Conference moira::parenting

    I know how you feel.  Jeffrey lost his first tooth soon after turning
    5.  It was a great experience.  Now at 5 3/4 he is getting ready to
    loose his top two.
    
    But the most exciting thing is that Evan (who turned 2 in June) said to
    me last night..."Mommy I have to go potty!!!!!"  So we ran in there and
    sure enough he really had to go.  I am pretty impressed that he is
    finding an interest in going potty so early.  I have been sitting him
    on the potty first thing in the AM and last thing in the PM.  I think
    with all of the male influence he is catching on quickly.
    
    

    
    In one months time, Michael (almost 9 mos), cut 3 teeth, learned to 
    crawl forward, pull him self up to the furniture, and is now
    "cruising" all over the place. He wants to walk SO bad!
    
    Its so amazing to watch them grow, but it is also so sad at the same
    time. He's not going to be a baby long...I wish it didn't go so fast!
    
    Chris
    

    Danielle is 22 months. In the last 2 months she has gone on the potty 7
    times! Everyday I encourage her with her videotape "Once upon a potty"
    it's a slow road but she's making progress. Daddy and I are thrilled!!
    We're hoping she'll be completely trained by summer's end.
    
    Nobody told me how difficult potty training is! So far it's the most
    difficult thing we've done as parents....
    
    Sandy

    
    Nicholas is 4 mos. old and I found him laying on his back in his
    crib.  He's figured out how to go from his tummy to his back.
    I'm hoping his first words will be "ma ma" but I know they'll
    probably be "da da"!
    
    Boy, it seems like just yesterday I was at the hospital having
    him.  Time does fly, doesn't it?
    
    -Chris

    Marc (2.8) has started sleeping in a "big boy bed" this week.  Last
    nite he actually slept all nite in the bed without waking up crying.
    A real accomplishment!  And this morning when I went in to wake him up, 
    he was standing up holding a pair of shorts that he had just taken 
    out of his dresser, and the first thing he said to me was "Mom, where's
    the shirts"? 

    
    Last week one day after turning 7 mos (it was milestone day!)
    Victoria (who was creeping) starting crawling top speed,
    pulling up (to the knees) and saying da,da,da.  THis week
    she added muma.. She also now bee-lines it to the dog - 
    a living stuff animal (groan) .
    
    I couldn't believe all the changes in ONE day! The day before
    she had her DPT shot - I wonder if there were super vitamins
    in there too.. whew!
    
    Mind you baby proofing happened real fast..
    
    Hope thats all for now...
    

    This weeks we celebrated Charlotte's 2 months in the world;
    She also had her first shots - never seen that shocked expression on
    her face befeore - it broke my heart! 
   (She weighed in at 11 pounds 10 ounces, by the way).
    This week as well, she's really seemed to mast the art of holding her
    head 90degrees while lying on her stomach! She practices this new
    talent endlessly. She loves to sleep on her belly, so, after she's been
    fed and has dozed off we lay her down on her stomach. So she 
    immediately wakes up, lifts her head and feet balancing on her belly
    and spits up. After that she's happy and lays down in it! 
    
    In her hair and in her ears, sometimes on her eyelids....8-)
    
    Monica
    (ready with that kleenex)

    This weekend I was at my mother's with my son Shane who will be two,
    two weeks from today.  He's got a very good vocabulary, but he's never
    said more than a two word sentence.  Well, my mother had noticed that
    he had some ink on his hands and realized that he must have found a
    pen.  After a few minutes of looking for the pen and getting very
    frustrated, my mother turned to Shane and asked, "Shane, were's the
    pen?" and Shane replied (very clearly, I might add), "I don't know where
    it is!".  His first 6 word sentence!  I was very happy to know that he
    can put sentences together, as I was beginning to worry.
    
    Lori B.   

    
    Jason up and decided last Thursday that he was going to be a "big
    boy" and has been perfectly potty-trained during the daytime since!
    He'll be 3 in September, so it's not a *major* accomplishment, 
    but I'm pretty proud.   
    
    Carol
    Now, to work on the nighttime....
    

    We've been getting Michael's (age 2.6) new room ready, with the "big
    boy" bed in it.  Pat got it all painted except the second coat on one
    wall of trim and the inside of the closet, and we moved all the
    furniture back into place and put the bedding on.  Pat planned to
    finish painting this week while I was out of town and have Michael
    sleeping in the room by the time I got home Friday.
    
    Well, last Friday night bedtime came, and Michael announced that he was
    going to sleep in his new room.  Period.  No discussion.
    
    We were not inclined to refuse such enthusiasm, so we said OK.  He took
    a little longer than usual to get to sleep 'cause he was so excited,
    but he slept all night in there without a whimper.  And hasn't been
    back in his crib since.  We have yet to hear a peep out of him till
    time to get up.
    
    It's the strangest thing to wake up in the morning to a little person
    standing beside the bed saying "Daddy, get up peese" !!!!!
    
    Steve
    
    P.S.  Now the question is how does Pat finish the painting?  She
    normally paints when he's asleep, but now that he's sleeping in the
    room ... well ... looks like Dad is going to get to play Babysitter
    this weekend while Mom paints!

re:                     <<< Note 215.10 by SCAACT::RESENDE >>>

>    room ... well ... looks like Dad is going to get to play Babysitter
>    this weekend while Mom paints!

Steve, you hit one of my hot buttons.  Don't play babysitter, just play Dad.

Frank_who_never_"babysits"_his_kids

Michael, 14 months, had his first "True" haircut yesterday. My baby is now a 
"little boy". Unfortunately, he screamed his head off the whole time. It 
finally dawned on me the barber was wearing a white coat. Mike sees a white coat
and he freaks. He associates it from being in the hospital and all the lab
tests he has had this past year.

We went to a local barber in Mendon, Ma. called Warren's on Rte 16 in the 
Lowell's plaza.  What a great place to bring children for a haircut. He has a 
barber chair set up like a car with buttons to push to activate a set of
play traffic lights. He gave me an envelope with some of Mike's hair in it.
The envelope has the date and Warren's address on it. 

They grow up to fast, 

Pat K.

    
    Yesterday, 5 days short of his 7th month birthday, Sean crawled 
    across the room to me.  
    
    He has been doing (bellyflopping) up until now.  (At least, that's 
    what my brother named it...where Sean gets up on all floors, rocks 
    back and forth until he has enough momentum to throw himself forward 
    and lands on his stomach about 6 inches from where he started.  Then
    he gets up and does it all over again.)
    
    Like .6, I couldn't believe the change over night.  I had been playing
    with him the night before on the ground...'checking out the flopping
    technique' ;-).  Then, last night, I walked into the room and sat down 
    on the floor 12 feet away from him and he took one look at me and crawled 
    right over.
    
    Couldn't believe the new display of coordination within just 24 hours!
    
    Of course, John nearly had a heart attack racing up from the basement
    when I started to yell...I couldn't get out much more than  "Hurry...
    quick!".  
    
    Cheers,
    
     Carol
          

    Christopher started walking on July 9, at 11 months.
    
    Ryan started riding his two wheeler without training wheels, on July 2,
    at 3 yrs. 11 months.
    

    While on vacation that last 2 weeks....
    
    Mitchell who turned 6 months, Jul 19, went from a crawling position
    to sitting position, stood up in crib, and started crawling...
    
    I'm so excited he did this while I was with him and not at the
    daycare.....
    
    Right now he's just starting to pull himself up all the time....
    
    Boy he's growing up fast...and he's just barely started eating
    cereal!
    
    Kristen
           

    Last Wednesday 7/29 Brad went for his first dental visit (2 yrs 10 mo)
    he did great.  In the middle of getting his teeth cleaned he looked at
    the Hygenist and said,"Were done".  When she explained that there was
    more to do he complied he even let her floss.  I went a bought some
    bubble gum floss for kids and he wants to floss everynight with me.  
    
    Its so hard to watch them grow up.
    
    Sasha

    	I'm just so proud of this.

    	My sister called the other evening and her son (my nephew ;-)) is
    one of the children featured in the national fall Kids-R-Us ad
    campaign.

    	If you visit the store, you'll see lots of posters of little kids
    around, he is one of the toddlers and he is wearing a green turtleneck.
    Apparently there is another picture of him wearing a white outfit with
    painted taxis on it, but I didn't see that picture in our local store.

	Ethan is of mixed races and apparently he is (and has been since
    birth) so striking that *everyone* kept telling my sister to have him
    in modeling. She sent his picture to a reputable modeling agency and
    after his first job (for which he got paid a whopping 40$) he is
    featured in a national campaign. Not too shabby, huh?

    			Wendy

    My son, Daniel, who will be 10 months next Monday, has finally cut his
    first tooth.   There for a while I thought his teeth would never appear.
    He has being teething since he was 3 months old.
    
    
    Bernie

    
    Today is Spencer's first birthday. What a year.
    
    	This weekend will be Spencer's birthday party celebration with some
    of his little friends and the following weekend will be *our* birthday
    party celebration with a lot of our big friends.
    
    				:-)

My son Patrick had a similar experience. Within the past month all four molars
have broken through. At 19 months he's still teething.

Good luck,

Chris

    This has been MILESTONE week for my daughter....The beginning of
    the week I couldn't stop bragging about Samantha because she
    is 10 months old and just started walking on her own - Well, she
    just starting letting go and walking to me - sometimes across
    the whole living room (it's not that big!  but I am a very proud
    mom!).....
    
    Then!  Yesterday she said her first word!!!  She has been saying
    Mum Mum and Da Da - and Pu Pu (for puppy) for months - but yesterday
    she said ADAM.....(Adam is Samantha's daycare provider's 4 year old
    who Samantha loves to pieces.....)
    
    Can you tell that I'm ONE PROUD MOMMY!!!!!!!
    
    

    
    Michael is walking 10-20 feet at a time now!!!!!  He started taking a
    few steps at about 9+ mos, but slacked off for a couple of weeks, then 
    started again taking about 5-6 steps, then slacked off again...and now
    at 11.5 mos he is definatly ON TRACK!  Walking all over the house, with
    his little hands inthe air for balance!  
    
    Chris
    
    PS....Happy Birthday Spencer!
    

Dirk (14 yrs, 9th grade) has transfered to the English section this year after
doing all his previous schooling in French.  At the beginning of the year they
went on Field week and had exercises for several classes to show what they
had learned.  The parents were invited to a Field Week Day where we attended
classes and saw the results.

I attended an English class where there were essays presented.  Of the 70
students who went on the trip, two essays were chosen as the "best" and as
examples to use in the discussion.  Dirk's essay was one of these.  I got
to read it to "the class" :-)  Had trouble keeping my voice from quivering! :-)

Cheryl

    Charlotte, who will be 5 months on Friday, became the proud owner
    of two bottom teeth, 2.5 weeks ago. I though the teething might take a 
    break but it looks like she might be swiftly awaiting the eruption of 
    the top two now....
    She's down with her very first cold this week -- lots of snorking and 
    sniffling....
    She's also started to watch everything, look around at everything and
    keeps her arms stretched out wide when you carry her so that she
    can touch what she sees. 
    My little plumpy is around 17 pounds now - ugh!
    
    Monica
    (gees, I got these muscles now!)

    Congrats Monica on Charlotte's two bottom teeth.  Chelsea who will be
    5 months on Monday, is still drooling up a storm and chewing on her
    hand like its the best meal in California!  
    
    We went thru our first cold at 8 weeks.  It was miserable for all of
    us.  We raised her crib...used the saline solution with the nose
    suck (oh joy!) and gave her small doses of pedicare infant decongestant
    drops.  It lasted about a week....was so glad when her little nose was
    clear again and she could breath comfortably.
    
    Will have to swap stories sometimes since our girls are only three days
    apart!!
    
    Take care,
    
    ..Lori

    Since the last 2 notes talk about kids around Neel's age I absolutely
    have to brag. Neel will be 5 months on the 13th so he is not far behind
    the kiddies of the last 2 noters. He has also been chewing and drooling
    uncontrollably. He does not seem interested in rolling over. He gets
    most of the way and then flops back on his back. When we do put him on
    his tummy he looks around for a while, discovers the proximity of his
    deeeelicious hand and goes for it like a tiger at his prey.
    
    He likes to STAND! Whenever we let him hold on to our fingers he pulls
    himself up and stands and nothing that make him sit. He becomes stiff
    as a board. Looks like he will walk, sit, crawl and then roll over -
    all backwards :-)
    
    Shaila

    Last Sunday my daughter said "I love you".  (Aahhh. . .)
    
    Then on Monday I took her into the supermarket and as we approached the
    cash machine she clearly said "money!"
    
    L

	Emily rolled over from back to belly today, after a couple
	weeks of making it 3/4 of the way then getting stuck.  She's
	4.5 months old, and up to now could only get from belly to
	back.

	Now, wonder if she'll manage to get back on her belly if
	she flips over tonight...?

	Karen

    
    
>	Now, wonder if she'll manage to get back on her belly if
>	she flips over tonight...?
    
    
    	either that or she'll be "calling" you to help.....:)
    
    

	Jim,

	That's what she did before (when she only rolled one way).  I'm 
	hoping she remembers her "new" skill and gets comfortable
	on her own.

	Karen

    Chelsea started rolling over from tummy to back around 3-1/2 months.  
    Every night for about a week she would wake up crying (3-4 times a
    night!)....the first time it startled me when I went in her room and
    saw her waving her arms around....its like my mind went "wait a minute,
    I didn't turn her over!"  It took her about a week to learn to turn
    the other way....now she stays on her tummy all night.
    
    Chelsea is 5 months and doing a mean backwards scoot and starting to
    put it in forward....its so exciting watching her do all these things
    for the first time.  As of last week she is sitting up frog position
    and after the face falls into the ground (such flexibility!!) she is
    able to pull herself backwards and straighten her back...then about
    two seconds later its toppling to one side....which she thinks is a
    real funny thing!
    
    This weekend we introduced the sippy cup...she was in her glory!  
    I'm not sure if it was the excitement of a new thing or the fact that
    the spout served as an excellent teething piece.  We took the lid
    off (had water in the cup) and offered it to her...she loved it!  Of
    course most of the water ended up on her, but she got a couple of
    gulps in and had so much fun doing it...and we had so much fun watching
    her.
    
    ...Lori

    Marc had his 3-year-old physical this morning, and he got weighed and
    measured on the Big Boy scale, and had his blood pressure taken for
    the first time!  I was surprised to see that they use a regular-type
    blood pressure device, same as for adults, just much smaller.

    
    I've yet to enter any of Anna's milestones in here yet, but I'm getting
    to the point that I need her to slow down. We've always joked about her
    being smart since both her parents are engineers. Well, she seems to be
    proving this to be true. Anna will be 18 months old on Nov 3rd. Right
    about the time she turned 15months she has been do her stacking
    buckets. There are 10 of them and each one is progressively smaller and
    fits ontop of the larger one. At first she would get it by trial and
    error, but eventually she would find the next one she needed by sight.
    If someone tried to help and put the wrong one on she would tell them
    no and give them the right one.
    
    Within the past 2 weeks she has mastered the Tupperware shape ball.
    Again at first it was trial and error and now she just picks up a shape
    turns the ball looking for the correct hole until she finds it and puts
    the piece into the matching hole. 
    
    I am just so amazed at the things she picks up so easily and also the
    way I can watch her work things out. It's almost scarey. But boy am I
    ever proud of my engineer in the making!!! I can't wait to get her some
    Legos!!!
    
    Patty

    Lori, same thing happened to us -- a few days ago the sippy cup
    was tried, and Charlotte thought it was really amusing. I am 
    not sure she under stood that it was for drinking, but enjoyed biting
    the spout and seemed a little surprised that water trickled into her
    mouth at the same time!
    
    She still can only roll from her back to her tummy on the left side, 
    although, the other day she did it on her right. She is squirming up a 
    storm though, and watches everything!
    
    Monica

    It's amazing how such small things bring such great joy.
    
    Of course I'm just in awe that yesterday we noticed that Sarah got her
    first two teeth (you can barely see them, but you sure can feel them). 
    I'm soooooo proud of her.  She's very curious about these new
    additions, she keeps running her tongue and fingers over them.
    
    She also wants to feed herself now (hmmmm, that independent streak at 6
    1/2 months, where did she ever get that from???) she'll grab the spoon
    from our hand and try to get it into her mouth.  She's actually getting
    pretty good at it (the dexterity definitely comes from her dad).
    
    My baby's growing up, heavy sigh...
    
    Susan 

	Emily's just started talking (6 months).  She's got quite
	a vocabulary so far, if you just know what she's saying...

	AH-da-da = Hi Da da!
	Ah-DA-da = I did it!
	Ah-da = All done
	
	and

	Ah-da-da-da = I love you Mommy


	;-) ;-) ;-) 

    	Last week, after being continually exposed to a baby doll (rather
    abstract cloth doll) in preparation for the new baby,

    	Spencer (16 mos) asked for a cookie and then gave the cookie to the
    doll. ;-) He's also started sharing his bottle with the baby. 

    	He really is such a sweet child.

    	The next step is to see if this behavior carries over to the new
    baby. (who I realize is a bit more of a threat than a cloth toy).

			
    			Wendy

	Emily started taking steps last week on vacation.

	She started by taking 3-4 steps to Daddy (from standing in the
	middle of the room).  Now she'll "walk" to the coffee table or
	sofa if she's 3-4 steps away.  She thinks it's pretty funny!


	Emily's 8.5 months old.

	Karen

    Daniel started walking yesterday.   He had made a few attempts in the
    past few weeks, taking a step or two and then crawling.   Well,
    yesterday he walked all by himself from one end of the room to the
    other.   He then clapped himself.    Also, this morning as I was
    dropping him off to his day-care provider, a bird was singing.
    He pointed at the bird and said something like bord.    Daniel is
    14 months and five days old.   Boy, how fast they grow.
    
    
    Bernie

    This weekend Gina, who will be 3 in May, wrote her name.  It had an
    upside down A and a sideways N, but it was recognizable.  She has since
    done it again, with a correct A.
    
    I was amazed by this.
    
    judy

    It's a bird...it's a plane...
    
    Nope...it's our first TWO teeth!!  
    
    Yes, Chelsea Rose (10-1/2 months) just sprouted her first bottom and
    first top tooth.  I think Mom is a little bit more excited at this 
    major event then Chelsea is!  She seems to be holding her own with
    the help of Oragel and a little Tylenol at bedtime.  I think the worst
    is over (for these two teeth) because they have broken thru the gums.
    
    So we have finally joined the ranks of tooth grinning babes!
    
    ..Lori

Justin (5 months) got his first tooth a week ago.  He's now working on the 
second, a matching tooth on the other side.  

However, he didn't get the bottom front tooth, nor the top front tooth.
He got one of the upper pointed ones.

*sigh.  My son, the baby vampire.  ;-)

        Carol  :-)

You know Carol, they come out in the same order that they come in, so when your
son is about 5-6 yrs. old, he will have this wonderful hole after that eye
tooth falls out!  Should be funny!

    Great to see that white spot, isn't it?
    And now, the teething will never end! I still have to laugh at 
    Charlotte's silly looking toothy smile. They seem to be coming in
    all at once - our household is beginning to look particularly gnawed on!!
    
    Monica (with a few little bite marked herself!)
    

    
    I guess this is the place to put this though it's more of a "Boy am
    I proud" than a milestone.
    
    This past weekend I took a trip with my mother, sister, and daughter
    Anna (22 1/2 months) to visit another of my sisters. We drove from 
    Weymouth, MA (South of Boston) to Hammonton, NJ (South Jersey). I had 
    my doubts about going on such a long car ride, but we made it!!!! Anna 
    was an absolute angel. We made each trip with only one stop halfway 
    through. And to top it all off, she was also an angel at my sister's
    house all weekend. I was one proud mother (Grandma was pretty proud and
    impresses too). 
    
    Patty

    
    TWO milestones...
    
    Peter (8.5 mos) has TWO teeth. (much to my surprise... yeowch!)
    
    and he has slept through the night for the last two nights.....
    Ferber is working!
    
    Jamd
    @>-;--

    Charlotte had her first long journey, and a few other firsts....
    Last Thursday we took the 2.5 hour trip to my parent's in Montreal
    (She's done that trip twice already) but then went from there to
    Portland, Maine the next day (a 7+ hour journey). She did better than
    expected, lots of sleeping, some frustration (really nothing to
    complain about seeing as she was teething badly and is in the middle
    of yet another ear infection!).
    She met most of Alan's side of the family who live there (yes, my
    baby is 1/4 American and a Mayflower descendant to boot!). We intro-
    duced her to her great-grandmother.
    Was a great trip!
    
    Charlotte got her first "Easter" egg - she is getting very brave and 
    starting those first few steps, but made the mistake of lunging against
    a hard piece of furniture and now has a lovely purple bruise on her
    forehead. (Alan felt incredibly guilty since he was
    watching her at the time!) More to come, I am sure.....
    
    She also seems to be a lot more talkative since we are back (and
    louder too!).
    
    Monica
    

Buttons!   Elise can do buttons!  She's so proud!


Pat

   Just need to brag a little about my son's third quarter report card....
   the school he goes to gives the kids regular academic grads for reading,
   spelling, english, religion, math, science and social studies but also
   uses U ("unsatisfactory") N ("needs improvement"), S ("satisfactory") and
   O ("outstanding") for subcategories in these areas and for art, music,
   phys ed, conduct and effort.
 
   Matt's always been a good student (8 years old, technically in 2nd grade
   but working in 3rd grade for reading, spelling and doing multiplication
   tables in math now).  This report card, though, is EXTRA special because of 
   his improvement in just about every area !!  And believe me, when you're 
   already at an "A" or "Satisfactory + ", going to A+ and "Outstanding" is no 
   mean feat !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   And all the "acting out" problems we've been
   having are improving too !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

   I'm so proud of this guy !!

    I just wanted to brag a bit about my son, Dirk who is 14 and in the 9th
    grade.  He has been selected from his class of about 100 as one of two
    boys and two girls to represent his school in Track and Field.  In
    fact, his coach wants him to compete as a senior rather than a junior. 
    Junior is grades 8, 9, and 10, and senior is grades 11, 12, and 13.
    He does mostly running where he is the best in the juniors and often
    competes and places in the seniors.
    
    The first real event should be this weekend in Lugano.  Up to now it
    has been practice matches. 
    
    Cheryl

    Charlotte, who will be ONE YEAR OLD! This Sunday (Mother's Day 8-) )
    started walking (consistantly and with ever growing confidence) about
    ten days ago.
    Now she will wander around the livingroom, into the kitchen and out
    the other entrance back into the livingroom, with a piece of tupperware
    in each hand, with arms held high, lurching about like a miniature
    Frankenstein's Monster, with a great big grin her face.......
    The Gates Are Up!
    
    Monica 8-) 8-)

    Monica made me do this :-)
    
    Neel will be ONE YEAR OLD on the 13th. I cannot believe my munchkin is
    growing up so fast (sniff!). He sat and cruised the furniture at an
    early age but had no interest in crawling. I was getting worried, but
    about 1.5 months ago he started "commando" crawling and is now crawling
    the "regular" way. He gets into everything. He LOVES to pick anything
    he can see and put it in his mouth. He saw an insect sitting on Daddy's
    arm and yep! tried to get at it and taste it (yuck!). The gates are
    going up this weekend since he can move from point A to point B faster
    than I can blink. 
    
    He has a reputation at his daycare for being a happy baby and he will
    eat anything. I get this "why do you ask?" look when I inquire about
    what he ate during the day. 
    
