yes we can!

climbing and talking

many advances in speech. yesterday he started saying "okeh" in response to "OK." he also likes to roar at the eric carle brown bear postcard that hangs above his changing pad — quiet roars that sound more like throat-clearing but will doubtless get louder and more acute. speaking of loudness, he screams just to hear himself do it, so we try not to react, but it's cute. i'm convinced that he says "it's dark" when we point out the window at night. no progress yet on "ball"/"balloon" disambiguation. he calls for me when he doesn't know where i am and wants to find me. he also (nonverbally) asks for help with matryoshka dolls when he's having trouble separating tops from bottoms — just hands them to me and expects them to be handed back in two pieces.

he likes to draw on paper! who knew. all kinds of doodles.

all of our work on descending/dismounting backwards has paid off because he climbs and unclimbs stairs with enthusiasm and an appropriate amount of caution. it's a sight to see him peer down a flight of stairs and then determinedly turn himself around to descend feet first. the same extends to playground equipment, although he may be developing some hubris that will unavoidably lead to some tumbles from too-high platforms.

finally, photos. we had a lovely thanksgiving in great barrington, massachusetts with joey and alana and many friends. alana took several family photos that are (1) fantastic and (2) embarrassingly some of the first we have. they're on my flickr feed.

advances

1. stands freely (if only in jest)
2. says "obama" -- not sure why.

no no nonono no no

Repeatable experiment:

Us: Hey Linus, do three singing pigs say "La La La"?

Him: Nononononono.

crawling updates

as you might expect, linus's crawling has improved dramatically since the last post/video. straight lines and curves pose little challenge, and he is experimenting with clambering over obstacles such as fan legs and fathers. when he finds himself in a fit of pique in his room, he crawls into the kitchen or bathroom to seek an adult. he enjoys grass and creeping thyme.

in other news, he pulls himself to a standing position every time the opportunity arises. beds, legs, tables, chairs, dressers, strollers, hampers -- all yesterday.

crawling progress

Last thursday Linus crawled for the first time in earnest (toward an iPhone on a hardwood floor). The following video from yesterday shows his mastery, after only 72 hours, of diverse terrain (cheap IKEA rug) and of identifying Apple products toward which to crawl (MacBook on the floor).

And just now he chased me around as I swept the kitchen floor along a sigmoid path.

he crawls!

I was at the library yesterday when LF, on a hardwood floor downtown, crawled several feet to get Kate's iPhone. I don't know the details; M should write a post about them. But we're calling it for the afternoon of July 23, 2009.

This morning (and yesterday evening) everyone was trying to make him crawl again: placing objects just out of his reach, enticing him with spinning tops, et cetera. No repeat performance yet. It's possible he forgot what he did to locomote so effectively. Here's what he does instead: lean forward, smack his hands on the floor, start moving one hand in front of the other, drag his hindquarters forward, get frustrated, sit back up.

recent fun involving drinkware

we're not sure why he does this.

grilling season is on

we are admittedly a little late to the game, but: we got a grill. thanks, mom and dad!

games, etc.

With the abatement of such distractions as ear infections and roseola comes a resurgence in such personality-building activities as games, eating and crawling practice. Mama can no longer drink a glass of water without a rogue hand being thrust down into the glass even before she can take it away from her mouth. Linus also enjoys throwing things with great enthusiasm and waiting for spectators to participate in the fun, rinse, repeat. Alas, we do not have a picture of this. Experimenting with foods has also resumed, today's subjects being a couple blueberries and a raspberry. The jury is still out. And finally, he has mastered the backwards crawl and picking himself up from a belly position to sitting. More to follow.

strawberry picking

16 quarts, ~3 hours.

biting and pulling up

today linus continued his self-study in motility. the subject area today was the bathroom. why the bathroom? well, in this sweaty weather, mama has to stay well-hydrated. that also means frequent bathroom use. one of linus's favorite toys lives in the bathroom as well. it's one of those (sort of scary, i think) contraptions that allows one to turn a knob or push a button and out pops a little disney character. yikes! anyhow, linus loves it and remains occupied by it's mysteries long after i've finished my task in the bathroom. so... i occupy my own self working in the kitchen until he finishes his baby work in the bathroom. incidentally, the epic of teething continues as well. he bites everything, and hard. toys, clothes, furniture, skin, nipples... this makes for frustration all around and our afternoons and evenings have been quite trying. normal sleeping and waking patterns are thrown off and the slightest of inconveniences turn into BIG PROBLEMS. while i am aware that i have a very easy child, frustration tolerance has clearly diminished with age and teeth. back to the bathroom. so, i'm puttering away in the kitchen and turn around to see my sweet little boy with his fingers wedged between the toilet seat and the lid getting ready to chomp down on some porcelain. ack!!!! where's the lysol?! i like germs, but i do have limits.

pulling up to standing

we put linus in a hamper full of warm dry clothes, as we often do, and he pulled himself up to a standing position to reach into the dryer. happy with his achievement, he enthusiastically pulled himself up in the hamper several more times after we brought him upstairs. unfortunately, an 18-pound baby leaning on the wall of a hamper is not a recipe for stability, so we had to move him to the floor. he tried to stand up at least once using his dresser drawers as handholds.

also, we think we witnessed, at dinnertime, his first attempts to crunch food with his incisors. so far he has crunched snap pea pods and cereal O's. he is getting better at putting desiderata directly into his mouth on the first attempt.