A whole slew of photos, from Natchez to baseball to ice cream

I am very, very, very behind on posting pictures here.

I'll hit a few of the big highlights of late...

William with Miss Aubrey at his class' end of the year party:



















William with a banner on Pentecost at his grandaddy's church:




















You see, that was William's first time ever to attend a Children's Time in church, and I was worried he wouldn't sit still for it. Luckily, Dad had apparently through this through in advance. He gave all the kids these ribboned banners and told them they could run through the church and wave their banners. I wish I had a photo of William beaming as he trotted after all the bigger kids, waving his banner through the aisles because his expression was priceless.

William with his Uncle John in Natchez:



















William swimming at a friend's house in Natchez (note: "swimming" actually means "playing on the side of the pool and resolutely refusing to get in the pool):





































Me with a margarita:

















Dressed after "swimming," William then progressed to playing in the playhouse:

















William with Grandaddy Johnny:




















William and Leland at the pool on Saturday morning:

















William and David singing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" at the Nashville Sounds game last night:




















Saying "Cheese!" for Crackerjacks (his first ones!):




















At the big Miss Martha's Ice Cream Crankin' ice cream festival this afternoon, with David and DeeDee:

















William, shoveling ice cream down his gullet as fast as he could:



















Two very sweet little old ladies pulled me aside and cooed over how adorable they thought he was--how serious he was, eating his ice cream.

All Things Castle

William has become enamored recently with a set of castle-themed Legos. David bought the castle Lego set because he correctly knew that William would adore it. This should come as no surprise to anyone who's been around him at all within the past ten or eleven months. He's obsessed with castles and the "castle people" who inhabit them (his catch-all term for princesses, knights, kings, queens, jesters, and assorted marauders).

William especially adores the big red-and-black dragon and the evil wizard figure, both of whom have plastic lightning bolts attached to them. The dragon "breathes" the lightning bolts, while the wizard has them attached to the end of his Gandalf-Saruman-esque staff.

But he hasn't quite grasped the correct wording for the concept. William showed me the evil wizard one day and told me, "The wizard shoots light bulbs out of his staff!"

"What? He shoots what?" I asked.

"Light bulbs. Lights bulbs, see?" he said, pointing to the lightning bolts.

"Oh yeah?" I said, trying not to laugh.

"And the dragon breathes light bulbs!"

Another one? When?

Gotta flog my own stuff here again. I've got a new article up on the website Betty Confidential about The Question.

Check it out here at www.bettyconfidential.com:
When to Have Another Baby?

Yes, some of you are guilty of asking me The Question. Don't worry. I still love you. Y'all are the ones who love William so much that you're just dying for a sequel, right?

Stand still, and let me put more sunscreen on you

You know how I know that summer is here? I mean, other than the fact that it's hot and also the fact that the calendar says June? I'm already getting tired of putting a thick coating of sunscreen, followed by a chaser of bug spray, on William every time we go outside to play.

You see, the Spraying Down of One's Child is a vital but time-consuming part of the preparations that I have to undertake to prepare to visit the pool. I took William to the neighborhood swimming pool yesterday afternoon and again this morning, and I swear, it took me nearly an hour to get us ready to leave. First, I have to dress William in a swim diaper and swim suit. Then I have to put on a swimsuit that covers a reasonable amount of flesh and find my cover-up and my own hat. Then I have to coat both of us in sunscreen. Luckily, spray sunscreen makes this go much faster than the olden days, when you had to use a tube of regular sunscreen...uphill, barefoot, in the snow. Then I have to make sure W's got sunscreen on his face and neck. Then I have to pack the small cooler with drinks and snacks. Then I have to pack the pool bag: towels, extra swim diaper, extra clothes and underpants for William, pool key, wet wipes, house key, cell phone, money for the vending machine (optional), lipbalm with SPF. Then I have to get the wagon out of the garage, put the cooler and pool bag in it, make sure the pool toys are also in there, and then convince William to put on his shoes and hat and get in the wagon. Then we can leave.

Usually, there's at least one time-sucking bathroom adventure that takes place somewhere during the adventure. Also, the phone tends to ring at least once or twice. Sometimes the UPS man shows up. Sometimes the plates of the Earth shift.

However, there is a silver lining. To my delight, I've disocovered that it is SO MUCH EASIER to take three-year-old William to the pool than it was to take two-year-old William to the pool. Seriously. He helps me rearrange the stuff in the wagon so it all fits. He helps me fetch things that I've forgotten. And then when we finally do make it to the pool, he can get his own toys out and do his own thing while I get our stuff situated. He shares his toys with the other kids, and he even stops running and walks as soon as I bark "Slow feet!" He doesn't even fuss when I insist that he stop playing so I can douse him with another spray of sunscreen.

I was really proud of him yesterday when a little girl kept taking his toys (not maliciously--she just wanted to play with them, too), and he didn't wail and moan and try to snatch them back. Today, he played nicely by himself, since we were the only ones at the baby pool when we first got there, and then he shared another child's toys when another family showed up. (Note to self: buy William his own mermaid pool toy so he won't have to wait to share the ones toted by the little girls in the neighborhood, who aren't so eager to share their toys). And when it was time to leave, he was very agreeable. He collected all of his toys that were strewn about, and helped me put everything back into the wagon. And we left, in a very drama-free way. Ah.

Plugged in

When I was childless, I thought that I'd never let a child of mine watch television in the car on road trips.

It wasn't that I sneered at the idea (like I sneer at some ideas that I've deemed silly or stupid). It's just that I didn't have television to entertain me on long boring road trips when I was a kid. I had to read books, scribble in activity books (anyone remember those magic ink pens?) do Mad Libs, listen to cassette tapes (yes, I'm that old), play the Geography Game or the License Plate Game with my family, or stare aimlessly out the window at the scenery speeding by. So I reasoned that any child of mine could entertain himself or herself the same way.

It was one of many lofty ideas that I had as a childless adult that I promptly threw under the bus once I actually had a flesh-and-blood child and was no longer getting anywhere close to my RDA of sleep. That should actually be a theme in my life as a parent, now that that I think about it. I had a friend tell me that she never takes parenting advice from people who don't have children or don't have extended experience in working with children. My own personal policy is that I am allowed to try out the theories I had before I had children but I am not allowed to feel bad if or when they don't work out at all and in fact flame out spectacularly.

You see, I had this lovely baby. And lo, the sweet baby who slept in the car became a child. A very bright and (mostly) happy child. A child who was not old enough to read to himself. And the child was also very social and wanted to talk with or at Mommy all the livelong day. And Mommy could only keep that up for so long in the car before she wanted to put her head down on the steering wheel and sob for mercy. Or at least for someone else to do all the talking and listening for a little while while she drove, drank Diet Coke and pretended she was going to write up her gritty and fascinating road trip for a sophisticated magazine and sell it and make lots of money.

So when William was two, I convinced my husband to let us borrow a DVD player from our friends for our trip to the beach last summer. No, we did not plug our son into the DVD player for the entire trip. We talked to him. We told stories and we sang songs. But eventually, we got tired. So William got to watch episodes of "Arthur" and "Sesame Street" and snippets of "Finding Nemo" and "Toy Story." And David and I were able to have a nice quiet adult conversation in the front seat. I even got to read some of my library book (I was immersed in the non-fiction book Hospital: Man, Woman, Birth, Death, Infinity, Plus Red Tape, Bad Behavior, Money, God and Diversity on Steroids by Julie Salomon.) We had snacks. We talked some more. We were all reasonably sane and happy.

This year, as you know, I was planning a trip to Natchez to visit with my family. Originally, we planned to fly. That little plan got derailed by a 106 degree fever the day before our scheduled flight, but I couldn't have known that in advance. So I was planning ways to entertain my active three-year-old on the airplane. I told David that we really should just suck it up and buy our own portable DVD player. He balked for a few minutes, then remembered the beach trip. And a couple of days later, he walked in the door with a bag from Target. We had second thoughts, though....which resulted in our buying a set of nice headphones for William to use when watching his DVDs.

Even after the plane trip was cancelled, I had a road trip to deal with. Not only one road trip but two: one to Natchez with my parents and one home from Natchez without my parents. Have you ever driven any of the routes between Nashville and Natchez? No? Well, let me just fill you in: they are boring. So boring. So blindingly mind-numbingly boring. So boring that you'd be hard-pressed to find anything interesting enough to play "I Spy" for more than two rounds, and you can consider yourself lucky if you see license plates from more than four states. So once the initial excitement of hitting the road waned and the best snacks had been eaten, I dug out the little white DVD player. So, for a little while, somewhere on I-55, south of Batesville, Mississippi, I got to have a nice conversation with my mother while my son watched "Cinderella." He only got to watch a total of two hours of TV on the entire five- or six-hour trip, though; that's how long the battery lasts, and I didn't clue him into the fact that the player has a cord that plugs into the cigarette lighter. So he still got some of the "God, I'm so bored" road trip experience that was so crucial in shaping me into the person I am today.

A week later, I drove home with William in the minivan (we've named her Matilda, a nice combo of Sedate Old Lady and Slightly Retro Wacky, don't you think?) that my grandparents have so graciously bequeathed to me. William contentedly watched "Sleeping Beauty" while I settled back in the driver's seat and listened to Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong sing songs from "Porgy and Bess." Summertime, and the livin' is easy, indeed.

I don't think I'll make big bucks (er, or any bucks) from writing this up here, but hey, now you know the secret to my survival.

Natchez Update

Please don't fall over in shock. Yes, it's been about ten days since I last updated this blog, but don't worry. William's healthy, I'm healthy, David's healthy, it's all good.

In fact, William bounced back from his miserable bout with...well, whatever it was that gave him those fevers and destroyed his appetite to the point that he even turned down popsicles...and we got the chance to come visit Ma and Pa Larson down in Natchez after all.

For those of you who actually do want the logistical details: David and Aaron drove us to Memphis last Thursday, where we rendezvoused at Grandaddy Dudley's house and met Mom and Daddy. David and Aaron then made a beeline for Corky's so David could get his ribs, and William and I took our inaugural ride in what will be our new minivan. Mom and Daddy drove us down here to Natchez, where we're staying until this Friday. At that point, I'll drive myself and the Little Prince north to Nashville.

What? Yes, I will soon be a Minivan Mom. About two years ago....actually maybe even a year ago...that would have made me squirm with self-induced angst over my impending entry into Suburban Matronhood. I thought of myself as still a little bit hip and couldn't imagine myself in a Mom-mobile. Well, guess what, folks? I'm so over that now. Let's be honest about my reality here. I live in the suburbs. I'm a mom. I wear bathing suits with skirts on them. I carry a purse stuffed with small boxes of raisins and Spider-Man fruit treats. Let's just call a spade a spade, shall we?

And so soon I will have a nice roomy minivan with plenty of room for people and stuff. And I can't wait. I didn't realize how small my Mazda was until I took a road trip in the minivan last week. Geez. Was I really so worried about being hip (despite the fact that I haven't been hip in a long, long time...and in fact, may never have been hip at all) that I would have forsaken room to tote around lots of stuff and have room for people at the same time?

If it's not one thing, it's another

Is there anything worse than a sad-eyed feverish little boy who just wants to cling to his mama for comfort because he feels so bad?

Why, yes, as it turns out, there is. A hyperactive little three-year-old boy who is relishing the fact that he has his energy back and can now wreak havoc upon his poor, exhausted parents.

Let's just say that I'm tired of 5:30 a.m. wakeups, screaming temper fits and general all-around orneriness. And I'm still disappointed that we've had to delay our trip to visit my parents in Natchez.

This too shall pass, right? Right?

Come on, Disney. Work with us here.

Does anyone know for sure that Disney is still using that silly "buy it now because it's going back in the vault forever!" policy toward selling its movies?

I thought it was still in effect, but I just discovered, through UltimateDisney.com, that I can still buy a DVD of "The Little Mermaid" from Amazon.com. Which was good news, actually, because William is dying to see "TLM" but I couldn't even land a copy at the local used bookstore, much less buy a new one.

In fact, I'd been getting really annoyed with Disney because I couldn't buy several DVDs that William has asked for because they just plain aren't selling them right now. Those movies are supposedly locked up in that "vault," and silly me for not realizing before I even got pregnant that I should have snatched up all these random Disney movies on DVD anyway. I mean, I'm not really a big Disney person myself, so I didn't buy all the movies just for myself (well, except for "Lady and the Tramp" because I am very sentimental toward it and "Sleeping Beauty," same thing). And we didn't show any movies to William when he was a baby. So he just started asking to see some of these movies within the last year or so, and then...we couldn't get ahold of them.

I vaguely recalled the "going back in the vault" paranoia that emanated from all those commercials heralding the release of this movie or that movie on DVD, and so I asked at the local Disney store. Sure enough, the saleswoman confirmed that they're just not selling certain movies. Bah, I say. William's all into the princess movies right now, but he wasn't even around four or five years ago. Like I was going to buy movies in anticipation of a baby that may or may not have even been born! And what if he doesn't like princesses and princess movies when he's a jaded five-year-old who doesn't want to be caught doing girly stuff?

Of course, it's mostly the ones that I'd want to get that I can't get. I can easily get the straight-to-video also-ran "The Little Mermaid III" or something equally Rocky-esque, but I can't buy the original movie, which I remember actually being a cute movie with fun music.

I realize that Disney uses that policy to drive up sales and create demand, but in my case, they're actually losing money. And I can't believe I'm the only mother who would happily drop some money on "The Little Mermaid" or "Cinderella" or "Beauty and the Beast" right now for my preschooler but probably won't in a few years when the preschooler is older and would rather watch the more sophisticated Pixar movies anyway. I did get lucky and happen into a used "Cinderella" DVD a couple of days ago, much to William's delight. But the Disney company didn't get any profit from the sale. McKay's bookstore did.

