Very behind! 67, 68 & 69

Sorry!! Getting bad at this! It's hard to let go of this tradition; I want to remember every little thing! But really, how long can I keep this up?! I can't track every tiny word (which are a lot)
67
dean can stack the boxes right side up
Talks a lot more
Says more
Climbs a lot! Climbed on stool up to table (bed last week)
Learning about toys on time out...Will hand us the toy as we come to take it away.

68
Waves and says hi and bye
Tried to put on chap stick
Says Uh oh
Reading better if I do it when he first wakes up
We switched to food first then bottles plus less milk
9 month nipples on the bottle. He suddenly was fine with them, thank goodness I tried again.
Says too many words to keep track of haha
Says go or bye bye and stands by door.
Says go go go and runs around, because of his cars book and KR taught him to run back and forth (like he needed to be taught that)
When he hears Sirens says weee
69
Folds arms for prayer
Climbs in high chair a lot
Says bless you (last week)
Another molar staring on bottom r
Top r is completely broken through, top L almost through, bottom 2nd l is all the way through
Unloads dishwasher...puts everything in silverware or ziplock bags drawers.
Hands me trash or crumbs instead of throwing it on the floor. Even just when he's done with something, like a book.
Eats with us at dinner, twice this week. He ate mushrooms, chicken, ravioli, sausage! Meat and veggies never happens! So I was grateful!
Bottle only at bed time!
Likes books again, thank goodness!
KR had Labor day off then that following Friday off so it was nice to have more time with him! Last Saturday we went to the psu farmers market for lunch and had tamales and zucchini pizza! This weekend we went to his parents Friday and Salem Saturday, to the riverfront park. Dean doesn't really like splash pad anymore, sadly.
Ok caught up!

66 (August 16, 2014)

I'm going to start using the date in the title so you and I both know when it really is haha.
This week Catherine was still in town so we swam some more, went to the zoo and even hung out at our place before they left. We love when they are in town and it hurts gets more fun each time, since the boys are older. They just bought a new house and moved in the day after they left here. So crazy!
KRs birthday was Thursday and since he had to work the weekend, there was no way to really postpone the celebration(although we still will go out to celebrate next week) so I tried my best to make it special that day. I had decorations up and made him one of his favorites, sloppy Joes. Sounds lame, but he likes them and we don't have them often because we dint always have buns. Well unfortunately for me, after forgetting to buy some at the store, we still had no buns haha. But then I got resourceful! I made homemade! And they were super easy and really yummy!! Like, I'm totally going to do that again!! I tried a new recipe for carrots, it was alright. But then his birthday cake I tried another nee recipe. It was a peaches and cream cake and it was delicious!!! Not very healthy though haha. But for his birthday, I give him what he wants, not the healthy stuff haha.
On to my list.
*Says thank you much better. When I ask for things or ask him to do things, after, he always says thank you haha (like can you please give me that? He gives it and he says thank you)
*Says Guck for truck
*Shakes his head no if he is answering my question. At the beginning of the week, he didn't nod much, but by rhe emd, he nods or shakes his head to answer and it's awesome!!!
*Is really understanding a lot. I asked Can you get my phone off the couch?" (Cuz I had my shoes on) and he totally knew what I asked!
*Better at stepping down, and practicing a lot. At the park, he will find a little curb, go to the edge, make the jumping motions but then still go one foot at a time and kind of fall down the step, but staying standing. Does that make sense? Haha
*Fishy lips. I posted a video because it was adorable and hard to explain.
*He's been laying on his tummy in the tub, so cute! Then I asked him to swim and he kicks his legs. Then it evolved into him scrynching his legs up, getting close to the front and pushing off, launching himself forward haha.
*Dances more, and once in a while sings.
*Says stroller (has been)
*Trash. Our task can is under the sink, so he can't just get to it, but earlier in the week he got obsessed with trash and any little piece he'd find, he'd say trash and want to throw it away. He still kind of did but not as much.
*He also picks up tiny specks, just like amy little crumb, like when they are crawling. I thought you already went through this phase dude! Haha.
*He started this thing where he goes in the kitchen or now anywhere, and stomps feet fast, back and forth. I think it started out of a frustration but then he liked the sound and does it for fun. I try to keep him from doing it, for the neighbors sake, but it's hard.
Ok how you had a good week!

65

So I goofed and haven't been keeping good notes this week. Catherine is in town so I've been distracted. We've been mostly hanging out at the pool, except Wednesday night we had a girls night for our mani pedis before the wedding.
Thursday was susans wedding!! It was at cathedral park and then the reception was at a mcmenamins in forest grove. They made it very casual and it was so nice. Afterward all the family in town went to swim. It was fun seeing so many people. Saturday we hiked through tryon park, which was more a walk. Then more swimming.
Ok so here's my list.
*says shhh with finger. A woman was shushing her baby in the cultural hall and Dean started saying shh. She ledt shortly after but every time we passed the gym, he would say it again.
*says bye-bye now and waves really high up
*Calls lions raaarrrr and sheep baaa (I think I already mentioned it)
*he uses his spoon and eats his cereal or yogurt all by himself. I finally decided to let him be messy and practice and now I have no choice haha. He went ever let me feed him. But he is getting better, thankfully. We also finally got him a fork and he loves it. Not always, but sometimes if he won't eat something, he might if he had his fork haha.
* Like babys a lot. When he sees pictures he says it over and over. And he calls Mickey beebee and loves him sooo much. He will give him kisses and hugs and cuddles. (I might have mentioned that. I'm not sure. I know I posted about it on Facebook but now I'm blogging to be sure)
*Saying mama and daddy a lot.
*Says yummy. Sounds more like nummy though.
Ok I think that's all I have.

64

*Dean was feeling better but still had runny yucky nose, a little cough. But it all cleared up by the end of the week.
*He woke up at 8 Sunday so we inly did one nap, after church. He did pretty well so when he woke up at 740 on Monday, we tried again and faaaaail. He was so grumpy all morning and then didn't take long enough of a nap during his one nap and was grumpy all evening
*Calls sheep baa
*Says whoa a lot
*Pushes backwards on motorcycle
*Noooooo. Haha this one is funny. He has been learning no but still doesn't quite understand what it means. So he says it randomly. But we were eating and he dropped something and then was like nooooooo. He did it once more. He may or may not have heard me say this once or twice in his life.....hahah.
*Says lotion "shh" and diaper "piper"
*Copies drumming fingers
*First sandwich- we've been giving him bread with chocolate sunflower butter on it, but it's so messy, we only do it right before bath. But I finally tried folding it into a sandwich and it worked out great at the park!! No mess!! He has had peanut butter a little here and there and no reaction so when his sunflower butter is gone, we'll just switch to peanut butter.
*he says Balloon more than just bah and it sometimes sounds like baboon
*ok so this has been for a while. When I say something hurts or to watch your head, he will gently hit his head, at first and then might progress a little and then it hurts! Like he had the remote and he was hitting it hard on my knee. I said, ouch, and that hurts mama. He then gebtly hit his head with it! Uhhhhhh? I stop him but sometimes it's too late. He doesn't always progress to hard hits. But still. I hope it's just him learning, and this is normal!
This week was really lonely for me, but luckily this rotation is not as hard as we anticipated. KR even had Saturday off and got home most days by 5 and one 6.
Next week he has Thursday off for Susan's wedding and doesn't have to make up for it Saturday! So the only hard time this rotation will be the weekend of the 16th, he has to do Sat and Sun, making it a 12 day stretch. And that's the weekend of his birthday plus we have two social events that Saturday. So I'm just mentally preparing, and it will be fine. I'm just grateful Catherine and her bits will be in town this coming week, starting Monday (which was yesterday, as I am technically typing this Tuesday morning haha. She's already here)

63 1/2

Oops forgot.
We tried to start weaning him from his bottle. One word. Fail.
We tried cold turkey one morning. He just wouldn't. Then later I gave it as a drink with his solids, he did a little better but still. So this was messing up his naps because he was too hungry to sleep. We already had that problem when he was little, not messing with that again. So then we bought new nipples for his bottle. See, he still had the newborn flow. Lots of things I read about trying to continue breastfeeding said to stay with the low flow (after all, the hole isn't going to get bigger on a breast) so I wondered if that was why he didn't like the sippy cup. Well I think we are right because we bought 9 month flow and it's all to fat for him. He knows instantly. The sad thing is, there are two more levels between newborn and 9 month, so we don't know if we should spend money on those abs do it more gradually, or not. For now, we just went back to normal. I think part of us worry he's not ready (and we have time, the goal is 18 months) and post of it is us being too overwhelmed to want to fight it quite yet.

63

This week. Phew. Well as much as we loved and appreciated our vacation, we kept comforting ourselves that we didn't have to jump right back in to real life when we got back; KR had another full week off. So we made a bucket list of what we wanted to do with the last of our "summer" since he'd be 6 days a week, therefore no Saturdays to play. It all started or great, Monday was warm and sunny and we went to KRs parents pool. We had fun relaxing and swimming. Our plan was then to go to yogurtland. That's where it all started down hill (sorry, last time you have to hear this story.) It was closed!! Permanently!!! I've noticed Bridgeport has been losing a lot of businesses and I guess that has been hurting business and yogurtland asked for a rent lowering (but never missed a payment). Well, long story short, bridgeport decided they'd rather lose another business than lower it a little. To me, they were greedy. KR pointed out, what is going to fit in that unique, tiny little spot? So one more business gone. I hope they don't fill it, since apparently they'd rather lose a stable, productive business and try and get someone else to pay more. Anyway, my main reason for being so mad is it was the only yogurtland in oregon and it makes me mad how many people are affected by the greedy decisions of businessmen. So for now, I just have to eat as much as I can at christmas. In the meantime, it's sad we can't celebrate birthdays or anniversaries or even just carry on our tradition of getting fro yo, walking around and then getting Dean a new book. It's more that than the actual yogurt that I'm sad we are losing. Hopefully that makes me sound less pathetic haha.
Ok so then, the rain came!! 3 days of our last week if "summer"! I had a hard time accepting this in day three, but we still made the most of it. We got done errands fine, went to Powell's for a book for Dean, got some black out curtains, which helped his naps so much! While on vacation, his naps actually got better and I hypothesized it was the darker window treatments. So although I've been guessing that a long time, this process it and motivated me to get my fanny in motion. And it worked!! we also went to the zoo, and it was crazy! I had wanted to go on a warm sunny day so bad. And by Thursday, we were running out of time, so we just went anyway. Well street maybe 20 minutes, the clouds cleared up and it warmed up nicely! We spent s few hours and had a nice time. As we left though, and came down the hill, it was still cloudy literally everywhere else! Tender mercy!
Friday and Saturday were busy in a great way! We knew it was supposed to warm up, so we wanted to do a hike. Friday evening was a bbq fire Chris and Susan, and it was out on Gresham. Well that's far and there would be bad Friday night traffic. So we planned our whole day out there. We hiked oneonta falls, which is in the gorge, then stopped at blue lake regional park, where they had a splash pad, then we went to mcmenemins edgefield, and explored the property, then finally to the bbq. It was so fun! The hike was super short. We wish it was longer, although Dean wouldn't have done any longer. But it was like the narrows, where you have to go through water. At the last part, right before a corner blocking the water fall, it got shoulder deep, if not deeper. But there was a wall on the right that you could scale, but it was hard. KR went first, and made it look easy, but when he got back and took Dean so I could go, it was so hard. I guess it was just hard not knowing where I should step or grab how far I had to get before I could step down to the knee deep part. I actually got stuck for a few minutes abs my feet were slipping. I almost fell in! But I girl already on the other side came back and guided me. It helped so much, because she could tell where the drop off ended. It made me think of like a million spiritual metaphors haha. Anyway, I felt so proud of myself, and the waterfall was awesome! (Please note the difference between this and the narrows. The narrows are in Utah and this was in shady and green Oregon. It was so cold and not refreshing! Haha. No it was a little, but you weren't already sweating!
Saturday we went for a run in the waterfront, my favorite, and then walked over to Jamison square and let dean play in the water. Then we walked all the way back to the Saturday market, then back. Dean took his nap and then we went to the Washington county fair!!! So fun! That's where KR did 4-H and showed his sheep. Then he had done nostalgia UN the firm of ice cream in a waffle cone. He looved then growing up and I can see why.
Ok on to dean's list...
KR was trying to teach colors and Dean left and came back with his colors book! we don't know if it was coincidence but we were both impressed!
Weeks ago, I started saying, look at mama, to get his attention and yell him something important. It seems to really work.
He started doing s big cheesy grin when we say Say peaches ( last week)
King dean
Wraps things, especially towels, around his neck (weeks ago)
Grumpy, possibly sick (I wrote this at the beginning of the week. He had a fever at the airport and was really clingy. Sunday he still felt hot but both days were just in his head. Then Tuesday he started a dry cough that sounded like a bark. Wednesday, add a runny nose, then Thursday his cough turned phlegmmy. Meanwhile, we discovered he had two molars coming in, up top. If his center teeth are number one, these would be tooth number 4. Does that make sense? Anyways he hit less grouchy as the week went on, but he still is short tempered and irritable. Sunday he was coughing a lot less)
Says alligator (weeks ago)
One thing I loooved was how much Dean loved books. He would bring them to us for hours straight, and his favorites were dr seuss, which are longest. He would sit for the whole book. Then on our trip, we quickly got lazy and he got distracted and before we knew it, we can't even force him to sit in our lap for any book. I've been kind of trying all week, and he had moments, but now I'm just hoping and praying it comes back. Like, I have a stomach ache over it. It's such an amazing thing how much he liked them and I would never forgive myself if we were the cause of that love dying so young.
Loves raspberries
He says Boo with head sideways, like when we peek around the corner. He also looks away and does it. So cute.
Peter cottontail book- it plays music and he loves it. And he finally! bobs along he's never really done that yet haha. It overflowed on to another toy that plays music too, so we'll see.
Loves to put shoes on. We wants to wear our shoes and walk in then, which doesn't work at all yet. And he always steps in the then, never sits and uses his hands.

