Friday Flashback

Milo recently celebrated his one-year anniversary at The Little Gym.

Bubbles have always been one of his favorite parts of every class. In the beginning, he enjoyed bubbles like this:

Check out that baby Mohawk!

Now, he can chase them all by himself.

I can't say enough good things about The Little Gym. Milo and I have made some good friends there, and he always has so much fun. It's amazing to see all the changes and advancements. I'm looking forward to watching all his fun in the years to come.

Wordless Wednesday

Friday Flashback

Last August, Milo was getting his first taste of "solid" food.

Now, he chooses what he wants to eat and feeds himself.

Mostly Wordless Wednesday

Self portrait

Friday Flashback

Remember when I freaked out about this:

Yeah, I was silly.

16 months

Dear Milo,

Another month has come and gone -- another month filled with excitement and some truly scary moments. Just this weekend, you made your first visit to the ER. You were pretty much unfazed by the entire episode. Your Daddy and I are still reeling from it. You were back to your old self the very next morning, trying to give me love headbutts and giggling like mad.

Our other big milestone this past month is that you are finally and completely weaned. One morning you got up and instead of asking for Mommy, you asked for yogurt. And we haven't looked back. Honestly, sweetie, I don't miss it. I don't get to hold you as much but I can live with that.

We were both sick this month, you for a couple of days and me for a couple weeks. That kind of threw off our normal schedule, and we're still working to get back into a routine. We hung out at the pool a few times with friends and you loved it. So much that you tried to go into the "deep" end on your own. I tried really hard not to freak out about it.

In other news, we got a new roof on the house and we got air conditioning installed. Both have helped us all sleep better.

We tried to take you to see the president when he spoke in town, but we arrived too late to get in. We missed out on that but we took you to the park, and you got to see a real-live train go by. You were fascinated by it.

So much has happened this past month, I'm having a hard time remembering it all. You seem to be constantly hungry so I expect a big growth spurt soon. Your feet are growing fast so maybe you'll soon catch up to them. I think it's part of the reason you seem clumsier than before. And maybe that contributed to your unfortunate fall.

Your personality is bursting. You are funny and sweet and sometimes a humongous little bit of a brat. You're definitely all boy, with your interest in trucks and trains and dinosaurs. You're awesome, even when you are exhibiting signs of entering the terrible twos. Sometimes I'm not as patient as I'd like be but I love you through it all. Mostly because you're so incredibly, undeniably cute.

Love,

Mommy

Mostly Wordless Wednesday

Chicks dig scars.

Daddy Talk: Being a parent

Boys will be boys and boys will bang their heads. I have plenty of scars to prove it. Plenty on my body and plenty on my dome. I know that one of those was because my uncle was bouncing us on the bed. I know he didn't mean anything by it but I took a wrong bounce and put the back of my head into the dresser. Left a nasty gash that had to be stitched up. I know my uncle never really got over it, it still makes him sad to think about. I think at the time my dad was deployed to Germany so he missed out. I never got to ask him how he felt about it.

It was my turn just recently, although not directly. I let my boy toddle right into the corner of a sliding door. Man, there was blood everywhere or at least it seemed like it. In reality it was maybe a teaspoon. But it was dripping into his eye and I couldn't do anything about it. The boy took it so much better than Dad. I was ready to bolt to get something, anything to fix that boy's face. All the planning I did for emergencies went away just like that. I didn't have my trauma kit, not even a first aid kit. I looked around and all I saw were paper towels. I couldn't use that, I was about to rip off my shirt until Pam grabbed a cloth towel used for decoration. It stopped the bleeding or at least caught it.

Pam calmed me down a bit and we waited til the EMTs got there to assess the boy. Most of the crying was done by the boy right after it happened. After that he was more upset about us fussing over him. This being my first rodeo I didn't handle it like I wanted to. I was ready to get going and get him fixed but I wasn't at all calm and steady about it. I had to get something done, anything. I know that's normal and these things happen. I think I should be proud I didn't bolt and held my son without getting queasy. And I need to thank Pam because she was calm.

Friday Flashback

Milo, last August, hanging with Daddy.

Milo, now, watching the trains with Daddy.

 

Look at my teeth!

Daddy Talk: Confused and Concerned

Last year I bought a small safe to keep my gun locked up. It's a Stack-On PDS 500 digital safe with a keyed bypass. I mention the keyed bypass because it was a selling point. In case the battery of the keypad dies, you can grab your handy key and unlock it. Lucky for me, in case that ever happens and I really need to get my gun I found out that all I need is a paperclip to get it opened.

You have to do a little work, I mean you have to open up the paperclip. Other than that, slide the small side of the paperclip and twist. And just like that it's open. I found about it from an article in Wired. It happens that a number of those safes are vulnerable and it's been blamed as contributing to the death of one child. The obvious thing is that I stop using it, no question of that.

The confusing and concerning thing is when I tried to ring the bell and let everybody I knew who was involved with this product how bad a danger it was. I purchased it from Amazon.com and thought it would be a good idea to let them know what was going on. It took 20 minutes to explain what was occurring with the safe and how easy it was to open. At first what occurred was that the representative was very sorry for what was happening and offered a refund. I went into how dangerous it was that the safe was meant to store guns and could be opened with paperclip. They apologized profusely and passed on my information to their safety group and that was it. The product is still listed on Amazon's site and is still being sold. No warnings, no nothing. The best that I could do was post a video as review it as 1 star to warn everybody else.

I then called Stack-On directly and was sent a form letter via email. I don't understand what's going on with these people. You get some little kid's finger tips cut off because parents are folding up their kids in the strollers and companies go out of business. This company has a product meant to keep firearms locked up and you can beat it with a paperclip. Why aren't they all over trying to get this fixed. The Wired article said that they let Stack-On know months ago and only came out with the report because they wouldn't respond. Thank God they did because it would have never occurred to me that me being responsible by locking up my firearms would be deadly to my son.