Sweet Child Returns

We had a bad week last week with nearly every evening being a battle and ending with Kieran whining and crying for at least 10 minutes (usually a half an hour). And that was AFTER we changed his bedtime to being later.

This week has been pretty dang good so far, but we'll see. He squeaked by to the Bag of Mystery from his magnets last week (we're holding him to 34 as the number to reach, 49 is a perfect week). He's at 33 this week with 2 days to go, I'm trying to figure out if I should give him an extra dip into the bag if he gets to 43.

We've spent every weekend this month with my brother's family (good thing he doesn't seem tired of us yet). Next weekend will be the first one where we don't spend time with them and I'm not sure how Kieran will react. Hopefully he'll enjoy time with just mom and dad, but we'll see.

Tonight we're heading to the South Baltimore Little League carnival (assuming the weather holds/isn't too nasty) and letting Kieran stay up a bit later than normal. I'm hopeful it will translate into late sleeping tomorrow. Probably not but hope springs eternal.

Alien Child

Someone please tell me how our beautiful, sweet, wonderful child became a pod baby who says nothing but "No!" to everything and anything.

Photos, finally

Yeah, so we're really really bad about getting photos posted. Most of that stems from the fact that we only dump the camera only once in a while. After which we lose the cable to the camera. Every time. Anyway, when I realized we had about 6 months worth of photos, I thought it was time to share them.

The top photo is about 4 months old. From his school, this is a height chart they did when he first started in the classroom. You can see there is about 4 inches between Kieran and the rest of the class. *sigh*

Next we have Ken and Kieran making bread together. For a little while Ken was doing this every weekend. Until Kieran confessed he didn't like the dark bread they made. This weekend we're going to try a honey wheat loaf.

From Passover. Kid in a yarmulke.

Kieran at swim class. Look at that smile.

Soccer class.

Kieran and the Ohio cousins. From left-right: Noah, Morgan, Kieran, Riley, Caleb.

Our Little Fish

After I introduced Kieran to our local pool, he's decided he wants to live there. The past two weeks, after swim class on Saturday, we went to our pool and spent about 2-3 hours there. For the holiday weekend, we also spent Monday at my brother's local pool (4 hours).

On Tuesday he mentioned his ear hurt. He had said something last week but seemed to have forgotten it in the excitement of seeing his cousins. When he insisted his ear still hurt on Thursday, I took him to the doctors. Yep - Swimmer's Ear. So, drops in the morning and evening for his ear, pain medication to help him sleep through the night the next few nights and he should be right as rain next week.

Of course, this means he is not able to go to swim class this week, nor is he allowed to enjoy water play day (today) at school, and we have to be very careful of his ears during bathtime. My biggest fear is that this experience will turn him off of swimming when he'd been doing so well. Hopefully he will prove me wrong.

Nature vs Nuture

So the other day I was talking with my mom about Kieran's inherent love of cats. "You've given birth to a cat person, go figure." she said. I have been a cat person all of my life. Kieran had cats until he was about 6 months old, then just Ochi for the longest time. But he really does seem to prefer cats over dogs.

Today on our car ride into work/school, Kieran kept choosing classic rock from the options on the radio. I like it, but I'll tend for more progressive/folksy music left to my own devices. However, I know Ken likes classic rock.

So, how much of Kieran's current preferences are gleaned from us by environment and how much was he born with? The world may never know...

Weekend Photos and Movie

We had a blast this weekend with our new (earlier) soccer and swimming classes on Saturday. Ken was gracious and let me take a 3 hour nap Saturday afternoon. Wow, I needed it.

Sunday, Kieran and I went to the Science Center where he got his face painted like a cat. He fell asleep on the walk home and half of the cat rubbed off. Above is a photo of the half-cat face. I'm hoping the face-painting place will have some images of his full makeup - they were terribly impressed by how still he sat for it.We had a picnic dinner in Riverside with live music provided by Nelly's Echo. It was a great time and Kieran danced his little tush off.

Quick Fish Photos

Kieran fished for the very first time during our trip to Ohio. Here are a few quick pics of him with the fish he caught. That's Uncle Matt and his cousin Riley in the first shot, and just Matt with him in the second. Thanks all for helping us have such a great time this weekend.