Catching up.

Ok do we just got back from vacation and I am so far behind, it's insane. Every week, I make an ongoing, bullet point list in my phone of what he does, so I can blog. Well I have those lists at least. So rather than get further behind, I'm going to put my raw lists here. Sorry, but better than nothing.
Oh and I'm going to put a bunch of weeks in this same post...

57
Climb on couch in corner
Loves books
Says flower and fish
When I say ahhh about something, not to him at all, he will be like ahhhh. But it's a soft, higher pitched sound. So sweet.
Says horse
Chsh for jesus. Just pointed in church, I never showed him the painting. Only the Greg Olson book we read to him.
Walks backwards
Says go for where did it go?
Lots of head bangs
Makes a f sound for frog and.flower
I say lets go take a bath and he goes to bathroom
I asked wheres the elephant, he brings zoo book.
I sing wheels on the bus, he went and got the book
Same with bingo and the book.

58
Na na for all done, mostly with bottle.
Obsessed with books. Brings them to us for hours straight.
Sleeps later on cloudy days
Up and down from couch.

59 (got to California on Tuesday)
Doesn't seem to like the ball as much but I think because of so much new stuff.
Wedding. Jennifer got married! That deserves its own post, eventually.
Temple. Jennifers endowments. Also well be included with wedding post.
Flying. Went well. Very early.
Better at animal sounds. lion, cow, dog Knows ears
KR taught him to say money in a deep throaty growl, associated with his wallet.
Nana when all done with bottle

60
Beach. Didn't like it at first. More to come on this.
KR taught him Nips and belly button and surprised me at the beach.
Roar with head back
Kicks ball so well
Disneyland. Another post for another day. One word though....magical.
Said grandpa
Awah for outside
4th of july. We went to the parade and then the checketts and then deb and dans and then home for fireworks. I love this holiday!

61
Baaa says the sheep
Uh oh. High pitched, slow and very separated. I love it but it was brief.
Boom when falls down.
Walk. Says it when I ask if he wants to go for walk. He loves walks and his stroller.
Blazers. KR taught him to point to the blazer symbol on his shorts.
Kisses and high fives to anyone but won't let them hold him.
Went to grandmas and moms. We went to oak Glen!! I grew up going there. Dean learned goats and baa.
Went to the 7th st pool. Loooved that splash pad.
Had mini birthday party for Dean.
Saw the new houses they will be moving to. So nice.
We went to the beach a few more times, started really liking it. Loved when we dig a little pool for him. Tried drinking the water in yoga pose. Ate sand, sand in his poop next day. Likes the water.

62
Tahoe! Spent time with cousins. Water park, Dean loved little water slides. Hiked to eagle lake. Vikingsholm castle, steep one mile hike down then back up! Game nights.
Reading opposites book, I said hot, he said C c c and shiver with cold
Said nips
Belly button. Says it
Mahmee
Neen for dean
P for plane, sees them so well.
Sees for trees
Wawa for water
Ah wa for outside
Fawa for flower
Caca for cracker
Fff for woof woof. If he hears dog barking, he says fff
Drove through night to tahoe, he only did ok, glad we didn't try day time.
Drove to Sacramento airport. Got there at noon, flew out at almost 5. Dean took 40 min nap in car, 20 min in airport, 40 min right as wet picked up speed to take off.


Ok, I know that's horrible, but again, better than nothing. Haha. Ok I'm off to enjoy the last week with KR before he goes back to 6 days a week.
Thank you so so much for all you did so we could come on this trip, those of you who did. We are so very grateful.