Early morning conversations.

We're camping at Cape Cod (Hurray!)
Jackson and I are up, and Jonah and Jason are asleep. I wanted to distract Jack so he wouldn't wake everyone up.
"Jackson, do you want to go for a walk?"
"Nah, I don't want to."
"What if we call it 'Exploring'?"
"hey, yeah. I learned about exploring on Diego!"

Happy 10 Months, Jonah Baby!

My Jonah Baby has just turned 10 months old (yesterday).  The tiny little person who came to us as what seemed like an adorable blank slate, is now an exploding personality.  The personality is his own, and is most definitely NOT Jackson's.  Some of this was apparent from day one when we brought home a sweet content baby who turned into Mr. Hyde when he became either hungry or tired, and who could roll over at birth.  Jonah still wants what he wants when he wants it.  (Diaper changes are NOT what he wants).  Jonah is also fearless.

Just before Christmas, Jonah started pulling up on things.  He had been a belly crawler, so at first he could just pull up to stand on his knees.  Once he built up his strength on his knees, he started using them to get around and then started pulling up to feet.  Now he is usually standing up and most often uses this new ability to turn the TV on and off or to find and collect small objects in his mouth.  He's not quite ready to let go, but he is cruising a bit and will bend down to get things.  Every time he performs a new feat of strength, he laughs and glows with pride.

This last week, he's been saying "Muh-Ma" in EARNEST.  Sometimes when he says it, he looks at me with recognition and adoration.  But most of the time he says it because he wants something:  to be picked up, to not have his diaper changed, for his parents to come back in the room with him, to get out of a crib.  I think he's been listening to Jackson, who calls out "Mommeee" whenever he wants something or needs a problem solved.  Jonah is indiscriminate with his Muh-Ma's, and lets out a string if them when either parent leaves.

Jonah is also a good eater, unlike Jackson (who is a good drinker and subsists on a diet of chocolate milk, juice, and peanut butter).  Jonah likes vegetables--broccoli and cauliflower, potatoes, sweet potatoes, green beans.  He's not a fan of fruit yet, the tartness makes his toes curl, but he likes fruit mixed with other things like baby cereal or blended into a smoothie.  Tonight, he ate 1/4 cup of baby cereal and plums, then ate more sweet potato and salmon than I did.      

Jackson and Jonah are good brothers together already.   Jonah likes to chase Jackson around and Jackson likes to say, "Ahh, Jonah.  Jonah is so cute."  Then he will spend hours trying to make him laugh.  If  Jonah laughs at something once, Jackson will keep doing it in the hopes of keeping him laughing, long past the point where Jonah gets bored of the gag.

I love to just watch Jonah move.  He glides along the floor at amazing speeds with his commando crawl.  Now with his standard crawl, he shimmies around so smoothly.  He likes to pick up objects with his left hand and use his little right pointer finger to touch things.  He likes to wiggle his finger against his lips making raspberry noises, and likes to have his people do it back.  He likes to shake his head back and forth with his people, and he likes to dance.  (At our weekly family dinners, we turn on the music and dance in the kitchen together after dinner.  This is a tradition I hope sticks as the boys grow.  Jackson made up a new dance move this week where he swings his hips around, so I pulled out some Elvis for him.) 

Jonah still has his little baby mohawk, but the rest of his hair is catching up, so its not so noticable unless there's a breeze.  And his hair is red, dark red, auburn I guess.  It's beautiful.  His eyes are a deep hazelly blue, and his skin is extra fair like his dad's. 

Sea Shells

Jackson came downstairs today, very excited about the conch shell he'd reached from the bathroom windowsill.  He had it pressed against his ear, listening to the waves.  I had a listen too, then handed it back.  He took it, yelled into it, then held it back up to his ear.  Every 10 seconds, he pulled it away to freshen the echo by yelling into it and couldn't be dissuaded.
Love that boy!

Beginning Reading

Jackson learned his first two sight words this week. The first word is
"Toy" as in Toy Story. (Thank you Disney/Pixar logos). The second word
is "Joy", also pronounced "Toy Story".

