One Cute Boy

I got this craft idea from my friend, Amy. The kids can "paint" with water on construction paper. Paxton loved it. And I'm glad it was just water, because he was very interested in splashing it around in the cup with the paintbrushes. Probably doing this craft on the living room carpet wasn't the smartest idea, but water dries quickly on 100 degree days, even inside.



We still go to the pool several days a week. For the first time in my life, I'm devout about putting sunscreen on--but mostly on my boy. He has yet to get a sunburn. His skin is still flawless. He even likes to rub the face cream on himself. He is still fearless in the water. He impresses the other pool guests with his brave 1-2-3 jump into the water. He shuns all rafts, and is aching to escape our arms and swim across the water all by himself. We do our best to entertain him, hoisting him into the air, helping him chase toys around the pool, and spinning him around. But his quest for independence gets the better of him sometimes.

I forget most days, but I'm supposed to be brushing Paxton's teeth at least before he goes to bed. For a while, I was good at remembering. He would even remind me. But in the disarray of houseguests, it has slipped my mind lately. Sometimes when Paxton has a hairbrush in his hand, he "brushes his teeth" with it. I'm wondering if he was attempting to comb his teeth this day. Possibly he was just being silly, hyped up on cupcake and a lack of sleep.

Paxton loves his books. He has several favorites now. The Push and Pop Transportation Book is an all-time favorite. This one from Amy is a puzzle book about vehicles, and he could listen to us read it to him all day. When he's feeling nostalgic, he likes to break out his Sesame Street Counting Book, a favorite from days gone by (a month or so ago). We're currently participating in the reading challenge from two of our local libraries. We keep track of the books I read to him and he gets prizes for completing a certain amount of books or time spent listening. I've really come to love children's books. They are an art form all their own. Some of them are so clever and original.

My sweet boy. Every single day I am blown away by his sweetness, his intelligence, his huge personality. We are so blessed to have friends and family who love him as much as we do. Life is bigger and better with him in it.

My Name is Paxton. I Like to Eat.

For a child who was horrified and offended by the very notion of his first birthday cake, he sure has come around. When we went to Autumn's baby shower two weeks ago, someone made an announcement that they would be serving cake. Paxton tore off to the back of the room, shouting "CAKE! CAKE! CAKE!". A woman was standing in the kitchen and he said, "MOVE! CAKE!". When he saw where the line formed to get some cake, he stood as patiently as he could, jumping a little in place while chanting "cake cake cake cake cake". I made cupcakes for our guests this weekend and he relished the opportunity to dig in. Here he is post-cupcake one evening. He's not shy about his love for icing.



And here he is after enjoying a cupcake at Tony and Mary's house.

And during the aforementioned cupcake enjoyment.

He also enjoys sitting in the chair that is just his size and having a snack. While he once loved Goldfish, he now knows about the bliss that is Animal Crackers, and snubs Goldfish that are offered to him. Here was a rare moment when he decided to indulge in a fish or two on the deck.

Thankfully, he isn't led strictly by junk food. On this night, I steamed some cauliflower, broccoli and carrots to go along with the rest of his dinner. After twisting his arm a bit, he tried a few bites and decided that carrots were the best thing to happen to him since the discovery of cookies. He couldn't get enough. By the end of dinner, he was covered from head to toe with vegetable remnants.

Friends and Family

We've been blessed enough in the last month or two to have lots of visits with family and friends. Above, Paxton and Chris visit with Chris' mom, Isabel. Paxton calls her "Ya-Ya" and although he only sees her a few times a year, it definitely doesn't take long for him to warm up to her. She's like a kid herself, and Paxton loves that. She taught him all sorts of silly things during this visit. Paxton now reaches out to our noses and says, "honk, honk!". He can act like an ape, or put his hands together to say "amen" all after three short days with his Ya-Ya. The nice thing about having her here was that Paxton got all the focused attention he knows he so richly deserves. I no longer can drive any distance with Paxton without constantly interacting with him. He gets bored and, thus, crabby. Like his mommy, he turns to food for comfort, begging me to give him "more? mooooore? mooooooooooore" cookies. When I draw the line, he screams bloody murder. Gone are the days of enjoying an interesting book on cd on my drives while he snoozes. Now I have to turn off the cd and sing songs from his Music Together class, or quiz him on his ASL. I am a woman who needs to frequently zone out recharge. That's why television is a much-anticipated evening treat, as is reading a good book before bed, or even just washing dishes. Isabel is "on" from the moment she wakes up to the moment she goes to bed. She and Paxton are a great match.

While Bob and Isabel, and Chris' brothers, Craig and Keith, were here, we drove to Leander to visit some more family. Isabel's sister, Mary, has a son (Tony) who lives there. He is married to a lovely girl, Mary (yes, another Mary), and they have three gorgeous kiddos, Courtney, McKenna and Luke. The drive was long, but it was worth it to visit with everyone. Chris really has an exceptional family. I think I still need to see a diagram to figure out who everyone is, but I enjoy any time we spend with them. While we were at their house, Tony put on a video of Courtney scoring a goal in her soccer game. Here she and Paxton check out the replay.

This is how playdates with Paxton and his friends look. They are just starting to occassionally interact with each other, but for the most part, they're happy to pursue their own interests. In this shot, Henry plays with a toy, Paxton spins the wheels of a furniture dolly and Tatum checks out what I'm doing with the camera. Although they still only parallel play at this stage, Paxton has started to show more interest in his little friends. He often "talks about" Harper (Bip-po) and Henry (Henny). Being a typical little boy, he doesn't like to bring up the beautiful and friendly, Tatum--yet.

My friend, Serena, rode her Harley from CA to Texas to visit us, among others. I hadn't seen her since just after I found out I was expecting. She came for our high school reunion. This was the first time she met Paxton. It was an interesting switch from previous visits, when I was more than happy to socialize with Serena at the local watering holes. This time, I dragged her to Paxton's music class, and talked her into an early, toddler-friendly dinner before she went to a camping spot with some mutual friends. We're on different paths these days, but I'm glad we still have a friendship.

We had a fun little party when Serena was visiting, hosting some old friends of Chris, my friends Carmen, Phil and Harper, and my cousin Megan and her boyfriend. Here, Megan and Paxton read one of his favorite books. It's a pop-up book about a caterpillar who is unhappy until he finally spins a cocoon (cu-cu) and becomes a butterfly (BYE!). Megan swooped in to steal a kiss before Paxton had a chance to think twice.

This is my current favorite picture. I told Paxton to say "cheese" and he did the sign for it. LOVE it!

Paxton gets punchy when he gets tired, and dinner is always right before bedtime. Here, he was feeding himself when all of the sudden, he dumped out his food and put the bowl on his head saying "hat"!

He has loved corn, hated corn, and loved corn again all in a month's time.

Chris and I are addicted to buying Paxton new toys. Really, we try hard to reel ourselves in. Today, at HEB, we were going to let him pick out any toy he wanted, and he kept grabbing boring, expensive toys. Luckily, there was a giant display of Hot Wheels just as we were leaving, and he ditched the other toys for two 99 cent cars. YAY! Here, he is playing with his water/sand table on the deck. He's had it for a month and he's already a little bored with it. Of course.

Baby Einstein, Indeed

At least once a week, Paxton surprises me with what he knows. Sometimes his knowledge is the result of Chris teaching him something without my knowledge. Sometimes he just absorbs something that one of us has said in passing somewhere along the way. Yesterday, we came to a stop sign and he threw his hand out in front of him and shouted "STOP"! I have no idea where he got that. I have said "stop" and "go" to him before in the car, but I don't remember doing it at a stop sign. The kid pays attention to everything. At this point, I'd almost believe he could read the sign.

He is spot-on with his animal sounds and identifications. His pronounciations lack clarity at times, but more people understand him than I would have anticipated. At the library on Monday, Miss Stacey was reading a story and mentioned hippopotomus'. He was standing in front of her, half listening, and he pointed and said "Bip-Bo!". She knew just what he was trying to convey. He says some variation of "giraffe", "alligator", "dog", "cat", "horse", "butterfly", "goose", "bear" and "duck". For other animals, he prefers just to make the sounds. He moos (cow), roars (lion), oinks (pig), hoo-hoos (monkey), bok-boks (chickens), and, well, makes an elephant noise along with doing the ASL for "elephant". He is almost as intrigued with his animal books as he is with his transportation books. And that's sayin' something.

As he continues to learn new things, I do, also. I daily go head-to-head with my toddler. Our biggest battle is mealtime. What is his favorite one day is detested the next. He currently loves his morning oatmeal ("meal-meal"), but I won't buy it in bulk anytime soon. As soon as I make the assumption that I can safely serve something to him, he turns up his little nose to it in disgust. He used to love scrambled eggs, but now he wants just two little bites of mine and then he's done ("nun?"). He once would have sold his soul for crackers, but now that he knows cookies exist (animal crackers = "crackers oink-oink"), he physically pushes my hand away when I offer them. Fruit is a crap shoot. One day he loves cantelope, the next day, he contorts his mouth in horror when he tastes it. One day he thinks pears are the bees' knees, the next day, he dramatically lets them drop out of his mouth at first bite. Yesterday, he decided that cooked carrots are the greatest thing since breast milk, but I anticipate him imminent hatred of them by next week.

