We’re off to see the Wizard…

The perfect scarecrow costume that I had researched and searched for high and low arrived 2 weeks ago and Tyler would only try on the hat for about 5 seconds before ripping it off. I got him to wear the shirt for about 2 seconds after some major begging and pleading. I was nervous he wouldn’t wear the entire ensemble, but he kept promising he would wear it on Halloween…just not a minute or day sooner (uh huh, sure).  The day of the big party at daycare came and as expected, Tyler refused to put his costume on in the morning. We arrived at school with crumpled costume in bag, greeted by an adorable Dorothy (Hana) and Lion (Georgie), as well as Toto (Anthony) and other miscellaneous non-Wizard of Oz costumed children. Again, Tyler wore the hat for about 5 seconds before ripping it off, and I didn’t have high hopes that he would put on the entire costume for the party…

Luckily I found out they managed to bribe him into putting on the entire costume and even got some pictures of him and Dorothy (will post once they send them to me).  I got off work a little early but by the time I arrived the costumes were off but still took a few snaps of Tyler and his buds…

Tyler and Hana:

Tyler and Georgie…

The sticking out of the tongue is a new thing he’s been doing…not sure where he got that from.

Tyler and Maddison:

The next day was Halloween and true to his word, Tyler put on his entire costume, complete with letting me tie strings of raffia around his wrists.  (after we gave him 2 small pieces of chocolate)

Just like last year, we went to historic Old Town Montrose, a quaint town/shopping area about 5 min. north of Glendale.  The streets are closed down and  the shops/businesses hand out candy to trick or treaters. Tyler and Jakey (Bob’s Big Boy) had a blast running up and down the streets collecting candy.

the streets were packed:

unwrapping and sucking on lollipops…

and more lollipops..

Willow (dressed as a ballerina) arrived later but refused to come out of her stroller so we couldn’t get any pictures together…All in all it was another successful Halloween. Among all the Buzz Lightyears, Ninjas and Vampires, Tyler stood out as the only Scarecrow and got many compliments

single mom

On Thursday Tom left to visit his younger brother, Sam, and family in Boston. It has been a while since he’s seen his brother and we have never met their son, Ram, who is now 3 and a half! So it was definitely time for a visit. I’m saving all my vacation days for maternity leave so I granted Tom permission to go and leave me as a single parent for 5 days. Tom’s coming home tonight and it couldn’t be any sooner! Being a single, working parent is definitely challenging. Being a single, working, PREGNANT parent is even harder. Luckily, Uncle David stopped by on Sunday and occupied Tyler for a few hours so I could rest. Getting ready in the morning is a juggling act and has been even harder since Tyler has started to have very active dreams in the early morning (4-5am). He’ll yell out in his sleep and thrash around, calling out for me to come in his room.  This throws off both of our sleep schedules and he’ll end up sleeping later in the morning – which gives me more time to get ready, but it’s very hard to rush a toddler to get out the door when all he wants to do is play with his cars. Luckily last night, Tyler slept from 9:30pm – 7:45am without a peep so both of us caught up on our sleep. I’m not sure if it helped, but before he drifted off to sleep I reminded him that he needed to stay in bed until he sees the sun come up, and only then can he come into Mommy’s room to wake her up.

Since I had Tyler all to myself and it was another 90 degree weekend, we spent most of the time indoors with the AC on. I broke out the paint and paintbrushes and let him loose. It was the first time Tyler had ever used actual paintbrushes and he loved it.

We also had 2 play dates – Friday night with Jakey and Saturday night with Willow. Both play dates were different yet exhausting with no time for snapping photos but a good time was had by all. Apparently Jakey asks his mom constantly to come to “Tyler’s House” – which I think he sees as some kind of gigantic playroom. A “Jakey play date” usually means chaos – cars and toys are flying every which way and the two boys are constantly running up and down the hallway. He’ll run straight through the door to Tyler’s room and starts rummaging through all the toys/cars and tries to carry as many cars as he can. They’ve been getting better at playing together and I’m glad to say no one has been smacked in the head lately

Willow, on the other hand, has no interest in playing with tyler and is happy enough either throwing a ball around or watching a dvd – her latest obsession is Finding Nemo. The 2 of them sat in front of the portable dvd player and watched the movie together while Kristina and I were able to talk and catch up.

