Donovan's Wonder Blog

Monday we had a stay-inside day. It was raining out, so Mom and I caught up on the dishes.

Mom is getting really good at snapping these pictures on her way to pick me up from doing something she doesn't agree with.

Mom & I finished the tuna helper for lunch.

When she heats things up, she sticks them in the fridge or freezer for a few minutes to cool them down enough for me to handle.

I did some walking and exploring. I am actually climbing OVER the walker, not out of it in this picture.


I'm walking all over now. I can walk from the living room into the kitchen with no problems now.

Occasionally Mom still puts me in the walker to help me focus on finishing a meal, but she's saying it might be time to wash it up and pack it away until Aunt Cindy needs it back. By the way, Aunt Cindy, thanks again for letting us borrow it.

Mom says Mary Kay might buy me a High-Chair for my birthday. I don't think I'm supposed to know that, yet, but I've overheard her telling people on the phone, and I understand more than she knows already.

Today we went to the playroom where they have toddler time and we played with other kids...well, actually Mom interacted with the other children more than I did - I was more interested in chewing on those spongy blocks they have. They feel nice on my teeth.

Mom took them away before I actually bit any chunks off of them.

When we got home, we took a nap and then we went to see the ladies at the WIC office. They told Mom she was underweight. (93 lbs.) Mom was surprised and concerned. Like I said, she eats constantly. They said she's not eating the right stuff and taught her what she was supposed to be eating. I thought moms knew these things, but I guess mine forgot. I guess sometimes mommies could use mommies, too.


Later we had a nectarine. I mean, Mom cut one up and I ate it. It was pretty good. Mom says they're usually better than the one I had today. I am looking forward to trying more, then, because I enjoyed this one so much, I had eaten the slices she gave me before she could peel the next one. She thought it was funny.

She also baked a sweet potato for dinner. We both enjoyed it quite well. I got to sit at the big table with Mom to eat. Normally she eats at the computer & I eat in my walker or stroller.

I ate with my hands first.

Then with a fork.


I have to say it was enjoyable both ways.

This morning Mom and I went to check out a church about 30 miles away. It was okay. There were no other kids there, but there were lots of grandmas, and I had fun with them while Mom got to talk to the lady in charge.

They gave Mom a brochure that had a picture of a kitty on the cover. I pointed to it and told her so. My word for Kitty sounds like I'm forcefully whispering "Kee".

I slept on the way home, and Mom got some gardening done while I slept in the carseat after we got home. When I woke up, she brought me inside to run amok.

I'm walking more and more, taking up to 10 or more steps at a time, now.

We shared a baked yum for lunch. It was yammy. :)

That's funny!

I'm getting better and better all the time about not throwing my plate on the floor until I've taken the food I want off of it.

Peek-a-boo!

After lunch I helped load the dishwasher.

Mom and I spent some indoor time today. I was in a cuddly mood. I nursed a lot again, and of course I got into everything while I wasn't nursing.

Something I decided I liked to do today was wave at pictures of Daddy.

This evening Mom and I had tuna helper for dinner. Because it's made with milk, Mom says she's going to be watching me closely for any kind of allergic reaction. Hopefully everything will be okay, though.

I finished my entire portion without ditching my plate. Like I said, I'm getting good at these things.

Mom says with this track record, she might start giving me a fork to feed myself with, too. Now that would be nice.

Tonight when I went to bed, Alex made noise and woke me twice. Both times when Mom came in to help me get back to sleep, I told her it was his fault. I said "Kee." She was impressed. She says this might qualify as my first word because it is a "linguistic vocalization used consistently to mean the same thing."

I think she was just trying to remind me she still has a bigger vocabulary than I do.

Friday we just hung out around the house for the most part. I was happy to be able to wear a decent outfit again. No more jammies all day.

Mom got some more gardening done and I yelled instructions from my stroller and waved at the neighbors driving by.

Mom made an interesting concoction for lunch. She spread some of my pasta primavera between a couple pieces of bread and called it sandwiches.

I started to eat it while she was making her own sandwich, but then she took it away and threw all the bread away because she said she found something growing on the bread. Yeah, it would have been me if she would have let me finish my lunch.

It was okay, though. She made spaghetti instead. That's fun, too. My appetite is kind of small right now because of my teeth coming in. I nurse a lot more than usual, too. Mom says that means I'm getting enough nutrients, but it makes her hungry all the time, and every time she eats, she tries to feed me, too.

It's not fair. She's the one with the appetite, and I'm the one with the pudge. Oh, well, I wear it well.

