I'm feeling kind of jealousFollow

Twas two weeks before Christmas
At a party one night
The end of our shopping
was nearly in sight.
The presents from Santa
were picked out and bought
When in one twinkling moment
our gifts were for naught.
For lo and behold
who else would be there
But Santa himself
and his 8 magic deer,
supposedly parked up the street
out of sight
And quickly, The Mr
and I learned on that night
the gifts we had chosen
for our sons with care
From Santa would not work.
We gaped and we stared
as our eldest, so sweet
in his footy pjs
climbed up on Santas lap
and started to say
"Santa I have been a good little boy
and this year from you
I want just one toy".
He came close and whispered
into Santa's old ear.
Santa, he nodded
and promised with cheer
"My boy yes indeed you've been
good as you say
and you'll get that one present
from me Christmas Day".
Our son, he did smile,
and it brightened the room
But the toy he had asked for
was our death knell, our doom.
Old Santa had promised
something not on THE LIST
In a flash I had realized
we weren't done..
I was pissed


2 weeks ago at a party Xavier asked Old Santa for one gift and one gift only, but he hadn't had it on his list. It's a Air Hogs Anti gravity Micro RC car. They can be driven on any flat surface. we have walls that are over two stories tall so I can just imagine him driving this thing all over the living room.

However that's not what Im jealous of. Because we had to change the santa gift for Zavi we also had to for Ashe because the original Santa gifts were bean bags with the boys names on them. So now we had to look for something for Ashe. And finding the perfect gift for Ashe is hard because he is 2 and can't talk well, plus his birthday is just over a wek before Christmas so he got the one cool gift I would have considered using in replacement.

Around August we had found the perfect gift but it was way too expensive. It was Kota the ride on Triceratops. $300, holds up to 60lbs in weight, walks around, roars back at you when you roar at him, grumbles, and laughs when you tickle the tummy or chin. This things was pure awesomeness! It's like having a mini pony to ride, only cooler, cause you know, it's a dinosaur. And you dont have to feed it or clean up after it. But there was no way we were paying $300 for one toy.

However,browsing the net yesterday, Sickabilly noticed that the local Targets were selling it for $99. Buying online cost $70 in shipping, but I decided to check out the Target next door. Alas, they had sold their last one 5 minutes before I arrived. So last night I called a bunch of local Targets all over the triangle and after everyone saying they had sold out Ifound a store that had only one left. It was in northern Raleigh so I asked them to hold it for me and I drove down to get it, theme song Mission Impossible stuck in my head.

The box barely fit in my car, but it did, and Sick and I dragged it down to hise in our crawl space for a couple of days. I'm so excited about this but I have to admit, I'm jealous too. I wish I was under the 60 lb weight limit so I could try it out. Ahh well. We saved over $200 and it will be a fantastic toy for Ashe and the newest little one in the years to come so investment well worth it.

Wow, I have seen that toy in the store. It screamed ANNOYING at me as I walked by.

Yeah at 2 Xavier was talking in nearly full sentences, could debate better than a 4 yr old, and what not. Ashe is definitely behind the curb and we're looking into it. Sick has a nephew who had a speech delay issue so we're already **** about watching it intently and getting him evaluated just in case. The Ped doesnt seem too worried, but she said an eval at 2 is free so why not? Frankly, I blame it on laziness and stubborness. Once the kid has decided a certain sound works for him on a word, no amount of us trying to correct him will make him budge.

Oh they already want it but I have my sanity to think of.

You are very thoughtful on every level for your children. I would not worry about the speach thing unless they reach 4.

Call him 'tarv'?

I wouldn't worry to much about the speech development. Steven's speech development was slower than normal and it was fine.

We saw the pony version of this toy and if Charmaine was younger, we would have picked it up without question.

Yup I understand this and I'm not too worried. Im only doing speech eval because it's free now, and because the MR is worried (with good reason as speech issues are on his side of the fam). It's really more to placate him than anything. And you cant beat free. I figure they'll come in, do the eval and say no worries, or give us some ideas and tools if he does need help. either way it cant hurt and only help.

I seriously can not wait until Xmas now. I think I'm going to have more fun than the kids are, watching them

Sure, if it's free, by all means have the eval done. It can't hurt.

I'm not in a very holiday mood this year. Wasn't last year either. I hope '09 is better for me.

Honestly Sam, that diagnosis of him messing with us cause he can wouldn't surprise me one bit, middle child syndrome or not withstanding.

It's similiar. It's CDSA (childrens developmental Service Agency) through NC. Until age 3 all evals are free. We have an eval scheduled mid Jan for 3 specialists to come over to our house for about 3 hours, hang out, play with him, and get a feel for how he acts in his own enviornment. After age 3 though you have to pay, which is why we're being advised to have it done now, might as well kind of deal.

I know most second kids tend to develop later than first born kids. A lot is due to people speaking for them, or them being able to convey what they want through other means. Im pretty **** about making sure we parents or big brother do not speak for him. And when he is asking for something we work on getting him to try and speak specifically what he wants, as well as gently correcting mispronounciations. And he does have words that are understandable. As I said Im not too worried. However he has this stubborn streak that since 12 months, once he has this idea for what a word "should" be, no matter how hard we try to help him, he adamantly holds on to "his word" and no amount of coaxing will change it.

He hears perfectly, can follow 2-3 step directions with ease (when he wants to) so it is not a hearing issue. He is just now starting to repeat stuff we say. I can get him to repeat most of the alphabet and 1-10. But while he can say the word dog, the animal frog = dog and the animal dog = dag. And no matter what he wont change it. And his default word for anything he doesnt know or he deems unneccesary to learn is daday. The Mr and I agree we can understand about 30% of what he says. The Ped says by this age we should be able to understand 75-80, but then again I know each child develops differently and his motorskills are really good. I know a lot of kids master one skill first before working on the next which is what I think is really going on.

he has quite a few words in his vocaublary. As I said Im really not overly concerned. but its easier to ease the husbands mind, and I cant say no to an eval for free.

haha... yeah.

my son calls dogs da da. Then he calls me, and anyone who walks through the front door DAH. Hes also surprisingly good with directions. I was wrapping presents yesterday and told him to put the present under the tree. A totally new task hes never done before. He picks it up and goes and shoves it INTO the tree, which was absolutely hilarious but close enough. He can point at body parts, loves to throw balls and is just learning somersaults. his priorites are all bass ackwards.

I still cherish the translation of De Profundis you sent me when you were 3