Birthdays!

Noah loves birthdays, and birthday parties. 

A couple of weeks ago, in an effort to help him with days of the week and time in general, we got him a little wall calendar.  Every morning when I go in to get him up, he'll ask if Ma is home, and I'll say, "Nope, today is Monday, Ma is at work."  So, he's at least heard me tell him the day of the week for a while.  (Side note, Monday and Tuesday when I went in to get him, he told me it was Monday and Tuesday - wow.)

One morning last week, he brought up birthdays, so I got the calendar and showed him that today would be Ching's birthday and all the things he and I could do that morning for her.  He's talked about it every day since! 

First thing this morning he asked if I was ready to go to the store and get cake and candles and balloons for Ma's birthday.  He's so sweet. 

Still the Same

Over the weekend, I finally transferred the photo and videos from my phone to the computer.  I store all of our videos of Noah in my Google drive, so of course, after putting the new stuff in there, I watched a few of the old ones.  Wow.  (Unfortunately, the one I'm going to talk about I can't find a way to post here for you to see.)

I watched one from almost exactly three years ago of him out in the front yard with us.  The stunning part to watch was how he really wasn't able to speak at all.  He's always understood everything we've said to him, but it's amazing how slowly, but steadily his speaking has improved. 

The fun part was that other than speech, he's still the same kid.  When he saw that I was recording him, he ran over and wanted to see it.  Then he was looking for Ramen to come to the open screened front door.  Then he ran over to my car and tried to open the door.  Ching asks him if he wants to drive, and the one thing we can understand that he says is "Yeah!"  When that fails, he runs over to Ching for her to pick him up and then points at the car indicating that if he can't drive, she can take him wherever he wants to go. 

He still does all of those things. 

Happy

We thought we had escaped it, passed it by, but apparently not.  Neither Ching nor I like the song Happy at all.  Noah has never heard it in either of our cars.  But yesterday as we were driving Noah started asking for the "happy... clap your hands song."  Several months ago, Noah's teacher was nice and made us a cd of songs they sing in the classroom - typical old school kids' songs.  (We don't really like them either.)  So, we put in that cd and found "if you're happy and you know it..." - nope, that was not his song.  Poor kid, we were failing horribly and couldn't figure out what song he meant.

Fast forward to lunch time at a restaurant with pretty loud music.  Happy comes on and Noah starts dancing like a fool and is, well, happy.  Yep, that's his new song.  It seems they've played it for them at school.  Sigh.  He usually has better taste.

How Things Work

On Saturday afternoon, we had lunch at Uncle Julio's.  And while Noah loves their chips, he didn't get his standard order of fries.  Later, when we were home, he wanted his usual fries and lemonade.  We said we'd already had lunch.  So, he said we could go on a picnic, get money, and go to the store.  When that didn't work.  He said we could call and get some - like we call and get pizza or chinese food.  When that didn't work he said the brown delivery (UPS) could bring it.  Poor boy.  He knows how all this works, but it doesn't get the result he wants. (Yesterday was actually very nice weather wise, so we did get his fries and lemon and chicken and eat at the park!) 

A few times, when we've been at various stores and getting ready to leave, we've explained to him that we have to give them money first.  Now, if you handed him a dollar bill, he wouldn't know that was money.  (Well, we did finally do that yesterday, just so he'd have an idea.)  But, he's not ready to make the connection between doing X and getting money, and then taking the money to the store and buying things.  It probably won't be long though. 

Last weekend we went to Cracker Barrel for dinner, and of course, walking through the store part, he saw a car and a truck he needed.  He took the car to the table with us, and then decided he had to go back and trade it for the truck.  (It is a very cool, solidly made old truck.)  He and I are done eating, but Ching is still trying to finish.  So he tells her it's time to go and to get up and go give them money.  He was done and was ready to go home and play with his new truck. 

He's also very into looking at clocks and saying either where the little hand is, or where it should be for X to happen.  He has no idea how to actually tell time, he just knows there's a connection there somewhere.  

In, he's kinda crazy news.  About a week ago, Noah told me the light fixture in the stairs said Hi to him. Since then, he insists that it be on all the time, because it's scary. Then, when he saw the other one like it in the downstairs hall, he said it had to be on, too.

Our boy is crazy smart when it comes to observing how things go and using that to his advantage.  

120

I believe we're living in some pretty stupid/crazy times currently.  But I am also incredibly optimistic about the future.  I believe everything from peanut allergies to Alzheimers to diabetes and cancer will be cured.  I believe this country will be strong and prosperous.  Those sorts of things. 

I also believe Noah and his generation will live to 120 or longer.  (I personally plan on living to 100.) 

So when parenting a kid under 10 seems like it's all so Right Now, and then teenagers and people in their 20s are also living Right Now, how do I raise a son for the long life?  How can I possibly instill that notion in him?  How does it affect the decisions I make, and the ones we help him make.

