You're a Big Brother!

All About AJ

You are a BIG BROTHER now!!!
You are quite excited and intrigued by Dexter. You are a good big brother. You want to help, but you're not in his face. You aren't rough with him, and you are still just being yourself. If anything, you seem to be quite enjoying all the extra attention and gifts you are getting. I made sure that I had all of your playdough stuff set up for when I breastfeed Dexter and you are loving that special Mummy and AJ time during those feeds. One way that you are different is that you are more affectionate lately. More hugs, kisses, and 'cute' faces. I got to take you to music on Thursday when Dexter was 9 days old. You only had to miss one day!

Well it's been a couple months since I updated your blog.

What can I say? I've stopped keeping track of 'words' and 'phrases' that you say because I think it's just safe to say that you 'talk' and have for quite some time. Your pronunciation is still pretty whack for a lot of words, but that's okay.

Pee pee on the potty has totally regressed. Although you will always pee on the potty when we take you, you aren't telling us when you need to go anymore, you aren't 'holding it', and you're peeing a lot. Actually, to the point that we are a little concerned. However, on a positive note, you ARE pooping in the potty regularly now for this past week. Seems that being a big brother pushed you in the right direction.

You can sing the ABC's now. You are a little obsessed, sometimes making me sing it with you upwards of 25 times during a drive in the car. You have about 2 or 3 toys that play the ABC song too and it's your favourite thing about them.

You can also count to ten, but you're not quite accurately pointing and counting as you go. But you'll count steps as we go up or your blocks as you build a tower, and things like that.

You can identify some letters, thanks to us, I guess, and your fridge phonics.

You identify your name too.

You know that your other name is Alton.

I don't think I updated about how Christmas went.
It was great. I definitely bought too many stocking stuffers and gifts. You had to spend so much time opening everything that you didn't even get to play with any of your toys until after your nap.

You really loved all of your gifts, but some immediate favourites were..
-Any and all cars and trucks (hot wheels and others)
-this wooden train from Auntie Heather that has stackable parts.
-A Dress Me Elmo from Auntie Erica, but that obsession was only for a week or so, and now you just play with it like any of your other toys.
-Your car case from Auntie Jen. You love to lug that case up and down the hall, open it to get your cars, and race them on your rug or your train track.
-Your Thomas and Percy set from Grand-Dan. Now your track can be made extra big!!! And you have trains from the real show!
-Your doctor kit. Since coming to so many doctor's appointments with me and watching me take my insulin, this doctor kit has been a real gem! You love to take my blood pressure, and you were 'injecting me' with 'Dexter medicine' about 10 times a day for a while there!
-You really liked your slippers too, come to think of it.

Gifts You Grew Fond Of...
-Your Fisher Price Little People Racing Ramps Garage from Gram which we've been keeping at gram's house since you were going to be staying there for 4 days while I was in the hospital.
-Your Fisher Price busy Day Home from Santa. I didn't realise that I had to teach you how to play make believe. I did, and now it's really fun to watch you make the characters interact.
-Your Fridge Phonics from Shauna and from Mommy and Daddy. Shauna's plays the ABC song, so it's got you hooked.
-Your Little Leaps Electronic Story Book. Once you found the page that plays the ABC song, you were hooked on that too.

Gifts That Are on the Back Burner
-Great Auntie Brenda got you Hokey Pokey Elmo. You are quite freaked out by this and not quite ready to give elmo another chance just yet. You are allowing him to stay tucked in the corner of the living room, but you don't like him coming out from there.

All About Dexter

Dexter, you were born via scheduled c-section (not due to lack of trying to go into labour early) on Tuesday, January 15th, 2008 at 11:31am. You weighed a whopping 9lbs 4oz thanks to my Gestational Diabetes.

You had your days and nights mixed up which I expected due to you being born in the morning, but slowly we're changing you over.

You are 10 days old today, and you've spent 2 nights in your crib and many naps. We kicked you out of our room even earlier than AJ! You're already a true second born.

Yesterday, you accompanied AJ and I to AJ's music class. You were such a good boy and you slept through the whole class.

We've been giving you some formula as well as breastfeeding. You haven't gained as much weight as the midwives would like, so I'm trying to squeeze in some extra feeds. For the most part though, you are feeding every 3 hours including the night. You gave us a long 4 hour stretch for maybe one or two nights, but that's it. However, I can't complain. Last night you fed at 1:00am and 4:00am and went straight back to sleep after. You woke at 6:45am.

You are a good little guy. A little sleepy. I just can't keep you awake during feeds. You're eating, but your eyes are closed the whole time.

You look a lot like AJ did in the early days, just bigger with a thicker neck. I'm so curious to see what you'll really look like one day.

Welcome to the world Dexter Alexander Clark!