Heh - the toddlers I know don't seem to have any interest in the toy versions of cell phones -- they can tell Mom & Dad are withholding the really good toys.

My brother got a spare keyboard so he could actually use the one connected to the computer when D was wee. The phone morphed from a teething device to something the kid could call people with a bit before the he had the whole language thing worked out.

Owen has this toy laptop that my mother got for him.

What's weird about laptops for tots is that the displays are so tiny. I would think that LCD displays are cheap enough these days so they could make them bigger.

I'd be a total mess if my best friends w/ the babies moved away. It's so much harder then if it's just grown up friends moving. although that's no picnic either.

So much of the communication with toddlers (not to mention babies) is in the shared physical presence. I mean, I can talk to B when she's away. It's not the same as talking in face space, but the main part of the communication is there.

Heh - the toddlers I know don't seem to have any interest in the toy versions of cell phones -- they can tell Mom & Dad are withholding the really good toys.

How old do kids usually get in the USA before they get their own cell phones? You can see here kids, really young kids, like early grade-school age, with their own cell phones. So not toddlers, but still.

Owen has this toy laptop that my mother got for him

There's something similar that you can get here - not a laptop, but a special keyboard with really big and colorful keys, for toddlers.

One of the cutest things I ever saw was a 1-ish y.o. at a restaurant playing with her dad's keychain and using the electronic car door opener thingy like a Blackberry. She'd hold it in both hands and "type" with her thumbs, and then put it up to her ear to "talk" and then go back to texting...it was freaking ADORABLE.

After a few minutes of this, she realized that an even more fun game was to drop the keys on the floor so her dad would have to pick them up, which was still pretty funny, but less cute.

Happy Birthday, Dana! Happy Birthday, Ellie!

Hello everyone from the other side! After quite the busy week, I arrived in CA without a hitch this weekend. Currently I'm studying for the DMV test and waiting for my stuff to get here.

When the nephew was not-quite-2 and forced to do longish stretches in the car seat, he'd grab the wee remote for the car stereo and play cell phone with it nonstop, complete with answering and hanging up calls (he'd make a beepy sound, push a button, blahblahblah for a bit, then push a button before stopping...)

It was clear where he got the "cell phone" concept, but we never did figure out where he got "limo".

I don't click on scary robots.

Weenie.

Okay, I'm still freaked out by my last dream. It disturbed me enough that I went back to bed twice to see if I could replace it with something more placid, but no. Just me beating the crap out of some (not real) kids. I'd blame tommy, except his robot link would have made me feel better about it, not worse.

I also can't decide what to try and eat this morning.

happy birthdays to Dana and Ellie!

Kalshane, Mattias is wonderful - I loved the picture of him looking at his mother with that "who ARE you?" look.

And for Theo - newt (sorry, couldn't resist).

I would like to take this opportunity to remind people that I have the most mundane dreams in the entire known universe. Last week I dreamt that I was standing in line at the post office. Holding the little piece of paper that says I have a box. Never started standing in line, never stopped, never found out what was in the box, just stood in line, moving at a normal pace, holding my paper.

Then last night I dreamt that I had volunteered for an extra month of camp. I spent my time unfolding my clothes from my suitcase. That was it. That was the whole dream. Doing something I will have to do about ten times this summer.

eta: I decided to eat leftover spaghetti this morning. It was possibly not the right choice. I recommend something else for you.

Freebasing catnip: HOW TO - Make SUPER CATNIP... isolation of nepetalactone from catnip

At least two thirds of domestic cats "enjoy" the effects of Nepeta, a.k.a. "catnip." But do they it enjoy it enough? If humans were able to isolate the active ingredient in catnip, could we not use it to become omnipowerful CATGODS? Imagine the possibilities! What fool wouldn't want their own personal cat army? A massive fuzzy force with which to execute your every bidding? A united, unquestioning militia that requires nothing other than unfettered access to the super-powerful catnip products that give their adorable cuddly lives meaning?

Nepetalactone is the active ingredient in catnip.* Today we are going to isolate nepetalactone in its pure form through a steam distillation. The distilled liquid will be extracted with an organic solvent (toluene), refined, then evaporated to give the final product.

Now I know what you're thinking: is it safe for cats to be around such a concentrated extract of catnip? Hell yes! Within reason. And we're all reasonable people. Pure nepetalactone has been studied on cats extensively. In fact, "catnip oil" that is available from botanical stores is essentially just nepetalactone, and it is widely used in homeopathic medicine.