted to see the boys, so I peeked in at Colin, did the "ahh" at seeing him sleeping on the boppy (he doesn't always sleep in his bed -- which should be another post all together!). Then opened Nathan's door, crept into his room to get a better look at his face, and then *boingg*, up pops his head! He sits up, I do the fast silent retreat without making eye contact. If you make eye contact, it's all over! Boy, I wish we could check up on Nathan every night like we did Colin. I really miss it!

Psychic link?

Flashback ... When Nathan was first born and sleeping in our room, we noticed that sometimes after Nathan woke up in the middle of the night, we'd hear Colin stirring. It was like there was a connection between the two boys. There was no way that Colin could hear Nathan, Colin was all the way upstairs (in the house in Roswell), and our bedroom was downstairs. And Colin sleeps very soundly. It was really eerie because it happened fairly often.

Two nights ago, it happened again. Colin woke up at 3am and came into our room. Soon after Nathan started stirring. Well, maybe this time wasn't so eerie because Nathan does not sleep very well and all three bedrooms are on the same floor now in the new house.

"Probably" & "actually"

When we went for Colin's 3 year doctor's appointment, one of the questions was "Does he say over 250 words?" Well gee, I've never really counted (even at the beginning), but he uses the words "probably" and "actually". Most of the time, he even uses the words correctly too!

Big guy/ little guy

The other day Colin pinched his finger or fell down (I don't exactly remember), and I went to comfort him. Afterward he reminded me that when he was crying (for whatever reason), that I called him "my little guy". Well, he informed me that he was the "big guy" and Nathan was the "little guy". I guess I will try not to make that mistake again!

"...and mom just started talking!"

I wanted to remind myself of a saying that we had here in the Sandage household. Back when Colin was just 2 and starting to talk, Colin would say the darnest things and then Bob would remind me ... "and you weren't even talking yet!". I have to admit that didn't talk until I was 3!

So now that Colin is 3, the saying has progessed to "... and you/Mom just started talking!" It's a little depressing for me. However, I have no complaints as to what I've accomplished, so if Colin is that much ahead of me, than look out world!

Talking southern

Bob and I have always been concerned about our kids having a southern accent. No offense to southerners but we are both from the Midwest (Nebraska), and I would really like my kids to sound like me. Soon after Colin started school, Bob noticed that Colin would say some one syllable words with two syllables. Like the word 'there' would be 'ther-air'. So we will remind Colin how to pronouce the word correctly ... umm I mean like us!

Recently I was talking to an Atlanta native, and she did not sound like she grew up here. She said that when she was about 13 and heard a video of her talking, she thought that she sounded pretty stupid (her words, not mine). So that day forward she made a consciense effort to not talk with a southern accent. There's hope after all. Get out the video recorder!!

Whistling

Nathan seems to be trying to whistle. It's so cute, he puckers up his lips and blows and blows. Every once and a while some sound comes out. It's actually a better whistle than I can do when he does get some sound out. Although I really don't do it the right way (according to Bob, who is an expert whistler). So my question is ... is he going to whistle before he talks??

**Jan 17, 2007 Additional note. Of course, as soon as I blog about something cute that Nathan does, he stops doing it. I don't think I have seen him try to whistle since I blogged about him whistling. Must have been a stage his was going through!

Baby sign language

Nathan is just shy of his one-year birthday and we think he is doing two signs!! He has been doing "milk" for a while, kinda sporadically though. And yesterday, at lunch Bob thought he saw Nathan do "all done". Then again today at lunch, I had the same thing happen to me! Nathan did the "all done" sign. I really think it's clicking for the little guy! Hopefully in the next couple of weeks, we see him pickup even more signs.

This makes me so excited. I was really worried that Colin would have the sign language experience, (Colin did about 14 signs before he started talking), and we would get lazy and not provide the same experience for Nathan. Here is the list of signs that Colin did (just so it is recorded!):
*milk
*more
*cheese
*wait
*all done
*help
*car
*airplane
*book
*bird
*baby
*water
*Dat Dog (his lovey)
*please

Nathan's birthday party

Well, Nathan turns one next week, but over Christmas while we were in Omaha where the grandmas and grandpas live, we had a big early birthday party for Nathan. Nathan did the obligatory smash cake routine for everyone where he got frosting and cake everywhere. So I figured the easiest way to clean him up would be in the sink. So in the sink he goes, I take off his shirt and pants and start cleaning his hands and face. Next thing I hear is Colin saying "I'm next!" and I look down at my 3-year old taking off all of his clothes! There are tons of people around, and he just doesn't care. So after Nathan is clean, I pick up Colin ... don't want to favor one boy over the other ... and put Colin on the edge of the sink. Then Colin says "I'm peeing in the sink!" I look down and sure enough, he is. I look over and my aunt has the camera taking a picture. Great now it's officially recorded.

Historical stuff

On the refridgerator I have a list of "Colin-isms", i.e. funny things that Colin has done or said that I want to remember. Being that the refridgerator is not the most permanent place to save things to remember, I will record them here.

First the summer before Nathan was born in 2006, Colin was 1 1/2 years old and just starting to talk. One of the things that he liked to say was "Go, go, go" Going through a pink light on the way to the ER when Colin was sick, "Go, go, go". In California with our mother's helper, Ali he added to it, "Go, go, go, go, go" whenever we were going to go somewhere.

After Nathan was born, Colin tried to breast feed his lovey, Dat Dog, for a couple of days. Obviously I was breast feeding Nathan. And then one day he lifts up his shirt and says "too small". I guess Dat Dog wasn't going to breast feed after all.

Some of the things that Colin has said (and the translation after):

"I can't like it" = I don't like it
"strapped out" = unstrapped
"Homaha" = Omaha
"dirty room" = mud room
"soup case" = suitcase
"Bummer" = Hummer (the car)
"spit out" = "spit up" (Nathan did this a lot when he was a baby)

Well, that's all that's on the refridgerator. Now I can start recording things on a as they occur basis.