Our boy cute for another year?

Recently, I read that babies are only cute until they are about 4.5 years old. It's a bit of a silly study but it made me a bit sad knowing that we only have around another year left of cuteness in Tristan. That's silly too, I know. As his mother, I think he is adorable and probably always will. I guess the difference is that strangers will no longer see him as adorable anymore when he is 4.5 years old.

For the first two years, we practically took pictures of him every day. This was especially the case in the first year since he changed so much and was super cute. Now that he is three, we take pictures of him only during occasions or when we see something interesting or with just the iPhone. It's kind of awful really. My iPhoto used to be covered with events of just Tristan doing things but now, it's mostly just pictures of food. Lol. Or some times Tristan will appear in the picture but he is either decorating cupcakes, helping me cook, or eating food I just made. He's sort of the sit-in model for my food blog :)

Tristan is adorable, even if we are the only ones that think so. After reading this new study, I'm going to try to photograph him a bit more. I mean I still photography him at least every month. Also, I don't know about other 3 year olds but Tristan doesn't like to be photographed as much anymore. Before he didn't care but now he will tell us "no pictures!" Oy.

 

Positive things we have going when it comes to eating

Lately, I have been talking too negatively about getting our 3 year old to eat. In fact, I feel like most of my eating posts are related to frustration. I don't mean to mislead readers in thinking this is normal for us. I often get the urge to post when I need to vent. It's somewhat therapeutic for me. Other bloggers could probably relate.

I want to let everyone know and also remind myself when I look back at this time one day that we are in fact very lucky to have a 3 year old who eats well. That's right. You heard me right! Tristan eats well normally :)

I breastfed Tristan for a year and he drank breast milk exclusively for the first six months. His first solid food was broccoli. He even tried bittermelon as a first solid food. Every new food presented to him was in pure form with no seasonings until he was around 12 months old. He only drank milk and water. Even now, he drinks more water than anything else. If you offer him juice, he would probably ask for water. He can be picky sure but we don't dine on junk foods like potato chips and we rarely eat processed foods. We may open a can of soup or cook from a pack of instant noodles once or twice a year. Processed foods usually gross me out. We eat a lot of brown rice, multigrain breads, vegetables, fruits, healthy grains, and we always have a variety. We have pretty much introduced Tristan to every kind of food out there since I love to cook Chinese, Vietnamese, French, Greek, Italian, Indian, Hawaiian, and so many other things. We are even doing tons of vegan food these days! Jean-Louis and I pretty much love eating everything and are somewhat adventurous eaters. Tristan will probably grow up being the same.

Feasting on durian

Tristan loved food until he was about two years old. He didn't care what it was as long as he could put it in his mouth, he would eat it. When he was around two, he started to resist certain foods, including some of his favorites. Jean-Louis called him a moody eater. Some times he would love it and other days he would hate it. He would pick at his food a bit for a few days or weeks and then he would go back to eating everything we give him again. We would go through these cycles where we would have to nag on and off to get him to eat most or all of his food. When he would be sick, it would be way worst. Nowadays, he will still eat anything but just not as much as we would like him to. Many people who have dined with us are usually impressed that he eats what we give him. They are also impressed he does this on his own.

Right now, Tristan is finishing all his meals. The nagging is almost non-existent. I guess he is hungry now from having so little to eat last week when he was sick. The type of nagging and coaching we do now is more along the lines of "you only have three more spoons to go. You can do it!"

Here is what he ate today:

• Breakfast: 1 slice of multigrain bread, 1 fried egg, 4 slices of pear, bit of water
• Lunch: chicken pesto salad panini sandwich (2-3 cups), 3 slices of apple, bit of water
• Dinner: mushroom, tofu, shrimp stir-fry rice macaroni (3-4 cups), 2 slices of orange, 1 hedgehog, 1 small vegan almond cookie, bit of coconut water, lots of water

Tristan finished everything above, except for a small piece of chicken from his panini sandwich. Today was a satisfactory day! The thing is Tristan knows that we are not happy when he doesn't eat. He also knows our rules at the table. Eat your main dish first, especially your vegetables and then you can have fruit and possibly a treat if you are really good. Sometimes we would present a dish of food to him and also give him a piece of bread or cracker to go with his meal. He would check with us first to see if he could start by eating his bread or cracker. That's because he knows that things like bread, crackers, and fruits are more like rewards for eating well. Some times we just tell him to eat everything together but he'll set aside the bread or fruit until he is done with his main dish anyway. Fine with us, as long as he eats everything.

