Disappointed

I read a discussion yesterday about letting a child experience math rather than just see it. So, during yesterday's nap, I got circle time all ready for him with counting bears:



I set up the tripod to record circle time and I was so excited - he LOVED the counting bears (they were "new") and then we read a book about golf and he said "gof, gof, gof?".

THEN I realized I had pressed the "off" button instead of the "record" button.

So I turned the camera on for the end of circle time when we were playing around with the bears and such.

We were talking about the number 9 (nine) and I told him to put nine bears. We had 8 already in and he put 2 more in, but I went ahead and clapped because we were trying to do nine. He picked up the nine card and said "ten" - I was glad I got it on film!!



BUT then I was disappointed again because you can't hear him say "ten" on the video - you can only see his lips move.

Oh well!!

Arboretum David Chicken

David Chicken is a rather annoying children's performer. He did a concert at the Dallas Arboretum and, of course, we took Timothy. Timothy didn't seem that "into" it during the concert, but afterwards he walked around doing the scakle dance (see pic - hands up). I guess we should buy him the CD - he kept doing the dance for the rest of the day!

If you'd like to read more about David Chicken, you can look at his website - he wears a cape and a chicken hat on his head. http://www.davidchicken.com/default4.html

While we were at the Arboretum, we met another Doman mom and her daughter (see pic - princess dress). The little girl is 3 years old and adorable. We exchanged some materials - it was SO great to be around another family "like us". The kids went into the petting zoo, did crafts, and just walked around together.

We are SO thankful grandma bought us a family pass to the Arboretum for Christmas - we've had so much fun there already!!

Favorite Part of the Program

I'll be honest...my favorite part of the program is having such a wonderful partner to share it all with. David's absolutely on board with all of this, many times more than I am, and he's just fabulous...on days that Timothy stays home with daddy, I never worry that he's going to veg out in front of the tv all day.

But, honestly, my favorite thing is not a part of the program at all - I love it when David and I let Timothy stay with a grandparent and we go out to eat and discuss what changes we're going to make with the program over the next month.

It's SO fun to be able to change his program, do more, and have a husand who's completely on board, too.

We're going to do more Spanish Bits (try to do them daily) over the next month. We'll use the picture dictionary CD-rom from IAHP. We're going to really focus our energy on making books - lots and lots of books. We're going to try to do more theme-based stuff, and art especially with our themes. And we're going to keep doing what we're doing because we must be doing SOMETHING right. ;-)

And we also decided that we ARE going to start SUZUKI VIOLIN this January. Timothy should be the right age by then. We're going to see if we can find a student at the college to do 2 lessons a week with, and we'll let daddy and Timothy do their violin lessons the first half and then the second half we'll just let the teacher play the violin. Of course, in the beginning we'll just give Timothy the cardboard violin and dowel rod ("bow") until he learns how to treat the violin. But for Christmas we'll have to get daddy a violin (Timothy might get his in a few months).

We also decided to go ahead and start Chinese - we want to do 4-6 hours a week of Chinese immersion. We'd like to start as soon as possible, but we'll have to work out the arrangements first!!

To my Timothy

Dear Timothy,

You never cease to amaze us, to make us laugh, to frustrate us...

Today we decided we would carve a pumpkin with you - we thought you might like to get in the pumpkin and icky squishy yucky pulp. We put newspaper down, we got the camera, and we waited - you came over, saw what we were doing, and went and picked up a big spoon to touch the pumpkin - you didn't want anything to do with the gross seeds!

You had more fun carrying around the spoon than you did with the pumpkins. When you walked past us carrying your spoon, you stepped on a pumpkin seed and it threw you into a fit - you did NOT want to feel the pumpkin seeds.

Yesterday while daddy finished mowing, you and I were playing and you kicked Ann B. Dextrous. You seemed frustrated, so I set the "child's age" to 24 months so it would do something new. It turned into a shape sorter, and you put all the shapes right where they were supposed to go. Later, you even put the star in the circle hole and said "Star in circle" - I was really impressed! It seems like every single day you do something that absolutely floors me.

We've read the popcorn book for the last couple of days and today we popped fresh popcorn. You LOVED to watch it pop up, but you liked to eat it most of all!! We couldn't get you to get down and play...you wanted to keep eating popcorn!!! I was scared you were going to choke, but you did fabulously with it.

Right now, you're in playing with daddy. Daddy put your cards in a big circle and he's telling you "Go stand on 91!" I keep hearing daddy clap his hands so you must be playing well!

We love you so much, and we're so blessed to be your parents!

Love,

Mommy

Scary Stories

About six months ago, we bought a book called The Whispering Room on clearance at Half Price Books.

It's a collection of scary poems by well-known authors (Shakespeare, Emily Dickinson, Brone, Tennyson...).

