two things about the Junebug

[metaphortunate]

1) He clapped!

We went to library story hour with shaix and her little dude; the Junebug's first library visit! He loved it! There was really terrible singing, and a nice librarian read us a couple of books, and one of the songs had clapping in it, which he did not do, because up till now he has not quite gotten clapping. He loves it when I sing and clap to him, but his reaction is not to clap himself but to try and nom on my hands because something cool is happening with them and all cool things must immediately be put in his mouth. And when I try to clap his little hands together he clasps them and grins. It's adorable. So he didn't clap during the clapping song. But afterwards when the librarian was reading a story - he clapped. All by himself. And I freaked out quietly to shaix and kissed him all over his little head and the librarian noticed so the Junebug got his own little round of applause. And then yesterday he did it again at home and Mr. E got to see it.

2) Communication!

Yesterday we missed the bus coming home from daycare. It was so full that it just went right by us. So I said, fuck it, with Daylight Savings (I love Daylight Savings!) it's still light out, let us go to that little park on the way. So we went to the little park, where there were a bunch of dogs running around, and I put the Junebug down on the grass. There were no dogs near him, but he still looked around, looked extremely worried, and then waved his arms frantically at me - and I knew that he wanted to be picked up. So I picked him up and sat him on my knee and he was fine. I tried putting him down again and same thing: worried waving, it was perfectly clear what he wanted. So we sat on the bench and as long as I was holding him he was happy and excited to be watching the doggies run around and bark and play with each other. It was lovely. I had originally thought that we were supposed to be trying to teach him to understand us, but hell with it: it's all good!

Comments

now reliving my previous life through *your* children

[zond7]

So much of upbringing the daughter is a complete haze, but i do very distinctly remember taking her early early on to san jose kid's library for the first time and her being vaguely impressed (oh yeah, some token teddy bears, some more of those cardboard square things you can chew on), and her sitting down, grabbing a book, somehow managing to open it with her cartwheeling arms and HOLY MOLY THERE'S A FREAKING CAT FACE INSIDE THIS THING

CHECK IT OUT THEY GOT A CAT IN HERE.

WAIT IT'S NOT RUNNING AWAY.

THIS THING IS EVEN BETTER THAN A CAT.

HOW DO I TURN TO THE PAGE WITH ITS TAIL ON IT?

etc

she was blase about books for another 5 years, but she did pretty much the same double-take when we took her to a movie that had tigers in it. also an imax movie with tigers. then, actual tigers. we had her number by then.

Re: now reliving my previous life through *your* children

[metaphortunate]

Nice! All our kids' books now have charming little drawings, which we like, but I think we need to get some ones that have actual photos in them because I'm told babies love photos. Especially photos of babies.

Re: now reliving my previous life through *your* children

[khedron]

_B is for Bear_ has a number of good touchy-feely pages, and also pictures of several different kids doing things (touching noses, being sheltered by umbrellas, that sort of thing).

Re: now reliving my previous life through *your* children

[reesei]

E also very much liked "That's not my dragon" - a touch and feel book about dragons. Much better than the boring ones about puppies and kittens, which are limited by real-world textures. "That's not my pirate" turned out to be disappointing; the pirates were not sufficiently engaging for her.

At Junebug's age, though, she mostly wanted books she could chew on.

Re: now reliving my previous life through *your* children

[kate_nepveu]

I love the that's-not-my books! We have the dino one and have given various others to many babies.

Re: now reliving my previous life through *your* children

[metaphortunate]

We have "That's Not my Dinosaur!" It's okay - too many of the textures are the same sort of plasticky thing, though, I think.

We also have the copy of "Pat the Bunny" that Mr. E's mom read to him and his sister lo these thirtysomething years ago. He claims he has no idea how all the ink scribbles got on that one page. The creepy part is that the page where they can smell the flowers, the flowers are still scented. What the hell did they use on those, is what I want to know.

[norah]

♥ is all I have to say - ♥♥♥♥♥.

[metaphortunate]

N HE IS SO AWESOME.

[wired]

Oh, yes! No, for the first 3 years or so, it's all them teaching you. I think babies are like furbies, in that we learn what makes them happy and feel like we have taught them. But it's awesome.

I was not vigilant about teaching sign language, but I did more-or-less teach my kidlets to sign "milk" "no" and "thank you".

[metaphortunate]

We are sort of doing sign language! It's hard though because mostly I am holding the little dude, which means I have one or zero arms free. Or if he's in the Ergo, they're free, but they're behind his head.

God, this is a perfect example of the communication problems with my mother. I told her that we were taking the baby to sign language classes: there's this place around here that does them sort of tupperware party style, and a couple of Mr. E's friends signed up to host, and for a while on Saturdays a bunch of new parents would go over to their place and a teacher guy would come by with flashcards and such and teach us some basic signs while the babies rolled around or drooled on the floor and we sang them songs with accompanying signs. Later my mother hesitantly brought up how we were "taking the baby over to someone's house so that a man could teach him to communicate." She was clearly worried that we had joined some sort of cult. *facepalm* But the classes were good, mainly focused on colors & foods & animals. I wish they had done more on clothing!

[kate_nepveu]

Awww! Communication is awesome.