10/01/08

Yes I know I have fallen behind on this again. I was busy helping my mom get ready for my grandparents visit. I steam cleaned all her carpet and then I stripped all the wallpaper off the bathroom and Brent and I painted the bathroom with primer. Mostly I painted and Brent just did the trim around the door and by the ceiling. Then my grandparents came and we have been spending time with them.

On this past Monday I had to have an endometrial biopsy done to check and see if I have cervical or ovarian cancer - hopefully not - I won't get my results back until Oct. 13th. That was no fun at all and I had to go by myself since Brent had a meeting and was not able to get off work. I didn't want to reschedule as I just wanted to get it over with. My mom stayed home with Korben. Anyway it hurt - alot - so when I got home I put Korben down for his nap and tried to rest and take a nap myself but instead Korben decided he was going to scream the entire time. I finally gave him some Tylenol since he was chewing really bad on his fingers and his crib rails and then 2 hrs later he fell asleep. By then it was so late I decided not to nap as I would be up all night. Brent has been working overtime and so we are trying to go to bed earlier since he works an hour before and an hour after. They are allowing OT for about a month possibly two. Brent wants to take advantage of it while he can, esp. with the Disney trip and X-Mas coming up.

Poor Korben has been trapped in the living room again, like he was when he was real little. He hates it and is constantly sneaking out of the gate. But we can't let him run around since his Grandpa's are working on the bathrooms and have tools and all kinds of stuff everywhere up and down the hallway and in the kitchen.

When I was at my appointment on Monday my Grandma watched Korben for a bit while my mom was doing something and my Grandma was telling me all the stuff he was getting into. I know he is bored in that little area plus I know he was testing my Grandma, he knows he can't get away with that stuff with us. Although every since then he has been testing us like crazy. Anyway apart from sneaking out of the gate, he pulled a bunch of DVD's off the shelves, climbed on the couch and was trying to knock the lamp over, climbed on the love seat and was pulling on the blinds. My Grandma said that he is just like how my Uncle Eddie was when he was a kid - I thought it just came from Brent's side of the family because I had never seen a kid like him and from what I keep hearing Brent was just like this too. Anyway I have heard horror stories about my Uncle Eddie growing up, such as eating the seats of their car, when on vacation he got into their suitcases and started throwing their stuff out the window while driving! Geeeesh I hope this is not what I am in store for! My Grandma told me to be prepared to bolt the furniture to the walls, she said she knows this from experience - I didn't ask cause I am not sure I want to know!

Korb has been saying more words and seems to be talking more often. On my last post I had made a list of words and didn't include 'shoe' as that was one he stopped saying and the very next day he started saying it again. He also has been saying 'mama' more often now, he really has a hard time with the "m's" and "b's" though. Speaking of that he is in his crib right now saying "Ma" over and over again. He now says phone (he pronouces it 'own'), hello, and he has been trying to say grandma and grandpa he sounds funny when he says it and he can't tell what he is saying but every time he sees grandma or grandpa he says it the same way every time and points to them. Oh, he also says banana ('nana') seems like there were more words but I can't think of them right now. He has gotten into the blowing kisses again. When I was going to get a drink the other day he was sitting on Brent's lap and he blew kisses to me as I was walking away, so cute!

Well I ended up finding a pair of Stride Rite sandals in his size on eBay for $2.00. Turns out he couldn't walk very well in the Gap sandals. Since it is still really warm here I went ahead and got them. His tennis shoes are really a pain to put on, esp. for just a quick trip around the block or to the store. Brent kept trying to let him go barefoot so I went ahead and got the sandals. They already came in the mail and Korben can run again with shoes on.

Korben has been doing something that has been driving me crazy. He learned how to take off his diaper through his clothing!!! Even with a one piece outfit on. He plays with the velcro through his clothes until it comes undone and his diaper ends up around his ankles! Drives me nuts!

