One Big Blur of Fun

My mom went with Nick and Henry and me this Saturday to the DuPage Children's Museum for their Family Fun Night. For Nick, it should've been called "One Big Blur of Fun" because he didn't stop moving the entire time.

Most of my pictures are blurry, but that's okay. Here is Nick playing in the music room.

Nick loved banging with those drumsticks, though I'm not sure if we can call the sounds he made "music." Notice how fast those drumsticks were moving.  :)

For a child as active as Nick, this museum is paradise because there is so much to see and do. It is loud, colorful, and filled with toys. His favorite part was the train. I was proud of how he waited his turn to drive the train. However, once he was sitting in the conductor's seat, my boy was not moving. He kept shouting, "All Aboard" and "Choo-Choo!"

Don't think that Henry missed out on the fun. He tried all kinds of things, including climbing up a squishy, wavy ramp. Henry loved people-watching most of all, though.

I noticed after I put Henry in these pants that they look like skinny jeans 'cause his legs are so chubby. Oh well, skinny jeans are in style now, even for guys.

One of the coolest things I saw for babies was this bar. It is set up almost like a ballet bar, but for babies. It had textured semicircles for them to feel with their baby fingers.

I'm so glad I took the boys. They had an excellent time, and slept like, well, like babies after all the commotion.

Fun, Exploration, and Snot: A Trip to the DuPage Children's Museum

I read this post today, entitled "Oh the Snot You Will See!" from a great blog that I love reading. I was sitting on the couch with a very sick, crabby little boy at the time. I laughed so hard at the poem that I nearly. . . well, let's just say that pregnant ladies have to cross their legs while laughing. This poem is so very true. But it also made me realize how Nick probably got sick.

The doctor said it's some sort of virus that causes high fevers and, well, lots of snot. He's had fevers as high as 104.6, and as his fevers spike, so does his temper. I have spent the last three days sitting around the house trying to placate him. My normally cheerful child has been. . . well, he's been kind of a jerk. The only plus is that he's been quite cuddly and wanted lots of hugs and snuggles. This is not a usual thing for Nick, who normally never stops moving.

So where did he pick up this bug? Last Sunday, Nick really needed to run around somewhere. It's been pretty cold outside, and this boy had tons of excess energy to expend. So Greg and I took him to the DuPage Children's Museum in Naperville. It's been about a year since we took Nick, and he was able to do so much more this time!

Nick met lots of new friends, and laughed and ran for three hours straight. He made a ton of noise. . .







































and danced up a storm.

Nick learned about simple machines (levers, of course).

He also picked up some kind of bug from one of the many germy children also visiting the museum. Sigh. I suppose picking up viruses and such is a normal part of developing his immune system. I'm definitely not going to stop visiting fun places for fear of germs.  But maybe, just maybe, I'll start carrying around hand sanitizer when I go to snot-infused places.

Random thoughts about my son's talents

Nick sure likes to make music. One of his first favorite toys was his little piano, and even at five months, he'd bang away happily at the keys, enjoying the noise. These pictures are from the DuPage Children's Museum, and I snitched them from my mother-in-law's camera, since mine is still in the shop. I think Nick would love it if I came home one day with drumsticks like this, with big rubber tips. My son has many talents, and loud music is just one of them. I wonder if he'll be interested in playing a musical instrument someday. . .

Today Nick was into singing and banging on things. After work, I had to take him on some errands. Through the blowing snow, we drove to the mall and I had to put him in the stroller while I handled some Christmas returns. He cooed and sang to every lady in sight, whether it was a clerk in the Gymboree or a little baby in a stroller. He also loved banging on the side of the elevator. Nicholas has this habit of trying to catch a stranger's eye and then smiling really big until they smile back. It's quite endearing, and it is interesting to see how people react, especially if they're people who aren't used to being around kids. So far he usually wins and makes the person smile. Today it was a somber-looking gentleman in a business suit on the elevator.

Then, after the mall, I had to go in for a blood draw. I have thyroid disease that's not well-controlled right now, so blood work has been happening more often. Anyhow, just while I was waiting in the waiting room to be called, Nick managed to traverse the entire huge room while humming to himself, walk by every single person and grin hugely, and destroy a magazine. I was chasing him the entire time trying to minimize the damage. He smacked on the fish tank and tried to tap the fishies, hung onto the leg of an older lady, and tried to steal a book from a teenaged boy. Then he removed the door stopper and began to chew on it furiously. This was in five minutes. I simply chased him as he waved the door stopper around.

But the most hilarious part was when I got called in for the blood draw. Nick is too big to sit on my lap while they stick me. Besides, he wouldn't be able to stay still. So I sat him on the floor with a magazine. He waited just until the lady had the needle in, and then he laughed and ran off. "Don't worry," the phlebotomist said, "he can't go far. We're enclosed by doors." However, Nick tried to pull a pile of papers off of the desk and laughed at us. Then he tore a sign off of the refrigerator and took off into the reception area, again singing at the top of his baby lungs. He was in the area behind the counter where the receptionists sit, crawling under the counter. Since I was immobile, I could only listen as Nick squealed in glee and crawled under their desks. He ripped a big orange sticker off of one of their printers and was hugging a receptionist's leg when I finally retrieved him. I do believe Nick made their day.

So why does Nick need a bath every night, anyway?

I have had quite an eventful evening. Nick has been as active as a monkey on speed, and I am therefore pretty exhausted. He seems to have gone from crawling to outright jogging in just a few weeks. Plus, I just spent the last twenty minutes cleaning up baby pee from all over the bathroom.  After cleaning a dirty diaper, I set Nick down on the bathroom floor while I ran him a bath. He has no control over that thing. It's like a fire hose on the loose. He managed to spray the floor, the cabinets, the clean towels, my socks, the rug, and the toilet seat cover. In hindsight, it was pretty funny, though I wasn't laughing. Nick was definitely laughing, though. He delighted in watching me crawl around cleaning up the mess.

Nick has had a lot of baths this week. Every day, in fact. Normally I wouldn't give a child a bath each day during the dead of winter, but there was no other choice. Suffice it to say that lately, my illustrious son has taken it upon himself to smear something or other into his hair every night, necessitating a bath. Tonight it was strawberries and creamed spinach. There just isn't a simple way to get that out of a baby's hair without a bath. But Nick really loves baths, so perhaps the food smearing is just a way to get an extra one.

I shouldn't say he was energetic all evening. When we first got home, he wanted to snuggle, and I sat down on the floor to play with him. Nick kept bringing me books and sitting down in my lap. Tonight he listened to five (yes, really!) books in a row. He especially likes the board books where he can turn the pages. He has an ABC book with a mirror on the "Y" page (for you), and he gets so excited when that page is coming up. In my opinion, sitting still for five books is pretty darned good for a 1-year-old. I think he would've sat for more if I hadn't had to get him his dinner.

These pictures were from last weekend at the DuPage Children's Museum. He really liked it there, because it was all hands-on. I took these pictures with the camera function on the videocamera, so that's why the quality is so poor. My regular camera has officially been mailed to Nikon, and until then, borrowed cameras or the videocamera are my only options. The wait to see if they'll honor their warranty is on. . .