A few cute updates...

This is likely to sound a bit disjointed...and I guess it is, but I wanted to post a few cute stories about Joshua over the past day or so.

"Mickey Sick"
I keep forgetting to write about this, but perhaps Joshua has some future medical school aspirations. When we left for the wedding in New Jersey, Nana came with a new musical set in tow for him to play with. Interestingly enough, he's enjoyed playing with the music stuff, but he seems to think that it's doctor equipment. He'll tell me that "Mickey's sick", lay him down on the couch or on the floor, and then start "checking" things. Last night he said "check body", "check ears", "check tummy" while poking at Mickey with his clapper and maracas. Very strange. We'll keep the hopes alive for scholarships to college and medical school.

"What time is?"
Joshua is famous for his questions, but lately he's been holding up his arm to look at his watch (which he doesn't have, by the way) and then asks, "Mommy, what time is?" I have no idea why he's so concerned with the time, especially considering he doesn't have a social calendar or a sports schedule to keep up with yet. I don't know, maybe he has a date or something. It's very cute.

"Chinchilla"
I seriously did not know what a chinchilla was until my not-quite-two-year-old taught me last night. He was coloring in a Diego coloring book and all of a sudden pointed out a picture of a chinchilla to both Jason and I. Seriously...a chinchilla. Now that's necessary knowledge isn't it?

"Holy Moly"
I had to laugh last evening and Joshua running around the house saying "Holy Moly" at everything. Mostly I think he likes it because it rhymes and he seems to be big on rhyming things right now, usually he giggles and carries on at how funny it sounds that he's making rhymes, although they usually don't make much sense (like "schmooky hooky" and "poop hoop" and things like that to get a giggle out of you). But last night it was "Holy Moly" and he continued to be enamored with the phrase this morning before I left for the office.

We'll see what new little things he has in store for us tonight! Maybe some pictures tomorrow...

Can you see me now?

My picture woes continue--- although I hope it's just the State Farm Powers who are frowning on me for taking a break from insurance and posting photos of my favorite little subject. So, I'm trying a new route. Hopefully this works.

This picture is of Joshua yesterday before breakfast. His favorite story to read right now is "The Poky Little Puppy". Actually, if I'm being honest, this has been a favorite of his for a long time, but I tire of it so quickly that I'll hide it until he forgets about it. (Another Mommy confession.) Well, it was found last week and we've been reading it hundreds of times a day. The good news is that Joshua is basically reading it to himself these days. He literally has the first two pages memorized---- it makes my head spin to listen to him reading to himself. I know it's all memorization, and we're not dealing with moments of brilliance, but it's still impressive. I thought it was funny that he wasn't even sitting down in the picture, just hunkering down in his pajamas to read.

Picture Overload

Maybe this barrage of photos will somehow make up for the lack of new "material" over the past week or so. Between these pictures (the best of the past few weeks) and the video of Joshua's singing, I hope everyone can get their fill of our little guy. I'm hoping that this upload will work, but I've had zero luck uploading photos from the office lately. If you can't see these pictures, please leave a comment or shoot me an email. But hopefully here ends the mystery. Perhaps my complications uploading pics from the office is a sign that I really shouldn't be doing that on my work time...darn.

Joshua is having a very "off" day. I think the cold has him down, and I'm hoping like heck that he doesn't have an ear infection. He woke up this morning fussing, and he's been very agitated all day. Every little thing makes him cry. Lunch turned into a huge ordeal because he didn't like Jason standing close to him while he was getting something out of the pantry. So he went into all out hysterics that lasted for at least 10 minutes. After he was done, he sat nicely in his high chair and downed almost an entire can of noodle soup. I have no idea what's going on, but I'm guessing that he's just having a crummy day with the cold. I wish we could do something to make it better. We're running our usual course of Ocean Drops, but it doesn't seem to be helping much this time. No fever to speak of...yet.

We're entering a whole new phase of temper tantrums these last two days. I'm coping by telling myself that it's just the cold magnifying his frustrations, but oh my goodness. It's really something. We've been sitting on the steps at least 3 times in the past two days because of Joshua hitting me when I tell him no. He's also getting this nasty scream when he doesn't get his way---- like he just has to let the frustration out somehow, and yelling is the best way to get it off his chest. Let's just say Mommy isn't a fan. Terrible 2's...here we come.

The little monster is now sound asleep upstairs. Our no nap theory didn't last too long. We're back into about an hour nap in the afternoons along with some better sleep in the evenings. Thank goodness. We'll take small victories where we can find them.

OK- off to tackle the rest of the to do list while he's still in dreamland. Hopefully he awakes in a much better mood than when he went to sleep. I seriously considered running away from home earlier.

