Skills
Mommy recently pulled up a sheet from Babycenter.com to see how my development is going. Mostly, I'm right on track, but in one area, I'm way ahead of schedule. It turns out that throwing stuff overhand is a skill that typically only comes for children aged 18 months and up. But for me, it's come much earlier. I can throw overhand---using either hand---right now, at only 15 months. I've made lots of other strides as well. Whereas before, if I wanted to get somewhere quickly, I'd crawl there; now I frequently walk instead. It's true that crawling is still a good way to get around, particularly if I'm planning to pick stuff up off the ground, but walking is good too. Daddy is trying to teach me how to run a little bit. He takes me by the hand and we try to walk hurriedly from one end of the room to another, all the while saying "run, run, run". This is really fun although sometimes I find that my legs don't quite go where I want them to and I end up falling down. Still, I can definitely tell that I'm getting better at it.

I went to see some of my play friends today and we had lunch together. Mommy made me one of my favorites, a grilled cheese sandwich cut into easy-grip strips. Some of the other children ate only organic stuff and one of the other Mommies seemed to think that grilled cheese was no good. She's crazy. I tried to offer some of my grilled cheese to the others (I like to share). At the end, my Mommy decided that she wanted to blend in better, so she bought us a big jug of Odwalla carrot juice. We also have healthy, vitamin-packed Odwalla bars of various varieties. Elsewhere on the food front, I've discovered a new delicacy that I really like. Mommy and Daddy were having Japanese food earlier in the week and it came with Miso soup. This is a soup made mostly from soy and tofu with some spices. Mommy gave me some to try, and I loved it. I ended up eating a good portion of miso. I hope she gets this again soon. At this point in my life, I'm pretty much a vegetarian. Mommy tries to give me meat occasionally, but I'm not really interested. Mostly I love carbohydrates.

Yee Haw

I've discovered a new and wonderful thing I can do with my walking skills---mount my big, stuffed pony. Now previously I used my pony mainly as a kind of springboard for flipping over when chasing Daddy around and around it. It turns out it has an even better use--I can now climb onto the pony and go for a ride. Daddy makes it bounce up and down while he sings the theme song from Bonanza (Mommy thinks it's bizarre that he knows all the words to this). Sometimes I like to ride my pony Don Quixote style, backwards. The pony doesn't seem to mind though.

Shoes

I've posted some pictures of me walking around in my new shoes. I walked around in Sonoma today as well. You can find them here.

Viva Mexico

Yesterday I got to have my first restaurant meal ordered just for me. We all went out to Chevy's, a mexican chain restaurant. It's very baby friendly. For one thing, it's quite loud at all times, so any contributions I make to the overall din are hardly noticeable. (Not that I'm loud, I'm really not.) For another thing, the place is filled with balloons, which I think may be one of the world's greatest inventions. Mommy and Daddy ordered quesadillas and they ordered me a kiddie quesadilla plate too. This featured some sort of corn stuff as well as quesadilla and French fries. Now normally when you put a plate in front of me, my first instinct is to fling it. But not tonight. I was in the mood for a fiesta, so I sat nicely eating the stuff from off my plate---including the corn stuff, which shocked Mommy.

Viva Mexico!

Walkin' Shoes

A big milestone for me. Mommy took me out to the shoestore today to be measured for my first set of walking shoes. I am a size 5 1/2 wide. I was given a balloon and a Polaroid of me in my new shoes since it was a big event.

Apparently there are two competing brands of first-walking-shoes, an Italian brand called Elefanten and Stride Rite. The shoe saleswoman recommended I wear Stride Rite because of my meaty ankles. They have a slightly lower top. They also seemed to fit my feet better. Apparently, Euro children have pathetic birdy-ankles so the higher topped shoes are better for them. I immediately tried out my new shoes, walking from shoe display to shoe display and knocking my favorites to the floor. My favorite shoes were a pair of red strappy-front sandals for older girls. I carried one around with me for a while. Happily, since my feet grow so fast, I'll get a new pair in just a short time---just like Mommy's shoe shopping!

A Walk in the Park

I'm nursing another cold that has me coughing all the time. This is absolutely no fun. The way I figure it though, I've had so many colds that I'll soon have antibodies for every germ in the universe. Then I'll really have a good time.

In the meantime, my preferred way of getting around is walking more and more often. Last night when Daddy was playing hide and seek with me, instead of crawling around to catch him, I got up and walked/jogged over to him. It's pretty strange with him crawling and me walking. I also got to walk around a great park that Daddy took me to on Sunday. They had swings, which I love, a sliding board, and a big plastic tube to crawl through. At the end of the secret passageway coming out of the tube is a big steering wheel. I quickly got up and got my arms on the wheel so I could "steer" the play area all around the park. The designers of these parks sure do know what babies like.

Blood, sweat, and tears

When Mommy picked me up from my crib this morning, she was quite startled at the carnage. It seems that I had a bloody nose during the night and ended up bleeding all over everything, my jammies, my blankets, my bedsheets, and myself. Despite all the bloodshed, I was in reasonably good spirits in the morning. Mommy thinks that this happened at least partially becuase I recently discovered my nostrils and have been exploring them diligently (like I explore everything else) these past few weeks.

Outings with some of my Lady Friends

Yesterday, I went to my friend Sophia's 1st birthday party. There were eight other babies (5 girls and 3 boys) and their mommies plus the birthday girl. We played with Sophia's toys and had good things to eat. There was even a snack tray full of Cheerios for my cohort. I enjoyed some vanilla ice cream and a bit of cake too.

Today, I spent the morning with my daddy while Mommy went to a doctors appointment. Then, after lunch and a nap, Mommy and I went to have a play date at my friend Chloe's house. Chloe is a month and a half older than I am and an expert walker, so I was proud to show off my new walking abilities to her. Chloe also demonstrated her impressive climbing abilities to me. Boy, I can't wait until I can climb up on the furniture and stand up, like her. (Mommy seemed less excited by this prospect.)

Chloe and I played with her toys, and I was especially taken with her cat, Mia. I petted Mia many times and had to work hard to contain my exuberance so that I did not upset Mia with excessively enthusiastic petting. We also pushed big plastic boxes around the room, and when Chloe sat in hers, I decided to put other things in the box with her so she wouldn't be lonely in there. We also played some especially exciting games of peek-a-boo with our mommies.

Chloe and I also had dinner at her house (our daddies were both out tonight so the mommies decided to get together). Chloe eats all sorts of things that I think are yucky. Ravioli, avocado, salad, tofu... I just don't understand the appeal. Each time I was offered one of these things, I quickly dropped it on the floor so Mommy would think I'd eaten it. Just give me the old standards, banana, cereal bars, bread, crackers, and Cheerios, and I'm a happy man. Mommy did manage to sneak that wierd avocado into my diet by spreading it on my yummy, crusty bread tonight though. How tricky of her!

Hi Da Da

My new favorite phrase is "Hi Da Da". I say it when I see my Daddy in the morning and when he comes home from work at night too. But it's such a good phrase that I like to say it throughout the day even when he's not around as well. Sort of trips off the tongue "Hi Da Da."

The Old Ball Game

Recently, I've been extremely interested in playing games involving balls of all kinds---baseballs, footballs, even frisbees (if that counts as a ball). Yesterday morning, as soon as Daddy arrived in the living room, where I was playing, I quickly scurried to the toybox and pulled out a baseball. I then held it up proudly and brought it over to him. He rolled it to me a couple of times. Next, it was off to the toybox to get my San Diego Chargers football, which I also presented to him. Later, I got out my green football and my frisbee to present to him. He seems to really like playing these catching games and so do I.

Put One Foot In Front of the Other

My walking has really taken off since Friday. I went to music together on Friday and walked all the way across the room several times, to my mommy's delight. This weekend, I have kept up the pace, and I'm walking all over the place, often carrying things with me. I am very proud of myself!

Photos from Miami and the story of My Easter Photo Shoot with Rosie

Mommy has posted the digital photos from the Miami leg of our Florida trip. You can see me with my cousins, Meryl, Libby and Matthew here.

Yesterday, I put on my Easter outfit and went to JC Penney to have my photo taken with a live bunny rabbit. The bunny I met was white, and she was very soft and friendly. Her name was Rosebud, or Rosie for short. At first, I was a little nervous around Rosie, but then I realized that she is like my guinea pig, Licorice, except with longer ears, and I decided that I liked her. The photographer gave me some small, nerf-like Easter eggs to play with, and I practiced throwing them since my Daddy has been training me to be a pitcher. The eggs made me feel good since Mommy and the photographer would cheer when I threw an egg and then the photographer would take my photo while I was looking in the direction of my throw. I also tried to give the bunny the eggs, sometimes. I didn't throw them at her, but I did carefully place them on her head!