    He loves to stand and he can stand without holding on for a few
    seconds. He stands longer if he does not know he is doing it :-). He
    loves to call out to Daddy "Dada" or sometimes "daddy". He calls his
    sister Avanti "Anna" or a longer version of "N". He will call out to me
    "Mama" only if he really feels like :-(. He has the loudest voice in
    his daycare (infant room) and he loves to "talk" all the time. He loves
    to look up in the sky and watch for airplanes or birds flying. Last
    evening we were at BK's and standing in their outdoor playground and he
    all of a sudden looked up, pointed and said "Ah. Ah" telling us that he
    saw a plane. We were soooooooo excited.
    
    He loves to rough and tumble with Avanti. He loves to climb all over
    her, chew on her clothes (teething :-)) - even her hair if it is within
    reach.
    
    Got to stop or else I am a runaway train.:-)
    
    Shaila

    Aren't these one year olds great!  Sarah was one on the 2nd and I can't
    believe it's gone by so quickly.  She's been walking alone for about 3
    weeks now and I still giggle when I hear her footsteps.  Her vocabulary
    includes mama, da (dad), baba (bottle), cack (quack), nana (banana),
    papa and be ba (big bird).  I'm so proud of her.  Two weeks ago Michael
    bought her a pajama bag doll and she loves it, it's the first thing
    she's become really attached to.  We'll ask her where her baby is and
    she'll grab it and cuddle her face into its neck.
    
    Like the others, I could just go on and on and on.... 8^)
    
    Susan
    
    

    Kevin will be one year on May 13th. It goes by way too fast. He is the
    second one, and has been walking for quite a while now, 10 months old
    to be exact. There is no stopping him, now that he has his mobility!!
    
    He had his first "real" people meal with us last night. It seems
    like he doesn't like that Baby Cereal mush anymore, so I gave him
    a plate of meatballs, potatoes, and carrots (all cut up real small!).
    And he loved it. He did give in and have some baby fruit. 
    
    He has also mastered the baby sippy cups and loves them. They get too
    independent too quickly. I have been depressed for the last week 
    thinking about his birthday party. At least he finally learned to 
    say MAMA this past week, which makes me extremely happy!!!!
    
    Just wanted to brag! I know there are a lot of 1 year olds out there
    now, since we were all talking about maternity leave last year at
    this time!!!
    
    -Sheila
    

    Well after reading all these one year old notes, I figured I better
    chime on in!!
    
    Chelsea will be ONE on the 12th...and it has gone by way to fast!
    
    We finally have SIX teeth and something painful is on its way...could
    be a molar, all I know is that I thought that I had been thru teething
    fits before and nothing matches the way she has been feeling lately.
    
    Chelsea is standing up on her own and taking about 5 steps...looks like
    a little drunk trying to keep her balance on a straight line!!  She
    gets so excited trying to walk that after the 10th try, she is so
    tired, but keeps on going....and ends up falling twice as much.
    
    Had her One Year Well Baby on Saturday...we were scheduled for the
    15th, but when she woke up Friday night screaming in pain and batting
    her head, I thought it was another ear infection.  Turns out she was
    teething and the Pedi didn't the heart to charge me for a teething 
    visit, so she did her Well Baby early.
    
    She is 30 inches and 19 lbs./9 oz.  Can you believe these are the same
    little bundles we took home from the hospital a year ago?!?
    
    Chelsea is the greatest joy to come in our life....each night I put her
    to bed, I still can't believe we are so blessed to have this beautiful
    little baby girl.  
    
    You know your really grateful to be a Mom when you are watching Barney
    in the morning with your child on your lap....the song comes on at the
    end of the show....you start singing it to your baby and tears are
    pouring down your eyes, because your thinking to yourself "I'm so lucky
    to be able to have a daughter to sing the Barney song to!"
    
    and on I could ramble...but I'm sure there is another Mom of a one year
    old out there ready to talk!
    
    ...Lori

    I second Lori!
    
    >>pouring down your eyes, because your thinking to yourself "I'm so lucky
    >>to be able to have a daughter to sing the Barney song to!"
    
    In my case however, I could say:
    "I'm so lucky to be able to have a Barney to sing a song to!"
    
	I couldn't resist 8-) 8-)
    
    Any other May'92 babies out there?
    
    All smiles,
    Monica

    
    How about an April 92 baby?
    
    Rebecca turned one on the 29th and I cannot believe that she has grown
    so fast!!! She is a shuffler - moves along on her bottom and has great
    fun turning round and round on the cork floor in the kitchen. She can
    get from one side of the room to the other in a flash - we have to
    watch her all the time. Last night she shuffled up and down the
    kitchen, talking to herself and waving at her reflection in the cupboard 
    doors for 10 minutes or so while Dave ate dinner. The stair gates are
    up and she pushes the bottom one shut if she sees it is open. This kid
    is reminding us of what we should be doing!!  
    
    I hold my finger up and saying "one minute" when I had to leave
    her alone to fetch something. She holds her finger up as she goes from
    one room to another and out of our sight - what a doll!!
    
    Only 2 teeth, but lots of upper ones on the way. We are still on mushy 
    food (very soft when the gums are really tender), but the other evening
    she managed to eat a piece of poppadum!! She loves spicy food - like
    prefers our guacamole to her mashed avocado!
    
    Rebecca can say mama (her first word), dada, teddy and bunbun (we keep
    rabbits which she loves to stroke and she has lots of toy ones). One 
    birthday gift said "for the young engineer from 18 months" - she mastered 
    it in 10 mins - going to be a scientist like her parents.
    
    As she now refuses milk in a bottle at creche, I've got to get her to
    take whole milk in her sippy cup before she can be promoted to the next
    room. This could be a battle, as the only milk she'll take these days
    is from me - wonder when this final baby habit will stop? :-(
    
               Celia
    

    Phew, I feel better now knowing that I'm not the only mom who starts to
    cry when she realizes how lucky she is to have such a wonderful baby,
    usually it hits me when I check on her during the night and I watch
    this beautiful little girl sleeping so peacefully.
    
    Lori, boy can I relate about something bigger brewing under the gums. 
    Sarah's at 6 teeth, too, and last night she woke up screaming and had a
    difficult time being comforted.  We ended up bringing her into our bed
    and she did sleep better there.  It was just that she woke up at 5am
    and since she couldn't find any of her toys decided to play with mommy,
    yaaaaawwwwnnnn.
    
    Today's her 12 month check up and daddy's got the privilege for this
    visit.  I made him promise me he'd call as soon as he could so I can
    get all the vital info 8^)
    
    Susan

	One more May baby...
	Emily will be 1 on the 23rd.  She's been walking for a while (started
	at 8.5 months), and is now having fun running (away from Daddy while
	he chases her, or into my arms when I pick her up a the end of the day)
	and turning in circles.

	She's just learned to stomp her feet to the song "if you're happy
	and you know it".  She can say Hi, Daddy, Dolly (do-yee), Sadie (Daydie),
	quack, pig, teeth, and light.  She doesn't say Mama yet :-( but she knows 
	who I am ;-)

	She can point to the light, my nose, my teeth, the balloons on her wall
	when asked.

	Her most recent accomplishment floored me.  I drove into the driveway
	last week, and before I even shut off the car, she said "Daydie"
	(Sadie is our dog, Emily's best friend of late).  She wouldn't stop
	saying it as we walked in the door.  She cried when I tried to put
	her down, and pointed to the kitchen window (Sadie is on a run in
	the back yard during the day).  She finally got to see Sadie out the
	window, and giggled with delight.  I gotta admit, I giggled too!

	Lori and Susan, Emily's teething, too.  Her first five teeth
	came in without too much problem; she was only fussy at night.
	(Her last tooth came in before I was even sure she was teething).
	This one's got her practically inconsolable from 5-8 at night.
	I thought for sure it came through last night, as she woke up
	SOOOO happy this morning, but it didn't.  

	Karen

    Sheila,
    
    Neel was born on the 13th too! Wow, and there another on the 12th.
    Wouldn't it be nice to have a big get-together of all 1 year olds born
    within days of each other.
    
    Happy Mother's Day all.
    
    Shaila

    Charlotte is there too - she popped those first 6 out really early
    and has had endless teething every since - the overt symptoms are 
    manifesting themselves more and more - obvious sensitivity, DROOLING,
    biting, being unhappy lying down, and discomfort while sleeping. 
    (hubby tells me I actually slept through her wimpering last night. I
    must have been tired!) 
    Hurrah for our one year olds!
    Monica

    Well, I should get back to work, but since everyone is bragging about
    their May babies...
    
    Hilary will be one on 5/21.  It's hard to believe it has been one year. 
    She is the happiest baby, especiallly when her older brother (2 1/2)
    body slams her.  She wiggles her arms and legs underneath him and roars
    (until Mom breaks it up).  She claps her hands to "Wheels on the Bus"
    and Pat-a-Cake.  Just found the sandbox, and has already eaten about 6
    handfuls of sand.  "mmm, that was good, I'll have another thank you." 
    It's great trying to clean her when she poops out all the grit!  Not
    walking yet, but cruising the furniture.  Big brother Erik has gotten
    her to climb the stairs by standing at the top and egging her on.
    
    I think that's a great idea to get everyone together.  Now if there
    were just 8 days in a week, no problem.
    
    Julie

    Dirk placed 2nd in the 800 meters and his _senior_ relay team placed 3rd
    in the all Swiss interscholastic track and field events.  He was proud
    but says next year he will have all gold :-)
    
    ccb

Josh is 7.25 months now.  How time flies.

In the past week or so he has accomplished several milestones.  

He started real crawling (hands and knees).  He has been doing the comando
crawl for the last month.

He can get from his tummy to a sitting position.

He can pull himself to a standing position. First it was on Mom, but now it
is on the couch or anything else within reach.

He went for his first swim in the swimming pool.  He likes to float, but
doesn't especially like to be splashed.

I am not in any rush for him to grow up, but he seems to have other ideas.

Barbara

PS. He also just got the chicken pox

    Well Cheslea is walking!!  I've got a feeling we are entering a
    dangerous stage here....she has the idea down tight, its just that she
    has need for much improvement in the area of balance...looks like a 
    little drunk on wheels...watch out oak dressers!!  She just turned one
    and has been crusing for about 2 months, but now she is walking all
    around the house and it tickles my heart to see you moving from room
    to room!
    
    Also, we are done with the bottle.  Chelsea has always showed a strong
    interest in her sippy cup....also a strong love in tossing it half way
    across the room.  Well we have been working on not tossing or shaking
    it up like a milkshake for the past couple weeks and I do believe the
    idea has started to sink in.  We kept one bottle (for emergency sake)
    and tossed all the others away.  Its been a week and she is doing just
    fine.  Since my daycare provider provides milk/juice and meals, my
    nights have just gotten easier.  No more cleaning bottles and nipples
    and packing them for daycare.
    
    My little girl is growing up and I love watching all of it.
    
    ...Lori

	Hooray, Chelsea!

	Karen

    A Hurrah from us as well!
    
    Monica and Charlotte (who still thinks sippy cups are for biting......)

    
    Well, I haven't reported any milestones yet for Caity (4.5 months) but
    I'll just stick to the recent ones.  
    
    On Mother's day, she cut her first tooth, and one week later she cut 
    her second tooth.  
    
    Last week she learned how to turn over from her back to her front and 
    wants to do it all of the time - this makes changing her diaper an 
    adventure!  (She turned from her front to her back at 5 weeks old)
    
    At the same time she learned how to get up on all fours without having to 
    push her feet against anything, and loves to just get in that position
    and rock.  She also gets into what we call the tripod, hands on the
    floor and feet on the floor, where she usually ends up on her head!
    
    We have also just started feeding her solid food - and she loves to
    eat off a spoon!
    
    Needless to say my little baby does not want to be a baby anymore!
    Hitting all these milestones at once is really exciting, but it also
    makes me sad to see how quickly she is growing up.  I guess its almost
    time for another 8-)!

    Andrew will be one on July 8.  He started walking last week on May 27.
    So far it's usually a half dozen steps.  He has a fire truck which
    Playskool calls a walker.  He loves pushing it all over.  He's even
    learning how to push it another way when he runs into something.

    Marilyn

    Dirk participated in the Interscholastic track and field meet last
    weekend.  He made finals in four of the five events (five maximum) he
    was in and his relay team finished with a silver medal.  He finished
    fourth in the 800 meter, just missing the bronze by .01 seconds.  The
    meet consisted of 13 of the best teams around Europe and Egypt (I
    hosted 4 students from the Cairo American College) and the junior boys
    from Dirk's school finished 3rd overall.  Junior girls also did well
    (second overall) but the vasity boys and girls were pretty far down
    the ratings.
    
    Next year we have discovered that Dirk will have to compete as Vasity
    but he is enthusiastic and wants to work to find out where his real
    strengths are.  Next year it is in London.
    
    Cheryl, mother of the Jock :-)

Today my pride 'n' joy, also known as my son Collin, turns 2! He had his
first "real" Birthday party this weekend, and was very excited to blow out
his candles and of course to open the presents.  He had a bit of trouble
sharing some of his new toys, but I suppose that's to be expected.  I did
have him give each child a little gift-wrapped "prize", so he did some
giving along with the receiving, and he did great at that.

Major milestones have been the explosion of his language skills, which went
from around 200 words at 18 months to full sentences by 23 months; Improved
memory skills - will recall things spontaneously that were discussed a week
or more in the past (or the exact spot on the sidewalk on the way to the park
where we saw a dead mouse about a month ago!) and synthesize several bits
of information into cause and effect (i.e. cup of ice left on table - later
cup of water - will say ice melted into water); More elaborate imaginative
play (give him a few Hot Wheels and some blocks and he'll be in his own
world for hours); Increased interest in counting and identifying letters &
numbers (counts to 9, but sees sets of things up to about 4); Desire for
more social interaction with playmates i.e. "Play cars, Dan!"; Drive to
do things himself (today it was putting a gallon of milk back in the fridge-
yikes); Improved physical coordination - i.e. pedalling his big wheel trike,
climbing/jumping/running); and yes, the onset of the chains of "Why?"s.

Of course, he's still a 2-year-old, so is not an angel all of the time --
plenty of "No! No! No!...s", hits, and "tantrums" when he can't get what he
wants, and he isn't the most consistent eater, but generally we are thrilled
at his "maturity" in communication, sense of humor, and general physical
development at the young age of 2.

Vitals - he weighs 36.5 lbs and is 37.5 inches tall (started at 9lb.14oz and
22.5 inches and has been "off the charts" the entire way) so it looks like
he'll be taking after his dad in height (6'6")! But, he got blonde hair and
blue eyes from my side (and big dimples from both parents), so right now
he's quintessential cute!  Most importantly, he has been very healthy, so
we count our blessings doubly every day...

Tonight will be the first night in his new "big bed", as we'll be transi-
tioning the crib to child #2 in four months!  I'm sure Collin will be a
great "big brother" - once he has a chance to adapt.

It just gets more fun all the time (well, ask me about that in about 15 yrs)!

Congratulations to all those other parents of near-2-year-olds -- so much
happens in the first 2 years, and so fast, it's almost hard to take a step
back and appreciate all the effort - and all the payback.  Enjoy!

-Cori 

    Cori,
    
    As the mother of an almost-2-year-old, thanks for your note. My 
    daughter is doing some of the same things as your Collin, and it is 
    thrilling.
    
    Lately she has been addressing each of her animals in a special tender
    voice. She gives them detailed instructions on their breakfasts and
    where to sit. Then she informs me of her wardrobe choice for the day,
    usually "bee shu" (bathing suit) and party shoes. This kid may have a
    future in Las Vegas. Then we must "read book" before leaving the house.
    
    Lucy

    Yesterday was Spencer's first day at a daycare, up until now he has
    been in a home situation (which is where his brother Griffin still is).

    It was clear to us that Spencer had outgrown the home situation and
    needed more of challenge.

    All of the concern I had over Spencer's adjustment to the daycare was
    for naught,....he got used to it sooner than I did ;-)
    
    
    				Wendy

A slightly more advanced milestone - the tooth fairy has visited my 11 
year old son for the last time - all baby teeth are gone.  He has beautiful
straight adult teeth (no braces for him, I hope!).

    This must be the biggest milestone of our lives.  Markus seems to have
    stopped wetting the bed.  I haven't said anything to him in ages nor
    checked nor anything.  But I asked him the other day how it was going
    and he said that he doesn't seem to wet anymore and hasn't for weeks. 
    He still wears the diapers though.  He's afraid that if he stops
    wearing them he'll have an accident.  I let him decide.
    
    By the way, for those of you unfamiliar with our struggles, Markus is
    12 and a half and must be Parenting's oldest bedwetter.
    
    Lucky to be able to put this in before my account goes... :-)
    
    Cheryl

    Congratulations Cheryl, to you and Markus!
    
    What a relief.
    
    Laura
    for everyone

    
    	What wonderful news!!!!
    		
    	Congrats to Markus, indeed a marvelous milestone.
    
    				Wendy

  Cheryl,

  Congratulations to both you AND Marcus !!!!!!!!   I'm sure he is proud
  of himself, as well as being a little on the leary side of "regressing" !!!
  And I applaud you for being so supportive over so many years and 
  understanding that this is more painful/embarassing for him than it is
  for us as mothers !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  Debbi

    
    Some smaller milestones - but gigantic in a first-time mothers eye!
    Caity (who will be 6 months old next week) started crawling on all 
    fours two weeks ago, got her two top center teeth last week, and is 
    pulling herself up to a standing position occasionally.  Of course, 
    that also means that she also got her first major bump on the head 
    when she let go of what she was holding onto!  I finally got to hear 
    that "I'm in pain" cry.

Congrats to all who are having exciting milestones!  Crawling, sitting, 
standing, and lack of bedwetting are all wonderful!  Congrats to all of
you!

     Carol

    Well, I spent last week @PKO (Maynard) and in the meanwhile
    my little Charlotte has been growing and developing. In the 
    care of her Oma (grandmother) she has learned to dance 
    (stands on the wood flooring and turning in little circles to the 
    music); has finally sprouted some of those molars (total of
    11 teeth - 5 within a week after some very mean teething); 
    knows what the words "Bath-time" mean when whispered by Daddy
    from across the room; yesterday evening discovered how to climb
    up onto the couch (oh-oh.....)
    Well, I will stop for gushing further; I'm so glad to be back - 
    I missed her so much!
    
    Monica 
     
    

    
    Well, since twice over this past weekend my daughter Anna, almost 26
    months, showed an interest in going pee on the toilet I went out and
    bought a potty chair yesterday at lunch. Well, as soon as we got home
    she wanted to use it, so I let her "get acquainted" with it....and she
    peed!!!!! I was so excited. We tried again after supper, but nothing.
    We then tried before bed and she peed again!!! She was so proud of
    herself. I was thinking "hey, this is going to be easy"....Well, I
    spoke too soon. This morning she was fairly dry, but she wanted nothing
    to do with the potty. Oh well, I guess she's not a morning person.
    
    Patty

    Well, I'm usually a read-only but have two important milestones. 
    Yesterday my son turned 5 years old - he's the last one in his
    pre-school class to turn 5 so it was a big deal!  Also, my daughter,
    Katelyn, took her first step this weekend (she's 11 months) and is
    already walking across the room (10 steps) as of last night.  They sure
    do grow up fast!!!
    
    Laura G

    I'm so proud of my Ilona, age 2 years, 10 months.  She can swim!
    
    Wearing her armband inflatables, she can dog paddle the length of the pool,
    about 20 feet, turn in any direction, keep herself upright without
    moving forward, and climb out on the ladder at the deep end.
    
    She then walks down to the shallow end, bragging to everyone, "I'm
    fimming!  I did it myself!"
    
    She can also peddle her tricycle, a tall, bright red one that looks
    real snazzy.  She rides out to the pool to go "fimming."
    
    She also gets dressed without help, empties her potty, butters her
    bread with a little knife, has decent table manners, and can carry on a
    conversation.  Her favorite topic is poop, but hey, at least we are
    conversing!
    
    Laura

    
    
    Oh Laura, that reminds me!!!
    
    This mom is beaming over Jason, age 3 years 9 months, who started
    swimming without his "bubbles" earlier this month.   He can't seem
    to swim on top of the water yet so he looks like a little fish
    coming to the water for air every now and then.   He's also started
    jumping off the diving board (with bubbles) this year, too!   He
    lets everyone who'll listen know that he jumps *without* holding 
    his nose (since his playmate does hold her nose!).
    
    I was a little leary of his babysitter having a pool at first but
    am now real glad that she does.  What an asset!
    
    Carol
    
    

    
    Peter is one year old today.   a year ago, he was 30 minutes old.
    
    My little bruise-o-matic has been walking since eight months, and is
    graduating to serious climbing.  His favorite all-purpose word is
    Ah-dah, meaning, 'I want that thing, please. It's mine, and you should
    know that, and I have an intense need to hold it, taste it, and wave it
    around my head!'
    
    
    
    Jamd
    @>-;--

Justin, our little heart baby, has been determined to walk and not to crawl.
This week he apparently decided that both are acceptable.  On the same day
he crawled for the first time and took his first unassisted steps.
He is 8 1/2 months old.  :-)

BTW, he still doesn't have any teeth.  :-)

       Carol

	Hooray for Justin!

	Karen, mom of another 8.5 month walker...

    My little Samantha (20 months) has been wearing big girl undies all
    week!!  She's had some accidents but overall she's doing excellent!
    
    No more bottles, no more diapers...."What's a mother to do??"
    
    -/andrea

ah.....sing and dance in the streets comes to mind!

Michael

a father of a 2 1/2 year old and 5 month old.

    Sing, Dance or Have Another Baby 8-) 8-) 
    
    Monica

I've been dreading the day when I have to break my daughter of her passifier.
She's loved that thing since the day she was born - she would suck on it so
hard that she'ld leave a ring around her mouth outlining it.  

Haley is now ten months old and has totally given it up all by herself.

That was easy!

Kirsten

    
    Okay, just to brag a little about the new one (you guys always hear
    about Spencer, not too much about little Griffin).
    
    	Sweet Griffin just had his 4 month checkup and like his brother is
    maxing out on the charts. Total weight is 17.4 and um, well I've
    forgotten the length but I know it's long.
    
    	He wears 18 month clothing and giggles all of the time. They said
    that we could start cereal anytime, but he's just not giving us any
    indication of needing more than what he's getting (total breastmilk).
    
    	One very interesting thing is that Griffin seems to have a "genetic
    hiccup" - he has light brown hair that will most probably go blond like
    his brothers but on top of his head he has a large patch of white hair.
    The Dr. said that he may just end up having two toned hair.
    
    	I just think of it as the place where the angels kissed him. ;-)
    
    				Wendy
                                     

    Eric is 5 years old today.  I cann't believe my little
    baby will enter kindergarten this fall.
    
    He is a very smart child.  At 5, he reads, adds, knows the numbers
    to the thousands.  Just the other day, I caught him teaching his
    daddy how to use the computer.
    
    Eric: "Dad, you have to make the arrow to point to the game first"
    Daddy: followed the instruction.
    Eric: "Now, click!"
    Daddy: clicked on the icon.
    Eric: "No, Dad.  Double click! It won't start if you only click once!"
    
    He is also a very caring and affectionate boy.  He never intitates
    fights and always wants to help out.  
    
    He attended Chinese School every sunday this past school year.  He
    now knows 20+ chinese words and his own name.  I hope this is
    something that he will continue to show interest. 
    
    We had a birthday party for him yesterday.  Invited some of his
    little friends.  Today we will have our own family celebration.
    
    Wendy
    

    AJ now 6.5 made the following announcement to me on the ride home the
    other day...
    