Taking a stab at video...

The following video is of Joshua singing "Rock A Bye Baby". It may not sound recognizable at first, but he's singing the last words of each line. I have no idea how his little mind works...but it's still precious.

Enjoy! It's not too often that we get video clips short enough to upload.

Picture Troubles...

I don't know what's going on with the Blogger site, but I've been having a terrible time uploading photos to the site. So, my apologies for the lack of photos of Joshua's latest adventures, but I'm working on it (though I'm at a bit of a technological disadvantage seeing as how this isn't my area of expertise...at all).

In terms of updates for him, I can share that our sleeping situation has improved dramatically since I last posted. Joshua seems to have taken like a fish to water with his new big boy bed. He is now starting to tell you that he wants to lay down in his big bed when he's tired. I see this as our first opportunity to start to wean him away from the "fall-asleep-in-Mommy's-lap" syndrome that we have. He's still waking in the middle of the night, but for much shorter periods of time. I believe he woke 3 times last night, but the longest we were awake was 45 minutes. A vast improvement for sure.

Daddy taught Joshua a few new words. I wish I could upload video, because this is priceless. When I came home from a very hard day at the office on Tuesday (more about that in a minute) Joshua greeted me with 3 new words from a book that Jason was reading with him. He showed me a picture of a "hoppo-potto-moose" and a "rhi-nocerous" (the "nocerous" part gets said very fast after a drawn out "rhiiiiiiiiii") and a "baboon". Now, aren't those three very useful words to know when you're 21 months old? The next morning, the first thing he asked for was that book because he had to "find hoppo-potto-moose".

Joshua made great friends with the air duct cleaner the other day when he was to our house to do a good cleaning on the dusty ducts. He's still talking about the man's "big BIG sweeper". From what I hear, he followed him all around the house and was "helping" as much as an almost two year old can help and talking to his new buddy Jim the whole time.

Joshua and I now have shared a nasty cold with each other, so we're suffering with that together. It continues to amaze me that he can run around full tilt with a snotty nose and not seem to mind. He's getting a little fussy a little easier than normal, but all in all, he's handling it OK. We've been lucky with how infrequently he's been sick, so hopefully this will pass quickly.

I mentioned my tough day on Tuesday, and I think it warrants mentioning here. I seem to write down the happenings in our life here with more clarity than I can speak of them. And this has been weighing heavily on my heart all week. Everyone knows that my career as a State Farm Agent has always been something that I take seriously, but I've always watched total devastation from afar, as my dad helped clients through house fires and similar situations. Well, at 11:00 on Tuesday morning, I got "the call" that sent me rushing to the scene of a house fire to stand with clients as we watched the fire department try unsuccessfully to save their home. The family is a super one- and one that I've really enjoyed getting to know. They have 5 children, all of whom ran from the home without even shoes on their feet when they realized that there was a fire in the garage. They sat in the front yard of their home, watching everything they love burning to ashes. Within minutes the entire house was engulfed with flames. I got involved immediately in taking money to their bank for them to have immediate funds available for necessaries, and then I started locating hotel rooms (not an easy task during the Little League World Series). I redirected a few shipments of new school shoes that were coming for the kids to start school in and cancelled the delivery of 2 new sofas that were coming the next day. And so, my firsthand experience of handling a total, devastating fire loss has begun. I spent yesterday at the fire scene with the family and the fire investigators to locate the source of the fire- a refrigerator in their garage. We began the process of inventorying their personal belongings- an utterly overwhelming task. Can you even imagine having to write down every single thing that is in your home? So if you haven't taken video or pictures or written down the specifics of your electronics, do it now and store it outside of your home.

The whole thing makes me so thankful for a whole bunch of blessings in my life. I'm so thankful to be in this career and to have the opportunity to be a help to this family. Today we've found them a home to live in, all by connections in this little, wonderful community I'm a part of. I'm thankful for our home...it's no Taj Mahal, but we're comfortable and we're safe and I realize that having a place to call home isn't something to take for granted when you compare it to the longing that this family has for a roof over their head that isn't a hotel room ceiling. Watching how quickly things can change just puts things into perspective...and it truly has been that way for me this week.

So, from hoppo-potto-mooses to house fires, I feel like we've run the gamut of emotions so far this week. Keep this family in your prayers, please. More soon.

Fun Picture...

Aunt Libby made me smile this afternoon when she sent me this picture of Joshua from our last trip to Lewistown when we visited to see Brooke's nursery. He plopped himself down on Libby's steps and flashed that smile at us. It looks a little devilish to me, but there's no doubt that he has a little spunk in him. I should note that I believe this was the only time he was still in the entire time we were at Libby's. The rest of the time he was TOUCHING everything in her house...he just couldn't help himself.

I hope it made you smile as well. More soon...

Progress....slow but steady!

The strategy of plugging through the sleep issues seems to be working with some slow, but marked progress. Joshua continues to be excited about sleeping in his "own bed". Last night, he woke up twice (once at 1:30 and once at 3:30), but both times, he fell back to sleep in his bed within 20 minutes without me holding him. Simply amazing for our little sleep troublemaker.

I had to wake him up this morning at 8:00. Unheard of.

And so, I do not claim victory, but simply appreciate the ability to sleep in my own bed with my husband (although I'm not so sure he's happy to have me back...HA!) for at least the large majority of the nighttime hours. Things are starting to make sense again.

On a side note, I've also just learned that our family photo is going to be featured in this year's United Way campaign brochures that are being mailed to every household and every business in Union County. Jason, Joshua and I donned our "Live United" T-shirts and had photos taken at the Lewisburg Studio in May. Since I sit on the board, we were all asked to participate and they asked us to bring Joshua along with us to capture a "young family" shot. So, we did. The picture turned out pretty nice. I'm convinced that we got selected because Joshua is so adorable... If I can figure out how to paste the picture in here, I will. If not, and you don't live in Union County, you'll just have to move here (and quick because the mailers go out right after Labor Day).

Tonight is a leftover lasagna night for supper, so perhaps I'll try to snap a picture of Joshua and his sauce...it's never pretty, but he does scarf it down like a champ. He IS genetically related to me after all!

A big boy...

The sleep strike appears to be lifting on Greenbriar Drive. After an absolutely horrendous night with Joshua on Friday night, we decided that we needed to do SOMETHING, ANYTHING that might help our little buddy get over whatever has been giving him fits. Jason's suggestion was to attempt the toddler bed, so that's what we did. And (oh my goodness, he's going to LOVE seeing this in print) he was right, at least it appears that way so far.

Saturday afternoon after Joshua's nap, we took a trip to the mall and Target to find Joshua a pillow of his very own, and to search for a few of the necessaries that we'd need to make this change. Incidently, do you have any idea how hard it is to find toddler sheet sets? Yikes. I have two on order from online, but apparently that's not something that you just stumble onto at a regular store. We picked up a pillow for him and some additional safety gates for his doorway, and then ventured home to make the transformation.

Right away, Joshua was enamored with his new big boy bed. He kept saying "Daddy made BIG BED" and "I Big Boy!" He immediately wanted to read books in his bed and sat for what I thought was a pretty long time for a 21 month old, reading to himself and to Bear. He made it pretty much the whole way through "Ucky Are" (Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are by Dr. Seuss) reading to himself. That's a 30 page book...and he knows it all.

When it came time for bedtime, I was a little nervous, but continued with our bedtime routine as normal. Tubby (time to play in the bubbles with Elmo and Dorothy), Hippety Hop towel time, PJ's, downstairs to say goodnight to Daddy and get Bear and milk, and then back upstairs to his room for stories and sleep. He drifted off easily and didn't move a muscle when I went to lay him down in his bed for the night. He woke once at 1:30, but was back to sleep by 2:30 and didn't rise until 6:30 Sunday morning.

Naptime was a dream yesterday. He went down easily, even talking about his big boy bed during lunch and play time leading up to it. And he slept like a prince for 2 hours. The pictures I snapped were from Sunday's nap time (during and after).

Last night was better. He woke up around 1 crying for me. But when I went in to see him, he stayed in his bed, trying to fall back to sleep on his own for about a half hour before saying "Mommy hold...rocking chair". So we rocked for a little while, and he was snoring in my arms in less than a half hour. (In Joshua terms, this is a VAST improvement!) So, the good news is that we've broken that nasty "Mommy can't keep her eyes open so we're going to the spare bed" catastrophe, and we're both getting more sleep than we have in weeks. Joshua was still snoring away when I left for my meeting at 7:45 this morning. Poor little buddy has some catching up to do.

T-minus 5 wakeups until the big weekend adventure without Joshua. Jason asked yesterday if I was having a nervous breakdown about it. I think it's only a minor one...but yes. I know he'll be perfectly fine with Aunt Libby (and Uncle Zig and Nana on their assigned shifts in case Libby happens to go into spontaneous labor), but I still hate the idea of missing him that badly for two whole nights. We'll all live, I'm sure. But I'll be anxious to get home on Monday....understatement of the year.

Enjoy the pictures!

"An octagon has..."

"eight sides."

