Return of the Max

After almost two weeks of Upset Max, Irritable Max, Frustrated Max and Inthedumps Max trading places as our son, we're pleased to announce that our son is back. Max has been out of sorts ever since coming back from Easter and we weren't entirely sure what was going on. Until a child can speak, the parents can sure get up to a lot of guesswork. We figured that his attitude could be chalked up to anything from the change in scenery while the house was getting packed up, to going back to daycare after an extended leave, to a growth spurt, to communication frustration, to ???. We were pretty confused. In retrospect, one of the key things that was happening during the days when Max was unhappy was that he was generally sleeping pretty poorly, getting up twice a night. I'm not sure if the lack of sleep was the cause or the symptom, but he's put in three good nights in a row and is back to his old self. Want evidence? Here's a video of what he's doing right now:



It should be noted that Mommy had shared her Drumstick with Max about half an hour ago, so this could have something to do with that. Also, it's mega trippy to start the first one and then the second right after so that he's doing loops on both at the same time.

This past week, we celebrated our 8th anniversary (yes, it's coming up this next week, but the annual Bon Appetit Ottawa event was on last week and that's what we decided to do). Grandma H spent the evening with Max, first taking him for a swim and then hanging out with him at home. It was awesome to be able to get out for a special evening so a big thanks to Grandma!! Oh yeah, as for the swimming, it's as if Max was never in the pool last year. The only difference is that now, when I have him in the pool, instead of just crying he actually cries FOR HIS MAMA. It was one thing before to just laugh it off, surrounded by a bunch of parents of new swimmers, some of whom were in the same boat. Now, I just end up looking like I'm torturing the little dude - the other kids in the class are older and all well adjusted in the water. We've only gone twice though and I'm sure things will turn around like they did before; I just hope that it happens a little quicker than before.

Footnote: when Grandma got home from the pool, she washed the chlorine off Max in the tub...allegedly, upon exiting the bath, he ran to the top of the stairs and shook the gate, crying for his Mama and Dada. Awesome, but not for Grandma H I suppose.

Speaking of asking for his parents, when I hang out with Max at home or in parks, he often lets out a "Mama" or two. So the other day, I asked Holly if, when she's alone with Max, he ever asks for me. She said yes, but I still never really got the sense that he ever had a super strong urge just to hang with me. This morning, I got him out of his crib and we were reading on the floor of the guest bedroom. Holly came in to check in on us and Max actually went over to her and gave her a hard shove out of the room. !. We were flabbergasted. Max came and sat back down and that was the end of Mom time for a while.

The only other thing I wanted to mention is that Max is getting a lot more vocal these days. He has picked up a couple of new
words, one of which should prove to be very interesting over the next while. The innocuous word he has picked up is bulldozer. Sure, it comes out as whoa-wuh-wuh, but he only uses it when he's actually looking at bulldozers. The other word is the dreaded "mine". I think that, aside from "no", this was the early word that I was least looking forward to. The other kids at daycare "mine" a lot, so it was only a matter of time. One of the most curious applications of "mine" is when he's reading some of his construction equipment picture books, he likes pointing to one of his riding toys and saying "mine", as if to remind us that he has a construction-like toy too. Time to get some kids over here and give him a crash course in sharing.

Here are a couple of recent pictures of Max:


Max packing up the old house with his family.

Max, mid-wave, hanging out with some dogs in the Home Depot parking lot.