Jonas and the Vacuum

Jonas has a deep love for vacuums. It's fine by me..the sooner he learns, the less vacuuming I have to do! The vacuum is stored under his brother's bed in their room and sometimes we'll come in while they're playing and Jonas is dragging the vacuum all over the rug and begging for it to be turned on. Here's a video from a few days ago where we caught him with the vacuum out. In the beginning, he knows he's not supposed to have it out without us there and he whines and cries trying to explain himself -- but the story changes and excitement comes when we ask if he wants the vacuum on.

Jonas is getting quite expressive and knows a lot of words, although this video doesn't capture a lot of it. Some favorite/common words are: eat, apple, nama (banana), dowww (down), uppa (up), dee'da book (read a book), go see, tiddy tat (kitty cat), doddie (doggie), mommy, daddy, der'd go? (where'd it go?) ball, sauss (socks), chews (shoes). He loves to show body parts on himself and everyone else (watch your eyes!) eyes, ears, beddy (belly), 'aiyr (hair), tee (teeth). High fives are a hit (no pun intended - or was it?), as well as the kiss (or boos here). His 2 absolute favorite words are: 'side (outside) and BYE-BYE! He loves to be outside, especially if it

involves looking at tiddy tats.

Cave

We visited again this cave in our city that has great views especially at sunset. I love to go there and watch the waves, let the boys run around and meet new people.



Our family:



There's a hole in the rocks of the cave that resembled the shape of Africa (backwards) so they chiseled away at it a bit more to make it look just like a backwards Africa, including Madagascar. Can you see it?



Elijah couldn't stop looking out to the water. The waves were splashing so high through this hole that one wave crashed over the wall and all over Bruce and Elijah as they were watching the waves [not good for a kid already afraid of the water, but he handled it well :].

Tree Master in the Making

Bruce is THE [self-proclaimed] Christmas tree master. He says when he was younger he would set up 2 or 3 trees a year because people would want his help - and they'd ask him to come back year after year (his sign that he's a master: regular customers). Hey, I'm all for it because it means I can sit with my cup of hot cocoa, unwrapping the balls and handing them to the "master" to hang.

But there's a new sheriff in town.



This is Elijah's first year to play such a big role in the tree decorating, and Bruce let him just go for it. And go at it he did -- he was quick! Five minutes flat and he had all the balls on the tree.



With some words of instruction or guidance along the way.



It was really cute though because ALL the ornaments were at the 3 foot and under mark, and many of them grouped together on the same branches. I just loved this one:

There is a serious lack of Christmas decoration selection here, so our tree topper is a cross-shaped ornament but Elijah got to do the honors. With some help from Dad of course.

It's really sweet to see Bruce releasing his tree perfectionisms to let Elijah go at it and explore in his own ways.

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Elijah and Mom made our first batch of Christmas sugar cookies for the season. Unfortunately I've only been able to find pink and blue food coloring here, so they look more like Independence day cookies - but we had fun!

And mom got to release some of her cookie-making perfectionisms to let the [almost] 3 year old help roll, cut, bake, ice and decorate. It's about the journey and the fun along the way, not the final product, right?

I'm so ashamed...

{This is me hanging my head, ashamed, that it's been so long since I've posted. I really don't have a good excuse except that life has been busy lately. A good busy, but not too busy to post. It doesn't seem like my presence in the blogworld has been too missed, but I'll carry on.}

Jonas just turned 11 months and has been crawling all over the place, stands without holding onto anything and a few days ago even took a couple of steps alone. He can walk just holding onto someone with one hand. And he is HUGE. A lot of mornings when I get him from the crib I know that he grew an inch overnight! Jonas had a check-up last month when he was 10 months old and he was the exact same measurements (in height, weight and head circumference) as Elijah was at 13 months. Jonas' head circumference is off the 'normal' charts, but the doctor didn't seem concerned...he's just a brainy baby!

Speaking of big heads, I think Jonas has had a hard time holding his up because 3 separate times over the last couple weeks he's crashed his chin into the tile floor from a mis-step in crawling and bled all over the place. He's starting to look like a linebacker with this band-aid chin strap.



Jonas still loves to eat and has been exploring the the self-feeding realm and now it's all he wants. Out with the pureed, in with finger foods he says!


In other news, Elijah is independent as ever and learning so quickly. He has learned all his letters thanks to this fun activity we've been doing every day (blog post coming about that, I think). He is more interested in singing songs lately and it's funny to hear his toddler version of the words to some of the songs we sing together. He is picking up some french words at school and is definitely understanding a lot! Yesterday Elijah came home from school and showed us the letter 'I' in a book and said, "this is the letter I but my teacher always calls it the letter E because she doesn't know it's the letter I but I think we should tell her it's just called letter I." Poor kid - it's confusing learning French and English letters at the same time. How do you explain to a 2 1/2 year old that it's a letter I in English but in French I is actually called E? And G is J and J is G. Or something like that.

This made me laugh...last week Elijah got himself all ready for school. He pottied, put on his big boy pants, shirt and shorts all by himself. I guess we need to teach him about the unwritten no stripes with plaid rule (and the no shorts in cold weather rule too). But I was proud he got himself all ready. He already does his breakfast all by himself, so I guess the next step is getting him an alarm clock and he can get himself up and ready and just wake me when he's ready to walk to school. Think it can happen by his 3rd birthday? :)



I've still got to update you on our Halloween and some other happ'nins in our house. Shwiya b'shwiya, as they say (little by little).


Later!

Family Vacation!

Some of our good friends here ended up inviting themselves [a welcome invite] to our family vacation and rented a condo in the same complex that we were in. We had a great time spending relaxing hours by the pool, cooking and eating dinner together, playing games and talking.

We spent many hours out on our balcony reading, eating and people watching. We could see gorgeous sunsets over the mountains from our balcony.

Jonas spent time in the pool for the first time, and really really enjoyed it for the most part. He lounged back in his floatie at times, splashed all over the place at other times.

The only picture we took of all of us together. We all look pretty rough!

The guys hung out and played games some.

Elijah watched to make sure they were playing fair.

Jeremy, Bruce and Zach. This is out to eat at this yummy fish restaurant in town.

Jer Bear loving on Jonas. Bruce and I played Settlers of Catan (Cities and Knights version) SIX times on vacation with Jer. Morgan won 4 of those times, and Bruce won 2 times -- only because they ganged up to keep Morgan from winning every time!

Morgan and Tina. This little town right down the road had Christmas lights up all over the place. It was beautiful and got us in the mood for winter! And I'm pretty sure they don't call them Christmas lights. :-P

Elijah had fun hanging out with sweet Sparrow and borrowing her Clifford books and Winnie the Pooh ball. :)



Elijah, Jonas and the Bird.

What's been crackin' with you guys? Any favorite ways to vacation in your family?

Fear of Water: Vacation Results

We had a great vacation! More posts to come about all the fun and relaxation we had. But first, I know you all are wondering how Elijah did in the water.

Elijah has a major fear of big bodies of water (pools, beaches, lakes, etc) where he sees water in the distance and just stands there whining and crying about it and won't go any closer. When you press him as to why he's crying he says "I'm crying a'because I'm scared'a 'da wadter". Poor guy.

We've done the whole "We are right here with you." "I won't let you go." "Just put your toes in the water." thing. We've begged. We've forced him against his will, holding him while we dip his toes in. He's screamed. He's cried. We've begged more. We may have even bribed. "Do you want to go to McDonalds? Just put your feet in the water." We've distracted with toys, gradually inching him closer and closer to the water. He's no fool, I tell ya. He catches on pretty quickly to our ploys.

So we were really praying for breakthrough with this vacation, and by golly we made some steps. Baby steps, but steps none the less.

We spent a week at these condos about an hour from our house:



And spent most of every day out by the pool. We said, forget the beach. We can go to the beach anytime at home, but we don't have a pool!

Do you want to know the key for Elijah? Cool floats!



We got him all excited about riding in the big blue whale boat, let him sit in it away from the water for a while, then moved it to the water's edge and let him play with toys leaning over the side of the float.



Then gradually, we pulled him into the water while continuing to focus on the toys we were playing with. Before he knew it, he was having fun in the middle of the pool!



He even interacted some with the other kids around him, which is good for the raging introvert around new people and new situations.



OK, so he wasn't wet in the whale boat but he was playing and mingling with a big body of water. Progress!



It seemed like each day we had to start all over with the progress we made the day before, but eventually by the end of the week he was in the water!


How?