Fit and Trim

Increasingly, I've been faced with the problem that I'm often mistaken for a girl. Now maybe it's because of my big blue eyes or my big smile, but Mommy seems to think that it's mostly becuase of my long flowing locks. I've never had my hair trimmed in my life and it's gotten quite long on the sides, coming down to my shoulders. Well, Mommy had had enough of that and decided that I should have my hair trimmed. Initially, she wanted to make a big thing about it and go to a specialist "baby barber". Naturally, this option would have entailed considerable expense, but on the upside, I would have gotten a balloon. Daddy was skeptical of this since he feared that the baby barber would be too zealous in cutting off all my curls. So the compromise was that Mommy would trim my hair a little, which she did yesterday. It's pretty much the same everywhere except on the sides, which are shorter. Since I don't really have a style for my hair (it goes where it goes), this arrangement seemed to work out just fine. I still have my nice curls, but things are not so long and shaggy on the sides. Mommy took me to a park to celebrate and people even guessed that I was a boy. Hooray!

Photos!

Mommy has just posted lots of lovely pictures from our trip to visit Uncle Dave, Aunt Julie & Cousin Emma. See if you can spot Emma's dimple. There is one especially good dimple shot of Emma with Aunt Julie. It is a red letter day for photos, since Aunt Julie has posted pics on her site today too!

Links

Just a note: Mommy helped me a lot in finding all those links for the post about Tilden park. She requests that my loyal fans please click through on them. You'll especially like the Angela Park link.

Rodney and me

I spent the day with Daddy yesterday, so that Mommy could actually go out and do something fun (as though hanging out with me is not already ridiculously fun). As usual, Daddy took me out on one of his endless walks and we had several adventures together. First, we discovered a new park with infant swings. I'm always initially a little skpetical of the idea of beig swung ridiculously back and forth, but I quickly warmed to it. I especially enjoy it when Daddy pushes me by my feet and yells "feeeeeet" while doing it. I also liked removing my Cal baseball cap and watching it sail through the air as a swung by.

Next, Daddy took me down a hiking trail and I got out and walked along side him for some ways. I can tell that he's really looking forward to hiking with me, but for now he has to settle for mini-hikes on relatively flat terrain. Our hike took us through a big almond orchard, which smelled kind of neat.

Later in the afternoon, I spotted a frisbee on the ground. It was a bright green color, and I made Daddy pick it up for me. I laughed as Daddy through the frisbee in the air and ran to catch it. We even played catch a little bit. I would hold out my arms and (with perfect aim) Daddy managed to launch the frisbee between my arms and the little tray in my stroller, so I could catch the frisbee. I even threw it a few times too, trying to imitate the backhand flipping motion Daddy uses to propel it.

The best part of the day was watching the dogs. A couple near where we lived had set up adog obstacle course for their border collies. Apparently, these dogs compete in jumping and other skills at local competitions. They were magnificent, running and jumping over bars. They didn't knock over a single bar. The part that most fascinated me was a loong yellow tunnel. I would have liked to crawl through the tunnel myself, but there was no room with the dogs running through it. Finally, I got to meet a very nice Boston Terrier named Rodney. Rodney is very friendly, he gave me some kisses. He's also an Aidan-sized dog, perfect for me to stand next to and pet. Daddy said I did a much better job gently petting Rodney compared to my attempts to pet Licorice.

It was a great day!

Tilden Park

Yesterday, I got to go to a terrific park, Tilden Park, which is located in the Berkeley hills. It was a beautiful day yesterday, clear and sunny and around 70 degrees, so we went for a ride to the park together. On the way, I got to see views of the SF bay from out the car window. Once we arrived, I got to go on a steam locomotive at the Redwood Valley Railway. It's not the usual sort of locomotive, since it's kid sized. It reminded my Mommy of the train she and my Daddy used to ride at Angela Park. The train at Tilden went through woods and around the edge of mountains. There was a tunnel too. I was not sure what to think of the tunnel initially, but I sort of warmed to it.

After the train ride, we rode deeper into the park until we came to an old-fashioned Merry-Go-Round. It has all sorts of animals that went up and down, horses, dragon, and lots of other critters. I rode on a horse with Mommy. The best part was the lights and the music. The carousel has lots of fabulous lights, and I took time out to point out every one of them in case Mommy missed any. I then walked around the park while Mommy and Daddy held my hand---sort of my first hike. It was a great day.

Words 2

I am also very good at saying "cat" and "hat." The other day, I called a cat by name when I saw it on TV and, that same day, I also said "hat" when I saw some parents buying their baby a sunhat on a TV show. I also rather consistently say "hat" when my mommy puts one of my hats on her head. In addition, I say something like "sh" when I see a brush.

Today, in the lounge of the Nordstrom's women's bathroom (which also has a "mother's room" for nursing mothers and changing tables so most local moms of babies and toddlers pass through whenever they are downtown-- an excellent marketing strategy on Nordstrom's part, I must say), I enjoyed warmly greeting everyone who came in or out with my bright and sunny, "Hi." I am a very popular fellow when I smile and greet people. I tried to give my friend Sophia a hug while we were sitting together at Nordstrom's, but I was a bit too enthusiastic and we both fell sideways. Oops! She didn't seem to mind. She shared her toy phone with me.

Words

Words are really useful things. While I'm not yet so good at making words that sound exactly like Mommy and Daddy's words, I'm getting better at making words in a language they can understand. Of course, I still have my old favorites like "ights" and "mamamama", but I've added lots of new words as well. Whenever I see a glass or a bottle, I say "ice". My parents aren't sure if I mean literally "ice" since the glasses or bottles are cold or if "ice" is a corruption of "glass". When I see a fan, I make a distinctive swinging motion with my hand and say "ffff". When I see cheese, one of my favorite foods, I say "chchch", and when I'm hungry for milk, I say "mm...mm". Of course, when I want Mommy and Daddy to name something, I say "aht", which means "what's that?". The amazing thing is that Mommy and Daddy can actually understand my language now. This is so much better than communicating by crying and whining.

Steps to Recovery

I'm starting to feel better. Lately, I go through phases where I have a good amount of energy followed by periods of sleepiness. By the evening, I pretty much was back up to my usual energy levels and was playing happily. Before this, I was sleepy. I like to find new and unusual places to sleep and I found a really good spot yesterday. I crawled under the middle of Mommy and Daddy's big bed and fell asleep there. Mommy looked all over for me and it took her awhile to find me. It's such a snuggly spot.

I'm taking a lot more steps on my own now. I like to walk, especially when someone holds my hand, but now I'll walk a little bit even when there's no one to hold my hand. I don't walk for far or very confidently, but still I'm liking the freedom of getting around on my own.

My appetite is starting to come back as well. Yesterday, I ate an entire cereal bar. These cereal bars are great, they're my favorite food. Mommy and Daddy have taken to calling them "crack for babies" becuase of their addictive quality.

Daddy thinks my baseball career may be looking up. While I was in Florida, I played lots of games of catch with Daddy using a real baseball. I like how real baseballs make a satisfying "thunk" when you throw them. Best of all from Daddy's perspective, more often than not I throw the ball with my left hand. Daddy always gives me lots of hugs and kisses when I do that. He still dreams of my being a left-handed middle reliever like his hero Jesse Orosco.

Back from Florida

We flew back to California yesterday. I slept for most of the time, so I didn't even notice as we flew from state to state. Right now, I'm not feeling well again. I started to get sick during the middle of visiting my cousins and have not felt better since. One day we were supposed to go to Sea World to visit the fishies, but I had a fever and Mommy and Daddy decided that the fishies would have to wait. I hope I fell better soon.

In addition to my not feeling well, we had another problem. I got into my second car accident. As Daddy was waiting for people to pull out of a parking space on a rest stop on the way to Miami, a woman currently in a parking space decided to back out right into us. She put a big dent in the bumper but happily no one was hurt. Daddy was pretty annoyed that the car was hurt though.

In better news, I got to meet my cousin Emma for the first time. She's a lot smaller than I am but still very cute. One thing I noticed is that she seems to cry a lot. I told her that in just a few months she'll be big like me and will be able to crawl around where she pleases and even to pick up and eat food herself. Speaking of food, this cold has totally killed my appetite. I've been eating very lightly the past couple of days.

Grammy Slipped On the Ice

I heard some bad news yesterday. My Grammy (Mommy's Mommy) slipped on the ice and broke her lower leg/ankle very badly. Mommy and Daddy say that it sounds like a compound fracture. The doctors are not sure whether they are going to have to operate to set it heal properly, but either way Grammy will have a long recovery. She had been looking into visiting me here around April, but now that will probably have to be delayed. That makes me sad.

Cousins

This could be my last weblog entry for a little while. Tomorrow I'm flying to Florida to see a bunch of my cousins. First, we're flying to Orlando to meet my newest cousin Emma Clare. I can't wait to play with her and show her all the neat things there are to do. Later in the week, we're driving down to Miami (don't like the sound of that since it means a long car ride) to see my three other cousins, Meryl, Libby, and Matthew. They're all much older than I am so I'm looking for them (especially Libby) to teach me life's wisdom.

In the meantime, I'm discovering new and splendid gustatory delights. Yesterday, for the first time ever, I actually enjoyed eating stuff from a spoon. In fact, I finished a whole jar of Stage 1 sweet potatos and finished most of a bigger jar of Stage 2 squash as well. Mommy says that I had never before actually finished a jar of baby food, much less eaten almost 2 jars in one day! I was not in the mood for anything from a spoon today, however. Nothing compares to the deliriously good cereal bars Mommy gives me. If I could live on only them, I'd be quite happy.