One exciting development that happened is Tyler has finally started to show more interest in using the potty. In a record DAY, he peed in the potty yesterday morning AND pooped it it right before bed time! Twice in one day!! We clapped and cheered and he was very excited, especially when it came to flushing it down the toilet. Normally he has no problems sitting on it, but nothing ever comes out (until we put his diaper back on). So, you can imagine my shock/surprise and happiness. One of my proudest moments….

Can’t wait for dad to come home tonight!

tyler, tyler, pumpkin eater…

Last weekend we made a little road trip down to Orange, CA to visit the Irvine Railroad Park. I had googled pumpkin patches and the Irvine Railroad Park came up and had really great reviews.  Even though it was a good 3 weeks before Halloween, it was pretty crowded but it did not disappoint. Tyler was immediately drawn to the stacks and stacks of pumpkins and wasted no time in sitting among them, picking them up, stacking and re-stacking them, then tossing them to the ground when he was finished.

They also had pony rides (the lines were way too long but Tyler was happy enough just petting them through the fence), a hay maze, and the piece de resistance, the 20 minute train ride through the entire park.  Unfortunately we only had our flip with us so we didn’t take any pictures…

The train ride invigorated Tyler’s love of trains and he broke out his long forgotten Thomas the Train tracks and trains and started playing with those again, shouting “All Aboard!!” over and over and talking about the “Pumpkin Patch” before drifting off to sleep for the past week.

Tyler’s also very excited about Halloween this year, unlike last year when he had no idea what was going on and wondered why Mom was stuffing him in a Monkey Suit. His daycare is having a “Wizard of Oz”-themed party  and asked each child to dress up as a character. Tyler is, of course, going to be the Scarecrow – the most intelligent of all the travelers all along, and later recognized as “the wisest man in all of Oz” I wasn’t sure how he was going to accept this but they watched the cartoon at daycare a few times and now he’s very excited telling everyone that he’s going to dress up as a scarecrow. I had high hopes of making his costume myself but after 2 trips to the craft store and hours online trying to find a decent hat, ended up buying him a costume that I will customize myself.  I don’t want to scar him from Halloween due to a bad costume like my mom did to me…

According to Tyler, I”m going to dress up as a Ghost and Tom is going to dress up as a Tiger. (on a related note, he also tells everyone his baby brother’s name is Tiger).

summer 2009 roundup

This summer we’ve really seen Tyler’s personality come out. He’s caring (always feeding us or his friends food) and funny (loves to crack jokes, make funny sounds and laugh). He’s almost always in a good mood except when he’s getting his haircut.  His favorite show is Peep and the Big Wide World, a hilarious show narrated by Joan Cusack about 3 birds that introduces kids to science concepts, without them even knowing it. Playing with his Pixar Cars is still his #1 favorite but has stopped asking to watch the movie. There are a handful of TV shows that he likes but he gets sick of watching TV after an hour and will often turn it off himself to go play in his room.

Lately he loves to pretend he’s cooking or washing the dishes. At the Children’s Museum he’s immediately drawn to the play kitchen areas. He’ll make mom “spicy things” to eat and he loves to feed Maggie treats and fill her bowl with food. His new favorite thing to do is drag a chair up to the sink to stand next to me and help wash the dishes. If I just fill up 2 big bowls of soapy water in the sink he’s content to play for a good 45 minutes, pouring it over and over into smaller containers and giving mom time to rest

As far as eating, Tyler still continues to have a healthy appetite. He will eat mostly everything except leafy greens like lettuce, cabbage or mi-yuk (seaweed soup – he’ll drink the broth but pick out all the seaweed). If he doesn’t like something he’ll put it in a small pile off to the side and proclaim “This Makes Me Sick.” A phrase he learned from me when he kept wanting to drink our coffee “No Tyler, coffee will make you sick.” oops. He loves broccoli, green beans and tofu yet hates french fries (I’m sure this will soon change).