    Mom you really don't want to hear this......(dead silence)
    so I prode, so I don't want to hear what?.....(imagining all sorts of
    disasters, illness, bumps, abuse)
    
    I swam in the deep end of the pool without my bubble!
    
    (I breathe a very big sigh of relief, knowing no disasters had
    happened) and tell him in a big way "That's great! Keep it Up, I'm so
    proud"
    
    then he tells me his reasons, I didn't want you to worry that I would
    get drownded!
    
    Oh and along the lines of Marcus' note...
    
    I haven't said anything recently to AJ, but I think he has finally
    started listening to his body, and hasn't had any "poopie" accidents in
    several weeks.  I haven't said a thing about it, since it seems to be
    becoming a natural thing, he seems to *finally* know when he needs to
    sit on the toilet, and hasn't even had a stain in his underwear in
    several weeks.  The doctors told me it would all come together in time,
    I think it has finally happened!  I'm one proud momma!
    
    Lyn

    Well,Yahli (20 months old this coming Wednesday) has grown so much so fast
    that sometimes it's hard keepeing records...
    In 2 months she had moved to a "big kids' bed",went off the
    bottle,she's been "dry and clean" most of the day/night that now we
    want to buy her "real" underwears,AND she is now talking.Well,ok-not
    "real" words,but she can put up a whole sentence (like "chachar che"
    which is actually "Shachar boche-Shachar's crying" or "'za va"=Uza
    tova"=Uza's good.AND-tonight at the bath she took a triangle
    ("meshulash")-looked for another one,found it and said with a big
    smile "tulat!".Then she threw one to the water,counted ("aat"-one)threw
    the other one and went "TAIM" (shtaim=two)!!!!
    singing and dancing in the street??? Mike-come on....me????????
    OH YES!!!!!
    R/
    

this past Saturday...

	2 teeth (bottom)
	hates to crawl
	loves to walk - not quite confident enough to walk without support yet
	*very* verbal (you should hear her try to say "Coca-cola" -- almost
			recognizable!  And "cookie" comes out loud and clear)

Hard to remember how tiny she was a year ago...

    OK, ok you guys did it to me. I cannot resist but add a few things
    about Neel our 14 month old. He has been in a big-boy's bed since he
    was 11 months old since he tried to climb out of the crib and kept
    bumping into the sides when he slept. He moves a lot not so much the
    distance but he moves around in one spot. So we moved him into a twin
    bed and he loves it. He has not tried to get off the bed. He usually
    just sits up when he wakes up and calls out to us. Since we have the
    monitor in his room we know when he is awake.
    
    Neel is almost ready to give up the bottle. He only uses a bottle for
    his morning milk at 6am and at nite at 9 pm. He has been off the bottle
    in daycare since he was 11 months old.  He eats everything that we eat.
    He loves his food spicy and he is an true Indian when it comes to food.
    He does not like non-Indian foods. Of course, he does like chicken
    nuggets from McD's.
    
    Neel loves to run rather than walk. He looks Sooooo cute when he runs.
    OK, I am biased but he is cute :-) He refuses to call me Mama but he
    will call he "Hey!". He does call his Daddy "dada". He has figured out
    that he can try to do something forbidden when we are not looking. But
    he has been caught everytime. When we say "NO" or "No Neel" he stops
    what he is doing immediately and looks at us with a "Who, me?"
    expression. He loves to "drive" his car and he is our race-car driver
    in the making.
    
    He is working his canines and molars all at once and loves to chomp
    down on things like Mommy's shoulder and hand.
    
    He is big boy, wears 3T or 4T clothes (depending on how truly 3T or 4T
    the clothes are).
    
    OK, I will stop now but will come back to brag some more. :-)
    
    Shaila

    Ok - I just had to add mine too!
    
    Katelyn turned 1 on the 22nd.  She's been walking for about a month and
    now we've decided that she's going to be the youngest person to climb
    Mt. Everest because she is very tenacious about climbing on everything. 
    
    Last week we went to a family reunion in Mississippi and my 12 year old
    cousin spent the whole time teaching Katelyn to say "hey" with a real
    southern accent. Now she says "hey giggie" to everyone.  Of course, I
    don't tell them that she's really saying "hey doggie".
    
    My 5 year old Brian, is Katelyn's favorite plaything!  She follows him
    everywhere and squeals for him to play with her.   I'm very thankful
    that he loves his sister and doesn't seem to mind having a little
    shadow.
    
    Where does the time go?

It's a banner month at our house for milestones.  We just separated Brad
and Jessica (they're 27 months old now) by putting them in their own rooms
instead of together in the nursery. I put the cribs  up against the wall in
front of the door in both rooms, and since the rooms are opposite each
other, they could still see each other.   Brad thinks it's just the greatest
thing to have his own room, and goes right into it at night before going to
bed.  No more side trips to Mom and Dad's room to reset the alarm clock,
play in the closet, or run into the bathroom to see if the toilet still has
water in it.  Jessica found it a little tougher, but knows that Brad is
in the room across the way.  And it's so cute in the morning to get one
up first and let them bang on the other's door and then run in to get the
other one up.  

And as of the night before last, Jessica has decided that she's a big girl
and should sleep in the bed instead of the crib.  She seems to be waking
up at night, probably from a fall out, and cries for someone to go in. But
she refuses to go into the crib and goes right back into the bed. Doesn't
even try to roam around when she's put it.  I can see us taking her crib
down entirely in another week or so. Brad also has a bed in his room, but
he doesn't think it's for sleeping, so is still in his crib.  I figure that
will change shortly as he wants to sleep in it when he gets to tuck Jessica
into her bed.  I guess we need to go out and buy them those new beds we've
been talking about as Jessica's bed was my brother's so it's about 40 years
old and will be put into our guest room (formerly, the nursery), and Brad
has a twin bed in his room that I'm giving to my nephew to help furnish
his new house. That way, both kids will get new full beds.

And, to continue the milestones, we've also started potty training.  Brad
is doing a little better than Jessica which surprised me, but they are
coming along.

And Jessica is starting to talk spontaneously now, and is almost to 2 word
phrases.  Guess the speech therapy is helping.  Brad is saying 2 word 
phrases like 'more juice,' 'I do,' and 'hi, honey'.  Guess I need to stop
sayint 'hi, honey' to him.  It was a little embarrassing at Caldor the other
night to see this little 2-year-old look at the lady behind the desk and
say 'hi, honey.'

I guess my babies aren't babies anymore.

Cathy

    Cathy,
    
    For all you've been through, what a wonderful thing to read!
    
    They do grow so quickly, and parents who have been through so many
    emotional rollercoasters seem to appreciate every milestone even more!
    
    I am so happy for you and Brad and Jessica!
    
    Lyn

I'm so glad to hear the speech therapy is showing dividends. Good luck with
the potty training. Patrick is in the midst of this and it's a real joy 8^)

Chris

	Emily can feed herself!

	I wanted to show my mother how well she does with the spoon (when I
	load it up) while we were on vacation.  After a few spoonfuls of
	yogurt, my mom said, give her the container.  I did, and she ate
	3/4 of a carton!  I guess I could have tried her sooner, she knew
	exactly what to do, but I figured feeding her was quicker.

	Yesterday, she took a fork away from me, and started feeding herself
	pasta salad.  Last night, I didn't even try, I just gave her a fork
	and let her eat off her tray.

	Last week was also a banner week for speech.  Emily's now mimicking
	many words we say.  She learned beach, pool (her word for the ocean ;-)),
	this, ball (not really new, but she started pronouncing the l's), mamie
	(for grammie), and Mommy (which she could say, but wouldn't say to
	me, or to call me.)  This morning she said, "please" and "bye, daddy".

	She seems to be growing so fast!!!

	Karen

    Well, Karen, Charlotte is not that deft with a spoon yet (mostly
    like to turn it around when it goes into the mouth - feeds the lap
    more than the face!) but she is starting to label things (I say
    "finally" since we've been excitedly waiting for this stage!). 
    
    Vocabulary: 
    
    "tick-tock" labels any analog clock or watch. Don't know
    who started her off on this, but it was the first real label she had.
    I thought it quite clever.
    
    "night-night" she's been doing for a while (complete will dramatic
    waving when Daddy takes her up stairs. Comes our "nigh-nigh" in a 
    baby whisper.
    
    "da" well, its nice to know she knows who one of us are ;-)
    
    "tee!" which is short-hand for "ONE, TWO, THREE!" which daddy says
    each night as he lifts her out of the bath into mommy's awaiting 
    arms.
    
    "mmmmmm" which is the sound a cow makes (and a horse). We were dining
    out last week to celebrate our 5th wedding anniversary, and there was
    a picture of a horse on the wall. The entire evening was: pointing to
    the picture and going "mmmmm". 
    
    "light" which is self-explanatory - she's pretty good about pointing
    to light sources (lamps mostly) and telling us what it is. 
    
    Monica (an equally proud mom!)

    Speaking of potty training.....Shane is finally out of diapers during
    the day!  Yeehah!!!  Now to get rid of the night diaper!
    
    Lori B.

    So many May '92 babies in here that I've just GOT to enter our new
    accomplishments 8^)
    
    Sarah so far has an amazing vocabulary, she points to things and will
    just call out what they are.  I don't know if she's learned all of them
    at daycare or hears us and picks it up from that, her pronunciation is
    also very clear.  When she's in the mood, she'll just chat your ear
    off.
    
    Yesterday she learned how to do high five, low five, baby five.  My
    parents had a party at their house and, of course, she was the center
    of attention.  Well, one of the guests taught her how to do the "fives"
    and she ran around the house with her hand high in the air yelling "Fi,
    Fi".  She even remembered to do it this morning after I got my morning
    hug and kiss.
    
    I love it.
    
    Susan

    What's a baby five?   %-)
    
    Leslie

    A baby five is putting your hands down real low and then just tickling
    fingers (at least that's what I've always called it 8^) )

    Yeah - my kids say HI FIVE, SIDE FIVE, LOW FIVE (pulling their hand
    away) and saying TOO SLOW!
    
    another variation...
    
    -s
    

    With all these baby stories i thought I'd add a big boy story.  Dirk
    has had some personal growth this summer that I found very insightful. 
    He spent 3 and a half weeks in Houston attending the Rockets Basketball
    Camp with his (very black) friend Oumar.  He then spent 2 weeks at a
    local music camp for all the brass bands in our canton (state).
    
    Dirk has never felt himself to be _really_ special because he lives in
    such a privileged environment.  He likes being good at sports but I
    don't think he every really understood how lucky he is.  After these 5
    and a half weeks we were discussing his experience.  Some of his
    comments:
    
    
    "In Houston the black kids hang together, the whites together, and the
    hispanics together.  Everybody looked at Oumar and me as if we were
    really wierd because we were black and white."
    
    "Half of the kids in the camp didn't even know where Switzerland is. 
    Oumar (who's first language is French) spoke better English and had a
    larger vocabulary than a lot of the kids in the camp."
    
    "I shot 17 straight freethrows in a row and shot 21 out of 25 for the
    freethrow prize.  Then Calvin Murphy said he'd give me a prize if I
    could shoot five more in a row and I did."  (He also twice won the fast
    dribble contest.)
    
    
    In the music camp in Leysin:
    
    "Half of the kids in the camp didn't even know where Houston is!"
    
    "They were amazed to find out that I was American and that I can also
    speak English and German.  I was the only one in the camp who could
    speak English."
    
    "They wanted to know what kind of cars we have.  I told them that my
    brother-in-law (he's a taxi driver) drives a mercedes limosine."
    
    
    Dirk definitely came back with the idea that he lives in a very special
    situation and that he is a special person.  I think he also appreciates
    better that easy race relations are not to be taken for granted and
    that his friendship with Oumar is a very valuable part of his life.
    
    Cheryl

    
    
    I have to add one.  Two weeks ago we were at my parents house for a
    party.  I went to put Robert down for his nap (8.5 months), he was
    really tired, but didn't want to go to sleep.  He cried and fussed a
    little in his portacrib, but wouldn't go to sleep.  After about 10
    minutes I walked into the room he just looked up at me and sobbed, then
    he said "Mama", and held up his arms.  I had tears in my eyes, how
    could I resist such a wonderful request.  I picked him up and gave him
    a big hug.  I rocked him for a little bit (he usually hates to rock,
    he's to busy!!!) and then put him down, he went right off to sleep.
    
    I can't believe that he's growing up so fast.  I still get tears in my
    eyes when I remember that little boy and the way he looked up at me
    that afternoon.  What a good feeling.
    
    Laurie O

    Cheryl,
    That's wonderful! Thanks for sharing this with us. I've always found
    that travelling for children is a wonderful way to put their lives in
    perspective. 
    Good for Dirk!
    
    Monica

    This note sucked me right in. :-) 
    
    Are there any Jan. '93 babies out there? Last weekend was a big one for
    us! Andrew, who's 6 1/2 mos, started crawling, sat up without
    supporting himself with his right arm (still the norm though), and
    Monday morning got his first tooth! 
    
    It's all very exciting. Andrew had been creeping backward for a couple
    weeks, and the weekend before last belly flopping forward, but last
    weekend he came crawling right out into the kitchen to get me. Now, I
    can't get away from him. As soon as I start talking, he comes to get
    me. He's also grown quite fond of the trash basket in the kitchen. When 
    in the walker, he scoots right over to it and knocks it over. Great
    fun, right?! :-)
    
    Karen
    

    Here's more about a May '92 baby:
    
    Neel has started insisting on feeding himself since about 2 weeks ago.
    He refuses to be fed except for sometimes. He has been eating with his
    hands for a long time now but he now can use a spoon/fork quite well.
    Of course, he feeds not just his mouth but his face, hair, back of his
    head, etc. So he needs to be scrubbed when bathed each evening.
    
    He loves to take walks and when he feels the urge to go out for a walk,
    he will march over to the shoe closet, open it, pick up his shoes, sit
    on the first step of our stairs and call out to us and tell us in his
    language ("Neel-babble") that he wants to go out. As soon as we put his
    shoes on, he walks over to the door and instructs us in Neelbabble on
    how to open the door and the storm door and proceeds to walk out. He
    walks quite a bit for a 15 month old.
    
    He loves to play in the toilet bowl and has this "thing" about open
    doors. If he sees an open door or if he hears you "think" about opening
    a door he is ready to make a dash for it. Everyone calls him "big boy"
    since he wears 4T clothes already. (Not sure if he is that big or the
    4T is misunderstood :-)
    
    He is a peaceful kid, goes to sleep by himself, does not need to be
    rocked or held. He wakes up everyday with a smile on his face (makes my
    day) and is an easy going kid but has a wicked temper.
    
    And i could go on  and on and on and brag brag brag brag brag.....
    
    /Shaila
    
    Big_boy's_mama

    
    Happy Birthday to Heather and Billie Maufe, 1 today!
    
    Milestones hum? Well they trashed both the chip aisle and the cat food
    aisle at the supermarket last night, had a wonderful party yesterday,
    go to England to see their Grandparents in October, eat real food and
    only have 1 bottle a day, Heather can take little steps and Billie runs
    around with her hands over her head screeching, and they've learnt how
    to be quiet when we them want to make cute noises down the phone 8-)
    
    I don't think I have ever seen a year go so fast, 12 months ago I was
    standing in a hospital room wondering what the h*ll had just happened!
    I wouldn't absolutely totally not miss a second of the past year!
    
    Simon

    Rowan (1/7/93) is not only sleeping 10pm - 8am consistently, he can also 
    smile now! :-) :-)
    
    Now, whats next...

    
    	Simon,
    
    	Emily spoke on the phone for the first time Friday.  I had
    	to call Daddy at work, and I gave her the phone before he
    	answered.  She said "Hi" about 5 times, then gave me the phone.
    
    	Of course, she'd somehow managed to disconnect Daddy after 3 "hi's"
    	without mommy's knowledge!  ;-)
    	
    	Lisa,
    
    	I didn't have any trouble with 1, as Emily wasn't really changing
    	much at that time (walking had come earlier, and she seemed almost
    	steady-state).  I'm having more trouble with this age, where she
    	is changing daily, and asserting her independence in new (and
    	less pleasant) ways.  As I see a really personality coming through,
    	I've been doing more and more thinking about how to parent her
    	correctly - almost as though we're entering that critical stage,
    	and the decisions we make now will have the bigger impact.  
    
    	Of course, I try not to dwell on it, but to evaluate each
        situation, and constantly talk with my husband on how to handle
    	new behaviors/disciplanary actions/ etc.  It does seem that
    	my little girl is growing so quickly, but for us, there will be
    	another infant around soon enough, and I suppose I'll be grateful
    	Emily's older!
    
    	Karen
    

    Last night was the first night that Samantha went to bed with underwear
    instead of a diaper.  She has not had an accident in 2 weeks during
    the day and only 1 wet morning - 
    
    Last night went as planned, dry panties this morning!
    
    That's my big girl.....and only 21 months!!!  Ya Hoo!!!!!!
    

    Neel (15 months) has decided to give up his pacifier. He has gone since
    yesterday morning without his pacifier. He also says "Look at
    this","What's that","This", "that","moon","doggie","bowwow" in addition
    to "Dadda","Mamma",and others. He is transitioning from infant room to
    toddler room at this daycare. He does not want his bottle anymore which
    he used only once in the morning and once at night since he was 11
    months old. He has also given up his nighttime/early morning
    bottle/milk. He now drinks milk while eating breakfast with Avanti
    before heading off to daycare.
    
    He loves "patty cake","itsy bitsy spider","row-row-row","twinkle
    twinkle little start" and a host of Barney songs. He acts out the
    appropriate gestures for each song. As soon as we come home he walks up
    to the VCR picks up the cover of a Barney tape asks Dad to play it
    while nodding his head in anticipation. He is a sight when he nods
    especially when you ask him "Is Neel a naughty boy" - he nods saying
    yes. What a riot!
    
    He loves to read with Avanti. He points at things in the book and says
    something in Neelbabble.
    
    My little guy is not a "little big guy". Sniff!
    
    Shaila

    
    Peter ((almost 14 mos) has been able to shake his head 'no' for about a
    month. No, he can nod Yes.... it's so cute. He hunches over from his
    shoulders to nod up and down.
    He can also talk
    	uh:  "up"
    	ma:  What else??!!
    	mm:  "More"
    	b-b: "banana"
    
    he is really trying to communicate
    
    Jamd

    This is a wonderful string, it makes me relive all those wonderful
    events I thought would never come.
    
    But now, alas, he's 6.5 and growing up just too quickly, into a little
    man!
    
    I need to brag a bit, and this seems to be the place.  AJ had his
    annual physical last week.  It was interesting to reflect that this
    little guy started out at under 5 pounds, (by a few grams) gained only
    minimal amounts of weight in his first two years, looked like ET
    because he had so little body fat for so long, and now look at him!
    He has hit the 75 percentile! he is 49 inches, weighs 52 pounds, is one
    of the tallest kids in his class!
    
    Just goes to show what a love for milk and veggies will do for a kid!
    He will ask for milk over soda, his favorite veggies include broccoli,
    carrots and celery.  Has demanded salad, cucumbers in particular since
    he was only in a point and grunt stage of infancy, woofed down two
    bowls of cream of broccoli soup when he was still in the stage of
    cruising in his walker.
    
    Sassy, yes!  But so polite at times.  His latest "thing" is that ladies
    go first, and he insists that he has to hold the door for me when we go
    and leave the daycare center, stores etc. and that absolutely I have to 
    go through the door first.  He is also very good about saying please and 
    thank you and excusing himself when he burps, or needs to get through
    where people are standing.  
    
    Yes I guess he does have a real good side!  and all of you with smaller
    infants, you too can brag this way in only a few years
    
    Lyn

Noelle, 13 months

- doesn't shake her head yes very often but appears to shake her head no
  quite meaningfullY

	mom:  "Are you a sleepy baby?"
	Noelle:  vigorous head-shake "no"
	mom:  "Do you want to go inside and read a book?"
	Noelle:  another vigorous head-shake
	mom:  "Can you say 'yes'?"
	Noelle:  yet another head-shake

  When she does want to read a book and I ask the question, she just stares
  at me.

And for words:
	car
	Mom-mom-mom
	Dada
	cheese (she *loves* cheese)
	woof
	da-tu (for button)
	dish
	catbird
	duck
	up (which means 'wherever I'm not')
	daaaaah (for down, after she's said 'up' and we say 'down')
	pooooooo (for pool)
	poop
	cuckoo
	cook
	cook-cook (for cookie)
	cup

And she's walking!  She'd been finger-walking for a couple of months now, but
she's finally letting go and just taking off on her own.

Ah, that felt good.  Thanks!

 - Deb

    
    Caity, 8 months
    
     I'm not sure if this is good or bad but she took her first steps!
     Her favorite pastime now is to stand up, let go of whatever she
     was holding onto and starting waving her arms around.
    
     On a sadder note for me, she also now holds her own bottle.  I'm 
     going to miss cuddling up with her when feeding her a bottle.
    
    

    
    its wonderful watching them toodling around the house arms in the air
    screaching! Congrats!
    
    Now baby-safe an additional two feet off the floor 8-)
    
    Simon

    Lisa started Kindergarten. When the teacher tried to put her on the
    wrong bus she said, "No Mr. Mohan. I go on bus #20". I won't have to
    worry about her; she's smart as a whip.
    
    I do miss her terribly though.
    
    Kate (Smiling through the tears.)

    Brian also started Kindergarten this week.  He was so excited about
    riding the bus, that he almost forgot to give me my hug and kiss. (But
    Mom, the bus driver might not wait for me!!).  As I watched him get on
    the bus, I was hit by the stark reality that my baby boy is growing up.
    It was much harder than I thought it would be.
    
    Laura G.

    Ryan started kindergarten last Thursday. I got choked up, while he was
    very excited. I was even more emotional, though, going to the
    kindergarten open house the other night, where I saw examples of his
    work already, and heard the teachers say how privileged they feel to be
    teaching our very special children.
    
    

    I guess this is a milestone of sorts...
    
    Michael just turned 6.  (that's a milestone all in itself!)
    Last year before kindergarten began, all new students were 
    required to have a kindergarten checkup.  I took Michael in
    and he refused to let the doctor do anything to him. No ear
    check, no vision or hearing test...nothing.  My husband took
    Michael back a week later and experinced the same frustration.
    We have been working with Michael about cooperation and shyness.
    His k-g teacher recommended a school therapist to help out.
    He made slow but unpredictable progress.  Sometime he cooperated,
    many times he didn't.
    
    Anyhow...Wednesday I had to take him to the dentist for a broken
    molar.  I broke the news to him Tueday night and he took it well.
    The visit to the dentist went smoothly and he cooperated well 
    with the x-ray tech.  Unfortunately, Michael's molar was decayed
    down to the root and we were told he had to have a pulpotomy (like
    a root canal).  He got to hand carry his x-rays to the specialist
    across town.  I knew what he was in for.  It's not a terribly fun
    procedure and it was a strange, new doctor.  
    
    To make a long story short, two hours later Michael had a crown
    on his molar and a smile on his numb little face.  He did absolutely
    wonderful.  No fuss with the novacaine shot.  Only boredom with the
    lengthy procedure and noise.  I was so proud of my little boy!  He
    did better than I did.  I was so worried he freak out.
    
    He's come a long way since last year.  And yesterday he started
    first grade.
    
