Playgroup

Thomas has been going to a playgroup with some friends since he was... I don't know... a few months old? It's been so much fun watching the kids grow together. Now that they can all walk around, it makes it all the more fun. Now I guess it's more about the kids. It used to be, I think, more of a time for us moms to get out and talk to adults for a change. I think it still is very much that, but now that the kids are more interactive, it is a lot of fun.

We go to playgroup on Tuesday mornings. The past two weeks we have been and that follows a rather long hiatus (maybe two months?) where either Thomas was sick or the host daughter was sick or people were out of town. It's been nice to have it back on the schedule again.

This week there were four kids, two girls and two boys. Thomas was the youngest but he did quite well!

It was nearly impossible to get a picture of all four kids in the same frame. Here's my best shot:


In this picture, the other little boy is trying to tackle Thomas. Funny.


Thomas and the other little boy listening to the host mom tell how to play together:


This is the host's daughter and Thomas hanging out in the "barn." Thomas loved the thing, but never wanted to use the door to enter. He much preferred to climb over the wall. Such a boy.

Not the best pictures, but it's hard to catch a good shot when they are just all over the place for the hour or two we are there. But we have a great time and we look forward to next week and the weeks to come!

14 months old!

Last Wednesday Thomas turned 14 months old! Where does the time go? It truly flies.
>

I took these pictures last Friday. Unfortunately the batteries in the camera died and I didn't get to take as many as I would have liked. Here are the best of what we have though:

Ignore the tag creeping out the side of his romper. Oops.






"Love the puppy!!"


Thomas is a boy in constant motion. He doesn't like to be held much and if I pick him up because I have to for some reason, he frequently will fuss, cry and whine until he gives up or gets his way.

He generally is a happy fellow though. He loves, loves, loves his dog (Sully) more than anyone. I think she gets more love and attention from him than anyone.

Thomas loves to be outside and really enjoys being in the water (even if it's splashing his hands in a tiny puddle on the ground). We have a lizard that lives on our back porch and he gets excited when it hangs out on the back door. If we say, "There's the lizard!," he immediately (and happily) goes to the door to look for it. And unlike his mom, he's not afraid to try to touch it! He's definitely a boy!

We've had a good week so far. Yesterday we met some friends at the aquarium and stayed twice as long as we usually do. Thomas just loves to see the fish! And today we had playgroup and four kids were there. I did take a few pictures and I'll try to post them soon!

Waterpark, outdoor fun and funny hair

I am aware that Thomas turned 14 months yesterday and I've yet to take his monthly photos. I will, in the words of Scarlett, worry about that tomorrow!

Today a friend asked Thomas and I to join her and her kids at the James Island County Waterpark. The weather was a bit iffy, but it just meant fewer people were there and we were rained on a little as we were already in the water. A little sun and a little less wind would have been nice, but all in all it was a great trip. I was a bit nervous to take our camera along, but I wanted to take pics, so I took our old camera. Unfortunately it wouldn't work when I tried to take pics of Thomas in the water, because the batteries are a bit temperamental. But just before we left, I tried one last time and it worked. Excuse the poor color quality...I promise he wasn't blue like a Smurf!


He had a ball. I took him down one of the little water slides a few times and he loved it. He also loved just floating around in the deeper water with me. We'll definitely have to go back; maybe we'll look into a season pass.

After naptime today we spent some time outside doing our usual. Thomas loves to visit his new bunny rabbit (thanks Nannie...and Papa!) and ride around in his "car" (thanks Nana & Grandaddy!).


I got tired of pushing him around in his car, I think he could go forever some days. But he still has fun with it all on his own:






Most nights at dinner he gets food on his hands and then rubs his hands on his face and in his hair. It's not usually all that camera worthy. But tonight he styled his hair in an especially funny way and I had to show you!

While eating his hamburger dipped in ketchup, note the lovely hairstyle completely done by him:


But he's still cute!


I'll do my best to do the 14 months pictures tomorrow!

A happy boy and his hat

Thomas loves to wear hats, his or ours, he's not picky. He'll find a hat on the floor and bring it to us saying "eh! eh! eh!," which I think in Thomas-ese means "Please put this hat on me now!" Then he'll walk around with it proudly until he takes it off to examine it and then brings it back to us to replace it once again. This particular hat he wears a lot around the house, but for some reason we've yet to take the tag off. So we call him Minnie Pearl in this hat. It was a gift from his California Aunt & Uncle. I think it's adorable. :)

Another thing he's been doing some lately is lying on his belly and scooting backward. Not quite sure why, but he does.



Another thing he does is funny, but it's no wonder he falls! When I say his name or pull out the camera while he's walking to me, if he's in a playful mood, he either pulls his hat down over his eyes or covers his eyes and keeps on walking. Probably not the smartest thing but it sure looks funny:

(I don't have editing software on this computer or I would have cropped that one a bit.)

Now for a new video. Dumb me, I took it with the wrong orientation. I can rotate it using Dropshots, but the quality suffers a bit. So I'm sharing both here so you can watch whichever you like (or both). If you watch the first one, you probably should turn your head to the left for proper viewing. :-)

Oh, and be forewarned, if you are at work or something, you might want to turn down the volume. Thomas is yelling his happy head off!




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A boy and his dog

Every day Thomas loves Sully even more. It is adorable to see. At first I cringed at him sticking his hands in her mouth (for fear of germs, not biting), and I still try to discourage her from licking him in the face (or anywhere), but most of the time, I just let them be. He loves to hug her, pat her, and generally just be around her. It is so adorable. And lucky for us, she is very tolerant of him.

I took some pictures this morning that show a typical day around here. As a sidenote, Sully is wearing the little "cape" because I put her flea medicine on her back last night and I don't want Thomas getting it on him. I think Sully will be getting a bath in the next day or so.


He's on a constant quest to get her to open her mouth. I think he wants to grab her tongue, but she is having none of it.







These are just about the only times Thomas will just lie on the floor. I think he's imitating her. Seriously, he very rarely does this if she is not around (only in his room at night, and that's only occasionally). He pretty much never stops.




We got up a bit early today to take Trey to the airport. So Thomas was really tired by lunchtime. After lunch I found him with Sully by the front door. He's not sleeping, he only stayed like this for a second (and I had to use the zoom on the camera as to not disturb the moment), but this is funny:


Not much going on around here lately. Today our original plans were canceled so we tried to go visit a few different people, but none of that worked out either. So we ended up strolling around downtown Charleston. It was nice and I ended up running into someone from home (one of my younger brother's friends) and my former boss with the City of Charleston. Thomas enjoyed seeing the carriage horses.

His mouth seems to be healing well. The swelling has almost gone down completely and he hasn't worked the stitches out yet. Hopefully we'll have more interesting things to share soon.

I'll meet you at the ER, STAT!

As the grandparents know, today Thomas got his first taste of having stitches...literally. After spending a couple of days in Pinopolis, we were packing the car to head back home. I had planned to put him in the carseat while I brought the bags from the front door to the car (which was in the driveway). But, as we took the first few bags out, it was a beautiful day and Thomas wanted to get down and admire the landscape lighting. I decided to let him do that while I put the bags in the car. He is pretty good with walking these days and he was barefoot (how he walks best). I thought he'd be fine and enjoy the lovely weather. It proved to be a very bad idea.

As I turned to grab the last of the stuff, I was about 10 feet away from him when I heard him fall. I turned my head back around (I had only turned away for a second) and he looked up with me with a look of horror on his face. Blood was coming out his mouth. I leaped over to him and scooped him up, checking first to make sure he had his teeth. He did. But I could tell there was a pretty bad gash in his mouth caused either by his teeth or the paci that had been in his mouth (something I never let him do...walk around with his paci when he's not in the crib or the stroller in public). I ran back inside, called Mom ('cause I'm new at this mom thing and in a moment of panic I think I needed confirmation that yes, I did need to rush to the dreaded ER). She agreed to meet me there and off we went.

