Experiments on my toddler - #1 (well maybe #2)

I guess I have to count potty training boot camp as experiment #1 which turned out hellish but worked ok, so I have moved on to #2.  Cue the Mr. Burns laughing and finger steepling...

During a visit back to Texas (before the move) I was still a bit jetlagged and intoxicated up late.  As I flipped through the channels I landed on an infomercial for Your Baby Can Read.  I sat enthralled as these tiny little kids were reading words!  And, I mean tiny like 8 months!  Because of my teaching background in reading, I knew the value of kids being able to read young, but 8 months???!!  The skeptic in me is thinking that this is all a crock (a big crock too at $180)!  But, I continued to think about it and decided there might be something to this.  Because of the alcohol jet lag or my overloaded brain, I forgot about it (or maybe it was the high price tag).

Flash forward to this January.  At a visit to my best friend's house, I saw some flashcards on the floor of her son's room and asked her if it was from YBCR.  Of course it was and she demonstrated - or rather her 2 year old read the words on the flashcards!  I was impressed.   

I don't know that Dylan is a genius above average, but he likes to learn new things and I've noticed him comprehending and asking questions about the gossipy shit I've been talking to my friends about on the phone intelligent conversations Kel and I have (so he's already figured out how to eavesdrop AND not look like that's what he's doing).  But, and this is a big but...I was NOT spending $180 on this thing!  $180 on my kid's future doesn't seem like a lot, but most of you have met Dylan and momma likes to go to Vegas.  After some searching and bargaining I got YBCR for about $40.  Now, $40 I am willing to invest in D's future.

I won't bore you with the whole process, but basically you watch a DVD with your child over a certain period of time and go through ten flashcards with each DVD. 

We started this mid January and within a week Dylan knew 5 of the 10 flashcards.  What I realized though is he had memorized how they looked on the card and by background color (the cards have different fonts and colors...).  Because I'm so smart I wanted to be thorough, I tested this out.  I wrote down the words he knew on paper and he couldn't tell me what they said.  I also asked him to read me the words in a book (the same ones he knew) and he could not. 

We've been on this for about a month and now he's starting to recognize words in books that he knows from the flashcards, but more importantly he tracks with his finger on the page while we read and he points at words and asks me what they say.  It's a small step, but very important!  I think he's also getting the concept that letters make up words.  He loves the letter 'D' and points it out often.  

Also, another milestone - the word 'hi' was on the first DVD, but not on a flashcard in the first set of those.  It's also on the second video and in the second set of cards.  Without any practice on the second set, he knew 'hi' and read it immediately.  He loves has a preference for the color, pink and so all of the words on a pink background he knows.    

I haven't been able to capture anything on video yet - but stay tuned.  I'll try again in the next few days.

The flashcards     

Channeling some Creativity

Not long after our arrival back in Texas, the events started filling up the calendar and one of the first was a baby shower and girls' weekend in Austin. 

Back in Dubai, my friend Shannon taught me how to make a diaper cake and I really wanted to make one for this baby shower.  After a few trials of rolling the diapers and experiments with tissue (not to mention a few pricked fingers), I came up with this!  I was pretty proud that my first solo attempt came out so nice!  

Only in Dubai...

Let's play a game called 'picture this'. Ready? Now I know it's hard right now, (for those of you in the states since it's so freaking cold) but picture a hot, sunny, July day in Dubai around 115 degrees. There yet? Think sweat trickling down your back, breathing air that feels like it came out of an oven, and (by far the best one) smelling the funkiest body odor you can imagine. Good, now while you're nice and sweaty, I want you to picture a two year old who gets into everything! Now picture seven men in your house. They don't speak English well and they are packing up all of your stuff. Now picture trying to explain to the movers, who don't speak English well, that the floor is not a good place for a utility knife because the two year old who gets into everything will find it and quite possibly hack off an appendage. Oh yeah, and picture not having a car. So, when said two year old hacks off said appendage we will be waiting for the ambulance to arrive quickly 'inshallah'.



This is what I endured for four days, YES, four WHOLE DAYS (it took two days in Houston to get our stuff packed up), while the movers packed up the villa so that everything could be shipped back to Houston.



If that weren't bad enough...on day two of packing, I came down the back hall and stepped right into a massive puddle of water. I was washing the last of the laundry that would go in our suitcases and the pipe that the washer drained into had backed up again. All towels had been packed up so I had to try and soak up the mess with packing paper. Note to self: packing paper has no absorption whatsoever. While I'm trying to stop the water from hitting the already packed boxes in the entry, I look and see wet footprints going down the hall. Soooo, the movers had just walked through the giant puddle of water and not said a thing. Fabulous.



The next day I had a guy come to disconnect and move our appliances to a friend's. Surprisingly the appliance transfer went smoothly. But, I arrived back at the villa to discover MORE water! The hole where the dishwasher had been hooked up was flowing like a river, well maybe more like a stream, onto my kitchen floor. Seriously? I had no idea how I pissed off Poseidon. This time the movers noticed the water and made a packing paper dam to stop the water from hitting the boxes, but had done nothing to try and stop the leak. I got my hands wet, literally, and most of the rest of me trying to get under the sink and shut off the valve. No dice. And, you guessed it, the tools had already been packed. AND, Dylan is thinking that this is his new favorite play spot. I called the maintenance number for the villa and waited for three hours for Emrill to arrive. After a quick peek outside I see an Emrill van down the street. I walk over there and convince one of the guys to come and take a look and explain that I called several hours ago. He told me that they HAD come, but no one answered the door! Eight people in the house and no one heard the door?? Come on! So I harass the poor worker and he brings his wrench over and tries to fix the valve. After his fiddling he realizes that the valve thingy is stripped and they'll have to replace the whole pipe/valve combo. Great. Luckily he stayed and the rest of his maintenance crew came down and finished within a few hours. We moved into our temporary apartment that afternoon. I walked into the kitchen and I kid you not, there was water coming from the bottom of the dishwasher. That was the moment I decided to finish my Jack Daniels project.



On the fourth day the container was loaded and locked and our flight out of the oven was booked for a few days later. Two days before the flight Kel tells me that we don't have our passports back yet. His visa hadn't been cancelled yet, but mine and Dylan's had. Great. I just knew he wouldn't get his back in time and I'd have to fly yet another time by myself with Dyl. I think Kelly was secretly hoping it wouldn't come back just for that reason. Somehow, it all got finished up and with three passports we headed to the airport for our scheduled flight.

Checking out the boxes

Packing tape, more fun than cars!

He even found a place to play with his cars during the chaos

That's what the movers thought our names were!
At last! Loading up the container.