Grams and her tutelage of Logan among other things

This week Logan was needy of more attention from Dad and Mom, but Grams
did a great job in giving the decrepit old folks a break. She got up
with him in the mornings and slowly but surely has weened him into
accepting her for reading stories before nap time and bed time. Yay
Grams! Grams has been sleeping with Logan and she has indicated that
Logan has occasionally been talking in his sleep, first saying Mommy
Mommy then going back to sleep.... then a little later calling out Daddy
and Baby <the new baby's name which I won't repeat yet until her
birth>... then a little later calling out Grams! Lately Logan is
fixated on asking people "How old are you?" When we answer with our
age, we ask Logan "How old are you Logan?" to which he replies, "I am
two years old."
Logan is getting better at saying "please".
At the pool on Thursday he was doing really well in the water, kicking
well and swimming well, seemingly very comfortable and confident in the
water. His lips turned blue and he had to get out to snuggle with a
towel with Mom, but then he got right back in it.
Logan is starting to get into imagination play. Two weeks ago he made
up little tea parties and served us up little eggs. Then last week he
lined up his trucks and cars in a row. This week he's lined up
dinosaurs as well and sort them and arrange them around his train
table. So he is starting to be able to play better on his own, albeit
he still prefers attention and a playmate like Mom, Dad, or Grams, to
get down and dirty with him. Evidently Grams played hide-and-seek and
got stuck in the little play-hut house and tunnel and tent. Logan had
to pull her from the tunnel :-)
Logan has been always wanting to make his own eggs and banana milk in
the kitchen these days... whatever he can do he will.
This Saturday morning Logan woke up with Grams about 6 and they played
and let Mom and Dad sleep in until 9 AM! Actually Mom gave Dad a
haircut at 8:30 AM without Logan to distract us so that was great.
Evidently Grams did a lot of swinging of Logan on our backyard swing and
they counted each swing up until 60 during one series of swings.
Afterwards Dad took Logan on Logan's bike for a walk to the Connellan
Air Museum where there were a couple old vintage airplanes on display.
Anything that moves on its own has a great fascination for Logan so
that's always good. From there we headed towards the Strehlow Research
Centre. It is a museum with a number of stuffed animals, from birds to
bats to butterflies to various mammals like numbats and bilbies and
Tasmanian Devils. There were also a number of birds, some with skeletal
displays showing us the largest birds that ever existed (about twice the
size of an ostrich or emu). There were also rocks and meteorites.
Logan was scared off by a large lizard and a 'coyote' as he called it,
but it was really a dingo. He liked it for the most part, but enjoyed
going up and down the gangway and stairs more than anything else.
Outside we could hear a train in the distance and Logan proclaimed
'Train whistle!' and desperately wanted to sprint off on his bike in the
sound's direction. Back at home Logan had a bit of a meltdown after
Mom left to go get some bread, but a good hearty lunch of yoghurt,
chicken, noodles, veggie, strawberries, and blueberries perked him back
up in time for Dad to put him right back down for a nap. Just before
naptime Dad changed Logan and while doing so Logan took a little hold of
his nipple and said out loud, "My nipples hurt Daddy." Dad always
gets to hear humorous things out of his kid's mouth and so the day is
never boring. In fact, just after nap time, a groggy and completely
'dead-to-the-world' little boy was carried out to cuddle and slowly wake
up in the Lazy-Boy chair with Dad. This was at his normal wake-up time
of about 3 - 3:15 PM. He wouldn't bat an eye or make a movement of any
kind, at least that is until his barely visible eyeball honed in on
Momma's bag of Reese's peanut butter cups on the kitchen counter.
Suddenly, as if a lightning bolt had re-ignited life into Frankenstein's
Monster, Logan alighted with such force and belted out the words, "I
want chocolate!" Somehow the thought of Pavlov's Dogs came to Daddy's
mind after that. Anyway, this was good because Dad and Logan were
going out to play with their pals Jesse and Bradon. First we went to
see if the go-kart track was open for some fast race-car driving.
Unfortunately it'd closed down and was now a 'nut' factory according to
the beer-swilling men who were sitting in the shade on lawn chairs just
inside the go-kart track compound. So instead we went over to the
re-furbished bowling alley for some fast-action of a different kind.
This was the first time in close to a year since Logan had played
bowling. He still wasn't completely into it, but he was certainly much
better and more excited about pushing the bowling ball down the ramp
towards the pins. Plus, he absolutely loved pushing all the buttons
there were as well as playing around with all the video games.
At night while Grams was putting Logan down to bed, Mom and Dad went out
for a walk on an extremely pleasant, cool and crisp evening. The sky
was cloudless and the half-moon with venus below it was especially
pleasing to the eye. This was the third night in a row we've gotten a
walk in thanks to Grams and we've enjoyed it immensely. On this
particular occasion, Logan's soon-to-be baby Sister was pushing her foot
out of Momma's belly causing a bit of laughter for Mom. The baby tends
to stir especially because we have the 'Baby Plus' on. Poor Mom has
been having a few issues with her inner little one in that she continues
to keep Mom awake at night. Last night Mom was up from 1 AM until about
5 AM. Eeek, guess we'd better brace for a whole lot more sleepless
nights all over again!
Sunday morning Mom was up at 5 AM and she had hoped Logan would wake up
at his normal time of late at about 6 - 6:30 AM. This was because she
was going to take him out on a little breakfast picnic at the park.
However, Logan as usual decided to complicate matters by sleeping in
until about 7:40 AM! So instead, we all packed up in the car and
headed off to Simpsons Gap National Park for a nice breakfast picnic
instead (about a 20 minute drive). With fortune smiling, we had a nice
cool morning to eat with little in the way of flies. Following
breakfast we hiked into the gap and spied a few wallabies as well as a
dragonfly, much to Logan's delight. It was just resting above the
waterhole on a rock and Logan felt compelled to disturb its peace just
like any little boy would.
Dropping Mom off at home for some rest, Logan and Grams and Dad went on
to the bi-weekly Sunday Todd Mall Markets, in which various craft and
food sellers set out booths along the outdoor pedestrian mall to sell
their wares. While Grams did some touristy shopping, Dad bought Logan
a chicken satay stick. You wouldn't think he had had breakfast based on
how fast he devoured the thing. Dad then got a chilli and cheese
kranski sausage (a yummy delight for Daddy). Logan still helped eat it,
but just the bun and onions. Logan then had more than enough energy to
experiment with going down and up the escalator at the shoppiing
center. Then he helped Dad get groceries and some Thai food for Mom
from the little Thai food stall. Naptime and afterwards we had a grand
dinner with friends at their house, as always a really nice thing when
Logan can play with his pal Bradon. Logan still doesn't play very well
with Bradon's younger brother Seth, but he appears to be dealing better
in some regards with behavior issues. For example, Logan and Bradon
were jumping on the trampoline. Bradon gave Logan a little push and
Logan fell down. Instead of crying about it and pushing back, Logan got
up (very upset) and told Bradon to "Stop pushing!" He did say
more loudly than he should have, however. The fact that it was loud
and demanding towards Bradon caused Bradon to become quite upset
himself, but I believe it might've gotten the point across to him and
Logan did well in not reciprocating the pushing act. At dinner time, the adults were enjoying themselves when out of the background there was suddenly a large eruption of laughter. Logan and Bradon were going into fits of hysterics at their picnic table all because they were saying the words "Silly willy" over and over back and forth. It sure is great when something so simple can cause a couple little 'normal boys' to entertain themselves with such talk :-)