Jamie Chew's Web Log: Vol. 2 No. 75

2009-02-10 20:25 (John) Liam, feeling better, was just overheard naming the colours on his shirt to Kristen. Kristen was not sure whether he was saying 'red' or 'wet', and when she asked "Red?" Liam replied "Yes: 'aka' [red in Japanese].".

Jamie went to school in the morning, then to skating (I watched him skate slowly forward and backward, and stop correctly! Yay Jamie!), then to Jake's and to Charlie's while Kristen and I took Liam to see Dr. Kennedy. She reminded us that when a child is running a high fever and you run out of allowable daily doses of Advil, it's okay to give him the maximum dose of Tylenol as well; we prepared to do that, but then Liam's fever came down on its own, and as of dinner time he was his usual self again, apart from having to run back and forth between the dinner table and the toilet catching up on a missed day of eating and pooing.

The high point of my day though was unlocking Dry Bowser in Mario Kart Wii after three days of trying, with Jamie cheering me on. It's been a long three days for Jamie too, and while he quietly said "I'm pretty good at fast cars on Rainbow Road", he graciously let me finish that cup race myself for the unlock, before spending half an hour playing Dry Bowser when he should have been eating dinner.

2009-02-11 47:50 (Kristen) I didn't push Liam to do much today, so he had a pretty enjoyable day running around in his pajamas until after lunchtime. Jamie came in for a cuddle before leaving for school, but I didn't see him again until after he got back from Hakobune in the afternoon. Liam slept for about an hour when I took him for a walk, but I didn't expect him to sleep for much longer. Liam and I have been having a good time with each other lately. We spent most of our time in bed before we got up chatting, and Liam told me that John had hurt his knees, but that he went and got new knees ("I wish!" says John). He is stringing together longer and longer sentences, with increasingly complex ideas contained within them, but his ability to enunciate those ideas is lagging a little behind, and the ideas want to come out faster than he can find the words. Consequently, he often sounds like William Shatner overemoting when he speaks. "Papa...get...New! Knees!" Poor boy will get past it. The evening was pretty calm. Jamie had to make a valentine to give to his entire class, and was pleased with the result. After a bath, the boys were in bed around 9:45. Liam refused to calm down, however, and so Jamie and John slept in the other room while he calmed down enough to sleep, eventually.

2009-02-12 24:02 (Kristen) Liam and I slept in again, and John took Jamie to school in some wild and wet weather. When Liam was sick, he wouldn't leave my side, and cried if I put him down. Consequently, I was pretty inert for two days and I'm still having trouble getting back into gear, so the morning was (once again) somewhat slack. I did talk Liam into "making breakfast" with his toy food, and he spent the entire morning playing and not watching television at all. That was somewhat remarkable in and of itself, and quite noteworthy. We ate lunch at Browning and not a moment too soon, as Liam had only picked at breakfast and was quite hungry by the time lunchtime rolled around. He went for a walk with Ken while Jamie went to Charlie's to play for the afternoon. Liam woke up the moment Ken dropped him off, making his nap about an hour and a half in length, so I took him to Treasure Island for a bit before we went to get Jamie. Jamie was more than a little tired, but perked up a bit when we got home. The rest of the day was pretty average, without much to differentiate it from the usual sort of evening.

2009-02-13 23:13 (Kristen) Jamie had the day off school, and ended up going to Hakobune with Liam in the morning, instead of in the afternoon. John and I enjoyed some adult quiet time before going back to get the boys a little after one. They were both in great moods. John and Jamie dropped Liam and me off at home so that I could take Liam for his walk while John and Jamie went to pick Charlie up for a playdate. Charlie and Jamie played parallel to each other for an hour and forty-five minutes, until John said that Charlie had to go home. Then they wanted to play cooperatively. Sigh. Liam fell asleep quickly enough, and slept for about an hour and a half before he woke up and it was time to go home. Both boys were eager to go to Tom and Michelle's for the evening, and barely said "bye!" as John and I ran out of the house for a rare and much-looked-forward-to evening out. When we got back, around 9 PM, both boys were not particularly happy to see us arrive as it meant that it was time to go home. It sounds like Liam talked Tom's ear off, and that the boys had a great time playing together in the basement. Much "squishing" went on, and Jamie is getting better about playing physically with Liam, who is the more physical of the two boys. Liam likes to "squish" people, but after an unfortunate dinosaur incident yesterday, knows now not to bite people. Liam was exhausted, as was Jamie, and fell asleep quite quickly for him, nowadays.

