Desmond's Panda Party!

Desmond is TWO!

I admit we phoned it in a little when choosing his party theme, but he was such a big fan of Kung Fu Panda that we just decided to go with it.

Here is his fun day in pictures:


First, the invitation. As usual, I spent entirely too much time on this. In all of his recent pictures, he is dirty or has food on his face or has boogers, so we tried to get him to pose for a suitable invite photo. 76 pictures later, this was the best we could do.

As usual, Anita Schmitt made a gorgeous and delicious cake. (Always my favorite part of the party.)

Kung Fu Panda stuff proved surprisingly difficult to find, and 99% of it was for Kung Fu Panda 2, which came out earlier this year. But since I couldn't find much from the original movie, and because I knew I would be the only one who knew (until now), we got Kung Fu Panda 2 stuff. The banner is one. Plates & napkins were also technically from the wrong movie. Oh well.

Happy Birthday banner, which was hung in Desmond's

bedroom (long) after the party.

Bulk Chinese takeout boxes 

+ Kung Fu Panda (the orignal movie!) stickers 

= great party favor holders.

 

Plenty of people came to celebrate with us.

And of course, the movie played a couple of times during the party.

Patronized a local Chinese restaurant for our party fare. It was good, as usual.

Kung Fu Panda (2) plates. 

And more takeout containers for people to bring home leftovers. Which no one did.

The birthday boy ended up eating alone in the corner, but he was cool with that. 

Note the Thomas the Tank Engine pajama top, which he would NOT take off. Grandma had made him a really cute t-shirt with pandas embroidered on it, which he liked very much and wore several times - just not for his panda party. I guess that's being 2 for ya.

He eventually got some company. 

Presents!!

This guitar ended up being perhaps the best present of all. Who knew?

Panda Pillow (from Grandma & Granddad) immediately became Desmond's actual bed pillow.

Cake!

The aftermath.

Hey, look! It's Dexter! In pajamas! 

Note his absence from all previous pictures. He had a high fever for the whole party. He tried to tough it out for a bit, but instead threw up on the couch in the middle of the party. He spent the rest of the time in his room watching a movie on the laptop. Dad and Mom and Tootsie took turns keeping him company. His fever broke right as the party was ending, and he was good as new.

What a mess.

But the birthday boy sure is happy. :)

He looks sick, doesn't he?

Post-party cake? Don't mind if I do!

Finally, a simple thank-you note:

Desmond is 22 Months Old!

And boy is 22 months VERY close to 2, in so many ways. He is more hilarious, more energetic, more verbal, and much much more opinionated, all in one increasingly tall package.

Teeth: ONE new tooth since last month!  His bottom right canine came in on or just before September 18.

Height: Still really tall. Holding out for his birthday for an official measurement.

Weight: If anything, he's lost a few ounces this month, thanks to what we hope is just a standard toddler-esque finicky appetite. (see below)

Sleep: I can't say this has been his best sleep month. In fact, it's probably one of his worst since infancy. Waking up once a night almost every night, often waking up his brother (and sometimes being awoken by his brother). He's also just started, in the last week or so, employing stall tactics at bedtime and naptime. Says he wants a song (often, the "burp burp" song - the one we sang to both boys while burping them as infants. An odd resurgence of that one, I think.) or "rock-rocks," but really he's just stalling. He used to be the kid that would tell you, "Naptime!" and now he is the kid who stalls.  Thank god he is still trapped in his crib, or none of us would ever get any sleep.

Food: Ugh. While we could usually count on him to eat 3 breakfasts if offered, he now refuses food (all kinds of food) often, and when we find something he IS willing to eat, we shovel as much of it into him as we can. Of course, that's the same food he refused the day before and will refuse again tomorrow. So it's not so much what food it is but what mood he's in at the time. He still drinks a lot of milk, which I suppose is better than nothing.


Words: Favorite new word? "Nope!"  It is pretty cute, I must say, even when he is refusing to do things he really needs to do (see "sleep" above). Strangers laugh when they overhear him saying it. He does string some sentences together, but we're still mostly just working with nouns and verbs. "Mom! Fish! Watch! Fish! TV! Please! Fish!" (That's "Mom, I want to watch Finding Nemo, please.") or "Mom! Fish! Eat! Fish! More fish? Please?" (That's "Mom, I would like some of those delicious vanilla goldfish grahams, please!") There is also the occasional adjective - "yucky" or "orange" (his favorite color, I do believe).

Books: This is another one of his stall tactics at bedtime.  He still does legitimately love his books, but lately he asks for more and more instead of going to bed. He still reads a lot of Frosty the Snowman, and we had a great rendition of "Moo, Baa, La La La" a few nights ago. He also really likes "Good Morning Sun," which is where we learned that he knows what a rooster says. ("Ca ca DOO doo!")  It's a good thing he is so cute saying all of the animal sounds, because that humanoid sun is pretty creepy, if you ask me. (Why are their favorite books always your least favorite?)

TV: We've given up all pretense of being a limited TV family. Now we just turn the thing on and sometimes leave it on. Interestingly, Panda has fallen somewhat out of favor. The new go-to is Finding Nemo, which is kindof putting a wrench into our Halloween and birthday plans (both were going to be Panda-esque). I am considering telling them that the TV is broken for a while, but then I'll just spend all of my time breaking up fights or putting people in time out, so I'm not quite sure if/when that will happen.

Phone: His love for the phone hasn't diminished at all in the last month. Nor do we really expect it to for a while, actually. Usually, he doesn't really want you - he just wants your phone.

Colors: Still being quite the stinker here, and I can't tell how much he actually knows and how much is just laziness.  He definitely gets orange every time, and I know he knows yellow and blue. Green and red are still hit or miss, and he often interchanges pink and purple for some reason. White and brown are pretty solid, too.

Other Likes & Dislikes: Play-doh is a new favorite activity.



He picks a color, tells one of us to "oh-pum-it?!" He gets the play-doh out of the container himself. Then you have to mush it for him to give him a flat (ish) palette for him to make various impressions with different cut-outs. He loves it, and it isn't TV, so we are all for that. 

Outside is still fun, but he'll often choose TV over outside. It's that time of year with schizophrenic weather, too, which makes it a little bit challenging to find the right wardrobe for outside play.

OH!!  Songs!  Desmond does love singing songs. Especially "FAST!" like "Foo foo FAST!" (That's "Little Bunny Foo Foo," sung very fast.) Other favorites are Wheels on the Bus, Baby Shark, and Itsy-Bitsy Spider, all of which naturally come with their own fabulous hand motions. What did we talk about at dinner before we spent it singing Baby Shark? I certainly don't know.

I'll close with a few more pictures from today, because whatever I write wont' come close to Desmond's cuteness. These also show his raw nose, since he has a cold that requires constant nose-wiping, and his recent too-short haircut. (Note to self and future stylists - going too short on this kid means spiky hair.)

A Day in the Life

Tootsie said I should post this recap of our adventures this morning. So when you get to the part about giant globs of diarrhea, be sure to tell her that you didn't need to read about that.

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Sleep sleeps weren't so hot last night. Desmond slept through the night, though, like a champ. Dexter finally crashed at about 10:00. Woke up at 2:20. Ended up in our bed, where I "slept" on my allotted 8" of mattress for a while, then switched to Dennis's side, then switched back to my space. Dex was kind enough to scoot over 3-4 inches, so I might have gotten a whole foot for the last 2 hours of the night or so.

Dennis had an early morning. Dex woke up almost immediately after he left, probably because Dennis spent 5 minutes trying to be quiet while he filled his pockets with change, keys, his pocket knife, lighter, money clip, and work badge. I got up with him. He ate a banana, which mercifully did not break in half while we were peeling it. While i was brushing my teeth, Dexter decided to go check on Desmond. Thankfully, Desmond was actually already awake, but Dexter seriously does not understand that he is not supposed to go into Desmond's room in the morning. gah. 

Then they argued and whined and argued and whined. So I ran to get dressed quickly so I could get them dressed and to daycare.  They were in my closet on their rocking chairs (which they had fought over) when I went to finish washing my face. Then Dex comes in and says, "I pooped."  I said, "You want to poop on the potty?" (knowing he had already pooped, but I like to ask) Dex stuffs his hand in the back of his diaper and said, "No. I poopy."  Pulled out his hand, which was covered in slimy diarrhea.  Awesome.

So I brought him into our bathroom to wash his hands, strip him down, and start cleaning him up. He had diarrhea all over the back of his shirt and pants and didn't really want to take them off.  Then he was losing patience with my methodical removal of all of his clothes and wiping of residual diarrhea off of his neck and back. He cried, 'I want a new diaper!!!"  Poor kiddo. He NEVER wants a new diaper. 

The whole walk back to his room, he was obsessed with Desmond, who was still in our bathroom playing in the jacuzzi faucet. I finally got Dex cleaned up and went to check the rocking chair. Blech. Globby clumps of diarrhea in a single, significantly-sized pile.  At least it was isolated, as opposed to Desmond's last diarrhea, which he tracked all over the office and living room. 

I sent them both to school anyway. Dexter may well be done with diarrhea for the day, and if he isn't, this will at least buy me enough time for a shower, which I am headed to now.

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This is really all much funnier (sadder?) when you get the whole backstory that we have been battling diarrhea from both kids for almost two weeks, despite my best efforts to sterilize everything they touch. In fact, here's an update from June 12 (this past Sunday) to put things into perspective:

=====June12=============
Dennis and I spent 2 hours this morning cleaning up vomit and diarrhea. Desmond threw up at some point during the night, then he had a massive diarrhea explosion shortly after breakfast. Dennis found him in the middle of the living room, dripping with diarrhea. My mission then was to find the rest of it, since he had clearly traveled a bit with a leaky diaper. <sigh>  There was a big puddle in the office, and then a trail into the living room.  Managed to get it wiped up, then sprayed the floor with 409 and wiped that up, then got my steam mop out to do some more sterilizing.  Stripped the bed and the changing pad, wiped down the mattress and changing pad and all of the crib slats, put the changing pad cover, crib sheet, crib bumper, and crib mattress pad into the washing machine on HOT, then washed all of the pacifiers with soap & water, then boiled the pacifiers, then finally put on new sheets and a new changing pad cover. 

So, I'm pretty much afraid to send him to daycare tomorrow. Because if he goes and gets sent home, then he is home until at least Wednesday. But if we keep him home tomorrow and he gets better, he can go back on Tuesday. 

Oh, and Dexter had a "loose" poop right as we were finishing cleaning up after Desmond.  Seriously, I have no idea what the heck is making them so sick so often, but I'm ready to sterilize the whole house as though we were bringing home an immunosuppressed chemo patient or something.

I have about 80 hours of work and conference prep to do this week, plus general cooking/cleaning/laundry/bath/bed/etc, so I've got to say I really don't have time for any more diarrhea. :)  And Monday is a firefighting night, of course.  As is Tuesday.

I did some meal planning and am about to get dressed and head to the grocery store. Dennis took both boys to the fire house (with a fully-stocked diaper bag and 2 changes of clothes). Desmond will be more than ready for a nap when they get back. 

 

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See? Fun.  And really, I don't know what parenting hormone it is that makes you want to snuggle and squeeze your babies after you just spent 2 hours cleaning up their diarrhea, but I don't think humankind would have made it very far without it.