Reading, Pancakes, and Bath

Claire has been asking to hold James a lot lately.  We compromise with letting them sit together in the rocking chair.

Then Claire likes to read him a book.

Daddy made me blueberry pancakes!

Bath time for James

J is for James!

A Few Pictures

Back Porch Picnic 

Playtime at the park

Claire's attempt to escape the inevitable nose-wipe 

Happy to be with Daddy!

James 3 Months, Claire 22 Months

James is growing stronger everyday.  He can hold his head up for long periods of time during "tummy time," and he sits up well in his Bumbo seat during meal time.  He loves to make eye contact and smile with someone--especially Claire.  He enjoys his playmat, watching me work in the kitchen from his bouncy seat, swinging, watching Claire, and riding in his carseat (as long as the car or stroller doesn't stop!).  He's old enough to be left in the church childcare now, so I resumed my piano teaching one morning a week.  He's finicky about his bottles and often puts up a fight before taking one.  We have a little bath chair that lets him take a bath at the same time as Claire.  He doesn't mind the bath so much, but doesn't like getting out of the water and getting dressed.  He still has some fussy times during the day but is doing really well at night.  He goes down around 7:30 pm and often sleeps past 3:30 am; after a feeding he'll go back down again until about 8:00 am.  He's still sleeping swaddled in his rock-n-sleep (the latest attempt to move to the crib didn't last very long).  He takes several naps during the day, including one fairly long one in the afternoons.  He is wearing size 2 diapers and starting to outgrow some of his 3 month clothes.  He eats every 2.5 to 3 hours during the day.

Claire still continues to impress people with her vast vocabulary and clear pronunciations.  She talks in sentences and phrases. She transitions quickly from happy Claire to full-blown temper tantrums when she doesn't immediately get her way, but back again when she is obliged.  She loves to play and does more and more pretend play everyday.  She's particularly cute taking care of her baby dolls and stuffed animals.  One of her Bible study teachers laughed at how she was rocking and taking care of a doll while simultaneously doing other things around the room--I guess she's been watching me multitask while caring for James!  She enjoying going to the park and we've had some beautiful spring-like weather lately.  She doesn't care too much for slides lately but loves swinging and exploring and playing in the sandbox.  She has started to sing some songs but doesn't like to do it if we request it and she knows we're listening.  I've heard her sing through "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" and "Baa Baa Black Sheep" almost perfectly.  She also loves to listen to her Kindermusik CDs.

Claire really enjoys her Bible.  She looks through it for her favorite stories--Adam and Eve, Noah, Baby Moses, Jonah, Zacchaeus ("key-us"), and her all-time favorite--Baby Jesus.  She has gone from finishing sentences in her books to being able to say whole pages, but she would much rather have us read to her.  Other favorite books right now include "Go, Dog, Go," "Shiny Dinah," and "I'm a Big Sister."  We have started doing family devotions from a book after dinner each night.  The devotions include a quick story, prayer, and song.  She really enjoys the "de-oceans" book.

We all went out for breakfast last Saturday.  Before we left the house, Matt asked Claire if she wanted to have pancakes for breakfast.  Of course, she did and proceeded to say "pancakes! pancakes!" the whole way to the restaurant and until they were in front of her.  She ate a the pancakes happily and almost finished the very generously sized serving.  Today, Matt got up early and treated us all to homemade blueberry pancakes.  Claire loved them.  Later in the day, Matt caught Claire with her toy skillet and spatula "feeding" James.  He asked her what James was eating and she said "pancakes and blueberries!"

We had a picnic lunch on our back porch last week.  Claire doesn't often have the freedom to get up and walk around during a meal, so it ended up being a very long lunch as she was all over the porch and in and out of the house.  She likes to list things, and when Matt asked what she had for her picnic lunch she said "chicken and blueberries and carrots and blueberries and oranges and blueberries and chicken and milk!"  At one point when she headed inside she closed the door and said "Bye Bye Brooks!  See you later!"

I took both Claire and James to the zoo for the first time and we had a wonderful day.  The weather was mild and the zoo wasn't crowded.  James slept well in the double stroller and Claire loved seeing the animals and talking about what she saw.

Only rarely has Claire ever gotten a chance to run around the house in just a diaper; usually it was just a few moments in the morning or bedtime routine. We started to notice that she behaves especially goofy without any shirt or pants on, and so the last few weeks we've allowed her to indulge for a few minutes prior to taking a bath. During this time, she manages to get us all giggling just by being silly. It's an excellent way to end the day.