We're always beating ourselves up about not doing enough poetry, so tonight we turned off all the lights in the house, we each got a flashlight, and I read the scary poems while Timothy played with his flashlight.

It was REALLY fun and Timothy enjoyed it tremendously! We'll have to let him run around in the dark with a flashlight more often!

Car show

We've showed Timothy about 50 different car Bits of Intelligence (classic cars, etc).

Today, we went to a car show. He seemed to really enjoy seeing the different cars!!

State Fair

I'm not sure I ever uploaded this picture of daddy and Timothy at the State Fair of Texas!!

Screaming

I had to share these pictures of Timothy and his cousin. They're 4.5 months apart (Timothy's older).

They play together really well (when they're not both screaming).

New Schedule

New schedule time - puzzles and blocks

Timothy's New Schedule

Bottle/Cards/Homemade Books

Free Play/Chase Roomba (Classical Music)

Hands-on Play, Parent Reads Aloud

Breakfast (Cards & Music)

Lady's Indoor Playtime

Bath

Walk/Play Outside or Indoor Physical Play

Math - Blocks and Puzzles

Card Games (or Book/Book on Tape)

Video (Spanish) while making lunch

Lunch

Free Play/Chore Time ("Learning Music")

Nap

Snack Time/Circle Time (Calendar, Book, Cards)

Music Time

Park/Store/Walking (out of the house)

Video (cok dinner)

Dinner

The schedule starts at 7:30 in the morning (when he normally wakes up) and ends around 7:30 at night (at dinner time).

We're trying to transition to one nap a day. It worked today - he went down at 12:30 and isn't yet awake.

We discussed this new schedule a lot and it seemed to work really well today - Timothy especially loved puzzles and block time!

Today, we read folktales during read-aloud time. They were really interesting!!

Timothy's Been Talkin'

In the last 48 hours, he's said:

balloon
that's yours
mama
daddy
hyacinth
bye bye
no
what's that? (it was french toast)
dog

Timothy Reads Sentences!!

We bought some wipe-off sentence strips at Walmart that we use at meals. While he eats, I'll write something on the sentence strip and hold it up. I normally write stuff like:

Eat your food.
Timothy is eating.
Are you finished?
You are eating peas.
Eat your cheese!

Today while he was eating, I wrote:
I will run.
I will kiss you.
I will spin.
I will sing.

I would hold up the sentence and then do the action (he LOVED it when I ran).

I found that he would start giggling when I held up the card "I will run" (before I even started running) and (this was nice) he puckered his lips when I held up "I will kiss you."!!

That was exciting!!

Daddy Showing Cards

We have very slim pickin' for Bit cards this week. We're doing lots and lots of art, including our new set by Charles M. Russell.

The Resolution

Well, here's how our day ended:

I had a meeting at the college. I thought I'd take Timothy with me - I figured he's sleep since he hadn't had a nap yet.

Long story short - terrible idea. He cried and fussed through the whole meeting, so I just had to walk him down the hallway and didn't get to participate in the meeting at all.

The meeting was at 2 and we had swimming lessons at 6, so I decided to just stay in town.

We went to a couple of stores, ate lunch, and then he fell asleep in his carseat. Just as he did, my stomach started hurting and I had to go to the restroom (urgently). So I tried to get a couple kids attention to stay with him in the car, but they ALL were listening to Ipods so they couldn't hear me. So I got out the stroller and put him in and ran to the restroom.

Finally, after killing 4 hours, it was time for swimming lessons. And, of course, Timothy was asleep and I sure the heck wasn't going to wake him up. He slept through all of swimming lessons so I just went home.

Yeah...a rough day.

Argh - Somebody Get Me Out of Here!!

Well, we're not having a very good day.

Timothy heard daddy getting ready for work and he woke up at 6am this morning. I gave him a bottle, hoping he'd go back to sleep, but he didn't.

Around 8:30, he started getting really sleepy, so I gave him a bottle and let him watch his flashcards DVD. It's 7mins. long and he was asleep by the time it ended.

I carried him into his room and when I put him on his bed, he woke up and started screaming.

So I let him play for awhile and we took a bath until he started fussing fussing fussing - getting really tired. So I gave him a bottle, let him watch flashcards until he fell asleep AGAIN. When I went to put him down, he woke up and started screaming.

I told myself "I am the mommy. I will not be dominated by a baby. He needs a nap. He will not be hurt if I let him fuss himself to sleep." I closed the door and he started screaming like a wild banshee.

At this point, I looked around the house at where to begin cleaning up. I had a bath, my hair was wet, I was only wearing a towel, dirty clothes were all over the floor, the toys were strewn throughout five rooms, dishes from last night weren't done....

and then the doorbell rang.

"It's CPS," I though "They must hear this baby screaming like a wild banshee and think I'm sawing his leg off.