Korben's Halloween costume came in the mail today, he is going to be a monkey!!!! Because he is a little monkey, always climbing up on everything. Later tonight after Brent gets home I am going to try the outfit on him and take some pics. I can't wait to see him in it, he is going to look adorable! We will probably spend this Halloween like we did last year and walk around the block with Korb's cousins. Only last year he slept the whole time and there were alot of us walking the kids around the block since everybody was in town for Skylar's funeral. We all had just gotten back from the viewing right before going trick or treating. Halloween is my favorite holiday but it has sorta been tainted by that. I am still trying to forget about that part of it and be happy and excited for Korben's sake but it is hard. Really I am still in denial about the whole thing.

I have some new pics but not alot, the last ones I took were of Kaylan's birthday party. We haven't done anything really fun since then. This coming Friday my parents are taking my grandparents to a very nice fancy restaurant and I don't feel comfortable taking Korben to a place like that. So that same night the zoo is having a family fun night for people with a zoo membership (which we have.) So we are thinking of going to that. All the rides at the zoo will be free and they are having meals for $2.50 per person. They have a little kids train and a merry go round, I think they have some other rides but those are the only ones I can think of right now that Korb will be able to ride. I *think* he might be okay on the train, I am not sure though, I don't think adults can go on it and I am not sure if he will sit there by himself, we'll see though.

Oh yes, and about the pictures, my family has a tradition with mini golf, we take a picture of everybody who gets a hole in one by the whole they made it in. As you can see Brent got 2 hole and ones and the only other person to get a hole in one was Zylee!!! It was an easy hole where all you had to do is hit your ball into the water and if you were lucky it went across a bridge straight into the hole. It worked for her but not the rest of us!

Anyway I will post the monkey pics after I take them. I still haven't uploaded all the videos to YouTube. I will get around to that one of these days. We will have more free time next week as my parents and grandparents are going to Vegas for the week.

09/02/08

Well we are back from Seattle, we had a wonderful trip. We are so thankful to Brent's parents for all they do for us and for showing us a good time in Seattle. The time difference really threw me off but Korben seemed to keep his regular OK time schedule, except he was going to bed later and he had very short naps, if any at all.

I am so glad Brent was off the two days after we got back so Korben had some time to adjust to being home. Sunday Korben didn't nap at all even though we put him down at 1 and kept him in there until 4:30 like he does everyday. Monday he did end up taking a nap but it was later and he didn't end up waking up until after 5. Right now it is 3:15 and I still here him talking to his animals in his bed, although I did just peek at him and he is laying down.

Korben hasn't been sleeping well at night since we've been home. He has been waking up a couple of times each night in pain. Those teeth are getting bigger and bigger everyday, they are almost all the way through. He has 4 that are pushing through at the same time. I was worried while we were in Seattle that he had an ear infection because he kept pulling on his ear but he hasn't done that since we've been home and his bottom molars look like they are almost all the way through so I guess it was just that.

Last night he wanted some milk at midnight when he woke up. I was in bed so Brent handed Korb to me and went to get him some milk. Korben is such a Daddy's boy! Korben started screaming when Brent left the room and didn't breath for almost the entire time because he was crying / screaming so hard. It scared me to death, his lips and around his lips were turning blue. I laid him on the bed since he made himself stiff like he does when he is mad and I rubbed his tummy and just kept saying BREATH! Right as he took his breath Brent walked in the room, thank goodness! Korben stopped crying as soon as he got in Daddy's arms.

When we were in Seattle the zipper on my diaper bag broke so I needed a new one. We checked a few places while we were there without any luck. I thought I would just run down to Wal-Mart when we got home and get one there but they didn't have any I was crazy about. I am on my 5th diaper bag already (although one of them I still use but only for travel) so I know exactly what I need and want out of a diaper bag. We then checked at Target and I did find one there but it was $40 & that is just silly for a diaper bag. So we headed to Babies R Us yesterday and I found two that I couldn't decide between. I think I spent 30 mins just looking at those two bags trying to decide which had better features. In the end it boiled down to the way each one felt on my arm. So I ended up liking the cheaper one of the two (only $25) and while we were gone to Seattle I had gotten some coupons for Babies R Us in the mail and it had a 15% off any diaper bag coupon in there so that was nice! I couldn't believe I couldn't find one at Wal-Mart though, I thought I could even just rebuy the one that broke because my mom had gotten it for me from there & I loved that bag but they don't have it anymore. I do think I like my new bag more though, it is black and not as long but it is taller and has more room for sippy cups on the outside and it has extra straps to hook the bag onto the stroller which is pretty cool.