    Jodi- 

    Well, since everyone else was adding their milestones about school, I
    guess I have to add mine too.  Last week my son Derek, who is 4,
    started pre-school.  I was a little worried because he kept telling me
    he didn't want to go (although when we went for a visit before, he
    absolutely loved it).  Anyway, he was so excited to go on that first
    day, and when he came home he was all smiles and told me that he had
    FUN and made a lot of new friends and he liked it a lot!  Now, every
    day he comes home with a smile on his face and is happy until he goes
    to bed.  He had been with his previous day care provider for 3-1/2
    years, and she was absolutely wonderful, but it was time for him to
    move on to preschool because he was just ready to start learing more. 
    It's such a relief to know that he likes school so far!  Sigh, I guess
    my little baby is growing up!
    
    Barb

    
    	Tomorrow is Spencer's birthday. He will be two. 
    
    		what a big boy we have. (sniff)
    
    			Wendy

    
    Anna (29 months) switched from her crib to a big girl bed this week.
    And she did it with no problems at all!!! The first night she woke
    up a couple of times but since then nothing. I put her in bed, we read
    a couple of books, I tell her I've got things to do and I'll check on
    her later, I say good night, turn out the light and that's it. Not a
    peep until morning. She is waking a little earlier than normal, but I
    figure that will get better with time. I just can't believe it was so
    easy. Last night I told her what a big girl she was and she said "I
    know". Now if I could only get her potty trained this easy.
    
    Patty

    Ever since my little girl was a baby I have always told her that
    "I love you and You're my best friend..in the whole world!"...She
    is now 20 months and the last few mornings she has gotten in bed
    with me and said..."I love you....Best friend in Woooorrrlllddd" -
    Too smart!
    
    

    Friday evening,Shachar (6 1/2 months) sat up for the first time.It was
    so wonderful watching it!! (when Yahli did it fo rthe first time I was
    in the hospitsl,so for me it was the first time seeing it..).He
    repeated it about 3-4 times that evening,all happy and thrilled..
    Same day,same time,Yahli had put up a 6-piece puzzle ("grownup
    style"-not the framed one).
    That's a weekend to remember!!!
    Rivka
     

	Emily's got two new phrases that I absolutely love.  Last week,
	she started saying Thank You (Comes out like queue, or queue queue).
	Yesterday at breakfast, she thanked the waitress every time she
	visited the table - it was too funny.  She also thanked Daddy for
	holding open the door for her to walk through.  

	Also last week, she started saying "I love you".  (comes out I laaaa you)
	She doesn't really understand what it means, but she'll blurt it out
	on occasion, and will repeat it when someone tells her they love her.
        I guess I've got Barney to thank for one thing... ;-)

    Charlotte is taking the other approach to politeness. When her
    grandmother gave her something yesterday I said "thank-you" so that 
    she'd repeat it. She said "welcome". Instead. And this was repeated
    later. We couldn't stop from laughing - she joined in, quite pleased
    with her little joke....
    
    Monica

    While this could also be under the "Funniest Kids" note I'll add my
    "thank you" story here.
    
    Yesterday we went out for lunch, the waiter came around and placed the
    food on the table.  Sarah (17 mos) said thank you to the waiter.  He
    either didn't hear or didn't understand "tank oo".  So, feeling that
    she should at least be acknowledged for her politeness said it again,
    still no response from the waiter.  Now, being quite annoyed, she
    started sqealing, the waiter looked back, as do all the people at the
    other table, and Sarah says: "Tank oo."  The waiter replied: "You're
    welcome."  and Sarah claps her hands at the her victory.  It was all we
    could do to stop laughing.
    
    Susan

    Kendrick had his first haircut Saturday (all on video, of course) at 
    fourteen months.  Now at least people will know that he is a boy but
    my baby is gone - he looks so grown up now :>((.  He was such a good
    boy though, sat very still - until the last couple minutes.  I still 
    find it hard to believe I have a boy (after four girls) but he sure 
    looks the part now!!!
    
      

One special moment came just two days ago when my 16 month old boy reached over
to spontaneously (no urging from me) to hug me ... what a RUSH!

    I started this note when my daughter Caileigh lost her first baby tooth
    at just 5 1/2.
    
    Well, on Saturday, my other daughter Paige lost HER first baby
    tooth--and she's only 4 1/2 (five in December)!!  I'm not ready for
    this (but she does look awfully cute).
    
    -Tracy
    

    
    Kevin was named "Student of the Week" for the first grade class
    at Woodland in Milford Ma. He also went up a reading level the
    week before. He really is coming into his own this year. We are
    so proud of his hard work and dedication to trying his best in
    school. 
    
    The school gave him a Student of the Week certificate and published
    his name in the local newspaper.
    
    Kevin's Proud Mom
    
    -- Pat K. 

	Yesterday when I dropped Emily off at my mother's, I said bye-bye,
	she said bye-bye, and I headed toward the door.  She ran after
	me with a bit smile and said, "Kiss ?"

	That's the first time she ever asked me to kiss her! (and was a good
	reminder that she *does* notice when I kiss her goodbye!)

	Karen

    Shortly after we told Kristine that she was going to have a sister/
    brother she starting telling us that there were three people in the
    house and after the baby it will be four.  That's when we realized 
    that she had already starting adding/subtracting small numbers at 
    the age of three.

      --Cida

    The other day Samantha and I were shopping and she said...
    One apple juice and another apple juice....
    
    Two Apple juice mommy..
    
    Yeah - she can do math..
    

Jessica had her bi-annual evaluation with the Early Intervention folks last
Wednesday, and has managed to increase her verbal skills from the 12-15
month range (6 months ago) to the 24 month range.  She's 30 months old, so
is still delayed, but that's one heck of a jump and we're pleased as punch!
She had scattered skills ranging from 24 to 32 months which is quite good
for her.  

Brad has his bi-annual evaluation yesterday, and he came in at a solid 28
months across the board!  This is phenomenal for him.  Given both evaluations
were so good, I'm just beaming today.

And the school system called yesterday as they have just received the referrals
so I'll be setting up the kids' plans with them soon, I guess.  Seems like
everything is falling into place, and they're beginning to catch up.

I'm one happy mom today.

Cathy

Cathy,

Congrats on your arena assessments going well for all your children. I can
relate to the joys of hearing 'age appropriate'. Early Intervention really
works.

Chris

    Great news Cathy.  As a mother who "sweated-it-out" I can appreciate
    your news!  Guess I can brag a little to (if you don't
    mind)...Shannon's evaluation in June had her achieving beyond the third
    year (she was 30 months)!!! They wanted to dismiss her from early 
    intervention but I said no!  I was beaming very bright that day too!
    
    Early Intervention *does* help, but parents are entitled to credit
    too!!
    
    -Beth
    

    Congratulations, Cathy!!
    
    -Tracy
    

Being a west coast person, can someone explain "early intervention"?

Is it a formal program?

It's a program with Federal roots but run by the state, for children with
diagnosed special needs under the age of three. It's similar to Head Start 
in philosophy but it's for special needs kids only, from any economic or
social background. It is not mandatory, at least not in Massachusetts. I
see kids all the time that are put into school at age three that have not
had any Early Intervention services, and I feel so bad for them. They have
to work so much harder to keep up. Early Intervention is paid for by the
state and your health insurance plan. After age three, any special needs
services are paid for by your local school system, whether enrolled in
that system or not.

Chris

    Kids who haven't been diagnosed with a particular special need, but
    are considered "at risk" are also referred to Early Intervention, if
    only for "keeping an eye on" until it's determined that there is
    no problem (if that's the case).  Because of Caileigh's birth history,
    she was referred to EI because she was "at risk" for cp, deafness,
    etc.  Children of teenage mothers, children of drug users, and other 
    high-risk infants are also referred.     
    
    Caileigh's visits included monitoring her physical development through
    play mostly.  Ironically, the only problem she seems to have, her
    hearing loss, was uncovered _after_ she "graduated" from EI.  At that
    point, she got back on the waiting list for help from EI (at the top,
    we were told), but no therapists became available before she turned 3. 
    Fortunately, we were able to acquire the services she need privately
    and pay for it through insurance and out of our own pockets.  Not every
    family is as lucky.  
    
    Mods, maybe we should move this digression into its own note?
    
    -Tracy
    

    
    Rowan started being able to sit without falling over, on 1st Jan (exactly 
    6 months after he was born). Of course he still gets a bit dizzy if he
    looks up or around or anything, but its like he's just got a bit more
    'human' :-) 
    

	Emily, 19 months, can count to ten!

	She was counting to ten 2 months ago, but always skipped five.
	( I firmly believe she was boycotting 5, because whenever I
	tried to fill it in for her, she'd scream, "NO!")

	Christmas weekend, Daddy and I emphasized the number 5 a couple
	times, and got very excited when she said it.  Since then, she
	has added it in it's rightful place between 4 and 6.

	This past week, I have noticed her trying to count things on
	her own.  She'll take a pile of measure-up cups, and lay them
	out on the floor, counting each one as she places it down.  Her
	Daddy used to do this months ago, but I haven't seem him do
	it in awhile.  

	sigh, they get old fast!

	Karen

    	Griffin had his 10 month check up recently.

    	Believe it or not, he is a little peanut. Hit the 50% on height and
    weight. Quite a surprise as Spencer continues to blow the curves away.
    Really re-enforces that each child is an individual!

    	Griffin is crawling, pulling himself up and walking along the
    furniture and has most definitely entered the "squirming while changing
    the diapers" stage. I had almost forgotten the joy of baby wrestling!
    	;-)                     

    				Wendy

    	Our beautiful angel; Griffin, turned one today.

    			Wendy

Wow, Wendy - that seemed to fly by! And now you're gearing up for #3?!?!
Truly amazing...

With "just" 2 kids, I can hardly find time to think about much besides
getting through the daily routine. But, we do have some important mile-
stones to report:

	My son, Collin, is potty-trained (at 2yrs 9mos.)!  He's so proud
	to do it by himself - and loves his Aladdin and Batman underwear.
	What a significant step to increased independence!

	Other things Collin has picked up lately - he enjoys doing mazes,
	dot-to-dots (with help on the order) and matching games in the
	coloring/activity books and he seems to count everything (can get
	up to 10 or 12).

	The other night, Collin and I went to return a video and on the
	way to the car, he pointed up at the sky and said "Look, there's
	a man's face! [in the stars]", so I stopped and pointed out the
	Big Dipper, which was easily visible, and told him in general
	about the constellations (not an easy thing to explain!). Now,
	every time we go outside at night he looks around for it and
	asks where the Little Dipper is and tries to find other	shapes.
	Perhaps a future astronomer?

	My daughter, Morgan, already has *2* teeth showing - first one
	is about halfway up and the 2nd just broke through this week -
	and she turns 5 months this weekend.

	Morgan started rolling over sometime in the past few weeks (still
	not a regular occurrence, but we find her "flipped" more and more)
	and she can sit up for a couple minutes before toppling over. She
	loves to grab/chew her toes and this is what usually makes her tip.
	When she's lying down, she tries to sit up - she's going to have
	stronger abs than me in no time (not a tough feat, admittedly ;-)!

Always fun to watch the mental and physical progress of these little
people!

-Cori
  

	Kristen will be 1 in about 3 weeks, she's been crawling for a while
	and walking while holding onto the furniture for about a month now.
	This week she has discovered the stairs and loves to climb up them.
	So we put a gate on the second one for now.

	She's also doing pretty well with the sippy cup, she started using
	it about a month ago.  This coming monday I'm putting all the bottles
	away.  I think she's using a bottle now for my convenience, since
	the sippy cups are pretty messy.  She doesn't have a night time
	bottle (hasn't for about 4 or 5 months), so that won't be a problem.
	
	What else, she has two teeth and eats with her hands and with a 
	spoon pretty well.  She's not saying much, really only mama and
	dada.  She mimics some other sounds too.

	Oh, she also tries to clap and likes to play peek-a-boo.

	They grow up so fast, I can't believe she's almost 1 !!!
	
	Karen T.  :)

    
    
    Today we celebrate Shannon's "Happy Day".  Although she was born on New
    Year's Day, Mom and Dad proudly brought her home on March 31, 1991. 
    She is truly a miracle that keeps on happening.
    
    

    
    Sophie - 4 years, 3 months old - last night out of the blue
    told me.... "when I'm 12, Peter will be 9."
    
    
    Wow! Wonder where she got that!           
    Jamd

  In the last 3 weeks my Sammy (2 years 4 months) seems to have learned and
    learned and learned.
    
    She is singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Row Row your boat and Skip
    to my Lou My Darling.  She can all the sudden to puzzles by herself,
    she's doing the wooden ones with the little pegs on the pieces AND one
    of Barned with 8 pieces that she has to put together....She has been
    undressing and dressing herself, putting on her own shoes and coat.
    When we get to a traffic light, she'll tell you (by the color of the 
    light) wheter you should go, stop or slow down...and if she sees a stop
    sign, she yells, Stop sign, stop mommy....
    
    She's playing Duck duck goose and simon says, saying grace by herself
    and her nighttime prayers...
    
    It's amazing - all the sudden, she seems to be getting old?!  Her dad
    and I are so proud of her!!!!!
    
    -/Andrea

    This weekend we 'celebrated' the milestone that involves leaving the
    baby on the bed just like we have since he was born, turning your back for
    a split second, and hearing a thump.....whahhhhhhh!
    
    :-( No damage done tho'
    
    Andy

	Kristen turns 1 today.  Last year this was Easter and she was born
	at 6:49am.  I'm doing a lot of remembering today.  I wish I was
	home with her....   But she's doing great and growing up fast.
	Saturday we had a party for her and it was a lot of fun - she loved
	the cake and icecream and enjoyed playing with her new toys yesterday.

	She's a little angel and we feel so lucky!!!

	Karen T.

    We had a milestone this weekend; Dad and 15�-year-old daughter were both
in the car at the same time - and Dad was not in the driver's seat. <gasp>

    We had told her that we wouldn't take her out driving until she
started driver's ed, so she hadn't actually expected to *go* driving yet.
This little jaunt was just from one end of our 100yd driveway to the other,
to get the car out of the way of the basketball hoop.

    In reverse.  With a standard shift.  Never driven before.
		    (Could more go wrong?)

    Melissa did well; she only stalled about 3 or 4 times, then inched her
way about a yard up the incline of our driveway .. and stalled.  And started
rolling down the driveway towards my husband's work van.  I couldn't hear
him, but I could just see my husband saying "The brake!  The brake!  Hit
the brake!"  ... and she was frantically looking around her feet to *find*
the brake.  Of course, (or this wouldn't hardly be worth telling at all)
she never found the brake, and hit the back of the van, but there were
no injuries and no damage (5 MPH collision, bumper to bumper).  

    I do have pictures of her First Accident ... ;-)

    However, this story HAS a happy ending.  Just two more stalls later, she
made it to the end of the driveway.  And has not begged to drive again in, 
hmm, about 48 hours now.
    
    		    - Lorri

    	Just when I started thinking, surely there will never be joy again
    in my life......


    		Griffin started walking last night.


				Wendy

    Wendy,
    
    the magic is always there, it is just sometimes hard to see it when you
    aren't remebering to look for it.
    
    Congrat's to Griffin

	Lauren rolled over on Friday, from back to stomach!  She did it
	at daycare (so I missed it) and hasn't done it since, probably
	because she would rather not lay on her stomach.

	Then, over the weekend, she began to realize that, while on her
	stomach, she could push up with her arms to see things better.
	Last night she was doing this in an attempt to see Mommy standing
	above her.  As she was watching me, I started to walk towards
	her and them walked right over her.  She flipped onto her back!

	So, she has rolled over both ways within just 3 days!

	Karen

    
    
    
    I tend to write about Shannon a lot in this conference, so today I
    thought I would post that....
    
    On this day last year, we were blessed with Courtney!

Lauren who is now 26 months, got a new "big girls" bed yesterday.
She was so excited to have a big bed.  Of course, mom is a little
sad - she seems so old.

Well, my wife reports from her mother's in TX that Shelby,
today officially two months old, rolled over and is starting
to do little baby push-ups. We got a real kick out of Stephen
Jr. doing these, the toes of both feet together on the floor.
You could see he was trying to get somewhere (the TV remote
was the bait), but he couldn't figure out how to get forward
motion.

	Hey, you stole my milestone!

	Andrew, 12 weeks old today, rolled over from his back to
	his belly last night.  Once he started, he wouldn't stop.

	He now can roll over both ways, and isn't safe anywhere!
	(Even left on the floor, he's managing to scoot and roll
	himself all over the place.  I keep finding him under the
	coffee table!)

	Of course, Daddy was the first one to witness him rolling
	belly to back, and was also the first to see him roll
	back to belly.  And, I didn't believe him either time until
	I saw it for myself...

	His other milestone, which is Mommy's favorite, is that he's
	been sleeping from 8pm to 7am since last Monday, my first
	day back at work!

	Karen

	Kristen is 13 months old and has started to copy some things we
	do.  She tries to brush her hair, sprinkle powder and yesterday
	after I finished beating the chair pillows in the screen porch,
	she took one off and started to try to beat it too.
	It's so amazing each new thing she does.

	Karen T.

    Well, this is a my little girl is growing up so fast milestone.
    
    Sarah (25 mos) started at a new daycare this morning.  It was a big
    change for both of us as she had only been in home situations starting
    at 4 mos old and now she was going to a great day school that takes
    kids from infants thru kindergarten.  We had spent a few half days
    there together and she really seemed to enjoy it.
    
    This morning she packed up her new 101 Dalmatians bag all by herself (I
    do it, mommy!) and then on the ride over we talked about all the kids
    she would get to meet and the new things she would learn.  At that
    point she asked me, "Will I learn to read, I want to learn to read." 
    She walked right into the Toddler II room, sat down at the table where
    the kids were eating breakfast and introduced herself to the boy next
    to her "Hi, what's your name, my name is Sarah."  Then she gave me a
    big hug and kiss and told me to go home.
    
    I cried all the way to work I was so proud of my big girl!  Where did
    my baby go, it's only been 2 years!
    
    Susan

    
    -1 is so like our situation.
    
    Rebecca is also 25 months and in a new nursery which she loves. She
    puts her bag together in the morning and is usually waiting by the door
    for us to leave. She likes to select her own clothes these days and has
    a preference for her new canvas shoes over the red leather ones because
    "they are like Charlotte's!". 
    
    She chants the names of her friends all the way there and cannot wait 
    for her nurses to open the door to us. She walks in, sits down at the 
    breakfast table and waves me away with a kiss! 
    
    She now wants to tidy up all the time at home "like at creche!!" - can
    she train her father I wonder? :-)
    
    My baby has gone, I now have a beautiful intelligent daughter who makes
    life so much fun even when she wants a story at 5.45am!!
    
               seals
    

    
    
    Nicholas rolled over yesterday for the first time...from back to
    stomache. Of course, I was at work, and John had left the room to get a
    drink, when he returned, Nicholas was on his stomache looking up at
    him!
    All last night, we kept a watchful eye, he would get his legs and
    stomache over, but would not get the other shoulder over.
    
    This morning, I was feeding him his bottle (we do this on the floor), I
    left him there to go and let the dog in, and when I came in, he was
    once again on his stomache!
    
    I hope I will get to see him do this soon......
    
    He is growing up soo fast, I can't believe his is already 5months.
    
    Anne Marie
    

    re. .173
    
    Sarah is in the same phase, likes to pick out her own clothes these
    days (you should have seen her in Raschel's on Sunday, "Mommy, I like
    this, and I want this." while pulling things off the rack).  She
    absolutely has to wear her spongy sandals at all times, including to
    bed, she even puts them on by herself (and occassionaly gets them onto
    the correct feet, too 8^) ).  This morning she dressed herself, had a
    tough time handling the fact that 2 legs can't fit into the same leg
    hole, but all in all did a good job.
    
    Now we've started the biggest phase of them all, potty training!  She's
    been asking to go alot the past few days and last night even performed
    as requested!  This phase I like alot 8^)
    
    Susan

YAHOO!!!!!!

As many of you know, our baby Justin has had 5 surgeries and lots of problems
gaining weight (among other things).  Originally born at a weight well on
the charts, he steadily dropped in the percentiles until we gave up ever
*seeing* him on the charts again.

Therefore, I am pleased to announce that:

  Justin Alexander duBois, age 20 months, was weighed in this morning and
    is now on the charts!!!!!!!  In the last 4 weeks he has gained over 
    THREE POUNDS!  He is somewhere between 5th and 10th percentile now (nurse
    says 8th, but I didn't double check...)  YAHOOOOOOO!!!!!  :-)

       Carol  :-)

    Way to go!!
    
    I know how happy you must feel. Next thing you know, he'll be jumping
    up on those curves, and he'll be eating you out of house and home
    [speaking from experience].
    
    Keep pushing those calories!!
    
    Cathy

    < and he'll be eating you out of house and home 

*Tell* me about it!  I have to carry an armload of bottles into daycare 
each day, and he goes through their oranges like crazy!!  They are all just
*amazed*!  :-)

    Carol

    Carol,
    
    
    
    
    
    
    YES!!!!!!
    
    
    
    meg

    Rowan was 1 year old on Friday, he started using a push along baby
    walker on Thursday, and we've decided that he's said his first word as
    well.
    
    He's a proper little boy now!
    
    Andy

    
    Anna (3yrs 2 months) finally decided it was time to use the potty. She
    has been almost accident free for a week. One wednesday night she even
    left the dinner table, ran to the bathroom and went all on her own.
    Usually she goes when I tell her it's time to try. I'm just tickled
    pink that this finally came about.
    
    
    Lara (4 months) is just growing by leaps and bounds. She has been
    rolling over (both ways) for a month now. She moves herself all around
    in the walker. She is quite the gabber and laugher (and has been for
    a month or so). She's gotten so long I'm going to have to move her out
    of the infant car seat to a big one cause her feet are flat on the back
    of the seat. Now if she would just sleep through the night!!!
    
    Patty

    Alex (6.5 weeks) has discovered his smile and is using it quite
     a bit now!   He is also sleeping a 5-1/2 hour stretch at night
    (not much by some people's standards, but a blessing to me!) and
    weighed in at 13 lbs, 2 oz yesterday.   He's a (big) treasure!
    
    Jason (shy of 5 years old) is taking showers on his own - only 
    needs mom for the hair washing.  He's also been swimming the length
    of the swimming pool all summer without assistance.  He's really
    grown up this past year!
    
    cj/

Anthony (5 yrs 7mths) rode his 12" bike without training wheels this weekend 
for the first time!  For the first few times we held him as he got going, but 
after 4-5 times, he can do it all my himself.

Dave

	Andrew, at four months old, can now get on his hands and knees
	and rock like mad.  A few times, he's managed to push himself
	forward (we call this the "leapfrog").  He's trying very hard
	to grab at things or to reach things on the floor around him.
	This morning he managed to get himself over to his pacifier,
	which was about a foot away, and rolled onto his back to play
	with it.  He was quite pleased with himself.

	He also started cereal last night.  Not a week ago, I reminded
	my husband how Emily started to need food just 3 days after
	she turned 4 months, and that Andrew seemed content with breastmilk.
	Seemed was the operative word.  Over the last couple days, Andrew
	wanted to nurse every 2 hours (down from 3-3.5), and was RAVENOUS.
	He even woke up at night Tuesday night and would only go to 
	sleep after nursing.  (He's been going through the night for 2 months).

	I gave him cereal last night, and he loved it!

	Karen

Okay, I have to give credit where credit is due - so often I forget to "sound
the trumpets" for my second child's milestones (not that I'm any less excited,
there just doesn't seem the time for it anymore ;-), so here's a report on
Morgan's latest milestone...

She's walking!!!! She had her "first steps" a couple weeks ago, around her
8-month mark, but this week she has been fully, independently cruising around,
getting up on her own, following her 3-yr-old brother, and chasing our cats
everywhere.  She'll be 9 months in another week, so I guess she's "following in
her brother's footsteps" since Collin walked way early (first steps at 7 1/2
mos. and fully walking by 8 months!).

