A busy morning

Yesterday Finn had his 15-month doctor's appointment. Everything went well, and he took his shot like a champ. 15 seconds after it was done, he was all set. He's got a short memory. He's now around 75th percentile in height and weight. Previously he'd been middle of the pack in terms of height. Presumably he'll end up pretty tall, since Katie is 5'8" and I'm 6'2". You know that he's a big boy now because he got to stand on the real scale. They didn't lay him down in the baby scale. No sir!

That morning we drove Katie to work, went to a park, and then went out for fluffy restaurant-quality pancakes (at a restaurant). He is a big fan. Finn was popular at work. Here he is in Katie's cubicle. The shirt is "Germagnet.'

At the park there was a busload of 3/4-years olds, so for quite awhile he just stared in awe. Eventually "we" decided to just hang out in the little-kids side of the park, and we had a good time. He's never been a fan of swings, but he enjoyed this ride for almost a minute. Later on there was also a squirrel that took up a lot of his attention.

He's a swinger from Jonathan Fortney on Vimeo.

Like a regular little person

Yeah, he's a talker. "Banana, dog, ball, mama, dada, hot, kitty." Some of these would be a little hard for an independent observer to pick out, but we can. "Hot," he really likes a lot. "Hot-tah." And you can tell him to do stuff. Go get the monkey book. Open that door. Close that door. Bring to mama. It's fun. In the mornings instead of wailing til 6:05 when I come to get him, he more often sits in his crib and yells from time to time. When I finally come in to get him, he sits up and grabs his blanket, ready for his morning banana!

It's been rainy a lot lately, so we've been going outside a bit less. On Saturday we went out in the rain anyway, for over an hour. We went exploring in the neighborhood! We jumped in some puddles, found a soggy 3-foot stick and pushed it around, poked his fingers into rain runoff spouts, stomped on some drainage grates, and yelled REALLY LOUD at a little black pug who was trying to do his business in the front yard. People driving by in their cars pointed at us and smiled. It was a good time.

We're up to 10 teeth now. 8 in front and 2 molars. No canines yet.

Here we are at our 4th annual Oscar party. We had a good crowd, drained some magnums, and best of all, I was the big winner in the Oscar pool. Finn had a fun time and enjoyed sitting on the big people chairs. He was NOT pleased when bedtime came around at 7 p.m.

Starting to see the benefits of communication

You used to be able to point at a picture of a ball and get Finn to say "bah." For months he's shown zero interest in that. Then this morning as I was sitting on the other side of the room stuffing diapers, he got out a book, opened it up, pointed to a dog, and said "dah!" then pointed to a ball and said "bah!" Then he was done. Okay!He'll also repeat "hot-ah" after you whenever you tell him something's hot. This morning I told him my cream of wheat was hot when it came out of the microwave, and then when I brought the bowl out to the living room 15 mintues later, he pointed at it: "hot-ah!" I told him it was okay now, and gave him a bite (too bland; no second bite requested). The other night he warned me that the bread machine might be "hot-ah" when I was making pizza dough - apparently Jonathan had told him it was hot the last time he used it. Pretty cute! We'll try to get some video this weekend, but we never know when he's going to pipe up, and when he's just going to smile and pretend he doesn't know what we're talking about.

My favorite thing is that he's more likely to try to tell us what's wrong instead of just melting down. Tuesday he was freaking out in his room and I said "What?!" then stopped, breathed, and restated "Tell Mama what's wrong. Show Mama what you want." He stopped, sighed, considered; took a step, then raised his arms for me to pick him up, and proceeded to direct me around the house. Eventually we got to the kitchen and got him a piece of bread, but I'm not sure that was his original goal. He just seemed to like that he could tell me what to do.

Speaking of which, our couch is now at his mercy. One morning I discovered he could climb on it himself if I took one of the cushions off and put it on the floor, and now it's like that 80% of the time he's awake. It's his indoor bouncy jungle gym. We get very imperious looks if he grabs at the cushion and we don't back him up with our super grownup strength.

Raai-aai-aai-aai-aainn, I don't mind

Of course that's a lyric from The Beatles "Rain," the B-side to 1966's "Paperback Writer" single. But I'm not telling you anything that you didn't already know. (What a great song, by the way.)

It's supposed to rain here all week. I guess that's what we get for not having to shovel any snow. We decided that Finn needed some proper gear for the season, so we got him a raincoat and some hard-soled shoes. The raincoat is pretty much just a windbreaker, but it does the job. He is enjoying the shoes--they're good for stomping. Here we are before we ventured out to go to the farmer's market today:

He was the only little maniac kid there, as the market was a bit of a wet ghost town. But he had a great time running around and jumping in puddles. He also got mud all over his face, hands, and pants. I like to let him explore. I should have brought his boots, though. He was popular with the vendors, which garnered us a lot of free samples. He was furious when it was time to leave.

