Video update: Party tricks with the Keddie kiddies!

Just a few snippets of the fun and funny things Joshua and Sophia are doing these days!

Some video footage of the hide and seek game they were playing during Sophia's 12-month photos:


Sophia demonstrating her ability to say "yes" in response to her very favorite question:


Sophia just chilling, standing like a boss:


Cascading giggles in the car.  I just wish I could have reached around to get a glimpse of Sophia's face!


A longer video, of Joshua "reading" one of his favorite books, "Flap Your Wings":


Reading together.  Or at least, next to each other.


Joshua, my assistant videographer, narrating a video of his baby sister:


And a short one, showing off Sophia's latest trick -- "how big is Sophia?"

"Sing 'Oh My Soul'? Just the verse?" [VIDEO]

As I mentioned in the three-year-old update post, Joshua is getting much better at (and more into) singing these days.  And it's surprising how many songs he's learned!  We always laugh about how he, as an illiterate toddler, is in an oral tradition all of his own -- he has to memorize things if he wants to experience them again on his own, and it's amazing just how sponge-like his memory is!

We realized a couple months ago that he had entirely memorized the words to Matt Redman's "10,000 Reasons," a popular Christian contemporary hit.  David used it as background music to last year's senior slideshow video, and Joshua loves watching that video and pointing out all of his friends.  (We all miss you, class of 2012!)  We were in the car listening to the radio when that song came on, and to our surprise, Joshua sang along with it!

Joshua calls this song "Oh My Soul" -- which makes sense, as that's a repeated and elongated line in the chorus.  And he consistently requests that we sing "Oh My Soul," directing either that we start at the beginning ("just the verse") or with the chorus ("just the chorus").

And I finally got it on video!  Please excuse my errors in singing -- I typically have to look up the lyrics on my phone, but I was using my phone to record the video so I was winging it and messed up a few times.  (Yes, Joshua's memory is better than mine...)  And as usual, Joshua got distracted by the phone partway through, but he does make it all the way through the song in this video!


Cutest.  Thing.  Ever.  I could listen to his little voice singing all day long!

Hex Bugs!!

Since we're spending Christmas in Indianapolis with David's family this year, my parents shipped Christmas presents out to our kids a bit early, and we let Joshua open them before we left for Indy.  (Which, I know, isn't exactly kosher, but it's become something of a family tradition, allowing him to open the gifts from the other set of grandparents before we travel...)

This year, my parents gave Joshua a starter set of Hex Bugs, a toy that had been highly recommended by some of my friends with kids around Joshua's age.  They're these little mechanized plastic bugs with rubber legs that vibrate when switched on, and then skitter around in these little hexagonal habitats.  The habitat pieces are designed for multiple add-ons, so you can add extra chutes and hexagons to create more elaborate setups.  We wanted to start small to see whether Joshua would even like these, so we just have the starter set -- which means that there are lots of openings, meant for future additions, through which these little skittery, jittery bugs can escape.  [Though now that I'm looking at the Amazon page again, it looks like it was supposed to come with pieces to block off these openings... Just my luck that the set we got didn't have those pieces!]

Those who know me and my EXTREME bug phobia can probably see the problem right away...

But Joshua really loves the bugs!  When I first turned them on and let him hold them to feel the vibrations, he found them fascinating, and loved putting them up to his cheeks to feel the little buggers go.  And when I showed him how to put them in the habitat to let them run around, he thought it was the most amazing thing ever.  And then when the little buggers escaped (as they did over and over and over again), he thought it was hilarious and shouted with glee as he tried to catch and corral them.

So I guess I'm resigned to them.  ;)  His uproarious laughs do make them worth all the minor freakouts I've already had in seeing the bugs escape and make a beeline for me.  (I have to keep telling myself they're just hunks of plastic, and they're certainly not actually gunning for me...)  I do supervise him closely when the bugs are on, though.  I can just imagine him losing the bugs while they're switched on, and then having a heart attack after seeing one skitter across my kitchen floor...

But just listen to his laughter in this video.  :)


And just a couple phone camera shots of the little dude playing with his new favorite toy!







