Jamie Chew's Web Log: Vol. 0 No. 87

2005-07-05 24:29 (Kristen) Jamie slept in today, and woke up with some difficulty. However, he was more than happy to spend time with Mio when she arrived. Jamie went with me over to Browning for lunch, played for a while, and then went on a walk with Ken and Ross.

Probably because Ross was there, talking, and therefore interesting, Jamie did not sleep at all on his walk with Ken and Ross. He came home at 2:45, wide awake. I thought of nursing him to sleep, but John's pareents and his friend Alan Kastner, who is visiting from Japan, came over with lunch and we decided to feed Jamie some more food to see if it would help with the nap. He did finally nurse himself to sleep around 4:30/:45, and he stayed asleep for about an hour, which is normal. He was not really awake when he started to cry, and I thought that it would be best to let him wake up rather than not go to sleep later that night. He really wasn't ready to wake up, however, and cried and carried on until I took him outside for a walk. He finally woke up fully and directed me around the block to Tom and Michelle's. He played there, still somewhat difficult to please, until John came over to start making dinner.

He climbed up into his own highchair to indicate that he was hungry, and I have to say that he is climbing everything lately: bathtubs, chairs, and just about anything that can be climbed. I'm soooo happy. He's pretty good at it, which does not ease my anxiety. [dry tone of voice] After a good meal and more than a few bites of key lime tart, which Peter and Leslie brought with them, he played with Gary and Ayami for a little while. On the way home, Gary pointed out a star in the sky to distract Jamie from the fact that the moon was not up. Jamie looked, and then waved 'bye-bye' to the star, which was very cute. He was finally in bed by 10:30, and fell asleep pretty quickly. I'm pretty tired myself.

2005-07-06 23:17 (Kristen) I was working pretty hard today again, and so asked Mio if she would mind keeping track of Jamie until 5:00. Bless her, she did. It wasn't too hard, I think: Jamie was zombie Jamie for much of today, preferring to sit in front of the tv and not do much. He didn't sleep very well last night, getting up before 8:00 after going to sleep quite late (11:30). So, it was very possible that he was just very tired. He did go to the playground with Mio for a bit, and Mio said that he played very well, although he was scared of the other children. This is a new thing, and I hope for his sake that it passes soon. I don't know the reason for it, either, but suspect it is just a phase.

He fell and scraped both knees a little, but was brave about it. We had lunch together, and Jamie wasn't all that hungry but ate to be social. He slept for about two hours, and played with Mio again. He was happy to see John's parents when they dropped by, and when we told him that our friend Jane might be here tonight, he clearly said "Jane." She'll like that. We took him up to the Scrabble club, and he enjoyed playing at the outdoor playground there. He was a little nervous about the other children until he found a little girl who was three weeks younger than him (but looked about three months younger, at least. She was tiny) that he enjoyed playing near. She was very outgoing, and I think would have won Jamie over on her own if he hadn't made overtures too. We stayed until 9:40, then went home. Jamie fell asleep in the car, almost in mid-bite (he was scarfing 'b's), and is now asleep in the bedroom, a perfect angel.

2005-07-07 23:10 (Kristen) Our friend Jane came to visit and we had fun spending time with her today. Jamie played with Mio, and about to settle into more television watching when Mio suggested that they go to the park. That got his attention, and the tv was unceremoniously dumped for a trip outside.

Jamie went for a walk with Ken after lunch, and slept for about two hours. John and Jane took him for a walk to the Big Carrot, and (unsurprisingly) stopped off at the playground on the way home. I traded off with John around 4:30, and took Jamie home around 5:00. Jane and John went off on their various errands, and Jamie and I read books and played outside.

Dinner was at Browning, and Jamie played with trains and with Gary in the basement along with Ross. I was very surprised to find them in the tent down there, as Jamie has been singularly uninterested in going inside it before now. However, I think that he's figured out that it's a little house, and therefore the greatest thing in the world. He really didn't want to say goodbye to gary, and didn't let him go until it was time to get into the bath. He was so very sweet, as John was scrubbing my back and Jamie insisted on helping. In the bath, Jamie did it again, on his own,and my heart just melted. He played with bubbles, and said "bye bye bubbles!" when it was time to dry off and go to bed. He's been restless tonight, and I think that he's having a hard time staying at an even temperature. His arm is cool, and his head, where it meetsthe pillow, is hot. Poor guy.

John says that Jamie was watching a busker play the violin at the Big Carrot, and made the sign for "more" when the person stopped playing. He put a coin that John gave him into the busker's box, and was disturbed that people were putting money into the wrong end of the box. There is a Right Way and a Wrong Way to do things in Jamie's world, and John says that it bears no resemblance at all to him either as a child or now, no sir, uh uh.

2005-07-08 24:00 (John) The peas that Jamie planted last week have sprouted, and I have to figure out a way to explain this to him. He's interested in the garden, especially inasmuch as it is a source of food. Today he ate our first day's harvest of five red raspberries, barely pausing between shoving them in his mouth and signing for more. He was also helpful harvesting herbs for spaghetti sauce, holding the herbs while I gathered them.