Sick boy

So William's been sick the last couple of days. As a result, we've been more or less housebound, except for a Kroger-and-Walgreen's run for supplies like Tylenol, ginger ale and most importantly, popsicles. (Don't tell me that a popsicle wouldn't make you feel better if you were sick because I won't believe you.)

He's been running a low-grade fever, so when the fever flares, he gets fussy. When the fever goes down, he's cheerful and sunny. But the two biggest signs that he's not been feeling well are:

1) He's barely eaten anything the last two days except for a cereal bar and, yes, popsicles. This is William we're talking about. He's usually the human equivalent of a garbage disposal when it comes to food. Only my old friend Miller could give him a serious run for his money,

and

2) This morning, I realized that I hadn't seen or heard from him in awhile. I left the computer and my work and ran downstairs to see if he was still watching "Sesame Street." He wasn't. I panicked and began searching the house for him. Know where I found him? He'd gone into his room and put himself back to bed. Again, this is William. He never ever ever voluntarily sleeps, much less crawls into bed on his own free will with no parental intervention.

Poor little sick guy. I've been trying to keep him quiet so he can rest, and I've mostly succeeded. He's been pretty good about drinking plenty of fluids, so I'm not worried about that, either. But he missed the last day of school today, and that made me a little sad because we love his school--and one of his teachers is moving away this summer. And I'm getting a little nervous about us leaving town on Friday. Let's hope he bounces back quickly.

The Ernie shirt

A few weeks ago, Mary Clare called me from a Hanna Andersson store in Atlanta. She wanted to find out if I wanted her to pick up a few items on sale for William.

I immediately said yes and asked if she could find what we call "easy pants"--or as the case may be for summer, "easy shorts." What makes pants "easy"? (I am resisting the urge to make a stupid joke here, I really am.) It's very simple. Their elastic waists means they can be pulled on and off with no trouble; the lack of buttons or zippers makes them easy for a child to put them on and take them off without an adult's assistance. I was hoping to get some red "easy shorts."

Mary Clare immediately found some red shorts, as well as a pair of blue ones. Then we began discussing the possibilities for matching shirts because the store had a variety of striped t-shirts on sale to choose from.

"I really like this one with blue and gray stripes," Mary Clare said. "And then there's this other one...it looks like, well, it looks like a shirt Ernie would wear."

And as a child raised on "Sesame Street," I could immediately envision what she referred to.

But you don't have to. I took a picture of it for you and posted it right here:




















See? It DOES look like an Ernie shirt, doesn't it? Hanna Andersson should hire MC to write product descriptions because she was spot on.

For the record, that is my old Ernie puppet in the photo. That puppet is legendary in my family because he is responsible for the fact that I clung to a pacifier well into preschool.

You see, my mom left me for a few days at my grandmother's house with a decrepit old pacifier when I was about two or three years old. My pal Ernie went with me. Mom hoped that maybe I'd have so much fun at my grandmother's house that maybe I'd forget all about the pacifier--or, at the very least, maybe it would finally just disintegrate, and she'd be rid of it.

At some point, I was playing with my Ernie puppet and I accidentally made the puppet bite off the nub of my pacifier. Like all young paci-ddicts, I howled and pitched a big ol' fit. My grandmother was scared that I had swallowed the tip of the pacifier, and she panicked. Eventually she realized that wasn't the case and calmed down. However, I was still a raging howling mess. So she cast about for a way to soothe me. That translated into my poor sweet Mama Joy bundling me into the car to go to the dime store so we could buy a new one. An hour or so later, we arrived home with a three-pack of brand new pacifiers.

When my mom arrived to collect me, she couldn't believe it. Thirty-odd years later, she still can't believe it. She had been so close to getting rid of the pacifier once and for all, and Ernie had just set it all back by what turned out to be many months.

Ernie lives at my house now. William had already easily given up his binky by the time Ernie arrived here, so Ernie couldn't cause any more paci-related mischief. But you know, I wouldn't turn my back on him for too long. You just never know what he's up to. He and William, as you'd imagine, get along very well, even when they're not dressed alike.

William Wyckoff may be reached at...

How absurd is this?

I just signed William up for his own email account. For the record, he can now be reached at williamdwyckoff [at] gmail.com.

Isn't it nice that we could get a really good username for him? Apparently it's much easier when you have a last name like Wyckoff. David should have thought about that angle when he asked me to marry him and I decided to keep my own last name.

And, no, I'm not deluded enough to think that my son is so smart that he's ready to start reading and sending his own email. He can spell his own name, yes, but I don't know how many of you want to receive emails with nothing but WILLIAM spelled over and over in them. I had to establish an account for him in order for him to receive a two-year subscription to Lego magazine. Yes, I'm sure you can all imagine whose idea that was.

So now my son sleeps in a big boy bed, he's getting potty-trained, he's learning to read (okay, that may be a stretch), and now he's got his own email address. Sniff. My boy's growing up so fast. (He also asked me if he could have my car keys the other day. Since his feet do not yet reach the pedals, I figured it wouldn't destroy him if I demurred.)

Obviously, David and I have privileges with this new email account. We have the password. And control. (For now.) We probably won't be sending out much email through the account, but if you should ever get an email from a William Wyckoff, well, for goodness sake's, open it and read it!

And no. He will not be receiving a cell phone anytime soon.

Shoe shopping with the three-year-old

I took William to the shoe store today to get some new shoes. (A big FAIL, I might add.) We went at a time when I figured the store would be mostly empty, and sure enough, it was deserted when we got there. Of course, within five minutes of our arrival, a passel of moms arrived, with their lists of shoes to buy in their hands. And unfortunately, William did not much behave like a gentleman there when all those people were milling around. Quite the contrary. We didn't have to call Mall Security, exactly, but maybe if we'd stayed there another ten minutes...

But one thing did make me feel better about the less-than-perfect shoe shopping expedition. One mother, who had her baby in tow, reassured me that William couldn't do a thing to bother her. When he approached her son in his stroller and growled at him like a dinosaur, she waved her hand to dismiss my concerns. She added about her son, "He has a four-and-a-half-year-old brother. He's seen it all. Nothing's going to upset him or hurt him." Sure enough, she did not blink when William tore around the store like a tornado. She didn't mind at all when he leaned up against her leg and giggled. She didn't even flinch when William roared at her son (and then leaned over and kissed him on the knee).

Mind you, I was trying to control him the entire time. It's not like I was just sitting back and letting him wreak havoc (actually, he didn't mess up anything in the store itself; he just dashed around and shrieked and flopped around and growled). But it was nice to have a fellow parent express some solidarity with me when my child was acting like....well, when he was not on his best behavior, let's say.

You know how I've written about the "That Child" phenomenon? Where you worry about what other parents are thinking of you and your child because it is your child who is causing all the trouble? And you catch the looks of superiority (er, or fear) that the other parents are directing at you and your wayward child? And the parents flinch every time your child moves because they're convinced your child is going to mow down their child (and, well, he just might)?

