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Lots of video today. Didn’t seem like it at the time, but since it was the first time that Carly could go to one of his classes we got a lot of video of that. 

Later, we went for a walk north. Stopped at Starbucks and used our stash of gift cards to get a venti earl grey latte to share on our walk.  

In the evening we decided to start in the stack of presents and opened one of them from my parents.  

From the morning. You get some of the head bumping thing he does as well as a good hiccup: 

At the class. He doesn’t like getting clothes put on, particularly when they are unnecessary and particularly on his head. We got the cape on when he was distracted. The antlers were less successful:

Taking a ride:

Jingle bells:

A group photo. Getting 6 infants dressed in capes and antlers and posed goes about how you would expect:

The teacher tries to get him to wear the antlers:

Bubbles:

The closing song. Possibly his favorite part of each class, along with bubbles:

On the way home, visiting his favorite family sculpture and playing with snow for the first time:

Our walk to Starbucks:

Opening a present from my parents. It was an awesome set of wooden blocks. Thank you!

August approved:

As did Carly:

Our friend Meg was headed off to Hawaii today for the next three weeks. We are just a little jealous. Anyway, before she left we met her at the Buk museum to check out the new shows (that August and I had seen on Thursday). We also went shopping at Home Plus. 

August also enjoyed Skyping with his Oma and Opa today and really missed having and audience when that was over.  

He spent more time playing with the Swiffer today, and something he has been doing recently is gently banging the back of his head against a surface when he is sitting against it. He also cruised farther than he has before, starting at one end of the crib, turning the corner and going the length of the crib, transferring to the door frame, going through the door, transferring to a chair, then the table, then another chair. 

Morning: 

He hasn’t been eating much the last few days. It is almost like he read the article Cherie sent us saying that is normal from time to time. He did have fun gnawing on some sweet potato though. Somehow he does a pretty good job of keeping the top teeth hidden. I will stay on the hunt for that elusive target: 

More swiffering:

At the museum, Meg gave us a gift for August. Turns out she got us two of the dancing paper figures I had used for his mobile. I was also the one that showed them to Meg in the first place when I first took her to that store last January or February. And she has seen the mobile. Pretty amusing:

August enjoyed the museum visit, as usual. He didn’t like being kept in the carrier though so he got to walk around. Oh, and note that he is wearing the awesome shirt my mom bought him:

Back home he didn’t want to wear pants. Well, he really just didn’t want to be on the changing table any longer. Anyway, he was playing with these cups, figuring out how to put them together. Most of the time he was making what he we call his thinking noise. Carly thinks it would be funny if he was working on a hard math problem as a teenager and still making this noise:

Last but not least, another apple sauce popsicle:

August’s fourth top tooth is coming. He will soon have all four of his central top teeth in addition to the three on the bottom. But for now they are all a different length. 

Today was the first day of winter break and we celebrated by taking it easy. Our one outing was in the afternoon to visit the Kid Cafe and to get a few things from the grocery store and pick up some pho for dinner.  

The morning: 

New toys, mom’s sock and the Swiffer: 

Reading with daddy. There are a few books that he really likes, but only the first few pages of each. So we will reread those first few pages over and over. This is one of them:

Then we went to the Kid Cafe. A little different as it was, being a Saturday, much busier:

You have a nice view of the park and the Rainbow Bridge from the ball pit:

Time for a hug:

Back home August got to try holding all sorts of foods. His favorite was the carrot:

He was making funny faces and noises but started to get frustrated:

I’ve mentioned how much he likes his music from his class. I put it in and he spent the next fifteen minutes or so laying in my lap like so:

Once again in a good mood, he spent the rest of his evening crawling all over the apartment – the most distance he has covered so far – and being hyper:

And it is too good to skip:

Today was the last day before winter break and August and I had been invited to the 7th grade party. So that was our big event for the day. 

A happy wake up: 

Around 9 we headed out in the 20ish degree weather to walk to APIS. It was actually a nice walk. 