Yet more pictures

Mommy has finally finished editing the pictures from my birthday and New Year's. First is January playtime a collection of pictures taken in Cali in January. Next comes New Year's 2003, Christmas week, and, best of all, my birthday. Enjoy!

Picture Time

I've put up some new pictures of me here. Three of them are pictures Daddy took of me this evening. One of them, the picture of Mommy, I took myself! I think I'm a great photographer. The last picture is a favorite. Whenver Daddy takes pictures, I like to crawl right up to the camera to investigate. This is a shot when I'm right on top of the camera. Enjoy!

Food, Glorious Food

Some of you know that throughout my life, food was not high on my list of desires or priorities. Sure I would happily play with food in order to humor Mommy, but eating it was an ntirely different matter. Mommy told me a story about a baby she read about online who was similar to me. One day, this baby's parents decided to do a little experiment. They placed on his highchair many items of food and one bottlecap and observed what the baby did. Answer: He played with the bright, shiny bottlecap and ignored the food of course.

Anyway, I think I finally understand the point of this food stuff. It actually is pretty good to eat. Especially if the food in question is bananas. I love these. I can now eat up to a half a banana at a sitting. I also like these crumbly baby nutri-grain ish bars. I love American cheese too. What I don't like is eating things on spoons. Mommy insists on trying to feed me this way, and I want no part of it. I'm my own man, and I want to put stuff in my own mouth on my terms...not hers. Anyway, food is cool.

Hobbits

My Mommy and (especially) my Daddy are addicted to the Lord of the Rings films. Daddy got the special extended edition for Christmas and now is in the process of watching virtually all of the extended footage. He's got a fever (which he thinks I gave him), so he's got a lot of time on his hands. Anyway, the weird thing is that Mommy and Daddy have decided that I resemble a hobbit. Hobbits are little folk with curly tousled hair and big wide eyes. I can't see how there's any resemblance to me at all. They've even taken to calling me a little Hobbit instead of the usual Mr. Baby (they rarely call me my actual name). Here's a bit of trivia I learned: Every actor except one wore a wig for the Lord of the Rings films. The one who didn't is the young son of the director Peter Jackson. He had perfect hobbit hair all on his own so no wig was needed.

Day of whine and roses

I've always hear Valentine's day is supposed to be a day of wine and roses. Since I couldn't come up with the roses, I thought I'd bring the whine. While my fever is down, I'm still feeling pretty out of sorts and not terribly happy. My favorite passtime was to go to sleep on Mommy's lap. Then, when she tried to move me, I would wail inconsolably. Not a good day.

Maybe Getting Better

I still had a "smidge of temperature" as they say in "It's a Wonderful Life" so Mommy took me to the doctor this morning. By the time I got there, my temperature was normal. They checked me for fun things like ear infections, but said I was fine apart from the fever. They also weighed me. I weigh 22lbs, 12oz. so I'm not packing on the pounds like I once was. I'm feeling a bit better, but still moving at only about half my normal speed.

I'm Sick

I took my Mommy on a playdate, but we had to cut it short because I got sick. Both Mommy and her friend noticed that I felt very hot. They took my temperature and it was 101.5. Happily, they gave me children's tylenol, and it seemed to work its magic---I'm down to 100.5. I hope I feel better. Mommy says it's my first fever.

...Uh oh. Back up to 101.9 at 6:10 pm.

Tickling

My Daddy is a big fan of tickling me whenever we wrestle around on the ground. For the longest time, I couldn't figure out how he did it, then it dawned on me how it's done. So Sunday night I decided to give him a taste of his own medicine. I crawled up to "hug" him in my usual way as we were watching the hype for the NBA All-Star Game (Daddy says the hype is far superior to the game, and I'd have to agree). When I got within hugging range, I put my arms around him...and then quickly moved my hands back and forth just under his ribcage. It worked! It worked! Daddy started laughing! This was great!

The Staff of Life

We went to Il Fornaio last night for dinner. A lot of people around us were complaining that it was bitterly cold outside. Mommy and Daddy snickered at this notion of cold---it was 45 degrees. They said these Californians don't know what real cold is all about. At any rate, it felt really cold to me. Mommy bundled me up in a heavy jacket and I got to wear my extreme sports snowboarder hat. Since several people commented on how cool my hat was, I decided to leave it on rather than tear it off at first opportunity.

At the restaurant, which means "the bakery" in Italian, I got to have bread. Lots and lots of delicious bread. My favorite was the Umbrian focaccia, which is focaccia topper with rosemary and sweet onions. Delicious! I also got to taste Mommy's mashed potatoes. At first I wasn't sure whether I liked these, but after a little trial I decided that I did like them. I had a great time.

Stacking Rings

Stacking rings are fun for a lot of reasons: they roll nicely on the floor, they're spinnable, they're fun to chew on, they are brightly colored and so on. Lately, I've found a new reason why they're fun---you can stack them on their base and makes a kind of ring pyramid. Stacking them on the base is actually a tough task because the base kind of tips back and forth as you try to put stuff on it. I have to concentrate closely to make sure the rings get on. But I can do it. Sometimes when I've just put a ring on the base, I like to immediately take it off again. Still, there are times when it's fun to complete the pyramid of stacking rings. I get lot of hugs and praise from Mommy and Daddy when I do that.

Duck, duck, goose

It was a very outdoorsy weekend for me. I went to two different parks a total of three times over the weekend. The highlight was a park with a big pond where ducks and geese live. While the ducks tend to be a little shy, the geese aren't. I was standing face to face with a goose, who was about as tall as I was. I found all these creatures to be fascinating.

Space Shuttle

Something called the space shuttle blew up today. Mommy and Daddy have been watching coverage of this event all day. Everyone is very sad. I think this is my first national tragedy.

Veggie Wheels

While I didn't originally like Veggie Wheels, I've come to appreciate their merits. After mommy ran out of delicious Fruit Wheels, she started giving me the veggie kind. I now really like to put things in my mouth though swallowing objects more than a few atoms in thickness is still difficult. The best thing about veggie wheels is that they rapidly break down into a kind of slurry when in contact with spit. Mommy now esitmates that my ratio of veggie wheel ingested to veggie wheel spit out on bib is up to 2 to 1. On the other hand, rice cereal, which is easy to eat but yucky, remains NOT a favorite.

Anniversary

My Nannie correctly notes that today is my one year anniversary in coming home from the hospital. Hard to believe I've been out that long!

Changing Tastes

My tastes are changing from the time that I was younger. While I used to really enjoy a good game of "chase the baby", I'm less interested in it being played the way it used to be. In the earlier version of the game, I would crawl away from my Daddy and he would catch my leg and pull me back to him on my tummy. I liked being caught so much that sometimes I'd make only a few crawl steps away and then stop and hold my leg out. I don't really do that anymore. If Daddy is going to chase me, then it's going to be a real chase. To make it even harder, I like to crawl behind stuff, like my big stuffed horsie, and hide from him so he cannot see me. Sometimes he spots me anyway and looks at me from a funny angle. That's great fun.

Toughness

My daddy is not so rugged and durable as I am these days. In the past several days, we were roughhousing in various ways, and he ended up being totaly shut down by my physicality. In one case, we were in a long crawling race on our hardwood (laminate) floors. Daddy's knees are apparently not as tough as mine for crawling on this surface at high speed and he ended up stopping. Yesterday, we were roughhousing by my horsey and I head butted him in the nose. He didn't seem to like that too much. Of course, I don't want to hurt Daddy, but I love to bounce around.

Tipping Points

One of the great things about many of my new toys is that they're eminently tippable. For instance, the Air-tivity table is fun to play with when standing on its legs, but even more fun--it makes a great crashing noise--when inverted. I've taken to tipping over other things---my gear toy is great to invert, the diaper genie is much more interesting (and much more rollable) when on its side. My big stuffed horse is also more interesting when on its side too.

On My Own Two Feet

Today I was waving at my mommy and her friend Cheryl, who were on the other side of the baby gate, and I was so involved in waving to them with both hands that I didn't notice that I was standing on my own. This was my longest time standing unsupported ever. It only happens when I'm concentrating on clapping or waving. Later this afternoon, I was in the living room with Mommy, Cheryl, and Cheryl's baby, Clara, and decided that I really wanted to get to the coffee table to taste and explore the candles. I had my hands on Mommy's while she was sitting in the floor, and I was so impatient to get to the table that when she let go I took three unsupported steps toward the table and got there on my own! Now I still don't quite believe that this happened, but Mommy has witnesses.

Socializing

I had a very busy weekend of socializing. On Saturday night, I got to attend my first Rabbie Burns night, a celebration in honor of the birthday of the great Scottish poet Robert Burns. From the look of it though, I think it's more an occasion for the adults to drink Scotch to excess. In any event, I was introduced to everyone, and there was a large contingent of guests at the party from the British Isles. Whereas normally my name is considered unusual and causes some people trouble in pronouncing, in this crowd I fit right in. No one even bothered to comment on the uniqueness of my name. In fact, there was an adult there who had the same name as me and congratulated my parents for spelling it correctly-- "Aidan." It seems he recently saw it spelled "Ayden" and was quite dismayed.