The three of us eat together all the time. Well, I eat breakfast with Tristan every day and Jean-Louis joins us on the weekends. I sometimes eat or at least sit with Tristan while he is having lunch and at dinner, the three of us all sit and eat together. I think Jean-Louis has only ever missed a couple of dinner sit downs because of his iPhone meetups. I think eating together as a family is important and we are fortunate to have schedules that support that. Sadly, I have heard of many families where this can't happen very often. We also all eat the same things and that is also important for Tristan to see.

Speaking of eating the same things, because I started baking more in the past year, people may have the impression that Tristan eats too many sweets now and has become a pickier eater because of it. Yes, I have baked a lot but I'm actually the one that eats most of it. Jean-Louis is always watching his weight and I'm the Mommy in the family so I eat all the leftovers, sweets included. We also send quite a bit of sweets to Jean-Louis' work so we can get rid of them quicker. As for Tristan, if he is well behaved and eats well, we may offer him a small treat. If he does get a treat, it will be 1/4 to 1/2 the size of the treat we would get. Many times when a treat was offered though, he never got it because he didn't quite finish his meal. If he doesn't finish or at least eat most of his meal, he doesn't even get fruit! Yeah, we use fruit a lot as a bribe. It's funny because he would come so close to finishing his food some times and then refuse to take the last bite and just declare defeat. He would tell us he doesn't want the cookie anymore just so he doesn't have to finish the last bite of his food. That's okay with us and we just take his food away. Remember that Santa hat cake I made? Tristan didn't even have a bite of that! He probably has a treat like a cookie or chocolate two times a week. That doesn't sound like a lot to us, is it? As for how often I eat treats, you don't want to know! I will be hitting the gym next month though and will be paying dearly for all my sweet sins. Oh boy :S

3 years developmental update

Wow, I still can't believe Tristan is 3 years old now! Bye bye under 3 freebies. We all knew the time would come. But really, time goes by quickly and kids grow so fast! I'm so happy to be able to spend so much time with him while he is still young. I feel like we have celebrated every milestone and everything we do together will leave behind great memories for the future. With another birthday behind us, here is the latest in growth and development for Tristan.

GROWTH

He really is getting so big! Physically he is a bit bigger than he was a year ago. He isn't growing at the rate he used to when he was a baby so we're able to let him wear his clothes for longer periods. He still wears some of his 24 month clothes even. Most of them are pants though. Last year's 3 year old winter clothes will get worn again, which I'm thankful for. Tristan has nice clothes and some of them are really expensive French clothes so if he can wear them for more than one season, then I'm happy! Some of the pants we let him wear last year no longer need to be folded at the bottom. He wore the same Halloween costume as last year! It was slightly big last year and this year it may have been a bit snug. Jean-Louis weighed Tristan a week or so ago and he's 32 pounds. When compared to the other kids at daycare, Tristan appears to be a bit on the small side.

FOOD & EATING

Tristan may be a bit small for his age (or maybe he's average) but I know he eats well and I'm not worried at all. Jean-Louis and I are both petite so I don't expect Tristan to be very big or tall one day. For the past week, Tristan has been eating well. He some times nibbles at lunch but then when dinner comes along, he eats all the food we give him. He'll have a bowl of vegetable and chicken soup, then yogurt, then fruit and maybe a cookie. Overall though, we still don't enjoy mealtimes very much. Whether or not Tristan eats all his food or not, we still have to nag at him or coach him along quite a bit. Sometimes we even have to soup feed him a bit to hurry him along. Jean-Louis really really hates doing that! Lately, it has been pretty good though and Tristan has been eating by myself.

Things are pretty much back to normal now. When we came back from vacation, Tristan became a bit more difficult at the dining table. Thank goodness we are back to our routine. We're allowing Tristan to eat more things now, including junk food like processed candies. He had his first lollipop just a few days ago. At first he really liked it but then after about 10 licks, he didn't want anymore. He has also tried pop, black licorice, M&M candies, and chips. When he does eat junk food, it's more like a sampling. The idea is just for him to try it and let him know that he can't have too much because it's not healthy. I think it's important for him to try all sorts of foods so that he at least knows what they are and will be able to follow when people talk about them. We also don't want to deprive him to the point where he would engorge in tons of junk when he's at a party because he can't have any at home. I heard that is a problem with some kids. Of course we are very strict with him as well or else he would be a very picky eater and not listen at the dining table.

