ch...ch...ch...ch...Changes!

Shit, things seem to be progressing fast around here. I posted before about him starting to talk more. But that's not even it. Every thing he does every day seems to be new and improved over yesterday. Let me shoot off a few examples here...

Dogs...Just today, he started to call Teeva, "T.C.", which is what I use sometimes when calling her (it stands for Teeva Chiro). Not only that, we were getting ready to take (all four) dogs out for our evening walk and Teeva was, of course, lagging behind. So he started yelling down the hallway, "TC...cmn", which I translated as "come on". Furthermore, after we got outside and TC was waiting on the top step and Cobalt was half-way down already (by himself and upright, thank you very much) he turned around and went back up and pushed on her butt to force her to get down.

Sleep... I suppose I should mention that Kyle is out of town, working on a courthouse renovation (she's the Project Architect, and defacto PM) in Fresno. (Apparently, they need more courtrooms to handle all the meth cookers in the area.)
Anyway, Cobalt's still been having a hell of a time getting to sleep at night, usually requiring a bottle of two of milk and his father having to put him back to bed a couple of times and/or his mother lying with him in bed until he falls asleep. Well, for the last two nights, it's been dad reading him a couple of stories and then goodnight. Last night, when I went to leave his room, he wanted a bottle (after refusing one 1/2-hour previous). Tonight, when I put the little angel down, he gave about 4 kisses, and as I got up to leave, instead of crying or getting out of bed, he just gave me a little wave and rolled over to go to sleep.
My friends, you have no idea how big this is for us. We've tried a number of things to get him to go and stay asleep at night. First, we tried a "routine"...that didn't last long as neither Kyle, me or Cobalt could adhere to it. Then we found him a new bed on craigslist. Then Kyle made some blankets for him... the first one was great and the second one, well, I really don't know what she was thinking.
So last week we went comforter shopping. After spending nearly an hour and a half in the stupid Bed, Bath and Beyond, we came out of there with nothing, as all they had was either shit or out of stock. I then went to Ikea to pick one up...it was cheaper and nicer. After getting the new comforter, he has slept through the night, without getting up to snuggle with mom, several times. I guess I can't take all the credit for his better sleep, but I'd like to think I helped in some way.

shoes... he has been very unwilling to wear any shoes on his feet for several weeks, or has it been months. We'd gotten him several pairs of chuck taylor's as they seemed to be the best for his high instep. We also have been buying him Teva sandals, too. Both have helped, but for the last couple of weeks, he didn't want the sandals or the chucks. Finally, last week, I took him up to the shoe store on Haight that has the chucks. Even though I hate Haight street, I was already there to pick up some contacts for Kyle, so I figured "what the hell". And I wheeled the boy over to see if he'd be interested in another pair. Lo and behold, he wanted another pair of red high-tops. So I got him a size 8 this time, up from the sevens. He put them right on and wore them out the store. They seemed a little long, but after a few trots, he was no longer stumbling.
This past weekend, on our shopping excursion to the gap and old navy, namely for jeans for me and pj's for him, Kyle found some high-tops on sale that were even better for his high instep than chucks...they lace down just as low, but they are more wedge-like than ankle-fitting, so his foot doesn't get smooshed. After two days at school, he reportedly has only taken one shoe off once.

Geez, I wonder what he's going to do tomorrow...start drawing?