Happy Thursday from Rainy Southern California!

I'm wearing a hood, and actually not trying to rip it off my head for these three seconds!

Playground!

Finally I was able to get all of the pictures to come through on my email.

On Monday we met Shilpa and her daughter Shreya at a park nearby.  We had planned to have a "picnic" lunch and then let the kids "run" around.  I use the quotations because there clearly wasn't going to be a picnic and only one of the kids actually runs.  Jayden did eat his lunch, but Shreya was more interested in exploring than eating in the beginning.  We let them loose on the first playground we found which was fun for them - lots of stairs, a big slide they could go down with us, etc.  But it also had a bunch of holes and seemed rather dangerous for our barely one year olds.  At some point Shilpa saw a sign saying the playground was for 5-12 year olds and at the same time noticed a smaller playground just down the hill.  And thank goodness she did.  The second playground was perfect for Jayden and Shreya.  They could climb up the stairs by themselves, they could go down the slide by themselves, there was a little bouncy toy they could sit in, it was perfect.  Jayden and Shreya crawled/ran around for about 45 minutes until they completely exhausted themselves (and us).  We're definitely going back to this park, though - it was so fun!

Ooh sand!  For the first few minutes Jayden just sat on the edge and ran sand between his fingers.  I probably could have left him there doing that for at least half an hour.  

Almost every time, when he got to the bottom of the slide he tried to crawl back up.  Jayden also always wanted to go down feet first on his stomach.  He actually has learned very well to go feet first down things.  So when I put him feet first sitting up down the slide, he got to the bottom, laid his head down and was too tired to lift himself back up again.  It was hilarious.

He couldn't quite get the traction he needed to crawl through the tunnel.  But he tried.  Eventually I  put my hand/foot behind him to help him climb up.  He didn't say so, but I know he appreciated the assist.

Sitting at the table covered in sand.  It was all good until he found something that he thought he should taste.  We quickly nixed that idea.  

He loved sitting in this toy and shaking it so that he moved back and forth.  It was pretty great.  

Shilpa and I both tried to get a picture of the two kids together, but as soon as one sat down the other one decided to move.  Usually Jayden was the one sitting and Shreya was the one moving.  Maybe next time.

Happy Thanksgiving, and moving on to Christmas

I hope everyone had a wonderful thanksgiving celebration, wherever you were.  We had a good time; we just hung around the house and ate and watched sports.

Jayden has been having some troubles recently with eating and sleeping.  He hates to nap - yesterday the only way I could get him to sleep was to either put him in the car or the stroller.  He's exhausted, so as soon as he's in either the car or the stroller, he passes out.  But until then it's screaming and whining and holding on to my leg until I pick him up (but heaven forbid I try to sit down - only standing will do).  I may have already told you all this, but he is getting molars (two or three, on the bottom), so we think that has something to do with his fussiness.  We're hoping that's it, at least.

He is getting more adventurous - trying to balance on his own more and more.  Today he stood up in the middle of the living room for close to a minute; he'd stand up, dive forward into my lap, stand himself back up again and balance, grab onto the dog, balance again, dive onto me, balance again.  It was pretty hilarious.  I kept begging him to take a step, but no dice.  Despite his mood challenges, it still is pretty cool to watch him explore his many talents.

Hanging out on the stairs on Thanksgiving Day.  Who needs two socks?!?

Mmmm, Thanksgiving dinner!

Family photo before I started cooking.  The positioning of the camera didn't allow me to  include Jasmine, but at least the three of us were all mostly looking at the camera (and Jasmine was about six inches in front of us, so she was there too).

Wearing the fancy new skinny jeans from Auntie Lizzle and feeling super trendy.

Coloring at dinner with Daddy on Friday night.  

What Jayden does when he (1) wants to climb up on the couch or (2)  is super tired and needs to take a rest.

I love overalls!  If it was appropriate for me to wear them, I would.  But they are a whole lot cuter on Jayden.

Passed out in the carrier while we shopped for our Christmas tree.

I have some more pictures from today, but can't get them on to my computer at the moment.  So more to come later this week.

A picture is worth 1,000 words

Which means this post is worth 10,000 words!  Rather than telling the story, I'll let the pictures (and the captions) tell you all the things that are happening at the Wallace-Ferrin household:

In case there ever was a question, yes, Jayden is funkier than you.  And always will be.

Jayden decided napping was not his thing last week.  Over the four days he was at day care I think he slept a total of two hours.  That meant that he would pass out almost immediately in the car and stay passed out for a while after he got home.  This picture was from Friday night.

Saturday the three of us went to lunch and Jayden had "bone-cakes" and syrup.  He was pretty happy about that.  (In case anyone is worried and/or judgmental, he did eat veggie/fruit purees beforehand so it wasn't totally unhealthy.)

Jayden loves crawling up on the couch and then pointing at his books until  we give him one.  He then leans back in the pillows and goes through every one of his books (that he's interested in that day).

Being silly with the spoon.  Jayden is increasingly adamant about feeding himself.  He's really bad at it.  But he often has to have a utensil in each hand to dig at the food while I have a third utensil that actually conveys the food to his mouth. Luckily his forks/spoons are small and not so difficult to wash.

This is the newest most amazing development - he stands on his own without holding on to anything!  It's blurry because it's hard to take the picture that fast.  But you can tell he's so proud of himself every time he does it.  He's pretty unsteady, but even over the course of the day today he got better.  So amazing and fun to watch.

Pounding on the glass table in the living room.  We did not know when we bought it that it made such a good drum.

Jayden has also started kissing.  I tell him "kisses?" and he opens his mouth wide, sticks his tongue out and bangs his face into mine.  And often he puts a hand on either side of my head.  And then sometimes he starts chewing on my chin, which actually hurts quite a bit.  In any case, it's rather slobbery.
One of his bottom molars has popped through (on the right) and a molar on the left is working its way through, which means Jayden has been chewing on his fingers - and everything else- constantly over the past few days.  

Jayden has also started leaning back a lot.  This is him standing up with his back to the couch and then laying his head backwards onto the couch.  He does this on the stairs also.  It's also how he stands up sometimes - he'll just lean on something behind him to steady himself.

Not only into feeding himself, Jayden is also into drinking on his own.  He'll let me give him a little bit of milk and then he'll grab the cup with both hands, pull it to the opposite side and squeal at me.  Unfortunately he's still working on actually getting the liquid into his mouth.  In this picture the cup is upside down, so he's not actually drinking.  But I'm not touching the cup either, so that's all that matters to him.

Happy Veterans Day (observed)

Jayden and I are having a lazy day - we both slept in until about 7:30 (heavenly as far as I'm concerned), we ate breakfast, ran around the house a bit and now I'm going to take the kids (Jayden and Jasmine) for a run. Then we'll come home, one or more of us will nap and we'll go to the grocery store later.  Then we'll play some more and maybe nap again.  And then we'll play, eat and go to bed.  Sounds like a good day, if you ask me.

This weekend was relatively slow as well.  I worked Saturday morning for a couple hours and then we pretty much hung around the rest of the time.

A little blurry - \it's so hard to get him to stay still!  But just hanging out in the seat of his walker toy.  He LOVES the seat.  In fact he is sitting there right now looking at a book.

In his Phillies jacket eating a grilled cheese at Capriottis.  Wait, are we in Delaware?!?

Trying to figure out how to work the new safety gate Daddy installed at the top of the stairs.  We should have done this a while ago.  

Wearing his Polo! He looks so funny in this picture; he woke up and the front of his hair was all straight, kind of like mine.  It was odd.  I know he looks like a different kid, but I promise this is still Jayden.  

"Clap your hands!"

Jayden is growing up more and more.  It's just amazing what he can understand.  He understands when I tell him to clap his hands.  I say "clap your hands," he pauses for a minute or so and then claps his hands!  It's so great.  And he understands when we say "no," and he often knows when he's doing something he's not really supposed to do.

He also has started using Jasmine as his walking toy.  Not the most stable or reliable walking toy, but really hilarious for Carmen and me to watch.  This is the best I could get:

Jayden also decided on Monday that he wanted to try feeding himself.  It was hilarious.  I was spooning food to him like normal and he reached for the spoon and got irritated at me.  He tried to scoop with the spoon but couldn't figure out how to get anything on the spoon.  He allowed me to help him get the food on the spoon and then keep the spoon steady until it got to his mouth.  Eventually, though, he got tired of that and decided he could do it all himself (which he couldn't).  But he tried.  So then he held the spoon in one hand and picked up the food with his other hand.  Here's the series of photos:

Last Saturday we went to dinner with a bunch of Carmen's friends from college - all of whom have at least two babies.  There were 7 kids under the age of 6, including three under the age of 2.  It was pretty hilarious.  I think because of daycare Jayden actually wasn't fazed.  One of the four year olds was not so excited about Jayden touching his toys and Jayden was fine.  He just kept doing what he was doing.  It was actually really interesting to watch. I didn't get too many pictures, but here's one:

Finally, a few more pictures from Monday:

We're trying to discourage the whole going down the stairs forward thing.  We're partially successful.  But I think the slipping and rolling over a couple times has been more effective in deterring this behavior.  

Jayden loves playing with these two mini loaf pans.  He takes them apart, puts them back together, takes them apart again.  It's a great game.  And not at all repetitive...

Jayden gets VERY upset when Jasmine gets to go outside  without him.  He stands by the door with his hand on the door handle trying to open it.  I have to be very careful about locking the door, otherwise he really can open it.  It's amazing.  And pretty cute to watch the two of them stare at each other.

Voting Day!

Carmen, Jayden and I voted this morning!  The Orange County Register (our local newspaper) was at our polling place and snapped this picture of Jayden and I at the polling station.  The actual picture is a head-to-toe shot, but I was wearing my Nike boots (we were out for our morning walk - I couldn't wear my work shoes) so I cropped the picture. 

Everyone go vote!