Toddler Troubles

So Keegan is two and a half. He is a very smart, out-going, and funny little guy but like any toddler he has been having a few problems.

The first we have been struggling with the last couple weeks is he likes to take off his jammies and diaper and pee in his bed. He doesn't want to pee in his diaper and he doesn't want to get out of bed to use the potty (I am with him on that, especially in the middle of the night) so he pees in his bed.

So, of course I am concerned. Thank goodness for the internet. Apparently tons of toddlers do this. That didn't make it a whole lot better when, last Thursday night, Keegan pooped in his bed (minus diaper) and smeared it all over himself and his bedding. I guess it could be worse, one of my friends at work said her niece actually smeared the whole room (toys, dresser, etc.) with poop. But, still we were kind of irate about it. Keegan got in trouble and had to give up a toy (you must understand this was the third night in a row we had dealt with the peeing in bed thing and he had been forewarned). Keegan couldn't believe we actually made him put his toy in the trash.

After that he tells me every night he won't pee in his bed. So that is good. We have also got a full plastic enclosure for his mattress (he was pulling off the waterproof mattress pad) and he wears a onesie under his jammies to make it harder for him to get his cloths/diaper off. So, far so good. Keegan even thinks the onesie is cool; he calls it his special super hero bodysuit. Just like Spiderman. So, check, peeing in bed problem temporarily nabbed in the butt.

Now there is problem two. Which we are trying not to make a big deal about. About a month ago Keegan started stuttering. It gets really bad when he is tired or excited. For example, this weekend he hardly stuttered at all. Then when we went to pick him up from daycare today he was tired and excited to see us. He was trying to tell us something to Look at something and for the life of him couldn't get past that L; it took him four stuttering attempts to get through it.

So a couple weeks ago I looked up some info on stuttering. Apparently it usually starts between the ages of 2 to 5. It affects a large percentage of toddler/preschoolers and about 90% of those kids outgrow it within a year. Kids don't start stuttering until they are talking really well; then the stuttering usually starts as they try to talk to fast.

As a parent the best things to do are to let them get out what they are trying to say no matter how long it takes, repeat what they said back to them when they are done, and don't make fun of them or interrupt them. If the stuttering continues for more than 6 months or is really upsetting the kid they should get some speech therapy.

So in general I am not too concerned. The only thing that is concerning me is that Keegan is starting to get frustrated and angry when he starts stuttering. This has just started over the last week or so We talked to his teachers and they are all great and have been really encouraging him.

Then today he started doing something even odder. When he starts stuttering he stops talking and covers his hand with his mouth. Then he slowly says the beginning of the word without stuttering and is able to quickly complete the rest of the word. It is actually kind of cool. Then he has a big smile on his face, and we tell him "Wow, you really said that well!"

I was curious as to where he learned this odd behavior. I mean really it is pretty smart. It makes him stop, calm down, and then he feels how his lips are moving as he slowly says the word without stuttering. He did this numerous times tonight and each time it stopped his stuttering and allowed him to speak slowly and clearly. I finally asked him where he learned how to do that. He told me that his teacher at daycare taught him. Well, I have to say it is not something that I would have thought of and thank goodness for the great teachers at our daycare. It is awesome that they are spending some extra time to help him get through this.

On top of that I am happy to see that tonight Keegan seemed calmer and is starting to deal with this stuttering thing without getting upset. He really is a smart kid and if we can get him to slow down and be calm; then I think he will nip this stuttering thing before it gets too bad. And, well, if he doesn't then we will deal with that when the time comes.

MN State Fair Fun :-)

The first thing we did when we got to the State Fair was to get breakfast. Lyle and I shared a funnel cake while Keegan discovered his new favorite food. You guessed it...cotton candy. Can a boy live off of cotton candy? Well Keegan would like to give it a shot if he can.


Then we went and saw lots and lots of animals. We didn't get many pictures of that. But after that we road the carousel and that was super fun.



Then there were the tractors. Keegan's goal right from the beginning was to see a ton of tractors. So we started with white ones and worked our way to the John Deeres...we even got to try sitting in an excavator and a bulldozer! Keegan's favorites!






We even saw some really old tractors.



After that it was time to visit the Kidway and give Keegan his first experience on some awesome rides. I had to go with him on three out of the four rides, but they were actually kind of fun. The first ride we rode were some race cars. Believe it or not we got put in a Kodak Race car; I was like geez give me a break.



Then after that Keegan rode his first ever ride all by himself. It was another car ride; but this one had really annoying loud horns...which of course Keegan loved.



Then Keegan and I went on the airplane ride. That was another fun one. Although the airplanes weren't made for anyone over 5 feet to actual squeeze in there.


Last ride was the pirate ship. Lyle and I tried to talk him out of this one; we thought it looked like a bit much. But Keegan persisted. So, in we went. Below you can see the progression of facial expressions. They start out unsure, go to concerned, and then end up at fullout upset. He decided afterwards that he didn't like pirate ships so much.




So there you go. It was a nice brisk sunny August morning at the MN state fairs. I am hoping next year we can skip the tractors and spend a bit more time looking at the horsies and the pet building. But Keegan thought we covered all of the perfect things!

Ren Fest!

A few weeks ago we also went to the Ren Fest. It was a pretty fun time. It got a bit hotter than we thought it was going to get. We also ended up waiting outside the gates for a bit because they opened late.

Here we are waiting at the gates!


Keegan's grandma bought him a Geode aka Dragon's Egg to crack open. He got to help the nice guy work the lever that cracked the egg. Below are pictures of him assisting. In the last picture you can kind of see his geode.




One of the other highlights was the food. We all really enjoy the beef sticks.



The other high point for Keegan was the acquisition of a wooden sword. He loved brandishing his sword (we are not sure where he learned that from).



Keegan even got into a sword fight...that rogue! Don't worry though he made it through unscathed. His enemy, well Keegan left him groaning in the dirt :-)


After that we had to rest up on some hammocks.


Then there was time for a little dancing to a fiddle player. Overall a good time. Although, I occasionally question the wisdom of buying Keegan a sword :-)

Fun at the Children's Museum

A couple weekends ago we went to the Children's Museum. For those who haven't been there it is a lot of fun; especially for children :-)

The special exhibit this time was Clifford: the big red dog! Keegan has the most fun feeding bones up the conveyor belt into Clifford's bowl. Then Keegan fell into the bowl (see below).


After that it was time to have a puppet show.


Then up to learn about how gears work.


Then Keegan and I built a bridge together. Keegan had a lot of fun walking on it :-)




After that we played in the sand in the art exhibit on the roof. Also a lot of fun!


We helped build a giant lego tower too.


Oh and then we had to stick our heads in a turtle. Well, I skipped that part, but Lyle didn't.



So there was a ton to do and we had a really good time. Keegan and I even crawled in the ant tunnels, where I quickly learned that the tunnels are made for kids not adults. I didn't quite get stuck by I sure had a heck of time getting out of there! So if you have kids and want to have fun, the MN Children's Museum is huge and lots of fun...especially on a super hot day!

Lots of fun this summer...feeding giraffes

We have done a lot of fun things this summer. Especially in August; it's like we are trying to make up for lot time here. So in this little article I will feature feeding the giraffes at the MN Zoo. If you haven't done it you should. For $5 you get 2 crackers to feed the giraffe along with a few minutes of one on one time. It was really cool...trust me, I am over 30 and I thought it was sweet. Keegan was delighted too! The only thing I can say is wow, do those guys have long tongues. Check the pics out below.

Look at that looonngg tongue!



Here is Keegan feeding the cracker!


The giraffe must have really liked the cracker!


After feeding giraffes we went to the farm and fed the goats. There was definitely a feeding theme going on here. The highlight of the farm for Keegan wasn't the goats though; it was the HUGE tractor he got to sit on. Keegan is a big fan of all "Things that go!" I can't even count the number of different truck, car, tractor, and airplane books that we have gone through at the library. The library even caters to this fetish by having a large "Things That Go" display set up.

Driving the Tractor


Feeding the Goats


Feeding the Goats Made Keegan a Little Nervous!


Then of course we had to ride the big pull tractor back to the main part of the zoo. This got some clapping from Keegan.


Keegan was getting tired so he took a ride on mommy's shoulders. Daddy actually carried him most of the time though.



We got to see the tigers up close. This one was playing with a large stick.


Then, of course, no trip to the MN zoo is complete without a ride on the giant mosquito! Which, in a way, stays with the feeding theme.


Then we had to stay with the feeding theme and share a chocolate covered caramel apple before we left the zoo!


All in all a great trip! I will cover are other great outings in another post. I hope this finds you all well!

Long Time No Blog....

Okay so we haven't been all that great at keeping this blog up. To be honest I have been too busy with my book blog; along with general household junk. Including the whole house going through some sort of flu last week.

So I suppose I could update on a few things. Keegan is still working on potty training. We really aren't pushing him too hard; other than to continue to try and give incentives for him to make an effort. Unfortunately the thing he likes as a reward best are suckers. A bit hard on the teeth. We've instituted a potty chart that he has to fill up with stickers before he gets a sucker but still. He is regularly using the potty at daycare. The last couple days there he used it three times; which is wonderful.