Hazards flashing, Thomas crying and me telling him the whole way how sorry I was and that I was going to help him be okay. Thank goodness Moncks Corner has at least one ER now (there are two). Back in my day, it would be a 30 minute trip. Yikes.

Anyway, Mom and I drove up at the same time and she assured me that I wasn't a bad mother. It happens. Yeah, but he's only 13 months old. I was hoping to have a little bit more time before he had to be a boy. :-)

They got us in pretty quickly and after a quick exam the doctor said he'd need a couple of stitches. No surprise as it was a rather large gash (about an inch, maybe?) and there was something hanging down. Yuck. It took two nurses, the doctor, a contraption called a "Papoose" (basically a board with straps) and Thomas wrapped like a burrito in a sheet to get through it all. Mom and I touched him and talked to him throughout the neverending time it took to stitch him up. He ended up with five stitches. That's how many I've had in my entire life. He's getting much too early a start on this.

Immediately afterward we were waiting for them to finish the paperwork and get our antibiotic prescription (a precaution since it's in his mouth), I realized I had the camera in the diaper bag. Here's the poor little one immediately after getting his first stitches. This picture is funny because he's feeling the stitches with his tongue and his bottom lip looks more swollen than his top lip...but it's not.


And here he is later today after a nap. He's drooling like a baby who just started teething because I guess it's hard for him to swallow all the time. Funny.


And a closeup...he's happy again:


He says Sully makes him feel much better.


The hardest part of this now, aside from eating (which is a little tricky for him), is that he hasn't been able to have his paci today. It makes his mouth bleed, so even though he wants it, I didn't let him have it for naptime or bedtime. It was tough at bedtime, but he managed to fall asleep. Of course, then again, he's pretty doped up on Amoxicillin and Motrin.

And just for a completely happy picture, he loved taking a bath/shower in his Nannie & Papa's shower.


Hopefully tomorrow he won't be too sore and we can have a very uneventful day. The doc said he knows Thomas will push the stitches out with his tongue, but he's hoping they'll stay in place for at least two days. I have to take him back to get checked on Saturday. That was enough "excitement" to last me for a long, long time.

First time in the lake

Thomas and I are taking a little break from Charleston and have come to Pinopolis to enjoy the lake and little bit of a break from this semi-single parenting gig. I only have a couple of pictures to share, but figured they were better than nothing. This was his first time really getting in the lake and he loved it. But it was hard to take pictures when the dog was running around splashing water and sand in her excitement and Thomas was threatening to walk in the water without me. So I got a few before he got more active. We have some friends coming over tomorrow to enjoy the lake with us, so maybe I'll have more pics after that.





He was funny today. He loved sitting at the shore and even tried venturing in a few times (with my assistance). I put him in a floating thing and as soon as I pushed him out in the water a little he was not happy. Later I walked out in the water and stooped down to hold him in the water. Then he loved it.

I've been looking into taking an infant swim class with him. THey aren't really to teach him to swim, but to get him used to the water and hopefully not let him be afraid of it. I'm pretty sure he's not! He loves the water. Thankfully he's generally pretty good about waiting for me to be with him before he walks in. Hopefully that will stay that way. But regardless, don't worry, I keep my eyes on him constantly.

Hope everyone is having a great week!

Videos to make you smile

These are two videos from the past few weeks. The first one is very short, but Thomas shows off his new dancing skills. Well, maybe he's still perfecting the "skill" part, but he "danced" nonetheless.



And the other one is nothing all-too-special... He's just talking a little and just being Thomas. :-) I just thought the other one was too short to only share one. And it's all I've got at the moment.



Time to go start the bedtime routine. Have a great weekend!