I'm still at home in social situations, but perhaps a bit more tentative than I was. Lots of people wanted to hold me and sometimes that was all right. But other times I preferred to be held by my Mommy and Daddy. Two of my best friends at the party were girls who live next door, Georgina and Madeleine Partridge. They are 9 and 7 years old and absolutely loved to hang out with me. They would run off and find more and more toys for me to play with. Naturally, I loved the attention and all the toys.

The following day, we all went to a Super Bowl party. This was my second time watching the Super Bowl, but my first Super Bowl party. Last year, they let me out of the hospital just in time to watch the Super Bowl with my Daddy in my sports-themed footies. This year, I wore jeans and my football sweater and sampled some quesadillas. (After mushing them up well in my mouth, I sucked off the cheese and then disgarded the remaining pieces of tortilla on my sweater. Too bad there isn't a more efficient delivery system for melted cheese!) My Daddy tells me that I experienced a very authentic Super Bowl this year. True to form, the game was a lot more boring than the ads. I did enjoy the halftime show though. I danced to Shania Twain and No Doubt. Why doesn't Mommy wear outfits like Shania's or Gwen Stefani's? Daddy suggested that she should, but it didn't really seem like she was going to take him up on that.

Cousin

I recently learned that I have a new first cousin, Emma Clare Morgan, who was born on January 21st in Orlando. She weighed 6 pounds, 12 oz. at birth---considerably more than I did. Not being as impetuous as I am, she decided to wait until she was full-term to be born. While the downside of this is that she didn't get to experience the joys of the big old world as quickly as me, the upside is that she seems to have some additional skills, like knowing how to eat and breathe at the same time, that I didn't have. As you know, I have many nicknames---Mister Baby, A-train, and so on. I thought it would be good if my new cousin had a nickname too. Mommy came up with a good one: E. Clare (a pun on the delightful dessert treat).

Insomnia

I find my sleeping patterns are changing. For a long while I took two naps per day, one in the morning and one in the early afternoon. Then I migrated to one nap in the early afternoon. Unfortunately for my parents, my sleep schedule seems to have shifted again. Now I prefer to nap from about 3:00 until 5:00 pm. I've been doing this for about a week, and I've been having trouble sleeping at night. I'm happy enough to go to bed around 8-8:30 (my usual bedtime), but I find myself waking up and not being happy about it during the last few nights. Worse yet, it's hard for me to fall back to sleep once I'm up. While this hasn't had much effect on my usual sunny demeanor during the day, Mommy says it's killing her. Daddy says something about my "circadian rhythms" being off. I don't know what that is, but it doesn't sound like a good thing.

Stacking Cups

Normally my idea of fun is to fling things around hither and thither. I"m not really keen on organization. But Mommy and Daddy think that sometimes play should involve a bit more discipline and last night was one of those times. Daddy lined up my stacking cups from smallest to largest and then instructed me on how to put a smaller cup into a bigger one. Eventually I got the hang of this. It was very different having a purpose for the stacking cups other than for banging and putting in my mouth. By the end, I was able to stck 5 cups inside one another. They make a satisfying noise when shaken this way.

By the way, while Daddy was convinced this was a new discovery, Mommy quickly disabused him of that notion.

ights

By the way, I'm figuring out the letter "L". Now, about half the time I refer to lights as "lights" instead of my usual "ights". The "L" sound is supposed to be a hard one to pick up, so this is a big breakthrough for me.

Bon Appetit

I have not been out to somewhat fancy restaurants in a while. Happily, I got to go out this past Friday to a restaurant called Il Fornaio. Il Fornaio means "the bakery" in Italian, which can only mean one thing---homemade bread. They say bread is the staff of life. That's not really true for me (milk is the "staff" of life), but of all the foods I've tried, bread is one of my absolute favorites. When we went to the restaurant, I got to sit in a nice, tall highchair which permitted a great view of the interesting things around me. On the ceiling were long strands of "ights" and at the end of the room was a roaring fireplace, another kind of "ight". They quickly delivered a big basket of bread and I settled in to really enjoy myself. The bread and some other goodies (Mommy gave me a piece of her rabbit-stuffed pasta, but without the rabbit) kept me well entertained throughout the entire dinner. My Daddy pronounced the evening a big success.

Giddy up

Yesterday, my Mommy built a great toy---a pony given to me by my Uncle Jack for my birthday. It's a grat pony, very spirited. The pony is suspended by four very thick rubber bands which makes it quite bouncy. It also whinnies and makes clip-clop noises as I bounce along. When Daddy came home, he gave me a very spirited pony ride. We were bouncing so much I was bouncing out of the saddle at the top of each bounce. I laughed and roared with delight. Mommy thought this was a bit much bouncing and asked Daddy to slow the pace of the pony from a gallop to a canter.

Food for Thought

After several months of having me try different foods, most of which I was not interested in, my Mommy has finally come up with a food that's an absolute winner---chocolate cake with chocolate icing. As I mentioned earlier, for the group one year old birthday thing, my Mommy baked many cupcakes. I didn't eat any of them at the party (owing to it being kind of messy), but Mommy did save me a cupcake to eat at home. I finally got to enjoy it last night. Let me tell you it was fabulous.

Here's how I like to eat cupcakes: First, I lick all the icing off the top of the cupcake. Icing is truly delicious stuff plus it gives me a delightful chocolate "beard". Next, I try to shove the entire cupcake into my mouth. It doesn't actually fit, but it does cause lots of cake crumbs to break off and go into my mouth. Mommy's cupcakes are so heavenly that they literally melt in my mouth (so I don't gag as is the case with other, lesser foods.) Then I pick up the crumbs on the table and keep eating until there's no more cupcake. Delicious.

I've never eaten so much solid food in my life. I hope there's another cupcake for tomorrow.

For Whom the Bell Tolls

One of the best parts of my Scoot About is its bell. I've never had a bell before, and I really like this one. It requres that I pull back a flexible plastic trigger. On releasing the trigger, it returns to its original position and causes the bell to ring. Anyway, that's how my Daddy explained it. To me, it means you push on the plastic thingy and get a nice noise out. I love it!

Yesterday, I went to a Gymboree preview---sort of an attempt to get all the Mommies to sign up for Gymboree. Currently I'm enrolled in a rival course called Kindergym. Well, the Gymboree stuff was pretty impressive. Mommy thought it was much more deluxe than Kindergym. So it looks like next "semester" I may be a Gymboree kid.

Wheels

I love wheels. The bigger the better. When I was in the airport waiting for our luggage, there was a big wheeled cart used to heft around stuff by redcaps. I really enjoyed investigating those wheels. In fact, Daddy had to pul me away before I started licking one of the wheels.

Finally, I have some wheels of my own. My Daddy assembled yet another of my birthday gifts, a Radio Flyer Little Red Scoot About. This was a gift from my Grandma Dorothy though she had no hand in building it (Daddy told me to stress that building this item was not a trivial matter.) Anyway, one of the best things about this toy is that it has wheels on it---fairly big ones too. While I think you're supposed to ride it somehow, I prefer to just sit beside it and play with the wheels, moving them back and forth. Maybe I'll taste them soon. Oooooh, wheels.

Happy Birthday...again

Yesterday I took my parents to a group one-year-old birthday party held by one of the social groups to which I belong. My Mommy was in chrge of baking cupcakes for all the babies and all the Mommies and Daddies at the party. She baked a LOT of cupcakes. I had a great time at the party since there were lots of wheeled vehicles to push around. A plastic motorcycle that I could sit on took my fancy. While I sat on it for a while as my Daddy pushed me around, I preferred to ride the toy dismounted, pushing it around the house as kind of a portable support for my walking. As usual, everyone thought I was cute an adorable.

After a time, my Mommy put a bunch of candles on the cupcakes and all the Mommies and Daddies sang happy birthday to us. I tried to blow out the candles on the cupcakes, but didn't quite get what I was supposed to do. After that, we all had cupcakes and ice cream. Except that a lot of the other people opted out---while Mommy had carefully ensured that everyone would have a cupcake, at party's end there were still LOTS of cupcakes left. Mommy did not seem too happy about that.

We were so busy later in the day that I still haven't had MY cupcake. Maybe tonight.

Labs

I got the results from my lab tests back on Friday. After initially diagnosing me as anemic, the fuller set of labs showed that this was not the case. I've got a clean bill of health. Yay for Mr. Baby!

Yet More Words

I'm making great progress in making words. Yesterday, my Daddy was reading me a book that had lots of pictures of animals on it. (Actually, he didn't seem to be reading the words in the book at all. He was just pointing to the animals and saying their names over and over.) Anyway, he came to one of my favorite animals, a cat. Now I've never seen a live cat, but they sure are nice in books. [Note: the previous sentence seems to be a hallucination by my Daddy, who helps me write this. I have seen and enjoyed many cates live and in the flesh.] After he said cat about a zillion times, he paused...and I said..."caaaaaat." I'm always careful to pronounce the "t" at the end. He was stunned. He tried again. Another zillion cats, to which I replied "caaaat".

