A Boy and His Blog

Archive for August, 2008

Posted by Daddy:

I wouldn’t have thought it was possible if you’d asked me a few years back, but I successfully took care of a three-year old for four days.

Jennifer went out of town with her mom, grandma and aunt, so I took Thursday and Friday off of work to step up to the plate as Owen’s primary care-giver.

Here’s what we did between 11:00 a.m. on Thursday and 1:00 p.m. on Sunday…

Thursday-
We visited a model train museum, then played at a park we’d never been to before.  We then ate at a sandwich shop, then went to the library where we bought a book and rented a DVD.  That evening, we bought some essentials at Target.

Friday-
We went to an electricity museum during the day, then to another park.  That evening, Owen went to his grandma’s house with the idea of sleeping over.  But, he changed his mind and decided not to sleep over.  So, he came with me to my friend’s house (where I had been geo-caching) and fell asleep on the couch while my friend and I recorded a podcast.

Saturday-
Owen accompanied me to work for a couple hours in the morning, then we went home and played for several hours.  That night, we went out to eat and one of the people in our party nearly choked to death.  No, seriously, a busboy performed the Heimlich on her and the paramedics even came.

Sunday-
Owen rode his tricycle, and then we went to yet another park.  When we got home from the park, Mama was home waiting!

All in all, it was actually easier than I expected.  Owen went to bed fairly easily every night and slept though the night very well.  When he decided not to sleep at my mom’s house, I picked him up and told him that it was fine that he didn’t want to sleep over, but that he would now have to accompany me while I did stuff that wouldn’t be that interesting to him.  He graciously accompanied to my friend’s house (as I said above), and even got up in the morning after only 6 hours sleep and kept me company while at work.  Apart from being shaken up by seeing a woman nearly die before his eyes, there were really no major issues to deal with.

When I asked Owen what his favorite part of our long weekend was, he said it was the train museum, which means his weekend peaked during the first two hours after Mama left.  I gotta admit, it was tough to top the train museum.

Oh – and I brought a camera along with us all weekend.  See the video here: 

He’s officially weaned now. I went on a four day vacation and when I returned and put him to bed he asked for refrigerator milk. At first I didn’t think we had any, so I told him that, and only then did he cry for “boobops”. But he didn’t cry in a way were he thought he would get them, it was more of an under his breath way, like he knew it was fruitless to even ask. I ended up finding some milk and after he guzzled down his glass, he happily crawled into my arms for hugs and then into his bed for the night.

Before I left for vacation, the last time he had nursed was over a week ago. It ceased being sad or sentimental to me soon after his birthday, and I felt like just getting it over with. Yet, I allowed him to nurse every so often, which amounted to every other day or two, just to let him have some control over the process. He wouldn’t hang around long, and only nursed for about a second on each side, disappointed there was no milk left. I thought the last time we nursed should be special, or significant, but it wasn’t. He had been having a particularly cranky day and when he asked for boobops he was already lying down in bed. I snuggled in next to him and let him nurse on each side for a second or two, while keeping him lying in bed.

His last nursing session was not special, or significant, which is a bit sad, but I have lots of fond nursing memories to look back on that are much better. Like the day he turned three and I snuggled him up to me and he nursed for a long time on each side. He gazed into my eyes like he used to as a little baby and payed close attention as I told him the story of how he was born. I told him only the good parts, and left processing for another day. It was a tender moment, one which was scarcely replicated after that day in our short nursing sessions, which shows it truly was time to end our nursing relationship.

Posted by Daddy:

Owen has been asking to join me at work and help me “make money” for several months now.  He’s come into my job a few times, usually when Jennifer dropped him off when going to therapy, but he’s never actually got ready in the morning and drove with me and spent the whole day with me until now.  On Saturday, August 2nd, Owen did just that.

Saturday isn’t a day I usually go into work, but I offer to go in on Saturday whenever the need arises as I like the extra money.  I figured Saturday is a better day to bring him in because, for one thing, I knew I’d only be there for a few hours instead of my usual 8+.  For another thing, I knew most of my co-workers wouldn’t be there, so if Owen was loud or cranky, he wouldn’t be bothering everyone.

I woke Owen up at seven in the morning, and asked him if he really wanted to come with me or if he wanted to still sleep.  He said he wanted to come with me, so I pulled him out of bed, gave him some cereal and got him dressed.  We left with a lunch I packed and drove to my job.

No one else from my department was there, so we had the whole office area and lab to ourselves.  When we first arrived, I showed Owen how I liked to make myself tea in the morning.  He requested iced tea, so we walked down to the cafeteria to get ice.  He liked doing that so much that we ended up doing that three times (although we had to pass a loud compressor on the way, so he insisted I carry him so he could squeeze me tight during the loud parts).