Last night he got up at 9pm and started getting upset. Lyle went down to find that Keegan had his jammies and diaper off and had peed on himself trying to get out of his bed. Apparently he was trying to go use the potty but didn't quite make it. Made me feel bad that we didn't get down there sooner. It was kind of unexpected; but makes me happy that he is showing a preference for using the potty.

Also we got a new camera last month. A Canon Rebel T1-Xi; much nicer than our previous camera. All the pics posted from my birthday on, us this camera. It is a very nice camera and does exactly what I wanted an SLR to do (take video and us the viewfinder).

I'll try to blog more, but for the most part nothing too exciting going on. Anyway, hope everyone is doing well!

Urgent Announcement ;-)

At least for Keegan...

He peed on the potty at daycare....TWICE yesterday!

He has been using the potty at home for the last month or so. In fact it's been weeks since I've had to change a poopie diaper; he always poops on the potty. He thinks it is yucky to have poopie in his diaper and I totally agree. We have a potty chart and he gets a sticker when he uses the potty; once he gets 7 stickers he gets a sucker. We told him if he used the potty at daycare he would get stickers when he got home.

Well no go there; so we instituted a new policy. If he used the potty at daycare he'd get a sucker. For weeks we reminded him and for weeks he responded "I only potty at home". I was getting concerned because he would actually wait to poop until he got home.

Then yesterday his teacher Miss Jen told him "Keegan remember if you use the potty you get a sucker." Well something clicked and he used the potty not once, but TWICE.

Of course first thing he does is run up and tell us that he used the potty and where is his sucker. Luckily we had a sucker in the car; so he got somewhat immediate gratification.

He was soooo proud of himself. He had to stop in each classroom on the way out and announce to all of the kids that he "Peed in the potty at daycare". He had to tell the director on his way out too. When we got in the car he wanted to tell Memaw, so we called my parents and he told them. Then when we got to swimming lessons he had to tell teacher Becky. She took it all in stride and exclaimed what a big boy thing he had done. His response: "I know. I'm getting bigger."

It is exciting that he will pee on the toilet somewhere other than home. Hopefully we can keep it up over the weekend while we are camping. I won't hold my breath because he is still young for potty training. I am hoping though this is the precursor to great things to come...like no diapers. He is actually interested in his "big boy" underpants now so we will see.

Holy cow let's rock n' roll...this isn't rubbish

Keegan has been picking up expressions lately. Even scarier he uses them correctly. So here are some examples.

Whenever we ask Keegan if he's ready to leave the house he now yells; "Yes, let's rock and roll!"

On Friday Keegan asked me for some dried mango. I asked him how much he wanted and he said "lots!" so I poured some into a bowl for him. I guess I poured too much because he exclaimed "Holy cow mom, that's a lot!"

Then the other day he said he was done with dinner and I told him he had to stay sitting until I brought over a rag to wash his face. His response, "That's rubbish!" This one should make my sister proud. Her goal while she was here was to get Keegan to use the expression "that's rubbish" successfully...and she has succeeded.

Keegan has also been continuing the singing, but he has started improvising. So on Friday when I had raspberries and Keegan had eaten all of his. Keegan started creeping his hand over to my plate and singing, "The itsy bitsy spider crawls over and steal mommy's raspberries...." This itsy bitsy spider has really bad manners now; he is constantly stealing my food, crawling in my hair, and taking my books.

Keegan is deathly afraid of lawnmowers. So we have been trying to get him not scared. It wouldn't be a big deal but when they mow the lawn at daycare he makes life difficult for the teachers and doesn't want to go the next day. He solved the problem for us today by making up a funny song to the verse of "The farmer takes a wife" where "the cheese stands alone". On the way to dinner he started belting out "The cheese mows the lawn, the cheese mows the lawn, hi do the derio, the cheese mows the lawn."

How does cheese mow a lawn...I don't know and have never wanted to know. All Lyle and I could say was "holy cow how does Keegan come up with this rubbish?"

Amazon ranking and sonatas

Okay so I need to be excited about this because I am odd like this...my Amazon Review Ranking went under 2000 last week! My new rank is 1825. I am very excited and I know that is lame. Still if you want to check it out (and maybe even say some of my reviews are helpful to you) here is the link to my profile: Reviewer Rank
My goal is to be a top 1000 reviewer by the end of the year :-) Hey we all need goals, right?

In other news, my parents and Lyle and I spend a good portion of Sunday night being serenaded by a toddler. Yes, through a long father's day dinner Keegan sung, "Happy Birthday to you, Happy Birthday to you, yay!" pause "Happy Birthday to you, Happy Birthday to you, yay!" pause, etc. This deluge of serenading was "sparked" by the candle on the table which Keegan thought meant it was someone's birthday. Does this mean we don't take him out to nice places enough? I kid you not the kid sung the same two lines from the Happy Birthday song over and over again non-stop over a period of about 40 minutes. At least he was happy.