But this was not my only feat of vobabulary valor. Later that morning my Mommy was showing me flashcards of various fruits that I might like to eat---apple, pear, orange, banana. She would say the names of the fruits while holding up the card. After a couple of rounds of this, I snatched the banana card from her and said, "banana". Now this is a big, hard word for such a little guy as me, but I said it. Daddy was in the room when I did, so I have a witness.

Christmas Photos

My first batch of Christmas photos are now posted. You can find them here. Mommy tells me that Shutterfly is running a special right now, so it's a great time to pick up more cute pictures of me. You can also find a link at my website.

Words

My vocabulary is expanding. My favorite word is still "dat", which I use to describe all interesting objects. This displaced my previous favoriate, "mama", which I used to describe everything. I also now use the word "ight" whenever I see a light. When I see a tree, I often say "tee", and when I see my piggy, I say "peegeegee". I'm also standing up on my own now more and more. I can't stay up for long and it's often by accident, but I'm feeling more confident in this.

Today I visit the doctor's office for follow-up to see if I've been exposed to tuberculosis as well as to find out about some other lab tests that were run. Mommy promises that there will be no more shots this visit, so at least it will be a bit better than the last one. I'm getting to like these trips less and less.

While I was back east, I learned how to clap. I like clapping, but what I like even better is getting others to participate in clapping with me. One of my favorite games right now is to grab the hands of my Mommy or Daddy and clap them together. They have bigger hands than mine, so theirs make a more satisfying noise when I clap them together than do my littler hands.

My Checkup

I got to do one of my least favorite things yesterday---go to the doctor. He weighed and measured me. My Mommy thinks my statistics are funny in this regard: I'm in the 10th percentile in height, the 50th in weight, and the 97th (!!) in head size. Were it not for my massive head, I'd be even shorter I suppose. The doctor then expressed disapproval at Mommy and I for not eating more solid foods. (Actually, Mommy is pretty good at eating solid food, I'm not.) Now for the torturous part. I had a whole bunch of shots and had blood drawn. This was bad enough, but then I learned that I had to go to another lab to have *more* blood drawn.

Mommy drove me to the next lab, but, because I'm such a wriggly guy, they couldn't to the tests because there was only one attendant on duty. (It takes at least three people to hold me down because of my strength and agility.) so it was off to another lab and more unpleasantness. With all the blood they took from me today, I'm surprised I have any left.

Anyway, on the way home a woman in a big SUV rammed into the back of our vehicle. Since I sit facing rear, I saw the SUV close in. Everyone was scared and on edge, but it doesn't look like much harm was done.

What a day.

My Favorite Word

Lately, I've really enjoyed saying the word "dat" whenever I see anything interesting. During the car ride home from the airport, there were so many interesting lights all around me that I said "dat" more or less the whole trip. A whole 45 minutes worth of "dats". My Mommy and Daddy are amused at how carefully I pronounce the "t" at the end of "dat".

Earned my wings

Well, I flew back west successfully. For most of the trip I was reasnably happy although I had no interest in getting back into the car seat after our layover in O'Hare. While I was waiting in O'Hare, I met a 16 month old by named Finley. He's really good at walking. I showed him that I'm good at cruising by pushing my stroller (while Daddy held on and made sure I didn't go too fact) all around the airport. He seemed quite impressed. Finley was flying off to North Carolina, so we said good bye to one another. We both waved at each other. At the end of the flight to Oakland, the captain of the aircraft thought I was so cute that he gave me a set of United pilot wings. I think this means I'm now qualified to fly large jet aircraft.

The bad news is that I brought back another present from the east with me---a cold. I'm sneezing and coughing and pretty miserable. To top it all off, I'm going to see the doctor today. What a day---I might have to have shots AND antibiotics. What could be worse?

The bad news is that

Having my cake...and eating it too

Yesterday was my first birthday. I'm one now. Finally an age that's above zero. I had a lovely party yesterday complete with a birthday cake. This was my first chance to eat birthday cake, and I made the most of it smearing it all over my face, my clothes, and especially in my hair. I did discover one thing though---birthday cake is not all that good in your eyes. Everywhere else it's great. The usual suspects were rounded up to come to my party and, as a special treat, Mommy bought all of us pointy party hats to wear. They all looked funny with pointy hats on their head. Mommy also bought these streamer things that you blow through and they unroll. These I found to be incredibly scary as they turned everyone into hideous mutants. I made everyone stop using these horrible devices.

My best birthday gift was from my Uncle Jack. He got me a pony! Well, it's not a real pony, but a big plastic and fur covered pony. Much like a real pony, this one has motion-activated pony sounds. Unlike a real pony, my pony doesn't eat grass, only batteries. Now how to get a pony to California?

I also got lots of other good stuff. My Auntie Max and her friend Hugh got me a bunch of college-wear, but I'm not sure who to root for. Auntie Max got me a whole Penn State ensemble, whereas Hugh got me a couple of Notre Dame outfits. Up until now, the only college-wear I had was a Cal hat that my Daddy's friend from work got for me. Now I'm confused as to who to root for.

Back East

I've been back east for several days now. It's a while different world here. For one thing, it snowed and snowed on Christmas Day. I haven't seen snow like this (or indeed any snow at all) since I was in Lake Tahoe last spring. On the day after Christmas, I went outside to "play" in the snow. It was pretty scary at first. I didn't like how it felt on my feet or especially on my hands. Eventually, I got a bit more used to it and tolerated being outside as my Daddy built me a baby-sized snowman. One thing that's definitely true about snow---it's cold.

I've learned some new tricks since I've been back east. Perhaps the one that is most delightful to everyone is my ability to clap. While I was able to figure out how to take tw toys and bang them together in a clapping-like manner, until very recently I never clapped without stuff in my hands. Well, I figured out how to do it. I like to clap along when people sing or chant as well as when I do something really fun like play where's the baby. Clapping is good.

Colds and Flu

Oh no. I've just learned that tomorrow at 4AM (!) we have to leave the house to fly on an airplane. While I don't mind flyig at all (makes me sleepy), the last time I flew, I got a cold that had me taking two rounds of antibiotics and lasted until about 1.5 weeks ago. I do NOT want to get another cold again. I hate having the cold, and I hate taking the antibiotics. I'm scared that the sick people in the plane are going to give me their germs. Yikes!

Catch

I'm learning all sorts of new tricks these days---like playing catch with my Daddy. When he first started rolling balls towards me (some months ago), my reaction was to slap at them with my arm, sort of like a hockey puck. Since that time, I've gotten much better at picking stuff up and now I'm quite good at it. Now, when my Daddy rolls a ball to me, I stop it, pick it up, and here's the best part, I sort fling the ball back in his general direction. He seemed delighted at this turn of events. In fact, he's not really that choosy about the direction in which I fling the ball. I can fling it about anywhere and he's delighted.

Christmas in California

One of the best benefits of livingin California is that I get Christmas *twice* a year. Yesterday, I received a bunch of gifts for first Christmas. My biggest gifyt was my LeapPad Learning Table. This table is the perfect hieght for me (short) and has lots of interesting levers and buttons to press. Whenever I press one, a lady who lives in the table sings me a song. My favorite is the alphabet song. I like this one so much that I sway side to side during it---dancing to the music.

I got some other stuff too. One toy consists of a whole bunch of gears that spin around when I press a button. The two best parts about this toy are that the gears are the perfect size to pull off the toy and put in my mouth. (They're tasty too). The other great thing about this toy is that when the gear spin around, I can press down on them with my hand and stop them from spinning. The toy makes an interesting grinding noise when I do this.

Of course, the toy I like the best ends of costing the least. Mommy and Daddy got me "snap lock beads" which are made in a very tasty plastic. This toy costs about $3. Naturally, it is my favorite (second only to my $1.99 stacking rings).

Vocabulary

I'm learning a couple of new words. While I still most enjoy saying "Mama", which is useful for virtually all occasions, I've added two new semi-words to my repertoire. Whenever I play with my stuffed piggy, my Mommy or Daddy will always say the word "piggy", so I decided to try it too. It didn't quite come out as smoothly as I might have liked, more like "peeegeeegeee" but close enough to be recognizable by Mommy. The other thing that fascinates me is a rotating fiber-optic tree that's in the family room. I can just stand and stare at that tree for hours. Again, Mommy and Daddy always say "tree" when they see me looking at the tree, so I decided to try it myself. Again, it didn't come out quite right but my word was recognizable as tree.

Head-butting

I mentioned earlier that one of my Daddy's favorite games is to kind of nudge me onto my back by butting his head into me as I was crawling along. Well, last night as we were rough-housing, I decided to give him a taste of his own medicine. As he was crawling towards me, I charged forward and butted into him. While I didn't quite manage to bounce him onto his back, he seeme delighted at the gesture. Eventually, I'll flip him over.

Chase the Baby

I used to not like having my diaper changed. All this fuss getting into and out of clothes was really annoying and unpleasant. Now I've found a way to make it fun---I initiate a game of chase the baby. Here's my strategy: I let them get me out of all my clothes so that I'm completely naked. Then I crawl away as fast as I can. As they try to catch me, there are shrieks of delight from them and from me at the fun of chasing a naked baby around the room. I find that I crawl faster at these times---I think because I'm more aerodynamic. They especially enjoy this game when my bottom is covered with Desitin and I randomly decide to sit and rest on the carpet while I wait for them to catch up.