Mostly, I am very happy, since Morgan seems happier to have the ability to go
where she wants when she wants (even if it's into the bathroom to unroll/eat
the tissue paper...), and I think she gets more "respect" from older kids now.
It also gives me more freedom to put her down somewhere and multi-task doing
other things (well, it only kind-of works since she's apt to be tugging on my
legs in no time - or else cruising out the door to explore).

However, I now have to worry about those hearth bricks and the other hazards
lurking around the house a bit more because she is so QUICK now!

Never a dull moment...
-Cori

	I've never entered any of Lauren's milestones before but this
	one I have to add!

	Lauren pulled up to standing on Sunday evening!  She was in
	the bathtub (nice safe place to stand up...).  Since then, she
	has been pulling up on everything.  No furniture walking yet
	but she can also climb stairs.  Not regular stairs but at
	day care there is a step up and she managed to climb it!

	Lauren has only been crawling for a month and she will be
	10 months old in 6 more days.  I can't believe how much she
	has changed from that tiny helpless infant she once was!

	I wonder how much longer till she walks!

	Karen

    
    
    Karen, 
    
    Seeing your note, I have to add mine...
    
    Nicholas also pulled himself up in the tub last-night! I freeked! 
    I was watching him real close, and after he got 1/2 way up, he didn't
    know what to do.... Its all down hill for us now!
    
    Nicholas has been doing the "military crawl" for about 1 month, and now
    he has learned to do "push-ups". He gets on his belly, pushes himself
    up on his hands and feet, however, he doesn't know what to do after
    that!  He will be 9mos on Friday! Urgh! he is growing up to fast!
    
    Anne Marie

    
    Wow!! All are little ones are growing up so fast. Lara (will be 7
    months on Oct 1) can creep forward 2-3 inches to grab something out
    of reach and is starting to get up on her hands and knees. It's so cute
    cause after she gets up she kind of looks down at her knees like, "wow
    this is cool!!" I'm not ready for this!!! Anna didn't start crawling
    until she was 8 months old. I guess it's time to re-batten down the
    hatches.
    
    Patty

    My daughter, Kassandra is 6 months.  She is now getting up on all 4's
    and rocking back and forth.  She also crawls/slithers backwards all
    over the place.  She is very frustrated though, because she cannot
    figure out why she can't go forward to reach one of her toys.  
    
    Cheryl

	Six month old Andrew is a milestone maniac lately.

	He's crawling (sort of like an inchworm) all over, and moves
	FAST!  He's sitting very well, and just last week started
	babbling (da da da, ba ba ba).  He's also figured out how
	to steer the walker (vs. randomly bumping into things) so that
	he can chase the dog around the kitchen.

	I love watching him grow!

	Karen

    
    Alex had his four month well-baby checkup this morning.
    Aside from his sheer size (17.5lbs!), he's not much 
    into physical milestones yet.  However, both the 
    nurse and his doctor commented on his ability to 
    "talk".  I guess I'd never really noticed that he 
    really carries on using voice inflections just like
    an adult.   His favorite is "num, num, num" in 
    response to newly-introduced cereal!    

>> His favorite is "num, num, num" in response to newly-introduced cereal!    

	Lauren does that too!  And she will be 10 months old!  It really
	is comical because she sits there feeding herself and everytime
	she has food in her mouth, she hums through it!  Num, Num, Num...

	I wonder when she'll stop doing this.  My MIL said that my
	husband was a hummer when he was eating food he liked.  I
	think she meant when he was older though.  

	Karen

    
    
    That is cute.  When Nicholas was a new-born, he would be such a noisy
    nurser! he made all kinds of sounds. When he is having a bottle, he 
    does make noises, but when eating, there is NO time for noises. We have
    to get the food in the mouth as fast as we can.....
    
    Anne Marie

    This is my first entry in this conference.  Until now I have just been
    a silent reader.  But, after reading these last few replies, I just had
    to have my chance on the stage too!
    
    My "little" Erika turned 6 months old last week (Oct. 6).  She weighed
    in at a very healthy 18 lbs. 8 oz. and is 26 1/2 inches tall.  She's
    continuing to climb steadily in the 90th percentile!  She gets her size
    from her father!
    
    She began sitting up on her own during her 4th month, and was already
    moving around slowly in her walker.  (The daycare provider started her
    in that at 3 months!)  She started REALLY crawling at 5 months
    (EVERYWHERE she wants to go!) and can make the walker race across the
    family room and kitchen.  Before 6 months she was pulling herself up on
    furniture, and people, and is literally "walking" along the furniture. 
    Her favorite spot (NOT mine!) is the fireplace hearth, which I have
    padded with lots of blankets for the moment!  She gets up at one end
    and walks down to the other.  I'M NOT READY FOR THIS!  My mom tells me
    that I walked at 9 months, so I guess my daughter is taking after me.
    Maybe she'll even beat my record!
    
    Now, if I could only teach her that laying still during a diaper change
    would make it go so much quicker, I'd be very happy!
    
    What a change in 6 months!!  And they say the best is yet to come!
    
    	- Jan

My Sarah (will be 2 on Nov 3) is hitting milestones so fast, my head 
is spinning.  In the last week, she has:

1) insisted on moving to a "big girl" bed (boy, did I have to scramble)

2) started using the potty seat consistently

3) started dressing herself (she insists, so I line stuff up on the 
   floor and help out here and there with snaps, buttons, and getting
   her head lined up with the right hole)


Suddenly, my baby is gone and I've got a "big" girl...


Pat

    Since I don't think I've entered any of his milestones here, I figured
    it's about time!  Jonathan is 13 mos old next week.  
    
    He has 5.8 teeth, and the cutest personality!  He crawls{fast!}
    everywhere, on 2 hands, one knee and one foot.  Sometimes he switches
    to 2 hands and 2 feet, with his butt sky high, but heends up bonking
    his head that way.  He pulls himself up on everything he can, and does
    some pretty quick 'furniture walking'.  Last night he took one step
    'all by himself' in between holding on to the highchair, and going for
    the wall - he actually let go of everything all at once!  I'm not sure
    who was more surprised, me or him!
    
    If you hold his hands when he walks, he'd rather RUN! (I think I'm in
    trouble).  He's done with his bottle, and does GREAT with his sippy
    cup, and at feeding himself (minus the past couple of days)
    
    He has several words he likes to use, with ALL different voice
    fluctutations.  "Oh" is a big word for him;
    
    Uh-Oh!
    Oh Dada!
    Oh?
    Dat? (that)
    Mama
    Dad-deeeeeeeeeeee
    Dada
    Mommommommommom (that's my favorite (-;)
    
    He gives big kisses with his mouth wide open (ewww!), and LOVES to play
    pick-a-boo.  He's at a stage where he's particularly fond of slapping
    my face (playing), and is very sensitive to telling him "No" to
    anything )-:  He knows his name quite well, and definitely has some
    concept between good/bad behavior.
    
    When he's eating, sometimes he'll take his cup and start to tip it into
    his lap.  I'll say Jonathan!! and he just sort of casually brings it up 
    to his mouth and gives this look like "Hey, Mom, chill out...!  What's
    the problem?  I was only DRINKING here!"  (-:
    
    He's *SO* much fun!!
    
    Patty

    Alyssa checks in at 1 years old today -- 22 pounds and 30 inches!
    
    She was born at 4:00 in the morning last year and this morning at 4:00
    she was up getting sick!  Could there be a connection.
    
    I can't believe its been a year already.
    
    
    Joolz
    

	Happy Birthday, Alyssa!  

	Your note makes me realize how BIG my 21 pound, 7 month old really
	is !

	Karen

Another milestone for Lauren....

   Her first tooth at 10-1/2 months old!  I thought she would never get 
   teeth.  She didn't complain either.  For some reason, Saturday,
   I decided to feel her gums and found a tooth that had just broken
   through!  She had no symptoms so I would have never known had I not
   decided to check!

   I hope the rest of her teething is this easy!

   Karen

    
    Congrats on Lauren's first tooth. Lara (almost 8 months) doesn't have
    any yet and is showing no signs. She still has that ridge on her gums.
    
    Lara has decided not to waste any time becoming mobile. The weekend of
    Oct 8/9 she started crawling. Typical first crawl stuff, 2-3 crawls and
    then a face plant. Well now only 2 weeks later, she's a speed demon on
    4 appendages. She's pulling herself to standing, as long as what she
    has her hands on isn't too high, i.e., she hasn't mastered the couch
    yet, but the storage box of blocks, the childs rocker, etc all work
    just fine. Yesterday she stood in the porta-crib at the babysitters.
    She can climb up the one step from the playroom to the dining room
    at the babysitters. She can get back to a sitting position on her own.
    She has even tried cruising along the box of blocks while standing.
    She has also even (fool that she is) let go while standing like she
    could stand without support!!! I have a feeling she'll be walking by
    Christmas!!! I'm not ready for this!!!
    
    Patty

    No teething pain?  I can't imagine it!
    
    Alyssa's molars are coming through and she has been absolutely
    irritable - having trouble sleeping, fevers.
    
    I hope they come in faster than the first 8 teeth did.
    
    

    Well, Sarah, 2.5, had her first milestone yesterday that I prefer would
    never had come, she got 2 stitches.
    
    Got a call yesterday from daycare that she had tripped and had fallen
    against a wooden ledge and cut her lip and it looked like it needed
    stitches.
    
    Flew out of work expecting to find a bloody, unhappy little girl, but
    instead found a clean, playful child instead.  Her entire class ran to
    the window to waive good-bye and her best friend gave her a big hug and
    kiss.
    
    While the stitching process was indeed traumatic for both Sarah and mom
    (we were both wiped by the time it was done), she was so brave and I
    was very proud.
    
    She's doing fine now and the stitches aren't very visible.  When I
    dropped her off this morning she showed everyone her booboo and then
    showed them exactly where it happened..."And then I fell right here!"
    
    Susan

	:-(

	Sorry for Sarah, but glad she's ok.

	Emily fell and split her lip in the nursery at Church
	3 weeks ago, but it didn't have to be stitched.  There
	was lots of blood, though (and the woman that held her until
	I came was quite understanding in spite of her blood-stained
	sweater).

	Karen

Wow, tomorrow is Shelby's 7th month birthday and I haven't even put one thing in
this string! Well, let's see, she just this past week started pulling herself up
into a sitting position from all fours. She will be crawling any day now; she is
all but doing it, and even manages to scoot forward a bit, so she can make it
from the middle of the living room rug to the edge pretty easily, where she
likes to play with the fringe. Her lower front two teeth came in this past
month. Everything goes into her mouth right now, so we are being extra watchful.
Her favorite chew toy is her foot inside those little soft kiddie shoes. 

    
    Time to brag again...
    
    At 10 mos, Nicholas has mastered the crawling. He can now crawl to
    furniature, pull himself up, and walk the lenght of the furniature. He
    even goes from the coffee-table to the cough. (Urgh! its all down hill
    from here). Last night, he climbed the stairs for the first time! 
    The when he got up the first step, I thought it was cute,then after
    setp 2 and 3, I realized its not so cute anymore :-)
    
    He also cut his bottom 2 teeth last month.......
    
    He is growing up way to fast!!!
    

    With teething and crawling notes, I feel a little out of place when my
    son's milestone was to enlist in the Navy.
    Not an easy task anymore.
    ed
    

    Well, last night in the wee hours of the morning I was startled awake
    because I'd just had a dream that Jonathan(13 mos) had climbed, totally
    unassisted, to the top of the stairs, and was just gazing up at me with
    that cute little smile.  PHEW!  It was only a Dream!  He can only climb
    the bottom few stairs by himself (they're wider cuz it turns).
    
    Well, this morning I was running late, and Jason and Chris were
    downstairs watching Jonathan while I was upstairs finishing getting
    ready, and I could hear Chris yelling MOM!!  MOM!!! MOM!!!!! MOM!!!!!!
    Finally I went to the stairs to see what he wanted, and there was
    Jonathan, half way up - at least this time Chris was right behind him. 
    Gulp!  BOY was he mad when I brought him back down! (-:  
    
    It's all over now........

    That's o.k., glad to hear it!  I wish one of my sons' enlisted in
    something!  But, now, I'll be sending in milestones of my
    grandaughter.....it's great.
    
    Olivia is 18 mths old.....and, alternating with her grandfather,
    counted to 20....
    
    Lorraine

    We had Brad's evaluation at the preschool this morning, and the kid has
    hit a major milestone! He's in a special ed preschool for his delays
    from the prematurity as well as some physical therapy for his swollen
    leg, and the evaluation says he is chronological age in all areas, and
    even above in some spots!!  To say that we're thrilled is the
    understatement of the year.
    
    Anyhow, he gets the boot from the preschool in 2 weeks which we figure
    will be a nice smooth transition for him because it will be right
    before we go on vacation for Thanksgiving.  I'm just so happy!
    
    
    Cathy

    Cathy,
    
    Congrats to you and Brad.
    
    I am always happy to see a  former preemie do so well.  
    
    My nephew was a kilo baby (6 1/2 months gestational age) is now 12 and
    is in advanced classes.
    
    Meg

    
    
    Cathy,
    
    great news!  I am so happy for you!  I can appreciate the news and
    relate to your joy!
    
    re: meg, that is great to hear....we keep hoping for average, but
    advanced would be a dream come true!!
    
    BETH

	Hooray for Brad!!!

    Michelle, our 26 month old girl-wonder has obviously had enough "dry
    runs" now and decided to go for gold (well, pale yellow anyway :-} )...
    
    ...just before having a bath last night she sat on her potty,
    said "Sel passen"   (translation "Michelle plassen" [dutch]
    			 	  or "Michelle pee"     [english]    )
    and proceeded to tinkle in her potty !!!
    
    Boy, were we impressed !
    
    
    Cheers,							Steve
    
    ps. I searched for an appropriate notesfile and note specifically to record
    this event - news like this should be spread worldwide :-)

Well, time for an update on my "baby" girl Morgan who is 12 mos. + 12 days
old today (born Oct. 27 '93).  The first year is so incredible with all the
strides these little people make on all fronts...

Vitals first:	At the 1-year checkup, she was 26 1/2 lbs. and 32 inches
		(both over 100% for her age - yes, the dr. said she's the
		"size of an average 2-yr-old"). Been walking since 8 1/2 mos.
		and is now running and climbing on everything ;-)
		Has 8 front teeth and 2 incisors are finally visible. Ouch!

"Vocabulary":	About 15+ words I'd guess - some favorites: hi, kitty, ball,
		bat(h), duck, moo, wak-wak (quack quack), niiice, hot, ma-ma,
		da-da, geen (green), bye-bye, moon...

Social:		Loves to perform on command - dancing on the coffee table is
		her favorite (oh no, what am I in store for? ;-). Will start
		jiving to just about any music, and has some cute antics like:
		being  a "wild woman" - she'll swivel her head back & forth and
		all around; telling me "no no no" while pointing her finger;
		waving bye-bye then turning & running off to hide when I say
		"Where are you going?" (not too fun in stores...), stomping
		her feet all around when we say "happy feet"; and the all-time
		favorite post-bath activity - running naked through the house
		to the chant of "naked baby!" (she learned this from her older
		brother, 3 1/2 who still enjoys the ritual...)
		
Food:		In transition from forumula to milk (50-50 mix)
		Loves most table-food but still has an occasional jar of 3rd
		apricots or squash. Favorites: thinly sliced turkey breast,
		pizza, peas, green beans, pears, corn on the cob (well, it
		makes a good teether).

She's very good-natured and enjoys mimicking us laughing - so fun to be around!
I'm proud of all her milestones but feel sad for the "blur" factor since they
all came so quickly!! I know the best is yet to come (2-way conversations are
pretty special) but it has been one great year and she has learned so much
already.  My "baby" is becoming a big girl fast...

Okay, enough for now,
-Cori

	2.5 year old Emily went to daycare in underpants today!

	She still needs to be asked/reminded to use the potty, but
	she has decided that she wants to be done with diapers and
	to wear underpants.  She's even doing her bowel movements
	on the potty!

	She's growing up very fast - she can now dress herself, so 
	her morning routine consists of taking off her own PJ's (and
	diaper if it's only wet), getting on the potty by herself,
	putting on her underpants and clothes all by herself, then
	doing socks and shoes with a little help from mommy or daddy.

	She's also taking great pride in being a big sister - watching out
	for Andrew, holding him, making him laugh, explaining the rules
	of the house ;-) 

	It's hard to put her to bed at night because she's such a joy
	to be with!

	Karen

    
    Lots of milestones this past weekend!
    
    Lauren learned how to eat with a spoon.  She needs help getting food
    on the spoon but does very well once it is there!
    
    Lauren also learned how to climb down the stairs backwards and also
    how to get off the couch.  She sometimes tries to go head first but
    I tell her to turn around and she does!
    
    Another big milestone is that she will finally use her walker.
    We got the walker about 1 month ago and she would collapse to her
    knees and start crying everytime we encouraged her to use it.  Then
    we brought it to daycare for two days last week so she could see how
    the other kids used it.  She didn't use it there but on Saturday,
    she was pushing another toy around in a bent over position (but
    standing) so I stuck her on the walker and she just took off!
    
    The biggest milestone is approaching.  On December 3rd, Lauren will be
    one year old!  I can't believe the changes that she has gone through
    in one year.  Its just incredible!
    
    Karen

	Andrew (9 months old last Saturday) took 4 steps on
	Sunday!!!

	Shocked all of us, himself included I think!

	He was standing with his back to his Daddy, and I jokingly
	said, "Come to Mommy!"  and he did!

	Karen

    
    Karen,
    	Our kids seem to be tracking each other. Lara, 9 months old on Dec
    1, started taking wobbly first steps this weekend. Yesterday morning
    she took 3 wobbly steps to the babysitter. This morning she took 4
    stable steps into the babysitter's arms. If she hadn't had a double
    ear infection early last week I wonder how much sooner she might have
    started. This is so much fun, but I'm not ready for this yet!!!! Anna
    didn't walk until a week before her 1st birthday, but my neice and
    nephew both were walking by 10 months.

	Andrew (10.5 months) walked across the living room last
	night.  There was a video playing, and he walked from the
	couch towards the TV on his own.  He stood about a foot from
	the TV for a short time before sitting down.

	He's been taking short jaunts (4-5 steps) for about 3 weeks, but
	this was his first real walk!

	His big sister Emily is marking her own milestones.  At 32 months,
	she can read the entire alphabet.  She's amusing herself with
	pointing out letters on every sign we see, "There's an M for Mommy,
	there's an A for Andrew!"
	
	They grow so fast!

	Karen

Matthew is ready to run in the house -- he is almost 11 months
old and started walking at 9 1/2 .  They do grow up SO fast.

  --Cida
  


    
    

    
    Today is Laurens 15 month birthday and she finally started walking
    yesterday!  She had been taking 7-8 steps at a time for the past week,
    as long as she had someone to go to but yesterday she finally got up
    the courage o take off!  I got home last night and she was walking
    around the house!  I was so surprised and thrilled too since we are
    leaving Lauren tomorrow for a week while we go on a cruise.  I was
    really afraid that she would start walking while we were gone and I'd
    miss it.  
    
    She'll probably be running when we get home!
    
    Karen                             

    
    
    Atlehi is 20 1/2 pounds!!!!!!
    
    with everything that went on with her this winter, I was beginning to
    wonder if she would manage to do this by her 2nd birthday, and we still
    have another couple of months to go.  It looks like we have the food
    sensitivities under control and she is discovering that food tastes
    good and is worthwhile.  
    
    meg

    ok, my turn to *brag* about an older kid !!!!!!!

    Matt is 10+ and in the fourth grade......last month, he was in the
    top 4 from his class in a Spelling Bee......

    last week, the top 4 from each of the grades 4th thru 8th competed 
    for the School Spelling Bee champ...................

    MATT CAME IN FIRST !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 
    St.Leo's School Spelling Bee CHAMP !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    I get to take him to the Fitchburg Sentinel/Enterprise office on
    the 17th to have his picture taken along with the other school champs !
    Then, on the 29th of this month, he competes in the REGIONAL at the
    Sheraton !!!!!!!!!!  

    Way to go, kid !!!!!!  He makes me so proud !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Wow!  That's terrific.  Nathan is in 2nd grade and has been in the
    spelling bee for the last 2 years (practice bees until 4th grade)
    and I truly think it is one of the most difficult things for
    an elementary school student to be involved with.  And the most
    rewarding!
    
    Tell him Congratulations and Good Luck!
    Pam

Congratulations to all!

My own:  yesterday we took 2 year old Justin to the cardiologist for his
yearly check.  His heart is doing fine, and he now weighs 30 POUNDS!!
He is at the 50th percentile for weight!!!!  He hasn't been at the 50th 
percentile since he was *born*!  Yay!!  Looks like we did it!!!  :-)

I guess I can relax a bit now.  :-}

        Carol

    Congradulations to you and to Justin!!
    
    ...But relax with a two year old?  I don't think so! :-)

    Way to go Justin!!
    
    Always makes my day to hear such reports!
    
    ...although, I will have to agree with the previous noter ... relax
    with a two year old .... if you know the secret please pass it on!
    
    ..Lori

Yay Justin!

Our 6week prem, 5lb David was measured the other day - at 5.75 years, he's now 
3'10"....

I think he's caught up!


Chele

	Hooray for Justin!

              
    Our oldest, Jason, has developed a real interest in numbers and
    basic mathematics over the past year.   We play a game on long
    car rides (which for him is anything over 10 minutes...) called
    "Math Master" where Mom and/or Dad give him addition and subtraction
    problems to try to stump the "Math Master".   He's doing real 
    well with any add/subtract with results below 20 and round numbers 
    above that.  It's so neat to see his mind work on the ones he hasn't
    completely memorized.   If you give him 5+7, he breaks it down
    in his mind to 5+5 which he knows by rote is 10 and then adds
    2 to that.    He's also grasping the basics of multiplication.
    A lot of fun!
    
    cj/

	Wow!  Way to go, Jason!

	

    re .231
    
    Hm, Jason does math the way I do multiplication!  :-)
    
    				cj *-> (who has totally lost her 
    				        multiplication tables due
     					to calculator dependency)

    
    Jonathan is 18 mos old, and making some pretty rapid progress ....
    
    He is totally independent feeding himself, and can sit with a bowl of
    cereal and a spoon, and eat the WHOLE thing without so much as a drop
    of milk on him.  COOL!!!  
    
    He's also started going on the potty at daycare.  SURPRISED us all! 
    They stuck him on more to just get him used to the idea of a potty, and
    when they picked him up, he'd gone poop and pee (Wed), and yesterday
    when they put him on, he went pee.  I'm scurrying around trying to find
    a potty like the one they have that's small enough for his **SHORT**
    little legs, so he can bend his knees and touch the ground when he
    goes.  He thinks it's pretty cool! (me too!)
    
    He has an understanding vocabulary of hundreds and hundreds of words,
    and a speaking vocabulary of ~20 words (maybe I should shut up and let
    HIM talk once in a while (-;), and he holds the cutest conversations -
    even if most of his responses are just in "baby talk", he's so emphatic
    about what it is he has to say.
    
    He's become addicted to airplanes, as we live at the end of the Nashua
    Airport.  He spends half his life looking up in the sky, pointing,
    saying 'pla! pla!' (long "a").  I feel like I live with Tatoo! (-;
    
    He's gotten through his BITING stage (thank goodness!), and made it
    through with only 4 victims.  Two kids at daycare, one brother, and
    dad. (I still say 1 of the daycare kids had it coming - she stuck her
    finger in his mouth!).  
    