When we got to APIS we joined the 7th grade party in the room across from Carly’s. one of her students, Anna, is the one who has spent the most time with August and loved him. But she is moving to California for the next semester, so today was her last day at APIS this school year. So August really enjoyed his last time with her for the next several months:

One of Carly’s students took photos and sent them to us. These three are from her. I particularly like the last one:

Back home he was all about doors today:

Helping hang laundry:

He was excited about his apple sauce popsicle and I went to snap a photo. He fell forward onto his face. You can tell I caught him at the start of the fall:

His dinner was basically broccoli:

Sometimes he has a tendency to stare off into space when eating. He is staring in the general direction of Carly, but I think he is zoning out here:

Christmas at the Althauser Niman house involves presents from the States, a couple things we bought for August but didn’t wrap (stickers and a banana shaker), and one string of lights:

A good day of sleeping for August. He slept ten hours for the night, and then took naps of 90 minutes and two hours. 

During the day we went to the park and saw two new exhibits at the Buk art museum.  

We were going to go to APIS to hang out with 7th graders after school and come home with Carly after her activity, but since he slept two hours for his second nap we didn’t go.  

August now has six teeth and seems to be working on more. He is also doing a lot of waving and working on his walking.  

Teething:

So after his nap I froze some apple sauce for him. It was a hit:

He has started offering things – particularly food – to other people. Today he took it a step further and started offering things to the balloon man in Carly’s painting. You can see that in this video:

He also went crazy with waving today, particularly into mirrors:

When we went outside it was only 16 or 18 degrees. We walked around the park and checked on the pigeons:

In the art museum there were a few pieces that caught August’s attention. This was one of them:

When we got back he fell asleep as soon as we got home:

When he woke up he spent a lot of time standing and playing at the coffee table and couch:

We knew Carly was on her way home and August started to walk down the hall. So I opened the door and we kept walking. All the way to the elevators:

We had to wait for a few minutes, and August wanted to play with the bumps on the floor. These are the same bumps we would drive the stroller over to calm him last spring:

Since he loves the Very Hungry Caterpillar and is fascinated by this same caterpillar in Logan’s room we got one for August:

A second applesauce popsicle in mama’s lap:

Before bedtime I caught video of two other developments. A game of falling on the bed, and cruising around his crib:

You get to see him wave. I am pretty sure he is waving at the washing machine:

August didn’t get asleep until 10pm last night and woke up at 6am. Then, when he fell asleep for a nap he only slept for 38 minutes. Not sure why he’s having some sleeping weirdness. It could be his teeth, but there aren’t really any other indications that they are bothering him. And he is still in a good mood. 

Anyway, the result was that he took another nap just an hour and a half later. He ended up missing his music class today as he slept through most of it.  

So when he woke up we made up for it by going to the kid cafe in the building next to us. For 3 bucks we could play for two hours. And boy did he have fun.  

From there we quickly came back to the apartment and then left to take the bus to APIS for my one PT appointment this week. He fell asleep on the bus, but only slept 20 minutes before waking up when we got to APIS.

While I went to the appointment, August watched part of the APIS Christmas concert. He really liked it at first but started to make too much noise after awhile. So when I got back to school following my appointment we hopped on the bus to head home. 

He fell asleep on the bus and stayed asleep once we got home. So we will see how long he sleeps tonight. 

Here he is in the morning: 

Playing in the bath:

Waving to the camera:

Standing at the table and playing:

Sleeping through his music class:

Here he is waking up from that long nap. He is now sitting up at the end of almost every nap:

At the kid cafe the woman working there spent a lot of time with him (there were only two older kids there most of the time) and he had fun with all sorts of things. 

Like the toys: 

And the merry-go-round:

And the octopus:

And the trampoline:

And sliding down the ramp:

And walking with a walker:

And playing in the ball pit:

And riding a rocking toy:

And more push toy:

While at APIS he had fun playing with the globe and beach ball in Carly’s room:

After it snowed a bunch last night it took a few hours to drop below freezing, leaving everything cold and icy. So we didn’t plan on going to far today. 

