5 on Friday, A Special Visit and Our Latest Disaster

Once again, here are 5 special reasons I am loving my boy this week:

5. Remember when I told you all early that Marino has a girlfriend at daycare (Delaney)? I seriously think he is in love. She was out sick on Friday, and when we got to daycare on Monday and he saw her, she yelled "MINO!," they ran over to each other and he was caressing her face! The daycare director also gave me a picture of the two of them hugging and Marino has his eyes closed with this huge smile on his face.

4. We're seriously in the midst of a language explosion! He says something new almost daily at this point. This morning, he was calling his friends at daycare by name "Kai Kai" (Kailani) and "Wy Wy" (Wyatt). Everytime he says something, I melt, his little voice is adorable!

3. Another example of Marino's great hygiene - he loves to wash his hands! Daycare has a handwashing station for the toddlers, with a little step stool, low sink, etc all reachable for the little ones. Today, Marino marched up to wash his hands when I picked him up from daycare- he just felt like washing his hands (and was mad when I turned the water off - no 20 seconds for this guy).

2. Wednesday, I taught Marino how to make a lion sound and clawing motion, in preparation for his lion Halloween costume. His "roar" is incredibly sweet!

1. Marino generally ignores any noise in the car...he likes to talk to himself (he stops talking if I talk back to him - he gets in his zone in the car). So, I was pretty surprised when he went completely nuts when "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley came on in the car. He was dancing - little arms flailing, little torso wiggling. I loved it - cutest moment of the week!

My father and stepmother were in town for a few days this week, so they came to visit us on Wednesday. Marino showed off all his wonderful skills: couch climbing, moustache touching, animal sounds, etc.

Last night, Marino had ANOTHER big accident. He was walking, tripped, and bumped his mouth on a toy. It should have been no big deal, but a series of bad coincidences made it so he bumped it precisely where a new tooth had just started to cut through (top right). He opened his mouth to cry and...blood everywhere. Agh. I called the pediatrician, but there was so much blood and crying that I couldn't get a good look. I just kept saying "Um, it looks really gruesome in there." She said if he didn't stop bleeding he needed to go to the ER and I was soooo not wanting another ER trip (does CPS come if you bring your toddler to the ER twice in 3 weeks?). I called my sister-in-law, Richelle, and she came and helped me hold him so I could see inside his mouth.
After he let me get a washcloth in there, it looked like most of the bleeding had stopped, but it was still hard to tell exactly what happened, since the tooth and gum looked odd. But he was acting happy and chewing on toys, so it didn't seem like anything too serious.

This morning I took him to the pediatrician to get his mouth checked out. She also went ahead and did his 15 month checkup (which was scheduled for tomorrow). She said that he had pushed the gum up over the tooth the was cutting through, exposing part of it. Above that is a pocket of blood (basically, a bruise). She the tooth will be fine, but it will likely be discolored (since its only a baby tooth, this won't ruin his modeling career or anything;)).

His growth has definately slowed a lot. She said genetics are likely taking over and he will probably be closer in size to my side of the family than Evan's. I'm 5'3 and Evan is 6'2, so there's still a lot of variation in how tall he may end up being. However, since he eats well and is still only in the 13th percentile for weight, he is probably not going to be a linebacker. We should know more when he is 2 (and the effect of his prematurity should be mitagated). He is a healthy guy and that is the most important thing!

He got the MMR shot today (I'm waiting for the other 15 month vaccine, chickenpox, for another 3 months). He was still sleeping at daycare, so I put him in his crib and he napped while all the teachers looked on in amazement that Marino was taking a nap outside of scheduled nap time;) I don't think he's ever stayed asleep all the way into daycare!

Hopefully the weekend will be accident free! Not sure how many more of these small disasters I can take!!