He would play with beach toys on the first step of the kiddie pool, and then one day Mom was in a float and pulled him onto her lap and we chased a ball around the pool. Grabbing it, throwing it and chasing it. He had the comfort of Mom (he was clinging and had his legs wrapped tight around mine) and realized he was having fun. He even said "I'm having a'fun at the b-big p-pool." One time he actually stood up on his own in the kids pool (wearing water wings) and another time floated around in a round floatie on his own, again chasing a ball.


Baby steps, but steps none the less! We were excited.


We are just praying that since it is likely we won't see a pool again until next summer that we will not have to start ALL OVER from square one with water fears.





Anything you have done to break your kids (or your own) fears of water? Send your help our way...we need it!

Belly crawl

It feels different when the second child starts crawling compared to the first. I'm not ready. Everything is happening too quickly this time around. Maybe it's because you can just see that drive and determination in Jonas' eyes as he scoots around. You know that nothing, no nothing, is coming between him and the prize. Jonas is extremely motivated to crawl, especially to electrical cords, dirty shoes or food. But I've just gotten so used to Elijah just knowing and obeying what he can and cannot touch. It's starting all over again. I'm not ready!

Jonas has been crawling now for 3 weeks, but he still doesn't lift his belly up off the ground. We keep saying we need to just attach a dust mop to his shirt and let him clean the floors. He crawls around room to room following Elijah or one of us, and by the end his shirt is in need of a good washing! Can we just skip the crawling and go right to walking already?

Here's a video of Jonas crawling after Elijah as he leaves the kitchen and heads to his room. Jonas wants to be anywhere Elijah is or where Mom is, depending on who is doing something more fun.

By the way, anyone have any ideas for us...Jonas has sore, rough, dry, red patches on his knees, I am assuming from crawling around on the tile and rugs. Some cream or something (that I would be able to buy overseas) or a homemade invention to prevent it during the crawling stages? All ideas welcome and appreciated!

Basketball

Elijah - like all little boys - wants to be just like his dad. Here's a video of them playing "basketball" together. Elijah is wearing Bruce's wrist guards just like daddy. [Bruce has bad wrist and elbow joints and often has to wear these when he's doing certain activities].




I just love how excited Elijah gets whether he makes a basket or not.

Crawling

He's coming right for you!

Motivated by the fancy toy mom's using to flash lights at him.

Watch out!

.....almost.....got it.

Jonas is a crawling machine. He started the army belly crawl in early August and is just trucking along now.

Tribute to Sheepie and Turtle

Sheepie and Turtle have become "our good friends" as Elijah says.

Every day Elijah involves them in whatever activity he's doing. They always get to sit in chairs and watch. Elijah asks them if they want to help and then helps them "help" by moving their arms to grab a block or pick a book. Or he puts them down for their nap. Or they sit together to watch a video. You get the picture.

But sometimes Jonas wants to help or play, and that's just not cool sometimes. Your little brother coming in trying to hang with your friends. Not cool dude. "Jonas, we don't want you to put the blocks in your mouth"

So after I make them all play together, they all find mutual enjoyment in turtle and sheepie "jumping" (read: smashing down) into the pile of blocks. All except maybe the stunt guys Sheepie and Turtle. At least there was A LOT of hysterical laughter every time the stunt animals did another jump.

I love watching these boys learn how to interact and become "good friends".

Right now....

Right now, we are enjoying the beach life. You can imagine us all sitting around in the sand, building sand castles, filling up and dumping sand from buckets over and over. And mom and dad taking turns resting in the sun, reading books and going for a dip in the cool ocean.

Ahh, this is the life.

You can also imagine half of us (the smaller half of us) screaming bloody murder at having to go to the water....anywhere near the water.

But we are working on it. Slowly but surely.

You can imagine us eating sand-covered snacks on the beach, drinking fresh cold water to stay hydrated, sharing our snacks amongst each other.

And doing so well at the sharing thing. {This was Jonas' first pretzels and he loved them. Now that he has SIX teeth, he's eating almost anything!}

And sharing thoughts with each other. Thoughts of pretzels and fish crackers and sand. And ah-da-da-ba.

And of course for the littlest member, many naps on the beach.

Ahh, the days of vacation. Summer vacation.

[This post has been scheduled....no I wouldn't dare post to our blog on our VACATION. Are you silly?]