Then there was August’s sleep schedule. He woke up around 3am and stayed awake for an hour and a half. I stayed up with him for awhile, then Carly took my place. He fell back to sleep but woke up at 7:10 – which seemed too early. But then he proceeded to only take a single 45 minute nap between them and when Carly got home at 5:30. 

He then took another nap and woke up around 6:30 just enough to nurse. We then proceeded to wake him up, thinking we didn’t want him to just fall asleep for the night. Thought we would be lucky to keep him up an hour. It is now 10 and he is still awake, although perhaps about to fall asleep. 

Anyway, we did make a successful trip to Home Plus and have a lot of fun around the apartment. Here are some highlights: 

Awake in the 3am range: 

Up (at 7am) and doing what he does best:

Milk time. Did I mention yesterday that he has started to sign ‘milk’?

Practicing for his part in the baby production of Hamlet. “…a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy…”:

Playing by th crib is obviously popular given how much time he spends there:

Awake from his one and only nap:

Under…

and around the table:

Finishing off a banana:

Off to Home Plus. Clear skies and ice:

Play time with mama:

Put him in the bouncy chair about 9:30 as he was still hyper. He proceeded to bounce like a mad man. Here he has calmed down a bit:

We had August’s third activity class and in the evening went to APIS for the Christmas dinner. 

When he woke up this morning j found him sitting up in bed. So that is a first. He was a bit fussy, so I didn’t take time for a photo, but he soon cheered up:

At his class we started with the usual songs. There were then a variety of activities involving fish. He tolerated the hat for about ten seconds:

We then played with fish-shaped rattles:

His favorite activity though was the parachute:

There were also the usual bubbles, and then we ended with playing with fish stickers. August really loved the fish sticker I put on his sock. After the class was over he was still playing with it and showing it off:

August didn’t cry once during the class, and as you can see from the above photo, he was happily sitting and playing by himself a few feet away from me while I put on coats. 

Back at home there was some good playing and a nap:

It started snowing and basically just kept snowing all afternoon and into the evening. So we took the bus to APIS instead of walking:

When we got to APIS we were greeted by one of the faculty kids. He was feeding August snow, which is what I was trying to get a photo of, but he posed for the camera instead:

Before the staff dinner, we had some time to spend in Carly’s room. He likes playing with the broken globe:

He had a blast at the dinner. Here he is going crazy with the kisses for Carly when she held him:

He fell asleep during the bus ride home. He woke up a bit when we tranferred him to the bed, but Carly got him back to sleep and he was down for the night:

Finally, our neighborhood dinosaurs in the snow:

We went for a walk along the stream and river today that was quite nice. And this evening I went with a couple friends to see The Theory of Everything. A good film; not great, but worth the ten bucks.

But I thought today would also be a good day to highlight some of August’s accomplishments. 

Perhaps the coolest one today was doing the sign for milk/nurse – it basically looks like squeezing your fist. He only did this while nursing, so no video, but it was very deliberate and different from his usual motions. So that will be his first sign and second official word.  

The next notable accomplishment is putting objects on/in other objects. He has been putting the salad spinner lid on the spinner for a couple days, and Carly has seen him set small objects on other objects. Below you will see him put a block in a small box.  

What else? Crawling more, our first video of him walking while holding my hands (although he has been doing that for some time), more vocalizing… Oh, and he pretty much has the pincher move (finger and thumb) down although I don’t know if we have a video of that.  

To the photos and videos:

Dinsing the best object for teething. Five teeth so far; I expect number six soon: 

Playing and crawling:

Not long ago he couldn’t pull himself up by the vertical bars. Not a problem now:

First toothpaste. Banana flavored. Warning: underwhelming video ahead:

Our walk:

Crane:

In the afternoon/evening:

Figuring out the double sided tape:

His feet while he eats:

Crawling:

Some nice vocalizing and playing with a tear in the floor:

Walking:

Putting a block in a box and dumping it out: