Thursday Night

1) Olin still uses a paci at night, but lately he says he doesn't need a pacifier because "I not baby. I big boy". And then about 5 minutes later he'll come asking us for a pacifier.

2) After Olin came home less one tooth yesterday afternoon, Leelee was very attentive to him and very nurturing. He rubbed his back and asked if he was ok and asked if he needed juice. He was also very curious about the hole and kept wanting to look at it.

3) Every morning around 5:30am we go through this rigmarole:

• Olin comes to our room and stands at the edge of the bed until I pull him up
• He gets himself situated comfortably between me and Dae
• He puts in his request, which is one of two things. I hold my breath, waiting:;
1. "Paci": hooray! I secretly shout, because that's the easy one, OR
2. "Milk": I inwardly curse and stumble downstairs, half asleep, to get him a sippy cup of milk
• If milk, he takes one miniscule sip and motions for me to take the cup away
• About 5 minutes later, just as I have fallen back asleep, he wakes me up to tell me he wants to "go back to bed"
• I set him down on the floor, and he runs back to his room

On a good night, this happens once. On a bad night, he can come back and forth  3 times with alternating requests of pacifier or milk. The guy exhausts me. But at least he waits until the decent hour of 5:30am to start his strict morning regimen.

4) Leelee wears a nighttime diaper at night. He's not nighttime potty trained and we aren't even close to being motivated to train him. Anyway, I went the cheap route and bought these random Winco nighttime underwear for toddlers/children. Dae said they look absolutely terrible, and look like Depends, which they kind of do. But I figure the real embarrassment lies in the fact that he's still wearing a nighttime diaper, not in the particular fashion of diaper that we choose to cloak him in!

5) Perfect segue to Olin's pottytraining. I'm actually getting nervous because school starts in 4 weeks and we aren't even anywhere in the vicinity of pottytrained. I keep trying to find a half day to devote to potty training (again) but have not been able to carve it out in our schedule. Just another to-do...

And it's official...he's toothless

Just like that, there's just a tiny bit less of Olin to love, as he is now minus one small primary central incisor.

The pediatric dentist squeezed us in this afternoon and the assistant managed to take two occlusal films and 2 bitewings! I was seriously impressed! At both the assistant's ability and Olin's total cooperation. He got one sticker per xray he took, so at the end he had a little roll of 4 Cars stickers that he clutched throughout the appointment.

Anyway, the occlusal film was bad, as anticipated:

Pretty obvious that tooth was a goner. There was no hope, so Dr. Hamilton said they could give him a little nitrous, a little local anesthetic, and take it out today. I almost wondered if I could just pull it at home, but he's still got some periodontal ligament attachment and it would probably be pretty painful, so I decided to leave him in the hands of the kids' dentist! (A side note: they took bitewing x-rays so I was holding my breath to see if he had any cavities since he always gets food impacted between the upper two molars...No cavities!!!)

Watching Cars 2 in the pre-op area

He did SO well. I've been around my fair share of children in the dental chair and he was as tough as they come! No problem with anesthetic, and even though I could tell he felt it when they started pulling the tooth because he moved and made a little noise, there was no crying and no fussing. Stickers stayed in his right hand throughout.

So I'm taking comfort in the fact that Brad & Angelina's daughter Shiloh lived without any problem sans one tooth for many years. Poor Olin starts pre-school this fall, and all his new friends will have never seen him with a full set! haha

Tooth #F

Olin's tooth #F is now so mobile I feel like I could literally pluck it out. It moves at the slightest touch of my finger, and moves significantly. So I texted the pediatric dentist today and am probably going to go in tomorrow to get an x-ray. He might use a little splint to stabilize it. I know it's no big deal, but the thought of him going toothless for 4 more years is pretty sad.

Doesn't show mobility, but the gingiva have changed color to red.

Second day in a row where he wailed for 30 minutes and then completely passed out at 5:00pm.

"Dad" coke for Dae

"Mom, look where we put Olin's old Pull-up!"

Ann in Richland

My favorite dental assistant of all time, Ann, is down here to visit this weekend. It has been about 3 years since I've seen her so I have been very happy to spend time with her again!

We hit the town:

1) Goethals Park for a farewell party for one of Christian's classmates. Ann helped Olin release a few nagging bark chips from his Crocs.

2) Treated ourselves to a pedi (Ann) and mani (me)

Smiley as ever

3) Wine tasting at Cooper. Ann's first wine tasting experience! She told me she tacked on a light buzz - haha

Below are Olin and Christian showcasing the little package of Sweatybands that arrived from Megan via Nordstrom. Thanks Meg! My workout-hair appreciates it immensely!

Three nights ago, Olin sauntered over to our room at midnight. I was majorly drifting in and out of consciousness but managed to clue into the fact that he kept asking for a "dry towel". Dae and I didn't know what he was talking about - figured we just misunderstood him. He kept calmly asking, over and over, for a dry towel. Dae finally said "I think he is actually asking for a dry towel". I looked at Olin a little closer and saw he was wiping his nose, and it was dark in the room so it took me a while to figure out he had a bloody nose. Funny guy. Why didn't he just say bloody nose? I guess he was going to take care of himself with his dry towel.

Golf Camp

The kids are currently enjoying Golf Camp, a 3 day series of 'golfing' at a local golf course. It's 1 1/2 hours each day, there are probably 30-40 kids, and they provide clubs and a whole bunch of really cheerful instructors. All that's fine and good, but by far the standout feature of this golf camp is the vast (dizzying) array of ice cream bars offered to the kids at the end of each day. It's like the ice cream truck stops by and the kids can have whatever they want, except it's a stocked freezer with all sorts of things: popsicles, Snickers, Milky Way, Sponge Bob popsicles, ice cream sandwiches, drumsticks, strawberry nut-covered drumsticks...

Today, in addition to the ice cream, the kids ran over after camp with a DumDum sucker for themselves and for me.

I put on my dental loupes and gave the kids a good dental scaling last night!

Double-fisting loads of sugar

There are a few things in our new house that didn't end up exactly as I had pictured, in my mind. Not necessarily good or bad, just different. However, one thing that has not disappointed, and has met my exact expectation, is the fact that we kept the cooktop on the island rather than on the perimeter. A lot of nights the kids will hover over the island while I am making dinner and they get to see all sorts of things cooking and frying. They're really into it. I usually try to have them help by putting stuff into the pot and things like that. I'm really enjoying it!

And Olin napping in the living room with towel as blanket...

Basil, Sunsets...

I asked Olin if I could take a photo of his hair this morning so he started to do all these funky poses:

We were driving home from dinner last night and saw this sunset sky as well as the rainbow on the other side of the sky.

Backseat Cheese:

Making pesto from our basil in the back corner. Those plants were nurtured by Halmoni and Haraboji, if you are wondering how they stayed alive...

Pelican Bay Cheese:

Olin-isms, Part II

"Moso-cycle" = motorcycle
"Gangnam sauce" = gangnam style
"water fountain" = watermelon

Thank you mom! We love our new buffet!

First sleep position

Second sleep position - same nap

Butterfly position at gymnastics

Butterfly leaning over

Potty treats. Not working - Olin still not pottytrained...

Wine tasting yesterday in Benton City

Olin-isms

Olin's pronunciation still could use a little help. Examples:

Goo's Clues = Blues' Clues
Goo-neh No = Goodness No (from Pete the Cat. He leaves out a lot of the consonants)

Last night I played a game with the kids where we hold up a card on our forehead, and we don't know what it is. The other two people have to give us hints as to what is on our card. Olin had a bird or something on his card. Leelee was giving him some hints and Olin guessed the randomest things.

Guess #1: "Uhhhh, goo-neh no?"
Guess #2: "Uhhhh, soup?"

So, basically one of his guesses was the phrase "Goodness No", and the other one was "soup".

The Hedgehog

A day in the life of a Hedgehog:

He's never looked more Hedgehoggy

Flossing at bedtime

Crying and wailing, followed by sleep some 30 seconds later, in the hall...

A hedgehog's nest

The poor guy burned his hand on a hot plate at the Korean restaurant tonight. It blistered just a little bit, and every 10 seconds or so, he would cry out for his cup of ice water, into which he would immediately plunge his thumb. We even got a little cup of ice water to go so he could continue his therapy in the car.

NYC, and finally...home!

It's 4am Eastern time and I am frustratingly not tired, for once. So I'll post all our NYC pics. First of all, this is our last official trip of the summer and I can't believe that I am so relieved to be home! Home sweet home, indeed.

We just got in tonight, and had a trip full of airport delays and snags. The most prominent snag was the fact that I actually did not get on to our first outgoing flight to Salt Lake City, on Thursday morning. They were overbooked, no one volunteered their seats (even at the going rate of $900 Delta dollars!) so I was the unlucky one who didn't have a seat assignment. Dae stayed with me of course (can you imagine if he hadn't? haha) and we each got compensated an $840 check and $20 of food vouchers. It softened the blow, for sure. Otherwise, a good trip. Highlights:


1) Chinatown

Chinatown Ice Cream Factory

Black sesame and Red Bean Flavors? Yes, and Yes!

2) Joe's Shanghai. We only hit Joe's twice this year, down from our record of three times. It absolutely did not disappoint. However, we were thrown off by the different number of xiao long baos per order, depending on location. Chinatown served up 8 of those little critters per platter, midtown only 6.

Lots of waiting crowds at the single-level Chinatown location

3) Green Flea Market on the upper west side. I got two items:

A perfect bookend! This sucker was heavy.

I love these. Dae keeps waiting for my ears to turn green, but so far so good.

4) Meeting up with James & Gina. They are a lot of fun.

We had dinner with them at Chef's Table in Brooklyn. This little D-shaped bar seats 18 people and serves up 18(?) courses. Delish.

Refinery rooftop bar. Gina looks mad. She isn't. :)

Wicked! 

5) Drinking champagne at the lounge:

6) And generally just doing whatever tomfoolery we wanted:

"The edge of tomorrow" in 3D. $19 per ticket. Ouch.

Love me some subway.

Empire state building, from the refinery rooftop