The incredible appearing baby

Yesterday I put the boys down for naps after J's 4 year well child visit. It was later than normal, and they were tired, even J, who is slowly but surely weaning himself off of naps, much to my deep chagrin. He groused a bit as he does sometimes and I thought it was 50/50 whether or not he would actually stay in bed. Baby E I bundled into his pack-n-play and put to bed without any complaint, as is usual for him

15 or 20 minutes later, I heard their bedroom door open and thought, "Sure enough, J's not going to nap today. SIGH." So, I walked out into the hall...and was met by Baby E, who gave me a loud, "Hi, Mama!" Wait, what? I'm sure I was the stereotypical picture of incredulity when I stared at him, dumbfounded. Where did he come from? Did I just dream that I put him in his bed? What was going on?

Befuddled, I put him back into his bed and closed the door. The only explanation that came to mind was that he had been reaching for a binky he saw on the floor and flipped himself over the edge somehow but managed not to injure himself in the process. Scary, dangerous, but not fatal, apparently. I wrote it off as a fluke and went back to my room. A few minutes later, I heard a suspicious noise but no door opening, so I went to investigate. This time I found Baby E already up on the top bunk across the room.

It was official: He had learned to climb out of his bed. And oh, the weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth (by me). I put out a desperate call to our ward list for an unused used crib and within an hour I had gotten one, a 22 year old model from a family who was in the process of filling their trailer for a move out of state (recalls? what? la la la, nothing to see here, move right along!). We only need it for a few more months; I was planning on putting him into his bottom bunk at 2 1/2 years old, but he's far too young for that right now, so a borrowed crib it is.

Additional investigation revealed that Baby E had learned how to prop his foot up on the side of the pack-n-play, lean far forward and grab the door frame, and then use these two points of contact to pull himself up and over the side. Pretty coordinated, actually, if I were of a mind to admire such shenanigans. This is yet another of the side effects of having a two year old who is as tall as many four year olds and as adventurous as many folks 10 times his age.

My 72 hours will be better for it

I'm going to skip right past the saga of last Sunday--every single family member threw up or had violent diarrhea and not all of that made it into appropriate receptacles and some happened at church--and report back on my 72 hour kit/disaster relief class, sort of. What I want to do are highlight some of the genius ideas that I heard on Saturday so I'll remember them and, in the process, perhaps they'll be helpful for you, too.

You see, like many LDS folks, I probably attend at least two or three specifically preparedness themed events a year, more if you count all the events on food storage and self reliance. So sometimes, it's easy to feel like there's nothing new under the sun, because we've heard it all before, at some time or other. But, as my mother pointed out, if you go in hoping to hear one or two new, useful tidbits, you're usually not disappointed. And this time I wasn't. So here are my newest tidbits.

1. Store your clothes in your 72 hour kit in vacuum packing bags. GENIUS! Clothes easily take up a third of our space, filling a whole bag on their own, and shrinking them down would give us valuable real estate we could use for other essentials, like a tent (which is our next big purchase, most likely). Plus, vacuum sealing the clothes means they are also waterproof, an added bonus. I'm doing this to our wool blankets as well!

2. Store only winter clothes and pack a pair of scissors. Then, if your emergency happens during warmer months, simply cut off the sleeves and legs. Again, brilliant! This idea eliminates the need to constantly switch out clothing for the seasons. And if you're really caught in an emergency, are you going to want to see those clothes again anyway? I think not! So if you end up with a pack of cut-offs, who cares?

3. Buy a hiking/travel backpack with a zip-off day pack. I won that Guerrilla pack a few months ago, and, while I was at this class, it occurred to me that zip-off day packs are the answer to how to pack your kids' 72 hour gear. You want to have them be able to pack their own stuff, but you also want to be able to carry their stuff and yours when they inevitably get tired. You could attach their bag to yours with a carabiner but that's bulky. This solution is sleek and, in my case, partially free, since we already have one of these bags. Love it! I think we might also use this idea for air travel as well. The possibilities are limitless!!

4. Have you heard of the SteriPen? It's a device that purifies a liter of water at a time with UV light. All you do is stick the pen in the water and presto! drinkable. If you're an extensive traveler or prone to amoebas or wanting to cut weight in your 72 hour kit or just thinking UV light is cool, this is the device for you. The basic model can do up to 200 liters of water, which is plenty for your average emergency or trip into a less than clean water area. Even better, for some situations, if the Life Straw, which allows you to stick a straw in cholera contaminated water and drink risk free, but unfortunately this is only available for purchase for use by NGOs and corporations in third world countries. Like the husband said a while ago when he realized that head lamps were now all the rage as camping supplies, "I guess things have changed in the 20 years since I last went camping." With disaster prep, it appears things are changing every 6 months, so keep up along with me, will you?

Disasters at home, imagined and real

Tomorrow I'm doing a class for our women's group on preparing for natural disasters specific to Ohio. It's quite fortuitous, really, since I was wondering which natural disasters I could expect just a week or so after moving here and then got the invite to do this presentation just a week or so later. I laughed when I got the call, since I'm so new here. I wonder how that conversation went: "What about that new girl? She...umm...looks like she can talk about stuff...?" Regardless, it has been fun to look everything up and make my signature low artistic ability visual aids (thank you, WordArt and pretty paper!) and far too comprehensive handouts.

Salient piece of information number one (info that will NOT make it into the class)? All my long and intense preparations for hurricanes are pretty much moot now. Darn it!

Salient piece of information number two? Preparing for blizzards is complicated and preparing for tornadoes feels like a timely exercise in futility, unless you happen to have a tornado/root cellar already built.