He continues to love reading books but lately has been even more interested in hearing verbal stories before bed time. His favorites are Jack and the Beanstalk from Dad, and a story I made up about him going to the dentist and getting a toy from the Tooth Fairy. His favorite story to tell involves heavy machinery. Something about Daddy driving a tractor/digger…I’ll be writing another post completely dedicated to sleep next…

clip of the week

Tyler’s BFF Jakey came over this weekend for some rowdy, sweat-dripping fun. Jakey is about 6 months younger than Tyler and it’s cute to see how he will constantly watch Tyler. The not-so-cute part is that he will imitate EVERYTHING Tyler does, from jumping off the couch to running up and down the hallway (Thank goodness the unit below us has been vacant for the past month). As Tom and I watched them race up and down the hallway we couldn’t help but think of our future with 2 boys of our own…and the need to move into a house with NO downstairs neighbors and a BIG yard…

future big brother

This weeks marks my 23rd week of pregnancy (only 17 to go!) For the past couple of months we’ve been prepping Tyler for his upcoming role of Big Brother. Before we knew the sex, we would ask which he preferred, “a baby girl or baby boy?” to this he would immediately respond “BABY GIRL.” This is no surprise because I’m often told how much he likes to hang around the new baby girl at daycare, and gets jealous when his teachers hold the younger boys. It didn’t help that his teachers were convinced that I was having a girl, and would constantly remind Tyler that he would soon have a baby sister.

As it turns out, we are having another boy and Tyler is now very excited about this. He knows that Baby Brother is inside mommy’s tummy and will bark commands such as “COME OUT” and “OPEN IT” while motioning towards my stomach. He likes to place old baby toys like rattles and such on top of my stomach for the baby to play with, or hold his cup of milk up to my belly button for Baby Brother to drink.

One of Tyler’s latest favorite games is coming up with silly names for Baby Brother. We’ve given him a couple of choices of names and he always picks the same name (which shall remain a surprise for reasons other parents will understand).  Now one of his favorite games is starting his sentence with “Baby Brother’s name is…………<insert nonsensical word>”, waiting for my shocked reaction, then falling backwards into fits of laughter. Some examples include:

“Baby Brother’s name is…………..wooshee gaga!”

“Baby Brother’s name is…………ahhh-ooh-gah!”

It’s been fun (and funny) seeing his sense of humor develop and grow just as fast as he is

Warning…following post contains lots of tears (mostly from mom)

The time had come. After my best friend Hedy told me her 2 year old had cavities ($1500 worth of cavities!!) I reluctantly made Tyler an appointment to get his teeth checked/cleaned with a children’s dentist his doctor had recommended. I immediately regretted our laxidazial approach to his dental hygiene:  the nights we let him go without brushing, let him chew/suck on the brush without making sure he was brushing properly, floss? what floss?

The dentist office was brand new and cheery, complete with brightly painted circus murals, gigantic waiting room/play room. So far so good! The examination room had a train table! 2 thumbs up!  Tyler sat it my lap, facing me and lay backwards into the dentist’s lap. He let her count his teeth one by one. No tears. Here comes the cleaning…the discomfort…the confusion…the crying. The dentist was fast and all looked good until we discovered a bottom tooth that was. LOOSE. How did this happen? did we ever notice? No idea. No doubt an injury sustained during one of his daycare brawls. Into the x-ray chair he goes with Tom (Tyler did not appreciate the 20 lb weighted bib) for 2 x-rays.  After careful examination and consultation from another dentist, they decided that the tooth did in fact need to be pulled because it was fractured and already showed some damage to the root. At this point, and I partly blame pregnancy hormones, tears immediately sprung to my eyes and I needed a moment to compose myself. Tom dealt with the dentist and they agreed it was best to take care of it right then and there. Poor Tyler was happily playing with the train table when he was suddenly taken to another room and strapped down Hannibal Lector style. His little head fit into these inserts and he was forced to stare at the ceiling (at a flat screen tv playing ‘The Incredibles” which provided some comfort at least at this stage). I pretty much started crying at this point and slumped down in a chair in the opposite corner of the room, all i could see was his little head being poked and prodded by the dentist and hygenist. Brave Tom watched over as the dentist applied topical anesthesia then novocaine, which is when the crying started. The entire procedure lasted not more than 15-20 min and our brave little guy was done.

After 5 minutes of mutual comforting and hugs, we were back in the waiting room looking at the gigantic fish tank. Tyler quickly pointed out “DORRY!” and seemed to have forgotten the whole ordeal. On the way home he kept grabbing at his lip because of the numbness, and he wasn’t able to eat real food for 2-3 hours. He was, however, able to suck down half a chocolate shake from In ‘n Out, come home and pass out for 2 hours from exhaustion.