The really exciting thing is while we were at Babies R Us we found some different kitchen drawer locks and Brent put them on already and they work!!!! YAY!!!!!! Now I won't have to worry about Korben getting into all those drawers all the time.

When we were in Seattle Korben was able to open Grandma & Grandpa S.'s doors and he has gone around to all the doors in our house trying to open them all. He keeps testing them all but can't open them yet, thank goodness!

I am babysitting my nephews and niece this week and Korben has been loving today. When I got up this morning to get Korben his milk Zylee was up. So she came and laid down with me & Korben while Korb drank his milk. When everybody woke up Korben was chasing Ryan & Zylee around the house. He often goes the opposite way around the kitchen so he catches them which is funny because it scares them. I guess they don't think Korb is smart enough to go the other way and it catches them by surprise every time.

Well I guess that is all for today. Pictures are from our trip to Seattle, I only took 517 photos there. :)

08/22/08

Well we leave for Seattle tomorrow & I haven't even begun to pack yet. I did write out my list yesterday now I just have to gather everything. I keep thinking of things we need to take though. I asked Brent if he could think of anything and he said clothes and toothbrush, gee what alot of help he is! I am actually ready to start packing now but since Korben is taking his nap I can't. Any slight noise will wake him up. That is the downside to sharing a room with him. We plan on moving into a rent house this coming spring & I am so ready for that! Brent & I won't have to tiptoe around when Korben is sleeping.

Korben has been sleeping very well the last two nights. He has gone to sleep at 9 and not a peep out of him until 9 - 9:30 the next morning! Extremely helpful for all of us since we are all still sick. Today is the first day I haven't had a fever!!! Korben's went away a couple days ago but he still has diarrhea but getting less & less everyday, same thing for Brent.

Korben has been really fussy this morning with the slightest things setting him off. He ripped two pages out of his favorite book - One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish - and he cried for about 30 mins over that. He finally started playing with something else and then about 15 mins later he went back to his book and once he got to the torn pages he started crying again. I had to rip out the rest of the page so he can't see where it was ripped out. But I have a feeling he is still going to notice because one of those is one of his favorite pages. I guess I will have to buy him a new one.

Anyway I knew all the fussing wasn't all about the book. So I checked his teeth and he is getting another tooth in and I found out there is indeed a 12th tooth already in there and one of his bottom molars is all the way through! What an explosion of teeth in the last couple of weeks!

Today I was working on his words with him (like I do everyday) and we look at books together and I say the words over and over again and point to things. For the first time today he seemed to really be trying to say other words, he said flag today which he hasn't said in a long time! But the funniest thing was when he was trying to say 'balloon' he says "ba" and then a bunch of gibberish but he says it the same way every time he saw the balloon in the book & pointed to it. Today is also the first day he turned away from looking at the book to watch my mouth move when I was saying the words. So I think that is progress. It is just so frustrating that he is a little behind on his speech since he did every thing else early. But the pediatrician (and I have read in several books) said that kids that learn all the physical stuff early are slow to talk and those who take longer to do all the physical stuff learn to talk earlier. From talking with other moms I too have found this to be true but it is still frustrating that we can't fully communicate with him yet.

Well I guess that is all for today. We will be gone for a week so I won't be updating this during that time. :)

08/20/08

First of all today is Skylar's birthday, he would have been 15 today. :( I miss him more everyday. Happy Birthday Peanut!

Korben and I are both sick...again. Yesterday Korben had diarrhea all day & he leaked his diaper every time so he wore 5 different outfits yesterday. I felt fine until last night, Brent & I both felt nauseous and had upset tummies. I started running a fever last night and I still have it. Brent woke up fine but is very tired & feels worn out. Korben is still running a fever too & has been wheezing. If it continues through tomorrow I might take him to the doctor on Friday. I would hate to be in Seattle and then have to deal with all that. Hopefully all of us will be well when we leave on Saturday! Keep your fingers crossed for that!

