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Journal Key:

Green = Steve | George = navy | Janet = Purple | Evelyn = Black

2/16/12 (Thursday)

Sometimes Owen wants to get into his chair, and I confess that when it's almost-but-not-quite dinner time I hesitate to let him. He's had such a hard time lately staying in the chair that I hate to waste whatever stamina he has! However, today he was so desperate that I let him sit there and have a snack while I got dinner ready. It was pizza (using store-bought dough), and he got to watch and to touch the dough a little.

When it was finally time to eat, I didn't think he'd go back into the chair. He did, though--he wanted pizza! I cut some up, and he ate it with his fork. He refused to use his hands, and he really had a tough time getting pieces onto the fork. "I need help!" he would say, jabbing vaguely at his food and protesting when we tried to help him. Eventually each of us got to help him a few times and he ate a good dinner. We tried really hard to convince him to use his hands like us, but he would hear nothing of it.

2/17/12 (Friday)

Today Cara and I had off. We took Owen to the Brick once we were all awake and dressed, and he was happy once again to see his little blue armchair. He has learned how to take the seat cushion out of it and so he had to do that this morning. When I came back in the evening to get him, he was in a table seat with the Brick's "action" figures. Even Miss Sandi says derogatory things about the action figures, which are a diverse collection of perfectly ordinary people who have no poseable parts. Owen was very happy with them, however, and had lined them all up in an arc shape in front of himself.

I took him out and we walked outside. Owen was thrilled to see Miss Sandi and Miss Vina walking down the sidewalk toward us. "They look so much smaller when they're outside!" remarked Miss Vina, and Miss Sandi agreed. I theorized that it was Owen's big puffy coat.

At home, we of course went straight to our own set of action figures: the He-Mans. After a few minutes of that Owen decided he wanted to get Hugless Douglas, which was up in his room, so we went upstairs and read that. Then he wanted his Scooby-Doo book, which was in the living room. Once in the living room, we were distracted by the TV. Owen wanted He-Man on TV; then he wanted She-Ra; then, having noticed the computer was on, he wanted ballet hippos. We must have mentioned on the journal before now that Owen loves seeing the "Dance of the Hours" segment from Fantasia on youtube. Well, he still does. We ended up having a very lazy single-parent type of dinner in front of the computer. The best I can say is that he had a lot of fruit.

Mommy, who was with her own parents, came home in time to read Owen his favorite books again. He once again exhibited his lack of decision-making skills by telling Evelyn all the books he wanted to read in succession...the one he mentioned last was the one that won.

2/19/12 (Sunday)

Sunday morning I was awakened from a dream in which I was changing Owen's diaper to hear Owen awake in his room. I did eventually change his diaper in real life, also. Owen's Grandmom and Grandpop came (my parents, that is)! Owen turned on his full level of cuteness and blasted away. He got a new "whee-whee" (lightsaber) toy for his Valentine's present from them. It is just his size and it lights up! It also had a little bag of M&Ms hidden in the handle, which I (perhaps inadvisedly) let him eat. He ate them all, one by one, except for the last four or so which he stuffed in his mouth all at once. Then, "More candy!" he demanded. I told him we didn't have anymore.

Owen is very done with sitting in his booster chair to eat. I blame myself for this a bit, since I've been letting him sit in my lap to eat food. But anyway today we gave up and removed the booster from his chair, and he ate more than one meal while sitting/standing in it.

In the afternoon, after the grandparents left, I took Owen out with me on some errands. He got to ride in a cart, which was OK, but he also got to walk around Best Buy, which I think he enjoyed more. He doesn't particularly want me to hold his hand, and enjoyed running down an aisle away from me while giggling (I did not really enjoy that). While wandering about the store, we found a bargain bin of DVDs among which was a Scooby Doo DVD, which I'm looking forward to showing to him.

In the evening, we took Juliana out for her birthday--the Loefflers and the Genzanos. Owen got to sit next to Juliana. He made her play with his He-Man figures, which was fun. He also seemed to want to make her eat things. Usually with his parents, he will pretend to give us a piece of food, but then pull it away and eat it himself, because that is Very Funny. But he genuinely wanted to give things to Juliana. Evelyn tried to get him to eat a french fry with ketchup on it, but he gave it to Juliana instead.

2/20/12 (Monday)

Well, everyone likes the Scooby Doo DVD. Several times today Owen came running into the kitchen to tell me that the "Creeper" was coming. It's really excellent that one episode actually has a "Creeper" in it, given that in Owen's Scooby Doo book the bad guy is the Creep. He believes that all of the bad guys are creeps, and the show is reinforcing that.

I've been working on finding new books for Owen to read, because he's very tired of all of the regular ones he's been hearing. I was happy to find Ride a Purple Pelican, and by dint of reciting the poems at him enthusiastically I have gotten him to want to hear it. When he's also interested in The Circus McGurkus, I will be perfectly content.

2/21/12 (Tuesday)

At Target today, I had Owen in a shopping cart. With his hands on the handle, he kept dropping his head down as if he wanted to watch my feet. I'd ask, "Where's Owen?" and he'd pop back up. At one point he explained to me, "I'm hiding!"

When we got home from ballet, PJ and Casey were already here: it was conference night at Lindeneau! They'd already eaten, but we all needed dinner and Steve had picked up Wendy's. Bowing to inevitability, Steve and I ate in the kitchen and left the kids and their food and their friends to their own devices downstairs.

By the time we'd finished and cleaned up and dilly-dallied for a little bit, they'd gotten out Twister and everyone was having fun. No one was actually playing Twister. Cara had moved a dining room chair and a step stool over to the bay window and shown Owen how he could climb up and sit there. He was delighted. He and Cara both reported, when I asked, that he'd eaten all of his nuggets.

Steve took him up for a bath, in which the Playmobil people all got to drink some tea--Steve poured the teapot out onto their faces. "One at a time," said Owen, very clearly and carefully.

2/22/12 (Wednesday)

Finally Owen seems to have the idea: in parking lots and streets, he'll hold our hands. It makes getting to the car a lot easier. Today Daniel was leaving at the same time we were. As we were starting down the stairs, Daniel broke away from his mother and went running down the sidewalk with her rushing after him. "Run, Daniel!" cried Owen.

He walked to PJ's house holding my hand on one side and Steve's on the other, talking about Cara, who had gone ahead, and loudly repeating things we said. After dinner everyone was going to play Uno, except Owen. When we discussed it he insisted that he wanted to play, too, and he sort of got to. He sat in my lap and played with my cards on the table. PJ asked why I was keeping my cards face-up. Well, it wasn't me. Owen wasn't particularly happy when we had to get rid of cards.

He and I hung out downstairs after he got bored. Cara had brought her doll, Shaun. Shaun was in a stroller, and Owen, wearing a knight's helmet, gave her a ride.

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