The Boy Who Loved A Bath

See that boy there? The one who's having a blast in the tub? Oh how we miss that boy. From day 1 Nigel has loved taking a bath. What's not to love — especially for a kid that would live in the pool if we let him. When we moved to Texas he was slightly less interested in taking baths, but he'd still sit still and play for a bit.

That all changed about two weeks ago. One day, after they had worked on the waterline in our neighborhood for the millionth time, some mud came out of the faucet and Nigel saw it. It totally freaked him out. We got over that hurdle, only to have a little poo episode. Now, he's afraid of sitting down in the tub. Afraid is an understatement. There's a whole 'lotta screamin' going on over here. We've got good old fashioned screaming, plus the yelling of some very dramatic — often hilarious — phrases, such as: "I gotta get out of here" and "There's some yuckiness in here." And it doesn't help things that our cold water is so hot (we've had more than 60 days over 100 this summer) that Tim has to run the bath 30 minutes before bath time and add ice cubes to the tub.

It's so dry here that we had been giving Nigel a bath every other day, but in order to get Nigel calmed down we're doing it every night with more play and less cleaning. Any other suggestions?

First Day of Preschool

The first day of preschool was a hit! When we dropped Nigel off, he hung up his backpack and went on inside the class without even looking back. He reports that he played with blocks, sang some songs, had snack and used the potty all by himself. Tim took off work, so that made the day all the more special (we had coffee alone... I know, right?!). This first week is half days, so we're settling in for lunch, a movie (Cars) and a special dinner of Nigel's choice (Smokey's BBQ).

A Shameless Plug

So, I know you all come here for the Nigel updates and photos, but please allow me this shameless plug: My travel story for Cleveland magazine is out! You can read it here. I also made it onto the contributors' page. Yay!

Friday Cooking: Cupcake Cones

This week we borrowed an idea from our trusty kid's cook book, but cheated a tad. Nigel drooled over the cupcake ice cream cones when we first explored the book last week, so we gave it a shot. We used a box mix and canned icing, so unfortunately, Nigel didn't get to do a ton this week. He dumped in all of the ingredients, helped stir (after flicking a bunch of cake mix onto the floor), iced the cooled cones and added the sprinkles. I was worried about the cones falling over in the oven, but they were quite sturdy. The cake mix made way more than the book called for, so we made 10 cones and put the remaining batter into a loaf pan (once the loaf was cool I cut it into little sticks and froze them for Nigel's lunches). Unfortunately, less than 7 hours after we made them, the cones have already gotten a little soggy; Tim said it tastes like chewing on stale bread.

One Super Healthy Kid

I took Nigel for a checkup today so he could catch up on immunizations and get some preschool paperwork completed. I used to joke that I would marry Nigel's RVA pediatrician if we both weren't already married. He was just that awesome... very open to new therapies and ideas. So I was quite anxious about finding a new doctor, especially one here in Texas. Never fear! My pal Amy referred us to an amazing doctor of osteopathic medicine. I was really impressed with her interaction with Nigel. She didn't bat an eye when I told her he drinks almond milk and that he wasn't circumcised.

A huge bonus point was that she didn't make a big deal about him being adopted... she only asked if there was any family history she needed to be concerned about. (We had a bad experience with an older pediatrician in RVA when we first brought Nigel home. He had an bump on his arm that the old man discounted as "some African ritual." We knew that wasn't right. When we took Nigel to the VCU adoption clinic, the doctor was furious about that comment! Turns out it was a horribly infected mosquito bite that required some special medication.) The entire staff there was quite amazing. When Nigel's vaccination records were faxed piecemeal, one nurse took the time to go through all 25 pages so Nigel didn't get any unnecessary shots. They also set kids up to have a stress-free visit: Nigel got to pick out a special band aid and he got several small trinket toys as rewards.

As always, Nigel got a clean bill of health. He weighs 32 pounds and is 39 inches tall. Nigel got 2 shots (with very minimal fussing) and a blood draw for iron levels (he didn't even flinch... he watched the blood going into the tube). His new doctor was so impressed with how smart he is that she gave him a vision test that's normally for 4 year olds — and he totally aced it.

UPDATE: Not long after I posted this, a nurse from Nigel's doctor's office called back with the results of his blood draw. Turns out, his iron levels are slightly low and they want him to take a kid's multivitamin with iron and calcium. Honestly, I'm totally baffled. Nigel eats red meat, greens, raisins, etc; we have beans at least once a day; and he doesn't drink regular milk anymore (excessive amounts of dairy block iron absorption). My limited Google research suggests that Vitamin C aids iron absorption, so we'll add and an orange or OJ to our breakfast and research the multivitamin. Anyone else dealt with this?

Indoor Obstacle Course

In addition to our indoor exercises, Nigel's added obstacle courses to his beat-the-heat fun. Earlier this week he ran down the hall, did 5 jumping jacks, ran back, and jumped over a yoga block and a yoga mat. Good times.

Friday Cooking: Blueberry Muffins

Friday cooking time here. We're due a trip to the grocery store tomorrow, so we had to choose a recipe based on our existing ingredients. After consulting our recipe box and three kid cookbooks, Nigel chose Blueberry Muffins (recipe below) from the The Kid's Cookbook by Williams-Sonoma; I actually purchased the book back in the late 1990s when I worked at Time Life.

Nigel helped measure and dump the flour, baking powder and milk; stir the ingredients; line the cupcake tin with paper liners; and add the blueberries. There was also a good teachable cooking moment — and an example of why baking and I don't mix: We reread the ingredients before we scooped out the muffins and realized we'd forgotten to add the sugar!

Blueberry Muffins

Ingredients
1/2 cup melted butter
2 cups flour (we used 1 cup of whole wheat and 1 cup of all-purpose)
1/2 cup sugar
1 T baking powder
1/2 t salt
1 cup milk
1 egg
3/4 t vanilla
1 cup blueberries (we were a little shy of a cup, so we defrosted some frozen strawberries and tossed those in, too)

Directions
Preheat oven to 375. In a medium bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. In a small bowl, combine milk, beaten egg and vanilla. Add the milk mixture and the melted butter to the dry ingredients; combine and add blueberries. Spoon mixture into 12 muffin liners. Bake for 18 to 20 minutes.