POTTY TRAINING

Tristan is going strong with his potty training. He is fully trained when he is awake and 50% of the time when he is asleep. It could be more because he has been increasingly waking up with dry pull-ups now. I can't remember the last time we had a potty accident. When we were in Hawaii, Tristan didn't have any accidents, even when we were on the tour bus all day. We were very lucky because it turned out that we had totally forgotten to bring along a change of underwear and clothes for him if he had an accident. So lucky! I don't bother asking Tristan if he has to pee anymore. He tells us and some times he will even hold it a long time, while I finish something up in the kitchen. We used to run up the stairs every time he told us but now we just calmly walk up. It's so nice to be potty trained :)

SLEEP

Tristan sleeps a bit less now since he has pretty much given up his naps. He stopped napping at home for a few weeks now. Sometimes when we are out, he may fall asleep and then we just let him. If he can sleep, I'm all for the naps :) We just don't bother putting him down anymore. He seems totally energetic and happy about it too. His bedtime hasn't changed. He sleeps around 9PM and wakes up around 7:30AM.

Tristan still sleeps in his crib. He slept in a twin and double bed when we were on vacation and only fell off it once. We thought we would have to transfer him over to a bigger bed or extend his crib when we got back. It turned out he liked sleeping in his crib. It's not a big deal to us since we would prefer to keep him in the crib as long as possible. He doesn't jump out and this way he is contained. I used to hear my friend talk about how her kids would run to her room at 6AM and wake her up. I'm trying to delay this from happening to me as long as possible. I know I'm lucky Tristan listens a lot. He wakes up in the morning and he calls out from his crib "Mommy? Are you awake? I'm not tired anymore." I would look at the clock and respond "Not yet Tristan. Go back to sleep. Mommy needs 20 more minutes." That usually does it :)

SPEECH

Tristan is piecing together new sentences like you wouldn't believe it. He'll hear something once and then try to use it in a new sentence. I'm not sure how and when this all happened but we're noticing it right now. He is also speaking with better tense. He'll say things in the present and past and is figuring out which one to use and when. He asks "why" to everything. I think the "why" stage started when we went to Whistler back in May. He's funny to have conversations with because he has answers for most things even though they don't make sense. Let's say he has a reply to most things :)

Jean-Louis says that Tristan has no theory of mind. What he means is that he doesn't know that there are some things he will know that we won't know. For instance when we pick him up at daycare and ask him what he did at daycare, he says I don't know. Then he turns to me and asks me "do you know mommy?" The same thing happens when I ask him about the kids at daycare. This makes it extra hard to learn about who he plays with and who his friends are. It wasn't easy knowing who to invite to his birthday party.

Tristan speaks English but has a full understanding of French. He says a few things in French and only French. He can say a few things and understand even more things in Chinese. One thing I'm proud of is that Tristan doesn't swear or say things like "damnit." I don't swear and Jean-Louis is controlling himself from saying things like "damnit" and "Jesus Christ." So far it's working because whenever Tristan is in shock, he says "oh my goodness." However, he does know dirty words and he'll say it to be naughty. For instance he says "caca" here and there to be funny. "Caca" is poo in French. Luckily, not many people know what he is saying and probably thinks he is just making funny noises.

BEHAVIOR

Some times we lose our patience at Tristan and then we yell and become aggressive. Tristan is learning from us and some times he protests and misbehaves for attention. A couple of times, he tried to hit or kick us when he was really mad. Every time, we pulled him aside, lectured him and got him to apologize. He's pretty good at saying sorry and he understands why we are sad when he is behaving badly. He is also polite and says thank-you and excuse me.

Tristan is rough when he plays so we're teaching him to be more gentle when pretending to play things like "kung-fu." We pretend fight him but he fights us for real and some times we really get hurt! I am definitely going to enroll him in some kind of martial arts class. He's going to kick butt!

He's goofy. He likes to make funny and weird faces all the time. I think he gets that from me. At his birthday party this past weekend, he had a hard time standing still with a straight face when everyone was singing happy birthday to him. He keep making faces and sticking his tongue out. I notice but Jean-Louis didn't. Some times he just does that.

Tantrums? What tantrums? Yeah, he still tantrums from time to time. They don't bother us much anymore since they hardly happen and when they do, they last maybe a few minutes at most. We're so glad the terrible-twos are behind us. From what I hear, threes are awesome :) It's already pretty awesome I think. Tristan really is a great little kid.

Tristan can draw faces now :)

Isn't it awesome?!? Reminds me of Charlie Brown :)

This is suppose to be Jean-Louis (aka daddy).

Tristan's drawing capability

Tristan is no artist. Yet :)

A couple of years ago, I was over at a friend's house around Thanksgiving and she showed me a picture of a stick man that was drawn by her then 3 year old son. It had a face on it and a stick body but the neck was disconnected from the head. She beamed with pride while holding it up for me to see. When I just smiled, she explained that he was only 3 and that a lot of kids can't draw that yet. Oh.