Wheee! Chase the baby!

Teething

Seems like my difficulties are never over. Just as I have finished my round of antibiotics (I HATE them!), I have my fourth top tooth coming through and diriving me nuts in the process. I have several coping mechanisms for teething. First, I like to hit myself in the mouth over and over again. This distracts me from the specific pain with more general pain. Second, I like to crawl along the floor and drag my face along the ground. This has nearly the same effect as the first. Third, I like to whine. Happily, my Mommy gave me some nifty orajel (on my mouth not to play with) and this made me feel a lot better.

Some new tricks

Last night, I showed my Daddy some new tricks I learned. First, I got to go on a supervised visit to see my friend Licorice. She has a bright red plastic ball which is a lot of fun to play with. I pushed myself up to a stending position on the ball and looked down on my "domain" -- Licorice, her cage, the ball, and so on. Then I showed Daddy a trick. I lifted the ball up off the ground while still standing. I didn't really mean to do this, but I ended up standing on my own power for a little while.

My other trick was to play hide and seek. I crawled behind my ultrasaucer and hid behind one of its thick plastic posts. Then, as Daddy kneeled on the ground to peek in at me, I darted my head out from behind the post to surprise him. There he was peering back! This was tremendously funny. I laughed and laughed (in my unique way).

Piggy Back

Lately, one of my favorite companions is my big stuffed pig. While the piggy used to be bigger than me, I've grown faster than she has, so now I'm bigger. I like to wrestle with the piggy. One of my other favoriate things is to go for piggyback rides. These aren't the usual kind of piggyback rides you might think though. Instread, the piggy perches on MY back and we crawl around the room together. I keep looking over my shoulder to see if she's still there and sure enough she is.

Arizona

My Daddy went hiking in Arizona last week. He asked me to post the link to his pictures, so here it is.

In other news, I had my Christmas pictures taken by a professional photographer. Unlike our earlier attempts at this, for this session I (a) smiled and (b) was awake. My Mommy thinks the pictures turned out quite well and she ordered a bunch of wallets to give to you guys.

One of my least favorite things to do is take my antibiotics. They're cold and yucky. While the last time I had them, I didn't like them but couldn't figure out what to do about it, now I have a solution to this problem---I spit the yucky stuff out of my mouth. This way I don't have to ingest it. Ingenious huh? Mommy somehow hates this solution.

Update

I'm pretty much all better from my cold. In fact, my Mommy is so happy with my progress that she has reinstated my social calendar. Today, I am going to have a zillion wallet size xmas pictures taken of me. That way, all of you can carry a Christmas picture of me wherever you go.

This weekend, we went Christmas tree shopping. I learned an important fact during this trip---some Christmas tree needles are sharp. As we were browsing around amidst the Christmas trees, I would reach out from my stroller and try to grab each of the trees. Some of them were soft, buyt some were really sharp. Ouch. Happily, I persuaded my Mommy and Daddy to get a soft-needled tree, a Fraser Fir, which now adorns our sunken room. Mommy and Daddy put lots of lights and decorations on it, and I must admit it looks pretty. Still, I felt excluded, I wanted to help with the tree, but they wouldn't let me.

Wheels are a fascinating thing. In my younger days, I used to find wheels frustrating since when I tried to pull myself up on them, they rolled. Now I think the rolling part is interesting. While Mommy and Daddy were tree decorating, I contented myself with playing with my stroller wheels. Who nvented these things anyway?

Picture Time

My Daddy took these pictures of me posing with one of my favorite stuffed animals, a big floppy piggy. When I was first born, I was a little smaller than the piggy. Now I'm bigger and like to hug and play with my pig. These pictures were taken before my most recent illness (so I'm in a generally happier mood). You can see the photos here.

Another visit to the doctor

My lingering stuffy nose and cough worsened quite a bit around Thanksgiving, and I have been a pretty miserable little guy for the past few days. The coughing fits are the worst problem. I start coughing and cough harder and harder and can't stop. This scares me, and I wind up crying. I also wind up spitting up much of my most recent meal. Mommy took me to the doctor first thing this morning. The doctor says that I have sinusitis and has prescribed a new antibiotic along with a decongestant. Ever since my first dose of the decongestant, I have been very, very sleepy. Mommy is very sad because I have not been my usual happy self and don't even smile these days. We all look forward to my feeling better and getting back to my normal, happy self.

All I want for Christmas...

is my two front teeth. My top teeth (all four of them) are starting to break through and they're really annoying me. Yesterday, I spent much of the day whining because my teeth had me in pain. In fact, I couldn't even enjoy my usual playtime activities. I'd start dashing across the floor, decide I was in pain, in then plop down motionless on the carpet partially on my side. Very sad. One thing that seems to help, but my parents don't seem to like, is banging my face into the carpet repeatedly. For a few moments, this is soothing. I can't wait for this to be over.

Happy Thanksgiving

It's my first Thanksgiving. I'm watching the Macy's parade with Mommy this morning. It's tape delayed here in the west since it's on from 6-9am our time. Everyone seems bundled up and sort of cold in New York. In comparison, it's bright, sunny and 70 degrees here. Daddy plans to take me out for a walk later today as Mommy makes Thanksgiving food. She keeps talking about making a special "turkey delight" meal for me as well. After having pureed chicken baby food and retching from it, I look on this with a little trepidation.

My Mommy and Daddy keep stressing certain words, and I've found them to be useful in lots of situations. Whenever I'm stressed out or tired or hungry, I've found that saying "MaMaMa" works well. When I'm happily crawling around or playing, I like to say "DaDaDa".

Gatekeepers

A sad night. Daddy put up a gate blocking me from visiting my friend Licorice. Now I'm all alone with only my Mommy and Daddy in the family room, but no Licorice. This gate is a lot tougher to move than the Pack and Play blocking the entrance to the kitchen was. Whereas with that, I found that, thanks to the miracle of leverage, I could push it out of the way, this gate seems a tougher nut to crack. Still, I have hope. Mommy and Daddy seem to be able to do som subtle thing with the handle to make the gate open. I'm going to study them closely and try to figure this out. I'm quite smart at this type of thing, so it shouldn't take me long.

A World in Motion

One of my favorite activities is to visit my friend Licorice. She always seems very happy to see me, but my Mommy and Daddy don't like my visits. In fact, they've put up a series of roadblocks to try to keep me from visiting her. Fortunately, I'm very strong and very good at solving puzzles, so I've managed to figure out ways around the roadblocks to see my friend. While before, I used to just like to stand up on Licorice's cage and play with her big red ball, now I like to spin her world (her cage) from side to side. Since I like to be lifted up and spun around, I feel like I should share the joy. I'm not sure if she likes it. Mommy doesn't like it when I do this. Nor does she like it when I "pet" Licorice. Seems like I've ended up with a handful of fur too often for Mommy's liking.

Anyway, last night after repeated visits to Licorice, Mommy seemed to be very angry at me. She told me "No" in a loud and angry voice. I was scared for a bit, but we both calmed down soon. I suspect visits to Licorice will be harder in the future.

Little Mouse

I've posted some pictures taken of me in my little mouse jammies taken last night. These jammies are from my Mommy's pen friend, Andrea, in Wales. They say "Mummy loves me" on the front. Also included in this batch are pictures taken during my dinner. My Mommy and Daddy are now going with the "Gandhi" feeding strategy---passive, non-violence. Left to my own devices, dinner can be quite fun (and quite messy). You can see them here.

A Day at the Races

My crawling skills are getting incredibly well-honed. As I was dashing around last night, my Daddy had the idea that he and I would run crawling races. We raced from the kitchen to the end of the family room. He's a loit bigger than I am so his "strides" in crawling are longer than mine. But I make up for this by getting in many little strides to his one big stride. While we've played this game before, he seemed surprised that now I was able to keep up with him in crawling. I even won one of the races. Checkered flag...here I come.

Play the Drum

I think I've inherited my Mommy's musical prowess. Right now, my favorite toy is my Leapfrog Learning drum which I've gotten really good at playing. I love to hit my drum. Sometimes it plays music back at me, sometimes it just makes drum sounds, sometimes it says the letters of the alphabet back to me when I hit it. Regardless, it's really great to play. I think the best part is that after I've finished tapping on it a little bit, it applauds my efforts with cheers and music. I smile and laugh during this part.

When I first got it, it was hard for me to use for two reasons. First, it seems to automatically shut itself off after a while. Happily, there's a big switch on the side. If I jiggle the switch around (MYSELF!) I can get it to start up again! Second, it used to be hard for me to handle. The drum has a head, like most drums, but it's hard for me to figure out which side is the head. What I've found is that if I just hit ANY side hard enough, it will still play music. I like to play the drum in different rooms too, so sometimes I'll drag it around with me as I go from room to room. I love this toy!