"The Mother of all Curse Words" --blog post #200

A few weeks ago, I was buckling the kids in the car. Jackson picked up some card, then said, "this is a pain in the f-ing a-." I said, "what did you say?" and he repeated his previous statement. His statement was so random, so deliberate, and said in such a way that I knew he was trying the new words out, testing my parenting, and aware that he said something that just maybe was outside his current boundaries--something that I as a parent couldn't just let slide and hope it would go away. I took a deep breathe, snapped Jonah's buckle, and started my quickly conceived speech about that not being a nice thing to say. I was told, "well, Daddy thinks it's a nice thing to say" 
So great, he ratted his daddy out.  Of course he had learned this from daddy. I don't use this kind of language in front of my child and even if it had come from me, I leave the f- out of this particular phrase.  Then there's the dilema of how to punish him. My stern lecture would only go so far, time out was insufficient and uninforcible since  I clearly wasn't going back inside for 3 minutes on the stair. I couldn't see any other recourse besides the threat of soap.
I told him again that it wasn't a nice thing to say, not for little boys and not for mommy or daddy either. I told him those were dirty words and the only solution was to clean his mouth up by washing it with soap (trying to convince myself that it was a real connection and very reasonable punishment). I told him if mommy or daddy said it to remind us that it wasn't a nice thing to say and we would be in trouble too. Then I got in the car myself, hoped my speech was impressionative, and wondered how to break the news to my husband in a way that would serve to put him on notice as well.
A few days later, Jackson was bouncing around the house, and told me he might "fall and break his f-ing head." I repeated my speech and again listened to his arguement that daddy thought it was a nice thing to say. I repeated my speech with emphasis on the soap. 30 minutes later, Jack was jumping on the bed chanting about falling and "breaking his f-ing head". 
I put Jonah down and let out a deep sigh of disbelief. Disbelief of what I was hearing from my 3 1/2 year old, disbelief that I was really going to have to get the soap out, disbelief that my husband hadn't tempered his own language. Visions of that scene from "The Christmas Story" flashed through my mind as I picked up my sweet baby boy and carried him into the bathroom, his fate sealed. I gave him a longer speech. He was unphased. I showed him a bar of soap, then had to explain just what it was since we use a body wash with the kids and liquid soap at the sink. I had to hold him down to attempt to put it in his mouth. He grimmaced, and I touched the tiniest bit to his tooth. He ran away complaining, but did not repeat his chant. I took the next opportunity to again chastise my husband.  Jason has since been moping around, wearing his 'worst father in the world' medallion.
Those of you who know my Jackson know he loves to play with my iTouch. He calls it "mine game". If I take it to work, I come home hearing "mom, do you know where mine game is?" in the most pleading little voice. I have it loaded up with toddler aps. He plays them all, but mostly he plays Pocket God. I recognize that torturing pygmies is a little mature of a theme. I'm a little embarrassed that when we visited Utah, he showed everyone as he said, "see the zombies eat the kidneys brains and that makes more zombies". I rationalize that playing Pocket God is good for him because he has to take multi-sequenced steps to a given reaction, it's bigger than just cause and effect.
 He also uses the YouTube ap to watch videos of his own giggling self, muppets singing 'Ma Nama Na', or Donald Duck shorts. He saved a video of someone playing a Roger Rabbit video game to the YouTube favorites. I saw him watching it a couple times, and it was boring so I tuned it out after a few seconds. Normally I let him use the iTouch on his own. He likes to play it when he's "boring" because I'm cooking or taking care of Jonah or whatever.  A few nights ago, he was sitting next to me playing with the iTouch. He turned on the Roger Rabbit video. About 3 seconds beyond the point I'd been tuning out, the narrator said, "This right here is a pain in the f-ing a-". I think a "fall and break my f-ing head" might've been in the upcoming dialogue. Instead of waiting to listen for that, I snatched the itouch from Jackson's protesting fingers and erased the link from the memory.
Jason is relieved that he's no longer the worst parent in the world. He handed that title to me for letting my sweet little boy have unsupervised access to the Internet. YouTube. What was I thinking?! It could've been much worse, right?! So now we're both on notice, paying a little more attention to our language and to our little parrot's viewing habits. This parenting thing is gonna be a long looong road, sigh.