Claire is wearing mostly 2T clothes and size 4 diapers, but I've ordered size 5 for the next big box.  Her favorite foods are fruits, cheese, yogurt, and bread.  She eats her veggies well and drinks about two cups of milk everyday.  She naps from about 1:30 pm until 4:00 pm and goes to bed at 8:00 pm and sleeps until 7:30 am.

Grab Your Popcorn!

First up, we have Claire at dinnertime.  You can see my attempt at putting her hair in pigtails, her use of good manners, and her use of her big girl cup.



Next, we have Claire reciting her four memory verses that she's learned in Community Bible Study.



Here is Claire reciting her ABC's...well...sort of...



And now her version of the Itsy Bitsy Spider



Every night at dinner before we pray, we ask Claire what she's thankful for.  She goes through a string of people and animals that only varies slightly from night to night.  It's as follows: "Hannah, Michael, Mrs. Donna, and Ginny Dog and Stormie and Brooks...AMEN!"  Hannah and Michael are Claire's friends, Mrs. Donna is Michael's mom, Ginny is Dana and Andrew's dog, Stormie is my parent's cat, and Brooks is our cat.  She does seem to be very thankful for animals...future vet?  I'm still hoping to make the list someday.



And finally, Claire showing us the fantastic puzzle storage box that Matt made for her.



I hope you enjoyed viewing what I captured in one afternoon with the camera! 

May I Have Yogurt Please? (Video)

May I Have Please?

Claire continues to learn at an alarming pace. She's learned her full name "Cware! Owuise! HEIzeur!" and is using "me" a lot more often... it's both strange and cute that she still refers to herself in the third person a majority of the time.


Claire has also learned a new phrase that ratchets up the manners meter more than a few notches. Instead of saying "[noun] please," she's now saying "may I have [noun] please?" and the answer is always "Yes!" because she's just so darn cute doing it. She nods her head at each syllable and says "maye - iye - haf - bwed - pweez?" Over the last few days she's gotten a lot of practice but still requires prompting, though not much. Here's how it works at suppertime:


Claire: "Bwed! Bwed! Bwed!" (she's asking for bread, a traditional request at supper)


Mommy: ...(blank stare at Claire)


Claire: "Bwed pweez?"


Daddy: ...(encouraging stare with raised eyebrow)


Claire: (head nodding) "Maye - iye - haf - bwed - pweez?"


All: "Yay!" (bread is served)


She's also applying this phrase to a lot of other things. Much of it works and some of it doesn't. We'll correct her eventually, but right now I like that she's getting practice at it and I'm not going to split hairs about the difference between nouns and verbs. For example:
- May I have color [with] Daddy please?
- May I have read book please?
- May I have pick me up please?

As a side story, Claire has never liked it when Daddy gets sleepy and shuts his eyes. If I close my eyes on the couch or in the rocking chair, Claire will shout "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!" until I open them back up... this can repeat quite a lot if I'm really sleepy. The most recent development in this exchange is her mastery of the word "Awake" so that when now Daddy shuts his eyes, Claire shouts "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!... WAKE DADDY!"  In addition to this, Claire is more tolerant of James being asleep but also likes to announce when James is awake; I suppose this is because he was asleep in her presence for so long (and she was constantly reminded of that) that she's pretty happy when he's "AWAKE!"  The other day, Amanda asked Claire to quiet down in James' room because he was sleeping; the obvious solution for Claire was to go to his bassinet and rock it while shouting "James awake!" - problem solved. 

Happy Little Boy

In the last several weeks, James has gotten over a lot of his fussiness and is smiling many times a day. If he's in a good mood, he can spend nearly 15 minutes alone on his play mat batting at his toy zebra and listening to music. At the table, he can sit for 5 or more minutes in his Bumbo seat and at least keep his head from falling too far backward or forward... and he'll enjoy it longer when he gains more body fat to help keep him upright. Speaking of chubbiness, he's really starting to fill out in all directions; you can really see it in his cheeks but his legs are the real hoot - they've gone from twigs to jelly rolls!

James prefers mostly to be held and still doesn't like tummy time for very long, but he certainly makes an effort to pay attention to what's going on in his field of view. He gets to watch Claire playing a lot and might be either grateful or annoyed if he could understand some of the things she does to keep him entertained. James also is taking a bottle each day; he still doesn't like it and complains every time, but more often than not his desire to eat overpowers his dislike of the bottle.

James likes to bounce at the dinner table


His favorite face is Mommy, of course


James is getting used to the camera; more smiles like this means many more pictures


Family story time

Two James Videos

Two Claire Videos

Two Month Stats

At his checkup yesterday, James weighed 12 pounds, 4 ounces (75th percentile) and measured 23 inches (50th percentile). He sure is a growing boy!