I had to seriously think about this yesterday morning when Joshua said it. And he was, in fact, correct. Don't ask me where he got it, but that's what he said. Jason and I joke all the time that it gets pretty scary when your kids are smarter than you are, and we're evidently getting closer than I'd like.

I really intended to grab a few new pictures of Josh this morning to share. But it didn't work out that way. Starting the laundry and fighting with him to eat his oatmeal took priority. I bribed him into eating his breakfast by looking at a catalog that had come to the house with Halloween stuff in it. He took great pleasure in pointing out every candle, which he calls "birthday candles" and every pumpkin. I also taught him how to say "Frankenstein", which I was quite proud of.

I hope I didn't sound overconfident in my post yesterday about our complete night of sleep (with the aid of a little Tylenol). Last night, my little night owl cried for me at 2:30 and was impossible to get back in bed. 6 different times I tried to put him back into his crib after he was snoring again, and 6 times he woke back up. He ended up in the spare bed and and slept fine as long as I was with him. This is bordering on ridiculous. I just wish I could figure out what's causing him to wake up and not be able to go back to sleep like he has been doing for the past six months. Grrr. He was still sound asleep when I woke up at 6:00 and needed to get ready for the day. So, I piled every pillow I could find around the sides of the bed, gated the top of the steps, and hoped like heck that he didn't roll out and break a bone. Jason was keeping an ear open, but isn't feeling well and needed some sleep too. Luckily it all worked out just fine, but if I told you I wasn't nervous, I'd be lying.

Oh the joys of toddlers....

Confessions of a Tired Mama...

I have a confession to make.

Last night, I put our son into a Tylenol induced coma to entice him into sleeping through the night again.

It's really not as bad as it sounds. The sleep situation has gotten complicated enough at our house that we needed to do something different last evening. Joshua's night waking has been a new routine, which has ended in my weakness (and delirium) with a visit to the spare bedroom where we both fall asleep. I'm deathly afraid that I'm creating a monster, so I decided that last night was the end of it. Even in all of his (many) night time wake ups, I've always stood relatively firm to the idea that I didn't want him in our bed with us. So I don't have the foggiest idea what's caused me to soften up in the last week or so. Could it be that two years of this nonsense (and that's not counting the 40 weeks of being up 16 times a night to pee) is finally wearing me out?

Joshua and I had a nice talk after his bath last night. We talked about how he was such a big boy, and that I knew he was able to sleep all night in his bed. Since he's so incredibly verbal, I know he understood at least parts of what I was saying. Heck, he was repeating most of it back to me. He kept saying "Josh big boy...sleep bed all night". I told him how proud of him we would be if he stayed in his bed without crying in the middle of the night. He'd say "no crying...bed all night". I felt like we were on the same page.

I keep thinking that he's waking up in the middle of the night with some kind of pain from his molars, and that's what's making it too hard for him to put himself back to sleep on his own like he's been doing for the past 6 months or so. So I decided to try a little bit fo Tylenol. One part of my brain says that it's the stupidest thing--- Tylenol would be out of his system before his normal night waking times began. But on the other hand, would it make him so sleepy that he could get into a deeper sleep and maybe not wake up at all?

I heard two peeps out of the little man last night. One at 4:30 and one at 5:30. Neither materialized into anything. He called for me at 7:00 this morning with a big smile on his face when I came into his room. And all was right with the world again. While I'm not delusional enough to think that we've conquered anything earth shattering, I am thankful for one solid, uninterrupted night's sleep. We'll try it tonight without Tylenol and see what happens.

We're tossing around the idea of moving him from his crib to the toddler bed, but I'm not sure that I'm ready for that quite yet. Although, last night he jumped up into the spare bed, laid his head on the pillow, pulled the blanket up over him and said "Night Night Mama", which led me to believe that he's showing some interest in that. One plus would be that we could lay him down in bed and sit with him to read while he fell asleep IN HIS BED as opposed to in our arms. But, the downside is that he's not showing any signs of being a climber, nor is he unhappy in his crib, and it's literally the only safe zone we have for him in the house right now that he can't get out of. Who knows. Regardless, I don't think we'll be making any changes in the setup until after our weekend away next weekend for the wedding. No sense making it any harder on Aunt Libby than it needs to be.

This sleep training stuff is tough business. I had no idea...none...that the toddler sleeping issues would be more complex than the newborn ones. But we're doing the best we can.

Thanks Danaca!

I couldn't resist sharing these photos that I received today from my new favorite photographer, Danaca! Seeing the quality on these photos makes me want to add her camera to my Santa Claus wish list this year. Wow! These were taken during Cousins Day 2008 in July and I just love them, particularly the one that I call "Check Mail" (I hope Lindsay saw that!)

