House of Kind Words

Silas took this picture. This is the view of our front yard as seen from the bay window in our living room. Silas stands at this window to look out quite often. When I come home from work, I see his sweet little face waiting for me at this window, and it is always a joy to see him break out into a big smile when he realizes I'm home...

...So, when I last posted, I mentioned that I wanted to write more, but mommy duties cut my computer time short. I wanted to write a bit more about what I had been thinking of that day.

Silas is a great kid, but he's also a normal toddler and this means he has moments of frustration, anger and over-excitement. These moments can lead to hitting, biting, and outbursts. We are always striving to find ways to stop these moments before they start. The loop reward system (mentioned a few posts back) has been very successful thus far. He really gets it and so we are trying to give him loops when he has been biting/hitting/tantrum-free for a long period of time. Sometimes, I think Silas is simply frustrated because he feels he can't communicate his needs. I remind him to use his words because, really, he has quite a large number of them and in truth can communicate much of what he needs too. We are also trying to redirect angry energy by doing "mad dances" to stomp away angry feelings rather than hitting. When I write this, I feel like I'm giving the impression that he is a little terror who needs serious behavior modification therapy. I assure you, that's not the case. We are simply trying to reward for good behavior and deal with fixing the cause of bad behavior before that behavior even begins.

Anyways, I could go on and on about all of this, but the real point I wanted to make, before I blab too much, is this: Learning how to parent Silas, to gently discipline him, to raise him to be a thoughtful, compassionate person, has really forced us to reexamine ourselves. We know any negative behavior we exhibit will rub off on him. We know we aren't perfect people, or perfect parents. We are perhaps hyper aware of this and therefore, we've really become focused on awareness of our own issues and actions. One thing Drew said recently really stuck with me: "How we react to anger is a choice." Anger doesn't have to be met with anger, and keeping a cool head when your toddler goes berserk...definitely helpful. And that is where "house of kind words" comes in. If you want a peaceful child, you must have a peaceful family, a peaceful home. If we are quick to anger, Silas will be. If we are judgmental towards each other or towards Silas, he will be judgmental. If we react to stressful situations or outbursts with anger, he will grow up to do the same. I know this is all obvious on an intellectual level, but in practice, it takes constant reminding. It is so easy to forget Silas is in the room when we talk about certain things, but whenever we speak negatively, we now remind each other that this is a house of kind words.

As a family, we share the same goals: we all want to live peacefully with each other, have a happy home, and enjoy each other's company. I suppose it helps that Drew and I rarely rarely argue, but this is just one piece of the puzzle, and we are still striving to deal with some of the issues all people face. I am incredibly grateful to Silas for showing us that it's not just the toddler in this family that needs to learn (or maybe unlearn) a few things!

On a different front, yesterday, Silas said another complete sentence. Out of the blue, with no prompting, he announced "I like salsa." Yep. He may look a lot like me, but he is his father's son. He also learned the word iPod this week (it was bound to happen). He can now be heard saying "mommy's iPod, daddy's iPod, sync iPod!"

Party time! Excellent!

Hey, dudes, I heard there's a party going on. Excellent! I've got my puppy jammies and my bedhead and I am ready to rock and roll!

Today, Silas burned a hole in one of my socks by putting it on the heater. He refused to nap for Drew and bit him three times. When I got home from work, he wanted to nurse and was asleep by 5:15. He's woken a few times but went right back to sleep after just a couple of minutes. Most likely, he'll be up bright and early tomorrow morning.

So, it's been one of those days. I wanted to write quite a bit more, but Silas has been stirring again and it doesn't seem like he'll quite settle down again for the night until I'm nestled up next to him. That's the trade-off for having him fall asleep so early. I'll have to continue on in another post.

LOOPS!

Hey look, over here! I've got something to show you. See these pieces of yarn looped together? I get them whenever I'm good or do something nice, like pet the kitty and don't chase him around, or when I cooperate for diaper changes instead of running away or acting like a squirmy bear.

As you can see, I'm very proud of my loops. My mommy said to stand next to them and smile for the camera. This is how I smile on command (and I think I deserve a loop for it)!
Okay, I think I'll let mommy take it from here...

A while back, I was talking with my friend Jill, and she described a positive reward system she uses with her boys, ages 4 and 2. Each boy has a jar and every time they do something good, such as be nice to each other or pick up their toys without being asked, they get to add a piece of pasta to the jar. Once the jar is filled, they get something they've wanted for a while, or get to go and do something fun. I thought I'd try something similar, but with my own twist. I cut a bunch of colorful pieces of yarn and when Silas does something "good" we let him choose a piece of yarn and loop it to the piece above it. We put a nail near the ceiling and the loops are trailing down from it.
Once the loops reach the floor, he'll get to do something special. We'll be emphasizing experiences over just getting an object of some kind. Right now, he'll most likely just ask to see Patrick. This is a positive reinforcement technique, so it's not used to threaten him, meaning, we never say "if you don't cooperate, you won't get a loop." He simply gets a loop if he's good and that's that. We give him two loops if he uses the potty, since we are really bumping up the potty training efforts at the moment. So far, this has been a successful endeavor and Silas seams to be getting it. We'll see where it leads.

September 08 Book of the Month

Announcing Planet Silas' September Book of the Month:

Hands are Not for Hitting by Martine Agassi ; illustrated by Marieka Heinlen.

This is a board book we've checked out from the library several times. Not only does Silas enjoy it, but we enjoy the advice it gives us in how to constructively redirect Silas from hitting when he gets overly excited or is in pain due to teething. It's easy to get frustrated when he hits or pinches or twists or squeezes. This book has been a lot of help in dealing with this. Now we tell him "Silas, hands are not for hitting. What are hands for?" And we can use an example from the book, or most often, start clapping our hands and get him to clap along. Seems much more constructive than just yelling "Nooo" at him.