The dentist gave us his tiny tooth in a tiny plastic treasure box, and that night we told Tyler about the tooth fairy. He placed the tiny treasure box under his pillow and the next morning a new car (“Tex Dinoco”) magically appeared. It was a good thing I kept a few extra Cars hidden away for occasions like this…

*Post Update* Finally! here’s the video of the cleaning, and when the dentist discovers the loose tooth. You can see the fear in Tyler’s eyes

our movie star

It’s been a while since we’ve taken video, mostly because the quality doesn’t come out very well on our camera. Introducing our new toy, the HD Flip Cam! Tom tested it out on our favorite subject the other day.

The many faces of Tyler…including a “funny face” that my mom taught him (scrunching his face up), his “fake” smile, “mad face”, etc.

Riding his bike…more like pushing it since his short asian legs can’t reach the pedals yet.

Noah’s Ark

We’ve been wanting to visit this exhibit for a while, but you have to buy tickets in advance and it kept falling off the “to do” list. I finally got around to getting tickets and it was well worth it. Taken from the Skirball Cultural Center site:

“Inside a floor-to-ceiling wooden ark, filled to the rafters with whimsical animals, you and your family will play, build, climb, explore, make music, make friends, and more. Conduct a storm, help construct the ark, and bask in the glow of a beautiful rainbow. Mingle with hundreds of fancifully handcrafted animals—from cuddly companions to life-sized puppets—all crafted from recycled materials and everyday objects, including bottle caps, bicycle parts, baseball mitts, croquet balls, mop heads, and rear-view mirrors.”

The exhibit was pretty awesome and Tyler loved seeing all the animals.

Tyler’s famous “fake smile”

later in the courtyard of the Skirball, they had a chinese lion dance! We wondered if the lions would scare him but he loved them.

The red lion kept coming closer…

and closer…

and close! With some nudging, Tyler reached out a hand and gave it a quick “pat pat” on the head.

In other news, Tyler has been sleeping much better these days. I’ll probably regret saying this since I always seem to jinx it, but he has slept through the last 3 nights without a peep. Not sure if it’s pure coincidence, but every time we’ve put him in bed 30 minutes earlier at 9pm, he seems to sleep better through the night. For extra incentive, I created a “sleep chart” and let him pick out a sticker for every day that he sleeps through the night. Like a mantra, we also repeat that he needs to stay in his bed from night until morning, only then can he come into Mommy & Daddy’s room to wake us up. First thing in the morning, our sweet little boy will pad into our room, climb into bed with us and give each of us a kiss (followed by multiple demands to turn on the tv, fetch him a cup of milk, play with him, wake up…)

Til the next setback/regression we’ll try and enjoy this “Sweet Stage” as much as possible

a fun day at the…doctor’s office?!

Last week Tyler had his 2 1/2 year wellness checkup at the doctor. I had been dreading this day since his nightmarish 2 year checkup at which he screamed at the top of his lungs when the nurse tried to even measure his head. Since January, we had taken measures to mentally prepare Tyler for this day. We bought him a toy doctor’s kit and read him books about going to see the Nice Doctor. I even requested a male doctor this time to see if that would make a difference.

To our shock and surprise, Tyler was an absolute angel with the nurse and doctor. He got on the scale and waited patiently for the results (32 lbs: 70% percentile), stood quietly while the nurse measured his height (37.5″: 70% percentile), and didn’t move a muscle when she measured his head (forgot the measurement but it’s 75% percentile – again, thanks to Daddy for the big head). To the doctor’s surprise, Tyler opened his mouth to say “ahh”, let him shine a light in his eyes and ears, and even sat quietly as the doctor opened his diaper and didn’t mind as we all inspected his “nether regions”.

It’s funny to note that at his last checkup, he measured 39″ tall which would mean he shrank 2″. The doctor and I came to the conclusion that he had been struggling and screaming so much last time that it was impossible to get an accurate measurement.

We really liked our new doctor this time, Dr. Henry. He actually sat down and talked to us for a good 20 minutes about everything from sleep problems to speaking korean to potty training, and was very good with Tyler. Apparently the last doctor had written in Tyler’s chart that he was “difficult’ and Dr. Henry couldn’t believe this, saying what a good boy he was

To end the appointment Tyler had to get 2 shots and a TB test. He cried for a brief moment but that’s to be expected. We’re so proud of our big boy!!