Now that Tristan is almost 3, I can't help but think back to that incident and laugh. I was clueless in what a 3 year old was capable of and I obviously wasn't impressed by the funny looking stick figure that was drawn. Now that I have Tristan to compare with, I am totally impressed! Tristan can draw a circle and something in it. Maybe a nose or one eye or two crooked eyes but that's about it. He can almost draw a face. ALMOST! I got him to try a few times and he came fairly close one time. It looked more like a panda head than a human head though :) Are you more impressed? The problem is I didn't ask for a panda head. I'm not even sure he knows what a panda is. Sigh. Either my friend's boy was artistically gifted beyond his years or Tristan sucks at drawing. Or maybe both.

Besides coming close to being able to draw a face, Tristan can also write the letter T very well. He recognizes it as the first letter of his name. He actually sees the initial as his name. Whenever he sees the first letter T in any word, he points and says it's his name. Then we say "oh yeah, that word starts with a T just like your name!" I'm trying to show him that there are more letters to "Tristan" than just the "T" but he's not quite ready for it. The only other letter he can copy in his name is the "i." No rush. We'll try again when he is interested.

Tristan's accidental ladybug

Tristan accidentally drew a ladybug one time. I think he was randomly drawing and then when it started to look like something he recognized, he pointed at it and said "look, ladybug!" We were quite impressed, even though we knew it was a complete accident :) So yeah. Tristan can draw circles, short lines, dots, and sometimes he can connect these things together. All the pieces are there really. It's just a matter of time before he draws a simple stick man :)

Tristan is getting better at coloring too. He understands that he should color and stay inside a defined area. He doesn't have the coordination or patience to do it yet but he gets the idea. He used to color in scribbles over a drawing. He is much better at identifying colors now too. I know I'm his mom and I'm biased but overall I do feel like he has potential. Remember the nice canvas art he did for me for Mother's Day? It was nice, no? :) Also, I remembered a daycare staff lady describing how Tristan was working to put together an art piece. There were all these pieces of tin and sparkles on the table and the kids were assembling them on sticky paper. Apparently, Tristan took his time and carefully placed each little piece of tin onto the paper. He didn't miss any. Hearing that made me proud :)

Spider? Fly? Suppose to be something.

I know Tristan is still young but a part of me really wants him to be artistic. I would love to do things like draw, paint, carve pumpkins, and a whole lot of other crafts with him. I'm dreaming of the day he will be able to help me decorate sugar cookies :) Ha. Too much to ask for? I probably have high hopes and expectations but if he is anything like me, he probably will enjoy some of that stuff. It would be so cool to sit by a lake together and paint a canvas or something. Jean-Louis can tweet and take pictures while we do this :) Lol. Jean-Louis isn't into creating art or crafts. If you were to ask him, he would just tell you that he sucks at it. We both tried to draw portraits and carve pumpkins together in the past but he would just get discouraged and quit. That's totally fine. When I carve pumpkins now, he just helps by scooping out the seeds and flesh for me :) I hope Tristan is artistic but if it turns out that he is not, we'll know which side he took his genes from. No offense Jean-Louis :)

Conversations with a 2.5 year old

Tristan is at the age where we can have conversations together and engage in pretend play. It's funny, confusing, and entertaining! I am loving this age :)

Here is us walking home from daycare. I always ask him how his day was and what he did. Then I ask about his favorite friends.

Me: Was Christopher at daycare today?

Tristan: No, he went on vacation to China.

Me: China? Why?

Tristan: He went to buy Toy Story stickers.

When we stay home together, we get to have lots of conversations. It's getting to the point where it's too awesome to miss and I want to remember this forever so I have restarted recording videos of him again. My hard drive is going to hate me but oh well :)

Today I made banana chocolate chip muffin top cookies. I gave him one of the cookies after his lunch and asked him what kind of cookie it is and what is in it. I thought he could examine the cookie and tell me what was inside. His response: Hmmm.... baking powder, I think. Me: LOL.

We went to story time at the library today. Occasionally,  a parent would leave the room with their child during story time. Tristan would then ask "where are they going?" Me: I don't know. Maybe they have to go home. Him: Maybe they are going on vacation to China.

What is up with China?? It used to be Mexico but now everything is China. There was a little boy at daycare who went away to China for vacation. He was apparently gone a long long time so Tristan and probably everyone else at daycare was aware that the little boy went to China. Tristan obviously still remembers.

A couple of months ago, Jean-Louis accidentally stepped on dog poop on the grass by where we parked our car. He made a big scene over it and spend some time cleaning it off before he went back in the car. Now every time there is poop on the grass, and Tristan sees it, he thinks that only Daddy can step on it.