Well, it's nice to get the opposite reaction. It's nice to hear that other parents have been there and know exactly how you feel, and you can't faze them a bit. I feel like I'm often that parent, actually, but I worry that not many other parents feel that way toward me and my son. Luckily, the women in my Disciple class at church have often played that role for me. They've told me stories about how their kids bit other children or caused a ruckus or whatever. And they've reassured me that whatever crazy thing William's doing, it, too, will pass.

It's just a good feeling, when other parents not only know how you feel at a less-than-perfect moment, but they smile and tell you they've been there too. And that it will all be okay.

So if you ever encounter a weary mother with a wild child in the shoe store, give her a pat on the shoulder and a few encouraging words. It will go a long way.

**********

Epilogue: We came home, and I ordered shoes online. I wonder if I should send flowers or something to the shoe store ladies, though.

Another happy Mother's Day

Want to know what I got for Mother's Day this morning?

My son made his bed all by himself! Not bad, eh? That's even better than the time he put dishes in the dishwasher for me.

And David got me a vase of beautiful flowers (including my favorites, roses and stargazer lilies) and made us pancakes for lunch. I also got a very small mint plant. I'm sure I will unintentionally find a way to kill it sooner or later, but for now, it's very nice.

So, so far, I'm enjoying the day. Being a mother is hard work, and I have to admit that it's nice to be recognized for it. In fact, I totally disagree with a premise supposedly espoused by the mother character in the book "Belles on their Toes" (the sequel to "Cheaper by the Dozen") by Frank and Ernestine Gilbreth. The mother, Lillian, claims to dislike Mother's Day because she believes it's one day that people use to atone for neglecting their mothers the other 364 days of the year. Of course, I suspect she espoused that belief to prevent her children from spending their hard-earned, hard-to-come-by money on a gift for her on Mother's Day.

And in the movie "A Christmas Story," there is a scene where the mother hops up and down, up and down, from the dinner table to fetch various things for her husband and sons. The narrator (the oldest son, Ralphie, as an adult) then dryly remarks, "My mother hasn't had a hot meal in fifteen years." That scene takes on special meaning for me now.

Also, I think I may have racked up some extra points for dealing with the massive nosebleed that William had at 2 a.m., requiring me to break out my Super Special Laundry Skills. You'll all be glad to know, I'm sure, that all the blood came out of the Star Wars sheets.

So yes, I love the recognition on Mother's Day. No, so it didn't require any formal schooling or advanced degrees. And yes, I've also gotten some great joy out of it. But I'd say I've definitely put in some blood, sweat and tears into this motherhood thing, and I'm glad that it counts for something.

I hope all you mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers out there are having a lovely Mother's Day yourselves. As always, I have to thank my own mother for the fact that I'm here at all; thanks, Mom. And thanks to my mother-in-law for providing a lovely husband for me. And thank you to my grandmother, Mama Lou, too.

Here are some photos that David took of me and William after church in the front yard....




































Here we are, checking out the blossoms on our baby dogwood tree:

A rose by any other name

William's name continues to be popular. It's the No. 8 name for boys on the Social Security Administration's list of most popular names for 2008.

I'm not feeling guilty about choosing the name for him, though. Hello, my name is Jennifer. My first name was the No. 1 most popular girl's name for about 15 years back in the '70s and early '80s. See? It was the No. 1 name for the whole decade of the 1970s. (Incidentally, if you go back to that list and look at boys' names, you'll see David at No. 4 and William at No. 9.) And to my surprise, it hasn't totally gone away yet, either. And it's still in the top 100.

Also, William is a classic name that's good for a boy or a man, and it pays homage to numerous men on both sides of the family. And doesn't his name fit him? Can you really see him having some other name?

He blinded them with science, too

So we're back from our first session of the speech and language development study. As I've said here, the study is designed to examine young children who are stutterers and children who are non-stutterers.

It was a good experience, I'm happy to report, and William behaved beautifully, which is noteworthy on its own. They put him in a room and asked him a bunch of questions about a series of cards and pictures. David and I watched him through the two-way mirror and listened through the sound system. The questions started out fairly easy and progressed to become harder. He was quick to point to pictures and identify the rose, the trumpet, the mountain, the circle, the square, the panda bear, and so on. But as they asked him to point to the picture of "dissecting," I think David and I nearly fell off our stools with muffled laughter. I mean, William's smart, but you show me a three-year-old who knows what "dissecting" means. He also did not point to the correct picture when asked to identify "militia." I'm not so worried, you know? But we were very amused when they asked him to supply another word for "big" and he gleefully replied "Gigantic!"

In between "games," they asked him to chew a small wad of cotton, so they could collect saliva to test for cortisol, which is a hormone the body produces under stress.

At the end of one series of photographs, we noticed that he was clearly getting antsy because he didn't seem to be paying as close attention as he had been. But he gamely stuck with it. He did everything he was told, smiled, used his manners, and even stayed in his seat the whole time. I was so, so proud of him.

William even behaved wonderfully during the hearing tests. The head researcher coaxed him to raise his hand every time he heard a "beep!" during one test. I whispered to David that as far as I knew, he had no concept yet of raising his hand. But after a few tries, William caught on. And he completed the test with no problems.

At the end of the whole session, the researcher met with us to share the results. She praised William for being so bright and cooperative, and she commented on his good manners (which made me feel good!). David smiled and said, "Now, if we can just get him to wear underpants..."

Overall, Wiliam has very good language skills, particularly in expressive and receptive language. That was very reassuring to learn. And as it turns out, William does have one vocal tic--they call it a "disfluency"--that puts him into the category of mild-to-moderate stutterers. Who knew? Actually, we probably did. If you've ever spent any time playing with William, you may have heard him do it. He sometimes repeats one word or syllable a number of times before going on to finish his sentence. For example, he might say, "That, that, that, that, that's not where the castle people belong, Mommy." It's not that he's having trouble getting the actual word out, or that he's laboring over the word. though. He doesn't produce the halting, sort of labored sound that people who have a traditional stutter produce. But he does sometimes repeat a word, often when he's excited or is trying to talk too fast and get all his thoughts out.

However, the researcher who was heading up the study assured us that she doesn't think it's anything to worry about right now. Since he's still so young, and because he's very expressive, he may outgrow it. And it doesn't seem to be bothering him or hampering him in anyway. So we're just supposed to ignore it, and it may eventually go away on its own.

Overall, this was a fascinating experience for me. I've always been interested to watch people conduct research, and so I would have been interested even if William had not been involved. But it was fun to learn a little more about how he works, too. William's my only child, and so I have no one to compare him with. It's interesting to learn how others see him and what they are able to learn by evaluating him.

Our next session is scheduled for later this month. If anyone's interested in enrolling their children in the study, they are still accepting subjects (children ages 3 to 5). Let me know, and I'll put you in touch with the research team. Email me at larson_jennifer [at] yahoo.com.

He blinded me with science

I'm about to leave to take William to Vanderbilt for the speech and language development study. The lead researcher told me that the kids whose parents talk to them about it beforehand tend to be the least scared and perform the best. I've been trying to prepare him for it, telling him about how he'll be helping some researchers with science. Lord knows what he'll actually say when we get there! Stay tuned.

Describe your child here...

Do you know how hard it is to describe William on paper?

I know. The irony. You'd think it'd be easy for me. After all, I call myself a writer. Not only that, but I've been describing him here on this very blog for three years now. But think about how many thousands and thousands of words I've used over the course of the past three years. Now imagine trying to condense all that down onto a five- or ten-page questionnaire.

And I've had to do a lot of that recently. For example, I just signed William up for a speech and language development study at Vanderbilt. The study is designed to examine young children who stutter and compare them with children who don't stutter. As a non-stutterer, William will participate in two sessions, of which the first one is this Thursday. In preparation for the study, I had to fill out a long questionnaire filled with questions about his health, his developmental history, and his personality.

I got stuck on one of the questions on the form. The question read "How would you describe your child's personality?" I sat there and gnawed on the end of my pen for a few minutes before getting up to find David to ask him how he'd describe his son's personality. We ended up with "friendly, extroverted and bossy." (I probably could have also added "stubborn, wiggly, affectionate and funny" to the list, but I figure that the study administrators will find all that out in due time.) Wow. Three words. Is that William? Is that enough? Is that accurate? Should I have crammed in, in teeny tiny letters, "stubborn, wiggly, affectionate and funny"? And yet, do they really need seven words to describe a person who's three?

I also recently filled out an application for the the local school system's gifted program, which is called Encore. The Encore program begins as early as preschool, and one of William's teachers suggested that I look into applying for him. So I did. I filled out a lengthy application, as did William's teacher, and we submitted them last week to the school system for review. I guess if they think he merits an assessment, we'll hear from them.

As I anticipated, the Encore application included pages and pages of questions about how he solves problems, how he interacts with people, what his curiosity level is like, etc. And the whole time I was filling the form out, I kept thinking, "Well, I'm doing the best that I can to tell you what he's like. I hope that's okay." But the reality is--and I hope the people who read the forms get this--my perspective is so limited, so one-sided. I have no idea if his approach to life is normal or not. I don't know if what he's doing constitutes gifted behavior or just normal three-year-old behavior. I don't have anything to compare him with. He's the only kid I have. Something that I might consider pretty normal might be amazing--and vice versa.

And not only that, but it felt weird to even be applying for the program because in some way, I felt like I was bragging about my son, and I don't even know if I should be doing that. I mean, I think he's smart, but who knows if he's "gifted," you know? I was once labeled "gifted" as a child, but I have to tell you, I don't feel particularly gifted as an adult! But I guess it's not up to me. Hopefully, the decision will not depend solely on my ability or lack thereof to adequately depict my son in all his complicated glory on paper. Maybe I should have added a coda: "I used to think I was pretty smart, but now I'm second-guessing everything I've written here, so maybe you should just meet William and then tell me what you think."

And hopefully, they will. I'm sure they understand that a parent's perspective is just one perspective and not the end-all, be-all--that a child is not just what or who his parents think he is. Even from someone like me; I'm a journalist, and I've been trained to view things as objectively as possible when reporting on them. But it's hard to be really objective about your own child.

William goes to camp

Spring is here at last. Hallelujah!

This picture...























was taken on Saturday afternoon at Camp NaCoMe, just west of Centerville, Tennessee. Our church had a family retreat all weekend, so William and I spent the day there. He spent most of the day, I should say, wading in the stream. It made me a little homesick for Montreat, though, and for all the rock-hopping I did there as a child (er, and as a teenager). I hope to take William there sometime soon, too.

I joked with someone that the two things that William was likely to remember from his first time at camp was 1) wading in the stream and 2) having a blue Slush Puppie drink from the canteen. And sure enough, that's exactly what he told his Sunday School teachers yesterday--that he got to drink a blue slushie at camp.

But you know what? If that's his first camp memory, that's okay. I grew up going to camp (camps, actually), and it meant a lot to me to take William to camp for the first time, even just for the day. My parents took me to a camp--Camp Hopewell in Mississippi--for the first time when I was about William's age. I only have a few hazy memories of it--but I have them. William is finally at the age where he may start forming permanent memories. And it's sort of neat to think that hey, this is something that he might rememember even years later, just like I have my early camp memories, too. He'll be 34 years old one day and recall how he waded in the creek in the sunshine and watched the older kids catch crawdads and turtles. He might remember how he asked for a blue drink and then wanted to know what color everyone else got so he could compare his slushie to theirs. Or the memories might be less specific and more impressionistic than that. Either way, it's sort of quietly awe-inspiring to realize that he's finally old enough for these memories that I have to also become his own memories, in some form or fashion.

(It also puts additional pressure on me, of course, to behave so that he can't haul out the old memories and make me look bad one day. :) )

William is three!

At precisely 8:35 a.m. this morning, I sang "Happy Birthday" to William. We were riding in the car on the way to school when the digital clock flipped to that time. That's the time, adjusted for the time zone change, when William was born, exactly three years ago today.

And as I say every year on this date now, I am SO GLAD that it's this year and not 2006. Labor and delivery? Not so very much fun. I didn't tell William that part, though. However, he was charmed to learn that I got to eat waffles for breakfast the morning he was born. He also was interested to learn that David brought me an Oreo cookie milkshake from Carl's Jr (obligatory "Carl's Jr what?" remark inserted here) later that day, too. And again, as I always say, those were the best waffles and the best milkshake I have ever had in my entire life.

So, without further ado, let's have a brief retrospective, shall we?

William David Wyckoff, born at 6:35 a.m. pacific time on April 22, 2006, in Twentyine Palms, California:




















William David Wyckoff at about 8:15 a.m. central time on April 22, 2009 in Nashville, Tennessee:




















In the hospital on April 22, 2006 with David:


















In front of our house in Nashville this morning before school:



















I still can't believe William is three, though. That cool April morning when he finally--finally!--was born took place three years ago.

It's even a little hard for me to believe it's the same person. I know, I know, that's such a cliche. I'm sorry. But it's true. I look at the photos of that tiny little baby and think about how I had no idea who the baby would become. That little seven-pound baby became a 34-pound boy who wore his Halloween wizard costume over his pajamas to watch "SuperWhy" on television this morning. That baby became the person who picked out popsicles in Publix this morning to take to school (he proudly announced to everyone he encountered, "It's my birthday! I'm three!").

And I changed from the person who endured multiple middle-of-the-night feedings with something less than a stoic attitude to a person who endures temper tantrums over snacks I won't let my son eat with something less than a stoic attitude (but I'm working on it). I won't go so far as to say I know exactly what I'm doing now, but I do think I know more than I did three years ago.

Catching up with Easter photos

We have been so busy lately that I still haven't gotten around to posting Easter photos, and it's been more than a week. I'm so embarrassed to be so far behind.

But as my friend's mom pointed out, hey, Easter season technically lasts for the 50 days between Easter Sunday and Pentecost. I guess as a preacher's kid, I should've remembered that. Ah well. Like I said, I've been busy. So we're good now, right?

William, all dressed up in his JFK, Jr. coat:





















The outfit under the coat. It was a little too big but he wore it anyway.





















Putting flowers on the cross in front of the sanctuary at Westminster:




















At church. I actually let him stay in the balcony for the first 15 minutes of the service, and he did very well. He told all the men around us that he wanted to see his daddy march in with the choir.



















At Diane and Aaron's house in front of the flowers:




















My favorite picture of the day:




















The three of us:

















William and his Uncle Mark:





















We had a very nice Easter this year. The weather was lovely, and we didn't have any trouble getting to and from churchm, which is almost a miracle in and of itself when you consider all the people who turn up out of the woodwork on Easter. And we had a terrific Easter lunch at Diane and Aaron's house. For the record, William received some books, lollipops, a remote-controlled Geotrax train and a bubble machine from the Easter Bunny.

Two good things

We've had a very up-and-down week here. But I did want to share two of the highlights.

The first was...William asked me last night at dinner if he could say a prayer for all the people who lost all their things in the storm (we had a bad tornado come through Middle Tennessee last week). And he remembered and included them in his night-night prayer.

The second was...we asked William what else he wanted to have for breakfast this morning to go with his oatmeal. And I swear to God, the boy said, "How about some vegetables?" David recovered his composure first and said, "Well, sure, William. Um, how about some carrots?" And William said, "Hmm, no. Can I have some broccoli, please?" I am not making this up. I couldn't make that up. You can ask David if you don't believe me.

If nothing else, this sort of thing reminds me why I still love my child even when he takes the Terrible Almost-Threes and rachets them up by a factor of about, oh, infinity.

Egg Dyeing 101

As promised, here are some photos from the Great Egg Dyeing Session of 2009:




















William's DeeDee did all the hard work, the drawing, the dyeing, the mopping up. I just took pictures.


































Oh, and you can get a mini-tutorial on creative egg-dyeing and watch William ham it up a little bit here:

Easter Egg "Hunt"

Whew. Two Easter egg hunts in one day. That's a lot of Easter egg hunting.

We went to one in our neighborhood, which was very very nice, and then we went to Cheekwood to attend the Easter festival there. As part of the festival, there were egg hunts every 30 minutes for several hours.

Although, to be accurate, these really weren't Easter egg hunts, not in the "hunt" sense of the term. There was no actual hunting involved. At both "hunts," the organizers merely rolled dozens of eggs out there and let the kids run for 'em. Someone at the neighborhood hunt did get very ambitious, though, and scattered some eggs on the playground equipment. So there was some climbing involved in that, at least.

But they were fun. William was big enough this year to pick up the eggs by himself with no trouble, and I think he thoroughly enjoyed doing so.




















































And here are some photos from Cheekwood.

We opted to attend the Cheekwood Easter egg hunt this year instead of the one at the zoo, and that turned out to be a good decision. The parking was a little more challenging, but the set-up at Cheekwood was terrific. Since there was a new egg hunt every 30 minutes, it wasn't like all your child's egg-hunting dreams hinged on one little moment when they might get stuck behind an oversized kid who should probably be studying for his geometry mid-term instead of hunting for eggs. Or a parent who doesn't get the concept that it's an Easter egg hunt for the children, and the children are supposed to pick up the eggs. We picked up Diane on the way, and then we met up with Leland and Mary-Allen and their families when we got there.



















We couldn't get them altogether to pose for a picture. This was as close as I got.















Yes, that's my son with his Easter basket on his head. We're expecting him to be valedictorian one day, of course.



















A rare photo of me with William. We were opening his eggs to find out what was inside. Mostly caramels, as it turned out.

















This was an unexpected hit. After the kids picked up a handful of eggs, we all meandered down the hill to the little pond. A bunch of frogs (toads?) live there, where they showed off for their enthusiastic audience.


















Photos of yesterday's egg-dyeing session to come!

Edge moments

Just when you think your child is going to push you over the edge--and you just realized that there really is an edge and that it's not just a figure of speech--he does something really sweet.

Last night, William was saying his prayer. It was a fairly short one, mostly thanks for his mommy and daddy and his big boy bed, but then he added, "and please help my friend (A) from school feel better soon." His little friend had been absent from school the day before because she had been sick, so he wanted to pray for her to get well.

I love those moments. I think those are the kinds of moments that help parents like me to get through the other kinds of moments, the edge moments. You know. The moment when you find out your child had to go to the director's office at school for misbehaving again. Or the moment when you have to literally wrestle your child into his room for a time out because he just. won't. go. Or the moment when your child flings M&Ms across the bathroom because you won't let him pick out his own massive handful of candy as a reward for going poopy on the potty.

As for future edge moments, well, let's just say that I'm reading a book called 1,2,3 Magic that multiple people have recommended to me. I'm learning about how to react with less emotion and more consistency when William deliberately does something that he's not supposed to do. I'm learning that I need to stop explaining so much to my son when he misbehaves. (That, of course, is hard. I'm a writer. I use words for a living.) And I'm trying to coach myself into believing that it will work...eventually.

And in the meantime, I am going to keep believing in the good moments to get me through the hard times. Like the moment this morning when my son crawled up onto my bed and gently kissed both my cheeks and said cheerfully, "I love you, Mommy!" We'll get through this Terrible (Almost) Threes. We will.

(We will, won't we?)

Send me away

I so need a vacation. I need to go away to a nice beach where I can lie on the sand with a fruity drink and doze under an umbrella. And when I come back, I will be rested and refreshed. And my son will be fully potty-trained and will have stopped hitting and kicking and spitting and all the other horrible bratty behaviors that he's shown such an affinity for of late.

What? A girl can dream, can't she?

How to discuss death and all those cheerful topics

I wrote a piece for an online publication called BettyConfidential.com...I've never written for them before, but an editor contacted me recently. I pitched a few ideas, and lo and behold, my first piece is up today.

So here it is: How do you talk to your young child about death? It came up because our Sunday School class has been discussing the best way to handle Easter with our kids. As I write in my article, it's a lot easier to explain Christmas from a Christian perspective to a preschooler than it is to explain Easter. For fairly obvious reasons.

W-i-l-l-i-a-m

So William's friend Sammy came over to play a few days ago (and Sammy's mom Jaclyn came over to play with me). Jaclyn asked Sammy to spell his name, and he did!

I was very impressed. Sammy won't be three 'til May, after all.

Then last night, during the traditional Wyckoff family Opening Night Hot Dog dinner, Diane asked William to spell his name. I just figured he'd spout off some random letters. But to my shock, he actually spelled his name correctly. I think my jaw nearly hit the floor.

So I worked very hard this afternoon to convince William to perform his little trick for the camera....



(Bonus: you get to see the big boy bed here, too.)

Big Boy Bed progress report

I know you've all been waiting with bated breath to hear how the Big Boy Bed is working out for us, haven't you?