Who would have guessed that this extremely bug-phobic girl would actually buy such skittery bug toys for her son...  The things I do to make Joshua laugh...  :)

NASA Johnson Style!

A brief interlude amidst all the Christmas posts...  :)

My younger brother, Eric, is an internet celebrity!  He and his fellow interns at NASA's Johnson Space Center created a fun little video parodying PSY's Gangnam Style, posted it on YouTube, and it's become a viral sensation -- over 3 million views as of this evening!

And it's been picked up by all kinds of media sources!  Screenshots featuring Eric have been posted on CNET, MSNBC, Huffington Post, Entertainment Weekly, and any number of other blogs and online news sources.  Probably most exciting was the inclusion of a brief clip (including Eric's vocals!) on Katie Couric's 2012 year-in-review special!  (Relevant clip available here; start at 5:10, and look for the big star himself at 5:48!)

Joshua absolutely LOVES watching the video.  He constantly asks to "watch Uncle Eric??" and he gleefully points out every planet, rocket, and asteroid in the video.  He's also picked up on the fact that we'll be more lenient about letting him watch videos on our phones if it's the Uncle Eric video, so he's capitalizing on that weakness as much as possible.  :)


We're so, so proud of you, Eric!  Definitely looking forward to having you come visit us soon -- and there are lots of our friends who really want to meet you and brush up against your internet fame a little bit.  ;)

Seriously the cutest video ever

But first a little blog housekeeping...  I'm working my way through the blog backlog, and will probably publish those posts in chunks so as not to completely overwhelm my Facebook feed with the automatic Networked Blog posts.  You're welcome.  :)  In the meantime, though, I'm showing my renewed commitment to this blog by giving it a little bit of a facelift!  I've installed a new custom font for the post titles (thanks to Google web fonts!), and updated the header image for the first time in over a year and a half -- it's crazy how much Joshua has grown since then!  The family shot in the middle was taken by John Jameson for our church directory -- David got Joshua to smile by tickling him, and we were all laughing as a result.  I love how happy we look there!

And because I didn't want to wait until I'd gotten caught up on old posts before putting up some recent cuteness...  Here's one of Joshua's latest achievements!

Some explanation behind the video that follows:

• Joshua recently rediscovered the "taggie" blanket he had played with extensively when he was much younger -- they're designed to give infants visual and oral stimulation, by providing a fringe of colorful tags for babies to chew on and play with.  Now that Joshua's a big boy, though, he wasn't interested in putting the tags in his mouth.  Instead, he promptly put it on his head and christened it "little hat!!!"  And hilarity ensued.

• Joshua is also in love with a book his Keddie grandparents sent him for his birthday, Richard Scarry's "Best Word Book Ever."  He calls it the "Book of Everything," and over the last few months, he's insisted that we read (and reread, and reread, and reread) the book to him.  A few weeks ago, though, we realized that one reason why he wanted us to read a page to him over and over again was because he was busily memorizing the text... Here's a shot of the spread that he's reciting, almost verbatim, from memory, in the video below:

And now for the promised video!


How cute and smart is our wee boy??

How to illustrate a successful children's book [VIDEO]

Attention all aspiring children's book illustrators -- here's a tip from our very discerning 22-month-old that will guarantee instant success with the obsessive toddler set!

Include on every single page a tiny, cute critter, utterly unrelated to the story itself, but noticeable enough for toddlers to latch onto the unrelated critter in favor of anything else going on in the story itself.

Maybe this is just Joshua, but in no less than five of his books (all five of which are his current favorites, by the way), the illustrators have included a random little critter which repeats on every spread of the book.  For instance, in the newly-released "Charlie the Ranch Dog," by Ree Drummond (a.k.a. The Pioneer Woman), there's a little chipmunk that sort of acts as Charlie's little sidekick.  I say "sort of," because the chipmunk is never mentioned in the story itself, nor does it actually play a role in moving along the plot.  And yet, there he is, hidden on every page -- and Joshua loves finding him.  He knows where the chipmunk is on every page and will gleefully flip through the book, shouting "munk!  MUNK!" and pointing him out.