Us: Be careful when you walk on the grass. Sometimes there is dog poop there. We don't want to get our shoe dirty and smelly.
Tristan: Oh. Only daddy can step on it?
Us: Nobody step on it! When daddy stepped on it, it was an accident! Just an accident.

Sometimes Tristan and I have lovely conversations during breakfast. While he was having his milk one morning, he asks me about his milk.

Tristan: This is cow's milk?
Me: Yes.
Tristan: When I was a baby, I used to drink Mommy's milk. Now that I'm a big boy, I drink cow's milk.
Me: Yes.

Later that evening or the next evening, he tried to make the same correlation using yogurt! He said "I am a big boy and I eat yogurt. When I was a baby I used to eat Mommy's yogurt." Me: Noooooo.

Tristan has great memory too. One day I was singing "Down by the Bay" with him and he sang along but only to parts of it. It was obvious he didn't know the whole song. Two or three days later, I heard him singing the song when he woke up. I was surprised to hear the entire song. He knew it all! Well, not all since you can go on and on forever but he knew all the parts that we sang together a few days earlier. It was as though he was rehearsing but we haven't sang it for days and I never heard him sing it without me.


I'm sure there are tons of other examples too but I can't possibly list them all here. From conversations I have had with other moms as well, it seems the 2 to 3 year old range is a very cute age for speech. Toddlers in this age range are learning one to two new words every day and are able to string a lot of new sentences together. Their vocabulary and speech is just exploding! For Tristan, he loves to sing and knows so many songs by heart now. He even teaches us new songs :)

Every mom gets criticized for something

I recently read an article called The Mom-Judging Olympics: A competition nobody meant to enter. It goes through results from their survey asking moms what kinds of behavior would make them judge another mom. 26 000 moms were surveyed and 90% of them would judge another mom. I hate to admit it but I would be one of them.

Have a bratty kid? 66% of moms will judge you. It depends on the circumstance but if you brought a bratty kid to fine dining, I would sure judge you. Tristan is mostly well behaved, which is why we can travel with him and dine out with him. If he were different, we would definitely stay home. Ruining it for others would only ruin it for us even more.

Breast-feeding your 3 year old? 43% would judge you. I don't think I would judge you. I breastfed Tristan and can now understand why some people can be attached to this. I have no problem with breastfeeding as a way to provide milk for thirst but if it were used simply to soothe a bratty child, I would judge you.

Have an overweight child? 37% would judge you and yup, I would too.

Give your kid junk food? 34% would judge you. I wouldn't if I saw this for the first time. We're even beginning to give Tristan a bit of junk food tastings here and there. Even though, there are a lot of things he has not tried and I hope he doesn't eat any time soon like cheezies, flavored chips, McDonald burgers, and pop. If I knew that you were feeding your kid junk food daily, I would totally judge you. If you were feeding your 6 month old junk food, I would totally judge you. But these are sort of different questions, aren't they? I make my own healthy meals so of course I would judge you.

Let your kid watch TV/play video games too much? 32% will judge you. I would judge you. There is no reason your child should be doing this too much.

Co-sleep with your child? 23% would judge you. I would judge you but not harshly. I remember bringing Tristan into bed with us maybe for a few hours a couple of times when he was a baby. We were super tired and just couldn't handle it. We felt guilty every time since we didn't want to develop a habit and have him not sleep in his own bed. It was part of us being scared of too much attachment. Lucky for us the few hours of bed sharing had no effect on his sleeping habits. He sleeps great in his own bed and has been there since day one :)

You work too much? 20% would judge you. I wouldn't judge you, assuming you have proper childcare arranged for your child. I am a work-at-home-mom but I do most, if not all of my work while Tristan is in daycare. Having said that, I really don't over work. If anything, I would love to work more!

Didn't try to breast-feed? 18% would judge you. I would judge you. Not breastfeeding because you find out you can't or it's not your thing is cool. If you don't even try and I mean really try, that's uncool. Breastmilk is the best thing for your baby. Everyone knows it. You got to at least give it a good try.

There is something that didn't make it on their top 9 list, which surprised me. It's something I know I would be judged harshly for. Do you let your child cry it out for sleep training? I did this and was criticized for it. I made the mistake of commenting on an attached parenting site about the issue and then I got bashed over here on my own blog. I was totally outnumbered over there! What was I thinking?