    He went to the audiologist Wed, and they've determined that although
    there's SOME loss, it's not significant, and he definitely hears very
    well in at least 1 ear, which is their major concern for normal
    development.
    
    And he's just so cute I can't stand it!! (-:  
    
    A Proud Mommmy!

    Well.......
    
    this may seem far in the future for some, but you will be amazed at how
    quickly the years pass.
    
    Lolita is 21 years of age today!!!!
    
    I am not sure how I feel about this at this point in time.
    
    meg

    Thomas was 10 months on the 31st of March.  And yesterday he took his
    first unassisted steps.  We knew he was close and are happy to know
    that our days of being bent over holding his hands to do the baby
    walk are almost history.
    
    He also crawled up his first flight of steps and got his 8th tooth.
    
    Quite the weekend!
    
    Meanwhile Gina (nearly 5) is getting more jealous of this little guy
    and is having some regression issues. But I figure this will pass (the
    regression, not the jealousy!).
    
    judy 

	Andrew's right ear is finally clear (it took 3 rounds of
	antibiotics this time), and, for the first time in seven
	months, is not on any medication whatsoever!

	yahoo!

    I did get some good news at the pedi yesterday.  Angeline
    has hit 18 pounds, which means she's gained 4 pounds since
    March 10th.  This is particular goodness because we are just
    coming from a 4 week bout with what I have been "lovingly"
    calling her bulimic imitation.  She's very good at eating like
    a pig and purging.  Somehow in the midst of it all she managed
    to gain the 4 pounds!   This puts her at about average for her
    age and a little meat on her bones.
    
    Of course, her father's getting all upset that she looks "pudgy".
    He has great fears of having a fat baby.  Why?  Who the heck knows!!!
    We went through this when I was pregnant and the ultrasounds kept
    showing a nine or ten pound baby (she was born at 8lbs 13 ozs).  He
    was all nervous then that we'd have a fat kid.  I just want a healthy
    one and she was just so thin before!  
    
    She's sure happy as heck lately so I'm not complaining!  I'm pschyed!
    I just told him when she's up and running she'll slim back down.  And
    at least her clothes aren't just ballooning on her anymore.  She even
    has cheeks again!
    						cj *->

    Aaron turned 3 months on Thursday (Apr. 27).  At his 2 month checkup he
    weighed in at 14 lbs, 8 oz (was 8 lbs 14 oz at birth!).  He's growing
    so fast.
    
    He's just getting over his first cold, first mom got one, then dad, we
    started feeling better when Aaron got his, and we got ours back!  He's
    feeling much better now, though.
    
    Aaron just got his first taste of formula this past weekend.  I've had
    less time to pump at work so wanted my husband to introduce it rather
    than our daycare provider just so we could watch him for any problems. 
    He seems to like it, much to mom's displeasure!  I guess deep inside I
    was hoping he'd hate it, though it's good to know he'll take it...
    
    I've been looking at his 30 min old pictures as opposed to his 3 month
    old pictures, he's changing so fast!
    

    
    Breanne graduated from kindergarten this past Friday.  Her report card
    was sent home along with her results from the National Acheivement
    test.  The range was from 1-9, 1 being the lowest and 5 being the norm. 
    Breanne scored a 9 in everything!  I'm so proud of her!
    
    

    Aaron finally rolled over from his back to his stomach this morning. 
    He's been almost rolled over, but never went all the way over before. 
    This morning I got him out of his crib, and since we had more time than
    usual to get ready, I we snuggled and played in my bed for a few
    minutes.  I was almost an arms length away and he rolled over to look
    at me, grabbed for my hair and went all the way over.  Boy did he look
    surprised!  He hates being on his stomach, he'll tolerate it for a few
    minutes but then will flatten out and start whining and crying!  I
    wonder if he'll ever roll from his stomach to his back...
    
    sandy

    My sister's 18 month old boy has been walking and running for awhile now.
    He holds the flashlight straight ahead for my sister when they go for 
    walks in the evenings (he's in the stroller then).  He watches some 
    children's television when they allow him, he seems to follow what's 
    happening, laughs in the appropriate places, and knows how to use the 
    channel changer.  My sister and her husband took him over to a friend's 
    house the other day with TV controls quite different from their own and 
    he walked up to the television, looked at the buttons for a couple
    of minutes, and then pushed the power button to turn it on.

    He has a small, but growing vocabulary, and ennunciates more clearly than
    my other sister's 3 year old.  If he finishes eating and wants more, he
    asks for it - "Mo please".  He knows a bunch of animal sounds (you 
    ask him what a dog says and he woofs, what does a cow say, and he moos, 
    and so on for chickens, ducks, lions, sheep, - snakes say "Ssssssss", etc).
    He likes to look at books, picks out which ones and brings them over, 
    and turns the pages for you while you read or talk to him about the 
    pictures.  He will spend quite a bit of time doing this before he tires of
    it (several books worth) and he's quite focused while "reading".  
    Sometimes he sits on his own, without an adult, looking at books and
    turning the pages one by one in order as if though following the story.

    So our question is, is he within the normal range, or is he more advanced
    than most 18th month old children?  It seems to us he is doing things much
    sooner than we remember the other kids doing them, but its been awhile.

    Leslie

    
    Sounds like my 18 month old.  She knows lots of animal sounds and
    also ennunciates very clearly.  She follows commands too and that
    can be rather funny.  I sent her out to the kitchen the other day
    with the command to "Go sniff daddy's knee".  Daddy didn't hear me
    and started laughing when she was sniffing and I told him that I
    made her do it.  I ask if she wants to put her cup away in the
    refrigerator and she walks right over to wait for you to open it.
    She struggles to put shoes and socks on... she knows where they go
    but lacks the motor skills as yet.  She constantly points things out
    and identifies the owner.  If she sees Daddy's sneakers, she says
    "Daddy's" but if she sees mine, she says "Mommy's"... rarely does
    she mix them up.  
    
    I really don't think that Lauren is advanced for her age.  Children
    tend to develop different skills at different rates and my doctor
    told me that Lauren was a little ahead in her development in that
    area (speech).  But she didn't walk till 15 months so she was behind 
    average on that milestone.  
    
    Karen

    Re: -.2 My 11 month old loves when I read to her.  If I say to her, "Go
    pick up, I AM A BUNNY", she'll pick up that book.
    If I ask her whether she wants to read, PETER RABBIT'S A B Cs or
    the quack quack book, she'll cruise across the room and pick up 
    one or the other.
    She understands alot of phrases."Do you want Cheerios?" always evokes 
    a grin and then she'll charge for the kitchen.
    "Time to change the diaper" evokes fake whining.
    
    Re: Previous, I haven't asked her to sniff daddy's knee yet.  ;^)
    
    Nancy

    re: Previous, in terms of dressing herself, Alyssa will try 
    very hard, however this morning she was trying to fit her legs through 
    the sleeves of her blouse!
    
    Nancy

	Sounds pretty normal to me.

	He may be doing one or two things ahead of other kids, and
	then other kids may be doing one or two things ahead of him.

	I remember waiting for Andrew to start talking, because I
	could remember that Emily had several words in her vocabulary
	before age 1.  Just about when I started to get worried that
	maybe ear infections had damaged his hearing, he started talking.
	
	And now, at 15 months, "More" is his most often used, most
	clearly enunciated word ;-)

	Karen

Re: "normal" vs "advanced"

It may just be me, but I prefer to avoid being concerned with whether my kids
are "normal" or "advanced."  They do what they do, I relish their
accomplishments, encourage them, help them when they have difficulty, and don't
bother with how other kids are doing in comparison, since it won't change a
thing.  I avoid comparing them with each other as well.  Am I missing the
point?  How do people feel about this?

						Brian

    .247  I agree with you.  You definately have the point.
    
      One thing that happened to me in growing up was being compared
    to kids that could do "better" who were "smarter" . It really hurts.
    It didn't make me do better or be smarter it took away a lot of
    self esteem.
    
        Rosie

    
    RE: .247
    
    Amen!  I agree wholeheartedly.
    
    Carol

The point was not so much comparison as it was for the parents to
consider whether they might be challenged to provide advanced educational
opportunities in the future.  However, it sounds like he's at a normal
place for his age.  Thanks for answering the questions.

To the other response:  Sorry I asked, I stand chastised and will go away now.

Leslie.

	Stephanie just turned 4 months last week and rolled over this 
	monday from her back to her stomach.  She loves playing with her
	toes lately and she was on her back playing with them when she rolled
	over.  She rolled over again Monday afternoon, but not since then.

	Of course Monday night/Tuesday morning she started with a cold,
	runny nose, coughing, stuffy nose, sneezing... I hope this goes
	away soon, she and therefore us aren't sleeping very well.

	Karen T.

    Hearing Lisa (6 mo) playing in her crib at 6AM this morning I got up as
    usual to go down stairs to get her bottle. When she's not crying
    I get the bottle without her. But even if she's playing I will
    peak around the corner into her room before going down stairs. 

    This morning I peaked around the corner and much to my amazement there
    was Lisa, standing up in her crib, holding the side rails, a big smile
    on her face as I greeted her. Time to move the mattress down!

    She already loves to walk holding two of my fingers, and she'll stand
    against the couch and play with stuff on it. I think it's safe to say
    I'm going to have an early walker on my hands. 8^)
    
    She'll be 6 months this coming Saturday.
    
    Gail

    Someone has got to tell Angeline (10 1/2 months) that she has no
    teeth!  She is slowly and steadily refusing baby food.  She will
    still eat her cereal in the morning, and still loves chilled jars
    of the fruit, but other than that - this kid wants food!  
    
    We were on vacation last week, and I think out of six days she
    only had one supper that wasn't solid table food.   
    
    I'm trying to get her interested in walking as I don't want her
    eating all this solid food then sitting there like Jabba the Hut!
    
    							cj *->

    My daughter, Sarah, will be 3 months old next Wednesday.  Last Tuesday
    she rolled from her back to her tummy.  Today she rolled from her
    tummy to her back!  This is my third (and last!) baby and I can't
    believe how quickly time is going by.  She'll be sitting up and
    crawling before we know it.
    
    Lila

    Yesterday, Sunday, Angeline called me to her bed for the first
    time.  She's just been getting a handle on the "mama" or "mum mum"
    word.  But she woke yesterday, she talked for just a minute or
    two, then got a little louder with her "mum mum", "mum mum".  
    
    Oh yeah, mum mum got right out of bed and got her baby to come
    snuggle.  "Oh honey, those are happy tears on "mum mum".   :-)
    
    						cj *->

	This is probably my milestone more than Emily's, but,
	Emily had her first complete, at-home haircut this weekend.

	She was very good, holding her head very still while I cut.

	My only mistake was not sitting her in front of a mirror.  She
	periodically would turn her head to try to watch me cut!

	Karen

    No more diapers!
    
    In two weeks Atlehi went from hit or miss potty to hit all the time. 
    (Of course positive reenforcement AKA bribery helped out here as well.)
    
    meg

    Aaron has his first tooth.  He's been putting his hands in his mouth
    even more than ever, but hasn't been any fussier or grumpier than
    usual.  It's cute watching him run his tongue over the new tooth,
    trying to figure out what the heck that thing is!
    
    He's also finally being consistant about rolling over now.  He's only
    done it a few times, (starting at around 3 months, but has never been
    that interested in it since mom will get or do whatever he wants!). 
    He discovered it really was fun on Monday had has been doing it each
    day since (both back to front and front to back).
    
    Next is crawling (or walking, knowing this little guy).
    
    sandy

Seven years ago, on her first day of first grade, Elspeth received a rose from
an eighth grader.

And today, she was one of the eighth graders, handing a rose to one of the new
first graders.

	-Neil

    Wow Neil!  That sounds like such a nice practice!  Where does
    Elspeth go to school?  Do they take in 37 year old first graders? :-)
    	
    						cj *->

    
    Jonathan, who'll be two on the 20th, learned a new word this morning
    ... and marks the beginning of "no rest" for Mom!
    
    His new word is ..... Why?  and he sure does know when/how to use it!!
    
    We were following a dump truck for a little ways befre it turned left. 
    Jonathan said "Bye Truck!"
    Me: Yup!  Bye truck!  He had to turn. 
    Why?
    cuz that's where he's going!
    Why?
    Ummmm .... because they need the dirt there
    Why?
    To fill in the hole
    Why?
    Because they're building a bridge
    why?
    so people can get across
    why?
    to get to the other side
    Why?
    Because they need to go there
    Why?
    Ummm ... maybe they live there or need to go shopping
    Why?
    To get stuff to have for dinner
    Why?
    Because they get hungry and like to eat dinner at home.
    
    Oh.
    
    I didn't think it was ever going to end ........!!!
    
    (-:
    
    I remember this!

complete with backpack, pictures and Mom & Dad and
the camcorder :-)  

One of the cuter moments occurred when Dad told Noelle
he was going to work and needed a hug and a kiss.  Noelle
gladly complied and went back to playing with a toy.  Then
this little blond girl popped out and had to give Dan a 
good-bye hug and kiss too!

- Deb B.

    Just wait a month or two.  Then you'll get to school to discover that
    the kids have decided that you're taking an extra 1-3 of them home
    today so they can play together more!  Needless to say, no parents were
    consulted during the planning on this.
    
    Congratulations!
    
    Irene

    Well, a "milestone" or not, Angeline and I had our first fight
    this weekend, and totalled two when it was over.
    
    The first was up at a bridge up the lake we were at.  I usually
    walk her up to the town and she stands up by the railings on the
    bridge and likes to watch the boats go underneath.  Well we had
    such a bloody battle when she decided she wanted to throw Teddy
    down into the water, I thought the locals were going to call the
    police!
    
    The second one was the next night....When she eats peas, I usually
    give her a small cup of them and put it on her tray and she eats them
    as her meal goes along.   Well I've decided it's time she stops
    throwing the occasional pea on the floor.  First I tried taking the
    cup away each time she did it.  She'd very sweetly put the excess peas
    from on the tray in her mouth, so I'd return the cup.  She'd take a pea
    and throw it on the floor.  I'd take the cup away, she take one from
    the tray and put it in her mouth.  I'd give the cup back, she'd throw
    one on the floor, all the while giving me her angelic little smiles and
    even leaning over to give me kisses (bribery already!).
    
    Well eventually she got mad when I kept taking the cup away and started
    yelling at me.  I kept telling her "in the mouth Angeline", and she'd
    throw it on the floor.   Finally I let her have the cup, but blocked
    her arm from reaching over the side of the tray.   She'd yell and cry,
    I'd take the cup away.  Finally I gave her one last try.  She tried 
    putting them on the floor, I held her arm.  She yelled and squiggled
    and tried to push against my hand.  Then she hauled off with her other
    hand and slapped me in the face!!!!!!
    
    Ok, it was all I could do not to laugh.  She is just a year old this
    week and her frustration was high.  Naturally she got a "No, you don't
    hit Mommy" and the peas got taken away (she was done anyways).
    
    I see my little one is starting to test the waters on what she can get
    away with.  *sigh* I've only just begun....
    
    						cj *->

	;-)
	
	Welcome to the "age of independence", cj !

	Andrew threw his first full blown tantrum the week before he
	turned one.

	I laughed.

    hMMM, now my problem is we had another performance last night.
    
    Just as she decided she was full, she started grabbing handfulls
    of food and throwing them and then leaned right over and stuck
    her face in mine, like "whatta you gonna do about it!".
    
    Where did my little Angel go?????  Is Deviline about to become
    the norm?  =;->  
    					cj *->

    Sounds like the stuff my little demon baby does when she is full.  The
    minute she starts to pitch things off the plate now, the plate gets
    picked up and put away.  This brings on some tears, but much less
    damage to the rugs, furniture, and keeps the dog's weight under
    control.  
    
    meg

    Yes, my daughter does the same thing - usually when she is full.
    It seems like lately she fusses when she put into the high chair and
    will do anything in her power to not be confined.
    When will she outgrow it?
    
    

    >When will she outgrow it?<
    
    Hopefully before her first date ;->
    
    The thing is, last night for example, if I take Deviline out of
    her high chair and put her on the floor to play, after a few minutes
    I can try feeding her more and she will continue to eat more and
    probably finish her meal.   It just seems that now that she's learning
    the word "no", it has to be tested.
    
    Paper and tissues are another good example.  One day I told her "no"
    to putting a piece of paper in her mouth.  Now if she gets her hands
    on some, she'll look around to be sure I'm looking and then put it in
    her mouth to test me.  If I "ignore" her, she just goes on and plays,
    if I say "no" she'll keep making the gesture like she's putting it in
    there just so I'll say "no".  
    
    I had no idea this starts this young!  My Mom says I deserve it :-)
    
    						cj *->

    We put the high chair up in the attic a few months back.  Atlehi
    doesn't like it and prefers to stand on a regular chair to eat.  Much
    easier to go along with this, and now I don't have the "toe breaker" to
    deal with in the dining room.  
    
    I imagine in a few years she will want it back to sit in.  At lest the
    other two did that.
    
    meg

	Yup.  Andrew's been eating in Emily's booster seat, and
	Emily's been sitting either in a "regular" chair, or the
	high chair, depending on the way the wind is blowing.

	I'd put it in the attic, but it's convenient for saving the
	carpet when she has popsicles in the living room ;-)

    Evan rolled from his back to his stomach Tuesday afternoon. [of course,
    we missed it]
    
    Rick and I knew he was getting close as he was concentrating _hard_ on
    this feat all of the 3-day weekend.
    
    He wouldn't do it for Debbie [his daycare parent] either. However, he
    flipped over and _laughed_ and smiled up a storm with Christopher
    [Debbie's 12yr old son] cheering him on.
    
    Several times Tuesday night and during the day yesterday Mom, Dad, and
    Debbie offered him the opportunity to do his stuff. Smiles, laughs,
    lots of talk, but no roll-overs thank you very much. Until Christopher
    got home from school yesterday, and FLIP!
    
    Debbie _was_ treated to Evan's first raspberry-noise, though, for her
    efforts. So her day wasn't a total loss.
    
    [Mom & Dad got the raspberry quite a bit last night and this morning.
    The kid's no dope. He gets a _great_ reaction with a _ton_ less effort]
    
      Annie

    
    
    Koree had her two-week checkup today and she is at 9 lbs 8 ozs (8 lbs
    15 ozs at birth).  She is in the 95th percentile for her weight, height
    and head circumfrence.  (Actually she was alittle over 95th for her
    height).  Looks like she is following in Big Sister Alyssa's footsteps
    for growth.
    
    Now, lets hope for 95's in school :-)
    
    
    Mommy Joolz
    

    My mom just called to tell me that Kimberly (3 mos, 8 days) just rolled
    over from her back to her stomach (why couldn't she have done it last
    week while I was still home).  She's been trying so hard for the
    longest time.  The way she's been working at it, she'll probably be
    sitting unassisted in a month.
    
    re .273  Kimberly is also going the 95 route.  She's just like her
    sister height wise but she's gaining weight like gangbusters (a
    michelin baby).  Sarah is 3.4, 41" tall and 30lbs, I fully expect Kimberly 
    to outweigh her soon.
    
    /Susan

    
    My daughter Laura will be 9 months old this weds and she is walking
    on her own. Over the last couple of weeks she's been taking a couple 
    of steps more each day.Now she can make it across the whole room, stop
    and pick up a toy and carry it with her. It's really amazing. 
    
    She absolutely refuses to crawl anywhere now. If you try to sit her
    down she locks her legs so you either have to lay her down or just let
    her go. She has quite the bumps and bruises on her forehead and mom and
    dad are getting a few gray hairs. 
    
                           Barbara
    

    Aaron is heading for that acheivement I'm afraid. He absolutely refuses
    to even try to crawl.  If we try to put him in "the position" he'll
    immediately flip over onto his butt (or back) and he still hates being
    on his stomach.  But he loves to walk.  He'll go all over everywhere
    with mom or dad holding on to him.  His grandpa got such a kick out of
    seeing Aaron run after our cat (she's in real trouble when Aaron starts
    walking on his own).  He also has no idea that he needs someone to hold
    onto him when he walks, we have to be ready at all times!  He's always
    prefered standing to sitting...  Boy, we'd better make sure we take our
    vitamins everyday and eat well, we're going to need all the energy
    possible to keep up with him when he starts walking on his own and
    getting into everything!
    
    Aaron was suffering on Sunday with nasty gas pains, his second (ever)
    cold, and he's teething on top!  I was awakened 4 times that night. 
    The worst was at 2:30, he woke up crying, I was in a deep sleep, got
    out of bed, rushed towards the door and discovered it was half open,
    the hard way.  I've got a nice knot over my right eye.  And all I could
    think of was..."Geesh I hope I don't get a blackeye, no one would
    believe that I really did run into a door!"  That (of course) was the
    only time his dad woke up!
    
    The good news is Aaron slept better last night (though he woke up at
    4:30) and ate his usual amount this morning.  Plus the prunes that I
    put in his cereal yesterday morning and evening are doing their magic!
    
    sandy

    Is this a milestone or a cute thing they do? Both I guess.
    I bough Lisa (8 mo) a walk behind toy yesterday. It's a fisher price
    toy, the front looks like her crib toy, it has a wide wheel base and
    wide wheels. She's been standing for 2 months and cruising the couch
    for about a month. I put her behind the walking toy and held it back 
    and let her lean into it to walk, my husband suggested I just let her
    go with it. So I did, she got the hang of it after just a couple of
    trys. She'd fall down to her knees a few times, but scampered right back
    up and walked behind the toy. It was so cute. She manages to follow it
    in a straight line, another week and she'll be leading. 8^)
    
    Gail

	Kristen can really ride her tricycle now!  She's just reaching
	the peddles and loves riding it.  She wants to go on walks all the
	time, with her riding her tricycle.  Sunday we took 3 walks - at
	least I'm getting my exercise.  And she's improving so quickly,
	Since saturday's walk when she mostly pushed along with her feet
	till last nights walk when she peddled most of the way.  We're so	
	proud of her!!  Oh, she's 2.5

	Meanwhile, Stephanie (7months) is getting the hang of going to
	bed awake and getting herself to sleep.  It's been a week and we've
	gone from crying for 1hr with mom coming in every 10 minutes or
	so to pat her back and whisper "I love you" to babbling for a few
	minutes, crying about a minute and then falling off to sleep last
	night.  I feel so much better, I'm really glad we started this.

	Karen T.

    
    Before I get bombarded, let me say that I acknowledge that this
    doesn't mean ANYTHING - but we thought it was an exciting 
    "milestone" nonetheless.
    
    Alex (16 months) pooped on the potty yesterday!   
    
    or in light of the baby-talk topic, should that be "moved his bowels 
    on the toilet chair rather than in his diaper" 8^)? 
    
    Carol 

    Carol,
    
    I think poop quite appropriate :-).  In fact, we "toot" all the
    time when gas is passed.  What I wouln't like to hear is "did
    we poop-poop in our dypee? "  :-)
    
    Congratulations in the upcoming freedom from dypees.
    
    						cj *->

    
    Oh, I think we're quite far away from diaper-freedom....
    but then again, I have heard of children trained by 
    18 months....so who knows?   

    I thought having 2 girls whose birth months are May and June was great,
    I could recycle all of Sarah's clothes (and she's always been very
    tall).  Not so.
    
    Kimberly, 4 mos, just came back from the doctors for her well baby
    check up and she's blowing past Sarah's growth bigtime.
    
    In 2 moonths, she gained 4 lbs and grown 4"  (17.5 lbs and 28"), the
    doctor and I checked 3 times to make sure we weren't measuring wrong
    but it was the same each time.
    
    I had to call my husband and ask him just what was it that he was using
    when she was conceived.
    
    /Susan

	Kristen has given up her pacifier.  Or I should say, we took it away,
	but either way it's gone!!!!!!!!!!  And we're so proud of how well
	she's doing without it.

	Now the story, since about 1 she's only been allowed to have it while
	sleeping, which included the car seat.  Since about 1.5 she's only
	been aloud to have it in the crib/bed.  Now she's 2.5 and she's great
	about getting up and putting it on her bureau, no questions asked.
	We really debated about why we should take it away from her, because
	it's not doing anyone any real harm and she's really attached to it.
	But it comes down to the fact that we're just sick of it and decided
	she's old enough.  So Sunday night we were going to start because 
	Saturday my mom was watching her and we were sleeping at my parents
	house after a wedding.  As fate would have it, we forgot the pacifier
	saturday so for her nap and bedtime Saturday my mom explained to her
	that we forgot it and she accepted that and went to sleep no problem.
	Same thing Sunday when she napped at my parents house.  Now Sunday
	night we're at home and she asked for her pacifier.  I said "Sorry,
	mommy lost it"  She questioned me a little and then cried for it,
	but I just explained, that I'm sorry it's lost and I know it's 
	hard for her to fall asleep without it, but I know she can do it
	and she still has her blanket to hug.  Then I gave her a few extra
	hugs and said goodnight.  She cried about 15 minutes and fell asleep.
	Monday for nap and nightime, she asked and I gave the same explaination
	both times she only cried for maybe 3 minutes.  So I think we're doing
	great!!! Anyway, there's no turning back now. I'm just so proud
	of her, because I was expecting a week of crying much longer before
	she forgot about it.

	Karen T.

    Congratulations on Kristen giving up the pacifier.  We're going on 1
    year since Sarah gave up hers (she was 2.5, too).  I expected a big
    todo, but she only asked once, accepted my answer and never asked again.
    
    So nice to see that beautiful face without that ugly plug stuck in her
    mouth.
    
    /Susan
    

    
    It must be the time of year. Nicholas 21mos, only used the plug when he
    was in his crib sleeping or at Nap time.
    
    We decided that we have a lot of changes coming up in the next few
    months (moving, new baby) that now was the best time.
    
    What we did was take all but 2 away, and the 2 that were left, we cut
    the tops off. When he asked for it, I showed it to him and explained
    they were broken. He went over, threw them in the rubbish, and has not
    even asked for it since! Yeah! I thought this would be horrible week
    transition period.  
    
    Anne Marie

    Lisa, 8.5 mo, took her first official steps over the weekend. My
    husband and I both witnessed it (so it's official). She was standing in
    front of me playing with a toy, not holding on to anything and she took
    a step toward me with both feet, and I caught her as she stumbled into
    me. It was great! She's been practicing standing up without pulling up
    and taking the one or two steps. This is sooo fun.
    
    Gail

    Angeline's been working so hard at learning to walk and/or cruise.
    It just seems to be slow going with her.  Lately, however, I've seen
    her do things, like - let go of the table and stand on her own for
    awhile.  Then she'll clap her hands like silly for herself (and
    of course, fall on her butt, or grab the table again).  I see her
    sitting with a puzzle, put the piece in right, and clap happily.
    I don't even have to be looking for her to congratulate herself.
    
    I'm really quite happy for her when she's so pleased with herself.
    
    She has FINALLY started crawling too, and it's the queerest crawl!
    She goes on her hands normally, but her LEGS!!  She bends her right
    one inward (so her foot is touching the inside of her left knee),
    and her left one goes out straight in a diagonal line from her body.
    She moves on the right knee and left foot.  Her legs form a shape
    similar to the number 4.  And does she MOVE!!!  She looks so funny,
    but again, she's so proud of herself.  Now she follows me everywhere.
    
    Time to shampoo the carpet!
    
    						cj *->
                                                  

    ...while Kimberly (5 mos on 11/6) was chewing on my finger,
    2 bottom teeth.
    
    I had stopped nursing Sarah by the time she had her teeth at 6.5
    mos, so this should be interesting.
    
    /Susan 

     .....my baby's not a baby anymore - ELEVEN YEARS OLD TODAY and growing
     into such a fine young man - we actually had a GOOD birthday morning,
     relatively stress-free which is a *real* accomplishment for us in the
     morning !!!!!


     HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MATT !!!!!!

  My 6 year old son Erik lost his first tooth yesterday, the day AFTER his
school photo was taken.


Elizabeth

    
    	At least he waited!  My daughter got banged by a toy at
    	daycare last week and got a black eye the day before we were going
    	to have her Christmas pictures taken :-(
    

    My daughter, Sarah, turned 6 months old on Thursday.  She's been up
    on her hands and knees for a couple of weeks now trying to crawl
    and yesterday she did it!  There'll be no stopping her now! 
    Lila
    

    Our kids got up this morning, got out their snow suits, put
    them on all by themselves, and right now are out rolling
    snow balls and building snowmen and loving the early snow fall.

    ALL BY THEMSELVES!
    bob

    Both of my daughters, 6 and 7, are learning to read.  After many
    months of working with my 7 year old the light has finally clicked!
    She's doing great now, and the best part is the 6 year old isn't far
    behind her!!!  I'm so proud of both of them and hope night time home
    work is much more pleasant!!!
    
    cg

    Lolita is home from school for a few days.
    
    As well as riding me about excercise, and making dental appointements
    for all of us,
    
    her milestone?
    
    She made a button down shirt in her spare time.
    
    Meg. who does well to sew on buttons, let alone make buttonholes and
    collars.
    
    two 1/2 semesters for her to go and counting

    Ok i'll brag too --
    
    My almost-12 yr old did the dinner dishes last night.  First time.  My
    husband and I were in the other room, trying very hard not to laugh too
    loudly at his remarks.
    
    And then of course we found all the dishes that "didn't get seen".
    
    Every little step.......!
    

    
    	Emily has learned how to spell her name.  She can't write it,
    	but she can recognize it and can recite the spelling.  Now every
    	time we're in the car, we have to spell everyone's name over and
    	over again ;-)
    

    Aaron finally started crawling on Halloween (the day before he turned 9
    months).  He started taking a few tentative steps a few days after he
    turned 8 months!  We took last week off and spent lots of time with
    Aaron and in that time he has become a pro at pulling himself up on
    anything possible, plus he now takes a few steps, stops, and takes a
    few more steps!  He also will stop walking and plop down on his butt...
    
    Now we're in for the real fun part of new parenting!
    
    sandy

	Stephanie turned 9months the day before Thanksgiving and she
	had been scooting around a little bit for about a week before
	that, not really getting too far.  But over the Thanksgiving
	weekend, she's really started moving.  She's crawling kid of
	funny, with one leg sort of stuck, but she gets places, and
	pretty fast!!!

	I expect in a few weeks she'll really be crawling like crazy
	- time for us to watch out.  We start the baby proofing again,
	we've slacked off an those things that weren't a problem with
	Kristen (2.5yrs) anymore.

	She's growing up so fast - CRAWLING!! - what happened to my little
	cuddly baby, now she always wants to be on the move all the time....

	Karen T.

    Well, it turns out Angeline started walking (no hands) this
    week.  She'll only do it a the sitter's though! :-( 
    
    When I come to pick her up, the sitter stands her up and we
    try to get her to walk to me, and she won't.  And she won't
    walk for me at home.  The only thing I can figure is, I'm 
    getting her at the end of the day, and maybe she's just tired.
    
    I can't wait until this weekend when I can have her all day and
    see how (if) she does! 
    
    I'm just glad I'm not one of the "jealous" parents that wishes I
    got to see it first.  I'm happy for any accomplishment she has, even
    if it isn't with me.  But gee, let me see it sometime!  :-)
    
    						cj *-<

    Evan got his first tooth yesterday [6 mos. 4 days]. It's hard to see,
    but sharp to feel.
    
    He also drank water from a sippy cup. Not a lot, but he's been
    insisting that he could drink from a cup or glass for a few weeks, so I
    let him give it a try. He's got the motion down, but looks a little
    surprised when the liquid pours into his mouth. He swallows nicely
    though.
    
      Annie

    Aaron is a little mocking bird these days.  He's been saying Hi there
    and hey you for a while.  It's so cute when he's upset at us for not
    letting him play with something (like my camera) and in the middle of
    his crying grumbles "hey there" comes out.  He can't figure out why we
    laugh!  He'll also say it if he feels ignored (someone is talking to us
    and not him).
    
    Other things he's saying:  don't do dat, good boy, oh boy, thank you  
    rudolph (his caregiver's daughters were talking about Rudolph, when they 
    quieted down he said rudolph nice and loud).  Also I had the news on this 
    morning and a commercial came on with the lead characters sayin "hi" to 
    which Aaron raised his hand to wave and said "hi" back to them!
    
    My baby is growing up so fast!
    
    sandy

	Stephanie (9months) can say bye,bye and wave now.  She's so cute,
	she's waving backwards, so it looks like she's waving at herself.

	Crawling like mad now too....We put her down and boom, she's off!

	Karen T.

    Lindsay (10 months) now has a word for bottle (baw-BAW) with a very
    loud second syllable.  And when she says it, you better give her one
    soon, or else.  I just love communcation.
    
    Janice

    Well, boy, did I find out Angeline can say bubble!!!!  
    
    We were at a shop in the Rockingham Mall.  They have a beautiful
    ceramic teddy bear that blows bubbles.   He's sitting with a pot
    that you put the bubble solution in.  He raises his arm, his paw
    has on of those loops in it to blow the bubble.  There's a fan
    in his head that blows air out his pursed lips.  As the loop lines
    up with his mouth, he "blows bubbles".   It is a riot!
    
    Angeline was sitting in her stroller just so excited pointing and
    yelling bubbles.  Three other women lined up their kids near it
    too!
    
    And yes, it was a sale item so I only spent $21.99 on it.  :-)
    
    							cj *->

Anthony finally lost his first tooth yesterday, almost 4 weeks after turning 7! 
It took about 2 weeks from being fairly loose to falling out.  A few more are
getting wiggly so it looks like his piggy bank will be filling up soon.

Dave

    
    
    Our Courtney (2yrs 7mo next week) has decided she has worn diapers
    long enough and has been dry all day and night for 2 weeks!  Im not
    that amazed, but what is so interesting is she doesn't make a big deal
    about going on the toilet.   She just kind of sneaks in, does her thing,
    and then may ask for help pulling up her clothes.  
    
    We are thrilled to no longer need diapers on hand, but the reality of
    not having a baby in the house brings tears to our eyes when we talk
    about it.  It has been 5 continuous years of diapering the 2 kids, and
    now itappears to be over.
    
    THis growing up stuff will really do a number on us!
    
    Beth
    

One night last week while we sat in the living room with the kids, we heard a
distinct "CLICK". It was the sound of my 21-month-old daughter Shelby's brain
entering the Terrible Two's. Now she goes from perfectly happy to screaming her
head off in anger at the slightest thing, like when I put her juice cup in front
of her. That must be the Evil Juice Cup, I need to remember to use the Good
Juice Cup.

Don't mind the bald spots on the sides of my head.

    
    	My 21-month old son got perturbed with me at dinner last night
    	because I put his juice cup to his right, instead of his left.
    	
    	He picked it up, moved it, and said, "NO.  Juice cup, right here!"
    
    	My husband said, "Of course, Mom, he's left-handed!"  (such a help)
    
    
    	Andrew's new milestone - he surpised me last night by completing
    	a puzzle he'd never tried before.  He needed no help, and seemed
    	to know right away where all the pieces belonged.  It was just
    	a nine piece shape puzzle, but I'd never seen him do one before.
    
    

    
    
      I just can't resist putting this in...everytime I think of it..it
    makes me smile.....Just before Christmas my 7 month old son, Jeff, got
    his first two teeth...and I was the one to find them!!!!  I was so 
    worried that my daycare lady would be the one to see them first....
    but it was me...MOM....yeah!!!  It was the best Christmas gift ever...
    
    Renee

    Ok, Ok....there's a couple of folks here who are going to grin
    and "have at me".... :-)
    
    Angeline has become, well, a bit more normal.   No longer do we
    want to go to bed at night.  The crib is the last place she wants
    to be now.  Granted, she does still want to sleep her 9 or 10 hours
    (down from 10-12), but now it has to be in MaMa's bed WITH MaMa there.
    She just will NOT go down at night in her bed anymore.
    
    This was the kid that would drag me down the hall and point at her
    bed begging to get in it!
    
    If I move her to her crib while she's sleeping, she awakens later and
    howls bloody murder until I cave and bring her to bed.  
    
    AND, she now insists on walking around with that pacifier in her mouth!
    Something she's never been interested in unless she was going to bed
    at night.  She never would even think of it at naptime.  Now, it's all
    the time she's around the house.  I won't let it go out with her to the
    sitters, which sets her off royally, but I put my foot down there.
    
    *sigh*... I knew I had it very VERY good before and I've appreciated
    every moment she was such a perfect kid.  Now she's settling in to the
    habits I read about in here.  
    
    You know what?  I don't begrudge her a single moment.  She's blessed
    me with quite some time of being just so good.
    
    Now, to go back and read all your stories and suggestions on similar
    situations!    Welcome to the Real World, MaMa.  :-)  :-)
    
    							cj *->

    
    Our Alex has a little wooden toolbox and toolbench with billions of
    plastic nuts, bolts, and washers.   Last night, after the ritual
    dumping of all the pieces all over the family room floor 8^), he
    started sorting the bolts by color.   Awesome feat for a little guy!
    
    

Bought Stephen (5 yrs old) his first ice skates and cross-country skis right
before the Blizzard of '96 (it was a good day for Play It Again Sports;
naturally, they didn't have any used stuff in his size). 

We started out with the skis in the backyard, on the *18 INCH BASE* (!!!!). He
did fairly well, especially considering how soft it was, and did not get
frustrated with falling down. Then we moved to the driveway, where it was just a
thin layer of packed snow on the pavement. This went much better, and within
half an hour he was able to go up and down the 50' drive with fairly smooth
strokes. He even managed the 180 degree turn a couple times without falling.

I'm psyched! This season will probably just be learning in the driveway and
yard, but by next season we ought to be able to go to the park across the street
and go on the walking path. This is the second real outdoor activity we can do
together; the first is "hiking in the woods" on the short trails around Mt.
Wachusett and Cogshall Park in Fitchburg.

    Steve,
    
    That sounds like so much fun for you both right now!  I bet
    you look like a winter picture card out there!
    
    						cj *->

    
    	Emily has learned how to write her name!
    
    	She started writing letters about 2 months ago, at her request
    	and with my help.  After a couple tries, she informed me that
    	she was ready to do it all by herself (of course, E was her 
    	first letter ;-) ).  Since then, she has been figuring out the
    	letters mostly on her own.  She'll ask me to make one, and will
    	watch, then start practicing.
    
    	At lunch on Friday, she wrote her whole name by herself.  I
    	figured Daddy taught her, but when I told him he said, "Wow,
    	I've never seen her do that!"
    
    	

    Our youngest, Anna, has just turned 6, doing great in Kindergarten.
    I wrote about her recent episode with Henoch-Schonlein a month back or so.

    Here's the other side....she's now reading up a storm and has
    gotten her very own desk in her room.  Whenever she's between
    things to do, she'll go up to her room and sit at her desk and
    write little notes...sort of poems, to herself.  We just noticed
    this gem sitting there (and we are keeping some of these for her):

    (she writes in all caps)

    SUN SHON
    DOWN ON MY
    FAMALI AND
    MY WITH
    HLTH AND
    WOMTH
    AND LOVE
    WTHIN

    Parenting is really something else, isnt it?

    
    re: .316
    
    Beautiful!    

   Indeed! Its good you're saving these for her, for yourself as well.
   To have the ability to use words to express one's deepest thoughts
   and feelings is a rare gift & treasure, especially in a youngster.

   Leslie

    Kimberly, 7.5 mos, has learned how to hug and kiss.  She reaches out
    her arms and grabs dad's shirt, mom and big sister Sarah's hair and
    pulls us close for a full open mouth slobber over our cheeks, mouths
    and noses.
    
    When she's done she just beams, as do I 8^)
    
    /Susan                   

    I like to think my daughter is advanced for her age (don't we all). I'm
    not all that thrilled that she is advanced for her age at taking a 
    fit! She plunks her self down on the floor, throws her head back (ouch)
    and thrashes about while screeming. I look at her as if she's lost her
    mind and wait until she's finished. After which she calmly goes about
    her business. Unfortunately sometimes it really does hurt when the head
    goes to the floor!
    
    Gail 

    Last night I picked up the kids (Gina, 5-1/2 and Thomas, 20 months) and
    anticipated a late dinner or leftovers because my husband had an
    appointment and wouldn't be there to play with the kids while I cooked,
    our typical pattern.
    
    Gina asked for spaghetti and I told her my predicament.  She
    volunteered, "I'll play with Thomas while you make dinner."  WHICH she
    did!  She kept him happy the whole time and once when I checked on them
    I heard her say, "We have to put the blocks away before we get out a
    puzzle."  
    
    judy

    Angeline has been talking (and I use that somewhat loosely, still) 
    a storm these days.  She's surprising me all the time with new words
    and I'm amazed at how clearly she says yellow.  And talking in her
    sleep is now commonplace.
    
    What she does, though, and it cracks me up...  I've been practicing
    her words with her at night.  My parents are called Nana and Papa.
    Everytime I say "Nana" she'll say "Papa", I say "Papa", she says
    "Nana".  We go back and forth about ten times and she never wavers
    from that pattern.   Now, when I say "moon" she says "stars", I say
    "stars" she says "moon".    Again, she never wavers....
    
    Now, most of the time if I say "MaMa", she will say "MaMa".  But a
    couple of nights ago, she started saying something else that I have
    yet to figure out!   I had my nephew in the car with me, and we were
    trying to figure out what she was saying.   I said "it's probably 
    something her father calls me..... but no, that can't be because most
    of what he calls me is only one syllable".   
    
    I did notice last night, though, when we're doing the drill, when I
    say MaMa she points to me, then she points to herself.  So I think
    she's trying to say "Angeline".   She was working on it a couple of
    weeks ago, but was pronouncing the "g" and "ene" at the end.  Now
    it appears she's attacking it from the beginning, and what I think
    I'm hearing is the "An" then the "ene".
    
    Something to consider when naming your child.  How the heck they
    are going to learn to say their name!  Go with Bob!
    
    							cj *->

    Aaron is starting to "tell" us he's ready for naps and sleep.  At
    daycare he's started walking into the bedroom where he sleeps and
    stands beside the playpen where he sleeps until Bonnie put's him in it
    for his nap.  At home we'll take him up to his room and play with him
    there.  After a few minutes we ask him if he's ready for bed and he'll
    go over and try to climb into his crib!
    
    He's also talking more and more.  He turned 1 year old on Saturday. 
    Since he's been able to pick up toys there were some that he would grab
    with this look on his face like "cool, I don't remember this one!".  So
    I would say "cool".  Now there are certain toys that he picks up and
    says "coooo".
    
    sandy

    re .322 ...
    
    Hey Cindy, maybe she's saying Sine-Sine??  (-;
    
    I'll duck now ...

    Don't laugh, Patty, that is still going on!  They are also
    calling her Jeanie now.   What is with these people???? :-)
    
    I did find, over the weekend, that it is Angeline she is
    trying to say.  She is attacking it from the beginning now
    so it's coming out "An an".  Gee, why aren't suprised at the
    "doubling"???  ;->
    
    						cj *->

	Usually when I'm playing with Stephanie (11months) and she gets
	the blocks in the pail or whatever I say "Good girl"  Yesterday
	she was putting the blocks in and saying "go gir" "go gir"  Makes
	me think I should be saying blocks, but she'll catch on....

	Karen T.

	We started potty training Kristen about 3 weeks ago and she's been
	doing great during the day from the start (Knock on wood). She wears
	a pull-up to bed and Sat. night I forgot to put it on and she woke
	up dry in the morning in her underpants.  Sunday night she wanted
	to wear her underpants to bed so I said okay, she's sick and was
	feeling miserable so around 11:00 she came into our bed, but I 
	swithed her into a pull-up and guess what, it was dry in the morning.
	Last night she wanted to wear the underpants again, so I said okay
	and WOW she's dry again this morning.  I'm thrilled, I hope it's
	not just a phase or something. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that
	she keeps having dry pants in the morning.  Oh, BTW, she'll be
	3yrs old in April.

	Karen T.

    It seems like turning one has turned on Aaron's learning center.  He's
    "talking" a lot more and is actually saying words more and more often. 
    His favorites are Ba-oon (balloon), boo (blue), kit-kat, goo boy, tha
    ooh (thank you), ahh too (ah choo, he does this with big smile after he
    or one of us or even the "kit-kat" sneezes).  There are several others,
    it's just soooo cute!
    
    He also "sings".  He was entertaining all of Market Basket on Sunday.  He
    was singing away as we went down the isles.
    
    sandy
                                         

    I know everyone's bored with Aaron reports, it's just that it is so
    amazing to watch him learn more everyday.  Now he picks one of his
    books out of the bookcase and will bring it to steve or I saying "book"
    waiting for us read (well, we usually make it through the first page). 
    He favorites are "Little Toot", "The Elephant Alphabet Book" and the
    Giraffe Number Book".
    
    Yesterday he needed a snack so I got him a graham cracker and said
    "I've got something for you" and he smiled and said "cracker".  It's so
    exciting knowing he can identify things (and people) by name.
    
    This parenting thing is great (of course you may want to check with me
    when he hits the "terrible twos" or worse yet the "terrible teens"!
    
    sandy

    Evan crawled and furniture walked over the weekend. Now he crawls to a
    structure to pull himself up and take off. [prior to that he rolled
    over and scooted a lot]
    
    He camel-walks himself up from a prone position in order to sit up.
    
    He also has 5 teeth now. The three on top came through almost all at
    once: left lateral incisor was through Friday morning, left central
    incisor sometime Friday afternoon, and right central incisor was found
    Saturday morning.
    
    In other news, he cannot be bothered to nurse at all any more. Up until
    Sunday, he'd humour me; but no more. I always said we'd do this as long
    as it worked for everyone. Now it's over. At 8.5 months he's moved on.
    
      Annie

    Angeline just spoke on the phone for the first time!   She generally
    just stares and listens when someone's on the other end.  (Of course,
    she yaks up a storm when the phone's unplugged and nobody's there!).
    
    But I just called to see how she was doing today, I could hear her
    squealing and yelling (with fun) in the background.  The sitter handed
    her the phone and I got a big " Hi MaMa"!   I asked if she was having
    fun, I got "UP"  (she yells up for "Yup"), and off she went to continue
    pushing the kitchen chair around the room.
    
    MADE MY DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    
    							cj *->

    Annie,
    
    Aaron was about the same age when he decided he didn't want to nurse
    anymore, I started my cycle a couple of days after the last attempt to
    nurse.  
    
    Aaron came down with his first ear infection a week or so after he stopped
    nursing, so keep an eye out!  
    
    sandy

    
    	3 year old Emily had a busy week on vacation with us.
    
    	Last Saturday, as I was cutting Daddy's hair and Emily was
    	coloring at the table, she held up her paper and said "Look
    	Daddy, I made your name."  We looked at the paper, and sure
    	enough, she'd written D-A-D-D-Y, with no coaching!
    
    	On Monday, she tried skiing for the first time and loved it.
    
    	Last night, she found one of the crafts she and her brother
    	had made at daycare at the ski area.  She thought it was hers,
    	then suddenly said, "Mommy, this says Andrew!"  I acknowledged
    	that it did say Andrew on the back, and then she said, "I think
    	they forgot the 'w' after the 'e'."
    