2009-02-14 21:08 (Kristen) Jamie made some lovely valentines, addressed to "my family," which made us all very happy. I got big hugs and cuddles from both boys this morning, and I'm happy that Jamie comes to find me in the mornings for a hug and kiss if we end up in separate rooms in the night. Our sleeping arrangements: somewhat fluid. John took Jamie off to Nisshu Gakkuin, and Liam and I hung out until he got back. John took Liam to the market, and I'm told that he was well behaved while he was there. I took him for a walk, and he took longer than I thought he would to fall asleep. He slept until 4, which concerns me somewhat, as I really don't know if he'll be asleep before 11 as a result. I meant to take him out for a walk, but forgot to until after it was too late to do so. Jamie and John were home when Liam and I returned, and Liam, Jamie, and I read books for a while until Jamie went off to play Wii. He complained occasionaly that he was bored, and I treated the statement with the tickle attack it deserved. It's been a quiet evening, and I'm wondering what we can do tomorrow to get the kids out and more exercised. I'm voting for the ball room at IKEA, but we'll see how the day goes.

2009-02-15 23:29 (Kristen) Jamie came into our room in the middle of the night, but I only noticed when I got up to find out what was bothering Liam. When I got back, I found that there wasn't any room for me, and I picked Jamie up to put him back into his own bed. He sleepily asked why I was moving him, and I explained that there wasn't any room for me in the bed. He accepted this, and let me put him back. Liam woke up a few more times, but finally settled back sometime around 5:30, so I think that I was up the first time around 5:00. Both boys slept late, and so did I as a result. Jamie came back in when it was light, cuddled for a bit, then told me that he was going downstairs. Liam woke up a bit later, and I went to cuddle and play with him before getting on with the day. I was completely shocked to see that it was 10:25 when I got into the kitchen. Our day was off to a slow start.

We had breakfast, and then Jamie and Liam bickered over who got to play with Jamie's DS for a bit. They both love the thing, and I think that we're going to be investing in a DS for Liam for his birthday, just to cut down on the "Play with Jamie's DS!!" from Liam. Liam really likes a Japanese drum game--a baby version of Guitar Hero and the like--and playing ANpanman games. Jamie is obsessed with Lego Star Wars, and you can see where this is going... After a late lunch, John took the boys out for a long walk in the Don Valley for two hours, which both exercised them and got them out of the house. I got some cleaning done, and ate a peaceful lunch of my own, which was nice. We met up at Dairy Queen, where the boys refueled and we walked over to Browning for dinner. John and I made salmon dinner tonight, and Liam was just beat when we got to Browning. The boys calmed down and rested while laughing hysterically at Pingu episodes, and had a good evening before we went home. They went to bed relatively easily, considering...

2009-02-16 23:37 (Kristen) We slept in again today, although not as long as yesterday, and had another morning spent in pajamas. John slept in and had a number of phone calls, and professed amazement when he came downstairs at noon to find boys in pjs. We decided to take another run at going to the Science Centre today, despite knowing that it would be a madhouse, as we also knew that Charlie White would be most likely free to come with us. Jamie hadn't wanted to go yesterday because he wanted a friend to come and none were available. John took the boys around the centre while I had a nice rest in the cafeteria, and then we all had a snack when the kids were too hungry to think of anything else. We quickly went to the Kidspark! section of the centre, and I don't know what Jamie and Charlie did for the ten minutes we had before the place closed, but Liam was just crazy happy in the market area, with its realistic toy food and cash registers with "scanners". We will definitely have to go back sometime, just so that Liam can play there for an hour or two. Maybe some Wednesday, I'll take him there by bus and let him play as long as he wants. We rounded up the kids, took them home, fed them spaghetti, and then took Charlie home. Jamie and Liam were exhausted (Liam particularly because he hadn't napped), and so we bathed them at 7:30. Liam still had a hard time falling asleep, and took until close to 9, finally, to conk out. Jamie fell asleep not long after, as he'd managed to negotiate some playtime with Gary before going to bed.

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

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