No matter what you do as a parent, there will always be something for someone to criticize. I feel like Jean-Louis and I are pretty solid good parents. We are strict, yet loving, and gentle with Tristan. He is well behaved, polite, average sized, and sleeps well on his own in his own bed. He was breastfed for just over a year but I would have gone longer if he wanted me to. I love to cook and bake so most of what Tristan consumes is healthy and balanced foods. He only drinks water and milk. We rarely give him junky foods and we have no TV so he doesn't watch at all. We do let him play on the iPad maybe 5 to 10 mins a week, which is really nothing. He can play with his toys alone and he loves to read with us. We receive compliments about him a lot and it always makes us proud :)


Overall, it seems like we have it really great here. Ah, wrong. We let him cry it out when we sleep trained him. He didn't end up crying much but we were dying inside when it happened. We yell at him. Sometimes we lose our temper in front of him. We sometimes remove all his food if he refuses to eat or try to eat. That means no food at all until the next meal, which could be more than 12 hours later. We bribe him a lot with things like sweets or a DVD movie if he eats all his main meal. And so on. Basically, there are a lot of things you can criticize me for about parenting. It doesn't bother me as much now that Tristan is 2 1/2 years old. It bothered me back then when he was still a baby and parenting was so new to me. I know what kind of parent I am now and I'm pretty happy about it and that's all that really matters.

Happy 1000th day birthday Tristan!

Hey, it's not every day you get to acknowledge that someone is exactly 1000 days old! I couldn't resist making Tristan a cookie cake :) Then after dinner, bath, and teeth brushing, we gave him a new toy. Can we spoil a toddler or what??? :)

Just like his 500th day birthday, we found out about this 1000 day by accident. We bought an app to count down my labour when I was pregnant with Tristan. Now that the labour is complete it just counts up in days, hours, and minutes since his birth. We don't monitor it anymore since we have no reason to know. Last time Jean-Louis looked into it for fun, it said Tristan was 499 days old. Oh, interesting. Last night, I was having a conversation with one of my friends on Twitter about anniversary and numbers. It made me think of Tristan and how he was nearly 500 days old when we last checked so I asked Jean-Louis about it. I figured we probably missed the big 1000. Imagine how amused we were when we found out Tristan was 999 days old! True story I swear! Honestly, what are the odds that we could have found out in time in both cases? Crazy.

 

What a 1000 day old boy looks like :)

Taken this morning on his 1000th day birthday

A natural organizer :)

1st time eating whole cherries & he does this!

Tristan is 31 months old (or 2 years 7 months)

It's been awhile since I have done a post on Tristan's developmental updates. Today is no special day, except that it is the 20th of the month. Here is a brief update on how he is doing.

Potty Training

Tristan is well on his way to becoming diaper free. He wears underwear all the time except when he naps or sleeps at night. He has only had 2 dry diapers so far after waking up in the morning but when he does pee in his diaper it only happens once since the diaper is only a bit wet. He's working on it :) This weekend we went over to Victoria and even when we had a diaper or pull up on him, he did not pee in them once. No accidents and he even did number 2 at a restaurant. This is not to say he doesn't have any accidents. There are at least a couple of accidents a week still. Some times we just don't make it to the bathroom in time.

Eating

Tristan is eating everything. He isn't as picky at the moment and will eat anything you give him. If he is picky, we bribe him with an upcoming course (e.g. cheese stick) and that usually does the trick. He has also been eating more sweets such as muffins, cookies, scones, and granola. These are all homemade but he also likes to eat store bought arrowroot animal cookies. I would say that he eats sweets maybe twice a week. He's at that age where we just want him to try everything and discover the world. If it's something that isn't great for him like a brownie, we'll just give him a bite or two. Jean-Louis almost let him try pop but then I said no. That stuff is pure crap and besides, Tristan hasn't even drank juice yet. Okay, so maybe he can't try everything quite yet! :)

Sleep

He sleeps from 9:15PM to 7AM. He naps for 1-2 hours. We can't really complain here. He's quite consistent and sleeps through the night. Some times if he wakes up a bit earlier, we just go tell him to go back to sleep and cover him up and he does.

Tristan is still in his crib and will be for awhile. There is a piece of wood we can move so that he can get in and out easily. We plan to remove that piece in October, after our vacation. Right now, he can jump in and out of his crib but he is usually good about staying inside until we get to his room.

Speech

He can sing but he is shy around others. Some of his favorites are Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Eensy-Weensy Spider, Happy Birthday, and Wheels on the Bus. His pronunciation is getting much better now. He can have simple conversations with my Mom on the phone and she actually understands him. He is still mixing his French and English. He is a little us in many ways. He says "oh my goodness" a lot and I've heard him say "what the heck" and "what the dickens." He tries to explain everything with "because... I'm a big boy" or something else. He loves to say because. You ask him why or how come and he'll say "because" and then try to finish it off with something. We find that he is constantly rehearsing his speech with us. We have to let him too but it's very interesting to watch him.

