Looking Back on April

Isaac is now 17 months old and, as Mary likes to say, he is now babbling in complete sentences. And it is SO true... he will just babble on and on and on. One really has to wonder what he is thinking, because you can tell he is definitely putting it all out there.

Isaac has also begun pushing furniture around in order to reach new heights. He'll move a chair across the kitchen in order to climb up on it to see and reach the counter top. He's learned this approach by watching his sister do the same. But his sister is able to move things much greater distances (from one end of the house to the other) and can reach much greater heights... such as the very top cupboards (pretty much NOTHING is sacred in our house anymore).

Isaac's vocabulary:
"NO!" This is pretty much straight up, and loud. Another thing he learned from watching Sofi. He often repeats her shouts of protest (which as a parent is a "thrill", hearing a protest "echo"), so it isn't surprising he picked this one up as soon as he did.
"ott", for hot.
"hat", for hat.
"baa-baa" for grandma
"wa-wa" for pretty much anything he can drink, including water obviously, but also milk.
"boot-ah" for boots, and also shoes, pretty much anything that goes on his feet.
"by-by", when he waves good-bye, which is usually waved backwards, at himself more than at the person he is saying good-bye to... it's very cute.
"boe", for bowl. He's started to eat his cereal out of a bowl.
"upple", for apple.
"OW-EEE!". This would appear to be as it is... a cry of pain. But instead Isaac uses this word as a cry of protest. Whenever he doesn't like what you're doing (setting him down when he wants to be held, taking him out of the tub when he wants to stay in), he cries out "OW-EEE!")

Has also started to "sing" a line from Old McDonald. He can often be overheard saying "ee-ah-ee-ah-oh".

He signs for "bottle" when he wants a bottle of milk, but unfortunately for him we've decided this past month to cut him off from the bottle. He is still protesting this loudly most every night. Unfortunately for Dad this withdrawal of a nightly bottle means Isaac wakes up earlier in the morning, so no more perks of late mornings.



Isaac is starting to ask to go outside. He'll stand by the back door and slap it, pointing at his boots and jacket. This is uniquely Isaac... Sofi rarely ever asked to go outside at this age. The picture above was taken on a rainy day, the first day that Isaac got to wear the red rubber boots that the Jacobson's so graciously loaned us. They're a bit big on him, so he walks kind of awkwardly in them. And yes, if you're wondering, this is a photo of him licking his fingers after dipping them in the mud.

All of us have enjoyed the warmer weather (though, as an aside, it SNOWED TODAY! What the heck was that about!). We've spent quite a bit of time as a family working in the backyard on the weekends, splitting wood, prepping the garden, and improving the grade around the house.



In the above photo Sofi is "brushing the flowers to help them grow". While I love the child-like imagination behind this gardening technique, what I love even more is the gardening outfit: a yellow princess dress complete with red gardening gloves and blue rubber boots with white polka dots!

Sofi has learned how to spell her last name, and considering that it is longer than four letters we are all very impressed. And how she learned it is also impressive. We haven't been rehearsing her. She picked it up one day by listening to Mary spell it out for a child care provider at the YMCA Child Watch.

For some reason Sofi has taken to calling us by our first names instead of calling us "Mom" and "Dad", despite our constant insistence that she do otherwise.

For an overview of all the photos taken in April, visit Flickr...