I love this pic. Julian's ball obsession continues, strong as ever. He is actually pretty good at rolling the bocce balls, even though they're very heavy. The sky is the limit for his ball obsession, literally...a few weeks ago he pointed up to the moon in the early evening sky and said, "Ball!" Pumpkins and melons are balls too. Didn't you know?

I'm tired lately. Business has been really good this week, but I'm pooped from it all, so today I'm taking the day off from the world of commerce. Well, I did sew up two wraps, but that's manufacturing, not really commerce.

I'm behind on my homework. I was trying to read Playful Parenting and Becoming the Parent You Want To Be: A Sourcebook of Strategies for the First Five Years this week, but I really haven't gotten any reading done at all. I've just been too busy with business. Heh. Last week I read 3-4 books, but this week, nothing.

I've been looking into the concepts of Positive Discipline and Non-Violent Communication lately, but just very briefly. The two sort of go together, although Non-Violent Communication is not necessarily for parents/children, it's frequently used in international mediation and diplomacy as well. Both make a lot of sense to me, at least what I've learned so far.

I feel like I'm very unprepared for discipline issues. I know spanking and punitive measures sure as hell didn't work for me. Being spanked and punished made me angry and distrustful of my parents, unwilling to communicate with them, and solidified my resolve to do things my own way, just to *hide* it better in the future. My brother was spanked way more than I was, and he certainly hasn't turned out very well. Sorry if you're reading this, Morgan, but you haven't.

So I know what I *don't* want to do as a parent, but I'm still grasping around to figure out what an effective alternative is. I'm a big researcher, if you didn't know that already, and I definitely like to feel prepared for new and challenging situations. I think I'm on the right track now, but I have a lot of reading and processing to do.

Julian is a fantastic little boy in so many ways, and without tooting my own horn too much, I think I've done a great job so far...but it is relatively easy to be loving and responsive to a cute blobby little infant who relies on you for everything. It's much more challenging to stay loving and communicative with a little person who has their own personality and agenda, and who can talk back!

Can you believe that it's August already? Not me. One second ago it was May and I was wishing that summer would hurry up and arrive already. One. second. ago. Flash!

New Julian words from the last 3 days:
apple
cookie
shoes
peepee
poop

He loves the word "apple". And he's SO proud of his exploding vocabulary. Funnily enough, he has started signing like crazy again, at the same time that he is saying tons of new words. He still signs "bird" instead of saying it. He started signing for "potty" again after a hiatus. He *finally* is signing for "drink", after almost a year of me signing it to him.

"Hurt" is another popular sign that he is using. Unfortunately he has a lot of opportunities to use it, as he insists on running everywhere, especially if the ground is hard, uneven, sloping and rocky. He also prefers to run with both hands full, so that when he falls he can't put a hand out to stop himself and instead breaks the fall with his face. Ugh.

Oh, he's up from his nap, gotta run!