Golden Pig Tales

-v- went to the store for food near Ezra’s bedtime, so I was the lone parent to put Ezra to bed. The process began with Ezra looking out the window crying and saying, ,,Mommy, mommy, mommy.” After about five minutes of crying and starring out the window he calmed his crying, so he could hear me offer to read The Big Book of Trucks with him to which he replied with a, ”Yes.” So, we went to his room, and I opened The Big Book of Trucks then named and pointed to each truck or other vehicles on each page as he turned the pages until he closed the book and said, ”Bye, bye.” Then I began to ask him which set of pajamas he wanted to wear. He couldn’t decide on a top and he was refusing to left me take off his milk covered shirt, so things got fussy for a few seconds when I took off his milk covered shirt and put on his bulldog pajama tops. He was fussy until he saw the hollow cube with shapes cutout on all six sides. He wanted to push the shaped blocks into the hollow cube. We did this for about fifteen minutes while listening to Johnny Cash. Then he started to close his eyes and sway his head, so I put him the crib, turned off the lights and sat in the dark until he settled. Before I left the room, he said, ”night night, daddy.”

Ezra is getting bigger! It seems like he is bigger today than yesterday. Kalab and I both seemed to think so, so it must be true. Pretty soon, Ezra will be 6 feet tall.

We had so much fun hanging out with Ezra this weekend! It makes me sad that it’s Sunday and we will be spending the day at work, rather than going to the park, reading books, playing with toys and walking along the streets to look for taxis, busses, u-hauls and motorcycles. That sounds like way more fun than work : (

Ezra also proved his spanish vocabulary is growing! He wants mas mango, mas sesame street, and mas play time. He’s so cute when he says it : )

I can’t believe one little kid could be this much fun!

We have Monday off for Prez Day, so this is a long weekend with Ezra. But even a long weekend is too short. It’s hard to stay on the same schedule we keep during the week, so on the weekends its sometimes hard to tell when and how long Ezra will want to nap or sleep. By the time you feel like you’re getting in a good routine and getting some good quality Ezra time, the weekend is over and it’s back to work. Boo! Friday Ezra stayed home and had a fun day with Gramma T, and Friday night we played race-stroller in the house with Ezra, which will probably some day come back to haunt us. Saturday morning we had breakfast with Gramma T, and then….no one can really remember exactly what we did the rest of the day after Gramma left.  Anyway, today I took Ezra out for an adventure. We went to the top of Powell Butte (an extinct volcano!) with the intention of going on a little hike. But Ezra indicated he was unimpressed after about 3 minutes of standing around outside the car in the cold wind, and wanted back in the car. So then we headed to Ikea, where they were giving away free breakfasts! But, we didn’t get that either because there were too many crazy people standing in line. Ezra tried to cut the line and got us in trouble. We ended up running up and down the sidewalk in the parking lot for 45 minutes, looking at cars, trains, and airplanes. I told Ezra we were at Ikea, and he repeated “Keea?” After Keea we went home, with Ezra falling asleep in the car on the way. This messed up his schedule for the day, because the nap was way too early and too short. I had a nap when he was supposed to be napping. Then when I woke up, I took him out for a walk, and he ended up falling asleep in the stroller with some sun on his cheeks, even though the weather forecast was for rain today. Even though Ezra’s sleep schedule was all weird, and he had a hard time falling asleep tonight, today was a fun day with Ezra. And we have a whole extra day for fun tomorrow!

Ezra’s 18 month birthday was this weekend, as Kalab posted as a result of my forgetfullness when it comes to blogging. Anyway, on Ezra’s 18 month birthday, we had a family day out and about. Kalab and I took Ezra down to the Esplanade to look at boats, cars, bikes, and even a submarine! We ran around after Ezra as he explored the grounds of OMSI, and walked with Ezra up and down and up and down the boat launch/dock ramp by the fire station. It was one of those beautiful spring teaser February afternoons. We finished up our celebration with Burgerville. Ezra enjoyed the fries, and also the special sippy-style cup that was included with the meal that had an awesome straw. Alas, Ezra knows not his own 18 month old strength, and he threw down the cup today in a fit of discombobulation and cracked the bottom of the cup resulting in irrepairable damage to the cup and a 2 minute fit of inconsolability until he forgot about the cup and I was able to put the cup out of sight in the trash. But at least he still had the straw as a memory of his 18 month birthday.