And it's not just some newfangled trend, either.  The 20-year-old Helen Oxenbury book "We're Going on a Bear Hunt" has a plucky little dog on every page.  And "Goodnight Moon," the undisputed children's classic, has a little mouse hidden on every full-color spread.  Now, the mouse is mentioned twice in the book, but I still think this counts.

Let's watch as Joshua demonstrates how fun it is to fixate on the little things:

This video is actually a couple weeks old -- Joshua can now rip through the entire book forwards, backwards, and upside down and immediately point out the little "mow! mow!" on each page.  I have to say, I can't wait until he's old enough to read through the "Where's Waldo" books -- I have a hunch that he's going to love those!

July 4th trip to southwestern VA

As long as I can remember, my dad has dreamed of someday owning some property in the mountains somewhere, where he could build a family vacation home close to the Appalachian Trail and retire to a life of hiking, fishing, and playing with his grandkids.  Well, that dream just got a little closer for him -- my parents recently purchased a property in a lovely and remote corner of southwestern Virginia!  It's still undeveloped (currently rented out to a farmer to pasture his cows), but my parents have all kinds of grand plans, and are really excited about slowly implementing them over the next several years.

So over the 4th of July weekend, we took a flying trip down to meet up with my parents and brothers and spend a couple days in Hillsville, VA.  We were only there for a couple days, but it was such a fun time!  The last time my family had seen Joshua was over Thanksgiving -- i.e., before he was even walking.  It's incredible what a difference seven months can make...  :)  My parents were continuously marveling at how fast Joshua can run, and what a funny little personality he has.  He invented a game to be played with my brother Eric and my dad, where he would reach across the table for a high five first from Eric, then from my dad.  And then he invented a game for my mom, where he would squat to pick up gravel or sticks or other little objects, then look for her and share his spoils with her.  SO cute!

Our trip started with dinner at the Old Mill at Mabry, which has an old water mill and some walking trails.  Joshua totally led the way in exploring the area.  :)




Then the next morning, we drove over to visit my parents' new mountain property.  And by "drive," I mean off-road over hills and fields, briefly getting stuck at the bottom of a particularly difficult hill, but finally conquering it with our rented all-wheel-drive Jeep and making it to the top.  (And by "we," I mean David -- thank you, honey, for taking on that stressful task!)  My parents are thinking of building at the top of that particular hill, which would give them some really beautiful mountain views -- we can't wait to see how it all turns out!












And then later that day, we went on safari.  Because that's what one does when one visits southwestern Virginia, of course.  ;)  My mom found a brochure for the Fort Chiswell Animal Park, a really cool zoo/conservation area, where you can take a guided bus tour through the 45-acre park and interact with camels, water buffalo, zebras, and so many more animals.  Joshua was entranced -- even though he was hot and tired, he was still super excited every time an animal approached the bus.  What a fun family excursion!












And one of the many videos we took of Joshua on safari!  (More can be found in the 2011 Videos gallery of our SmugMug.)

What fun memories!  We're looking forward to many more down in this little corner of the country!

"Um, bye-bye!" [VIDEO]

I actually took out the camera today!  Hurray!  :)  I'll have more photos posted soon, but I just had to share this absolutely adorable video.  I was trying to get some photos and videos of Joshua enjoying his latest game of putting toys inside other objects, and got a few of him playing with this monkey rattle.  But check out the very end of this video!!



Joshua does have quite a few words now, but he rarely says them on cue.  So this was super exciting!  :)  Look at how smart and cute he is!!

Joshua discovers a loophole

As anyone who's been to our home (or seen photos taken in our apartment!) would know, we're a book-loving family.  We have this awesome wall of bookcases in our open floor plan living/dining room, with books jam-packed on the shelves all the way along the wall.  And, well, they're colorful, and bright, and make a really satisfying thwack when they hit the floor... So one of the biggest temptations in Joshua's young life is the desire to toddle up to the bookshelves and FLING books onto the floor.

We've had some success in the last couple weeks, though, at teaching him not to do that.  He would run up to the books, fling one down, and we would say "noooo, Joshua, leave the books alone!"  Then we would promptly pick him up and put him in his playpen.  It's more of a distraction than anything else -- his music-making toys are in there, so we were using the pen as a diversionary tactic.  But our willful little guy did NOT like being removed unceremoniously from the books, and would protest loudly when we put him there.

