Our main meal is lunch, so most of my kitchen time occurs in the morning. At first I didn’t pay much attention to the airplane sounds as we get them all the time, but I happened to look out and see nine propeller planes flying in formation. Joseph was taking a nap so I took the liberty of going up the apartment stairs for a pretty fine view of the military kids doing their tricks. I have to say I enjoy the prop planes more than the jets. They’re slow enough that you can follow their movements and they aren’t so horribly loud! I loved watching they dance in the air doing spirals and forming hoops for other planes to pass through. I’ve never been to an air show, but I think I’d enjoy it with the proper set of ear plugs. Those jets can be a little terrifying and even more so for a 1-year-old. I’m grateful for the “noisy” book we have that has a picture of airplanes along with the sound of a prop plane. Joseph loves the book and when I read it to him I sign “airplane” and add a sound effect. Whenever the jet noise scares him I sign “airplane” and make the noise and he lights up or calms down. It must help to know the reason for the noise and that it’s okay. This morning the jets did their tricks over our heads and it was scary because you don’t get much warning, and if they swoop over our house we get no warning at all. Once I thought it was safe to go outside with Joseph because I saw them in formation further out, but one wasn’t with them and he swooped down on us from above and we got the shock and didn’t see a thing! Still, I find it slightly cool that I was just relaxing on my couch gazing out the window when a formation of six jets suddenly blew past announcing their time of rehearsal. Needless to say, Joseph took a later nap today!
Speaking of the boy, he stood for a number of seconds today, smiling before gently lowering himself down. He has the control . . .
He also built the star tower up in the right order (four starts on a column). Stephan thinks it was mostly accident.
He is in love with our visitor’s baby girl, and luckily the baby tolerates his love well enough. He’s remarkably gentle; the only real problem is that he always wants to put his fingers in her mouth.
When he uses the potty now we walk together to the toilet and he lifts the seat up for me so I can dump it then we flush it together. Can’t remember if I blogged that or not . . .
He has started communicating with us quite well and it makes life much easier in some ways and harder in others. His “more” sign (clapping hands) can mean please, water, yes, I want something, up, Mommy milk, potty, or I’m happy just to name a few. That creates a challenge when we don’t know why he’s clapping and he doesn’t seem to answer our questions, but normally, we ask “Do you want water?” and if that’s what he wants he’ll clap again and the world is at peace. The one really great thing about this is that his whining is dropped dramatically. We’ve tried to train him that if he whines he doesn’t get what he wants, but if he calms down and asks nicely (defined as clapping with the crying mostly under control) then he gets what he wants as long as it’s something he’s allowed to have. It’s hard telling him no even when he asks so nicely. He’s even good at doing that in his sleep. I’ve taking him off the breast at night and he’s started crying, then stopped and clapped his hands. How can I resist that?
The garden continues to grow dandelions at an impressive rate. It’s been a cold, rainy June, so I’m not sure how great that is for my other plants. We shall see, we shall see.
June 4th Joseph started putting shapes into the shape sorters. Since that day he hasn’t been as successful, but it still keeps him occupied. With him starting to put things INTO other things, that means soon we’ll be able to teach him to help clean up with us!
We went to a play group the same day and had a great time even though rain kept us indoors. Joseph loves being around other kids and their strength and roughness doesn’t seem to bother him. Since we were out for a short time I had him in cloth diapers, but had no intention of doing EC, but about halfway through he come to me fussing and he didn’t want food or to nurse so I thought maybe he needed to pee. He was still dry after several hours from when we left home so I decided to give peeing in a public toilet a try. He’d never been interested before, but this time he went like a pro! He stayed dry until we got home that day, too. Nothing like that has happened again and we’ve had plenty of down EC days, but the successes are more fun to report.
June 5th we had a reunion meeting for PEKiP folks. Unfortunately, the two older babies couldn’t make it, but it was great fun to see the other babies and mothers and to share experiences again. Everyone was surprised Joseph wasn’t walking yet. I’m not sure if the babies remembered each other, but they did enjoy each other.
June 7th Joseph took his first steps! He grabbed my skirt to get up off of the potty but once he was standing the skirt was not supporting him anymore, but he didn’t know that and took a step or two toward me. I praised him but he didn’t know what I was so excited about! That same evening Stephan was holding his hands as Joseph walked and Stephan let go and Joseph stood for a second then took a step before Stephan held his hands again. So far, no repeat performances or interest. He is interested in walking if we hold his hands, though. Now after he goes to the potty we walk together to the bathroom where he lifts the toilet lid (he’s only supposed to do that when we have something to dump – maybe a complicated rule for a 1-year-old) and helps flush. He finds that great fun.
He now has eight teeth: four on top and four on the bottom.
June 8th both Joseph and I woke up a bit sick. That evening I lost all my food but Joseph got away with only the snuffles. He’s been sleeping a lot and we both are on the mend.
June 11th I finally sent in our taxes. It always seems to take longer than expected – I started months ago! They’re sent under the wire (over seas folks have until June 15th), but they’re done! Now we can enjoy our first guests at our place in Emmen. They should arrive any minute now, so I’m signing out and it will probably be another two weeks before I touch base again. Thanks for your faithful reading anyway!