In the last week or so, he has been saying "love you" to us. Yup, it has taken him this long! Not sure if he totally understands it but we'll take it :)

Growth & Exercise

Tristan weighs 30 pounds. He can jump down from the third step on the stairs. He likes to run because Mom and Dad runs. He walks home one way from daycare and he increasingly wants to walk more. He loves biking on his Strider and requests to do it every day. He is at that age where we can take him out more and he can have fun. Overall, he is just easier to care for and more fun to be with. I think that is a recipe for traveling more, don't you? ;)

Behavior

Tantrums are on the decline. At the moment. Of course this could change but we're enjoying every moment of peace:)

When he coughs, he knows to do it into his elbow. He is an expert at blowing his nose. Bye bye aspirator! He started blowing his nose a few months ago. A couple of weeks ago, he started to spit out toothpaste after we brush his teeth.

First dry overnight diaper

We just reached yet another milestone in Tristan's potty training. He's has been doing very well in underwear pretty much all the time except that he still sleeps in a diaper. We let him wear underwear when we go out and we have so far managed to find public washrooms for him whenever he needed it. I have to say little boys are lucky they can pee while standing up! He even peed while standing on a log off a trail when we went hiking in Whistler. He sits and pees too but lately his preference is to stand, since daddy pees that way too :)

Tristan is advancing in potty training because he can hold his pee for long periods. I remember one day when he only peed twice from the morning he woke up to the time it was 4PM. I must have peed like 5 times by then. Since then I have tried to get him to drink more but it wasn't like he wasn't drinking at all. This week he actually wet his bed many times. He wears a diaper to sleep and he pees so much that it leaks. It really annoys me since I have to do laundry all the time. We decided to cut him from any drinking after 8PM. We encourage him to pee before bed but it doesn't always happen. We have been starting to tell him not to pee in his diaper and if he doesn't for awhile, we can put an underwear on him. He seems to like the idea but we just figured he is not ready yet.

Yesterday, I forgot to change Tristan out of his underwear for his afternoon nap. When he woke up, the bed was soaked. He didn't even know until I pointed it out. When he realized what had happened, he cried. He was devastated. This morning when he woke up, he walked straight to the potty, sat down, and pee on his own while I was in his bedroom fetching his day clothes. When I came to the bathroom he was said "look, I peed!" I took the diaper he threw on the floor and noticed it was as light as empty. I was totally shocked! Then Tristan said "I hold it. No pee it there. I hold it." Hooray! Then we both did the happy dance :)

I'm beginning to think that Tristan felt all along that it was okay to pee in his diaper during nap and sleep times. We allowed it since we didn't think he was ready. It seems that he is ready to give up the diaper and that we just had to tell him no. "No it's never good to pee in your diaper. You only have it on for emergencies. Try not to pee in it." I think he understands. And now he is trying.

Tristan's favorite books

We have lots of books for Tristan. Among his favorites are Curious George, Thomas the Tank Engine, The Octonauts, his French vehicles books such as La tractopelle d'Axel. A year ago, Tristan loved the Karen Katz books.

We read to Tristan a lot. We basically either play or read for entertainment since we don't allow him to watch many videos, movies or play with the iPhone/iPad too much. Some times we read to him too much or at least it feels that way. When I say too much I mean for 3 hours or more a day. He loves books but when it gets too much for us, we actually have to tell him "no." Mommy needs a break from reading. Sorry babe.

Since Tristan loves reading so much, we some times use it against him if he misbehaves. We normally read to him every evening before he sleeps. If he is very bad, we simply don't read to him at night. We're so cruel, eh? When we tell him no because he was bad, he does get sad but he gets over it. It kind of breaks my heart though:(

Here are some of Tristan's favorite stories:

• Curious George and the Dump Truck
• Thomas the Train: Go Train Go
• Thomas the Train: Stop Train Stop
• Thomas the Train: The Crack in the Track
• Thomas the Train: Blue Train Green Train
• Le bus de Marius
• La tractopelle d'Axel
• Baba Yaga the Flying Witch

I think it's great that Tristan loves to read. He loves being read to but he is starting to copy us and he is trying to read back. For instance, we read so many of the same stories over and over again that he actually knows what is going to happen so he tries to read back from memory. Because some of the pages have just a few words on them, sometimes it does appear that he is reading straight from the page! We're impressed but then again, we have only read everything a gazillion times.