Since Korben has been sick this week he has been fairly mellow - or I should say more like a "normal" kid. We did have an incident on Monday. I was sitting in my mom's recliner and Korben came up to me with something black in his mouth and as I was going to take it out to see what he had he laid it in my lap. It was a cricket!!!! I about died, I am terrified of crickets! It was still half alive. I have no idea how he even caught the thing. I jumped out of the chair and was screaming & it scared Korben half to death. He went running in my mom's bathroom and just stood in there looking terrified. Poor baby! I didn't mean to scare him and I am sure he didn't mean to scare me either....well, maybe!

Korben has been giving himself away when he is about to do something bad. He says "NO" and then does what he knows he is not allowed to do. It is pretty funny and I have been able to catch him alot faster now since he tells on himself!

For some reason Korben has taken to calling me "Da or Dada" ***SIGH*** I don't know why he won't call me Momma. Today after dinner Brent said to Korben where is Momma & Korben pointed to me and said "Da - No" because after every time he calls me Da or Dada I say no. Anyway Korben likes to annoy me I guess.

Oh I almost forgot Korben has new teeth! I think I posted before that one came through, well including that one he got 3 new teeth in the last week plus one of his molars is all the way through now! He has 11 teeth now. I actually think there is a 12th one there but he won't let me feel for it and he surely won't let me see it. But finally we are making some progress with the teeth!

He is starting to say more and more words. He now says (as he points these things out) hair, teeth, nose, and eye. He points to each ear too but doesn't say ear yet. I know the pediatrician said that we need to delay responding to him to force him to ask or learn to talk more quickly but she doesn't understand how Korben is. He goes from 1 to 20 in seconds and is very intense. It seems mean to make him go through that when it can be prevented. The only time I ignore him when he is crying is when he does throw a fit. That used to happen so often & after we ignored him everytime he gave it up real fast. He threw a big fit today because Daddy wasn't home on time. He somehow knows what time Daddy gets home and everyday he starts looking out the window on the door at 5:15. Daddy didn't make it home until 6 pm today (he surprised me by buying a birthday cake for Skylar because he knew I wanted to celebrate his birthday) so Korben wanted to go outside and wait for Daddy. I said no because I am sick and I was still in my pjs. He screamed for 30 mins nonstop.

We are getting excited about our upcoming trip. I am a little anxious about the flight. On the way there it is right during his nap time. When he is overstimulated he won't nap and become really cranky. I am hoping that doesn't happen. I did buy some new toys and books that he won't see until the plane ride and then I will leave them in our suitcase and bring them out again on the ride home. Hopefully that will distract him enough. I am worried he is going to want to run up and down the aisle of the plane.

Well I think that is all for today. Brent & I are about to put Korben to bed and get in bed ourselves and watch a movie.

Oh and a note about the pictures, no Korben doesn't take a pacifier. My aunt had bought a pack because her son needed one for a school play or something. They were sitting on my dresser and Korben got ahold of one. He started chewing on it, I thought it looked so weird I just had to take a picture. He ended up not even liking it and handed it to me.

08/19/08

Well we made it back from Hot Springs fine. Korben was an angel on the way there and back and a little devil in the hotel! On the drive there he took 2 very short naps and mostly just looked out the window. I think he spotted every flag on the way there and kept saying "Clock" we are starting to think maybe he is saying "Look." Anyway it was sprinkling lightly and Brent had the wipers set to come on every so often and Korben thought it was the funniest thing. He laughed and laughed and by the time he stopped laughing the wiper would come on again and then it would start all over. I tried to get a video of it but my batteries died in my camera. :(

When we were driving up in the curvy roads in the mountain (I was getting sick!) Brent & I both smelled something and I turned to Korben and asked him if he had a poopy. He shook his head yes so I told Brent we needed to find a place to stop. Brent said there is no place, I told him just to pull in somebody's driveway or into a parking lot somewhere. So we found this shack that looks like it used to be a buisness. It had a sign out front that said onions and an old happy birthday sign hanging in the window. The parking lot was gravel. So we got Korben laid out on the front seat and I had the bag ready and was getting the wipes out and Brent took off his diaper and he was clean! The little booger fooled us both.

