Motion

Clare, Isaiah and more

Just getting started

 Bernadette exuding cuteness on Thanksgiving and there weren't even any grandparents present to observe her at the moment!
 

Isaiah briefly helped transport stuff to the car. Shortly after this picture was taken, there was a cry of "help, help," which we often hear now when he is frustrated or can't do something.

Notes

Today:

Matt in elevator, presses button and points: Do you want to press three?

Isaiah: No, Two.

Isaiah pushes button and narrates.

Isaiah: He pushes two. Daddy pushes three.

Wednesday evening:

Isaiah: Daddy will put the left front sock n the smoocher's left front foot.

Wednesday morning:

Endless snaps (the price of being able to change diapers easily later), wind that pushed my bike around. I'm enjoying this day.

Monday evening:

Minor death experience. Balloon pops. I show Isaiah the remains and tell him the balloon is gone. He looks up in the air. He goes into the other room. "Looking for the balloon." He comes back. He looks up.

Parents ...

Marian and I dancing around the living room to South Pacific soundtracks cracks Isaiah up. "We are so entertaining," he says. 

Blocks, building

Reading 

 

Brown Bear, mesmerizing (and still popular with the older crowd, too).

Couch time

Bernadette is smitten...

You should see the beaming smile she wears when she looks at Isaiah. He is just the most fascinating thing to her. He's been showing a little more interest in her, too. He usually brings a pillow to rest his head on when we're going to nurse, and the last couple of times he's brought two: "One is for Bernadette." Yesterday he brought me a book (Love You Forever) and told me to "read it out loud for the baby."

"Oh," I said. "You think Bernadette wants to listen to this story?"

"OK."

p.s. Bernadette has also been known to fill the room with a big, sunny grin when she sees her sling getting into position. So there you have it: her first and second loves have been established, and she's not even four months old. I wonder when the crush on Daddy will start?

Circus practice

We would never run away, but it's also fun to practice some acrobatics (and Dad gets a little workout in the process).

Tractor! (And trucks)

Pulled out the tractor and dump truck that had been stored away for months. They were very popular. Also went to the small, local Plainville aiport today and saw one helicopter take off and two planes doing repeated takeoffs and touch-and-go landings.

Dialogue

Isaiah: He will take the dump truck and backhoe loader to the Green House.

Matt: You have a very specific plan.

Isaiah: OK.

Matt: Do you just say "OK" when you don't understand what I said?

Isaiah: Yes!

October Ends

Saddled up.
For homemade pizza in Yonkers at Pete and Magda's.
And a final look from a friendly face.

Playing Basketball

Halloween Bat

Isaiah was a bat, at least for a few minutes. Then he started saying help, and we had to switch to a shirt with no wings sewn on.

At the Grown-ups' Table

Tonight Matt invited Isaiah to sit "in a regular chair"; he accepted eagerly, even grabbing his drink and moving it from the high-chair tray to the table. Isaiah climbed into the chair and got settled, took a big bite of his corn, and kicked off the following dialogue:

Isaiah: So how's your day?

Mama: (Trying not to crack up completely.) My day was fine. How was yours?

Isaiah: OK. (Pauses and looks around with a grin.) We are all eating in chairs. We have no experience. We are not at all offended.

Daddy could only laugh helplessly through all of this. Bernadette slept.

p.s. Although we've been reading the Little House books, I've read chunks of them to myself, and Isaiah just listens to whatever part I happen to be on when he asks to "hear more about Laura." Today, however, Isaiah and I finished reading the first novel that he listened to all the way through: Stuart Little. When I closed it, Isaiah said, "Read it again!" So my challenge now is to figure out how to explain that a novel is different from a picture book, that we just spent three days reading the whole thing, and that I'm not going to go back to the beginning and start all over. Or I can do what I did today--divert his attention. Or I can go back to the beginning and start all over. Any ideas?

Siblings

Couch Time

Looking up at the world.

More Personification

(With a Little Onomatopoeia Thrown In)

It seems there's something about a swing that really brings out the bard in our young man. Today, after swinging for half an hour while engaging in our traditional activity of pointing out all the different kinds of trucks that went by, I asked Isaiah if he wanted to play on the slides.

"No," he said. "Still swinging. Still listening to the babble of sweet trucks."