All in the Dugan household are recovering from the weekend. Joshua is making it a bit more difficult than I'd prefer with his newest sleeping antics. I'm telling you what--- this kid and his sleeping! I'm beginning to think that I'm getting paid back for the kind of sleeper I was for my parents...and I sense that I'll have the same kinds of stories and sentiments to share in 30 years that they do about me in my younger years. Trust me, they're not endearing stories. This is going to sound really silly to anyone who doesn't know what I've been through with my darling son. Last night was actually a little easier than many of the others we've worked through. He woke up crying at 4:30 and didn't end up being asleep enough to move until 6:00 am. Even then, I made Jason move him because I was too chicken to chance him waking up! Every night for about the past week it's been the same idea. He wakes up in the middle of the night and then takes anywhere from an hour to 4 hours to fall back to sleep. As long as you're with him he's OK, but don't even TRY to put him down awake. I'll take any and all suggestions from those with experience. At this point, we're muddling through under the assumption that "this too shall pass". And it better, or else Joshua will forever be an only child. I can't have TWO like this!

Living Large...

The smile on Joshua's face pretty much sums up our weekend. It was a great one, minus the fact that Daddy was away. Joshua and I headed to Lewistown on Friday afternoon partially for the Richard Reunion and partially for backup for Mommy.

Friday afternoon, we went straight to Aunt Libby's house to see Brooke's finished (and beautiful, might I add) nursery. Literally, all they're missing is the baby...and we can't wait! Joshua attempted to rearrange her living room (too many temptations for little fingers) and then we decided to scram. We had a typical evening with Nana and Pap at their house. We sat in the garage, enjoyed the mild August weather, and chased (let me specify- watched Libby chase) Joshua around the driveway. He was happily reunited with his mower, and it was as if they'd been away from each other for years. It was really a week, but he SURE was happy to see that mower again. We visited with Pappy Ray a little bit and had a nice supper together. Tractor rides #1 and #2 happened before bedtime on Friday and Joshua was thrilled! The pictures in his little striped shirt are from one of our many giggle fests this weekend. Joshua was "calling somebody" on Libby's cell phone and thought it was very funny when Zig would make the phone ring. It scared him and he'd quickly hand it off to Libby and then crack up laughing. Simple pleasures...

Saturday morning, Libby, Joshua and I did a quick errand to the Bon Ton and then headed down to the church for the reunion. I wish I could tell you that this is one of our favorite family gatherings, but I can't. I believe Libby was called Megan at least 3 times. And I was called Libby and asked when my baby is due at least 2. And that's precisely why we aren't fond of this particular party---- no one knows us well enough to know who we belong to and in what order we were born. I suppose that's typical of all family reunions....but when it was Joshua's nap time, we took the excuse to get out of dodge. Joshua was a real champ during the picnic. He talked nicely with everyone, read books with Nana and Ne Ne. Swung on the swings with Libby and Stephanie and ate a relatively good lunch. He deserved his nap and he didn't fight it for one second.

Saturday evening, Libby and I treated ourselves to a taco salad from the OIP (a Lewistown favorite of mine) and then played with Joshua around the house. As the evening progressed, we thought about taking Joshua out to the fire house to see Uncle Zig and show him the fire trucks. He loved it. He had that same mesmerized look on his face that he seems to get when he sees something or tries something for the first time that just blows his mind. Uncle Zig let him drive the truck, let him sit in the seats in the back, let him touch the radios and even turned the lights on for him. (He really liked that part and has continued to say "Uncle Zig turn lights on" ever since we got home today.) He tried on Zig's helmet and even rang the bell on the truck. The only scared moment was when Zig tried to give him a "ride" by letting the driver's seat down. His lower lip came out and he cried for a second, but then went right back into ringing the bell. I'd say it was a hit.

Today we headed home and have managed to clean the entire house, put away all of our stuff from the weekend, fold and put away two loads of laundry (with a few more to go), play a whole bunch and get Joshua down for his nap. Daddy is expected home in a few more hours after a very long drive home from Connecticut. Joshua is very excited to see him and has been asking "When Daddy home?" all afternoon. I know he'll be thrilled to see him come walking in the door.

It really was a great weekend. I hope you enjoy the pictures. They capture the fun pretty well, but I wish you could have heard that giggle....it was priceless.

Reading "Hunting and Trapping Digest" while buckled in to Uncle Zig's truck. He loved it!

Richard Reunion...Maitland Church of the Brethren Pavillion

Fizer Trucks with Uncle Zig in Burnham