Yoga Master

Baby CP's teacher says that he can follow along with pretty much everything that the yoga instructor asks the kids to do.  Last weekend, his gymnastics teacher said that he was ready to move up to the next level.  And two weeks ago, his swim teacher awarded him a sticker for breath control.  Way to go Baby CP!

Two and a Half Years Old!

I do owe a Halloween post, but had to share today's daycare photos first.  Baby CP turns 2.5 this week!

Very recently, Baby CP started to make this face...we call it a "gui lian" which is kind of like a monster face.  I have no idea where he learned it.

I was worried he would be upset when we dropped him off at daycare today since we had a really long weekend, but he was fine.  Here he is with one of his newer daycare buddies.

Baby CP Visits the Mountains of Colorado

We took a long weekend trip to Breckenridge, Colorado.  We decided to take the 10 minute walk to BART to SFO.  I had invested in a GoGo Babyz Kidz Travelmate for a trip with Baby CP back to NY and it's really great because while Baby CP refuses to sit in a stroller, he finds it exciting to have his carseat attached to wheels.  Denver is a 2.5 hour flight from San Francisco, and Baby CP was super well-behaved up in the air.

One of Mr. CP's high school friend's in-laws owns a LOVELY cabin up in Breckenridge which was large enough to accommodate 3 families and 2 more adults.  The group included a soon-to-be 4 year old, her baby sister, an almost 6 year old and his younger sister, Baby CP and a super gentle dog named Tex.  Boy did Baby CP enjoy himself!  On the first night, you could tell that Baby CP thought Tex was interesting, but every time Tex tried to check Baby CP out, Baby CP would yell "No Doggie" and run away.  After a few hours, he had seen me and Mr. CP pet the dog, so he finally decided it must be safe and walked over to do some petting himself.  From then on, we witnessed Baby CP lying around with the dog, walking up to the dog to pet him and hug him.  Standing close to Tex to snuggle.  It was super cute!

This is a video of Baby CP walking a friend's dog here in SF.  After becoming buddies with Tex, Baby CP now wants to play with all dogs.

Baby CP also loved to run around with the older kids and to play with their toys.  The only times he really whined all weekend was when it was time to sleep.  Watching him interact with other children is so interesting, and my favorite is when he tries to talk to older kids.  When he talks to us, he just speaks more matter-of-factly, but when he talks to older kids, I think he gets the sense that they might not understand him as well as we do, perhaps because we have well-trained ears for his favorite words.  So he kind of gets really close to them and repeats himself and then cocks his head to the side as if to make sure they're making eye contact and to see if they understand.    

Click here for an awesome video of Baby CP and one of his new buddy playing butterflies.  They ran around the house giggling and shrieking for about half an hour.  I think Baby CP was laughing and running so hard that he might have thrown up a little.

I just wish I had a video of the kids dance party...these kids have moves.

Baby CP Can Act

Click on this link for a funny video:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_sEzat76pY

Sometimes he does a more robust "sad", but here is Baby CP and his acting...and some eating on his own.

Months 25 and 26

Baby CP continues to grow and develop very well.  In daycare he participates in all art projects and music classes and has a blast outdoors at the playground.  His teacher tells me that unless he isn't feeling well, he's always good and takes are of the other little kids.  She also says that out of all the kids, he enjoys learning the most and has a very long attention span.

Baby CP has been using his imagination skills quite a bit recently.  I overhear him creating dialogues between his cars and trains.  Sometimes when I'm telling him stories, he makes up new parts of the stories on his own. He also enjoys singing and sometimes makes up his own words and songs.  He also pretends to be mad or sad sometimes with faces, sighs and everything.  It's hilarious.  We like when he gives certain vehicles a "time out" for being bad.  

Baby CP got sick a lot over these past 2 months - about once every 2 weeks for almost 3 months.  The doctor said this was good for him.  After he got better from his last cold, he suddenly started eating very well and often on his own.  It has truly made life easier and mealtimes much less stressful.  He's gained a significant amount of weigh recently and man, have his feet grown!

We attended a wedding and Baby CP was a big hit with the ladies.  He's so funny...usually he prefers to hang out with us, but sometimes when there are young ladies around, he just disappears.  He went and found this group of young women on his own and just ditched us!

Baby CP modeling one of the hats at the wedding.

Around his second birthday, Baby CP started to refuse to change his clothes and diapers, so we either let him run around for most of the evening without pants on.  This has somewhat facilitated potty training.  Over the past couple months, if he doesn't have pants on, he generally will go to sit on his potty on his own to pee and will also go poop on his own.  He likes his privacy while pooping though, and NOBODY can be in the room as he does his business.  He will give you the policeman stop hand and tell you NO or GO AWAY. You gotta' respect that.  

