Krista Cogan & Hilda Hugelmann

So Otto speaks very well, but not always very clearly. When he's not pronouncing something quite right, often he'll correct himself if I make him look at my mouth while I say the word. We were working on colors the other day. Here's a reproduction of the conversation:

Me: Otto, what color is a polar bear?
Otto: Whipe!
Me: Good! White! Look at Mommy. White!
Otto: Whipe!
Me: Look at Mommy. Wh-iii-Tuh. Wh-iii-TUH. TUH. Tuh. White!
Otto: [Thinks for a second.]
Me: Whi-tuh!
Otto: Whipe-TUH!

Kids are currently sleeping and happy.  Carl had a good birthday party, and they both enjoyed playing with Carl's new toys.  We had a good time with friends and family today.  Carl enjoyed his cupcake very, very thoroughly.  I will post a pic when I download it.  After partying and fireworks, we came home, put the kids to bed and enjoyed one of my favorite movies, Red Sonja (shut up, I love it!).  Ben made me a perfect White Russin to go along with it.  Everything is good, and one more day of the weekend! Excellent.

Two big steps for the kids yesterday, Carl's is literal:

-Carl crawled the whole way up the steps, with a little prompting from Daddy.  I think he *could* have done it before, had we wanted to, but he didn't have any interest. He's also climbing in and out of a little bouncy chair, having claimed it as his own.  So cute!  Also, have you ever heard a one-year-old say "Kitty Kitty Kitty" without any vowels? It's kinda spitty, but very cute!

-Otto.  So we were watching Wheel of Fortune before their bedtime, as normal.  Contestant says "E".  Pat says, "Yes there are 3 E's".  Vanna turns over some E's.  Otto looks at the E's, thinks for a minute, and says "Eeee, Mommy! That's a E!"  ...o.O...  Uh, isn't it a little early for that, kid?

Been reading up on toddlers and kids and camping.  Have come to the conclusion I need to make a couple tethers. Very period... Now to try to find an actual pic instead of just a description.

Captain Jollypaws just hunted a big, buzzy, zippy fly.  Snatched it right out of the air and ate it up.  Crunch crunch!! Good Kitty!

Heard from the boys' bedroom:

Otto: (groaning and mumbling) *shuffle shuffle*.... HEY... HEY Car-wool.  Carl-wool.  WAKE-UP CAR-WOOL!!! HEY!
Carl: *shuffle shuffle* EEEE----yayayayah!!! (sound of bottle being thrown) UH-oh!
Otto: YAY CAR-wool! HEY! *clap clap clap* Da da da, Da da da, da da da da da da da (SUng to tune of "This old man")
Carl: *giggle giggle* YayayayaYAYAYAYAYAAAAHHH!!!
Otto: Ta-DAAAAHHHHH!  *pause* Mommy?


Life is good.

Well, it's finally time.  Carl has taken to walking everywhere. Not that he doesn't fall down a lot, but now it's all about the two-legged locomotion for him.  It only took 6 days from a step or two here and there to walking as the preferred method.  Now I say to you:  LET THE RACES BEGIN!!!!

Also, I love my farmshare.  For dinner, we had a big, fresh green salad topped with scapes and leftover steak, plus a Worchester-Soy dressing.  Dessert was a big bowl of little red-ripe-the-whole-way-through strawberries and a leftover orange-cheesecake brownie.  It was....very good.  Seriously, every one of you should get in on a farm share for the strawberries alone!

We saw Up tonight at the Dependable Drive-in in Moon tonight. Excellent movie.  Tear-jerker, feel-gooder, happy ending.  I expected nothing less from Pixar.  But, why go all the way out to Moon for a movie you may ask? Why, I will tell you!  We got:

2 adult admissions
2 movies (didn't stay for the other one, it was too late)
2 drinks (large pop, small slushie)
1 hot dog
1 funnel cake (dense, not a small one)
onion rings

for $22!!! PLUS, you just bring the kids right along.  They slept comfy and happy the entire time in their car seats! Wooooo! I recommend it to all parents who miss going to movies.  Weekends in the summer are riduculously crowded, though.  Go during the week (Sun-Thurs) in the summer.

Carl took his first steps Friday! The impetus? He was walking toward.... a 12-inch long knife! Daddy's boy, indeed!

I got this from a friend's blog. Too funny not to share:

Dada. Of course.

He's definitely had directed babbling for a while now. Dadadada for Ben, Mamamama for me, Uhuhuhuhuh (glottal stops there) for Otto, kagakagakaga for Jollypaws and bababababa for balls. But they aren't generally exclusive, so I wasn't counting them.

But today.... We had stopped at Sheetz from a relative's wake (Oscar U Traini, 69, a favorite cousin and original Trekkie, RIP. I will always fondly remember you). Ben wanted a quick snack on our way back and before we went to pick up our new baby jail pen thing, so he gets out of the car by himself and walks away. Otto, like he always does in that situation, says, "Where Daddy go? Daddy!" Carl, who had just been quietly chilling in the back, like he always does, says in a quiet, questioning little voice: "Uh? Uh? Dada?" Very unmistakable! Good baby!

In other news, Ben now seems to be completely recovered from the flu (or whatever it was) he caught at War Practice, and I am mostly over it. It was yucky, and I am very, very glad the kids didn't get it.

In further other news, Welcome Karl Canne! Excellent choice of name, there.

Your results:
You are Beverly Crusher

Beverly Crusher 70% Uhura 65% Deanna Troi 65% Chekov 60% Will Riker 60% James T. Kirk (Captain) 55% Geordi LaForge 45% Spock 44% Jean-Luc Picard 35% Data 32% Mr. Scott 30% Mr. Sulu 25% An Expendable Character (Redshirt) 25% Leonard McCoy (Bones) 20% Worf 20%

A good physician and a caring parent. You are devoted to your children and to your occupation.

Click here to take the Star Trek Personality Test

Ben bought a factory-refurbished TomTom online a little while ago and it arrived today.  I have to say, it's an interesting and very helpful little device, especially to someone like me who really, really stresses out about directions.  It was only $80 since it was not "new".  I like it! 

You know, I spent nearly that much on formula and diapers and wipes today at Sam's.  Just 2 more months until Carl is off of formula.  And maybe, just maybe, Otto will be out of diapers, too.  We'll see how this weekend goes.  Potty training ahoy! This episode: Adding Pants.  Seriously.  I did the naked training, and that kid totally is potty trained.  But only when he's naked....  

I was reading a blog about people who decide not to vaccinate their children.  If you are reading this, and you haven't vaccinated your child, I will be honest: I think you are wrong and putting both your family and the public's health at risk.  Below is my reply to someone on the blog wondering if they should vaccinate their baby or not:

Do not live your life in fear. Everything has risks.  Everything.  Vaccinating has risks.  Not vaccinating has risks.  You risk your child dying in a car accident everytime you strap him into his carseat.  You risk him being abducted everytime you turn for even a split second.  You risk him breaking his neck and being paralyzed for life the first (and second, and every) time he uses the stairs.  And on and on. You CANNOT put your child in a bubble, and you cannot protect him for everything, no matter how much you want to.  Being a mom is really scary.  Really, really scary, because there is always a risk that something will happen to your angel.

The very best thing you can do is weigh the risks and go with the course with risks you are comfortable with.  With vaccinations, for me, it is simply a numbers game.  If I did not vaccinate, then my child is more likely to catch a serious, debilitating, deadly disease than if I did vaccinate.  Easy one. Vaccinate.  Is there a chance of nasty side effects with vaccinations? Yes. Is there a greater chance of getting the nasty disease without the vaccinations. YES! Either way, you don't get a zero chance of illness.  So pick the option with LESS chance of illness.  Vaccination.

And to the people that say we have a "natural" immunity to these diseases, that is a giant load of hooey.  Millions and millions of people in the world over the years die from these diseases.  IF we had natural immunities, then we wouldn't have epidemics or pandemics. Common sense! It is true that some diseases aren't really found in the west anymore, like Polio, but that is because of vaccinating.  Eradicating disease through vaccination simply does not work if a lot of people don't do it.  Vaccinations are not a simple "personal" choice.  It's a choice about the welfare of your society and your community, as well as the health of your child.

