My mom called the other day for a boy fix. She said I hadn?t posted anything about him for a while. I take that as a hint that I should do a little updating on how we are coming along with a few of our issues.
Eating:
Well… eating could be better. I was excited for a while there. I was getting him to actually eat meat. I used my chopper to mince it nice and small then I used the mashed potato trick. The bits were so small he couldn?t pick them out. Ha Ha! My mommy super powers worked! That is until he either figured out the chicken was in the mashed potatoes or I have fed my child a lifetime quota of mashed potatoes. He threw his dish off his tray not once, but twice. Of course he threw every other dish off his tray yesterday too. Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner. He was one hungry little boy this morning. So we are back to mac n? cheese. But we can get mangoes in him. Just not when they are cold. He says they are hot.
Sleeping:
The rocking continues, but is has lessened somewhat. Unless he is really really tired and then is is still pretty hard. I have learned that I need to change the music on the iPod about once a week. The kid adapts way to easily. We did have a huge stride in parenting this morning though. The boy was never allowed to be verbal in his crib in the orphanage. So when we got home he never played or talked or cried out while in his crib. Yesterday he woke up from his nap and instead of whispering to him I spoke to him. He spoke back. Good thing! Well this morning he woke up at about 6:20 and instead of rocking we could hear him… are you ready for this? Playing. Yep, he was playing with Steve the Cat!!! We were both utterly stunned. We laid in bed and just smiled. This was until he figured out he could stand up in his crib and play with the iCrib. Now I?ll have to go get the Ocean Wonders back from CS?s parents house.
Potty Training:
Potty training requires an action plan. I quickly learned that you can?t just stick your kid on the potty without having a plan. You need essentials. Pull-ups or underpants, a potty chair, and don?t forget a potty chart. When we started we had none of these things. Just a little boy who said, “poo poo poo all done.” Then pointed at his butt. Nice. So we abandoned potty training for about a week. We revisited potty training this week with our action plan in place. The boy likes to sit on the potty and yesterday he peed 3 times! Today… not so much. So we went to Target in search of underpants. Hoping that he would get the clue that he can no longer go in his pants. The problem with potty training a post institutionalized child is that they are small. The boy is the size of a 1 year old. Some of his 12 month pants are still too big. Toddler underpants, sized 2T and up. I bought them anyway hoping that a good hot water wash and a dry on hot would shrink them a little. We?ll see. For now I?m not giving up. He wears cool liner pull ups during the day and we spend a good amount of time in the bathroom. Of course he likes to play with the shower curtain, try to flush the toilet and play with the potty seat lid instead of doing his business.
Tomorrow I?ll tell you my story of why there are some people in this world that really should not procreate.