Rockets and Purple Shovels

Nathan has suddenly started saying many words, and often repeats the last word of a sentence when someone is talking to him. He has turned into a little tape recorder! Last week we were in Tampa with the entire family - Tom and I, Ben, Jen, and Nathan, Becca and Adam, Seth and Amy, and our friends Rick and Stella. We had a wonderful time doing many fun things, but here I just want to talk about Nathan. He of course has said Mama, Dada, and Nana for a while now, but he had not called anyone of the rest of us by name. By day 2, he knew all our names, and some of them came out really cute! Tom wants to be called Grumpa, to distinguish himself from Nathan's other 2 grandfathers who go by Grandpa and Papa. Now Nathan calls Tom "Dumpa" and they did some serious bonding. He calls Becca "Bucka" and Adam "Ah." We couldn't get him to put an end syllable on his name. Seth sounded more like "Set", but he had no problem saying Amy since he has a babysitter named Amy and he has said her name for a long time. Rick sounds more like "Ri" and Stella is "Sta."

Tom and I were here for dinner last night, and before the meal was ready, we were out in the back yard with Jen and Nathan. Ben was in Florida for work. Glenn, the next door neighbor, was in his yard setting off rockets. Nathan, held safely in his mom's arms, was fascinated watching the rockets go way up into the sky, and then come floating down under small parachutes. When we came in for dinner, he kept talking about the "rahtet," bringing it up again and again in a questioning tone of voice, obviously wanting to see more rockets. I think he said "rahtet" about 100 times during the meal. Jen asked him, "Do you want to see Glenn set off another rocket?" and Nathan replied, "Yeah!" in that enthusiastic way he has of making the simplest suggestions sound like the greatest idea he ever heard of.

He said it so often that Jen texted Glenn, asking him if he could possibly set off another rocket or two after dinner. Glenn was happy to do it. This time he came over to our yard, and set up the rocket just a few yards off the deck. Jen stood holding Nathan again, and he was wiggly with excitement. However, the noise when Glenn set off the rocket startled Nathan. It sounded much louder up close than any of us had expected, and it made him cry. Poor baby! Jen calmed him and told him that he was fine, and it was just a scary noise, but the rocket was fun to watch. He didn't buy it. Jen asked him if he wanted to see another rocket, and he said, "No!" just as emphatically as he had agreed earlier.

Glenn actually had several more rockets, but we came into the house, where the noise was much less scary.

Since Ben was out of town and since Jen had to leave especially early this morning, I stayed here overnight so I would be here when Nathan got up. He woke up happy and chatty, and started out by looking for his purple shovel. He says both of those words, and repeated them again and again all morning. Sometimes he was just showing me the shovel, and sometimes he put it down and then went looking for it. But he said it again and again and again, just like he had said rocket last night. It's amazing how persistent he can be.

This afternoon I got tired of hearing about the purple shovel, and I asked him if he remembered the rocket that Glenn had sent up into the sky. He told me about that again for another hour - "Den" (for Glenn), "rahtet, "sky," and down - over and over and over, complete with pointing up and down appropriately!

At 17 months

I haven't blogged in a while, but not because Nathan isn't being cute!

He is doing so many new things. I mentioned to Jen recently that he has turned into a little tape recorder, repeating whatever we ask him to say. There are very few sounds he can't repeat now.

But there are other things. He turns pages well, even in magazines. He can be very gentle. I think he is unusually aware of his body. He walks backwards to be silly. He started climbing into and out of the molded toybox he got for Christmas immediately. He goes up and down the stairs pretty securely, and is working on climbing onto the couch himself.

Last week we went for a walk, with him walking along with me. The temperature was in the 40s, and the sidewalk was clear, but there are still piles of snow, especially at the ends of driveways. He took his favorite kitchen spatula with him when we walked, and used it to dig into the snow piles. He loved it. He touched the snow with his fingers when it was stuck on the spatula. Then he started tossing snow into the air, and stepping on it when it plopped onto the sidewalk. One time he tossed it in the wrong direction, and it came down onto him, onto his face and neck, and into the neck of his coat. He squealed, but was laughing!

His language skills are improving daily. Some of that has really been fun. "Ba" meant ball, bat, banana and bus for quite a while. He has been saying "Nana" for months, but every time I tried to get him to say "banana," it would just be "ba." I was determined to get him to say the whole word, so I said, "Say banana."

Nathan said "ba."

I tried again. "No, say banana."

After several rounds of this, he became exasperated with me. Finally, he pointed to the banana, and said, "Ba!" Then he pointed at me, and said, "Nana!"

We still haven't gotten him to say the word banana.

The Zoo at Goebbert's Pumpkin Farm

Today Jen and Ben took Nathan out to Goebberts. Al, Marilyn and Muriel (Al's mom and Nathan's great grandma) met them there. Jen had invited me to join them, which I did.

At first Nathan seemed a bit overwhelmed by the unusual environment. He got excited about the ponies going in a circle with kids riding them, but he was a bit afraid of the large camels that also had kids riding on them. He seemed to get sleepy, and wanted to be held.

Then we went into the petting zoo. The toucan and the lemurs and the foxes didn't thrill him much. But then we got to the llamas. Cups of carrots were available to feed to the animals, so we fed some to the llamas. Nathan definitely got a kick out of that. There were some very tall girrafes that amazed me perhaps more than him. He liked some turkey-looking birds, and the tiger cubs (large cubs, weighing over 100 pounds). He was fascinated with the white-necked ravens, which are larger than crows. His favorite was a baby zebra that came over to where he was standing, and mouthed his fingers! It's lips were like velvet, and he got so excited he was squealing with the fun of it all. It was such a joy to watch.

It was a fun afternoon. Thanks for including me, Jen! I loved it.

Nate's Big Walk

Walking

All night long Nathan was walking around the family room. He started out walking along the couch and then minutes later he was crusing around the family room making his way towards the kitchen. At this rate, we will have a full fledged walker on our hands within a week.

Nathan's First Steps

Nathan has been walking along the couch for weeks but has lacked the confidence to remove his hands for more than a second...that all changed today. This morning he removed his hands and walked about 3 steps. He continued to do this many times throughout the day. He will be walking before we know it!! Take a look, we hope you enjoy!