Of course we couldn't get through the day without taking a walk. We returned the laundry basket to the place where they left our laundry for us.

Later Mom actually got a photo of me on the ladder like I was trying to show you on Thursday.

See, I told you I look cool.

Then we split a pear. Actually, Mom cut it up and I ate most of it. I saw her sneak a couple of bites, but she was fixated on some chocolate candies instead.

Saturday we went to Lenny's Birthday party. Everyone sang that same song again. It seems to be a common theme at Birthday parties.

I wasn't interested in the cake, but Mom gave me some pizza crust and I thought that was pretty good.

But what is really cool is that Lenny's family has all sorts of animals. They have a horse and chickens and a really cool cat and a billy goat! After taking this picture, the billy goat tried to eat Mom's hair. She thought it was funny once he let go. She said it hurt her a little bit, though.

I'm glad he didn't get ahold of my little piggies like he was trying to. I'm not sure if that would hurt or tickle, but I don't think I want to know, really.





Tonight before bed Mom and I played in my room. She kept trying to get a picture of me walking, but I kept falling down before the photo would take.







I get all excited when I'm walking to her, and I'm starting to get braver and walk to where I want to now, too.

At one point this afternoon, Lenny took a toy I was playing with. I didn't cry, though. I got up and followed Lenny (walking) halfway across the room and took it back.

Mom says I'm a tough guy, and that's why I don't cry. She's wrong, though. I'm just smart. If I cried over every little thing, I would be wasting so much time that I could be using to explore other things.

I spent the day in my pajamas again. That was because our laundry still wasn't back this morning.

But I started the day out by playing my recorder. It's good and noisy. A surefire way to wake up the whole neighborhood.

Then since we had a hard time sleeping last night we took what Mom calls a "massive nap." It was almost 2 hours long. I felt great afterwards.

We went for a walk this afternoon to see if we had any mail and if our laundry was back yet. It wasn't.

When we went back, Mom did some gardening and I watched. When the neighbors drove by, I waved.

Later we took a short ride. I was so groggy by the time we got back into the neighborhood that Mom just drove around the block a couple of extra times and I fell asleep in my carseat. Mom was nice and didn't wake me. She just busied herself with some gardening near the truck while she waited for me to wake up.



This evening she let me feed myself a little bit, but she didn't want me messing up my pj's, so she took over before I got too far into it.


Then she played peek-a-boo with me around the refrigerator door. It made me laugh.






So then I made Mom laugh by tickling her little piggies.








I keep trying to convince Mom that not only is the paper in the bathroom a great source of amusement, but a great source of fiber also. You wouldn't believe what she thinks it's for!

She was trying to flush some down the toilet again, today, but I caught her. I grabbed one of her nice smelly lotions and tossed it in just before she pressed the lever.

She was upset. That will teach her, though. Maybe she ought to consider the value of the things she tries to flush away.







I tried to climb the ladder that our neighbors loaned us. Mom tried to take a picture.

Well, there's a small delay on the camera's shutter, and I swear, I was standing on the ladder when Mom pressed the button. Looking pretty cool, too. Oh, well. Not a big deal. I didn't even think it was worth crying over.

Note to self: not everything with a hole in it is a wind instrument. No matter how hard you blow, some things just don't make noise. (This bottle is empty. It's a mixing bottle that hasn't been used yet.)




This evening I did a little work on one of my toys. I had to check it's allignment. I figure if I'm going to learn to work on big boats like Daddy does one day, I gotta start somewhere.

Tonight when I went to bed, I woke up after a little bit. Our neighbor lady came upstairs to get me and said that Mom was out picking her daughter up from work. Well, a few minutes later Mom walked through the door with a big smile on her face and a basket of laundry in her hands. It was the laundry that had been taken from us last week! Almost all of my onesies and sweatshirts are in there, not to mention my socks and several of Mom's items, too. We are so happy!

Mom says now I don't have to spend the whole day in my jammies anymore. Thank goodness! I was tired of trying to keep clean all day long!

It's just not natural.

This morning we went to Toddler Time. It was hopping! There were probably 12 or more kids there. Some of them were twins and triplets, so they didn't each bring a mommy of their own, but there were lots of people.

On our way home Mom stopped by the beach and we tried to find some tide pools. It was so nice. It wasn't very cold at all. We didn't find any tide pools, but we did find some cool rocks. Mom says she's going to put them in the garden.

When we got home, we took a nap.

Then Charlie and his mom came to visit us. We had so much fun. Charlie and I kept taking eachother's drinks. See, I had juice and Charlie had milk (from a cow - I can see why it's drank from a cup instead of from the source, like mama-milk.) and we both preferred the other's beverage. Mom says I'm still too young for cow-milk, though.

Charlie and I get along great. We played "boo" through my playpen. Charlie showed me how to stick my face into the netting to look around the corner.


It was funny. We laughed a lot.

Charlie also liked the decor in my bedroom. He loved the stars floating in the air. I'm quite fond of them, too. Mom is starting to use the sign for "star." I think she wants me too, also. We'll see.

When they left Mom and I did some gardening. Mom was taking the big stones out of the dirt and throwing them over to the driveway. They were tumbling and thumping and doing all sorts of funny things. I was BUSTING UP!


Mom said I needed a nap this afternoon, but I disagreed. After trying to nurse me to sleep for quite some time (during which I tried standing up while nursing, getting out of the chair, rolling over while nursing and pulling out a handful of Mom's hair) Mom conceded that a nap wasn't a good idea, after all.

We went for a walk instead. It got cold, though, so we didn't go very far.

I'm teething right now, so I have been a bit fussy. I was crying at Mom when she was trying to make some phone calls to clients this evening. I can't help it, I just want to be the center of her universe. It can be a big universe with lots of stuff in it. I just want to be the center.

I also wake up almost every 45 minutes at night. Mom is very patient and always comes up to nurse me back to sleep. She says she can see the white spots on my gums where at least 2 more teeth are trying to come through.

I appreciate her coming to me when I stir. I seem to get congested pretty easy right now, too, and the nursing helps me clear that out. Mom says that's just part of teething. Plus it's nice to cuddle when you're not feeling so hot.

To show my gratitude, I've stopped biting her while nursing. (Don't think I'm not tempted, my mouth is pretty sore.) And I also make sure I give her lots of kisses and hugs throughout the day. Sometimes I even take a few steps on my own to get to her and kiss her.

She deserves it. Teething isn't easy on either of us.

Wow, gotta do some catching up on the blogging. Sorry about not being better about the daily posting.

Anyway, Monday I spend the day in my pajamas. Mom said it was one less thing for her to wash, and we don't have a lot of options for me to wear right now. I still intend to get as messy as possible, so she's going to just have to figure something out.

We had macaroni & cheese for lunch. Mom didn't want to finish hers, so I took care of it for her.

We also went for a walk around the community. In the mail room we put up a nice note to the people who took our clothes asking for them to return them, please.

Also, Monday I learned how to blow into a recorder to make a whistle noise. I was so proud to be able to figure it out. Mom says I'll get better as time goes along. She says she's surprised that she isn't bothered by it. She is bothered by the fact that every time she's playing on the keyboard, I turn it off.

Well, she's no Bach.

Later that evening Mom put on a movie. Shreck 2, in fact. That little TV thing is kind of neat. And I got the best seat in the house. I just wish they made them bigger.

I wonder why Mom only turns it on once or twice a month.

Tuesday morning we went swimming with Charlie and his mom. The pool was indoors and heated, so it was pretty enjoyable. I like to float and generally chill out in the water. Mom holds on to me pretty well. The only problem is that she's got my morning snack half displayed and she won't let me have any.

By the way, she let me pick out my swim trunks. While we were at Wal-Mart the other day, she held up 5 pairs and said "you choose." I picked the camouflage ones with the sharks on them. They're cool. Mom says they're not the ones she would have picked out, but she respected my decision. I was pretty clear about my preference, though. I picked them out immediately and turned to put them in the cart right away. She said, "okay, then, if that's your decision," and put the others back. I didn't fuss because my mind was made up. Like I said, they're cool! I can't believe she didn't get a better picture of them. Don't get me started.

Charlie thought they were cool, too. He and his mom had lots of fun also.












"Hey, Dude, You got some water draining from your ear, there."




After the pool, we went across to join the Parent Cafe at the Toddler Time place. Charlie and I went into the playroom with the other children.

All that before noon!
It was a great morning. I love it when Mom's spontaneous.

Pizza again for lunch. Yawn.

This afternoon we went for a walk. It wasn't a very long one, but it was nice. Then I watched Mom do some more gardening. She says she made good progress today, and that's a great thing because the sunny weather is only forecasted to last a few more days.

Later I played with the watering can. I dumped all the water in my tray. Mom looked like she was going to be upset, but then she just said, "worst case scenario, you get wet, you put your pjs on early."

Well, sometimes that's just how it goes.