Photo Extravaganza

My Daddy took some pictures with one of my favorite companions, my reflection. This guy always seems to appear whenever I stand near the patio door. I like to kiss him sometimes. He's always happy to see me. Handsome guy, I'd say. Anyway, you can see the pictures here (on Shutterfly) or here on Ofoto. (Mommy says that some people might be bunching orders on Ofoto so the pics are posted to both places.

Runner-up Halloween Costumes

A variety of costumes were tried on before I settled on being Tigger for Halloween. Daddy has posted some pictures taken in runner-up costumes. You can view them here.

I was very nearly a sheep except that I grew too much from the beginning to the end of October, so we returned the sheep outfit a week before Halloween. While Mommy and Daddy managed to get some nice photos of me in the Bee and Lion costumes, this was luck since I actually loathed wearing those two outfits. ( In fact, I hated two different lion outfits.) I'm glad that I got to try on several costumes and decided on Tigger. I was quite comfortable and happy all day in my roomy tiger stripes.

By the way, I've been practicing saying Da Da this weekend, and sometimes I even call my Daddy that way. Ma Ma is still my favorite word though and I find it works equally well for calling both my parents. I have them well trained.

MaMa

Sounds are a funny thing. I like to make them, but have never been very particular about the order or timing of them. Usually, I just make whatever sound I'm feeling at the time. But there's one exception. When I see my Mommy or Daddy after not having seen them for awhile, they seem to take great delight when I make the sound "Ma Ma". They always reward me with a big smile and a hug, which is good. It's interesting that the same sound seems to refer to each of them, confusing too. When they're both in the room I sometimes say "Ma Ma" and they seem uncertain as to whom I'm referring. Oh well, live and learn.

Walkers

Mommy tells me that infant "walkers" are no longer considered safe. Still, if I want to get around, I need something to hang on to. So I've come up with a solution: I pull myself up on the side of my Ultrasaucer and then push it around the room to wherever I want to go. Voila! Instant walker. Mommy somehow seems concerned when I do this.

This is the week of Discovery Toys. A Discovery Toys representative visited one of Mommy's mothers' groups today, and I got to delight in many fun developmental toys. Then I came home to find a package from my Auntie Max. What was inside? A neat Discovery-brand toy! I can chew it... I can bat it and make things go round... It is a lot of fun. Mommy tells me that she and I will be attending a Discovery Toy party on Saturday. I think that I'm going to be a very lucky boy come Christmas and my birthday in December!

Halloween Photos

I've posted many new photos of myself. Some are taken in my Halloween costume. The landscpaes are taken from the top of Mt. Diablo, the highest point (at ~3900') in the bay area. You can view them here. You can also view my album by visiting the photo albom section of my website and clicking the "Halloween" hyperlink.

Lounge Lizard or Card Shark?

Well, my rash is gradually healing. It doesn't hurt anymore and it is covering less area. I still get to splash in the water many times a day, however, since Mommy is still being very gentle during diaper changes and avoiding wipes for a bit longer. Unfortunately, my cough is worsening again, especially at night. Geez, if it's not one end it's the other!

We are very excited because my dresser and a small chest with a hutch are being delivered today. Now my socks, hats, etc. will live in drawers instead of in baskets and plastic boxes on the floor. Mommy and Daddy are very happy about this, but I'm kind of ambivalent. I really enjoy carrying around my socks and chewing on them. Now I'll have to figure out how to get them out of the drawer.

I had my music class yesterday. I love to bounce and rock to the music. I also got to bang on and shake some instruments again. This is always a lot of fun. I am a very good drummer, and the mommies have also dubbed me "The Mixmaster" due to my flair with the teacher's electronic keyboard. After class, Rowena (my teacher) puts her keyboard down and lets the babies play with it. I have always been enthusiastic about crawling over and pushing the keys, but a few weeks ago I discovered the keys that start pre-recorded melodies and beats playing. Now I go for those buttons almost immediately, and we all get to groove to my tunes. I am the only baby who does this, and some have said that I'm destined to be a lounge lizard. I think I'll be a DJ instead and play all the hot parties.

Mommy, Daddy and I attended a poker night at the home of Matt and Patti in Danville last night. I got to crawl around and bang on a big stock pot. I would have liked to chew on some poker chips, but no one would let me for some reason. Daddy kept saying, "Put a fork in me. I'm done," when he didn't like his cards and pulled out of a game. I don't know why he wants people to poke him with a fork, but next time he says it maybe Mommy will let me have a plastic fork for a few moments so I can make Daddy happy by poking him.

Nasty Rash

Yesterday, I developed a diaper rash. Not a minor pink tinge between my cheeks as appears every once and a while, a painful, raw rash that spread across my cheeks and into my groin area. It really hurt! It still does, unfortunately. This morning when I woke up, Mommy merely touched my behind with a wipe and little dots of blood sprang up on my tender skin. This upset Mommy very much as did the obvious pain I felt during the diaper change. She decided to clean me with running water instead of wipes until the rash improves and to let me roam au natural from the waist down to let air hit my skin. Mommy also read that sometimes babies get yeast diaper rashes when they are on antibiotics, and decided to see the doctor. We went this afternoon, and I do indeed have a yeast infection on my behind. A medical student got to look at my butt too to observe what a yeast rash looks like. Both doctor and medical student were nice, and I have been taken off my antibiotic (since my runny nose output is clear instead of its original disconcerting green and the antibiotic is responsible for the yeast running amok on my backside). I now have some lotrimin cream to apply to my rash twice a day. Mommy, Daddy and I can't wait for the healing to begin!

A Report on My First Halloween

I was Tigger for my first Halloween. Mommy bought my costume at Target and then made me a special, springy Tigger tail. I was very bouncy and made an impressive Tigger. I am especially bouncy when Mommy sings the Tigger theme song:"The wonderful thing about Tiggers- is Tiggers are wonderful things. Their tops are made out of rubber! Their bottoms are made out of springs! They're bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun! But the most wonderful thing about Tiggers is I'm the Only One!"

Mommy and I went to the John Muir Women's Health Center on Halloween so I could have my photo taken. (We'll only get one print from this photo session since the photographer was just doing this as a favor to the center to drum up business, but we took lots of other photos that we'll share with my fan club.) There were *many* babies at the center to have their photos taken. The most popular costume for babies seems to be a pumpkin. It was like hanging out in a whole pumpkin patch! Linus would have loved it! None of the babies seemed to be "The Great Pumpkin," however.

After the photo shoot, Mommy and I went to lunch with some other mommies and babies. An upscale supermarket had a display of pumpkins and haybales out front, so the mommies took the babies' pictures with pumpkins. I absolutely *hated* sitting in the hay, however, and I made this very clear to everyone by screwing up my face and crying. I think that some of the photos will show my happier side though. They have not yet been developed. The manager of the market thought the babies and the pumpkins were extremely cute and asked if he could take a photo of the mommies, babies and pumpkin patch for the store. I went along with this since it required me to sit on mommy's lap and not directly on the hay.

When we got home, Daddy was there, and I modeled my costume for him and we had another photo session. I was very happy to see him! We thought we'd briefly visit a few neighbors to show off my costume, but our neighborhood was crawling with what Mommy referred to as "marauding packs of Halloweeners"-- not badly behaved, just an amazing number of them traveling in big groups. We gave up on the visiting idea and just answered the door with me in costume. Many children commented that I looked very cute. For part of the time, I stood up behind the child gate (within view of the door) and pretended to be a tiger at the zoo. I liked Halloween! (Daddy will post some pictures to the Internet soon!)

Mount Diablo Yesterday but no Santa Cruz Today

Mount Diablo

Daddy, Mommy and I drive to Mount Diablo State Park on Sunday. It is not that far from my house, and we hoped to see tarantulas crossing the road since an article in the Contra Costa Times claimed that it is tarantula mating season. It seems that male tarantulas live alone in their burrows for 6-10 years and then set out wandering looking for a partner to mate with. If a the tarantula meets a female and survives the mating process (females are rather aggressive), the male just keeps wandering until he eventually is eaten by a predator, squished by a car, or dies of exposure. This is rather sad. The article also said that tarantulas are actually very delicate creatures (they can die as the result of a fall from 2 or 3 feet) and their bite is only as severe as a bee sting. All of this information made us long to see the hairy critters, but none could be found. A park employee said that the article was actually off by a month as to when tarantula mating season is. Oh well..

We did, however, get to see some great views from atop Mount Diablo (about 3850 feet high). We also got to experience some queasiness from the very twisty, steep roads. Even so, our stomachs settled and we later went to Chevy's (Fresh Mex) for dinner. Mommy and Daddy got to enjoy a relaxing meal as I took a nice, long nap.

To Santa Cruz or No?

Mommy and I were going to go to Santa Cruz today to visit her friend, Cheryl, and the baby living inside her tummy (due on November 10), but when Mommy called this morning, Cheryl said that her baby was showing signs that it might make it's appearance sooner rather than later. So we stayed home and Mommy talked with Cheryl about signs of labor and kept her occupied for a while so she didn't have to just pace around the apartment and wonder when things would pick up. The hospital told her that with her current symptoms, the baby could either come today or in several days, so we'll have to see when Baby Clara decides to be born!

