Right now Xander is eating ants on a log for a snack. Ants on a log is something I had a lot when I was a kid: celery sticks filled with peanut butter with raisins stuck in the peanut butter. Last time I gave it to him, he picked out the raisins and ate them and swiped the peanut butter with his fingers and licked them. Today he just nonchalantly picked up the sticks and ate them. Woohoo! Another vegetable down his gullet. Although he dawdles and picks at his food, it's not a problem of being picky about the taste of food. When we "force" him to eat foods, he almost always says he likes them. Last week he ate meatloaf, boiled potatoes, and lettuce. He'll eat carrots, peas, green beans, lunch meat sandwiches, lasagna, pizza, pork chops, chicken, lettuce, kale, celery, and even meatloaf sandwiches. The only problem is getting him going. He will sit at the table for hours. Doesn't bother him. He'll eat food in bites so tiny you need a magnifying glass to look at what's on his fork. He'll also eat fast, with big bites, if you lay into him and threaten to take away his plate. This boy! He will do things so willingly and easily but he waits until you pull out all the stops.
For the last two days, I have told him to sit on the couch and stay there for naptime. We put on the Oceanic Collection books on CD that Aunt Pat gave him and he follows along in the ten books. The lights are dimmed, the blinds closed, the company is gone (Nick and I stay in his room to play if he's awake at this time), and it's just him and the audiobooks. If I play them through twice, it takes almost two hours. So far he doesn't fall asleep even if he's really tired, but he doesn't fall asleep for a lot of his naps no matter what I do. At least with this method he stays in one place, doesn't bother me, doesn't get into forbidden-at-naptime toys, and gets a chance to relax (without the TV). I'll have to borrow a whole bunch of books on CD at the library tonight.
Speaking of the library, he had Preschool Storytime today. While he was in there, I talked with the teen program coordinator about the volunteer work I'm going to be doing. Nick slept. Yay! Storytime usually lets out at 12:30. We were talking in the teen section at 12:15 when there was an announcement, "Would Xander's mom please come to garble, garble, garble." I said, "Uh-oh, that's never good. I wonder if he had an accident," and speed-walked with the stroller over to the storytime room. I was intercepted by someone who said Xander was in the kids' section. There were about four or five librarians hovering over him. He was holding his craft (an apple shape decorated with different colors of tissue paper) and a book that he presumably wanted to check out, so I realized that storytime was over and all the kids had already been let out and Xander's mommy wasn't there. I think Xander was doing okay. He had a normal-for-him earnest look on his face and told me, "I'm finding you, Mommy." But he was in the middle of several very solicitous library workers and I felt a little bit like a Bad Mommy. Poor lost boy with his cute little craft wandering around all by his lonesome--except for the librarian entourage I mentioned. The teen coordinator very nicely said I wasn't there because I was talking with him about the volunteer work. It's a small library. I actually didn't think it was a very big deal at all. If Xander reads this when he's older and tells me he was scarred by the experience, I will listen to him and apologize profusely.
Nick is still having trouble sleeping and waking early from naps. I really hope some teeth poke through soon so I can see if that was the reason for all this high-maintenance behavior. Yesterday I had to hold and rock him to sleep twice and let him hang out on my bed with me twice. I like doing it, but I don't want to create that habit. I am not a human rocking chair! On a more positive note, he had fun just now lying on his tummy in his bassinet looking at a mirror and then rolling over on his back to look at his mobile. He's still happy a lot during the day but not like his usual self. His usual self smiles, laughs, and coos almost constantly and doesn't cry out in discomfort like he's been doing lately.
He would rather stand up than anything else--he's always had that preference, but now it's ridiculous. If I put him in a baby chair or swing, he arches his back and scoots himself down until his head is where his little butt should be. Needless to say, this makes him unhappy. The only thing I can do is hold him or put him down on a blanket. I am in the market for an exersaucer! I know people used to say it was bad for babies to let them stand when they're so young, but there was pretty much no stopping Nick from doing it from the beginning. He's always done that baby stepping reflex, too. But either he hasn't lost the reflex at three and a half months or he's acquired the skill of stepping when someone's holding him upright. Watching him, it seems like he will just start walking away one day.
Every now and then I wonder if he will be one of those Toddling Terrors, the little ones who don't stop getting into things until they're asleep.
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