It’s the weekend, which means more time with Ezra!!!!!!!! yay! I am excited to have Ezra around all day for two days! I only wish that I had been able to stay home with him today but unfortunately I had to be at work. Boo! I think we are going to try some fingerpainting with Ezra tomorrow. Hopefully we can keep his fingers on the paper and not let him dash about the house with painty fingers decorating all the furniture, rugs, and cats!Yay! 

We went to pizza for my birthday dinner tonight. I had told Ezra in the morning and again after I picked him up from playcare that we were going to go have pizza for dinner. Ezra’s response would go something like this: Ezra: “Pee-ah?” Me: “yep, we’re gonna have pizza!” Ezra: “Pee-ah! Pee-ah pee-ah pee-ah pee-ah!” So I guess either Ezra likes pizza, or he at least likes the word. We didn’t get out the door until a little after 6, so I was sort of worried that we would have another Taco House night. In the car on the way over, Ezra was excited to see all the cars and BUSSES! So many busses. We got to pizza place and Ezra was a little unhappy that we had to leave behind the street with all the BUSSES! But once we got into the pizza place, Ezra was super well-behaved. We sat at a booth and Ezra enjoyed some apple juice and breadstick before the pizza arrived. Then Ezra munched on a piece of pizza and finishing his apple juice. It was very pleasant! I was very happy to have a happy boy with me at dinner - what a nice birthday present : )

We took Ezra to the zoo on Saturday morning. The sun was out, the sky was clear…it was a great day although a little cold. We got to the zoo early for zoo standards, but sort of late in the morning by Ezra standards. We saw brown bears, a cougar, some sheep and goats, polar bears, the elephant family, a wolf, an elk, a zebra, a giraffe, and a tiger - many of these are interesting, but not generally the animals Ezra is interested in when we look at his animal picture book. We walked past most of the exhibits, but most of the animals were still sleeping or weren’t very active either because it was too early or too cold. The funniest part about Ezra’s trip to the zoo was how generally uninterested Ezra was in the animals. His biggest fun during the trip was while we were near the elephants, and he found some steps to walk along and sticks to pick up. Everyone else was there to see the new baby elephant. Ezra was interested in watching the elephants for maybe 30 seconds. He was mad when we decided to leave the steps at the elephant exhibit after 10 minutes. He grew increasingly cranky as we continued our walk through the zoo, which seemed even harder to get out of while towing around a cranky tired toddler as the cold wind started blowing through the zoo.

We were at the zoo maybe an hour or 90 minutes. As we left the zoo, and the car warmed up, Ezra relaxed into his carseat and began to drift off asleep. Driving away, I noticed that the children’s museum has a Bob the builder exhibit. I think that’s where we should have taken Ezra.

Where’d it go? Where is it?

Kalab and I have been asking these questions with Ezra about various objects. It started a few days ago when Ezra put a piece of bread underneath a big salad scooper, and I said “Where’d the bread go”? Ezra lifted up the scooper, and I said “Yay! There’s the bread!” and laughed and clapped a little. Ezra put the scooper back over the bread. This time, Kalab said “Where is it? Where’s the bread?” and Ezra lifts up the scooper to again reveal the bread! Wow! Woah! This went on for quite a few minutes before Ezra got tired of it. The best part of the game is that after hiding something, Ezra lifts up his arms and has his hands up by his head to make sort of a shrug/I don’t know gesture. It’s really totally hilarious. So we’ve been promoting this game and Ezra has played along by hiding various items under various items. He will “hide” something for 10-20 minutes if you’d let him. Unfortunately for Ezra, mom and dad get bored of it before he really does. But he’s improving his hiding skills. In fact, he’s getting so good at it I think we might try to teach him the shell game next, so we can maybe make us a little money while we’re standing out on the street watching cars!

