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Got sneakers?

Posted on September 9, 2008 12:05 am by TheAngelForever

Do you have an older sibling? I am the oldest in my family. I have to admit, I never really paid attention to how my little brother reacted to me when we were really young. As a mommy, I have been watching my little guy try to follow his big brother around. If NHL does something, JSL wants to do it.

A week before Labor Day the boys were outside. I asked JL to bring up NHL’s old push to ride Fisher Price bike to see if the little guy would like it. For some reason we could not get the push handle back on the bike. I told JL just to take it outside to see what JSL would do.

Sure enough he loved it. He was "walking" his bike all over the place. He did not stop moving for most of the time he was outside. He had a blast chasing after his big brother and daddy. There was a little problem, JSL had no real shoes at the time. At that point he was not really walking on his own, so he only had the soft bottom shoes. His froggy shoes were in rough shape anyway, so we just let him use those.

Two days later we went to the doctor for JSL’s 15 month visit. I asked the doctor if we should get him shoes since he was basically ready to walk. She said it was probably a good plan for when he’s outside, but for indoors it did not really matter. That night we packed up the boys and went to get some shoes. We bought NHL a pair of black tie shoes for the Jewish holidays and to have something other than sneakers. And below are JSL’s sneakers.

Labor Day weekend JSL finally started to walk around on his own. Since that time he has gotten better at balancing and can go for much longer distances, bend to get things, and turn around while walking. The problem has been he does not like to walk in his shoes. He was so used to walking with naked toes that the clunky nature of sneakers throws him off.

This weekend we took the sneakers back out again. This time we held his hand and he tolerated the shoes. Last night he was started to get a kick out of wearing them and walking around stores and things with an adult hand.

Today I figured out how to get him to nap in the afternoon. We arrived at school about a half hour before NHL was getting out. I parked the car down a side street and JSL and I walked to school. Thanks to the sidewalks we went all over the place. We walked and walked and walked. The smile on his face as he looked up to me while holding my hand was priceless. I promise, I will get a photo of that soon. When we got back home he was so exhausted he slept for almost two hours!

Categories:
brothers jsl milestone photos play time

Birthday balloon crown for Mimi

Posted on September 8, 2008 9:07 am by TheAngelForever

Today is a special day, it is Mimi’s birthday.

Happy Birthday Mimi!!!!

As I have mentioned before, my boys are extremely close to my grandmother. They see her as often as possible, love to visit her apartment to have chicken soup with matzoh balls (and other goodies), and more important to play and snuggle with her. JSL still loves to sit on her lap where she will sing him to sleep.

Yesterday night we went out to dinner to celebrate Mimi’s birthday. Much to our surprise there was a special someone at the restaurant. It was none other than Mr. Twisty!

When Mr. Twisty heard that it was Mimi’s birthday he was very careful not to ruin the secret. He did not want to bother other people at the restaurant, so he made her a very small birthday crown. Here it is on Mimi’s head.

We all had a lot of laughs thanks to Mr. Twisty. He also made something special for NHL. NHL did not even need to hear the list of possible balloon creation. He immediately asked for a lion. ROAR!

After our delicious meal (thank you Aunt S and Uncle M) we decided to order some cotton candy. I was convinced to let JSL try some of it. At first he did not want anything to do with it, he simply played. Check out what he created.

Unfortunately for us, he soon discovered that the cotton candy was sweet and enjoyed it. Needless to say he was up quite late last night. Apparently the sugar rush got him, but not NHL. Here are both of the boys enjoying.

We all want to wish Mimi a wonderful birthday. We are so glad that you live so close by. The boys and I love spending time with you. We hope to make many more special memories together for years to come.

We love you Mimi!

Categories:
birthday family fun jsl laughs nhl photos yummy

A Knitting Tale

Posted on September 6, 2008 9:36 pm by TheAngelForever

Ooops! I am late blogging again. Not to worry, I have not been sitting around on my head, no I leave that to my kids!

Please note, no toddler was hurt in the taking of that photo. JSL is strange and actually asks us to flip him upside down. If we do not understand this he will bend over and put his head down and bark at us to grant his wish.

Silly me, I decided to work on a hobby that I have been putting on the back burner recently. Of course I am talking about knitting. With both boys home for almost three weeks before kindergarten started, birthday party preparations (including building Mount Dinocake), time with family, a newly walking 15 month old, and of course reading Breaking Dawn – knitting was put on hiatus.

That is not to say that no knitting has been going on. After my summer bloggy giveaway I immediately set to work to make two M&M cloths for my winner. Since she had two children I made one for each in their favorite color to include in my package. This is what I sent to her (along with some pens that were not in the photo):

I have also been making DW Cloths here and there. Tonight I took out the collection of them that I have on hand that have not been given as gifts (whether for birthdays, just because, weddings, bridal showers, baby gifts. . . ) or used by us. I have thirteen of them in a wide variety of colors.

Here is another view of the thirteen DW cloths that remain.

Right now I am going to take a break from the DW cloths to knit a scarf for my niece who turns one in a few short weeks. Something I learned last winter was that they do not make scarves for little toddlers and in our neck of the woods, kids need them! I called my sister-in-law up today to find out what colors would be best. After several conference calls from the yarn store we came up with a lilac color.

Slowly I will play catch up on things that have been going on here, but I wanted to update on my knitty goodness.

Categories:
family jsl knitting me moments photos

Go, Go, Go!!!

Posted on September 3, 2008 12:05 am by TheAngelForever

What do you do when you have a stubborn toddler that refuses to do what you want when it comes to walking?

For weeks now JSL has been SO ready to walk, but he refused to do it. If you even said the "w" word he would immediately drop to a crawl, give a laugh and bolt away from you. Clearly he was showing us that he would do things on his own timeline, not ours!

Note to self: If this is his true colors coming out, then the teen years are going to be mighty fun!

Over the last week we have noticed that when JSL does not think we are watching he will cruise, let go and take 6+ steps at a time. Over the weekend this increased. Now he is trying to pick things up, turn and stand up in the middle of the floor.

When I went to pick JSL up at my grandmother’s today he came out her apartment door and charged at me on two feet down the hall. It was so sweet to see how excited he got.

So how did we FINALLY get the breakthough? We were quite creative. Rather than asking JSL to "walk" to us we said to come here or used his favorite new demand to us "GO!" We told him to "go, go, go" and he went!

JL was able to get some video of the little guy charging around and chanting "go go go" tonight.

It has been so much fun to watch JSL reach this huge milestone. He is quickly getting more balance, but his need for speed often causes him to fall and restart his adventure.

Categories:
jsl milestone video

Mistake of driveway proportions

Posted on September 1, 2008 10:28 pm by TheAngelForever

A little over a week ago the boys and I were visiting my grandmother for lunch and an afternoon together. Mimi made fresh chicken soup with giant matzoh balls for them to gobble up. For a treat after she had gone to the local farmers market and bought fresh ears of corn. The boys LOVED this part as you will see.

Toward the end of our visit my father called my cell phone. He wanted to tell me something interesting that had happened. He arrived home to find that the end of the driveway was blocked off so nobody could drive on it. When he got out of the car he saw that it had been sealed.

You are probably thinking to yourself . . . "So what? People have that done all the time."

True, but the difference here is that my parents were not supposed to have this done!

When my father got to his front door there was an envelope with a bill inside. He looked at it closely. It was for 43 Grover Street and they live at 43 Big Bird Lane (obviously made up names – since we do not live on Sesame Street).

Ooops! Yes, someone clearly made a rather large mistake. The street signs are quite clear, so that was not an excuse. Plus when we went by the other house it is a shared driveway, so quite different actually.

My father put in a call to the company letting him know that they had made the mistake and that he was not paying for this since he did not have a contract. Sure, my parents were thinking of having it done soon, but it would have been done AFTER major repairs to their house were done so as not to be ruined by that.

The company must have been quite embarassed since they never called my parents back. For their sake it will hopefully serve as a lesson.

Oh well, thank goodness they did a decent job and did not ruin my parent’s driveway.