He understands at least an order of magnitude more than he says these days, and he says quite a bit. Taking him with his tricycle to Jackman School after dinner this evening I told him "feet up" without gesturing in any way, and he obliged so that I could push his (non-pedal) tricycle.

I tested him on his alphabet today. He can correctly identify 21 letters without prompting. He needed a second guess at K (not an M) and V (not an A), and isn't sure at all about Q, X and Z. Clearly, we're not playing enough Scrabble with him.

Jamie fell asleep in the bath tonight, with me singing Summertime after running him ragged for a few hours. I hope he sleeps well tonight.

(Kristen) John bought Jamie new sandals today, as his feet are growing at an astronomical rate. They're like puppy feet: little dogs with big paws that turn into huge dogs with big paws. He jumped from a 5 to a 7, and I don't think that those sevens have long to stay on his feet. He's gearing up for another growth spurt, I think. John also bought Jamie a pair of Finding Nemo flipflops, since he keeps trying to wear John's. He was delighted, but still needs work at keeping his toes clenched around the foot strap.

2005-07-09 22:00 (John) We got up at nine. I went to get my parent's car and took visiting Jane over to get her nine-year-old friend Jacob. With Jamie and Kristen (and stopping for more raspberries at bushes en route) we walked to Daniel's house, where Jamie spent two hours playing with Ross and Tom, and Jane, Jacob, Michelle, Daniel and I talked about anime and manga (and sigh, World of Warcraft). Kristen went out for coffee with her colleague Jenny while Jamie, my mom and I went to the market. Jamie wouldn't fall asleep despite heroic quantities of food, I suspect because he was too hot, until we were two blocks away the house on the way home.

Kristen quickly transferred him to the Zooper Buddy stroller, and I unloaded the groceries. Then while I took a much-needed nap, she took the sleeping Jamie to Alison and Kurt's for dinner, where I caught up with them an hour later by car. Jamie enjoyed playing at their house, mostly by himself but occasionally with Toni, and was generally too excited to eat even my Blueberry Sorbet.

(Kristen) Jamie enjoyed playing with all the toys at Alison and Kurt's, including the little push car they have. We are going to have to buy him a little pedal car or something soon, since it is clear that he thinks that they are so very great. One person remarked that Jamie was a very nice, easy-going kid to be around, and I beamed. When we got home, he made me read a book I got for him from the library about trains about eight times, and I think that we'll be buying a copy of this book before the renewals run out.

2005-07-10 22:30 (John) Jamie was in fine spirits all day long. He ate well, he ran around, napped for more than two hours, and is still up playing with Gary as I write this. After our friend Jane left this morning to go up to her cottage, he pulled out a CD that had her picture on it and said "Jane?", asking me to put it on for him. Of course a few minutes later it was "Arr, arr, arr!" so I had to switch it for a Rubbadubbers DVD, and then when that was done a Teletubbies video. Very clear ideas what he wants at all times.

Daniel and his family are up at a friend's cottage too, so we had our usual salmon dinner with my parents at our house, accompanied at Jamie's request by Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto played by Vladimir Ashkenazy, and the Rubbadubbers DVD.

That was the good news. The bad news is that one of his mosquito bites from when I went to Albany last weekend has gotten infected, and there's a patch about three cm in diameter of cellulitis that looks serious enough that we went to see the doctor. You can see it on his right arm in the photos. Dr. Laudansky (on call for Dr. Kennedy) told us that we were doing the right thing treating it with fusidic acid and ice, and gave us a prescription for cephalexin in case it got worse. We drew a ring around the rash after we saw him, and when the doctor called back to see how things were going six hours later, the rash hadn't spread, but it hadn't improved. Our current plan is to keep our fingers crossed for the night, but start him on cephalexin in the morning if there's no improvement by then.

2005-07-11 17:02 (Kristen) Jamie's upper arm is no worse, and starting to show signs of improvement. There is a second infection on a lower bite on his arm, but we're on it and it isn't getting any worse as of this afternoon. He is happy, active, and watching a little too much tv today. However, it is so awfully hot outside that it will be hard to get decent outdoor running around time until much later in the evening.

John has gone to get my mom from the train station, as she is passing through on a short trip. She was disappointed that Jamie wouldn't be able to come and meet her, but understood when I told her that Jamie couldn't make the trip in this heat in an unairconditioned car. We'll all waiting in anticipation, and look forward to spending a few hours with her.

2005-07-11 24:10 (John) The only thing hotter than the weather tonight is apparently going to be the weather tomorrow. Jamie's arm is stable, so we're sticking to the topical antibiotics and keeping our fingers crossed. We had dinner with Laraine, Millie, Jeff, Heike and Scott at the Sher-E-Punjab tonight, which given the hour, the weather and everything else meant that we got to spend a lot of time at the nearest playground, though Jamie did enjoy the mango shake and Mr. Singh made him a special order of mild tandoori chicken.

One good way of enticing Jamie out into the hot weather is to tell him we're going raspberry picking in the backyard, and it's not hard at all to tell him we're going back in. He usually has a full slate of indoor activities plotted out (play trains, read about trains, watch DVDs, watch VHS tapes, listen to CDs, etc.).

* For the benefit of Scrabble players, words that are not in the Scrabble dictionary are marked with an asterisk.

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