Museum Fun

Here is Linus playing a djembe drum at the Museum of Nature and Science. The Museum has a Discovery Zone with hands on activities for kids. Volunteers and staff help kids explore and at 11 they hold a story time or activity. On this occasion the talk was about African music, specifically from the Ivory Coast. The kids got to hear some music and then play instruments. One kid broke a shakere and the facilitator handled it so well.

Linus' favorite activity is to play in the tub filled with a dish soap bubble concentration. There are a bunch of bubble wands in there. We can easily be at that tub for half an hour with me making bubbles and encouraging kids, while Linus watches and swishes wands around in the soap. I think it is fun to get to make a bubble mess on carpet! He also likes to play the piano. It has a window so one can see what happens inside when keys are pressed. After he played it for the first time, he was much more interested in his little 4-key toy piano.

Up

Linus' first real verbal command is "up." For example, he accidentally knocked his cup off the table and he pointed to it on the floor and said, "Up." Hooray! He still points at things he wants and grunts or whines, which is effective, yet annoying, communication.

Linus said a great full sentence the other day. I handed him his toy cow and he said, "The cow says moo." I can't even begin to guess how many times I've said that sentence to him in his short life, so it wasn't all that surprising except that it was a full sentence.

I've been under the weather all week and the three of us are just getting by, which is why I haven't posted. But little Linus is doing great.

Social Graces

We are trying to raise Linus to be a courteous lad, among other traits like being open-minded and into social justice, environmentalism, the arts, etc. I've always been impressed with how polite my nephew Brandon has been from an early age. I have him in mind as I consistently tell Linus please and thank you so that he picks it up from the beginning. It has already started to pay off. The other day as I handed him blocks he said, "Kew," after each one. He was saying, "Thank you."

Linus loves to meet people. At the two birthday parties last Saturday he was quick to meet new kids. Here are pictures of him meeting girls. The one is of him going up to meet a girl at Bennett's party at the sand and water park in the Stapleton neighborhood. Bennett turned two. The other photo is of him playing with the bubble machine with a girl at Charlotte's first birthday party in the evening. (He has made so many new friends here in Denver! Two parties in one day! I've never been to two birthday parties in one day!) The other pictures are of Bennett exhibiting birthday joy to his mom Genna (she is in orange) and the picture of the birthday girl in the high chair is Charlotte. Her parents are shown singing to her. Bennett and Charlotte both live on our block.

Linus kissed his first baby! I was holding a six-month old from the neighborhood and I asked Linus if he could give her a kiss. He leaned right over and kissed the top of her head. Everyone responded positively, so he kept giving her kisses. I joked that if we had another baby, Linus would love it to death.

Park

The playground has reopened at the park near our house. It has been closed due to construction work the entire time we have lived here. Linus and I went and played there this morning. He liked watching some bigger kids play. Once they left, he went and climbed around the play structure. He is getting more confident walking across the bridge that dips down and sways a bit. He still holds onto my hand while he does it, though. When we go down the big curvy slide together he laughs.

I told Linus, "I love you," the other night and he repeated it back. Yesterday when we returned home from the museum I said, "Home again, home again; jiggedy jig," and he said, "Jiggedy jig." I love to hear him say things.

Either he is teething or coming down with something because he went down for a nap an hour and a half earlier than usual.

(The one picture is of Linus holding onto me at the park. I held the camera down by our hands and hoped for the best as I clicked it.)

Beep

Here is Linus eating his first corn on the cob at Martha's and Bill's. We had some at home on Monday night that was soooo incredibly sweet and fresh. It was Olathe, a variety grown in Olathe, Colorado. The newspaper proclaimed it the best sweet corn and they were right. We had the butter dish on the table and Linus wanted some. I cut off a small pat and put it on his plate, intending to instruct him in buttering his corn. I didn't move fast enough and he promptly ate the pat of butter. Matthew guessed that Linus thought it was cheese. He wanted more, but I didn't give him any more and told him he'd had enough fat.

One of the snacks at Bennett's birthday party were little boxes of raisins. Linus thought this was the coolest thing ever. It became a love-hate relationship when he brought a box of them home. They would get stuck in the box and he would lose his patience, fling the box around, and holler. In the process, raisins went flying. I finally threw the box away and only give him raisins in little bags or bowls.

Last night Linus said hi to a man when he was out for a walk with Matthew and he told me "night night" when I said it to him at bed time. The word he says most frequently is beep. Any time he hears the microwave, a car, or construction equipment backing up and there is beeping involved, he says beep and grins.

Sponge

Linus is going through another phase in which he is fascinated by everything and I can tell he is soaking up loads of information. Since he received the Market Day book from BryAnn last week, I picked up on his interest in books that have more complex pictures on each page instead of a picture of a single object. He studies each page in that book with so much focus. And by the way, his way of saying cockadoodledoo is "cockadoo." I wish you could hear him say it. Yesterday at the library I got him a book with Jack and Jill as the story line and pictures taken of little felt dolls acting it out. Linus is especially interested in the part about Jack breaking his crown. At that part Linus puts his hand to his head. When we went for our walk this morning, he wanted to bring it along. I wasn't too keen on his taking a library book outside, but he wouldn't let go of it. So off we went for our walk and about 2 houses up, he plopped down in the middle of the sidewalk and wanted me to read it to him. One of the neighbors was mowing his lawn and he laughed when he saw us.

Before Matthew left for work this morning I made a run to a community-wide yard sale at the nearby elementary school. I got some books and a toy shopping cart for Linus. He was so excited about the books. He pulled them from the cart and couldn't decide which to look at first. What a joyful moment that was for all of us. One of the books he'll have to grow into, but I had to get it. It was one I recognized from my childhood. It is called Be Nice to Spiders by Margaret Bloy Graham, copyright 1967. It is a Weekly Reader Book Club edition, from back when they sold hardcover books. It is a wonderful book to add to our collection.