Ezra has been super clingy to -v- as she as written. He becomes so clingy once in a while he wants to cling his teeth to -v-, which has never happened to me. Though I am at times jealous of the fact Ezra is clung to -v-, I am not jealous about his clinging with his teeth to her flesh.

Ezra is awesome and I love him more than just about anything. The past few days, however, Ezra has been super mom-clingy and moody. Ever since we went back to daycare after our extended holiday/snowday “staycation”, Ezra has seemed to revert to being a superfan of mom and only mom. He gets upset when dad is the one who walks in his room in the morning. He is upset when I am not the one to soothe him when he takes a tumble. He gives me a scowl and furrowed brow when I say bye bye at playcare in the mornings. He screams and cries when he does not get his way in the realm of toys or food or diaper changing. I am hoping that this is a short-lived phase, but think it could be the start of the terrible twos?

I uploaded a huge number of photos of Ezra to my Picassa account today.

http://picasaweb.google.com/valeriester/EzraSBest2008?authkey=pP2wht0rp6U&feat=directlink

Ezra has grown so much just since his birthday! It was fun looking back on the last few months. I noted that there were very few pictures taken around the time following the tooth incident. Lots of photos from times when grandparents are visiting.

Here is one of my favorites, from sometime this summer:

Isn’t he cute?????

And here’s another good one,though not quite as flattering it shows off Ezra’s natural flowing mullet : )

I think Ezra wants a puppy.

Today I took an actual vacation day, and Ezra and I were home alone. We had such a fun day out and about! We went to the street and looked at cars (twice), ate bagels, went to the mall, and finally out to dinner with Kalab. Ezra was in such a fun mood the whole day! I think Ezra enjoyed the trip to the mall the best, because there were puppies at the pet store. Ezra squealed with glee and clapped his hands and pressed his nose up to the glass window where the puppies were playing at the pet store. Those puppies held his attention for oh…about 10 minutes. But for the rest of the day Ezra kept repeating “puppy? puppy? puppy?”

Ezra went to daycare today after 3 snowy days at home with his mom and dad. Those 3 days were nice to have, but at the same time felt really long because in addition to entertaining, being entertained by, and caring for Ezra all day, Kalab and I also had to squeeze in as much “working from home time” as possible. I don’t know if Ezra really liked the snow, or being outside in the snow and cold weather. He was a little less animated than he usually is when we go outside to watch cars or play in the park, but still wanted to go outside, which is more than I can say for myself. I hope Ezra enjoyed some extra time at home with mom and dad, because I know that I enjoyed the extra time with Ezra!

Ezra is 16 months old today! Yay! Yay! Yay!

To celebrate, we went out and selected the finest of all douglas fir pine trees from the local fred meyers. Ezra seems a little perplexed as to why we have a tree inside our house.  Tomorrow we will set it up in the red room and decorate it with lights and other things, and he will probably be even more perplexed…

During a span of calm yesterday, I heard Valerie saying to Ezra, ,,One. Nine. Three. Four. Seven. Seven. Eight. Night. Zero. Zero. Wall. Door. Floor. Stair…” and continue until she was able to distract Ezra with the fact I was near. This happened again this morning, but I was the one naming the object pointed at by Ezra, which happens every day.

It’s fun to do most of the time, but some times he points at the same object over and over and over and sometimes I only want to say, ,,Truck, car, tree, tree, tree, limb, tree, tree, leaf, leaf, leaf, leaf,” so many times, but what I want is second to giving Ezra what he needs for a better understanding of the world by connecting objects with words that he will hopefully someday use to communicate.

I also consider this pointing and naming of objects a warm-up to the Why Phase I have heard so much about.

I came home from my work trip and decided it was an opportune time to close Mom’s Milk Bar for good. He has been a little upset at the closure of what I think is his favorite hang-out/chill-out spot. Ezra last nursed on Wednesday morning. When I woke up with him on Friday, he didn’t really try to nurse so I thought the shut-down would be easy. Friday after we came home from playcare, however, Ezra really reallyreallyreally really wanted to nurse, and it was hard to tell him no while he was wailing and crying. But I didn’t give in, and today we had a couple of requests and pouting when being denied but it wasn’t as extreme as Friday. I think Ezra might be able to get over the end of this era quicker than I will.