But it wasn't. It was the speech therapist. I had forgotten about our appointment today.

She asked why Timothy was screaming and I explained everything...then, she recommended that we see a behavior specialist.

I'm all for it - we need to know how be the parents!

Still no nap, and I'm about to pull my hair out. I'm not kidding. Next picture you see of me I will have no hair.

We have seen a LOT of cards today, though - but that's it.

Timothy's New Walking Program

Program Name: Walking

Purpose: 1) To grow and organize the cortex
2) To improve respiration, mobility, balance and respiration

Clothing: Comfortable clothing in which he can move freely. Long pants would be advisable to protect his knees—always consider the weather once he is walking outdoors. Consider changing his shoes when he walks outdoors to prevent sliding and protect his ankles.

Motivation: #1—FUN! #2 Give him responsibilities to meet through his mobility. Initially, it will be within the home---such as dusting a table or putting away toys. As his distance increases, he can begin walking outside on the sidewalks---getting the newspaper, bringing the neighbor’s paper to their door, watering flowers, bringing dog biscuits to neighborhood dogs, etc.

For completing these responsibilities, he should earn rewards—vestibular activities, reading with Mom, extra bath time (maybe bubbles), etc.

Program: Begin with 30 sessions per day, each week increase by 5 daily sessions until you reach 60 sessions per day.

Begin with a distance of 4 meters. Once you have gradually increased and reached 60 times per day 4 meters, increase his distance per session by 2 meters per week, until he is walking 8 meters per session. At this point begin to decrease the number of sessions as you increase distance.(50 x 8/40 x 10/20 x 20/10 x 40 etc.) Your first goal will be 400 meters per day.

Once he is reaching this goal consistently and easily, begin increasing his daily distance by 50 meters per session per week until he is walking 4 times per day 800 meters. Continue to increase distance to get him walking 1600 meters per session (in 45 minutes) 3 times per day.

This is Timothy's new walking program - Donna emailed it to us yesterday. We measured his walking for the first time this morning, and by morning nap he had already (easily) done 400 meters - I guess he already met his first walking goal!!

Halloween

Can anyone guess what Timothy will be for Halloween??

Playdate

Timothy had some friends come over to play! For 2 hours, we had 3 kids under the age of 3 in this house! Wow!!

The little boy is 3 months older than Timothy and they got along soooo well. Well Timothy would fall down, he went over and tried to pick him up!! They were just great friends!!

These friends lived across the street from us, but they've now moved away. We're going to drive in for some playdates, though, seeing how well the kids got along.

CBS News Sunday Morning

Watch the CBS Morning News this Sunday - they're going to feature "smart babies" and the Institute for the Achievement of Human Potential.

I'm setting it to record...

POP

My dad is Timothy's "pop". Pop dotes over Timothy and just adores him.

Today, I was playing with the word magnets with Timothy...they have family members like granny, grandma, mommy, daddy, so and so forth. But everytime I showed the word "pop" Timothy smiled and tried to grab the word.

I had to take a video to show my dad, even though he is NOT in my good graces right now. Timothy spent some time with pop and grandma yesterday and I found out that they gave him regular peanut butter (with sugar and hydrogenated oil in it) and a "small piece of" an oreo cookie. When I asked if they wanted me to send lunch they said "Nah - we've got stuff"...little did I know the "stuff" he'd be eating!!

Mandarin Chinese

So, language is pretty darn good.

Maria said Timothy seems to understand most of what she says (and ignores words he doesn't like such as "no") and says some words in Spanish.

Yesterday, he was playing with the word magnets and said "daddy, lady, chimchi" I had to look down and see what word he was pointing at when he said ChimChi...it was Timothy! Maria says his name sort of like Chimotee or something, but I don't know where he got ChimChi from...I guess it's just a pronunciation problem.

We do full Spanish immersion one day a week, complete with Spanish videos, Spanish music, and a Spanish-speaking nanny. We do word cards in Spanish, also, and Timothy has illustrated that he can read some words in Spanish (thought not as many as in English). We sometimes let him watch Spanish-language videos during the week, but not often.

Now, though, we're really thinking about adding a language next year.

Let's face it - it's never going to be easier for him to learn a language than right now. And speaking another language (somewhat fluently) is a big advantage in the world. I work at a college, and we have a wide variety of international students.

We're really, really considering getting a student to spend a couple hours with Timothy, once or twice a week, in total Mandarin Chinese immersion.

Mandarin Chinese seems like a great language to learn right now, with the Chinese population so huge. They're just now starting to introduce Mandarin Chinese in the high schools and it's expected that by 2015 it will be as widely available as Spanish. So that's good.

I posted a new poll "Should we Teach Chinese" to get some input.

I'm also open to comments on the idea.