We're finally all caught up...it only took me 3 hours to upload everything and update the blog...sheesh!  I need more days off!

Baby CP Turns Two!

Due to some workload craziness, I didn't have much time to plan a big second birthday party for Baby CP. In the end, we just invited family and a couple friends, one of which was Thomas the Train on an ice cream cake.  

Baby CP eating his birthday noodles.

Baby CP drooling over his Thomas Cake!

Baby CP chasing Cousin Junior on their respective cars.  "Go [Junior] Go!"

He also celebrated his birthday at daycare with his friends, so I didn't feel that bad about having a small party.

By his second birthday, he could say all kinds of things.  He could express more emotions and he can also be quite bossy.

"I'm sad."

"Bring car to take a bath."

I want "a little milk in the Dora cup and a straw."

"There's frosting on the cake on the table!"

Look at him go!

Catching Up - The Rest of Month 23

I have the day off from work today, so I am updating the blog with a ton of photos that I've been collecting since May.  I haven't been able to upload all the photos I receive from Baby CP's daycare while at work, so keeping the blog up to date had been somewhat challenging.  Enjoy!

23 Months Old - The Terrible Twos

It all started with a week and a half of being sick with a few days of high fever.  He was needy and crying all the time AND the ugly head of the terrible twos has shown itself.  They were here in full force and now that he's feeling better, thank goodness he is mostly back to normal, but signs of the terrible twos indeed remain.


He refuses to let you take any item of clothing off without a fight  diaper changes often involve screaming and/or crying.  This I find bizarre.  We try to distract him with interesting things, but he's just really upset if you try to undress him.  He also doesn't want water poured over his head in the bath anymore and tries to climb out and get as far away from me as possible.

He gets upset when other people play with his stuff and he protests by telling you that someone is playing with "my car"! 




Baby CP was very excited to play with the fire engine at a local block party last weekend.

Sometimes he refuses to sit in his carseat or a stroller.  If we're in a rush we have to force him into the carseat which results in crying really hard for a really long time.  Super annoying...but you gotta go what you gotta do sometimes.   I think we have to start planning even more of a time buffer into anything because the terrible twos may rear it ugly head at any time.

Unfortunately while he was still recovering, Baby CP started acting very unhappy at daycare, which resulted in staying home for a couple days.  Even the week after he was better he still protested when we dropped him off.  The teachers said that he still played with his friends well but wouldn't allow the teachers to get too close (i.e. the same stuff like changing clothes or diapers).  Thankfully today he greeted his teacher with a smile though I saw hesitation on his face when I handed him over.  I hope he was ok today.


Baby CP and his daycare buddies playing outside at the new location

On an unrelated note, he seems to have grown a noticeable amount recently and he's been eating more than he used to eat.  And thankfully, now when he doesn't want to eat something instead of spitting it out on the floor (or my couch!) he comes back to the plate and spits it out there. 

22 Months, 3 Weeks

Since our last post Baby CP made a trip back to NY to see his grandparents.  Baby CP's cousin, Junior, also made the trip.  These two are trouble makers.



NYC was cold that day

 Baby CP was very well behaved on the plane both ways...videos helps with that a lot.  We tried out these special JLab sound limiting headphones so that he could hear the videos without bothering neighboring travelers.  It did not occur to him that he could run up and down the aisles.  Luckily there were no other kids on the plane doing that to give him the idea.

After being back a week or so, Baby CP caught another cold, though this one turned nasty.  After discussing with Grandma CP, I think it was roseola.  He's been so fussy and needy and had a super high fever for a few days.  He had a non itchy rash for a day and still continues to refuse food and drinks for most of the day.  He also demands to be held all day long and says "no" to almost everything.  Poor guy.  I hope it passes soon.

The cold wiped him out and he passed out while watching Thomas on the couch

Sometimes you can catch him saying "my" truck or "my book".  He can identify blue things.  He's not so good with other colors yet.  He picks or gnaws chocolate chips off of cookies.  Gross. 



Exploring nature

It was pretty warm this weekend, so I broke out the water table for Baby CP to enjoy some outside time in the backyard.  It's not too often that SF gets warm enough to play with water outside.

21 Months, 3 Weeks

These pictures make me laugh.

Baby CP has a new favorite cartoon - Busytown Mysteries.  He likes to sing along with the theme song.  He definitely has preferences for different shows at different times - he might request Dora or Busytown Mysteries one day, but on another he'll say no Dora.

  I think these are fine motor skill training exercises.  He looks very focused.

Baby CP was sick this week.  His teachers said that on this particular day he was so unhappy except when they were making these lanterns.  He had not been this unhappy since his first week at daycare and he insisted on being held all day and asked for mommy all day.  Poor guy.  His runny nose seemed to have dried up yesterday though, which is pretty good.  Usually it takes about 10 days to run its course.