A Tough Week

It's the beginning of a new school year, which means that it is time for Joe to move up to a new class -- from infant to toddler. As it is, we were driving 2 hours a day for Joe to go school and it was really becoming difficult, so we decided it was the right time to switch his school. He had a normal first week and as a former child care provider, I know that it's always harder on the parent than on the child, but it's much harder to be on the other side of things than I ever imagined it would be.

His reports for his first week were as follows:
9/7 -- "Joe had an ok day. He got to know his teachers and other friends in class a little. He had some happy time and was a little sad. He ate good and did work on colors and shapes."
9/8 -- "Joe had a very good day. He started off with different table toys, puzzles, etc which he loved. We worked on the alphabet and colors."
9/9 -- "Joe had a wonderful day. He played with play-doh, coloring and puzzles and we read the book 'Ten Little Monkeys'. He was happy overall and cried very little."
9/10 -- "Joseph is getting there. He has happy and sad moments. Please bring pictures of his family for Monday so we can share them with the class."

I'm afraid that if I got a report, it would have looked something like this:
9/7 -- "Joe Momma burst into tears and refused to let go of Joe for five minutes. We had to pry them apart and force her to go to work."
9/8 -- "Joe Momma rocked Joe in our rocking chair for 5 minutes, cried and then went to work. She did slightly better today."
9/9 -- "Joe Momma did not cry, but instead got angry and threatened us that if we didn't do a good job taking care of Joe she would break our legs."
9/10 -- "Joe Momma is the most difficult, sensitive parent we've ever had."

Hopefully I'll do better next week. Here's a couple of pictures that his new school gave me. They had a welcome sign for Joe this week and also gave me a couple prints of Joe playing with his new friends. My scanner's down, so it's a picture of a picture, but you get the idea. All I know is that I'm so happy it's the weekend.

Class Picture

This is Joe's teacher Judy and his class (L to R): Finnegan, Ava, Zachary and Joseph (or as I know them, Finn, Ava, Zach and Joebertson)


Wonderful kids, wonderful teacher and wonderful place for Joe to spend the past 9 months. Look how happy they are! If a normal picture says a thousand words, this one says a million. I also want to note that Zach and Joe are the same age and represent the smaller and larger end of the 16 month spectrum. :) Love it!

Water Sports and the Black Eye

Joe says, "MOM! I'm so MAD that you missed a month of the blog!!!" Well, it's been rather busy around these parts and I got behind on the updating. I hope to make up for it with an extra long post of pictures this time. The picture above is Joe in the middle of a tantrum -- he has those now. They are short and to the point and happen occasionally when he doesn't get his way. Joe Daddy and I think we're hitting the "terrible twos" early. He gets frustrated, but doesn't have the verbal skills to express what he wants or why he's upset, so he usually slaps his hands on the ground, pinches us or falls onto the ground and whines. Nevertheless, it's rare and we hope it stays that way.

I'll start with the bad news first:
Joe got his first black eye this past month. He got into a fight with the rocking chair at school and the rocking chair won. Poor Joseph! They applied ice and by the time I got to school, he was playing and having a good time, so he seemed to be a real trooper about it. It faded in about four or five days.


In better news... one of the reasons why the blog was not updated in July is that I got to spend the first part of the month in Omaha with Joe's Aunt M! I had some work drama that ended with me getting some time off and a big promotion, so naturally I hopped a plane to O-town just as fast as I could. It was great to see M and finally get to check out Omaha. We marched together with her church in Omaha's annual Gay Pride Parade, which was a lot of fun. Omaha is a nice place and her church is one of the most welcoming, loving places I've been in a long long time. I hope to visit her again soon (like when her Jeopardy episode airs?) and maybe take Joe and the crew with me.


When I returned, the summer was in full swing, so we took Joe to the fountain at Joe Daddy's work to see if Joe might be interested in swimming a little this summer. He really didn't want to get into the water any more than just getting his feet wet, but he still had a lot of fun.




Uncle J came to stay with us for just over a week while he had a conference in the area for his work. With the extra help, we decided to take Joe to the beach. Joe was stunned by the ocean and spent most of the time sitting in one of our laps and watching the waves come up and go back out over and over. He did a little bit of playing with buckets and shovels in the sand and overall handled the whole thing very well. I think we'll try it again later in the summer!






Finally, just a couple of days ago, I went to visit the boys I used to nanny. (My "practice children"!) They loved playing with Joe and were very sweet to him. I can't believe how much they've grown!! Time flies! Before we know it, Joe will be their age.

If you haven't done so in awhile, I highly suggest going back to some of the first blog posts and watching a couple of the videos. It's unbelievable to see Joe so young that he couldn't roll over yet or so small I had to feed him Pedialyte from a medicine dropper. It's one of the reasons I created the blog in the first place -- you can really see the progress that Joe has made! See you next time!

Daddy's Home

After two weeks living it up in the Motherland, Joe Daddy has returned to P-ton! I officially survived a 2-week stint as a single mom! Joe and his dad have been spending the weekend re-bonding.


Joe Daddy was surprised by all the new things that Joe has learned just in the past 14 days. Things like stacking stars and blocks, feeding himself with a fork, using a box like a slide, opening and closing drawers to get his toys, and in general he just "seemed more like a little boy". Here's a video of Joe Daddy witnessing another one of Joe's many new skills:



For the first time ever, I'm going to let Joe himself conclude this post. I, Joe Momma, proudly present for his blog-hosting debut... well... take it away, Joe-bert!