    	I checked, and the "w" was in fact scribbled, so it appeared
    	to be part of the "e".  
    	
    	They grow so fast!
    
    	

    Not-quite-six-month-old Jake has had a few milestones lately...
    
    He's started "talking" - when he wants Mom (which is very, very often)
    he says, "Ee-mum-mum-mum-mum-mum..." ad infinitum.  When he wants Nana
    (my mom, who is my daycare provider on the other end of the house from
    my office!), he says "Ah-nananananananana..." ad nausem.    He learned 
    to do a very respectable raspberry about 3 weeks ago.  Last night, he
    rolled over the entire living room (and ours is fairly large), with a
    bit of creeping thrown in for good measure.  
    
    When Jake wants something and isn't getting it or wants to do something
    he obviously can't manage himself, he'll just grab whichever of your
    hands is close by and use that instead of his own.  And he learned to
    close the gate/tray on the rocker seat last month, and is now on
    auto-pilot.  In goes Jake, down goes the tray.
    
    Best Milestone of the Month, though is **WE GET TO TAKE HIM OFF THE
    NUTRAMIGEN TOMORROW!!!!** Yes, I am shouting.  Any Mom experienced with
    this wonderful, horrible formula understands my joy.  While the
    Nutramigen is a godsend during times of colic, etc., it costs an arm
    and two legs ($15.99/can of powder here in AZ, minimum!).  We're
    switching to Good Starts tomorrow at $4.97/can of powder, per his Pedi! 
    Yee-hah!  On the flip side, he's starting to get a little bit bored
    with applesauce and rice cereal only, and it will be at least another
    month before the pedi will let us add some other flavors to his diet.
    
    As for my seven year old, Joe, who is usually the neighborhood chicken
    and chief couch-potato, he's getting very brave, and has decided
    to go to his school's monthly roller skating party and actually skate! 
    Usually, he just plays video games...
    
    M.

	Stephanie will be 13months in a week and 1/2.  Over the weekend she
	started taking just one little step.  By Monday she was getting from
	sitting on the floor to a standing position WITHOUT pulling up on
	anything, just all by herself.  Now yesterday she starting taking
	about 3 or 4 steps at a time.  IT'S SO EXCITING!!!   She still
	would rather crawl and I suppose she will for a little while longer,
	but I'm so excited that she's started this.

	I know she'll be able to get into more, but she's getting so heavy
	at 22lbs that it will be a relief.  Especially when we go from the
	car into a store and I have the diaper bag and my pocket book over
	my shoulder and her in my arms and I'm holding my almost 3yr olds
	hand with my other hand - sometimes it's really difficult to manage
	this.  I try to park next to a shopping cart, but that's not
	always possible.  So I'm thinking it will probably by easier to
	hold two hands???  Maybe I'm kidding myself.

	Anyway, I'm just really excited and proud of her!!!

	Karen T.

    At 22 months, Katherine learned to "flip" her coat this weekend.  She's
    so proud that she can now put on her own coat that I'm not allowed to
    help anymore.
    
    Irene

   My 6 year old son Erik read me a story last night.  Mind you he has pretended
to read to me many times before.  But something has clicked and he actually
read the book to me.  He pointed at each word and tried to sound out words
he didn't know.   He was so excited that he did an encore reading for his
pappa this morning.

Elizabeth

    My wife went with the 1st and 2nd graders to a school field trip
    to the local Science Museum and took our daughter Anna with her.
    Anna's in 3 day/week Kindergarten but was home that day.

    While there many of the kids bought something in the Museum Shop,
    and Anna bought a tiny globe.  She played with it all day, studying
    the countries, and then decided to write some stories about
    the Earth.  I found one when I got home that night.

    THE WRLD THAT COOD NAVRE SPIN
    BY ANNA

    ONES OPAN A TIME THAR WOSE A WRLD
    THAT COOD NAVRE SPIN SO SOME PEEPLE
    GOT SUN AND SOME PEEPLE DID NOT AND
    MAINEY PEEPLE CHROLD TO LAND THAT HAD SUN
    AND THTS HWO IT WANT.

    The gist is that on a world that did not spin,
    some people would be in sunlight and others
    would not. Clearly those in darkness would travel
    to lands that were in sunlight!
    bob

    re .338
    
    You have a bright little girl there.  I especially like chrold =
    traveled.  Reminds me of my daughter when her third grade teacher
    called her the "spark" in her class.  Now she's working on her Phd. and
    working for NASA.
    
    Tony

    re: last
    
    Wish my son's teacher would call him Spark or some other flattering
    nickname.  My very bright but very lazy student got pegged as "Crazy
    Man Joe" by his teacher this year, and the name has stuck!
    
    M>
    

    Evan [age 10.5 months] thinks he can walk.
    
    Actually he doesn't do half bad. He takes off across the floor and gets
    in anywhere from 2 to 7 steps before losing control/balance.
    
    He also likes/wants to climb ... I do love his confidence.
    
      Annie
    

    Well, I started Angeline in her own bed on Sunday.  It's been
    ok so far.  The first night she did get up an go looking for
    me, but the past two nights she's pretty much stayed there.  I
    the monitor in her room so I generally wake up when she starts
    yelling for me.
    
    I'll tell you this, though, I'm normally a very light sleeper...but
    I think I've awoken everytime she's moved!  I'm just so afraid of
    her wandering around.  She really can't go anywhere now though.  I've
    closed the bathroom door, and put the gate up across the hall just
    past her bedroom door, so she can't get out to the rest of the house.
    She can only head down the hall to my room.  It took me a night to 
    figure this one out.  
    
    I opted against putting the gate across her bedroom door.  I guess 
    someday I may have to, but for now, I want her to have access to me.
    
    Daughter is doing better than mother at this point :-)
    
    						cj *->
    

    cj,
    
    I put Katie in her own bed a little over a month ago.  I know what you
    mean about waking up every time you hear the smallest noise on the
    monitor.  We gated her bedroom door as we sleep downstairs and don't
    want her to have access to any room but her bedroom.
    
    It works out very well at night.  She is usually pretty tired and just
    goes right to bed when we tell her it is time.  However, she has not
    been so good at nap time.  She gets up and wanders around the room,
    playing with toys and reading books for HOURS before she will go to
    sleep.  We've been able to deal with this so far, as she only naps at
    home 2-3 days per week, but this has been a challenge.
    
    She fell out of bed a few times the first week, but hasn't since.  We
    keep a big soft comforter folded on the floor beside the bed, just in
    case.  She is growing up too fast!!
    
    Kristen
    

	Stephanie is 14months now and I'd say she's really walking now.  By 
	that I mean she walks most of the time and only crawls occasionally.
	We're really proud of her.

	She also just got her 3rd tooth.  She's been a terrific eater ever
	since she started eating real food instead of baby food, but this
	should just help her even more.

	And last, but definitely not least.  She's talking up a storm.  I'm
	amazed that at 14months she can already say so many words. She says
	"Bunny, Doggie, Cow, MooMoo, Blanket, Juice, Drink, Bagel, Hi,
	 Thank you" and some more that I can't think of.  That may not seem
	that great, but my older daughter Kristen didn't really say even
	these basic words until she was about 2yrs old.  I remember being
	concerned and the doctor saying it was fine as long as she understood
	directions, etc... Well now at 3yrs old Kristen talks just as well
	as other 3yr olds.  But all theses words for Stephanie at 14monts is 
        just wonderful!

	Karen T.

	Well, I'm not sure how great the tone is.  But Kristen can sing
	a few songs now.  She'll sing "I love you" from Barney and 
	"Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" and she knows all the words!
	She just turned 3yrs old on April 11th.  It seems like she's hit
	some kind of developmental mark all the sudden with memory, because
	not only is it the songs, but she can count to 20 and she's
	starting to remember things that happened a year or so ago.

	Karen T.

    
    RE: Memory skills
    
    Soon you may find a really neat one when they can memorize a 
    favorite book *word for word*.   I remember my now-6-year-old
    doing this with Aladdin.   He couldn't read, he just knew each
    and every word on each page from memory.  It was particularly
    fun when he'd correct me if I paraphrased something...."No, Mom,
    it's not she *said*, it's she *replied*!".   I don't think he
    could do this anymore - it seemed to be more of a memory 
    developmental stage.
    
    Carol

    Katherine, who will be 2 next week, has started recognizing colors. 
    For the past few mornings at breakfast we play a game with her Fruit
    Loops.  She picks one up and tries to guess the color.  If correct, I
    congratulate her.  If she's not correct I tell her the correct color
    and she repeats it.  This morning she only got 2 colors wrong in about
    5 minutes of playing this game.
    
    Irene

    Jake, the 7 month old is now fully crawling, leg cast and all.  He sits
    on his own.  He has always loved to stand with human assistance, but
    he's working really hard on trying to pull himself up with the
    furniture, the walls of "baby jail" (the playpen), or even from the
    floor.  He's so cute.  He follows Dad around like a puppy, crawling a
    mile a minute to catch up with old Mr. Long Legs!  He also pats his
    bottom furiously in order to notify us of his need for a diaper change,
    and clearly says "Mamma", "Dada", "Nana", "Go" (for his older brother,
    Joe), "Ug" for hug, and other things that are less clear!
    
    Joe, the 7 year old, is in his first year of Little League, and after
    the first 3 games, is batting .857 (7 at bats, 6 base hits!), in spite
    of the fact that he can't run worth a (expletive deleted).  He just
    hits that ball hard and straight enough that they can't catch it and
    tag him out before he fast-walks to first!  He is also Student of the
    Week in his class this week, a title awarded to the child who
    does his/her "personal best" for an entire week.  Not bad from the kid
    who couldn't tie together 3 days of good school behavior and work last
    year...
    
    Ain't kids the greatest?
    
    M.
    

    Well, I heard Angeline's first four letter word Saturday night.
    
    "MINE"!!  ;->   *sigh*
    						cj *->

    
    Lauren, 2 years, 5 months decided to potty train last week!  She
    is doing wonderfully.  Only had 5 accidents in the past 7 days 
    (excluding nap time and night time... we are putting her in
    pullups or diapers for that, however she has had some dry naps
    and nights as well.
    
    I'm pretty psyched.  I really wanted this done before the baby
    comes (due 6/13).  There is one drawback, however.  Now, if she
    has to go, I have to drop everything.... might not be so easy if
    I'm in the middle of breastfeeding!  She just doesn't have the
    handle on pulling her pants down/up yet.  Oh well, one step at
    a time!
    
    Karen

    re .350 - I can well remember holding a nursing baby while helping my
    older son off the toilet. I was amazed at the number of things I
    learned to do simultaneously with 2 kids!!
    

    
    Karen,
    
    You may try putting Lauren in more skirts/dresses - they're a lot
    simpler to deal with.  Work up to really loose fitting pants/shorts.
    
    

The last week has been an amazing week!!  About two weeks ago, I asked
Shruthi(just turned 3) about quitting diapers.  She was not inclined to do it! 
I and her teachers at daycare felt that she was ready - so for one week, we
spoke of how come Sunday, she would be a big girl and wear big girl panties.  I
took her shopping with me one day and she picked out all her favorites - Beauty
and the beast, Pocohontas, Lion King etc.  Then last Sunday(4/29), we started. 
Starting with the word go, she has been great!  From last sunday to now, she has
not had a single accident!  She can tell us exactly when she wants to pee/poop
etc..in fact, sometimes, she just goes in by herself!  She is Miss Independent
these days - needs no help from us!  She has been wearing diapers for nap time
and bedtime..but in all this week, had just one wet diaper!  We are debating
about trying her in just underwear tonight!  This past week, I had some free
time, so we did things we would not normally have done during the week - go to
the playground, go out bowling, go to the mall, go out for dinner and she has
been fine all the time !

Is this a dream?  My husband is sure that we will have trouble, once the novelty
of going pee/poops in the potty wears off! 

    
    	Andrew, 2 years and 2 months old, can sing 25 out
    	of 26 letters of the alphabet.  He's boycotting the letter
    	J for now ;-).
    
    	Then last night at dinner, he started singing "the itsy bitsy
    	spider" well enough that I recognized it, complete with hand
    	motions.  I never sing that song to him, which made it more
    	delightful!
    
    

Eight year old Evan has now achieved the rank of Orange Belt in karate.  :-)

(The ranks start with no belt, then white belt, then orange, etc)

       Carol

    
    	We've reached a milestone in our house, though I'm not
    	sure it's a good one.
    	
    	After very nearly 4 years together, Emily has finally decided
    	that I am not so terrible to have around (this from my Daddy's
    	Girl, who wouldn't even let me hold her once when she was
    	sick with croup).
    
    	Unfortunately, she's catching up for the past in terms of
    	separation anxiety ...
    
    

    Karen,
    
    We have similar happenings at our house, too.  Sarah was 4 two weeks ago 
    and has recently discovered that Dad is pretty neat to have around,
    she's always been a diehard Momma's girl.  
    
    It was pretty evident how important Daddy has become this past Tuesday 
    after I picked the girls up at daycare.  We were driving down our street 
    and found that traffic had been stopped.  At that point we couldn't see 
    our house due to another house and some trees; what we could see were 
    the 2 firetrucks and ambulance parked in OUR yard.  I'm
    hyperventilating thinking my house is on fire and trying to stay calm
    when Sarah notices the vehicles and starts crying "Why are the fire
    engines at our house?  Where's my Daddy, is my Daddy ok?  We have to go
    get my Daddy!!!"  Fortunately, our house was fine (and my husband was
    still at work), unfortunately, the neighbor's house has some pretty
    severe damage.  Sarah didn't calm down until I called him at work and
    she could talk to him. 
    
    /Susan

    Re: .356 & .357
    
    This is amazing!  I just went to a parent workshop last night and one
    of the interesting things I learned was that young tots usually prefer
    their mother until age 3-4 and then they begin to take a strong
    interest in the parent of the opposite sex.  Then after a few years, I
    forget at what age, they go back to the parent of the same sex to pal
    around with. Of course this varys as in some families Mom or Dad may
    not live near the child.  But in these cases sometimes they bond to an
    uncle, aunt, or other significant person in their life.  Then, the big
    kicker, eventually they bond to adults that are not even in the family,
    a girl scout leader, a soccor coach etc..  Many parents feel jealous of
    these natural stages children go through, including me!
    
    Marianne
    

    	
    
    I'd actually gotten used to Emily preferring Daddy, especially
    when she was still in diapers ;-)
    
    I know this whole thing started because I was telling a friend
    that I was happy my kids didn't throw fits when I left them off
    at daycare, but it'd still be nice to know they'd miss me even
    a little while I was gone.  That night, Emily was distraught over
    me going out, and I had to spend an extra 15 minutes calming her
    down before I left.
    
    

    A couple of milestones for Aaron:
    
    Today he went to have his ears check (1 1/2 weeks after having the
    tubes put in) and not only is there NO infection, there's NO FLUID!  As
    I told someone else, maybe there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
    
    Aaron's one year molars are finally poking through.  He's been gnawing
    on his hands (he won't chew on teethers) for the last month or more. 
    The last week has been the worst.  He's only about 4 months late on
    the 1 year molars!
    
    sandy
    

    Sandy,
    I'm so glad the tubes are working for Aaron. It must be such a relief
    to feel that something is finally working.
    
    I was playing with Laura last weekend, kind of flipping her upside down
    and I noticed she's getting some molars too. They're about 1/2 way thru
    and I never even noticed! They grow up to fast!
    
                               Barbara
    

My youngest daughter will be 10 months tomorrow and for the past couple of weeks, she has been standing on her 
own (without holding on to anything).  She gets so excited she starts laughing and of course we all clap for her
Its like she knows what she is doing "look mom, no hands".  Of course my other daughter (alittle over 2-1/2) 
says "look at me, I'm standing with no hands"  God forbid if Alyssa is not the center of attention at all times.


I guess I can boast about Alyssa too....It has been a week for her and she has had no accidents.  Even waking up
in the mornings with dry underwear.  She has graduated from the pull-ups to the "big big girl" underwear during
the day and just pull-ups at night.  When she uses the toilet, she tells me that "only babies go in their pants, 
big girls use the toilet"

    I get such questions concerning Angeline...:-)   Here's her update:
    
    . been counting to 10 for about a month now
    
    . talks up a storm
    
    . now "drills" herself on animal noises.  Like, "what does a doggie
      do?" etc...  she just asks and does them all herself
    
    . no further "seizure activity" (knock on wood, it's been a year and 
      a half now)
    
    . doing very well with her visits to her dad (every other weekend)
    
    . calls Sandy Pendak "Mommy"  (grrrrrr..... :-) )
    
    . sings "Tinkle, Tinkle, lil stor" at the top of lungs every chance
      she gets
    
    . is rapidly approaching two (Sept 9th) with a lot less trouble then
      I've seen in other kids, but allows Deviline out a little more
      frequently
    
    . totally rules the roost
    
    . won't go to bed by herself yet.  All MaMa's fault, I know.
    
    Thanks to all for asking...
    							cj *->
                                                              

    Hey CJ, Aaron's been known to call you Mommy as well, if I'm not
    mistaken.  Angeline also call's Steve Papa every now and then (he's
    papa to Aaron rather than daddy).
    
    Angeline also get's mad if I get there to pick Aaron up before you get
    there to pick her up!  She'll stand at the door calling out "my Mama!"
    
    sandy

    Steve and I were waken up at 4:00 am this morning to the sound of Aaron 
    (19 months already!) singing the ABC song (not accurately, but...).  We
    just chuckled and waited for him to go back to sleep.  That beats the
    heck out of waking up to the crying of a little one who doesn't feel
    good, doesn't it?!
    
    We've been using the ABC song as a lullaby, we also count up to 20
    using the same tune.  Aaron occasionally wants to show off.  He'll
    sing "1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 14, 17, 17, 17, 20 - now I now my
    ABCCCCCCCCC's, tell me tell me tell me of me"
    
    What a brilliant kid!
    
    sandy

    
    Anna started kindergarten today!!! Putting her on the bus was not as
    hard as I expected it to be. Boy do I feel {proud/sad/old/nostalgic}
    (pick one).
    
    Patty

    
    	Sandy, my sister read somewhere that the number 15 is a 
    	sticking point for most kids.  My daughter used to just
    	skip it when counting.  I wonder why ??
    
    

    My daughter, Gina, started first grade today at Sunset Heights in
    Nashua N.H.  She went to private kindergarten, so it was very hard to
    see her sad/scared little face when we left her in the classroom.
    
    I find myself very distracted today.  
    
    I'm sure she'll make friends and feel fine by Friday.
    
    judy

    
     Kristine, our daughter, who just started first grade at
     Infant Jesus School came home yesterday very excited about
     her day at school. She proudly said, "Mommy you won't
     believe what I did today in computer class!  I used Windows 95."
     She then got even more excited when I told her that we just
     purchased the same software for home.  

     I guess Microsoft is even getting to the (barely) 6 year old 
     first graders!

      --Cida

    Well, I"m at the very beginning of many "milestones".  Alycia rolled
    over for the first time two weeks ago.  From front to back.  She's
    trying and trying to go from back to front, but keeps getting stuck on
    her arm.
    
    Also, just about a week ago, she discovered her hands.  At least
    they're keeping her fascinated enough at changing time.
    
    Holly

    I guess it's a milestone for Sarah and Mom.
    
    I registered Sarah for Kindergarten this morning.  Where did these past
    4 years, 10.5 mos go?  As I stood in line I started to feel rather
    emotional about this.  On one hand, I am so excited about the new
    challenges and experiences she will have and on the other hand I can't
    believe that my baby is growing up so quickly.
    
    Sarah, however, can't wait to take the big bus to school and learn how
    to read more words.  Last night she told me, "Mom, it's ok, you'll be
    fine."
    
    /Susan

    Susan..
    
    Wow!  That did go by quick!  I can remember when you were pregnant with
    her!!
    
    Holly (Taylor, who used to work in Relocation)

    
    	Susan, I actually got misty eyed when they talked
    	about our kids riding the bus next year (and I can
    	be fairly stoic about such things).
    
    	Emily also cannot wait to ride the bus, and to go to
    	school "every day".
    
    Karen
    

    
    	Andrew has just seemed to explode with learning/milestones
    	over the past few weeks (since his third birthday).
    
    	The other night before dinner, Andrew was coloring by
    	himself.  He asked me what "Emily" starts with, then
    	after I told him, he said, "Mom, I made an 'E'".
    
    	I went to see, and sure enough, he had written three E's (only
    	the first one he wrote had 5 lines ;-) ).
    
    	After that, while I was at the stove, he wrote Y, J, D, and H,
    	with no guidance from anyone!
    
    	I asked him who taught him how to write those letters, and he
    	said, "I did!"
    	
    	He has started to use the potty, too, and has had success with,
    	um, both types ;-)
    
    	His new bed is put together (waiting for mattresses, though), and
    	he is ready to move into it when the mattresses arrive.  He
    	has also told me that the baby can sleep in his crib, and asked
    	if it's a boy, if it can sleep in his room with him.
    
    	I'm trying to be brave about all these changes ;-)
    
    
    	

    Corey just turned 3 on April 5th and got an excellent report at his
    doctor's visit.  He's a whopping 38 1/2 lbs. and 3'10".  Phew!  No
    wonder my back is killing me!  Corey also sat on the potty 4 times this
    weekend and went pee 3 out of 4 times (with a little help from Mommy -
    I had to pour warm water on his bibit).  ;-)
    
    Meghan turned 1 year on 2/6/97.  She took her first steps at 9 1/2 mos.
    and is a BIG climber now.  She has 9 teeth and I think she's getting
    her second molar -- ouch!!
    
    /Karen

    
    	WOW !!
    
    	I think I'll stop complaining about trying to carry
    	Andrew around ;-)
    
    

    ha ha ha ha.....too funny, Karen!
    
    The worst part is when I have to carry both of them at the same time! 
    I brought them to McDonalds a couple of weeks ago and this one had a
    Playland inside with tunnels and a ballpit.  Well, Corey did *not* want
    to leave so I had to carry both him (while kicking and screaming) and
    Meghan and hats and coats and shoes.......
    
    I think I'll stay away from there for awhile!
    
    ;-(
    
    

	
	This is not your typical babybook milestone, but it's a big one
  at our house.  My 6 year old daughter Emilie is officially tall enough
  to ride the Yankee Cannonball at Canobie Lake.  (that's a roller coaster)
  
   	What surprised me most is not only did she ride the coaster
  multiple times but she rode all the spinning rides that make me sick.

	No more kiddie land for us (Sigh!)

    
   Elizabeth

My 9 1/2 month old son Ethan just learned to crawl last week.

Last night he started to cry when I left him sitting in the family room 
to go make dinner.     He cried for about 10 seconds, and then he suddenly 
realized he could come after me!    His look of surprise and delight 
as he figured it out was just precious.   It took him a while to get
to me, but he was so excited to get there under his own steam.  

I was pretty excited too.  29 pounds is a lot to haul around from 
room to room!   We're delighted he's starting to get places on his own.
Now to step up the baby-proofing!      Beth B. 

    Beth, Aaron started crawling on Halloween (9 mths) and was walking by
    Thanksgiving, so be prepared!!!
    
    sandy

Thanks for the warning Sandy.  Ethan pulled himself up to standing
for the first time on Saturday, and is now perfecting the art. 
We started pulling out all the babyproofing gadgets last night to 
figure out how to install them.   And realized we need
a few more, of course!  He already pulled up to standing by
grabbing the edge of the toilet seat and would have started splashing 
if I hadn't stopped him. Ah, the fun begins!!!    Beth B.