The trick I stumbled on quite by accident was finding that if I say what the food is while I'm offering it to him, he's more willing to try it. "Do you want some PEAR?" gets a more accomodating reaction than just handing it to him silently, on a fork. It's like he just wants to be completely in the loop every step of the way. Last night, when he was enjoying his carrots, I got out his Meal Time sign language book to teach him the sign for "carrot". He loved that. He doesn't always immediately attempt the sign himself, but then, someday when I I make some comment about carrots while we're at a playdate, he'll blow me away by signing "carrot" back to me. His wheels are turning. This morning, he took the signing book from me and "read" it, saying jibberish words and making jibberish signs to himself. It was so cute.

In two days, our little guy turns 18-months-old, and our little guy is not so little anymore. Every day he is demonstrating more personality, more independence and more intelligence. We have had such a wonderful time figuring each other out and exploring this life together. He changed everything, and as cliche as it sounds, I really don't remember my life without him. And I don't want to. He has added structure, as well as spontaneity to my life. Never before did I have three well-balanced meals a day. Now I have no choice. I can't stay up until all hours, because I need my rest to keep up with his energy. I used to spend my days inside, now even in the 100 degree summer days, we make time to swim or run in the yard or walk the dogs or pretend to drive the "big car". I love to think of new activities for us to do together. I love to teach him new things, because he is so hungry to learn. At the end of every day, I'm utterly exhausted and sometimes at the end of my rope, but always, always, when I say our prayers with him as I'm tucking him in, I thank God for my son, for my husband, for our family and friends. My life has never been so blessed.

Showing off his Skillz

Here Paxton shows his ASL and musical skills.

I Love Every Moment With Paxton, But...

There are things about being a parent that you are forewarned about, but they don't really sink in until you experience it yourself. My most current example of this is the tendency of toddlers to assert their independence. Paxton and I have a battle of wills for most of his waking hours. It's 2:30 p.m. and I can define this day by how many times Pax and I have gone head-to-head. Because I had to have our cat, Soma, to the vet in San Marcos by 8:00 a.m., Paxton got to get out of his crib at exactly the moment he woke up. That's a rarity. I'm not proud to admit that most mornings I shut off the baby monitor and catch another hour of sleep while Paxton entertains himself in his crib.

Because we had to leave quickly, I packed snacks and water for Paxton and threw him in the car still in his pajamas. He was great about it. He was still in his morning sleepy-mode, so he just enjoyed watching the surroundings and chatting. When we got to the vet clinic, he started getting irritated because I was trying to focus on what the doctor was telling me about Soma and ignoring him. Paxton was walking across the row of chairs while the vet tech tried to lure him to sit down. Then he got upset and started pulling on my shirt and demanding to nurse--"NIN! NIN! NIN!". Argh. I could barely hear the vet over Pax's screaming.

After that debaucle, we drove back to Wimberley with Paxton unceasingly demanding "More? More? More?", meaning that he wanted whatever cookies I might be stashing in the front seat, and he wanted them immediately and without pause. I steadily handed him animal crackers, even though I knew better. He's become Cookie Monster. He snubs all other foods, hoping that by turning his nose up to healthy food, he'll be offered a Lorna Done. I inadvertantly created a monster. A Cookie Monster.

We got home, and I laid him down for a nap. I went into my own room to read and ended up falling asleep for my own nap. When I woke up an hour later, he was already awake. Hopefully he actually slept for a while. He's pretty consistent with his morning nap. I got him from his crib and brought him downstairs for lunch. After eating three bites of Tex-Mex Macaroni and Cheese, he decided that he wanted no more of it, and he swatted at the fork as it approached his mouth. I got out some applesauce. He ate one bite of that, because he shunned it. I put some Goldfish Snack Crackers on his tray, and he ate about five of those before he started throwing them on the floor, prefacing each toss with a bold "Uh-Oh!". In the high chair, he decided that he wanted to nurse again, shouting "NIN! NIN-NIN! NIN!". Sigh.

Because he was hyper and bored, I took Paxton to the community pool. Unfortunately, we were the only two people there, so there were no other kids for him to focus on. Instead, he tiptoed around the very edge of the pool, twice slipping in. When I would hold him in my arms in the water, he'd push away from me, trying to swim on his own. Clearly at 17-months-old, he can't exactly tread water on his own. If he sees a raft coming toward us, he says "No!" and pushes it away. He's not sure what he wants, but he's pretty sure that I can't give it to him. So much for fun in the sun.

Right now he's upstairs throwing all of his possessions out of his crib and complaining that I'm attempting to make him take a nap. Chris wants us to meet him in San Marcos in an hour or so to look at dishwashers and have dinner, but I don't know if I could handle being in a public restaurant with my wound-up son tonight. We tried that on Friday, making a quick stop at Jason's Deli before going home to put Paxton to bed. I ended up with my face and hair covered with chocolate pudding and a restaurant full of judging eyes staring daggers at the bad parents of the worse toddler.