Father's Day

It's a tough night in the Carnes abode because we're missing our fearless leader. Joe Daddy is halfway through a two-week adventure in England. He's there for a conference and unfortunately it falls smack on top of Father's Day. He was invited to go last year, but asked to postpone it until this year so he could be with Joe during his first couple months of life. Needless to say, there wasn't any Father's Day celebrating going on around here today, because we're holding off until Joe Daddy returns this coming weekend.


I've been doing ok as a single mom thus far. There was one mishap (see pic above). See that little pile on the floor in front of the high chair? Yeah, that's poop. Joe poop. I got him ready for his bath and he took off into the kitchen butt-naked, squatted down and BAM. Better there than on the carpet, I guess!


I would be remiss if I didn't send a shout out to Uncle J who came up this weekend to help me wrangle Joe so that I could get some chores done (groceries, laundry, etc). He watched Joe solo on Friday from 8:30-6:30 and quite a bit the rest of the weekend too -- and OH all the poopy diapers! Joe had about a dozen of them and Uncle J changed almost all of them. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you! He left a couple of hours ago and Joe cried big crocodile tears and stood at the window to watch him leave. That's babies for you, though. I tried to tell him to keep it together, but he just doesn't have the kind of poise and composure that I do. (That's my story and I'm sticking to it.)



The video above shows that Joe is just as ornery as ever. I love watching him explore everything. I don't mind if he destroys a whole roll of toilet paper, because it's only 50 cents and I've found that if I let him have his way with something he wants to explore, he gets it out of his system the first time and leaves it alone after that. Reverse proof is that I won't let him touch my computer and he's constantly trying to figure out ways to get to it.



This video is for Aunt M who said that she was in withdrawal from missing Joe pics and video. Nothing interesting happens in the video above -- it's just Joe eating some Easy Mac, but it is like two minutes long, so hopefully it will help quell some of her Joe-needs.

Joe gives kisses and blows kisses now, but only sometimes and only to those he loves. He's very selective. Uncle J get about two dozen on his way out the door. I got quite a few when I offered him bites of my pasta lunch today. He says "hi" "bye" and "yeah" all the time. I love that he learned "yeah" before "no". Also, he uses everything as a phone. The remote, his toys, his food -- he holds anything to his ear and says, "HI!" and then "bababa" and then "BYE!" Apparently I use the phone too much?

I'll update again for Joe Daddy's homecoming! Much love to you!

Training for Everest

Joe had his one-year doctor's appointment and passed with flying colors. He is still off the chart for height and head circumference and barely on the chart for weight. The calculations over the past 12 months have come in and his final height should range between (drum roll....)

6 feet 2 inches to 6 feet 4 inches! Holy cow!

My brother is 6'4" (and I, at 5'9" am 5 inches taller than the average lady), so it's not a complete shock, but it does pretty much guarantee that Joe is going to be (possibly a lot) taller than his daddy. Exciting! The world needs more gentle giants.

Also taking him to new and exciting heights is his newfound love of climbing. He loves to climb up stairs, playground equipment and anything else that he can get leverage on.


This video shows the climber in action. Be sure to listen carefully to hear Joe's conversation with me. He's definitely trying to chat nowadays!



In child care news, Joe Daddy and I met with an awesome lady who has two kids and is looking to watch a third out of her house in a nearby town. We tested the waters with a quick 'playdate' and her older child (a boy who is almost 3) just fell in love with Joe. They played together and Joe followed him around and it was pretty amazing. As with most people around these parts, she has a huge house full of amazing toys and a big backyard with a playground. The kicker is that the amount she said she would charge us is almost half of what we are paying now. So, a child care change might be in our future. As always, I'll keep you posted.

Tomorrow is Mother's Day and I have already received flowers and my first ever professional massage! It was quite lovely. I've had a couple of great meals and of course, I've gotten to spend time with my wonderful boys. In addition, I substitute taught in P-ton Regional Schools for the first time on Friday and got this lovely note from one of the kids at the end of the day. I think I'll keep it in my back pocket in case I need a little reminder that I rock. :) Happy Mother's Day to all you wonderful momma's out there! You rock!

Happy Birthday, Joseph!

I cannot believe it has been a whole year. It went by so quickly and yet it feels like he's always been with us. We had a small gathering of Joey's closest adult friends and ate cake and ice cream -- and opened presents of course! Since it was Easter, Joey's cake was in the shape of a baby chick.


I also made a regular cake for the adults separately so that Joey could destroy his cake as much as he wanted and we could still eat too.


Here's Joe opening up one of his presents -- he's moved up to a full set of keys on his baby piano! He had mastered his 4 key baby piano, so it was clearly time to move on up, even if the box said "18 months+".


Here's the birthday group (minus Joe Daddy who was taking the picture).


And here is the obligatory "baby stuffing his face with cake" birthday photo.


Finally, at long last, I am ready to reveal my birthday blog surprise.

I can't put into words how wonderful it was to watch Joe develop this year and how much I love him. He is everything that anyone could ever want in a child and more. Rather than write out a 'retrospective' of the year, I decided to make a video. Without further ado, here it is: