Back from Sea-town

Two plane rides later - we're still alive!  It was not easy to travel with a one year old, but Jayden was really pretty amazing.  We were super lucky and we had a row to ourselves up and down, which made all the difference in the world.  Jayden just doesn't like to sit still and he does not like to be held for long periods of time, except when he's sleeping.  He tried to crawl under the seats, both in front of us and behind us.  He just wants to move.

A rare quiet moment on the flight up to Seattle, reading a book in his own seat!

Leaving Seattle, staring out the window at our airplane

Hanging out with Mama on the plane.

Jayden learned to bite!  Some lady offered us the crackers from her snack pack and Jayden loved them.  At first he just gnawed on them until they softened and he could chew and swallow.  But by the end he had figured it out and was actually biting down with his 8 (yes, he now has 8) teeth!

We had a good weekend.  It was a whirlwind trip, but we did a lot.  On Saturday, Mom, Ellen and I went to our old elementary school (and Mom's current job) for the annual carnival.  I saw my kindergarten teacher, my first grade teacher and my third grade teacher and they all got to meet Jayden.  We played in the kindergarten room for a little bit, while talking to my kindergarten teacher.

The newest challenge for me is Jayden's new eating habits.  He no longer needs pureed food - and really does better with real, human food.  So now I'm having to figure out how to "cook" for him but still make sure he gets all the nutrients that he needs.  It's so tempting to just feed him buttered noodles every night.  I am planning to make a giant batch of spaghetti sauce sometime this week or weekend.  We also learned this weekend that Jayden thinks scrambled eggs are the greatest thing ever.  So I'll definitely need to make him some scrambled eggs from time to time.  It's just not easy to cook a dinner when we don't get home from picking him up until 6 pm and then his bathtime is 7 or 7:15 pm.  Doesn't leave much time for gourmet toddler meals.

I have said this to a few people already, but it is quite clear to Carmen and me that when a baby officially becomes a toddler has nothing to do with how old the baby is, or whether or not the baby can walk.  Toddlerhood is officially a state of mind.  And Jayden is there.  If he doesn't get what he wants, if he can't figure something out, he definitely screams.  And he knows how to throw a fit.  For now, he can be calmed down, but Carmen and I are going to quickly need to figure out how to manage him and figure him out even more than ever before.  On the positive side, he's also developing a sense of humor - and it seems like he almost knows he's funny.  Last night in the bath he "styled" his hair himself by running his hands over his hair forward and then just started grinning at the camera:

The hairstyle. And the smile.  You can almost see the two teeth coming in on the bottom.

He has definitely found his tongue.  I think his tongue is discovering his teeth, but the result is that his tongue is hanging out of his mouth half the time he's awake.  I'm always worried he's going to bite his tongue during his crawling adventures.  

And that's it.  There are more things I want to tell you, but this post is long enough and it's 10 pm, which means it's already past my bedtime.