Playing

I know that I keep saying that Jacob is getting more fun, but we are really enjoying the stage he is at now. He is constantly cracking us up with his actions and attempts at talking. He talks all the time now and some of it is actually recognizable. I mentioned this in a previous post but we are really having more successful communication with him. We are learning his signals for when he is hungry, thirsty, and tired. He also responds when we ask him such things as "are you sleepy?", "want some milk?", "ready for a bath?". Now if we can just get him to understand that when we say "no" we mean NO!! We are constantly redirecting him, but have started our version of time-out. There is no way he would stay put somewhere in time-out, but what we do is when he is doing something wrong repeatedly or getting into something that is a danger to him, we pick him up and make him sit calmly on our lap for 2-3 minutes. So far this has worked. Not only does it make him forget what he was doing to begin with, but it is teaching him how to sit still. He is a kid on the go and doesn't like to be restrained, so this is a lesson in behavior that he needs!! I'm hoping that our girl has a calmer demeanor, but if her kicks are any indication, she'll be even more active than Jacob! YIKES!!!

Jacob's favorite game right now is Peek-a-Boo. He simply says "Booooo". This has been a great activity when he starts to get fussy because it livens him right back up. Sometimes he initiates the game too. He doesn't play the hide-the-face version, but likes to hide around a corner and sneak up on you and vice-versa. Jacob's great-grandparents got him a book of Looney Toon characters that have flaps on the pages of the characters playing peek-a-boo with you. This is definitely his favorite book right now. He brings it to us to read to him ALL the time and says "Boooo" when he hands it to us. The other day, I was in the kitchen and I heard him saying "booo" over and over. He was reading the book himself on the couch. Too cute!!! I do have a video of him playing peek-a-boo with us, but it refuses to upload for some reason. Oh well. Here is another one though....

I finally shot a video of him dancing to his fridge toys. Since I shot this video, he has since added some dance moves to his routine. He has started rapidly stomping his left and right feet down in repetition like happy feet. So cute!!