31 posts tagged “ethan”
This morning, after arguing with Ethan over whether or not he can get up at 5:45 and crawl into bed with us...again...I gave him a run-down of our weekend, which includes a trip to the Higgins Armory in Worcester. Ethan thought about it, and wasn't overly convinced he wanted to go. So I asked him if he wanted to get a treat afterwords, and OOH! we could go out for ice cream.
"No, I don't want ice cream. It's too cold for me," says Ethan.
"Okay, what kind of treat do you want?" I ask.
Ethan thinks. "I want an up-and-down treat. Something that goes up and down," he describes, guesturing like he wants a long stick.
"Do you want to go get cookies?" I tried.
"No," he says in his condescening 4 year old voice. "Cookies are circles. I want something up and down."
We go back and forth on this until it's time to get his boots on. By this point in time Jeremy's trying to figure it out with me. Ethan tries again, "I want something red. Red, and goes up and down."
Jeremy won this one. "Do you want Twizzlers, Ethan?" he asks.
"Yes! That's what I want!"
If only he could figure out the waking up thing, we'd be GOLDEN.
In my little family, things work really well since my husband's a big kid, and my son is a little kid. Apparently, this makes me the adult. (Commence laughing here...)
But, considering that my husband is a big kid, he's not all that interested in playing with the baby toys the "kids" nowadays are into. So we don't have a whole lot of them anymore. As my son is growing, he really wants to be like Mama and Dada, which includes playing with our toys and watching our cartoons. Yes, I draw the line at South Park. (Jeremy ordered the movie on DVD, and Ethan picked it up and wanted to watch it. This is where the adult came out in me, and I had to put my foot down.) I mentioned yesterday how the family is all a big fan of the Simpsons, and how our most recent family outing was to go see the movie. Fun times!!
What Ethan's gotten more interested in since Christmas is the Nintendo. Most specifically, my DS. (Which was my Christmas present, I might add...) He LOVES playing the Wario Touched game..it just cracks him up. And Monkey Ball, though that one he'll more often than not hand off to me and tell me to play while he watches. Since we moved into the new place, he's also become enamored by the GameCube. We haven't quite gotten to the point where he'll play games (again, more often than not, he's watching me play Mario Party), but we're getting to that point.
Why do I let my child spend all this time with the DS? Well, first off, Ethan has in the past had a slight delay in his gross motor/fine motor skills. Which is why it amazes me that he can actually play Touched, as you really need to master some specific movements and actions with the touch screen. And you need to do it quickly! Aside from that, I don't remember telling him more than once or twice what buttons do what...he's figured that out for himself pretty darn fast. And he's also gotten really good at figuring other things out as well. At my nephew's birthday party, Ethan started playing around with one of the poles holding up a tent, quickly figuring out exactly which button to push to collapse the tent. (Happily, he was not strong enough to actually push it... But his Pepere was very impressed!)
So yes, there are good reasons to let your child play video games...and to play video games with them. You know what would be even better...having a Wii to play video games with your son. :)
This post is brought to you in conjunction with Parent Bloggers Network & EA’s Wii-Boogie, a family gaming experience. Shake it. Sing it. Create it.
Every morning recently, Ethan and I have gone through this routine:
- Jeremy gets ready for work around 6:30. Ethan logically assumes it is time to get up. He comes into my room and climbs into bed with me. I am smarter, and realize that if you're not working, 6:30 is a horrible time to get up.
- I try to convince Ethan to stay in bed and go to sleep. Ethan scares away the cat, then demands to watch Caillou.
- I finally relent, and we watch about 3 hours of Caillou.
Caillou bothers me. I would rather watch the Backyardigans than watch Caillou. I'm actually almost to the point that I would rather watch Barney, or, even worse, Boobah instead of Caillou. Finally, I needed to have some questions answered for me, and did a search of Caillou on Wikipedia. Here's some interesting trivia for you:
- "Caillou" is French for "stone". It can also be French for "bald head". Makes you think twice before giving your child adjectives for names, eh?
