Snow? Oh yes, we have snow

Photos over here

Dalty health and Tantive IV updates

Dalton has continued to heal from his fall on Monday. The swelling peaked on Friday. While we still have all sorts of interesting colors in and on his face, the shape of his face is approaching normal.

We had an additional scare yesterday when Dalton woke up with a substantial limp and refused to walk in the morning. Cathy got on the phone with our family doctor who told us to give him ibuprofen and see if it improves. He steadily improved over yesterday and there is no sign of limp today.

We don't know what happened with the limp. Friday was date night so Dalton was at school until about 8:30 pm. He was lying down in a room with a bunch of other kids watching a movie when we arrived. He complained lightly about his leg hurting on the way home and then more so over the sleeping hours. We initially assumed that his overalls were too tight. He claimed that a hammer hit him or a friend made a hammer with his or her hand and hit him while he was laying down at school. There was no mark. We assume he pulled something somehow. We'll ask at school tomorrow, but he is better in any case.

Hopefully, next week will go better. We essentially had our biggest injuries for the year packed into last week.

We've been working on the Tantive IV over the last week and competed it on Saturday. It was a fun activity for Dalton and I. I think it has contributed to a substantial increase in my popularity this week. Dalton has been requesting I sit in the back seat with him on our trips to and from school. I have also started talking through a horse puppet with him during some of our playtime. That has been a huge hit. He tells me I do the voice right (did I mention my sore throat). Today has been pretty much chain demands to play with Horsie. It has been great for learning words as that is Horsie's favorite game. We've added "boy" and "girl" to his vocabulary today.

So here are the pictures of our progress on the Tantive IV over the past week. Dalton placed over half the bricks.

Oh, we're a no guns family so if Dalton asks, those turrets are hair dryers.

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday
No Work on Friday (Date Night)

Saturday (Extra bricks are in front)

LEGO update

Here is today's update on the Tantive IV.

I wish I could say that this was the big event of the day. Dalton fell down at school and hit his head on the concrete. School called me (they never call). When I arrived to pick him up, he had the biggest bump I have ever seen in the middle of his forehead. It was scraped up and bloody for extra effect. We picked up Cathy and headed out immediately to see our pediatrician.

While it looked really bad and Dalton was very upset, he was also very lucid. Our doctor did the standard neurological tests for a 3 year old (how old are you, can you spell your name, what's the square root of negative one) and Dalton seemed fine. He sent us off with advice not to panic if Dalton had black eyes or discoloration on his neck in the next week or two.

In any case, he was completely his normal self tonight including being a turkey about bedtime. We even made some good progress on the Tantive IV.

More LEGOs

We have a long and distinguished history of opening Christmas gifts early in our house (provided they are LEGOs). The latest installment is shown at the left.

I haven't quite been bitten by the LEGO bug like Cathy has, however, I do think the Tantive IV is cool. Not having any better large gift ideas for Christmas and under a constant barrage of requests to update my list, I asked Cathy for this set.

Cathy bought this and my big LEGO gift for her during the Black Friday sales. The two sets arrived in the mail shortly after and I broke mine out on Sunday. It has turned into very nice Dalton and Daddy time. I generally pick out the LEGOs and he puts them on. I'd say he's placed over 60% of the LEGOS so far.

Here's a picture of Sunday's progress. The figures aren't supposed to be in it yet, but Dalton wanted them there. It has already been flying around the room despite the lack of thrusters. I'm thinking of daily updates as long as he's interested.

Snow!

We are currently receiving an abundance of snow. This resulted in our annual ritual of building a snow family. Poor TY never seems to get his own snowman. Maybe we'll go back out and rectify that later. You will notice that we went all out this year and even sprung for carrots.

Dalton had a great time. In addition to the snow family he made snow angles, snow people and snow brooms. He also helped shovel and sweep the walk.

For those of you who are global warming skeptics, please note that the arms are branches from our rose bushes with full blooms on them. It has been quite the warm winter thus far.

D is for drum!

Well, that was disappointing. I spent way too much time combining five pictures of Dalton drumming on a box into an animated gif; only to have blogger change the format or some such and it won't display. Sigh!

Fortunately, living with a toddler has given me a whole new perspective on time needing to be productive.

I don't quite have Cathy's level of obsessive "keep at some technical problem until it works". However, 2 hours later, I did manage a work around with the movie below. It's not the looped like I really wanted, but it will have to do.




Dalton was in a drumming mood this morning. This was during the good hour and a half of "Dad and Dalton" time after we woke up. Cathy snuck out at 7 am for some uninterrupted time at the fabric store. She was there yesterday in the heat of Black Friday madness. In addition to the long lines and the whining to go home, I'm told the following conversation also occurred.

Dalton: "This yellow fabric would be good for a lion costume!"
Cathy: "It's after Halloween. We're not making a lion costume."
Dalton: "I know that."

(some time passes)

Dalton: "These black buttons would make great eyes for a lion costume!"
Cathy: "You were a penguin for Halloween. We're not making a lion costume."
Dalton: "I know that."

(some more time passes)

Dalton: "Let's pick out a pattern for a lion costume."
Cathy: "We're not making a lion costume."
Dalton: "I know that."

I can't imagine why she felt the need to slip out early this morning. I think she said something about Cricut cartridges.

Dalton woke up pretty much right after Cathy left and yelled for mommy. There was a couple of weeks a year or so ago where he would yell for mommy and daddy, but even then he meant mommy.

He was less than pleased to find that mommy was out and wasn't going to be back for a while. His response was to kick me out of bed and wail for 20 minutes straight. It was actually convincing at the beginning, but evolved its way to forced. We keep telling him he needs acting lessons, but he hasn't caught on yet.

Wow! I don't sound like a very sympathetic parent here. I assure you that I have seen them played by actors on TV.

I did feel bad for him, but I also think waking up without mommy being there is a skill he needs to start working on. Next time, we will let him know it will happen the night before.

He cheered up and we had some fun play for about an hour and a half until he hit his head on the wall 5 minutes before Cathy got home.

Our housekeeper came over and vacuumed, dusted, and scrubbed today. She normally shows up on Thursday, but Cathy pushed her visit back due to Thanksgiving. We cleared out for most of the 3+ hours she was here. Our late morning adventures involved the Mall, Michaels, and Target.

While we were at the Mall, I noticed that Dalton can do algebra. He normally rides the cars and a carousel. The cars cost two quarters and the carousel costs one. Today he asked how many quarters we had. After learning we had four, he stated "I can ride the horse (carousel) two times and the car one time." I was pretty impressed.

Another thing that has been going on is that he is in "a sensitive period for language". That's fancy Montessori speak for he's interested in words right now. He now has about 15 words he can read and spell. It seems that he's picking up an extra word or two every day. Here's my recollection of the current list.

Dalton
Mom
Dad
Fox
Egg
Did
Go
Stop
Dog
Mall
Pool
Papa*
No

Hmmm, I think there are more. Cathy would be able to give a better account, but she's currently trying to get him to sleep.

You might have noticed that we have been teaching him words we normally spell out in front of him. While it is a sacrifice to parental sanity, reseach shows that people learn best when things are most relevant. Besides, I can always talk about the grand excavation that has been sealed and filled with a dilute aqueous solution of sodium hypochlorite.

*Papa will note that he's the first grandparent to make the list. He, of course, has a level of difficulty advantage over Grandma and Grandpa. However, it would be reasonable to gloat around Bana.

Halloween

So I'm a big slacker for not getting this up earlier. Cathy asked Dalton what he wanted to be for Halloween and he said "a penguin". We couldn't find any penguin costumes for sale so Cathy proved her awesomomness by sewing this for him. He was quite the hit at the mall getting many ooohs and aaahs.

We managed to dodge the bullet on the candy handout again this year. He was watching the other kids line up to have things put in bags while we were there, but he didn't ask about it. I would expect that this was our last candy free year.

Cathy was critical of her work in that she thought she made the costume too large. I think it looks great. If it is too big, maybe he'll want to be a penguin next year.