I understand psychologically what the "Terrible Twos" are all about. Besides being unable to fully communicate his desires to us, he is also trying to assert his independence for the first time. I get that. It's a necessary step in child development and I'd be concerned if Paxton wasn't going through this stage. But it is exhausting. I count the minutes until 7 p.m. arrives so I can have just a short break before I turn in for the night myself. Being a mom of a toddler is far more difficult than being up all night feeding a newborn every two hours. At least back then I was able to read while he ate. Now he grabs the magazine out of my hand and comments on every picture he sees. Two days ago he called Tori Spelling a horse and whinnied. As I was reading about the ship captain who sacrificed himself to pirates for his crew, Paxton couldn't stop talking about the "law-lo" (water) and boats. I love interacting with him and hearing his observations, but any hours he is awake have to be dedicated to complete focus on him. I could use a little more recharge time.

The blessing is that I know every mother in America feels this way sometimes. I'm not alone in my complaints. I'm probably overdue for a mommy get-together. There's nothing like an hour spent letting the kids run themselves ragged while we vent our woes to one another. I thank God constantly for my mommy friends. They're such a gift to me, and to Paxton. Well, it's been thirty minutes and he is still not asleep, so I suppose I should stop talking about it and actually tend to my motherly duties. Three hours until he goes to bed. Aaaaahhhhhhhh.

Didn't my mommy say NO clippers?

Just chillin' in my jeep, gettin' a haircut.

I like this movie!

This lady's nice, Mom.

I'm not sure what's going on, but I'm glad I have a truck at hand, just in case.

Paxton's First Big Boy Haircut

If Paxton was a girl, he'd have long, luscious hair, stretched down his back. I know this because in 17-months, he's already had three haircuts just to keep it somewhat in check. The first time, I watched a Youtube video to teach me how to go about cutting a boy's hair. I set up his high chair in front of a video of Thomas the Tank Engine, got my scissors, combs and water bottle, and went to town. It turned out really well. To everyone who failed to examine it closely (thanks, Amy, for pointing out the bald spot over his ear), it was a fine looking haircut. Andrea even told me she was going to enlist me to trim Henry's hair. I would never actually do it, because it's one thing to mess up my own child's hair, but another thing completely to butcher another toddler's 'do. Anyway, I write that experience off to beginner's luck, because the second time I tried to cut his hair, it just looked a mess. I knew I had to find somewhere to get his hair cut professionally.

I'm sure most people take their kids to a regular salon for their trims. I really wanted the whole kid experience for Paxton's first professional haircut. I had a hard time finding a salon for children anywhere within a 50 mile range of our house. Most of them were in North Austin--a place I make every effort to never visit. Chris did a little research of his own, and found a place called "Shearz" in New Braunfels, only about 30 minutes from here. Paxton and I went just before closing one day on a whim. I was concerned that he would be over-tired and react poorly to a stranger holding scissors to his head. I underestimated the power of toy trucks.

When we arrived, the stylist was outside, smoking a ciggy with her co-worker. She rasped that she'd be right in. Paxton made a beeline for the toy fort and began to roll the trucks to and fro. Like every public place that has kids' toys, they looked a little worse for wear, but it didn't seem to bother Pax. He was in heaven.

The woman took her time on her smoke break, but finally came in to begin the cut. She isn't exactly ripe for her own kids' show. She had tattoos on her wrists and wasn't a big fan of smiling. I explained that it was Paxton's first haircut and made it clear that I wanted his cut cleaned up, but I didn't want him to look like a "big boy", per se. "So no clippers," she asked. I asserted that I definitely did not want clippers. I am not remotely ready to see my baby boy with a buzz cut.

Paxton sat in a red car and watched a video of The Incredibles. He didn't bat an eye when she wrapped the apron-thing around him. He was still clutching one of the cars he forked from the toy fort. I was circling him like the papparazzi, taking dozens of pictures and videos of every moment. The only time he looked even a bit curious was when the stylist brought out the clippers (much to my surprise). She trimmed his neck, and his baby sideburns. While she did it, she whistled a bit to him, just like Dr. Pruett does when he checks Paxton's ears at appointments. She wasn't the kind of person I envisioned working at a salon for only kids, but she did a good job with the haircut and I will definitely return.

Before we left, Paxton got to pick a toy out of the treasure chest, and we got a certificate with a lock of his hair on it, recognizing his First Haircut. His bangs were a little short, but I was so pleased to find that we didn't even have to comb it for the first week or so. It laid so perfectly, that it was practically maintenance-free. His hair grows so quickly that I'm sure we'll be visiting Shearz again before we know it. Maybe I'll hop on the pony next time and have her take a few inches off my rat nest, as well. If it's good for the silly goose, it's good for the mama gander.