Jean-Louis is somewhat of a bookworm so if Tristan turns into one, we'll know where he got that from. It's cute watching the two guys read together. Jean-Louis would read and Tristan would sometimes repeat what Jean-Louis says line for line until the end of the story. He's going to be a dorky child when he grows up! I love it :)

Audio: Tristan singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

Audio: Toddler sings "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" by CocoaGeek

Tristan's first haircut

Today is a sad day. At least for me. I cut off Tristan's nice hair and I'm going to miss it :( It took 26 months to grow to this length.

We were at Winners today shopping and Jean-Louis once again tells me that people everywhere are calling him a girl. Why is it such a bad thing for little boys to have longish hair anyway?? The long hair didn't bother me much but it was sort of messy and needed cleaning up. The plan was to cut just the back of the head in time for Chinese New Year. Since Jean-Louis will be cleaning the house tomorrow and we were able to eat an early dinner, we decided it was time. The stars were aligned and I had no more excuses:(

It was our last time to have fun with his hair so we had to take pictures :)

A 5 minute haircut of just the back, ended up being a 30 minute haircut of the whole head. I had to cut the sides since it didn't make sense not to. Then I had to even things out and ended up cutting more and more and more. I would have cut more too but I made myself stop before too much damage was made. Overall, the haircut looks good but it definitely could be better. Since it was my first toddler haircut, I'm cool with just good :)


Tristan behaved well, considering it lasted a long time. He was constantly moving so it was actually very challenging. I never came close to poking him with the scissors but his hair is not quite even since he was moving so much. Well, also because I have never done any other haircut aside from a full head buzz on Jean-Louis. Near the end, we had to give him things to hold and play with just to keep him in his seat. First the hair clip, then the iPhone. I know! Horrible but we won't be doing this often. The new haircut will take some getting used to. Jean-Louis says he looks chubbier. I'm not sure it's an improvement but he definitely looks more boyish now!

Tristan's first dentist trip

This week I tried out a different dentist in my neighborhood. It worked out well for me so I made an appointment for Tristan. As of three days ago, he is 25 months old now. It was time.

Tristan's first visit to the dentist today was awesome. He wasn't scared one bit and was cooperative and curious the whole time. Normally, one parent would hold the child and the dentist would have a look. Tristan sat in the big chair all by himself. I sat at the end of his chair observing him. I some times held his hand, in case he needed some comforting. He was just fine :)

The dentist kept asking me if this was his first trip to the dentist since he was so cooperative. He said that a lot of the small children cry. He was really impressed that Tristan was so quiet and well-behaved. That made me pleased :)

The examination lasted about ten minutes. The dentist looked inside Tristan's mouth and using a new toothbrush, he counted all of his teeth. An assistant on a nearby computer documented what the dentist was describing. Tristan has eight teeth on the top and eight teeth on the bottom. He is expected to get four more teeth so that there will be ten at the top and ten at the bottom. Yup, four more molar are expected! After that, somewhere between ages 6-12 all of his teeth will fall out and he will get his adult teeth.

The dentist was very gentle with Tristan because he didn't want to scare him. He turned on the polisher and using water, he polished four of his top teeth. He just wanted Tristan to get used to the noise and feel of the tool in his mouth. Like they keep telling me, "small steps!" He also turned on the air tool and blew air at Tristan's face. He got Tristan to touch all of these things so he wouldn't be afraid. Then at the end, Tristan got to select a toy. When he couldn't decide, the dentist took a tooth container toy and handed it to him and said "to remember me by."

We spoke about using fluoride. The dentist doesn't believe that much fluoride should be used. A pea-size toothpaste for a day is sufficient. If we brush twice a day, half a pea-size each time. We currently use a pea-side in the morning and then at night as well. Now I'm going to use training toothpaste in the morning and then Tristan's fluoride toothpaste at night. It's funny because the Fraser health guys told me that fluoride should be used right away when the first tooth appears. They told me that unless you ingest tubes full of fluoride toothpaste, it won't harm you. The dentist tells me it does. You won't be able to tell until your child gets their adult teeth. The teeth will come out with white freckles (??). Apparently, fluoride exists in food sources like milk and juice.

The best part about this trip was when the dentist remarked that Tristan had nice teeth and that he looked like he had just come from a dental cleaning. It was so clean, white, and he didn't even have any plaque. I was so pleased again! When I told Jean-Louis this, he was shocked. He thought for sure we would get lectured on not cleaning his teeth properly. The truth is, Tristan doesn't like to brush his teeth much. We have to bribe him and force him some times. He always brushes first and then we brush him after. We started this process very early and we do try to stress the importance of it every time. I guess what I am hearing today is that all that effort has paid off :)