He is really is growning up fast. 15 months! What has surprised me the most lately is how aware he is of stuff he isn't supposed to do, and how fun it apparently is to try and get a rise out of us. Finn doesn't just bang on the window blinds. No, he'll touch them with one finger, and quickly look at us. Then he'll touch them with his whole hand, and look at us. Then he'll bang them really hard, and then look at us with a big smile! (He isn't supposed to touch them because they can detach and fall down on him.) If you just ignore him, then things escalate to banging more quickly! There are many examples involving the trash, the bookshelf, you name it. I guess I had thought this wasn't something that he would master til he was 2 or 3. I was wrong!

Also, we gave him his first hair cut last weekend, on the front steps. He was getting pretty shaggy along the sides and in back. I think that Katie did a nice job.

Puddle season

Yesterday when Jonathan picked Finn up from day care he wasn't wearing any of the same clothes as when we dropped him off - including shoes. Turns out he fell in a puddle. (I'm not convinced "fell" is what really happened, but we'll take their word for it.) We don't have a camera crew at school, but here he is last weekend enjoying a puddle across the street.


Puddle stomping from Katie on Vimeo.
Unfortunately, we didn't get the boots on him until AFTER he'd gone in the puddle, but better late than never.

Dog and monkey show

More videos today!

First, here's Finn with his monkey book. He used to like to pull all the books off of our living room bookshelf - not a very endearing habit. Now 90% of the time he just gets this one. He likes to yell at the monkeys. At the very end he says "mon...." or something like it, and once or twice he's gotten a pretty clear run at both syllables. He can also say "butt" pretty clearly when he wants to. Most other words still lack a final consonant ("dah!" for dog, "nao" for nose, etc.), but somehow "butt" and "monkey" aren't a problem. I would love for his first two word phrase to be "monkey butt." I think it'll be a long time coming, though. He chatters almost constantly lately, and although the cadence and tones are a lot like English, he really doesn't seem concerned about "words."

Monkeys! from Katie on Vimeo.

Next up, Finn with dogs. Every Sunday morning we go to the Los Gatos farmers' market, and usually when we're done shopping we let Finn run around in the park it borders to look at the dogs and the other kids. He LOVES dogs and likes to yell at them in the same growly voice he yells at monkeys, but will only try to pet them if they turn away and he thinks he can sneak in a run at their flank. I think these dogs were too big to yell at. About 10 minutes later we met a big brown Newfoundland, and he didn't yell at that one, either. If only Jason and Gwen were still in town, I'm sure he could yell at Schamali to his heart's content.

Big dog kisses from Katie on Vimeo.

Last up, more dancing, this time to country. There are a couple good head bobs at the beginning, but mostly he doesn't seem quite sure what to do about country music.

Country? from Katie on Vimeo.

Bonus photo: like hats in Minnesota in December, Finn has acknowledged that sunglasses have their appropriate time and place. Plus, I think he thinks he looks cool.

Jonathan leaves for Tucson tonight and won't be back until Wednesday after Finn goes to bed. I have homework due in 2 classes for Friday, and the other one meets on Wednesday. Wish me luck!

Biting off more than we can chew

One of Finn's favorite things lately is putting on "Big" things - Daddy's coat, Daddy's shoes, oven mitts, Daddy's gloves, you name it. Not so much my shoes - apparently they're not comically huge enough. Here he is trying on Jonathan's jacket:

Soon after that he ended up on the floor, but he didn't seem to mind. Oven mitts and gloves are a little safer. Here he is with the gloves, right around the time he started to get bored with them (of course):


Giant hands! from Katie on Vimeo.

As for me, I'm taking nine credits again this semester. Am I going to be as busy as last semester? Magic 8 ball says: signs point to yes. Right now it's especially tough because I'm still trying to figure out the flow of my new classes, and Jonathan's leaving town for half of next week. On the bright side, he doesn't start teaching again until the end of March, and this is probably my last semester of classes (just my portfolio and an internship in the fall, and nothing this summer), so I've got that light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel thing going for me.

In other Finn news, he's back to excellent sleeping, and apparently had a blast at the Super Bowl party he and Jonathan went to yesterday. He's also doing great at day care. Usually he cries when I go to leave, but I can look back from the gate and see that he's stopped before I get to the car. The past few days he hasn't cried at all (dinosaurs! blocks!), and Friday he wasn't sure if he wanted to go home when I came to pick him up, or stay and play some more! Oh, and tooth #9 has appeared, so now he's got all his incisors, plus his random molar.
A few more photos at Flickr.