Otto had his second haircut today.  Poor baby.  He hates haircuts!

Today I - made brandied mushrooms amd pot roast! Yum!
Today Carl - learned to clap his hands! Cute!
Today Otto - used the potty of his own free will! Success!

Bonus: Today the Door-to-Door Christian Missionaries - got a 45-minute long earful about the early church,  the gnostics, and misogeny and beauracracy in the Middle Ages.  Heh heh.  They did not know what to make of me!  Serves them right for interrupting me while I was potty training Otto.  They gave me a pamphlet and a promise to look up "gnostic" on wikipedia.  That was fun.

Carl stood unsupported today! WooHoo! That's my Baby! And... Oh god, no!  Not two of them mobile!

I would like to relay a story about Otto.  First, though: Otto is just about two years old, and his vocabulary is expanding exponentially.  I mean, it's CRAZY how many words he's learning - and FAST! He knows all kinds of words I didn't teach him (pink, nasty, dirty), and words I didn't mean to teach him (dude, shut up).  He doesn't speak perfectly clearly, but you can usually get what he's saying from context.

So we were at the pediatrician's office (very nice, huge aquarium in the middle of the waiting room), and Otto looks toward the aquarium and says at the top of his precious, sweet little voice, "FUUUUUUUUK!!!"  There was half a second of silence while all eyes, adult and child alike turned to stare at him while my heart rapidly sunk to the soles of my feet.  I was just inhaling to say...I dunno...something...I hadn't decided, when Otto runs toward the closest corner of the aquarium, where there is a big FROG, and says, "FRUUUKKGG, WRIB-BIT! WRIB-BIT!!" Ah...that explains that.

I did not teach him "frog", either.

Otto is talking in his sleep.  It is SO cute! He's a little hard for other people to understand, but translation: "I'm sorry, Mommy.  Outside.  MY shoe MY shoe!  Otto's burger.  Want down, please."

More random bits about Otto: Even in daylight, the kid totally talks up a storm.  He uses "Please", "Thank you", "Welcome" and "Sorry" really well and mostly in appropriate cases.  And he can sing the ABC song and count to 11, courtesy of daycare.  He has an excellent sense of pitch and rhythm, and grooves in time to most songs that he likes.  He's partial to My Chemical Romance and U2.  Takes after Mommy there.  Ben bought him a little (non-expensive) drumset for his birthday on the 30th, and I can't wait to see him play!  He recently had pinkeye, which was annoying, since he gave it to me and Ben, too, but we're all better now.  His appetite is much smaller now that he's not growing so fast, and he has an unhealthy obsession with candy and chocolate milk.  Also takes after his Mommy there.  We indulge him with the chocolate milk about twice a week, and the candy much less often, though we let him have his fill on Easter.  He looked like a chipmunk with all the Jellybeans stuffed into his mouth!  Precious little boy!  Next up - potty training! We were going to wait a little longer, but he seems interested in it now, watching the older kids at daycare

Random bits about Carl: We've taken to calling him "Carl-bear" or "Bear" or "The Bear".  He's just so squeezy-good like a Teddy Bear!  He has changed SO MUCH just in the past month.  He has exactly one tooth on the bottom, which he uses with a vengence on crackers and cheerios, and he's starting to get annoyed with baby food, since he can't chew it.  My boys are chewers!  He just had his 9-month check-up, and to quote the doc: "This cute little guy is really thriving!"  He's tall, though - 75th percentile - so is wearing 12 month stuff already.  Gonna have to pawn some baby clothes off on someone.  He's almost got his pincer grip down pat, which he uses to eat (chew on, really) paper.  Him and the cat - what is it about eating paper!?  The most exciting thing, though, is the pulling up and standing.  He's even starting to cruise the furniture! He'll be walking by Pennsic! Also, he sounds like an angry old Japanse midget when he gets annoyed.  It's so cute!

Hmmm, I need to get a new Pic for them....