One rough week

This was a rough week for Liam. He caught a bug at his new daycare and this week it became an ear infection. He had a couple nights of a fever and cough. The poor guy is such a snot machine right now. :(

In spite of all this, he's done pretty well. He played well at his new daycare. Wednesday night Liam and I made some Valentines cards for his classmates. On Thursday they had a little Valentines party, complete with cupcakes. I was surprised to learn, however, that Liam's daycare was not going to be opened today. So Liam got to spend today at Cheri's house with his pal Ben.

Good-bye Uncle Bill.

Last night, Liam's great Uncle Bill passed away. Bill never got to meet Liam and Liam never got to meet Bill, but I know that Liam has one more guardian angel looking out for him now.

Break my Heart

Yesterday Liam broke my heart when he asked to go the Cheri's house instead of school. I told me that he missed playing with Ben. I know that he loves his new school, becuase he often doesn't want to stop playing to come home when I go to pick him up, but he also misses his old daycare.

First day as a shamrock.

Last week Liam said good bye to Cheri's House. Today he started going to preschool at Resurrection Church. It is a different environment from what he was used to a Cheri's house. There are more kiddos and a little more structure. He is actually one of the youngest kids there. Most of the toddlers are 3 years old. There are so many new toys to play with that Liam jumped right in and seemed to be having quite a lot of fun here.

Jolly Green Giant

My mom visited us this weekend for her birthday. We took her to the Hidden Lake Gardens conservatory to take in some lovely green, growing things. Liam had so much fun with Grandma and even more fun running around in the gardens. To my surprise, Liam wanted to use the potty while we were at the gardens. He used the potty successfully, and then continued to use the potty the rest of the weekend! :)

(written from memory on 3/18/09)

Phrase of the day...

"I DO IT". Yes, he's only 2 and he's already mastered the phrase "I DO IT!" So today, Liam washed his own face and lathered his hair in the tub. He clipped his own finger nails (with mommy tensely watching). He got out his own plate for breakfast. What a big little boy he has become!

This Little Piggy

Overall, this weekend was very trying. It was a combination of me being tired and a little sick and Liam being, well, a toddler...tantrums and all. But with all it's ups and downs, Liam made up for it this evening when he took my hand and started doing the "Little Piggies" poem on my fingers. I didn't really get what he was doing until he got to "wee-wee-wee all the way home". I started to laugh and told him he did a good job. Then we each did "piggies" on each others hands for a while. He is such a clever boy!

A kindred spirit...

Today I found this blog about making crafts from recycled items. This is also one of my pastimes, so I had to share!

Dinosaur Say Roar!

This weekend we visited two museums. Yesterday, we went to Impression 5 Science museum with Alissa and Ashtyn. Today, we decided to go someplace new. We took Liam to the Nautral History museum on the MSU campus. It is a small museum, with modest collections...but the displays are pretty nice. I told Liam that we were going to see Dinosaurs. He got very excited and said "dinosaur say ROAR!" He had fun going through the galleries on the first floor. Then we headed up to see the dino bones on the third floor. But the huge skeletons were a bit frightening to Liam and he wanted daddy to carry him. He told us that the dinosaurs were "scary". I told him that the Triceratops was a plant eater, like cows...thinking that this might make them seem a little more friendly. But he told us "that scary cow". Well, so much for that. :/

We did spend a little more time there and looked at the animal dioramas. At the gift shop, Liam picked out several tiny plastic animals: 3 dinos, horse, and lion. Then we walked over to look at the clock tower. The sun was peaking through clouds and the campus was quite lovely. Liam and I raced each other on the snowy sidewalks. It was a nice outing and we all had a lot of fun!

Think of the Children

In an effort to improve safety for children's products, our legislators have introduced the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act. Unfortunately, this act goes too far. If enacted, it will hurt our economy, create more waste, and more importantly it will significantly affect my pocketbook!

Please see my sister's wonderful post on the matter. She says everything more eloquently that I can and has many great links on the subject: http://fireinthewind.squarespace.com/ranting/2009/1/9/think-of-the-children.html

The Cat Returns

Tonight we watched Hayao Miyazaki's film, The Cat Returns. This is one of Liam's favorite films, mostly because of all the kitties! This interest in cats is because, Liam and our family pet, Dozer, have become inseparable. Even though they didn't get alone too well initially, Liam and Dozer are the best of friends now. Liam is obsessed with watching Dozer, feeding Dozer, playing with Dozer, chasing Dozer, and even naps with Dozer. Liam also has fun sometimes pretending to be a cat with Dozer. :)

Horsey New Year!

Yes, you read that right....Horsey New Year! Since we didn't get out of the house yesterday, we were all pretty stir-crazy today. But everything was pretty much closed today. So we decided to treat Liam to a trip to the MSU horse farm. It was opened today and more importantly, it was free! The frigged weather prevented us from staying outside too long. Luckily the stables were open, so we visited horses and barn cats inside. Liam loved to visit each of the horses. We learned from one of the students working there that some of the horses were kept inside because their had been shaved for ultrasounds and it was too cold for them outdoors now that they were missing so much fur. There were also two very friendly barn cats in the stable. One of them liked Liam so much that he followed Liam around. Liam had so much fun that he didn't want to leave.

Unfortunately for mommy and daddy, Liam fell asleep briefly in the car on the drive home. This meant that he wouldn't lay back down and nap once we returned home. Liam was pretty crabby this evening and fell asleep in my arms at around 6:30pm. Even with Liam not taking a nap, I managed to be quite creative today. I resurrected my long-dormant silk-painting skills to paint two orchid paintings. Why orchids, you ask? Well, every February Sean and I enter orchid-themed artwork in a local orchid show. Today's paintings will hopefully be good enough to use for this year's show.

On the Eve of the Eve

I had to work today, while Sean was home with Liam. In the mid-morning, Liam and Sean came to the museum in the building where I work. I visited them during my break and helped Liam make some festive new year artwork in the craft room. The guys had fun looking at all the exhibits afterward.

I came home a bit late, after stopping at the grocery after work. Liam was so excited to see me when I got home! He gave me a big hug and was in a great mood all evening. Being greeted with a happy munchkin makes a long day of work worth it!

Christmas at Cheri's House

Yesterday Liam celebrated the holidays at daycare. Cheri, his daycare provider, bought small gifts for each of the kids. Liam got a train, of course. ;) He was so excited about it that when he got home, he had to tell daddy all about it. Liam is working so hard at making sentences now and puts words together. It is cute to see him gesturing with his hands as he attempts to convey what he is thinking. :)

Polar Express

Today we treated Liam to a train ride with the Little River Railroad in Coldwater. This time of year, Little River has a polar express themed train all decked out with Holiday decorations. The trip includes cookies, hot cocoa, and a visit from Santa! We met my mom at the station and all road together. Liam was so excited!

We sat in the lounge car for our trip out. The windows were nice and large, so Liam got a good view of all the scenery. We ate cookies and Cheetos, and sipped our cocoa. There was a little coal stove in the corner of the car to keep us warm.

When we arrived at Quincy, Daddy and Liam wanted to get out to look at the Engine up close. We took a moment to pose on the back of the caboose. It was very chilly outside, so Liam and I went back in the train to warm up while daddy took video of the engine changing position.



On the return trip we sat in one of the passenger cars. It was a little cooler, but te seats were comfortable. After a while, then invited us to go see Santa. I talked about Santa a lot to get Liam used to the idea. It seemed like he might actually sit on Santa's lap today, but once we got next to Santa, Liam suddenly got shy. The best I could do was kneel near Santa with Liam in my arms. Santa offered Liam a candy cane, which took without hesitation, but he did not want to talk to Santa...at least he did say thank you for the candy. He did make friends with Frosty. ;)

The rest of the ride back we listened to the train whistle. Liam clowned around and made faces in the video camera after he scarfed down his candy cane. When we arrived back at Coldwater, Liam said bye-bye to the train and to grandma! He was sad to see them both go. But after a long and busy day, he quickly fell asleep in the car on our drive home.

A colorful score!

Look at this awesome picture that I found at a second-hand shop for only $5! I rearranged Liam's room just so that I could incorporate it in his play area. I think it really brightens up the room and Liam loves to look at all the fun pictures.

What's that? And other questions...

Over the last couple weeks Liam’s favorite phrase has been "what’s that" – actually "wat dat". He usually asked this question every time he wanted to bring my attention to a sound he heard, like: water running through the bathroom pipes, a car on the street, the neighbor’s dog barking, or the distant sound of a train whistle. My mom heard Liam’s "wat dat" while we were talking on the phone last weekend. She laughed and said, he’ll soon be asking "why".

Well wouldn’t you know it, this morning Liam asked his first "why" after I told him I had to go to work. It made me feel a little sad and spark that mommy guilt about being away from my child every day in order to go to work. But on the bright side, he is a bright and inquisitive little boy.

Puppet Pals

While we were at IKEA over the weekend, we picked up a small horse puppet for Liam (really it's more of a donkey, but Liam wants us to call it "horse-y"). He really loves the puppet and wants mommy and daddy to play puppets with him. Last night he played with his frog puppet and I played with horse. Together horse and frog went looking for bears in the dark, while horse held a flashlight in his mouth. Liam has figured out how to whisper now, and he was very cute whispering quietly as we would sneak up on various bears around the house (I have several holiday decorations with bears in them). We played like this for quite some time.

Gosh, behind again!

Well, life has been quite busy between work, school, keeping house, and raising Liam. I started a couple of posts in the last week but have not finished them yet…I will try to when I find the time (ha,ha). The amazing thing is that Liam just turned 28 months! I can hardly believe that he’s such a big boy!

He’s talking even more lately. Just this morning he said “my clothes” and tapped his shirt with his hand, as I was getting him dressed. He usually uses the word “me” rather than “my”, so this was a first. Liam didn’t like the shirt I have picked out for him, so he picked another one out of the drawer.

Liam is also singing more lately. He started trying to sing “We wish you a merry Christmas” with his Thomas video last night. He also likes to sing the ABC song when he’s playing – although he’s often missing quite a few letters and they are not in order. ;)

Sled-o-rama

This evening, the snow was coming down pretty good. Sean decided that he wanted to walk down to the Library for some more books and videos. He took Liam along with him, pulling him on his little sled. It was a very cute sight!