Mommy and I just went to the market today and then came home to play. I especially enjoy carrying toys around with me while I crawl these days. Mommy and Daddy often find blocks and the rings from my stacker toy in various places around the house like a trail of breadcrumbs! I am also extremely surefooted and speedy when cruising around the furniture and the windowsills.

I had some baby applesauce today and ate more than the usual taste I usually do. This made Mommy very happy since I have been turning my nose up at just about all solid food again. However, shortly after eating the applesauce, I had a rather painful and puffy-looking rash appear on my behind (definitely not there before breakfast). This makes Mommy wonder if I am allergic to apples in greater-than-a-taste-size quantities or whether apples just lead to more irritating "output" than some other foods. An allergic reaction would be unusual since apples are not usually allergenic, but Mommy is going to lay off the apples for a few days and see whether the rash goes away.

In health news, I no longer have my coughing fits, just an occasional cough and a runny nose. My nasal output is now clear rather than the green shade that led mommy to take me to the doctor, so I'm gradually improving.

Healthwatch Update

My Mommy took me to the doctor yesterday to see about fixing my cold. I was definitely nervous about going back there since it seems every time we visit the doctor she gives me painful shots, and I end up feeling worse than when I went in. Anyway, she looked me over an weighed me. I now weight 22 pounds! I was too wriggly for them to check my height, but I think I'm still a little on the short side. Mommy said that in the first time in a while, people are starting to guess that I'm younger than I really am perhaps owing to my small (but powerful) stature. The doctor prescribed some cough medicine and some antibiotics and sent Mommy and me off to get them. We had to go to three drugstores before someone actually had the medicines we were after.

We got back around 2pm. I figured Mommy would want to start me on the medicines right away so I could get healthy sooner, but she decided to wait. Apparently, she read that the meds had to be given every 12 hours and she didn't want to get up at 2am. I don't see what's wrong with getting up then. In fact, 2am is one of the best times to jump around. Anyway, she waited until 8pm to give me meds. I didn't really like the taste of them though---reminded me too much of yucky baby food. Actually, I'm not as against baby food as I once was. It's sort of okay. The problem is that Mommy keeps ruining the best part of the activity: holding and chewing and banging the spoon. Just when I'm starting to get a good rhythm going banging my spoon, she takes it away to refill it with more food. I'll eat the food to humor her so I can get the spoon back (sometimes).

Monday Night Football

My grandmother Timek got me a new toy when I was back east, a small green textured football. Last night, perhaps inspired by Monday Night Football, which was on TV, my Daddy and I played football together. He would sort of roll the football around the room and then we would race to see who could get it first. Lots of times I got the football before he did. I also tackled him a couple of times (once for a huge loss of yardage). Footballs are funny---they don't roll like normal balls do. Insead they weave around crazily dodging this way and that. It's funny to watch a football roll. Mommy just sat on the couch and rolled her eyes as we "boys" wrestled around together. Wait---it's a fumble!!! Gotta go.

Weekend Walks

This weekend, I got to go on some endless walks with my Daddy. The weather right now is different than I ever remember it being. It's not as hot (only in the high 60s) and the leaves of the trees are turning colors. As I ride by in my storller, I like to reach out and grab the leaves and the bushes. Because of my cold, I find it much more comfortable to nap in the stroller than on my back. Somehow napping sitting up leads to a lot less coughing than lying down does. Anyway, we walked for about 10 miles each day. I don't think there's any more tread left on the wheels of my stroller.

Sleepless Nights

I hate this cough. It's driving me completely nuts. During the day when I'm up and about, it's not really a problem, but at night when I'm trying to sleep, it's a big pain. Tonight, Mommy got me up and took me to the bathroom to be "steamed" by the water vapor from the shower on the theory that this would fix me. That didn't turn out to be right. It just made me damp and still just as prone to coughing as before. It looks like next week I'll get to visit a doctor to figure out what is wrong with me.

Out in the Cold

While I've had little colds before, this is the worst cold I've had in my life. It's really hard to breathe with my nose all stuffy. Bottles just don't taste as good as they used to (plus it's really hard to coordinate sucking and breathing when your nose is stuffy). Finally, all these darn time changes (Mommy tells me there is ANOTHER one tonight) have me completely confused. I don't think Mommy and Daddy like this any better than I do. I was up around 2am last night and was stuffy and coughing. They came to get me and comfort me, but they didn't seem all that happy about it. Hopefully, I'll start feeling better soon.

Back west

Yesterday, I flew back to California with my Mommy. I was impressed that I am now more mobile than she is. She had to go everywhere in a wheelchair whereas I got to crawl along beside her (okay, it's not quite true, she carried me, but I COULD have crawled, I really could have). I hate being stuck in my carseat all that time on the plane. After the first leg of the flight, I let Mommy know I was tired of the carseat. I tried to tell her, but when that didn't work, I stiffened my body like a board and made it close to impossible for her to strap me in. I see other people walking up and down the aisles, and the arms of the seats look good to pull myself up on. I don't see why I can't wander around too. Grrr. I hate that there seems to be a different set of rules for me.

My Daddy was there to pick us up at the airport. He greabbed me and popped me into the carseat for the ride home. Boy, don't these people get the idea that I'm SICK of being in a carseat. At least this time the carseat was in a car instead of a plane. We drove home and I got reacquainted with all my toys. Later in the evening, daddy played a new game with me. As I was crawling around on the floor, he would nudge my side with his head, thereby flipping me over. I absolutely LOVE this game. I lauged and laughed.

Than I got tired and went to bed. It was a little before 10pm. It sure gets late early out west.

Tiptoes

When I'm outside in the backyard, I like to crawl over from the grass to the patio area. The patio is a neat, hard surface, very different from the grass. It's also where there are lots of good places to pull myself up. Anyway, I've discovered that crawling on my knees on the hard patio surface is no fun at all, so I've come up with a solution. When I'm on grass, I crwal as normal; however, when I come to the patio, I arch my whole body up so that I'm "crawling" on the tips of my fingers and the tips of my toes only. While this method is slower than the usual way, it does get me to my destination without as much discomfort as the usual crawling method. I love to innovate!

Last night I had a bath. I really love baths. I love to splash. I love the feeling of the warm water. I love to chase around my rubber ducky. Mommy set me in the bathroom in preparation for bathing and I immediately made a beeline for the tub. I then pulled myself up on the tub and was all set to dive in (I was planning a swan dive.) I was annoyed when Daddy prevented me from doing my graceful dive. Soon though, I was enjoying splashing about in the tub while Mommy and Daddy cleaned off the accumulated stuff from living the active baby life. This was great, and I wished it would never end. But then they took me out and started to towel me off. Perhaps they didn't hear me---I said I wished it would never end. Then Mommy started rubbing lotion all over me. I tried to jump up and signal to them that I was not finished having my bath. I DID NOT WANT IT TO END. Then Mommy started putting a new diaper on me. Why do they not get the message???? I'm not DONE with my bath. I do not WANT it to end. They are not listening to me.

I was very frustrated.

Day with Daddy

Another weekend day with Daddy. It's getting predictable now. We spend lots of time outside and in between we watch spoting events. Today's menu was the baseball playoffs. Frankly, I don't know how Daddy can watch so much of this. I fell asleep midway through the Yankees-Angels game. Daddy let me try a couple of new things. He gave me a sippy cup filled wit water. It was kind of neat drinking things other than formula---and drinking in new ways. He also gave me a bunch of Cheerios to try. The Cheerios were fun to play with, but I don't get the appeal of eating them.

Happy Birthday Mommy

Yesterday was my Mommy's birthday. She is 408 months old! To celebrate, we went out to one of her favoriate restaurants, Il Fornaio. While I was quite happy when we first got there, I got tired as the evening progressed and found it hard to get comfortable in my stroller. By the main course, I was pretty sick of being there. Eventually, Daddy had to take me for a walk in the stroller to improvemy spirits. Despite the fact that she had just turned 408 months old, Mommy did not seem to be having a real great time. Maybe she was tired too.

I got Mommy a card that had the characters from one of my favorite books on it. It said, "Guess How Much I Love You" on the front and then wished her a happy birthday inside. Birth being one of the biggest events in my life, I can see how it's important to celebrate. I also got Mommy a decorative photo album that I filled with all my favoriate pictures of me. That way, Mommy can quickly show everyone how cute I am---even when I'm not around to show them myself. Mommy seemed to really like this gift.

Movie Night

Last night I went to my first movie in a real movie theater! Now, mostly people don't like to watch movies with little guys like me. They don't seem to appreciate the incisive commentary I bring to a film. For instance, after last night's film, The Good Girl, got started, I felt that it was appropriate to comment on Jennifer Aniston's acting performance. My take: "ba-ba-ba-ba-eeeeeeep." Anyway, in this movie theater everyone appreciated my comments. That's because on Monday nights, this particular theater runs "baby night." The theater is filled with babies and their parents. MY Mommy heard about this from another Mommy in my Music and Movement class and decided to give it a shot.

Anyway, it was quite interesting to look around at the lights and the other babies. In fact, it was so interesting that I was not at all interested in eating. I hate it when I get so wrapped up in things that I forget to eat though. It makes me grouchy and irritable later in the evening.