Other "Suff" Caleb Says

When he is coming out of the bathtub...

"I slippy!"

When he is covered in jam...

"I sicky!"

And when he is pinned between two objects...

"I suck!"

A Little Homemade Tail

I've never seen it, but I assume the show "Date My House" is about people getting to stay in a house they are considering buying. Although we are not considering buying this house, I look at it as sort of "Date My Kitchen Appliances" - I really like this gal's pots and pans! But some of her other kitchen-y things confound me. For example, there are no bowls suitable for food preparation in the kitchen. There are several bowls that are too big for cereal, soup, or salad, but too small to mix cookie dough in. I am perplexed. So we are using one as a piggy bank.

Caleb asked me the other day if he could "Put a penny in the pig", which I thought was funny, so I decided to put a pig face and tail on the bowl.



Now for this to make sense, I have to explain who Polly Easterwood is - basically she's a retired music teacher from Meredith's hometown and Meredith let me borrow a CD of her singing a bunch of - really wonderful - children's songs. One goes like this:

I had a little pig
He ate from the trough
He ate so much that his tail popped off!
I'm gonna get me a hammer
Get me a nail
And I'll make my pig a little homemade tail!
Weeeeeee (Pig squeeling sound)

So Caleb watched me tape the tail on and I asked him if he knew what it was:

"It's a little homemade tail, Momma!"

what a memory!

Morning at Lakes Park

We started our Saturday with a pancake picnic on a pier.

Annalise ready to explore.




Some critters we saw along the way...







Caleb catching up to daddy...
Best of all (in Caleb's opinion) there was also a train!

Sundries

Most of the time since we have been in Ft. Myers, I have tried to go out everyday. Partly because of curiousity, but mostly because it is less stressful than hovering over Caleb all day while he threatens the furniture with his typical 2-year-old behavior. In hindsight, I don't know why anyone was concerned about the dog - the dog has come no where close to damaging anything in this house, but Caleb... it's just a matter of time.

But today we are housebound because Rob needed the van to tote radio equipment. They are setting up two of the translators today. Ultimately they will repeat the Ft. Myers station, but for now, they will repeat the Miami station.

Yesterday we went to a playgroup hosted by one of those on-line networking sites. It was at a beautiful park in Cape Coral, very nicely shaded. There were a lot of moms and babies there. Most of the kids were younger than Caleb (i.e. not yet or newly walking), but he still had an incredible amount of fun. The park bordered a marina and he couldn't decide what to focus on, the slides or the boats. Plus one of the moms brought jello, which he also loves.

We also have plans on Friday to go to another playgroup which we found out about at church. I called the gal on the flyer to tell her we planned to come and she seemed stunned. She started the playgroup more than a month ago and no one has ever come! So Friday's playgroup is going to be a tiny one. I like the size of our Miami playgroup - about 5 moms. It's big enough that at least 2 of us can meet every week and small enough that Caleb can really know the kids well. We'll see how things work out here.

Annalise cut her first tooth last week. She turned 6 months on Sunday and we had her pictures made on Monday. The child WOULD NOT smile for the photographer. We got a couple of wide mouthed happy-ish faces. Afterward we ate at the food court and a man in line behind us had her grinning from ear to ear. I wish he had been there for the pictures!

Funny Things Caleb is Saying and Doing These Days

Sometimes I start to make a list of all the funny Caleb-isms that are current, but before I get a good list started, he gets ahead of me - that is his speech matures enough that the funny ways he says stuff suddenly disappears. Still he has some funny things he's saying right now...like:

- It's 30 o'clock! - He says this whenever he means time or if he sees a clock.

- The sun camed up mommy! - translation, I'm awake, now make me breakfast!

- I want to sleep on your elbow. - Elbow, shoulder, they're both joints...

- Not today! - This basically means no, but really he's imitating something I tell him (a lot!).

- Der we go! - I didn't realize I say "There we go!" a lot until Caleb started saying this.

- What's that guy's name? - This is the most common variation of a whole series of questions he's asking right now - that is, he's just as likely to ask me the name of a turtle as the name of a stranger.

- Grody! - He picked that up from Rob.

Did you notice that almost everything he says ends with an exclamation point? He likes to squeal now too...almost always at completely inappropriate times. He also likes to spit - I never thought of that as a motor milestone, but it did take a while to master.

Otherwise, he is gaining new skills - I was excited to see his drawing ability is appearing. Before he only drew scribbles, but I see a very clear train in this picture.

It's the first thing I've noticed him draw that was an identifiable picture. Too bad it was on the magnetic board so I can't save it.

And as Annalise gets bigger he likes to play with her more. Still he's more of a danger to her than a playmate.

Road Blogger

On the road traveling back to Ft. Myers after a quick trip to Miami. Rob has permission to put two of the station's translators on the air, and we made the trip back to Miami to pick up equipment. We left last night at Caleb and Annalise's bedtime and are doing the same tonight.