Like many of the books that make the Planet Silas Book of the Month list, this book works for us because it's interactive. I've posted a few images as examples.

Below, the picture shows that hands are for "keeping safe." Silas is signing the "parent" sign (all big people are parents). And then signs "baby" for the little girl (all children are babies to Silas). And to top it off, there is a car in the picture. "Car" or "cah" is one of Si's most frequent vocal words, at the moment, and he'll be sure to point that car out to you. "Cah, cah, cah."
You can't really see it, but Silas is giving me a hug, just like the little girl in the picture. So sweet.
Hey Happy Camper, that's a good book, huh!
And our Honorable Mention is:
Teeth are Not for Bitting by Elizabeth Verdick ; illustrated by Marieka Heinlen.

See a theme here? I don't have any pictures of this one, but thought it worth mentioning. Similarly to Hands are Not for Hitting, this book helps toddlers and parents alike cope with the frustration and pain of teething and the behavioral issue (biting) that can result from that pain. This book is from the same series. I have a feeling we may be checking out other titles from that series in the near future. For instance, there's one called Tails are Not for Pulling. Hmmm.

Baby's first criminal act, and other antics

Ah, the sleeping babe. Nothing could be more precious, more innocent...

And then he woke up and dialed 911 without us knowing it.

Picture it--A weekday. I'm at work, and Drew is talking to his mom on the phone while he starts changing Silas' diaper. Silas doesn't like diaper changes. Hates them in fact. But he does like phones. So, Drew gets off the phone with his mom and hands it to Silas to keep him busy while the diaper change is in progress. Silas starts pressing buttons, as per usual. Drew thinks Silas might be pressing too many buttons, so he takes the phone away from him. Silas protests. The diaper change ends. Life goes on.

And then the phone rings. It's a 911 operator who tells Drew they just received a call from our number. Drew then has to explain that his 1 year old dialed the number. No it's not on speed dial, it was random (what are the odds?). No, he's not being held at gunpoint and being forced to say that his 1 year old dialed the number, and by the way, are we going to be fined for this?

The operator said that they may still have to send a patrol car around, just in case. But the police never materialized, so they must have believed Drew when he said that he wasn't being held hostage. And we haven't been fined. Silas is no longer allowed to play with the phone, unless it's been unplugged.

Did I mention that he gave me a black eye? What a little devil. This happened three weeks ago while Drew was in WI. I was still lying in bed, which is on the floor, and Silas had already gotten up. He picked out a book and very excitedly brought it back to me so that I could read it to him. On the way to the bed, he tripped and slammed the corner of the hardcover book right into my eye. Holy cats! I've never had a black eye before. It took 3 weeks for it to totally heal, and it wasn't even a very bad shiner. I had no idea it would take so long to heal, because on TV, it only seems to take a few days and then people always returned to their flawless skinned selves.

Si is also going through a biting/grabbing/pulling/pinching faze. The bitting can be explained by the fact that he's getting so many teeth in at the same time. We're up to 12 at last count, and 4 or those are the recently cut molars. More appear to be on their way. While I understand that teething is painful, it is still disconcerting to have him run up to me while I'm doing dishes as though he's going to hug me, and then end that hug by chomping into my leg. Ow. He just can't seem to help himself. Same goes for the grabbing/pulling/pinching. He gets so excited sometimes and he doesn't know that he's hurting. He seems to think he's playing with us. But we're always very firm with him. Unfortunately, we've been told that at his age, he can't really remember that it's a bad thing and causes us pain. At some point, however, it's gotta sink in, right?

So, let's recap. Sleeping cherub. Dialing 911 emergency when the only emergency in progress is an unwanted diaper change. General parental abuse. I think the picture below seems more accurate then the sleeping babe portrait, at present. You don't think they're sharing a brewsky and conspiring against me, do you? If so, I'm really in trouble!

Miss you, Daddy!

Drew left this morning to go to his 20th high school reunion in Wisconsin. That means that I'm in single parent mode until his return on Sunday. This is the first time Drew has ever been away from Silas overnight, so it will be interesting to see how Si (and I) deal with it.

We already miss you, Drew/Daddy, so these videos, are for you:

I call this one Things just aren't quite right without my daddy so I'm gonna keep cr--hey, what's that in my ear?


Aren't you glad there's no sound?

After that, Silas was feeling better. --So much so that he was ready to show a big person who's boss. Since Drew wasn't there, I was the target.

I call this one, Toddler Attack.


One more thing: I usually do a monthly shout out when Si turns another month older. Forgot this time... Yesterday, the 16th, he turned 16 months! Woo-hoo!

11 months old -- Toddler Preview!

Silas turns 11 months old on Saturday. Although technically not a toddler until his first birthday, apparently, he is trying to earn his toddler chops a bit early. Here's a glimpse of Si's current "antics" and a preview of what lies in store for us over the coming months.

Washing machine. Silas loves opening the door. Over and over again. And over again. The only way to prevent him from doing this all day long is to close the bathroom door (where our washer and dryer are located) and keep him out:
Yes. He knows how to turn the dials, push buttons, etc. This is probably because we often have him help us start loads of laundry (hey, get them working young, right?):
Drawers are made for opening, and clothes are made to be tossed on the floor:
This is the window ledge above the bed. We're SO glad he can reach it now:
We just discovered that the baby gate we got for the stairs will not work on ours. Until we find one that does, we'll have to watch him like a hawk (notice the outstretched hand):
Fire place. I don't think I need to say anything more about this one:
Not pictured: Silas can reach the dial on the stove and can turn the oven on. We're so proud of him and hope that he never unintentionally blows us all up.