Night Terrors

Last night we had our first experience with night terrors. At 1:24 AM, Karston started screaming. He was blood-curdling and crawling to the top of the bed. Not matter what we tried, he wouldn't wake up. (You're not supposed to wake up a child having night terrors.) After twenty minutes of screaming with his eyes firmly shut, he woke up. He was in my lap. In an instant, he stopped screaming and opened his eyes. When he looked at me, he smiled and said Meow. So I called him my little kitty, patted him, turned out the light (the lower lip stuck out), and settled back in bed holding him tightly. He did it again for a couple minutes around 6:30 AM, but it didn't last as long. I would definitely say that night terrors are way worse on parents than on the child, because Karston didn't seem to mind at all, and we sure did.

Whew. We were staying at my grandmother's house (we were in Mountain City for her funeral), and moving stuff kicked up 30 years of collected dust. We were sneezing and blowing noses, and Karston's sleep breathing did not sound like his normal. So we're hoping that this experience with night terrors was caused by sleeping someone else (dusty), and that we don't do this regularly.

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Strongman

About a week ago (Daddy says two weeks), Karston was watching Curious George. George wanted to be big enough to ride the roller coaster, so he was asking for advice. The strongman told him to lift weights so he could grow big and strong. At this point, Karston wandered away from the TV, to his tinker toys. (We approve! Toys do beat TV.) Then we noticed that Karston had put together several constructions of two round tinker toys with a bar between them, and was lifting them. He was even grunting softly while lifting his "weights." So Karston wants to grow big and strong ... and he was paying more attention to the TV than we thought.

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Mess!

We decided to punch holes in the house (adding skylights and windows), and the carpenters started on Monday. In particular, the stairs are covered with bits of drywall and other debris. While Daddy was carrying him upstairs (who wants the toddler walking on that?), Karston kept pointing down to the steps and crying, Mess! mess! Yep, he sure knows a mess when he sees one.

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Best Playschool Day Yet!

We've been hoping for this day: Karston had a good day at playschool! Instead of crying for Dada when we left and again at pickup, Karston was playing with a little girl who copied his full body laugh, head leaned back, belly sticking out, ha ha ha. He said Bye bye to his teachers, too. And he didn't cry for Dada all afternoon either. We're thinking that this weekend of playing with other children, even 1 year older and 1 year younger, made a world of difference. Now he knows about kids playing!

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Beach

The beach report ...

On Saturday, Daddy and Karston went to the beach with Jen and her two girls ages 3 and not-yet-1. Since it was drizzling when they got there, Daddy huddled under the pier with the two oldest, Karston and Nadia. Whenever it cleared for a minute, they ran out, with life preservers on, to stick toes in the water. One wave knocked Nadia over (Daddy caught her); she was a big brave girl about it and kept playing. Karston thought the water was a bit cold but he wanted to be close to the action.

The weather was nicer today, so Opa, Grammy, Daddy, and Karston got in the boat with Jen and her girls. Nadia has been talking about last summer's boat ride and playing in the tidal pool ever since. Yes, she remembered a trip when she was 2! Obviously we all wanted her to do it again since she liked it so much! The boat ride and the tidal pools were the expected hit. Karston liked the tidal pools better because the water was warmer, and of course no one got knocked over. The real excitement came when it was lunchtime, time to head back: the boat had taken on quite a bit of water because the drain plug wasn't plugging, and at the same time, the bilge pump failed. Yes, two failures you don't want to see at the same time! With much coaxing, it started and even got home, but it was the don't-slow-down-for-any-reason trip back. It wasn't uneventful, but it turned out fine.

Mommy slept well, and now I feel like I've got this cold mostly kicked. The kids had a great time playing at the beach. Successful weekend!

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Curious Karston Goes to the Beach

Karston's favorite bedtime book for the past several weeks is Curious George Goes to the Beach, so Daddy took him to the beach today. I'm just getting over a cold, so I stayed home. I'm sure we'll have a report on Karston and the beach soon! I hear that he liked the beach, but the water was too chilly for him. Life preserver or no, Karston staying out of the ocean is fine by me!

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My Chair

Some days you start off with one plan, and end up with another.

This morning, we planned to take Karston to the Museum of Life and Science to play. (This part of the plan worked out well.) I've started calling that museum the Children's Country Club because we see so many parents and toddlers playing there. I can tell we're all members so that we don't pay admission each time so that we don't mind leaving early for nap time. It's really a children's club! Oh, and some of the museum parts are nice too. Karston enjoyed the playground, the farm animals, the explore-a-caboose, and especially the train ride twice around the grounds. After our train ride, we had a nice lunch in the cafe, and Karston even ate most of a banana while we were there! He didn't have much breakfast this morning, so I'm glad he ate some lunch. We all had a pleasant time at the museum.

The second plan turned out differently. We planned to buy some shorts for Karston since he didn't have any generic shorts in his dresser. At the store, we found tons of girls' clothes and almost no boys' clothes. We found plenty of outfits with long pants, and many heavy outer layers. But shorts for this 90+ degree day? *sigh* We finally found one red knit pair that we got. While Daddy was searching for shorts and I was chasing Karston, Karston found a small chair. It's a blue elephant wearing a pink party hat, and it's a chair for very small rumps. Karston has a very small rump, and he looked so proud sitting on this chair! Once he found it, he didn't set it down. I had to lift Karston and his chair up to the counter to scan it for check out. Then he ran out of the store carrying his chair, looking for a place to set it down while I made sure he stayed out of traffic. Driving home, Karston held on to his chair; even though he fell asleep, he still wouldn't let Daddy take it away. During his nap this afternoon, he kept one hand on his chair. He's calling it Sue (maybe Zoo?). So we wanted shorts, and we came home with Sue the blue zoo elephant chair.

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What Does the Animal Say?

This weekend, we noticed that Karston has a vocabulary of animal names and sounds. We hadn't tried to teach these to him, but he has picked it up. He would say an animal, or point to one in a book, and then make a sound. So far, we have five animals in the repertoire.

• What does a cat say? Our cat Linus is loud, so Karston meows loudly. MEOW! MEOW! MEOW!


• What does a dog say? Arf! Arf!


• What does a snake say? Ssssss


• What does a cow say? Moo


• And Karston's favorite that he has known since he was very young, What does a lion say? ROAR!

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