I had Annalise's 6 month well-baby visit scheduled with her pediatrician for Monday, so I had it changed to today. She's up to 17 1/2 lbs and 25 1/2 inches long. She had been all bubbly and gurgly, then shot time came and I turned her around and as soon as she saw the nurse, she started crying! She remembered having shots before! I guess pain makes a pretty clear memory, but I didn't think she would remember it being only 4 months old the last time she had shots.

Caleb got to see his friends from playgroup too. We had a very full day! Between all the busy-ness, we didn't have food at home, so Caleb and I had lunch at Taco Bell. I realized not long ago that I hadn't been to Taco Bell in ages, probably not since I came to Miami. We went a lot my senior year in high school, so I think I had higher expectations for the food :) In short, my craving has been quenched...pretty much indefinitely. Caleb really liked the cinnamon twists though.

Caleb and Annalise at an ice cream store in Ft. Myers.

12 for 7

Happy Anniversary to you too Robbie!

Almost Sightseeing

Sweet little girlie :) We went for a walk yesterday and Annalise wore this sunbonnet for the first time. She was so cute and didn't mind wearing it (Caleb hated hats and wouldn't keep them on.) It came loose and fell off somewhere and that was the end of that.

If you are looking for an old-time Florida vacation, I think this must be the place to be. They even still have those funny squatty motels with unusual names in Ft. Myers.

So we were going to go sightseeing today, but we went to a shell store and that was about it because by the time we'd see what there was to see, it was naptime.

Say, Ahhhhh!

There were also a bunch of stuffed animals, which I supposed were big-game trophies, but some of the animals seemed out of place, like little tiny deer and zebras, and I didn't know people hunted zebras. But it struck me as a sort of zoo...where they didn't have to feed the animals and it didn't smell like poop.

Craigslist Conquest and Other Great Deals

Hooray! I finally made a great deal on Craigslist!

Before we came to Ft. Myers, I decided I would try to buy a booster chair for Annalise on craiglist to avoid having to carry ours back and forth. I got this one for FIVE DOLLARS! The seller even brought it to me. It's in perfect condition and cleaned up very nicely. Annalise says, "Great deal, Mom!"

She's wearing my favorite of her food bibs in the pictures - I call it "Dolphins in Love".

Evidentally this area is a mecca for consignment shops and thrift stores. I've seen soooo many. We've been to a couple so I got a few things we needed, but didn't want to invest much in - a bathmat, a napkin holder, a couple of extra toys.

Here's one of the "New to Us" toys - actually it was a big bag of playdough tools for $1, but Caleb's favorites are these two "kids" - as he calls them.

He likes to ask me, "What's this kid saying?" after he cuts their hair, I say, "I said just a little off the top!!"

Also this awesome tunnel for $1!!

He was crying, and she felt sorry for him. Ex. 2:6

Have you ever re-read something in the Bible that you thought you were very familiar with and suddnely noticed a line that you realize you'd never read before? I was reading Exodus - the part where Moses's mother puts him in the basket and Pharaoh's daughter finds him and I noticed the verse above. I guess it's not a really important verse and doesn't have a lot of deep meaning, but I sort of identified with this woman who's been dead for thousands of years, looking down at this pitiful 3 month old. It's things like this that make me think that times have not really changed - I mean, obviously technology has changed a lot of things, but what she felt was pretty timeless...at least I hope.

West Coast Living

Greetings from Ft. Myers!

Well technically North Ft. Myers. As per an earlier post, we are temporarily transplanted from the gold coast to the gulf coast. We're renting a townhouse for 3 months while Rob sets up The Call's new frequencies in Ft. Myers and Naples.

We are renting this place from a young couple. The owners are in transition as far as jobs are concerned and in order to make ends meet, they've moved in with his parents and are renting out their house. Which, good for us, is furnished.


I took pictures of EVERYTHING so that after we childproof their home, we can return it to it's original, childless, condition.

I'm happy with this place so far. It is not as big as our house, but it is built to use the space wisely - something the builders of our townhouse did not consider. Also the backyard looks out to TREES! The neighborhood seems quiet and we suspect is largely populated by "snowbirds".

Here are Caleb and Annalise enjoying the new digs.

Caleb has been a little bit of a firecracker since we got here. I think it's because he's so curious about everything - at least I hope! I think being 2 years old must be either terrific or terrible. Or rather, I think it's probably both extremes jolting back and forth and spending no time in the boring, predictable middle.

One thing I thought I was annoyed at, but realized I will miss when it goes away, is Caleb's insistence on being like me. Today for example, I made a peanut butter sandwich for him and a ham sandwich for myself (with pickles). He would not eat until I added ham and pickles to his sandwich and he ate almost all of his peanut butter and ham sandwich with pickles.

Annalise has gone from belly baby to sitting pretty overnight. She spent about 20 minutes in that "mommy props me up while I sit" phase and now sits very well. Since we will be here until she is about 9 months old, I expect she'll be crawling long before we go back to Miami.

Courtesy of BabyCenter.com

Grandma Fodder

Just doing my part to keep the "gran"s happy:



Annalise is not quite 6 months old - I really didn't intend to start her on solids before now, but it's funny how babies can communicate before they can talk. She let me know in her own way that she was ready.