Coasters are the coolest!

So lately, Joshua has discovered the wondrous joy that is the wooden coaster.  :)  We have an old set of six wooden coasters from Target, which are apparently perfectly sized and shaped for little hands to play with.  Joshua discovered the wonderful thwacking noise they make when you bang them together -- or against the coffee table, or against the hearth, or against the wall...  And, well, he's been enchanted ever since!

The coasters usually reside in a stack on the shelf in our coffee table.  So these days, once Joshua gets put down on the carpet to play in the living room, he'll immediately crawl over to that part of the table, pull down a couple coasters, and happily play for hours.  It's so adorable!

The other day, Joshua was sitting on the floor with a coaster in each hand.  He then wanted to pull himself up to stand so he could bang the coasters on the top of the coffee table, but couldn't figure out how to gain enough purchase on the table to pull himself up -- because, of course, his hands were full.  Much though I tried to explain to him that he needed to let go of one of the coasters, he just couldn't bring himself to part with either, so he gave up on the standing thing that day.  Over the past few days, though, he's become more adept at pulling himself up, and he's finally managed to pull himself up to standing using just his wrists, freeing his hands to cling to his beloved coasters at all times.  :)

So we're thinking we need to get him some wooden blocks or something similar for Christmas?  That, or we should never get him toys ever again, since he totally prefers random household objects to the toys we've already given him...

And what Keddiebears post would be complete without photos?  :)  Video at the end as well, so you can see just how earnest Joshua is when playing with his coasters!


Double coaster joy; pulling up to stand; "Yeah, I'm standing.  It's no big deal." 

Stacking and thwacking 

We just love this little face!!

Halloween and Steven's birthday!

I'm really late on blogging about this, but -- here's what we did on Halloween!  :)

Our friend Steven (known around these parts as Phil's dad) turned 30 on Halloween, so Hilary threw a Halloween/birthday party for him that evening after small group.  The kiddos dressed up (along with some of the adults!), and we all had a grand time eating Indian food, watching the kids play, and greeting trick-or-treaters.

I think it's so funny watching Joshua and Phil together.  Phil is about 4.5 months younger than Joshua, but he's bigger and heavier... So I'm always a little surprised that he's not sitting or crawling or anywhere near as active as our little guy!  He's certainly getting more interactive these days, though, and it's a joy watching our boys get to know each other and figure out this whole playing together thing.  :)


Before the costumes (since Joshua in his very padded tiger costume wouldn't have fit in his carseat):
playing with Phil's toys, Phil's mom, and Phil.  :)


The birthday boy and his son 

Phil the puppy and Joshua the tiger! 

The B family in their Halloween/birthday getup 

Joshua got overheated in his tiger costume, so we took off the top part 
Most of the gang who were there -- yay for small group friends!
We always have the best time at Hilary and Steven's parties.  :) Thanks again for hosting us and giving us great memories for Joshua's very first Halloween!

Joshua Watch: Nine Months

Oh, man, has this been an active and mobile month!  Here's the one and only tiger shot I got with Joshua during his nine-month "photo shoot":


I got this shot in the split second he was on his back after David tickled him to wear him out just a little, right after David stepped out of the frame and right before Joshua rolled over to tackle his tiger and then crawled as fast as he could out of the room... Whew!  I make no promises about having a tiger comparison photo for next month...

But yeah, this month has been huge in terms of developmental milestones!  At the beginning of the month (at 8 months and 1.5 weeks), Joshua pulled himself up to stand for the very first time.  He was crawling around on the daybed in his nursery, reached up for the railing, and pulled himself up to stand.  We were so excited!  Shortly thereafter, his new favorite game became standing on the daybed and slapping at the alphabet cards we have on the wall next to the bed.  He laughs especially at W is for Wolf (so silly that a wolf would ride a bicycle!) and X is for Xanthos (silly card makers had to dig into ancient mythology to come up with an animal for X!).

Within another week and a half (at 8 months and 3 weeks), Joshua took his first hesitant steps while clinging to the coffee table in our living room.  We now have a cruiser!  He doesn't do it very often -- he's clearly a goal-oriented little guy, and won't just cruise for cruising's sake.  But he will take a couple steps if it will take him from the couch to the coffee table... especially if there are coasters or books on the table for him to pull off.  :)  We've basically repurposed our wooden coasters as toys for him.  They're apparently much more fascinating than the pile of baby toys he's been given so far!

He's incredibly fast at crawling these days.  And he loves following us around and exploring the entire apartment!  We've had some success at training him not to go certain places -- when he starts heading in the direction of the kitchen or the bathroom, we'll sternly say his name and tell him to turn around.  I think he's puzzled any time my voice drops anywhere out of the silly and fun high register I usually use with him, so he'll stop short when I use a lower register to say his name, and then turn around to try to figure out what's going on.  We've been mostly successful in teaching him not to play with the cords to our laptops and the books on our lower shelves, which is encouraging!

And in other news, Joshua is now a full-fledged babbler!  The floodgates opened midway through the month, when he all of a sudden just started a steady stream of babbling while crawling.  He would lock onto a target across the room (usually the coasters or the desktop CPU), start crawling towards his objective, and so very earnestly babble along the way -- "DA RA RA ba ba ba gee gee GEE GEE!!"  It's so incredibly cute.  And then he started babbling "mamamamama," which he promptly figured out how to shorten to "mama... mama..."  Our doctor says we can count that as his first word, so that's been written up in Joshua's baby book.  :)  And I suppose it's possible that he's thinking of me and/or looking for me, right?

Joshua clearly understands at least a few words, too.  We've trained him to know to lift up his arms to be picked up when we say "up!"  And a few days ago, after I said "up" and picked him up, he looked at me and said "up!"  Granted, it was more of an "aahhp" kind of sound, but I think he was imitating me and trying to say the word properly.  So exciting!

Oh!  And we've got baby stats for him this month, from his nine-month appointment!  As of 10/27, Joshua weighed 18 pounds, 12 ounces, was 28-3/4" tall, and has a 17-3/4" head circumference.  So he's about 25th percentile for weight and 75th percentile for height.  Dr. N. was pleased with his growth, so I'm not going to worry about him not weighing as much as some of his 5- or 6-month-old friends (ahem, Evan and Phil)!  He's also cut his top two teeth, which are totally changing the look of his smile again... He looks more and more like a little boy than a baby every day!

Speaking of looks... I know most of you just want the Joshua photos.  :)  So here you go!  Our attempts at a nine-month photo shoot...


Target acquired... 

Mission accomplished 

Pulling up, standing to survey the possibilities on the daybed, and reaching for the pillow while still standing 

Standing and smiling -- apologies for the baby handprints on the mirror!
It may be more exhausting taking care of our very mobile and curious little boy, but it sure is a ton of fun!!  We love you, Joshua, and can't wait to see what new milestones are on the horizon for you!