It was fascinating watching him learn the cause and effect of it all, though.  After just a couple days of consistent playpenning, we noticed a few changes.  Joshua would toddle up to the books, stop short for a moment, look around at us, then fling the book down and then run away as fast as he could.  He clearly knew what he was doing.  :)  Then about a week later, the cutest thing happened -- he stopped at the books, and instead of flinging any of them to the floor, he started lovingly stroking the spines, saying "nooooo, nooooo..."  I guess he picked up on what we were saying to him!

It looks like he's finally learned to not throw any books to the floor now.  But what's really interesting is watching him test the limits of this rule.  We do allow him to play with our DVDs (none of which we watch these days, anyways, thanks to internet streaming!).  And of course he's allowed to play with all of his own toys.  So this is what he's taken to doing lately:




And a quick video!


He's discovered and is happily exploiting this loophole.  He's totally going to be a lawyer just like his mama.  :)

Adventures in self-feeding

We're slowly getting more adventurous about the food we serve to Joshua.  He's been ready for all kinds of table food for a while now -- it's just that David and I are having to steel ourselves for the inevitable and extensive mess that arises as a result of toddler self-feeding.  It's so much easier to just spoon-feed him, wiping him down after every bite, controlling the mess as much as possible...  But at some point, the control freak has to let go, and recognize that the boy does need to learn to feed himself, eventually...  :)

So, baby steps!  We started out by letting him try a toddler breakfast bar one morning.  And he went to town on that thing -- he loved the strawberry-banana filling, and was so good at taking bites by himself and not choking on it!  We were so proud.



A more recent addition to his dinners has been steamed broccoli.  The first piece I gave him was perhaps a bit too big (he hadn't quite figured out how to hold it and take bites), so after one small gagging incident, I've taken to chopping up the florets into teeny pieces.  But wow, does Joshua love broccoli!  He'll literally lick his bowl clean!



He's slowly figuring out the whole "bowl" concept -- about half the time, he'll take a piece from the bowl and put it directly in his mouth; the other half of the time, he dumps the bowl onto his tray and then throws the bowl on the floor.  We're working on table manners...

But he's generally good about keeping the bowl on his high chair tray, if it's filled with ravioli!  This does really push us out of our OCD comfort zone -- Joshua loves squishing the ravioli in his fingers, and then rubbing it into his hair.  But he also loves eating the ravioli, and will blow through two or three whole bowlfuls at a meal!  Here's a cute video of our ravioli-eating machine in action!


We'll be sure to keep you all posted on what new and exciting culinary adventures we embark upon!  :)

Joshua's first year collage and slideshow!

Just barely getting this post done before Joshua turns 13 months old...  I've finally finished Joshua's first year retrospective slideshow!  It's a collection of some of our favorite photos and videos of our dear wee lad -- and believe me, it was hard to winnow it down, because there's no such thing as a bad photo of our cutie.  :)

But before I post the video, I have to post our "Joshua Watch" collage, in celebration of making it all the way through a year of monthly growth comparison photos with Mr. Tiger.  There were definitely some months near the end there where I didn't think we'd be able to get any more usable shots of Joshua at least kind of lying back next to the tiger, but we managed to eke it out!  Any future children will have their growth comparison photos taken propped up in a chair or doing something more interesting than placidly lying back.  ;)  But in continued celebration of Joshua's first birthday, here's a little collage of all twelve of his Joshua Watch photos:


And then the slideshow video.  WARNING: It's long (almost 13 minutes), and super high on the cheese factor... David has been poking fun of my song choices all week.  :)  And he specifically wanted me to point out that his contribution was Randy Newman, not "let them giggle."  But I say, if you can't be sappy and sentimental about your baby turning one, when can you be?

Hope you enjoy this year-in-review of our amazingly cute, sweet, wonderful little boy!

We have a walker!!!

Joshua took his first halting steps this week!!  We were at small group over at Hilary and Steven's, hanging out at the end of the evening and enjoying some really tasty chocolate treats.  Joshua was standing, as he does a lot of the time now, and he saw me holding a box of chocolate-covered almonds.  They were just out of his reach, but close enough to him to be tantalizing -- so instead of plopping on his bottom and crawling over to me, he reeeeached out with his hands, and then took his first few steps!

We then got him to repeat his new trick.  Carrie put a few almonds on a plate, and held the plate out just beyond his reach.  And again, he reached out and tottered forward a few steps, following the plate as she pulled it away.  So exciting!!  Of course, he then got upset that he wasn't allowed to have any of the chocolates -- all that effort, for nothing.  Poor boy, I would have been upset, too!

But since then, he's been testing out his new skills and walking like a champ, even without the lure of forbidden chocolate.  :)  He'll still generally only take two or three steps at a time, but he's doing it really consistently.  Before we know it, he'll be running all around the house...

Just this morning, I had the camera out in hopes of catching his fleeting baby steps on video.  What I got was beyond my wildest dreams -- a really long stretch, several seconds long, of him tottering his way towards me!

(Please excuse my crazy over-excited voice... I've got to learn to modulate that for these videos.  :)  And please also excuse the fact that I cut the top of his head out of the frame for much of the video -- I was much too excited to pay attention to my camera screen!)

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!!

Baby BOOM! (video)

Just some baby laughter video fun to brighten up your Friday afternoon!

What's been keeping us busy: Joshua crawling (videos)!

So the other major thing that's been keeping us on our toes and becoming more fun (albeit time-consuming) by the minute?  Our little guy is now officially mobile!

Here's a video I took a few weeks ago, while he was still trying to figure out how to position his knees to get proper traction and forward movement.


Two days after that video was taken, he was a full-fledged crawler.  Here's a video I took last week, when he turned eight months -- you can see how his new-found mobility wreaked havoc on my attempts to take his tiger comparison Joshua Watch photo.  :)


Even though this second video is less than a week old, it still looks so awkward and slow compared to how Joshua crawls now... It's incredible how quickly he picks things up and grows and develops!  He still hasn't figured out how to turn while crawling -- he'll stop, pull himself up to sitting, pivot on his bottom, and then start crawling in a new direction.  But I bet he'll figure out this last little step within the next few days!

It's also been fascinating watching his personality as it emerges under these new circumstances.  He's definitely a strong-willed and stubborn wee lad -- I'm afraid he comes by that honestly through both his parents.  :)  Now that he can propel himself around the apartment, he's decided that his favorite toy in the world is the power cable to our laptop.  Followed very closely by the DVD player, and then the cable hooking up our computer to our TV.  And really any electronic cords and cables.  We'll tell him no, redirect him, put him back in the very middle of the room -- and without fail, he'll look around, figure out how to reposition himself, and then very determinedly start crawling his way right back to the cable we took him away from.  Sigh.  Time to figure out how to teach/train/discipline an eight-month-old...

It's so much fun playing with him, though.  I mean, it always has been, but now there's this whole new world of movement and mobility.  He's so pleased with himself when he can get to where he wants to go.  And he's so inquisitive -- he'll crawl all over the apartment just to be able to personally inspect every bit of carpet fluff and every chair leg he can propel himself towards.  Such a strong and smart little guy!

Added bonus -- all this burning of energy means he's been napping and sleeping really, really well lately.  :)  Here's hoping he keeps this up!

Sitting up like a big boy -- and Joshua's video debut!

Over the last week, Joshua has figured out how to sit up all by himself!  We've been trying to teach him how to sit up unsupported over the last few weeks, by sitting him down on a blanket, and then watching as he sloooowly tipped over and face-planted... But all of a sudden, about a week ago, Joshua figured it out.  And now it's his favorite thing in the world to do!

Not only can he now sit up by himself, but he's also figured out how to pick up a toy, flail it about, and bring it to his mouth -- all while not tipping over.  :)  Such a smart and strong boy!

He's gotten confident enough in his sitting abilities to happily sit and play for several minutes at a time.  Long enough for this shutter-crazy mama to get some really cute shots of him sitting up all by himself!



And what better way to commemorate this milestone than to present to the world Joshua's blog video debut?


We're slowly uploading the few videos we've taken of him, so hopefully there will be more embedded video on this blog in the near future.  :)  Enjoy!