One big issue would be dating and marriage.  If you're going to live to 120, why would you even bother with dating in high school or maybe even your early 20s?  How do you pick a career and stay open enough to the idea it will probably change several times, so be invested, but not too invested?  How do you stay open to changing some things, but being consistent in others? 

Look at how much has changed in the past forty years.  How much more will in change in the next 40?

I don't know.  I'm fascinated with both history and the future.  Does it help to take the long view?

Getting To Know Noah

Friday. Noah and I returned a book to the library and got a new one (for me - he gets library books at school), then we went to Chick Fil A and he got his favorite, a strawberry shake and fries, and then we did some shopping at Wally World.  Later that evening, I realized I had understood everything he had said to me that day. 

That is a big deal. 

I'm not sure we've ever really been able to describe Noah's lack of speech.  The problem seems to be that he gets in a really big hurry to get his words out - and runs it all together and it sounds like gibberish.  His teachers and speech therapist have worked really hard to get him to slow down so we can understand him.  He's made so much progress just since October, when he really got into the swing of the school year.

One result of his inability to really communicate with us was that we (I) often felt like we didn't really know him all that well.  With his new ability to communicate so much better, his personality and such is really starting to come through. 

He's kinda bossy.  More so with Ching than with anyone - she calls him her Tyrant!  His teacher told us, in addition to his ultra smart schemes (which are brilliant in avoiding confrontation) he tends to boss his classmates sometimes.  He likes to boss us, too.  Lately, when Ching gets home from work, he's even told her to go change clothes because he wanted her to wear a different shirt. 

He's a little bit ocd and a stickler for the way things are done and does not like change.  One of the worst parts of this is he just won't try new foods.  Again, his teachers are really trying to help us with this.  He's not as likely to tell them straight up NO, so we send a little bit of something in his lunch for school and they get him to at least take a bite.  Not being able to get up from the table and go play when the other kids do is a great motivation! 

Our favorite phrase of his comes from food - "I can't want it."  

He's incredibly stubborn.  On fb the other day I said it was like arguing with a jack hammer.  You're just not going to win.  He will repeat what he wants until he gets it.  Sometimes we can get him to do X instead of Y, but not always.

Speaking of stubborn, wow with the whole issue of pooping.  That's a whole post within itself.  Once again, at school the other day they noticed his need to poop dance and actually got him to go sit on the potty and poop.  We can't get him to do that.  He's still in diapers over night - so he's learned he can just hold it until sometime over night and just poop in his diaper and not the potty.  Sigh.  Soon we'll stop doing the over night diapers.  But he sleeps 10 to 11 hours and we know that's a long time to hold it.  We don't think he'd get up and go pee.  He still doesn't get out of bed until we come upstairs and open his curtains and turn on the light.  

He's also learned to use "tomorrow" - as in, "Noah it's time to take a bath," "no, tomorrow."  "Noah, we need to cut your fingernails," "no, tomorrow."

He's a smart kid.  I'm not sure we know how smart yet. 

He still loves to watch cartoons, these days it's Fireman Sam, Sheriff Callie, still some Curious George.   He has so many of them memorized.  And he still loves music.  He loves playing with his firetrucks and cars.  He has a very set in stone arrangement of these things in his bed when he sleeps. 

We hope to help him use these strong traits for good and not for evil!  Smart, stubborn, scheming, and handsome could lead to real trouble. 

Future Vacations

Last weekend, we took Noah to an RV show.  He loved it.  He checked out almost every single one, trying all the beds, pretending to cook when there were dishes visible, and pretending to drive all the ones he could! 

I've often wanted an RV.  But the reality is they're expensive and if you're not using it all the time, you have to put it somewhere.  And really, we're kind of hotel people! 

One trip we plan on doing eventually is to rent an RV and go through all the parks in Utah, then Yellowstone and Yosemite, see the huge redwoods.  All that.  Probably a month long trip.  An RV is just much easier in all of those places.

The second trip... I realized my parents' 50th wedding anniversary is in a couple of years.  None of us has ever been on a cruise.  Hmmm.  What started this line of thought was realizing that Disney World is just too big and too expensive and too crowded for our taste.  But, a Disney cruise might not be terrible.  So, I asked my folks about maybe doing a cruise for their anniversary.  That gives us all time to save up and find a good one - maybe Disney, maybe not.

The third trip...  Any time we've watched the Tour D' France, I've always thought that a fantastic vacation would be to rent a car over there and pick any of the Tour's routes and follow it.  Again, probably a three or so week trip.

But lately, with the help of HD tv, I've really started wanting to go to Switzerland and see the Alps and all the little Alpine villages and such. 

So yeah, a month over in Europe.

The fourth trip...  Of course, at some point we have to take Noah to Taiwan.  Ching's mother still lives over there.  She would love to go eat all of her favorite foods.  We have no idea what Noah would eat over there!  What's funny is that my 13 year old nephew is still into Japan.  We've toyed with the idea of taking him to Taiwan for his high school graduation.  Noah will be old enough for such longs flights by then!

It's a good thing Noah seems to love to travel as much as we do!