To our shock, it is working out beautifully. No, really. It is.

The first night, granted, was rough. Drunk with freedom, William was in and out of bed until nearly midnight. Even after David and I turned off our bedroom lights, William tiptoed into our room and crawled tentatively up onto our bed a few times. We ignored him, while stifling giggles, the first few times.

Then finally, I got up out of my nice cozy bed and walked him back to his room. It was around 11:50, so I said, "William, it's nearly midnight, and it's time for you to settle down."

And William replied, "Midnight? Like in Cinderella?"

And in one of my finer moments in parenting, I said, "Yes, and you might turn into a pumpkin if you don't to go sleep now." And I turned the lights off and made my escape...er, my exit.

Hey, it worked. He stayed in his bed after that. He can take it up with his therapist in a few years.

Friday was a long day, and we were all pretty wiped out. The silver lining, however, was that William went to bed without a fuss at 8 p.m. on Friday night, and the next time either of us saw or heard him was at 7:30 on Saturday morning. He had stayed in his bed all night. All night. (Or as far as we know, which is the same thing in my book.)

Amazing. Simply amazing. Grand Canyon-Statue of Liberty-Mount Rushmore amazing.

The best part is that William did it again on Saturday night and again on Sunday night. AND he's mostly managed to restrain himself from the lure of unfettered freedom during naptime, too. Okay, yes, today was a little trickier and involved a mid-nap trip to the potty and a few M&Ms. But he still managed to stay in his bed for almost two more hours, which is remarkable, really. He's still not entirely convinced that he needs a bedspread on his bed, but we'll work on that.

And I had one hilarious moment this morning that is a direct result of the Big Boy Bed. William woke up and scampered out of his bed this morning, only to come into my room and find me still sleeping. I hazily remember him gently crawling up onto the bed next to me and scrambling aroud for a few seconds before climbing back down. I dozed back off for a little while. When I woke up, I turned over and there, lying in the bed next to me, was my old baby doll, Amy, who often stayed in William's crib with him. He had brought her to snuggle in the bed with me so I wouldn't be lonely.

Is this just a wonderful reward for surviving the Terrible Almost-Threes?

At long last...the Big Boy Bed is here

So this is what William's room looked like as of about 4 p.m. this afternoon:
















And this is what it looked like at 6 p.m.:




















That's right. We put up the Big Boy Bed at last.

Right now, it has the Wall-E sheets that David picked up at Target, although we do plan to get some nicer sheets for it soon, too. (William has specifically requested Star Wars sheets, and David enthusiastically agreed that his son needs Star Wars sheets. Needs them.) I still need to buy a quilt or comforter and shams for it, but at least it has some sheets and a pillow.

William was so pleased with the new bed, he could barely stand it. As soon as we got it all put together, he threw himself on his new bed with a great sigh of delight. Then he sat up and declared, in what was just short of a royal proclamation, "Take the crib away. I'm too big for it now."

I suggested that maybe he just sleep in his crib again tonight, and he looked at me like I had grown a second head. He rejected that idea. The crib is still up, but no one is sleeping in it, except for poor lonely Pooh Bear and Knuffle Bunny.

William is here:



















As for first experiences, I am also expecting a first experience tonight. I am expecting my very first experience with a toddler creeping into bed with me in the middle of the night.

*******************


Gratuitous picture of William from Cheekwood last week:

Tomorrow is another day

It's early, but so far, today is better than yesterday. Aaron is here, distracting William while I try to get some work done. We created a Good Behavior chart, and so far, William seems eager to live up to it. So cross your fingers.

And I feel it's only fair to report that we did have one small victory yesterday. Frustrated with being alone in the house with William, I ordered him into the car to run some errands with me after an early dinner. It was only when we were about to leave that I remembered he was wearing underpants. But we went out anyway, and guess what? He stayed dry the whole time. We did make a short pitstop in the bathroom of Bed, Bath & Beyond, and William willingly went potty. And we made it home with no incidents (of the potty variety).

One day at a time, one day at a time, da da da da, one day at a time.

Exhausted

I've heard about how some kids are worse at three years of age than they were at two. And I'm starting to really believe it.

William, at almost three, is far more of a handful now than he was even six months ago. In fact, I'd say that his current stage is the hardest I've ever dealt with, aside from the early months when all he did was nurse and not let me sleep.

I am so exhausted. I am exhausted, physically and emotionally. I am exhausted from trying to curb the bad behaviors--the hitting and the throwing things and the pushing. I am exhausted from trying to institute time outs. I am exhausted from trying to encourage good behavior. I am exhausted from dealing with his constant defiance.

And I am exhausted from failing.

I just lost it this afternoon. I tossed William into his crib, since it's the one place he can't escape. And I shut the door to his room and called my parents and cried.

I just can't do this. I know that children at this age are a bundle of impulses, and I know that they are just asserting their independence and pushing every button that they can. But I feel like my child is doing it far beyond anything I've ever seen from anyone else's kids that we know. Nothing seems to be making a difference.

And I really don't know where to go from here. I just feel...defeated.

The list

Took William to Target today. (I wore my red shoes, so I could click my heels together and chant, 'There's no place like Target, there's no place like Target, there's no place like Target.' Because you know, there really is no place quite like Target. If you just tried to say Wal-Mart or KMart, well, all I have to say is 'you poor poor deluded thing you.')

I had jotted down a short shopping list the night before. After I plunked him into the cart, I dutifully turned over the list to him so he could be the Listmaster. The list was very exciting. It had the following items on it: kitchen soap, bath soap, brown socks for David, waterproof mattress pad, napkins and Goldfish crackers. This should give you a sense of the thrill-a-minute life I lead, no? At any rate, that was my list. We bought the stuff on the list, plus oh, $20 or $30 worth of other random stuff*, and we headed home. (*Target has a $50 minimum, you know. And by minimum, I mean, absolute bare minimum. It really should be $100. Just hand over $100 when you cross the threshold. Don't expect any change.)

Tonight, at bedtime, William was "reading" a favorite Frog and Toad story called "The List" to David and me. I asked William if he remembered what was on our shopping list this morning.

He thoughtfully considered the question before confidently replying, "Books....toys...and candy."

And you know what? For a few seconds, I sincerely wished my list really HAD had "books, toys and candy" printed on it. The small pleasures that make us happy, you know?

Quickie read

Nice post today on CoolMomsCare.org about how competitive mothers can be: Mommy Wars. And no, even though I contribute a weekly post to the CoolMomsCare blog, I didn't write it. But I'm glad I read it.

I can pedal!

As it turns out, William can actually pedal his tricycle by himself. We've been encouraging him to do it for awhile, but usually he'll pedal a few times and then whine for us to push him again. See below:
















But after getting a report from Miss Aubrey that William is a fast-and-furious pedaler at school, we've decided to encourage him to power his own self a little more often.





































But of course, sometimes he still wants Daddy to push him.

Sneaking a treat

So this morning, I was working upstairs on the computer when I heard a rustling noise coming from downstairs. I immediately suspected my lovely son of getting into something yummy and off-limits from the pantry, so I went to investigate.

"William, are you eating something?" I called as I walked down the stairs.

A second later, he popped into view. He was holding a crumpled handful of pink plastic. He unfolded his palm to show me the empty wrapper of Hello Kitty fruit treats, which had been in a goody bag he received recently.

"Yes," he said. "I ate the catfood, Mommy."

The CD player

I didn't mean to let a whole week without a post go by. Gah! A week in the online world is like a month in the real world. Sorry, y'all. I'll do better. I've been snowed under with some freelance projects, but I'm slowly digging myself out.

In the meantime, the most interesting news about Prince William is his newfound addiction to the CD player in his bedroom. I'm about to just suck it up and spend some money to get him a kiddie CD player so he won't destroy the clock-CD player that's in his room right now.

It sort of amuses me and makes me feel old at the same time to think that whatever CD player I buy will be the equivalent of the little red and white record player (yes, I am that old) that I had as a small child. But instead of listening to Disney books on records with the little chime that tells you to turn the page, he's all into hip-kid music like They Might Be Giants. Well, and since he's still his father's son, the Star Wars soundtrack. I wonde whatever happened to that old record player I had. I remember listening to "Sleeping Beauty" (yes, really) and "101 Dalmatians" and a whole bunch of others on it. Later, Mom and Daddy upgraded and bought me a bright red Panasonic tape player that ground out a lifetime's worth of Cyndi Lauper and Michael Jackson songs. Ah, the '80s.

So if anyone's bought a super-indestructible CD player recently, please let me know the details. We need one ASAP.

What's he up to now?

Random photos from the small snowfall we received on Sunday:



































Let's see. Since the Great M&M Caper, we've had a couple more interesting episodes happen here.

About an hour or two after the GM&MC, I had to do another phone interview for a freelance story I'm working on. As I was winding up the phone call, I started hearing the toilet flush, over and over. Like when your child is too quiet, a constantly-flushing toilet is also a bad sign. Not just a bad sign. A Bad Sign. Still on the phone, I walked out of my office and down the hall to William's bathroom.

There he stood, bare-bottomed with a very poopy diaper down between his ankles. He was wiping his bottom with a wipe, then flushing the wipe, then wiping with a new wipe, then flushing it. And had been doing so for awhile, apparently. Judging by the meager amount of wipes left in the box, I estimated that he had to have used up at least a dozen. Maybe more. I gasped something about a poop-tastrophe to the woman on the other end of the phone and hung up to help him out. He's never tried to do that before, but you just had to know he'd try when I was attempting to get something else done. But you know, I have to give him props for trying to clean himself up. That's the sort of thing we do want him to be able to do. Er, but without so much flushing.

Last night, I was again working on some freelance stuff while attemping to cook dinner. I was dashing back and forth between the computer and the kitchen. William was off allegedly entertaining himself, although he occasionally intercepted me to, I don't know, tell me about Darth Vader or the castle people or something. On my last dash upstairs, I noticed a package of hot dogs on the dining room floor, so I stopped and grabbed it and threw it back in the fridge. Five minutes later or so, I returned to the stove and started cooking some vegetables.

A minute or so later, William toddles back into the kitchen and hands me the now-empty package of hot dog, save for an inch-long piece still left at the bottom. "I ate the hot dogs," he reported.

He had eaten THREE uncooked hot dogs directly out of the fridge. Three cold slimy turkey hot dogs. I sputtered all over the place, sort of grossed out but mostly trying not to laugh, but not doing a very good job of doing so. "Wha, wha, wha...but WHY?" I finally managed to spit out.

Apparently, he was hungry and he wanted hot dogs. He had just eaten a (cooked) hot dog for lunch a few hours earlier, but I guess he just wanted more. And I guess the whole uncooked-ness didn't bother him because he ate THREE of them like that. THREE. (I'm a little hung up on anyone eating an uncooked hot dog at all, much less multiple uncooked hot dogs). You'd think I didn't feed the kid. But as I remarked to a friend on Facebook, hello, does he look like he's starving to you?

Every time I think, hey, I think I have a handle on what to expect out of my son, I get a surprise. Not that I have a good handle on how to get him to stop kicking and hitting sometimes, but I at least knew that it happens and I have to deal with it. But I never saw the Three Hot Dog Incident coming. Who expects that? I mean, it never ever would have occurred to me to say, "Hey, William, please don't go into the fridge and eat the raw hot dogs in there, okay?" And I couldn't really get mad at him because I hadn't ever told him he couldn't eat three uncooked hot dogs.

But we did have a nice little chat about asking Mommy for food when we're hungry. But given that this is the same kid who found a way to get M&Ms, I don't know how effective the chat is going to be. I guess we'll see.

Melts in your hand

So, I was checking my email a little while ago, and I kept hearing this weird rattling sound. I stuck my head out of the office and peered around. The door to Wiliam's room was shut, and I could hear him puttering around in there. His CD player was playing, so I could hear music, too. I went back to the computer.

A few minutes later, I finished up my email and went to see what William was up to. He opened the door right as I got there and said, "Mommy, can you put this jar of Em-Ems back up?"

Remember that big glass jar of M&Ms that I put in the bathroom to entice William to go potty? William had taken it down from the bathroom counter, somehow figured out how to unscrew the huge lid that I never thought he could get into. Behind the closed bedroom door, he then feasted on the candy 'til his little heart's content.

Astonished, I looked at his face, smeared with chocolate. His hands were smeary, too (don't listen to the Mars folks: M&Ms certainly do melt in your hands). As he smiled and offered up the jar, I sputtered with laughter (really, you would have laughed, too). And then I tried to regain my composure and be stern.

"William! How many of these did you eat?" I asked, surveying the amount of candy left in the jar. I estimated that at least a quarter of the candy was missing, maybe more.

"I ate a lot of them," he reported.

Good grief.

The jar is now on top of the armoire in my bedroom in the place more commonly known as Toy Time Out. Who knew I'd need M&M Time Out, too?

DST starts this weekend

Public service announcement time.

Hey, y'all, did you realize that Daylight Savings Time starts this coming Sunday? That is, March 8. Yes, it does seem early. That's because it is earlier than we're used to it starting. It used to start in April. But now that it lasts later into the fall, it starts earlier in the spring, too.

I'm actually looking forward to it. First of all, I'm pro-anything that allows there to be more daylight later in the day. Nothing is more depressing than darkness at 5 p.m. on a cold, grim day. This is particularly true when it would be nice to take my child outside and let him run around but can't because it's dark outside. I'm looking forward to pre- and post-dinner walks around the neighborhood again when it warms up a little more, too.

Secondly, William's sleep schedule has been a little wonky lately, and I'm guardedly hopeful that DST will perhaps result in him sleeping a little later in the morning. Please, God. It worked last year, and it would be very, very helpful if it worked this year, too.

So fall back, spring forward. Bring it on.