More Mad Skillz

Now that Graham is over being sick, his development has resumed its leaps and bounds growth! I'd been putting Cheerios* on his high chair tray recently, but while sick he preferred to push them on the floor and scream until I picked him up. In a fine mood yesterday, he finally decided to pick some up and try them. The first few didn't make it down his throat - he held them tightly in his balled up fist and shoved his entire hand in his mouth. After a bit, he figured out the pincer grip and was soon picking up cereal pieces and popping them in his mouth like an old pro! He sucks on them until they dissolve, then goes in for more.

It took Elias a long time to figure out the proper way to eat Cheerios*. He would grab them between his thumb and forefinger but had trouble transferring them into his mouth. So he would nibble at the parts visible around his fingertips and then drop the last unreachable pieces back on his tray. This went on for a couple of months before he got the right idea.

Everything is now going swimmingly with Graham, but he's so excited about all the great things he can do that he doesn't want to sleep anymore! He wakes up frequently and when I go in to get him, he is invariably sitting up in his crib or is up on his hands and knees rocking back and forth trying to crawl somewhere... maybe off to find more Cheerios*.

*They're actually Giant supermarket's generic organic 'oat hoops'

Graham's Mad Skillz

Graham worked diligently on his sitting up today and finally developed this technique...



the babbling and head bump are optional.

If Pride is a Sin Then He's Headed Someplace Warm

Graham sat up by himself for the very first time today! This picture was taken right after he accomplished his amazing feat - you can see the pride in his eyes.



He's been on the verge of crawling lately. He gets up on all fours and rocks back and forth. Sometimes he even 'steps' forward with his arms, but he hasn't figured out he needs to move his legs also, so he just ends up falling down on his belly. Today while he was in his pre-crawl position, he settled back on his haunches then just pushed himself upright and swung his legs around.

Bravo, Graham!

you say foe-tay-toe, and I say foe-tah-toe

More pictures of the kids. This one is kind of interesting: I left Elias alone in the tub (bad Daddy!). He'd been curious about the bar of soap for a few nights, and was always trying to play with it. I didn't want him to, because I was afraid he'd get some in his eyes and become even more scared of getting his face wet than he already is. So as I left the bathroom, I told him not to touch it.

When I got back, the bath water was cloudy white and there was a semicircular notch taken out of one side of the soap bar, which was sitting in the soap dish. I looked at it, and then looked at him and asked, "Did the soap taste good?"

He answered quietly, "No."

Then I wondered what happened to the missing piece of soap. "Elias, did you eat the soap?"

"No."

"Then where is the rest of it?" I asked.

"I don't know."

I fished around in the tub for a minute, and was relieved to find the missing bit, which he had sensibly spat out.

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Also in this set, some photos of Graham. Wendy will probably be appalled because she didn't get a chance to edit them, but I thought he showed some amusing expressions, despite the snot bubbles and drool.

Our New Game (Even Graham Gets to Play!)

The last couple of days, Elias has been asking me to play the Go To Sleep game with him. The way this works is this: we go to his room and he pretends to be the adult at bedtime, while I pretend to be him. He tells me to get into his bed (luckily he has a comfy queen sized bed so there's plenty of room for me and my constant companion Graham). After Graham and I climb into bed, I make a point of getting under the covers, "to keep warm" I tell Elias, since he is suspicious of covers and prefers to spend these cold Pennsylvania nights sprawled out on top of them, much to John's consternation. He turns out the lights and sits in a chair next to the bed to tell me a story, as John does when telling Elias his bedtime stories. A typical story goes something along the lines of "I'm going to tell you a story about trains. The train lives on the tracks. It goes clickety clack." If I ask for a song (usually John sings him a song before leaving the room), he'll sing something like, "Singing a song, song song song" or a version of Salty's song, "Yo ho ho and a bucket of goo, the tiller spins...".

The funny thing is that he doesn't use his normal voice to tell the stories. Instead, he does this cute, high-pitched mouse voice. He sings his songs in a breathy, tuneless falsetto. I don't know if these vocal stylings are supposed to be an homage to John or what, but they're very charming.

After finishing the song, he then tells me, "I'm going to sleep in the other bed" and gets up and leaves the room. I followed him once and found that he goes into my room and climbs into my bed, but usually Graham and I just lay in bed and enjoy the silence, a rarity in our house. A minute later, he comes back, turns on the lights and announces, "It's 3 o'clock! Time to wake up!" Then I get up and we play a different game.

Graham's "Six Month" Appointment

Graham had his 6-Month Well Baby Checkup today, 2 days shy of his 7 month birthday. The doctor diagnosed a slight ear infection and confirmed that he has at least one tooth coming up, which is a bit of a relief to hear since Graham had turned into a pretty crotchety old baby the last couple of weeks

His stats:
weight: 15 lbs, 15.4 oz (10th percentile)
height: 27" (50th percentile)

He's up from 14 lb, 2.3 oz and 25.25" at his 4 month appointment, but still turning into a skinny minnie like his big brother. Cousin Guillermo is going to outweigh him any day now!!