Taisei Buffet

Remote Controls and Swamp Coolers

In the last two days, we've noticed two interesting observations made by Taisei.

1. Remote Controls
In recent days, we noticed that Taisei would say "wan-wan" (which means doggie) and hand us the DVD remote control. Could he really be asking for us to turn on the TV? We knew already that he would take the X11 remote light switch control and correctly point it at the lights. He would also take the TV and DVD remote controls and point them at the TV. But did he really know what everything was for?

Sure enough, that's what he wanted. He would hand us the TV remote control first, followed by the DVD remote control. He knew what he wanted! Today Wami put on some home-made DVDs, since he seems to enjoy looking at himself in the camcorder. When he saw those, he pushed the DVD remote towards her again and wanted her to do something. This was not what he wanted? Ok, fine. So we put on his regular show: Baby Einstein. We had never even noticed that the logo for the Baby Einstein company F.H.E. is a little doggie! Now, Taisei was happy. He recognized "his show" immediately.

He's watched this particular episode so many times, he can "quote" the babies that are in the show. Quote means he says "baabaabaa" at the same time the little girl does.

With this observation also came a realization that Taisei likes to watch TV! We are immediately going to limit his TV hours per day. So far, he watches an episode or two a day. Yikes. Any parents with TV advice?


2. Swamp Coolers
Every day, when it starts warming up in the morning, Wami goes to turn on the swamp cooler. Google it if you don't know what that is. They're popular in Utah. Well, this swamp cooler has it's own water source that we turn on and off every day so that we don't accidentally waste water. The routine is that Wami goes upstairs, reaches under the sink to turn the little knob, and the properly measures and deposits a cup below the know, since it has a small leak.

Today, put his head under the sink, just like Wami does. He reached for the knob and pretended to fiddle with it. Then he picked up the cup, measured straight down from the knob, deposited the cup in exactly the right position, and walked away. Hilarious! Maybe you have to be there to appreciate it. ;) Here it is for you to visualize.


New Words:

• Hiro - points at Hiro and says it.
• Mama - whenever mama walks away
• Baba - sadly, this is very random and occasional
• Baby - whenever he sees a baby, which is funny cuz isn't he a baby too?
• No-no-no - uh-oh for us
• Uh oh! - he overuses this, although it's a cute one
  

Foods of the week:

• Kiwi
• Blueberries
• Corn on the cob!
• Gyoza/Potstickers

posted by Jerin at 9:39 PM | 5 comment(s)

Fifteen Month Check Up

Weight: 19.1 lbs - he has fallen off the weight chart, i.e. He's negative %!
Height: 31 inches - he's shot up to 50%. Is that really correct? He did hold still for the nurse to measure.
Head: 46.2 cm - 25%. Hopefully that means his brain is growing too?

Questions for the Doc:

• What should we do about his poor eating habits? Well, he doesn't exactly have fat parents. Don't worry about it. He'll eat when he wants to. Just don't fill him up with junk food.
• Should we supplement with vitamins or iron? You don't need to, but you can give him vitamin supplements if you want.
• His weight gain is so slow, but he's hanging out of his car seat and the should straps barely are almost too low now. What do you say? Yes, move him to a forward facing car seat now.
  
• He gets patches of itchy skin - eczema, probably? Try to avoid having to use steroids, especially on the face, by generously applying Cetaphil moisturizer to his whole body.
• We tried the Benedryl trick for the plane flight, but was the dosage not enough? Next time, try Dramamine. That'll knock him out.
• Can we use sunscreen now? Yes, any decent sunscreen should be OK at this point. Make sure you use it.
  
• What should we watch out for at this age? The two greatest dangers are water and burns. He won't purposely get near a heat source, but he may accidentally trip into a BBQ or a campfire. Get him a wading pool, but make sure to watch him. Babies drown far too often around here and it only takes 2 inches of water.
• Anything else? Taisei should be having his teeth brushed regularly now. It should be at least a couple times a day. And don't give him the bottle before bedtime or it will rot his teeth out.
• Lastly, establish order and structure in the home. Taisei is at the stage where he is constantly testing you, pushing your limits and seeing how far he can go.

New words: Duck, Na-na (grandma), Doctor (maybe just a one-time copy-cat word), ball. This "new words" section is probably about to end because he's already copying several new words a day. I'm guessing that means a "word explosion" is imminent and there will be no keeping up with the new words of the day anymore.

New trick:

• Gives kisses on demand, always with a loud "smack." We don't know how he learned this. Yesterday Na-na asked him for a kiss, and he just did it! I don't feel like we ever used the word "kiss" much. Amazing synapses action.
  

posted by Jerin at 8:32 AM | 6 comment(s)