His own language

Frankie is "talking" up a storm lately. It seems like he learns new words almost every day. However, there are a lot of words that I still don't understand. I told Frank that I can't wait until we can understand his language...and he told me he can't wait until he can speak ours! His new words for this weekend include: hot, more (always "more more"), water, pretty, and no, no, no.

Frankie had a follow-up doctor's appointment this morning to check his ears, and they look good! However, he has an eye infection, so we got some antibiotic eye drops for that. Hopefully it will clear up soon.

Here are a couple of pictures from this weekend:

happy boy

loves his fire truck

First happy meal

Tonight Frankie had his first happy meal, and I am pleased that my son actually went for the apple slices before the fries or the chicken nuggets. He managed to eat the entire happy meal, and he loved it! We almost never eat fast food, but tonight it was just what we wanted.

Temper tantrums

We have officially entered the temper tantrum stage. Tonight, he had three of them, and I am officially exhausted. First, when I pick him up from day care, he immediately demands to be let down so that he can walk through the lobby of the building to the elevator bank. This is about a 300 foot walk, and he gets easily distracted by other people, things, noises, etc. I usually let him walk until we get close to the elevators and then pick him up to get on the elevator. When I went to pick him up tonight, he threw his head back and started screaming. Thankfully, it was short lived and he was okay by the time we got into the elevator with seven other people. But I know the day is coming quickly when he will scream until we get to our car.

Then, I made spinach, mushroom, chicken enchiladas for dinner, and he did not want anything to do with them. We fed him some various other food items, and then I decided to let him practice using a spoon and gave him some blueberry yogurt. He loooves using a spoon, but it takes him forever to eat that way. I let him feed himself yogurt for about twenty minutes, and then I took it away to take him upstairs to get him to the bath. He kicked and screamed for a good five minutes while I carried him upstairs, took off his clothes, and put him in the bath. It was not until I gave him his toothbrush that he calmed down.

Speaking of his toothbrush....I took it away from him after about five minutes of "brushing" his teeth in the bathtub. And he completely flipped out. He stood up in the tub, pointing at the toothbrush and screamed and cried. He was bouncing up and down, almost shaking. I felt bad for him, but at the same time, it was so ridiculous...he wanted a toothbrush?! After that, I had Frank come upstairs to put on his PJs and get him to bed. I was completely exhausted and defeated. Thankfully, he calmed down enough before I left to give me some kisses and say goodnight, so I know he still loves me. I am NOT looking forward to more nights like this, but I know that they are coming!

First trip to the zoo

Today we decided to take Frankie on his first outing to the Dallas Zoo. In the last couple of years they have completely revamped the Dallas zoo, adding a huge new section devoted to animals that can be found on an African safari. I was really curious to see the new exhibit, and I was excited to see how Frankie liked all of the animals. The weather in Dallas has been gorgeous this week, and we were not the only people with the bright idea of going to the zoo today. It was packed! The Africa exhibit was really cool--still nothing like seeing those animals up close, in the wild, but very neat for a zoo. Frankie seemed to enjoy being outside, and he liked seeing the monkeys and the elephants, but I think he is still too young to really get it. He was distracted by the buckle on his stroller, his graham crackers, and other people more than he was attracted to the animals. He did enjoy his first ride on a zebra on the merry-go-round. It was really nice to spend a day together as a family!

Here are some pictures from our day at the zoo:

fun with an elephant statute

petting goats

riding the carousel

One year pictures

Chocolate syrup helps the medicine go down

Frankie absolutely hates medicine. When he was younger, it was easy enough to force him to take it, but in the last month or so, it has become really difficult to get that medicine in his mouth and keep it there. Sometimes I have luck mixing it with juice, yogurt, or applesauce, but sometimes he detects the medicine and then refuses to eat or drink any more. When Frank is here with me, sometimes we can hold him down, hold his hands, hold his mouth open, and force the medicine in there, but usually at least half of it is spat back out at us. And he is way too strong for me to get it in him that way by myself. I have tried putting the medicine on a spoon, in a sippy cup, in a regular cup...nothing works consistently. Tonight, I gave him the medicine mixed with some juice in his sippy cup and he refused to drink it. I took the medicine out of the sippy cup and put it in his bathroom cup that he loves to drink out of, but he shook his head "no" and clamped his mouth shut. I remembered reading in a baby book that chocolate can mask the aftertaste of medicine, so I decided to put chocolate syrup on the spout of the sippy cup and see if he would drink it. And it worked! Sort of. He drank about 3/4 of the medicine before he decided he had enough of my shenanigans. Maybe the key is to keep mixing it up? I have 8 more days of this medicine to go, so hopefully I will manage to get at least most of it in him so that these ear infections go away for good! My mom told me that I am smarter than him so I just need to keep coming up with ways to trick him, but I feel like my days as the smarter one are already numbered!

Spoke too soon

Yesterday I expressed my amazement that Frank can be so happy and content even when he feels like crap. Well, he decided to prove me wrong today. This was one of the worst days I can remember with him, almost as bad as when he was a newborn and we hadn't yet discovered that he had acid reflux. He would not sleep unless I was holding him, he would not eat, and he was generally inconsolable most of the day. I took him to the doctor and it turns out that he has two really bad ear infections on top of his stomach bug! Poor little guy!! Usually ear infections do not bother him too badly, so I know that these must be really bad to be making him so miserable. The pediatrician gave him a shot of antibiotics, so hopefully that will help. On top of Frank feeling terrible, I also felt terrible all day today because I got Frank's stomach bug. Overall, it was a horrible, no good, very bad day, and I am glad that it is almost over!!