Here is Linus playing in the play house I made for him out of a dishwasher box. We've been having so much fun with this thing. We play a variety of peekaboo games, including one involving his stuffed snowy owl. In one side of the box I cut a door and in each of the other sides I cut windows of different styles. I had a blast making this for Linus and look forward to one day helping Linus decorate a box playhouse with crayons or markers.

Helper

Linus is big into helping. He loves to help me with the laundry. If I'm sorting clothes, he puts dirty clothes into the dryer. When it is time to move the clothes from the washer into the dryer, I hand them to him and he shoves them in. When I fold clothes, he piles them up in the basket. Matthew and Linus put Linus' toys and books away in his room at the end of the day and Linus has come to like putting his books on his shelf. This morning, he pulled a bunch of books down and then sat there and put them back. What a fun game! When I pack his diaper bag to go somewhere, I usually hand him something to put in. Then he finds other things to put in there, like toys, books, or papers.

Here is Linus helping me make cucumber salad. He played with the peeler and helped peel the onion.

Joyful Gift Recipient

BryAnn sent Linus some belated birthday presents. The one that caused the biggest response was a wood mobile with a cat at the top and tropical fish dangling. He pulled it out of the box and proceeded to giggle with joy. It was cute to see him so excited.

We all went to the City Park Arts Festival this morning and one of the vendors gave Linus a pinwheel. He looked adorable waving it around while he rode on Matthew's shoulders and it was a beautiful sight to see him riding in the stroller with the pinwheel spinning in the breeze. What work of art did we purchase? A peach pie. We met the baker, the owner of a bakery in town that uses organic ingredients. She'd baked the pie this morning. Since I won't be turning on the oven until the daily temperature drops below 60, what a delight for us to have this pie. Plus, a lot of peaches are grown in Colorado, so we should enjoy the bounty.

Verbal Skills Explosion

In the last week, Linus has become very verbal. Every day he says something new. We've made the call, and his first word was baby. We were waiting for him to use a word more than once without us saying it first, and that is the word. His second word was tree. He pointed to one in a book and said tree. He said cat on Wednesday. Yesterday he said his first sentence, "Wuter doin?" for "What are they doing?" He excitedly pointed to a bulldozer working in the park as he asked it. I was blown away. Later in the day he attempted to say cockadoodleoo after I said it while reading a book to him. That was hilarious! He also said no for the first time this week. His one and only time saying it was in response to my asking if he wanted to ride Bennett's bike.

In other exciting news, Linus identified the following body parts by pointing to his body instead of mine: eyes, nose, mouth, teeth, hair, ears, and toes.

Here is Linus at the sand and water park in the Stapleton neighborhood. He'd just finished eating a plum and has a red, sticky face. The water aspect of the sand box wasn't working, but about 20 kids showed up and played. By 10 o'clock the sun was nearly literally cooking us and we fled for home.

16 Months Old

Today Linus is 16 months old. No matter how crazy life gets, or the fact that I lose track of what day of the week it is; I always remember the 3rd of each month. Here is what Linus is up to these days:
-He loves to play with the Mega Blocks Brandon passed down to him. He has just started building with them. He takes me by one finger and pulls me into his room to build with him.
-In the last week he has started saying things that approximate English. He repeats things we say. He has said hat, baby, beep beep, cat, yay. For cat today he said, "Ta," When I asked if he could say bird, he said, "Bee bee." Which is how he says baby. I pointed out a dump truck to him on our walk today and he said, "Duh tuh." He said, "Bee bee" on the phone to his uncle Peter the other night when we called him to talk about the new baby, Linus' brand new cousin, Lorraine (aka Lorrie).
-He blows zerberts on my legs and arms.
-He laughs really hard when we play chase and it is so much fun.
-He enjoys it when I do the finger play that goes like this: These are Linus' fingers. These are Linus' toes. This is Linus' belly button; round and round it goes.

Rice Krispy Treat

Here is Linus enjoying a rice krispy treat that he pilfered from a plate on the step while I hooked up the sprinkler. We had just returned from Bennett's house and Linus was wet, coated in sand from the sand box, and sticky from the orange juice popsicles. I thought I'd water the lawn and rinse Linus off before bringing him inside. His diaper is sagging because it is bloated from when Linus sat down in the wading pool.

My version of rice krispy treat for my kid? I use organic brown rice krispies, organic free trade chocolate chips, organic butter, and the regular old mysterious marshmallows. My mother always made rice krispy treats with chocolate in them and that is my favorite kind. We took them to Bennett's house for the party.

Tired kid update: He fell asleep in his high chair again while eating lunch. The thing is, he did it with pretty much no notice. He pointed to something on the counter, then put his head down and zonked right out. I guess I'll move lunch up a bit. We had a fun time at the zoo this morning, so I guess I wore him out.

The Week of the Popsicles

Linus had his first popsicle at the zoo with Sara and Billy. Then I got a popsicle mold that makes them in the shape of sailboats. I put blueberry yogurt in them and we enjoyed those popsicles together on a very hot day. Then Linus and Bennett each had three orange juice popsicles at a summer party at Bennett's house. If I'm going to have a popsicle, I choose a fudgesicle, but homemade ones are lots of fun to share with little Linus.

(Bennett turns two later this month. His favorite toy is his lawn mower and he also likes to push Linus in the stroller if we encounter him when we are out for a walk. He isn't very good at sharing yet, but his moms are working on that with him.)