Crap therapy

So, I was reading online ways to encourage your child to crawl. Owen is 8 months now, and this the average age for crawling to begin. We have rolling down to an art form (to the point where sometimes if I look away for a minute, Owen can end up all the way on the other side of the room, under a table- each heart attack is great fun!). A lot of what they say is to tease your child by placing a toy just out of their reach. Ok, they don't say tease but let's face it, that it is tormenting. I have done this many times (I never said I was above tormenting) but Owen has figured out how to roll to the toy. Its almost like a 3 point turn: he rolls to his tummy, back to his back but on a slight angle and one more time head-on on his tummy and BINGO! Toy with in reach. But I am not sweating it too much. He is showing signs of trying to move forward (literally and figuratively). He is sticking his bum up in the air but accidentally rolls over instead of inching forward.

But the point of this blog is "Crawl Therapy".

On the web site I was checking out for crawling help, someone had posted about crawl therapy. Will wonders never cease. You see some babies crawl, some scoot around on their butt, some roll, and some skip it all together and go to cruising (grabbing on to furniture and making their way around the room by walking). Apparently those that skip it are now being deemed developmentally delayed. They suffer from poor comprehension skills, trouble reading and spelling. They are now being enrolled into crawl therapy to teach them to crawl, even though they already know how to walk. Ok, I thought this was the absolute stupidest example of parenting gone wild. I never crawled. I scooted. So apparently I am not up to par with my peers. I have no problem with crawl therapy if your child isn't doing anything to get mobile. But a child who skips ahead, who decides they don't need to waste their time on their hands and knees...They are supposedly special needs?? Huh?

I just had to share the ridiculous parenting world we live in . And on to the photo of my slow baby.

A few random photos again

TT Mama

So it finally happened. I ventured out into the world and proclaimed myself a trailer trash mom for the day. All I need to do is take up smoking and add three more toddlers under my arm and I am good to go to the trailer park.

Cris and I have been working on the bathroom (hence no new posts). We have tearing apart and fixing, venturing to home depot and planning. I will put up some photos of the before and after- even though it has nothing to do with Owen... Anyhoo...

I had to venture out to Home depot to pick up a few items (we make about 3 trips a day) for the reno. Too lazy to change, I went outside dressed in a paint stained shirt- but not quite stained enough to be obvious, just tacky. A pair of blue shorts that are just a bit too small- I bought them at the Value Village 50% off sale and thought I would easily lose a bit a weight to be able to wear them. Instead, everytime I sit down, the velcro pockets pop open. Really flattering- glad I could share. And to top it off, literally, a red Running room "Canada" hat. No makeup. No hair do. (Although I am a bit better today, on Thursday I ventured out with paint in my hair not realizing it.) Owen comes with me for a little trip. He is dressed to the heights as well. A too big onesie with red popsicle stains, vitamin D stain (that looks like brown slop, maybe like coke) and his diaper hanging out the leg holes. And no shorts. Oh yeah.

So we go through Home depot and after talking to two separate very helpful men, realized we didn't have to buy anything. Triumphant! I don't think that has ever happened. So to celebrate we go to the beer store. This is were it gets good.

I carry Owen in to the Beer store, shabby outfit, dirty baby and immediately grab a 12 pack of beer. In line, I attempt to balance the baby and the beer case. But I end up having to hold Owen across his belly instead of over my hip. Well baby and beer are heavy and I have to hunch over to hold them both. And I realize that to the outside eye, I look like I am so stuck on my case of beer that I refuse to put it down despite squishing my baby's organs. I felt oddly guilty for having a baby in a beer store. I loudly mentioned that the beer was a gift for "your father" so no one would be wondering what mother downs a box of beer with a dirty baby. At least the line was short and fast so I was able to take my baggage out to the car quickly. Thankfully the cashier didn't card me. I noticed a few people watch as I climbed in to my car, checking the car out for car seat and piled garbage in the back seat. At least we don't drive a total sh*t box.
If it weren't illegal, I would have cracked open one of those tasty cold beers and driven us home! But I can only imagine how well that would have gone over. That would have been the icing on my tiara and sash of trailer trash mama.

Dinner with the Dummies

a.k.a. Dinner at our house.

I can only imagine what eating dinner would be like for a stranger in our house.

Owen has recently started eating more solid foods. Well sort of. We started with green beans. These did not go over well. In fact, they went so badly, that Owen stopped eating the cereal, convinced that it must be the same as that horrid green slop (which after a little sampling my self, I couldn't agree more). He even went so far as to refuse anything offered by me. I trashed the green beans and went on to carrots. Convinced these would be tastier I was all excited to have him eat them. Nope. Not having anything offered to him on a spoon by me.

So Cris and I came up with a genius plan to have him eat cereal again, before we tackled carrots (the green beans were frozen for a date way in the future). Owen was still very interested in anything Cris or I ate. So we decided that Cris should pretend to eat the cereal and then offer it to him. So we got out our acting chops and started fake eating everything in very loud voices.

"Oh yum yum yum. Daddy's food sure is delicious!"

"Nummy nummy nummy. Mmmm. Mummy's food is tasty!"

" Numm numm numm. gobble gobble gobble."

"Yum yum yum. Delicioso!!" (Damn that Dora the explorer and her backpack. I can't get that bag's catch phrase out of my head. Even worse it is followed by singing the chorus of "Back pack's" song. If you have ever heard it, your ears will bleed in sympathy).

Owen would watch us very intently. Surely, what we were eating was the best slop ever. So Cris tentatively offered him a spoonful of pureed cardboard (cereal). You would think it was liquid gold! He opened wide and took a nice big spoonful. He smiled and laughed. But refused to swallow. Little victories.

2 loud, long and overboard dinners later, we are back to swallowing cereal and have even taken carrots from Cris! I was beginning to think Owen was going to have pureed cereal at his wedding. We will eat Cheerios yet!

LOVE HIM!!!

Diaper Dooty: the Return

The escapade continues. I was feeling like a blogging failure with no fun stories of poop or pee. Owen hasn't had an accident filled with hilarity and body functions in weeks. Instead I have been forced to write sad stories of hospitals and garage sales. My apologies. We can now safely return to the Diaper Dooty series with smiles on our faces and poop in our diapers!

So I went out for a girl's night the other evening with two girlfriends from work. Did you know I have not been out of the house alone for a social occasion in 7 months!!! Painfully sad. Anyway...So Cris was left home alone to tend to the munchkin (whose most permanent nickname is "Munchie". It's short for Munchkin and it sounds like Monkey, another common nickname for him. I digress again...).

In preparation for me actually exiting the home, wonderful dad that he is, Cris made Owen a nice bowl of cereal (aka pablum, not fruit loops) so he could see how to make it. Ah cereal, that wonderful gloopy crap that taste like cardboard. As far as I am concerned you can't make it wrong as it tastes awful no matter what you do to it. So Cris puts it all together and starts feeding Owen. He then reveals he is not quite sure how much cereal he has put in. Maybe two and half...Maybe three tablespoons. He had used a lot of milk and therefore had to add more cereal to make it not so soupy (can't you just taste it?). I think he probably put in about 4 tablespoons.
Umm, usually I make it with 2 tablespoons.
So Owen got a nice big dose of FIBRE!! What happens to little babies who get too much fibre? No surpisingly it doesn't all come out.
No.
Instead we get this.

This took place all day. The poor kid must have thought he was passing bricks. The amount of noise...And the colours his face went! That's red.
These photos made me laugh so hard! Yes I take great joy in my son's constipation. Hey, lots of comedians have made tons of money on this exact stuff. I am starting Owen off early for that comedy career. And therapy.