Im really behind on updates…so to make things simpler, this update will be more of a list of some of the new things Nathan’s been doing over the last couple months.

He makes up songs now and then. One had only the words “yum yum yum yummmmmmm” and one was “I dont like carrots” to the tune of Nick Jr.s “I dont like candy corn”, which turned into “I like candy corn” (can you tell this was all the way back around Halloween. Wow, Im behind!)

Nathan is really talking in full sentences now and we can have total conversations with him. It’s very cool. Some of the things he says are:
What are them doing?
Whats that sound?
Who that is? Or who her is?
I want a other one
Do that again
Whats them names? (for what are their names or who is that)
When he’s trying to stall or get something he wants after we’ve said no, he says “Because I need XYZ” or “Just one more time” (While holding up his pointer finger to show me just ONE).
“I just need to see something for a minute” (When he’s trying to stall)
“Donk” (no idea, probably something he does with his friends at school)

He remembers a lot of the Chinese and Spanish words he learns on TV or at daycare-
“ting” (listen), “ni hao” (hello) and “xie xie” (thank you) in Chinese
“arriba” (up) “abajo” (down) and “salta” (jump) in Spanish. He even used Arriba and Abajo correctly in context once or twice, and he can count to 10 in Spanish.

He recognizes his name when he sees it in CAPS and loves pointing out N’s whenever he sees them (”That’s my Name!” and tells us N says Nnnnnn). He remembers that Nurse Shark begins with N from a book we have. He’s getting better at recognizing some other letters and can tell us what sounds some of them make and what words start with some of the letters (thank you Leap Frog Letter Factory!)

He’s still good at remembering the books we read and saying the words with me. He can do that with some TV shows and a lot of the songs on the shows. Speaking of TV, he is a HUGE Dora the Explorer fan. Followed by Diego, Max & Ruby and the movie Finding Nemo. He loves the Cars characters too.

He told Gary a story he made up and repeated it to him a few times, though I cant remember what it was about, so Ill have to ask Gary to do a separate post.

He has a few friends that he has really clicked with. Two at school and two others. He tells us they are his “best friends”, though his teachers are also sometimes his “best friends”, and so is Daddy on good days.

He’s saying I Love You to us more, sometimes without us saying it to him first.

He loves playing “tickle monster” with us (i.e. he hides with one of us under a blanket while the other one pretends they cant find us and then surprises us with tickles. We’ll giggle and whisper under the blanket wondering where the Tickle Monster is, or if he’s coming (it’s usually Gary) and pretend that he really can’t see or hear us. He also loves playing football, especially with Gary. They throw the ball, then Nathan runs for a touchdown and spikes the ball. Sometimes he gets tackled.

He’s getting better with the potty (though we’re still just going with the flow and not really pushing it at this point.)

He considers Fen part of the family, which is just adorable when we’re talking about something he, I and Gary are going to do and then Nathan says “and Fenny?!”

All in all he is just growing into such a smart and talkative little guy. He remembers so much (must get that from Gary), and is so silly and goofy sometimes. He’s starting to show more empathy when he’s bad, coming over and saying sorry sometimes, though we still have plenty to work on and he gets his fair share of time outs!

We moved Nathan to a “big boy bed” (i.e. toddler bed) at the end of October. He wasn’t trying to climb out of the crib and he was happy enough in there, but we were given a toddler bed from some friends and Nathan was excited about the idea of it, so we switched. So far so good. He’s waking up at night now and then, which he wasn’t doing before, but otherwise has been sleeping great. There have only been a couple times where he’s come out of his room when he should be sleeping, and if I take him back in and rub his back a bit, he’s fine.

And he loves the bed. He plays in his room more now and loves jumping on the bed or piling all his stuffed animals on it.
This is right after we made the switch.

This is generally what his room looks like by the end of the day. I like that he’s enjoying his room more though. The latest game is piling every single stuff animal (not the puppets though!) on a blanket and pretending its a boat or that it’s “safe” from the Tickle Monster (i.e. Daddy.)

Can’t believe I haven’t updated since early September and it’s already the end of October…slacker! So here’s a little catch up through the end of September.

Nathan started in the Old 2’s room in September. He loves it. The first week or so he asked if he could go to the new room everyday and he still tells me occasionally that he wants to go there, just to make sure I’m not taking him to some other room. He loves the teachers and his friends and comes home singing lots of songs. He has the Alphabet Song down pat. They have the kids sit on the potty several times a day, so I’m sure that will help us with potty training when we really get into it.