Keegan has been doing this more and more. He often breaks out into sporadic bursts of song not uncommon to any classic musical. Today on the way to swimming lessons a drive by a sprinkler incited a rousing rendition of "It's raining, it's pouring, the old man is snoring, yay!" These audio renditions are always fragmented and concluded with a celebratory cry of "yay!" followed by clapping. I wish I could be such a good critic to myself.

Camping at Lac Qui Parle

Last weekend we went camping at Lac Qui Parle. Where is that you ask? Well go through Shakopee, MN and drive 3.5 hours west and you're there. The closest town is Watson, which has a gas station. The next closest town, which you might even call a small city, is Montevideo. Montevideo actually sports a Walmart (but to our dismay no Super Target or even a Target).

To Keegan's great delight on the ride out there we saw many cows and many barns and many pieces of large farm equipment. Never mind that there were a billion of said items that we passed, Keegan's excitement at seeing cows, horses, barns, trains, and tractors never dimmed. Each viewing was, to him, as breathtaking as the if it was the first one he had ever seen.

Lac Qui Parle is on Lac Qui Parle Lake (surprisingly). When we got there we found out that the check-in building is up by the Upper Campgrounds (where we were camping) and the hiking is down by the Lower Campgrounds (many miles to our south). The check-inn building was also their interpretation center and has a very interesting display of stuffed birds (not the cuddly kind). A Bald eagle and some loons were among the highlights; along with some bear and fox pelts. Also there was a little store in there; which to Keegan's delight sold rock candy on a stick.

After checking in we went to the Upper Campgrounds to set up the camper. Keegan loved his new shades and was determined to get a fire started. As you can see below.


We made a small fire and set up the camper. The campgrounds are completely in prairie and have no shade so to speak. They are very nice large pads that are placed a good distance apart from each other; with ample space to kick balls, play bean bag games, etc...of course we partook in all of these activities and more. The other nice aspect of the camping spaces is that the whole Upper Campground overlooked Lac Qui Parle Lake and it was a beautiful view (see below). The bad part was that my grass allergies got progressively worse as the trip went on. On Sunday I was a quivering mass of watering eyes and snotty nose.


After the fire burned down we decided to take the only hiking trail near the Upper Campgrounds. This trail goes to the largest Cottonwood tree in MN. Okay, maybe not something on the top of my "things I want to see in my life" list but kind of cool considering we were in the middle of exactly nowhere. So we took the hike (mostly through prairie).


Some of it did go through a forest with plants that had leaves almost as big as Keegan.


Finally after 2 miles we got to the Cottonwood tree. It was huge and there was almost an inch of fluff all over the ground.




After that we began the difficult walk back. Two miles is a long way with a toddler who thinks he can walk it all. Keegan ended up riding on our shoulders almost the whole way back. It got even longer when I found a wood tick on my sleeve and then Lyle found another one on my back and then I found two more on my stomach. All in all I pulled 5 wood ticks off of me. Making me twitch the whole walk back. Although you wouldn't know it from the picture below.



Anyway, after getting back and removing my cloths and finding numerous wood ticks (but no deer ticks). My dad further searched my discarded clothing and found three more crawling in my pants. Such did my weekend of phantom itching and heavily applied bug spray begin. I think everyone found a tick on themselves but I was the one with the mother load.

The next day (no ticks for me!) we drove down to the Lower Campgrounds (yes you had to drive down there it was so far away). The Lower Campgounds are where the rest of the hiking trails are and the swimming beach. So we spent the morning at the beach. It was a good time had by all.







After that we drove into the town of Montevideo to visit a huge children's playground they had there. Very cool and artistic play structure. As well as a neat little town for the toddlers. See picture below. We didn't play that long because it was in the nineties and Keegan actually came up to me and said "Mama it's too hot to play anymore." So as you can imagine it was hot. We went and got some ice cream, stopped by Walmart, then went back for naptime. Then finished up the trip by making dinner over a fire and doing other camping things.





The next day we did the 4 hour drive back. Which Keegan was remarkably good for. He didn't sleep but instead read his books, sang along to songs, and tried to spot...you guessed it...cows, barns, trains, and trucks.

All in all it was a nice camping trip. No rain, nice park. I wasn't too impressed with the hiking (probably because of my more than close encounters with the tick-kind); but the Cottonwood tree was cool and the swimming beach very nice. It would be a great place to go canoeing and it was really quiet. Overall a success!