Owen had a good time in my cube.  He drank the iced tea, played with some of the trinkets I’ve obtained from various vendors, and ate the food I had packed.  When it was time to go into the lab, I had to gown him up just like a proper lab tech.  I had him wear the smallest gloves, safety glasses and lab coat available (all were way too big).  The lab coat has slits in the side, so I weaved the coat through the slits a couple of times so he wouldn’t trip over it.  He enjoyed letting the large safety glasses slide down his nose and below his chin.  Most of the time, he sat on a chair, but after a while he helped me out by throwing away some items as I finished with them.  I then gave him a tour of the lab, which he enjoyed immensely.  When we left the lab, Owen saw the sink and asked if we should wash our hands.  I was just gonna bolt out of the gowning room without washing our hands, but Owen must have read the procedure, because he was right.  So, we washed our hands.

After getting ice again, he asked for another lab tour, so we went back into the lab for another tour just like the last one, only that time we avoided the loud area of the lab.

Finally, after shooting a foam rocket (I got at a seminar last May) down the hall, we called it a day and went back home.

I gotta say, I think I was actually more productive at work having my son there as I was continually worried that I would be perceived as wasting company time, so I kept doing paper/lab/computer work the whole time.

Owen would like to join me again someday.

A collection of cute things Owen has said lately:

We went to a horse stable with Daddy’s job and Owen and Daddy got to ride horses! That night we talked about it while we were putting him to sleep. We talked about how one horse he rode was white and one was black. Owen then said, “and some people black and some people are white”. I said, “yeah, that’s true” delighted at his totally non-judgmental observation. But then he further proved his innocence by asking, “what color are we?” As Daddy stifled a laugh, I explained that people say we are “white”, but really we are a peach color, just like how “black” people are really brown.

He also told us that he rode on three horses: a black one, a white one, and another white one. Really he rode on the white one twice, but he did take three rides so we didn’t argue.

Speaking of math, he is fascinated with zero right now. He observes how there are zero of things, like zero water in an empty bottle, or zero food on a plate, or zero boys in a room. He says, “if there are one boys, and then that boy go away, how many boys? Zero!” He even named a little park we found “park zero” (it is across the bridge of what he calls “park 1″. He can’t understand why there isn’t a garage “0″ and we try explaining that even though 0 is a number, people don’t generally start counting with 0. It’s quite the concept for a three year old, but he seems to have gotten it.

Owen was telling me the other day that for his birthday he wants to go to Arby’s and invite no friends. He then said, “at my first birthday I not have no friends, that was crazy! When I turn 4 I go to Arby’s and have no friends too.” He really didn’t have any friends at his first birthday, just Mama and Daddy. We think Daddy told him the story of his birthdays one day and he noticed that he had no friends at his first one.

One night Owen asked me, “why Owen get presents on my birthday?” I explained that we like to celebrate the day he was born, because we love him. Then he asked “why at birthdays Owen gets presents and at Christmas Owen gets presents?” I explained how at Christmas everybody gets presents to show that we love everybody, and at birthdays only the person who’s birthday it is gets presents because it is their special day. He then said, “why we blow out candles on a thing, why?” I said, “we put candles on a cake and we blow out as many candles as you are years old, so last time you blew out three, and next time you’ll blow out four.” He is beginning to realize that he gets presents at these consistent times of year, and now when we say, “maybe we’ll get you that for your next birthday”, he says, “no, for Christmas” because he knows Christmas comes next.

He is still resisting potty training. The funny thing though, is every time he poops he finds a new way to present his new diaper and wipes to us to signify that he wants a diaper change. Sometimes they get pushed out on his cart, or pulled out in his little wagon, or driven out on his semi or digger or tractor, or carried out in his food basket, or presented on a large wooded spoon that he calls his dust pan. He’s even carried them out inside of his butterfly net. He gets quite creative with his diaper presentations.

Owen now refers to Daddy and I as “guys”. If we’re at the park, he runs over and says, “hey guys, come over here!” or if we are at the store he says, “look at this guys”, or if we’re on a walk he says, “come on guys”. It’s cute, it’s like he feels a comradery with us, like we’re all buddies.

One day, Daddy was exasperated with Owen and he said, “you drive me nuts!” Owen said, “no, not nuts, noodles!” He went on, “cause I like noodles, that’s all I eat”. Now every time we say, “you drive me crazy” or “you drive me nuts” he says, “no, noodles”. He even tells us now that we drive him noodles. All of us have been using “noodles” in the place of the word “crazy” lately. And now when I start to get frustrated he says, “does Owen drive you noodles?” I say, “no, Mama is already noodles.”