we're back!

Hi all - thanks to everyone for their kind sentiments regarding my grandfather. We definitely will miss him.

Back to the center of the universe (aka Nathaniel). Since it's been a while since my last post, here are a handful of tidbits about our last week or so.

Radiators
Radiators and mouths are not a good pair. Nate helped reinforce this last week when he ran face-first into a radiator. It wasn't nearly as traumatic as the broken head incident, but it did necessitate driving through a snow storm to visit the doctor. It looks like there wasn't any major damage, although there's a chance that Nate's teeth may turn black at some point. That may coincide with the halloween we dress him up as a pirate.

Talking
Nate reminded me that he knows so very many more words than I mentioned the other day. It seems like every day he says another word or two. Flower, shoe, car, hat, hot, cup, more... He's like a little, abridged dictionary.

Raisins
Most kids like raisins, and they are a healthy, handy snack. Easy to carry around, they don't go bad very quickly, are a good source of iron... you know. I used to like them myself, but since they've become one of Nate's favorite snacks, they have plummeted off my "things I like" list. Why? Because they result in very disturbing poops, filled with plump little raisins. Ew!

Tantrums
Nate's been throwing tantrums recently. He is also still throwing food. And occasionally he throws both food and a tantrum at the same time. I'm really not sure how to handle it. Anyone have any suggestions for resources about toddler behavior? When he's really worked up, he will stamp his feet and flail his arms around. It's really fabulous.

Duckie
On our way down to NJ last week we pulled over to a Barnes & Noble when Nate woke up from his nap, mainly so he could stretch his legs a bit. After laying down on the floor and throwing a small fit because we wouldn't let him pull all the books off the shelf, we made our way to the children's department at the back of the store. They had some Easter books and toys scattered throughout the area, including multiple versions of Nate's favorite stuffed animal, which we have cleverly named "Duckie." I forgot how good Duckie used to look, but over the past months he's been loved so much he looks like he was in a bar fight. Nate's favorite thing to do with Duckie is give him a big hug and then bite his beak and walk around with the poor duck hanging out of his mouth. Anyway, at the bookstore, Nate ran from display to display pulling all the clean Duckies off the shelf and trying to eat them. To top it off, there were a ton of truck books, and even one about an apple truck! This was almost too much to handle and Hurricane Nate took off through the displays biting innocent Duckies, saying "vroom vroom!" and grabbing apple books. We made it out relatively unscathed and got a truck book that enabled us to have an extra ten minutes of screaming-free driving.