Korben had fun running around the hotel room and up and down the hallway and climbing the stairs but it was exhausting keeping up with him, esp. since I was still sick. Korben was able to turn on and off the tv, open the mini fridge and figured out how to turn the radio on the alarm clock (which Brent couldn't figure out to turn off.) But the problem came at sleep time. He didn't go to sleep until close to 2 am both nights. I ended up going to the funeral services by myself, I rode with Dan. Brent stayed home to give cranky Korben a nap. After the services I went with Dan and some of his friends to have some appetizers and desserts. I called Brent and he said Korben had screamed the entire time I was gone - almost 2 hrs by that point! Poor Brent! He finally was able to get him to sleep for about an hour and a half.

The next morning we got up and had breakfast with Dan then got on the road. Korben fell asleep about 30 mins into the drive and slept for about 2 hrs. Every time Korben would get bored I had a bag of toys and I would pull out a different book or toy for him. He was getting bored with the toys so then I did turn on the Baby Einstein DVD and he watched about 15 mins of it before getting bored of that and then went back to looking out the window.

08/11/08

Korben got a new tooth!!! Finally! It is on the bottom, he now has 9 teeth. They sure are taking their time coming in.

Today has been a crazy day. I am still really sick & I have no energy. Korben is getting worse, his breathing is labored like mine & he keeps coughing & sneezing now. He is taking his nap now but I don't think he is sleeping very well as I keep hearing him move around & he is coughing. My poor baby! :(

Anyway before his nap he was running around the house like a mad man. He got into the kitchen drawers - again - and found a pair of Kaylan's scissors from school and was running with them! YIKES!!!! Then he figured out how to climb on the love seat which is higher up then the couch and he was jumping on there. Then he was in the kitchen being quiet so I ran to find out what he was doing and he was sitting in the middle of the kitchen table!!!! He climbed up on a kitchen chair which he hasn't been able to do before. He was trying to get into his animal crackers & was playing with the paper that mom had on the table. After that he got into mom's purse again and had her wallet and was taking out the cards as he ran. This all happened in less than an hours time & I was wore out from chasing him. He just thinks its a big game & runs in circles, so I put his pack n' play to block one way so I could catch him. The pack n' play blocks the DVDs, so when I moved the pack n' play guess what he got into next. Needless to say he spent most of the morning in time out (we put him in the pack n' play) I have to leave the room when he is in there now because I just want to laugh at him. As soon as he starts heading to time out he says NOOOOO & then over & over he says no-no. It is so cute but I can't let him see that so I have to leave the room.

I told Brent about my day when he called me on his lunch and he promised to try to do something with the drawers - tonight. We'll see though, I have been asking him for at least 2 months now. A few weeks back I put one of the childproof locks on, it doesn't lock it but it does make it difficult to open it and for now Korb can't open that one drawer - which is the one with the most dangerous stuff in it. I would do the rest but my wrists are really bad and it took me forever (not to mention it hurt like heck!) to get that one in. I am going to bug Brent every hour after he gets home until he does it. :) I want my baby to be safe! I don't know what I am going to do about the climbing on the table, the only good thing is if I make sure all the chairs are pushed in before I let him play then I can hear when he moves the chairs on the tile floor it is noisy. Today though that one chair was pushed out already so he just climbed up without me hearing. It really does amaze me how fast he gets into things.

Tomorrow we are heading to AR for my friend's moms funeral. We'll see how Korben handles the 6 hr long drive, this will be his longest drive to date. I am going to take my DVD player and his Baby Einstein DVD's. I don't usually let him watch tv - he sometimes will watch what we watch but mostly he likes to play. Brent does put on cartoons when he is home but Korben just watches the intros, dances and then runs off to play. I don't like to use tv as a babysitter, esp. when I am right there, I would rather put on music and let him dance. He has never watched tv in a car before so this trip might be the first time but only if he gets really fussy and nothing else will calm him down. Poor Korben will never have a tv in his room, I will never allow it - meanie mom! :)