Nap Time

Timothy refused to take a nap this morning. After attempting to put him to bed 5 (FIVE) times, I let him watch a video. This is what happened.

Brookshires

On Monday, I took Timothy with me to Brookshires to get some more pineapple (we can NOT be without pineapple).

When we go to the grocery store, I talk to him about all the items we see on the shelf, I let him touch the produce, I give him a running narration...

We were almost done, and I asked Timothy "Is there anything else we need?" He looked at me and said, as plain as day, "Balloon".

We always look at the balloons while we're in line and we hadn't seen them yet.

Brookshires is slightly more expensive than Walmart, but here's why I shop there:

In March, I had a college meeting and I had to bring something for pot-luck. I took Timothy with me and we were going to get a cake.

Well, I got out the lysol wipes and wiped down the shopping cart, then I put in our seat protector, then I put him in, then I turned around to get my purse. I heard him laughing and I turned back around and he was rolling away in the shopping cart...

I ran as fast as he could and I caught him (he didn't go that far).

It was scary, though. I go to Brookshires when I'm alone with Timothy because I don't have to worry about getting my cart back to a corral and such - they ALWAYS walk you to your car.

Developmental Chart

Stage 1 of walking (cortex) uses the hands in the primary balance role - the hands are normally at shoulder height and held up like a tightrope walker

Stage 2 of walking (early cortex) frees the hands for balance - the average child reaches this stage at 18 months



If we're not fully in Stage II yet, we're very very close.

Swimming Lessons were Canceled

Timothy didn't get to do his swimming lessons yesterday due to a big rainstorm!!

He didn't seem too disappointed, though.

Cards Video II

Cards Video II

Here's the rest of his 10/2 Cards video I said I'd upload.

Timothy's First Sentence

Yesterday, Timothy spoke his first sentence!!

Now, mind you, it wasn't a sentence of his own creation. We have some word magnets on our refrigerator - he's been carrying the one that says "Elizabeth" around the house with him and he lost it so he went to the fridge to get another one. He pointed at one and I said "That says grandma!"....Then he walked to the other side of the refrigerator and pointed at the word "daddy" and said "That says daddy!"

I was impressed.

When daddy came home for lunch, I was telling him about Timothy speaking a sentence and when I told about myself saying "That says grandma!" Timothy yelled "Grandma!!"

Later, we went for a walk outside. Timothy walked 3 houses to the left, back, and one house to the right - I was really impressed. He can walk much longer distances now...but he still creeps when he wants to go fast.

While we were on our walk, I said "Look! A cat! Do you want to go see the cat?" and he said "See cat."

Okay, so we don't have consistency with language yet - but I'm still really, really happy with where he is!!

Misc. Pictures

Waterfall

We have a great park in town with a waterfall. Kids swim in it ALL the time - it's very clean, clear water. When I went to school to teach on Thursday, daddy took Timothy to the park in his swimsuit so he could play in the waterfall!

He didn't want to, though - he only stuck his foot in. Too cold!!

Cards Video

As you know, we're going through a LOT of cards right now.

We normally do 1-2 sessions a day while Timothy drinks milk.

I have received a few not-so-nice emails telling me that I'm wrong for trying to teach my baby. The concerns (that I remember) have been the following:
1) It's stressful for him and he hates it
2) It prevents him from doing other things
3) It sets up unrealistic expectations
4) He's not really learning anything

Yesterday (10/2) I recorded one of our typical sessions. He had seen these cards for 2 days in a row, and this was his third. Unfortunately, though, the video was so long that I had to break it into thirds. This is set 1 of 3.



As you can see, it's not very stressful for him. It doesn't keep him from doing other things (besides looking aimlessly at the ceiling). He loves it (especially choosing the right answer with his feet) and it's a really fun bonding time for both of us.

So here's how one Doman family does cards.

We've Been Had

To those new readers who don't know, Timothy doesn't say much. Some days he'll say several words, and then for a week he won't make any sounds at all. He gets speech therapy every other week for an hour and we've been SO worried.

Our Spanish-speaking nanny came yesterday. I told Timothy bye, then went to gather my belongings. I was packing up the laptop in the living room and Timothy was eating in his high chair with the nanny supervising him. This is what I overheard (only in Spanish):
Maria: Do you want to play today?
Timothy: Si
Maria: Do you want to watch the bird?
Timothy: Si
Timothy tries to put a raisin in Maria's mouth
Maria: Is this for me or for you?
Timothy: Te

I walk in and Timothy just looks at me. Hello - he was carrying on a whole conversation there. Why doesn't he do that for me?

Apparently, we've been had - Timothy can talk when he wants to. In English or Spanish.

Swimming Lessons

Timothy did SO well in swimming lessons. He'll be going 2 days a week for the next month!! He loves them!

Pumpkin Patch