- Caillou's parents are named Doris and Boris. No, seriously. They are.
- According to Wiki, Caillou's sister Rosie is "between a year and a half to four years younger than Caillou." First, that's an insanely huge range. Second, if Caillou is 4, wouldn't that make Rosie an embryo? She certainly is a brilliant embryo...
- Apparently there has been petitions to take Caillou off the air because it teaches children to whine and complain when they don't get their way. Granted, one thing I like about Caillou is that he actually does complain occasionally, thus representing a Real Child. I would start a petition to get Caillou off the air because he's annoying.
- And, from my own experience, you should never have a theme song with the words, "Growing up is not so tough, Except when I've had enough", only because I keep hearing it as "Growing up is not so tough, Sucks when I've had enough." Which does brighten up my day...though I'm filled with fear that my son's rapidly growing vocabulary will soon include the word "sucks."
Thankfully, my mornings will soon be (relatively) my own again... I start work on Monday, and Ethan will be heading back to preschool.
And, yes, we have already started the "I don't wanna go to school!" phase. Whee!
So I went to this one yarn company, and printed out a pattern for a dog-shaped bath mitt. As I started making it (first typing out the pattern, as it was written by someone who wasn't all there, I think), I noticed a couple of things. Like why wasn't it made in the round? Hmm... No matter. So I finished the mitt part.
On the bright side, with what I've learned so far, I know I can make some mittens myself, and hopefully make them in the round as well. Which means I can have custom made mittens for the winter, as can Ethan. AND, I can be ultimate winter-mom geek and make that long connector bit, so he won't lose them at school.
Because I already KNOW this child will lose them. And then say that the aliens stole them. Because he's weird like that.
Today at nap time, I decided to amuse Ethan by making up a story about him and his cousin, Baby Declan. Now, this is Ethan's favorite kind of story. EVER.
There are some variations, but Ethan's favorite parts have to do with Baby Declan being trapped on a mountain, Ethan climbing the mountain (with a ladder) to rescue him, and fighting bad guys with a lightsaber. He also likes it when airplanes are involved, especially anthropomorphic ones that will take to him. Of course, Ethan always wins, and they get to go for a picnic at the end.
I thought I'd share this all with you, especially as I know my sister reads this, and she should know what the heck Ethan's talking about, as he will go up to everyone and tell them how he rescued Baby Declan from a mountain.
Oh dear.
Anywho, Ethan's is purple, Declan's is green.
As you may know, Ethan is a preemie, born a little more than 8 weeks early. He spent those eight weeks in the NICU...through his first Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's. Those were some rough times, and the nurses and doctors from the NICU made things bearable. I have since learned that they were right about so many things, and there were so many hidden blessings with my son's arrival.
Ever since, Ethan and I have participated in the March of Dimes WalkAmerica. We are asking that you help us reach our goal this year of at least $300. The money donated goes to fund research to help prevent premature births, birth defects, and some of the other dangers newborns (and their mothers) face. Since Ethan was born, two of my friends have had preemies, and two others have had miscarriages. I'd like to continue to do my part to prevent these in the future.
Ethan's birthday is November 6th, but we did not expect him until January 3rd. Yes, kids, he was a preemie...born 2 months early (at 31 5/7 weeks), and spent his first two months in the hospital, coming home on January 4, 2004. I can't say enough good things about the NICU staff, and how wonderful they were at making his first Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's memorable.
We got our pictures done yesterday, so here's the comparison!
I will say, though, with moving out here, we have a new Picture People to visit. This one was all digital! I'm super psyched...we were in and out in about 2 hours...including getting our holiday cards printed!
And if you think that one on the right makes Ethan look like a big kid, you should check out the standing shot we have...
Though I am sad I forgot the rest of those mango slices at the hotel. :(
More to come after pictures get taken off the camera. Which will probably be after the wedding (not mine, my sister's). And after my parents leave. Which means sometime around Thanksgiving.
Told you I was keeping busy!