Salient piece of information number three? This is the first time I've taught a group of people I mainly don't know since I last taught at the College of Charleston. Strange!

Salient piece of information number four? The only idea out there for how to teach disaster preparedness via active learning is to have everyone assemble 72 hour kits really fast! Seriously? That's the best that has been done? Tsk, tsk, tsk, Internets.

So now, I'm off to finish gathering all my materials and get to sleep early, since Baby E has croup AGAIN, and I will almost certainly not be sleeping much tonight, Night 2, the worst night for croup symptoms, as I well know, this being bout number 3!! The new pediatrician noted that if he gets it a fourth time, he will need to be seen by an ENT doc to address what is most likely a physiological problem with his anatomy that makes him particularly susceptible. More surgery for Baby E? Ridiculous! As it is, we have to schedule his two year old allergy screening soon, which is tons of needle pricking fun. This child can't catch a break! And neither can I!

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Happy Birthday, Baby E!

My second and last "baby" is two years old today. He continues to alternately mystify and amaze me. On the one hand, he is the latest of late talkers and yet he can communicate volumes through his facial expressions and monosyllables. He is a tough kid who is becoming increasingly determined to make his wants known. Once upon a time, we thought Babe E was going to be our easy going child. We were wrong. He is just as opinionated and willful as his brother, if not more. Whereas I was somehow able to put the fear of my wrath into J and convince him that running off, leaving my side, not coming when I call, walking into the street, touching the oven, etc. was BAD BAD BAD, I have not had the same success with Baby E. He defiantly refuses to do what we tell him most of the time, often standing in front of us or running away, looking back over his shoulder, grinning, daring us to count to three. Cheeky child!

Baby E is a loving boy who still likes to cuddle; he even lets me hold and rock him sometimes, still, but he'd much rather be playing with his trains, trucks, cars, or planes. His greatest joy right now would be to ride on a school bus or a steam engine. He likes to play by himself, most likely because playing with his older brother can be a minefield, and I will often find him lying on his side under or on top of some random table or chair, driving a line of trains or cars around in circles. He is also a climber--never met a shelf or hill or piece of furniture he didn't want to scale. The appearance of bunk beds in his bedroom made his month! Baby E has a big sweet tooth (again, wonder where that came from?) but doesn't like cake or cookies much. He's more of a candy man, himself. And he LOVES music; he's got more rhythm than all of us, I think. You gotta see this kid dance! Or hop! He's very physical, actually.

I think his first full, distinguishable sentences happened today: "Make macaroni and cheese for E! Right now! Come on!" Now imagine someone saying all that with out any of the opening consonants and you'll have a pretty good approximation of how he talks. You'll also see that it was food that drove him to speak. His first word every morning is "Eat!" He's been having a growth spurt from birth, it appears!

Baby E has dark brown hair but his curls appear to have been a trick of the humidity in SC. Right now, he's in desperate need of a haircut to curb the shaggy look. His eyes are the darkest brown, and he is still the tallest two year old we know. He laughs a lot and keeps us laughing and we love him tons and tons!

On our first VERY cold outing in Cleveland.


Playing with balls and making ice cream at the Metroparks Farmpark.


More balls at the Great Lakes Science Center.

Blowing out the candles on his birthday cookie!

School daze redux

So one not so fun part of moving was having to find another preschool for J to attend. We really lucked into our last preschool and it was marvelous! J loved almost every minute of his time there and he thrived in the school environment. The teachers were free with their hugs and genuinely happy to see him each day. His art projects were numerous and varied. His progress reports were detailed and informative. He attended with another little girl he loved very much and he was happy as a clam. In short, it was perfect. I was sad to leave Charleston, but I was really, really sad on J's behalf to be leaving his fun school. Their goodbye card made me cry; he was just excited that they gave him a going away coloring book!

And then we moved away. And we had to find another school. And we were going to be coming in in the middle of the year. And it was imperative that we get him in a class, because he was flailing around, talking incessantly about his former preschool, and at loose ends while the rest of us were getting (somewhat) settled. So, I found out about this little cooperative preschool just across the street from us and went over for a visit. Turns out, they did have an opening just now in J's class (though he was on the waitlist for pre-K next year; don't even get me started talking about the pre-K debacle--I'm sure there is another blog post in there soon!). BUT, the school is VERY different from our old one, particularly in that it is a cooperative school, so parents are in the classroom at all times, and the school is a lot less structured and more inquiry-based as opposed to thematic and it's an adjustment for us.

The school decided that J needed to come for a "play date" in the classroom to see how he fit in. That's right; we had to audition for preschool! Luckily, our audition went well; the teacher AND the classroom parent (who happened to be the president of the parents' board or whatever it's called) both felt like he fit right in, so, a week later, we were starting preschool! Hooray!

Of course, though his first official day went well, his second, today, wasn't as pleasant: he got pushed down twice, got told by the other kids that he didn't know the rules, got splashed at the water table and had to change his clothes into some leftover shirt from who knows who, and after all that he got upset. Understandably. But J and I talked about how the kids might be feeling about a new person in the mix, how he might respond when someone pushes him (he has experience in this area, sadly!), and what the teacher's job was in the classroom. He seemed to understand and felt better about the whole idea. Plus he REALLY liked getting to clean out the tortoise's cage, a special treat he got today. The teacher and I talked later, and she lamented the lack of empathy her class was showing and promised to keep watch over him, and I told her what he and I had discussed. Hopefully everyone will settle down soon and he'll be back to enjoying this new experience.

If not, I'll just have to take him out and we'll make do. But I really, really don't want to do that, so I am crossing all my fingers and saying my prayers instead! Wish him luck!