Baby Update!

Abi started crawling yesterday! We have some video, but I haven’t had time to import it and get it online. She looks a bit like Benjamin, when he first started crawling — although her approach is definitely discernably different than the frog hop. She puts her face down, lifts up her butt, and then slides forward — sort of like a caterpillar — while Benjamin started up, and fell forward.
Her locomotion arrives about half a month later than Ben’s did, but its not really her fault. The laminate flooring in the living room, where she spends the majority of her tummy time, is far too slippery to be able to start crawling on, so this weekend we went out and spent $80 on an area rug. Its not a terribly attractive one — that would have cost a lot more — but it does the job, and it helped immediately. Within 4 days with the new-found traction she’d started getting around a little bit on her own.
Benjamin’s also growing up. He maybe doesn’t have quite as many words as we’d like, but he’s learning. Here’s a sampling of his vocabulary:

  • Dowwwwn (accompanied by a little finger pointed towards the ground) is usually used when he’s finished his meal and wants to get down to play. It’s also usually used first when he’s ready to get into his chair to eat, until we correct him.
  • Bupp! means up, and its what he says when we’ve told him that he can’t get “down” into his booster seat, he has to get “up” into it.
  • OOOOTAY! roughly translates to OK, but is usually used for declaring success. Yesterday, at lunch, he lined up his hot dog slices, standing on end, across his plate. When he was done, he proudly announced “OOOOTAY!!” and then giggled at his own brilliance.
  • MMHMM is an affirmative, which he uses when he wants to give himself permission to do something he’s not allowed to do. This is helpful to us, because when we hear him repeating “MMHMM, MMHMM” we know he’s probably going after the scissors, or trying to take Abi’s pacifier away.
  • Baff is obviously bath, which is still accompanied by the sign language.
  • Shoes and Wwwalk usually go hand-in-hand, since he knows you can’t have one without the other, and are pronounced perfectly — aside from the extra care in forming the W.
  • Bobble is bottle. He started with “baba,” but we were determined he could do better. Bobble seemed a fair comprimise, since its not really baby talk.
  • SAT? is what’s that? and gets used liberally, along with Uh-oh!, pretty much any time he’s bored, curious, or has found something unexpected.

Aside from these, and a few others, if he’s in the right mood, he’ll try to copy single, simple words you use in front of him. He usually does the best on his first attempt, but gets worse as he over-analyzes it. He can identify most parts of your face now, and if you ask him to find a “nose” he’ll have to visit every single person in the room and touch their nose.
He counts along with us, up to five, although he never gets it right all the way through, it usually sounds something like “WAAAAN, FREEeee, FREEEEE!, Ffooor, BYE!!”
He gives kisses on demand — especially to Abi, who he loves to kiss and hug. I figure he should also learn a more manly greeting, so we’re working on “gimme five!” He waves good-bye any time we leave the house.
I lament a little about all the changes in our life lately, and how those things have robbed Abi of some of the early life experiences Benjamin had. She seems to be a little more introverted than he is, and although I’m an introvert and proud of it, I wonder how much the extra social exposure Benjamin had in his first 8-10 months of life shaped his personality (not to mention his love of music) and if Abi could have had more of those experiences, if life hadn’t worked out the way it did. We try not to treat her any differently than we did Benjamin, or coddle her any more just because she’s a girl, but the reality is that our lives are very different than they were when Ben arrived, and she’s probably a lot more sheltered.
Still, they’re both healthy and happy, giggle at least as frequently as they wail, and are more-or-less on-course developmentally, so I guess we’re doing alright over-all. Now that we have health insurance, they’re both back to the doctor’s this week for some check-ups and shots. Ben’s getting his ear tubes checked out this afternoon, and we’re all getting over a bit of a cold, but life carries on. We’ll get some pictures/video up soon!

3 thoughts on “Baby Update!

  1. love the update. as i was reading i could actually “hear” you or ben saying those words. lol. i love it.
    i always think its funny how often you use the words introvert and extrovert. and i would actually have thought you and nicole would be switched……. you bing extro and her being intro.
    i guess i might not fully understand what it means….even though i breifly read your post about them.
    also- ginny told e i got the “jons” confused…. sorry. i totally thought she meant you during your speech….. since the other jon didnt really give a “speech”… my bad for openinging my mouth….
    dont mind all the typos…

  2. This is so cute! My neices ( 3 and 11 months) Used to do the same things. It was so funny to hear them “talk” and crawl.
    So how is life up in America’s hat? =)

  3. OK – the title of this post scared me guys! Now that I’m over the shock the post was WONDERFUL! Watching your kids grow and learn is amazing – wish we could see you guys! 🙂

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