Elmo! Elmo! Elmo! Oyyyy-neeee!

Sesame Place is a Sesame Street theme park located in Langhorne, PA. It's all things Sesame Street from the rides, to the shows, to the decorations and music, with costumed characters walking around. We were there only this weekend, so we couldn't take advantage of its water park attractions, but the rest of the park was enough for my little guy.

Alex was ALL 'Elmo! Elmo! Elmo!' whenever he saw a picture of him, but when it came to meeting a costumed character of Elmo, he froze up! That didn't stop him from chasing the Ernie character around shouting 'Oy-neeee! Oy-neee!' I told Dan that I wanted to go before it closed for the season. He was all 'ohh, he won't get it' and 'it's really a hassle' and 'where will we stay' and 'we have so much to do on weekends' and blah, blah, bl-blah.

Does this look like a guy who seems 'hassled'?

That was taken at an attraction called 'Dine With Me!', in which you get a buffet dinner along with close up entertainment from the characters after which they walk around and meet and greet all of the kids.

Alex 'got it', BTW and Dan had a great time too.

October 26, 2008

Food Strike!

Alex goes through phases of rejecting food. He comes out of them too. I brought it up at his 15 mo check up and the pediatrician told me to not worry about it if he's not losing weight or showing any signs of malnutrition - which he wasn't. She said it's a typical complaint over toddlers.

I've just rotated his meals, trying anything and everything to see if he'll take to it and I just default to baby food if it's gone on for too long during the day. I can usually make a breakthrough with fruits and Gerber meat sticks.

Apparently, it's normal for toddlers to do this and they don't starve. Now only if I could find a way to go on a food strike.

October 13, 2008

Indoor Fun at One

I've been stuck inside more days than not for the past month. I had to revive some of our last winter indoor activities, adjusted for age.

Alex loves books - so we go over the books he's chosen to read. For a different twist, I make up a different story with sound effects to go with the pictures. If you have baby photo books, those are great too, I've found. Alex LOVES looking at family photos. I'll also hold him up and go over all of the hanging photos on the wall (almost all of him) and tell him a story about each photo or the age he was when I took it. He LOVES that game.

'The Dinosaur Game' - so named because I happen to be doing it with a lot of stuffed dinosaurs. I use Alex's stuffed animals in various 'chase' scenarios or I will sit them all in a circle and pretend to do a song session with them. Alex could go for hours crashing into the circle or when he does, giggling and laughing when the dinosaur gets 'revenge' and wrestles with him, with me growling the sounds of the dino. I've done similar games with hand puppets, but you can just make his stuffed animals 'talk' to the same effect.

Lessons - I'll take things like his colored baby teething rings and go over the colors or I'll take the numbers from his foam square playmat and go over the numbers with him. I've made up 'rewards' for his playing along, such as a tickle, a wrestle, a nursery rhyme, etc. I also go over 'What Words Do you Know?' or 'What does the ____ say?' to go over sounds he knows, such as animals or machines.

Song Games - I learned a bunch of song games that involve physical play to nursery rhyme songs. We can get at least a half hour to forty minutes of "The Grand Old Duke of York" knee bouncing or "Little Bunny Foo, Foo" hand acting along with many other songs. If you don't recall nursery rhymes independently, you can look them up online to get rhymes, MIDI files to tell you the melody and suggestions for hand or play acting with them.


Coloring - I'll set out a time for us to both color in both coloring books and blank paper. I got some chunky crayons that have been easier for him to use.

Pretend Games - Using some cartoon he knows as an inspiration for a story, I'll get items that aid making up some profession Alex could do. I'll play "construction worker" or "professor" or "fireman" with him, casting him in the role of the main character. This game cracks him up so much, he has a hard time paying attention to the story line. LOL

I'll also use television with Alex. We have a Baby Einstein collection, but I'll use PBS shows and interstitials just as often. I'll set out a time for us to watch a DVD or show together and I comment on the show. Sometimes I point out things to him, sometimes I make it silly. I'll sing along with songs if that's applicable. I'll also use recorded music for dancing and singing sessions.

I've found that these kinds of activities can fill a LOT of time and attention space. Alex will often want to redo some part of it that really makes him laugh or that he really enjoys. The big plus is that all of these games make him think, so a normal naptime is a near guarantee.

October 6, 2008

It Finally Happened...

So, yesterday I was at a local sprinkler park with Alex. He had been tapping his feet in a puddle left over from the sprinklers and he was joined by a girl of about 7 who could splash with a lot more force than Alex could. Alex was already changed into his beach coverall to dry off and I didn't want him to get wet again, so I asked the girl if she could splash a little lighter (she was just washing sand off her feet) because I didn't want him to get wet again. A debate over his getting wet again ensued, because, y'know, she was 7. Finally she asked me 'And who are you? Are you his grandma??!!'

Her father (huh?! - mid 30s definitely), looked horrified and yelled 'NATALIE!!'. I just laughed and shrugged at the guy saying 'I gotta get used to that.'

But hey - 17 months before anyone ever asked me that!! That's pretty good! LOL!

August 23, 2008

Signing Time

Alex's first pediatrician was against signing. He felt that the frustration would lead Alex to talk sooner. I haven't been successful in getting Alex to learn other signs since he made a break through on talking (ton of words at a time), but before he did, he learned signs very quickly.

I SO don't agree with the idea that learning signs will slow down speech in a hearing child. It's not exactly the same thing as being bi-lingual in spoken language, because the child can tell the difference between a sign and a word, but I do consider ASL just another language in which he learned some communication. I have noticed that Alex once said the words for the signs he knows, but he abandoned them in favor of signing. But it's not like I'm not worried that he's going to be 15 years old and not able to say the words 'milk', 'eat' or 'more', though. I mean, c'mon.

I'm all in favor of signing. Like other posters here, I saw Alex just light up like a Christmas tree when he realized that he'd just communicated with us when he first signed 'milk'. It seemed to me, it encouaged his speech, not delayed it.

August 20, 2008

Little Yeller

I've never seen Alex try to yank anything away from another child. But today, on the playground, I intervened twice in his verbal aggression towards other children. On two separate occasions he yelled at other children for playing with something he wanted to play with. But he hadn't been playing with it at the time they had their hands on it and he hadn't even been going for it. He almost succeeded in intimidating another little boy off a ride. I corrected him right away then because I felt the other kid gave up too easily when Alex had been in the wrong. I didn't want he and Alex to work it out that way. In the other instance, the other child was 4 and could understand me when I intervened on her behalf. I did that so that Alex could see she and I work it out when he doesn't have the verbal skills yet. (She was going to give up too and it was her ball he wanted.)

August 20, 2008

What to be for Halloween?

I need to shop for Alex's Halloween costume. I want something Halloween-ish, like a devil, witch, fairy, etc. Alex loves Elmo to pieces and he'd be awfully cute as Elmo, but there's just so many years I can have the ability to choose his Halloween costume for him. So, while I can, I'm eyeballing some classic creature stuff. When Alex has the ability to plan, make choices and verbalize them, then I'll have to deal with his preferences. After all, I know there will be a day that I'll have to deal with some Ninja Turtle nonsense or some superhero or whatever.

August 19, 2008