Nathan has a cute way of talking to animals like they know what hes saying. “Fenny, I have cookies!” or “Fenny, were going to the fair Fenny!”, or telling the random dogs we saw outside on a walk that he had magnets in his pockets. Sometimes well tell him something and he’ll turn around and tell Fen.

We’ve been trying to give Nathan choices, like “do you want to hold our hand or do you want us to carry you”? or “do you want chicken nuggets or a hot dog?”, simple things like that, and he’s gotten crafty when he doesn’t want to do or have either and will answer “nusin.” (nothing)

In September Nathan did some dance-jumping.

And played on some drums (Opa’s real ones were a lot of fun!)

We went apple picking at a local farm and got to see some of their animals.

(He’s telling that chicken that his friend (another chicken) is in the cage next door.)

He tried on Mommy’s shoes.

Made silly and happy faces.

Tried to take a picture.

And wore his first pull-up! He was very happy about it and yes, I took a picture of this momentous occasion!

He’s in them all day now and thankfully they seem as absorbent as regular diapers because he’s not using the potty much except right before bath time. We’re in no rush to rush him

More pictures from the month here.

We went to the beach again a couple weekends ago and had a great time. It was just the three of us and even though the weather wasn’t great most of the time, we managed to have plenty to do…we made it to the beach a couple times, visited a water park one afternoon, made a trip to the boardwalk, played mini-golf and took some walks. It was relaxing and nice to just move at our own pace.

When we were at the beach in July Nathan loved the sand but didn’t want to touch the water. This time we got him into the water and he loved it! The tide was going out and it had created a little sand bar so we could walk out a bit with the water only up to Nathan’s knees and the waves were were smaller by the time they got to us. Nathan had an awesome time jumping the waves while he held our hands.

There was the usual digging in the sand too.

We visited a water park one afternoon and after a little time warming up to the place and a couple failed attemps, Nathan decided to try one of the smaller water slide that he could go down himself. And he loved it and immediately wanted to go on the big water slide with us. We spent most of the afternoon going down that water slide or floating around the lazy river. It was a really fun afternoon and it was awesome to see Nathan overcome his fear.

We played mini-golf a few times because it was only a couple blocks from where we stayed and was a good activity when the weather wasn’t good for being wet. Plus Nathan loved the idea of the animals and pirates there. After one of the visits we decided to try out some of the arcade games and Nathan had fun playing on the motorcycles and cars.

The trip to the boardwalk was fun too. It was a nice afternoon and because it was the weekend before school started, I think the crowds were down a bit.

Nathan took his first ride on the boardwalk tram.

And he enjoyed his first Dippin Dots (my first ones too)

Ice Cream Headache?

He also had a great time on all the kiddie rides and didn’t want to leave at all.

Another almost first was that for a couple hours one night we were a little worried that Nathan had his first broken bone or sprain. He’d been jumping and twisting around on the couch and caught his toe in between the cushions. It’s rare that I hear him cry out quite like that and his poor little pinky toe was red and swollen. We contemplated a trip to one of the clinics in Ocean City but decided to tape up his toe with a bandaid and wait until the next day to see how he was. And he was, of course, just fine. (Thank goodness. That’s a first I’m happy to wait a long long time for.)

Lots more pictures from the weekend here.

I may be the only one that finds this completely adorable, but yesterday when Nathan and I left for school/work in the morning he looked out toward the street as soon as we stepped out the door and told me “It’s fog.” To my surprise, he was right, there was mist and fog hanging over the street and trees.

This morning we stepped out and he looked out toward the street and said “It’s fog today again.”

I guess I never really thought about him knowing what fog was, and for some reason I love that he understands what words like “too” and “again” mean and how to use them. He’s turning into a little boy more and more everyday…singing more and more songs, remembering words to more books, showing his sense of humor more and more (oh, how he loves to give us the wrong answers when we’re reading or watching interactive TV shows, always with a mischievous grin on his face. And last night we were talking about how today is Gary’s birthday and I whispered “tell Daddy he’s old” (he is 35 today afterall ). There was a pause, maybe we said something else, and then Nathan put his hand on his chin and said “you’re Ooooooold.” He made up for it by remembering Gary’s birthday this morning without being reminded.) He’s also kicking and throwing balls really well and playing pretend (he likes to pretend he’s asleep by snoring, but often he’s looking at us out of the corner of his eyes, just waiting for us to yell “wake up!” Especially funny when he does it in the bathtub with one ear under water.) I think he’s losing more of the baby chubbiness now too.

Looking just like Gary.

But that would be Mommy’s chin.

And poopy potty too! Nathan peed and pooped in the potty last night for the first time. Who’d have thought I’d get this excited about that?

For awhile we’d ask Nathan if he wanted to pee pee in the potty before bathtime, and sometimes he’d sit on the potty, but he never actually went. Eventually he lost interest and didn’t even want to sit down. Since we’re in no rush to potty train him, we decided not to push it and just leave the potty in the bathroom and let him decide when he wanted to use it. The last couple nights after bathtime he’s told us he needs to poop and wanted to sit on the potty. Last night as he was getting out of the bathtub Nathan told me that he needed to poop and I asked him if he wanted to sit on the potty. He sat down and we hung out in the bathroom for a good 10 minutes. We just hung out and chatted, and I’d occasionally ask him if he wanted to get up and he’d tell me no. I think during our conversation he told me he had peed and pooped, but I didn’t really believe him until he got up and I saw that he’d done both! Nathan seemed proud, but more than that he was very interested in the fact that it was brown. Boys.

I’m fully aware that this may not happen again for 6 months, but I think it’s a pretty big step in potty training none-the-less. Go Nathan!!

Nathan’s got a few new things up his sleeve lately. For a couple days we caught him saying Mom or Dad instead of Mommy or Daddy, but that seems to have stopped.

He’s often asking us “where that come from?” or “what that noise?” A lot of times he already knows the answer, but it’s cool to see the inquisitive side peeking out.

He asks us to “hold my hand” a lot when we’re taking walks, which is sweet. Some of our neighborhood doesn’t have sidewalks and he knows that when we’re walking in the street he has to hold our hands, so I think that’s where it came from.

Nathan’s doing more make believe or pretend play lately. He likes to put his little rubber ducky in the drivers seat of his dump truck and tell me “ducky drive” and he built a tower of MegaBloks, then stood the little MegaBlok man in front of it and told us it was the man’s backpack (watch Dora much? Ha.)

We’ve heard him singing Ba Ba Black Sheep and the ABC’s all the way through. He sings lots of other songs too, last night he was attempting “Take me out to the ballgame”, which he’d learned at school that day. He’s also getting the hang of “yours” rather than everything being “mine mine mine”. (Although he has started a very fun phase of “I need that” to just about anything and everything he sees.)

Nathan seems to be developing a little sense of humor too. We read The Runaway Bunny a lot before bed and there are a couple pages where the Little Bunny is kind of hiding so I always ask Nathan where the Little Bunny is. Lately he will point to all the wrong places, occasionally looking up at me with a mischievous grin, before finally pointing to the place where he very well knew the Little Bunny was all along. Goof.

Well as usual, when it rains it pours with Nathan. He never does only one new thing at a time. Just in the last few days there were three that really impressed/got to me.

Last Friday during our weekly Shabbat dinner, Danielle and I were telling Nathan about how it was Shabbat and he spontaneously started singing Shabbat Shalom at the table. So looks like we have a new Friday night tradition in our house. Then on Saturday when we were on the way up to Pennsylvania for a Birthday Party, Nathan was entertaining himself in the backseat just idly chatting as he normally does when out of nowhere he sang the ABCs all the way through all by himself three times in a row.

Finally, this morning as he and Danielle were leaving the house, I told him, as I do every morning, that I love him and this time he looked up and said “I love you Daddy” in response. Which was the first time he’s ever done that unprompted.

So, Nathans been jumping for awhile, but he recently started getting his feet really UP, and last week I noticed that he was jumping forward. Kind of cool to see that progression. He also likes to walk on his tip toes sometimes while saying “tip toes. tip toes”, and he’s getting a little better at catching a ball…though you do have to stand pretty close to him and remind him to put his arms out.

I’ve also caught him singing to himself lately. In the car he’ll spontaneously break out into a verse of Wheels on the Bus, or just sing “all through the TOWN”, and one day I got to hear him sing Twinkle Twinkle all the way through. As soon as I hear him start singing I shut right up because if I talk or sing with him he’ll often stop.

We had a fun time celebrating Nathan’s 2nd Birthday. It was unfortunate we had to work that day, but I picked Nathan up a little early from daycare so we got some extra time to play outside in the afternoon. Then Oma came over for a pizza dinner and ice cream cake dessert. Yum!

We talked to Nathan about how he was turning 2 before the big day. For a few days when we asked how old he was going to be we got an answer like “7″, but by his birthday, he knew he was 2 and was pretty proud to tell you when you asked.

Profile of a 2 year old (the morning of his birthday.)

Blowing out candles. (I really need to cut my face out of that!)

Digging in.

(Please excuse Nathan’s red and slightly swollen face. Poor kid got hit pretty hard with allergies that week, but it’s gotten better since.)

Nathan & Oma.

Family Shot.

More pictures here.

(Birthday Party post to follow!)