The use of tools

Last week I picked up Jory at daycare, and he was using a wrench to bang on a xylophone. It was a plastic wrench and a wooden xylophone, granted, but I was still impressed that he's learning to use objects in tandem - the use of tools.

Banging is basically the extent of his progress to date - including banging his toys against my face, which I don't especially appreciate as an improvement in his motor skills. You can see a little example of his progress in this video.

But we know that eventually our boy will be unlocking doors, painting pictures, and using his hands and feet in sophisticated ways, like his daddy does here:

We're going to the zoo, how about you?

Jory and Daddy went to the Palo Alto Zoo on Tuesday. On the plus side, the zoo is close, the exhibits are well maintained, and Jory got up close with the animals. However, it's not exactly huge. We saw the raccoons, bobcats, turtles, geese, rabbits, rats, and ferrets. And then we were done.

Jory got to pet a ferret (and yes, I washed his hands afterwards!)

The raccoons come right up to the glass, so I got this photo where it looks like Jory's hand is petting the raccoon:

In this photo, Jory is looking at the bobcat sitting in the shade:

Family dress-up

Jory got to spend an evening at a friend's house while KC and I went out for a date, so we all dressed up and took some pictures!

We need to learn to take the family photos before Jory has a chance to slobber all over himself!

Hand coordination

Check out the video - we're still working on that motor coordination!

Peas, please!

Two weeks ago the food of the week was peas. A friend asked whether I was buying the peas from the farmer's market and shelling them. My answer? A most emphatic no - frozen peas are good enough for our little gourmand. Actually, he doesn't really even like the peas, so I have to mix them with apples. I'm sneaking in fewer apples every week, hoping to trick him into liking his peas.

This week we decided to go Indian - and Jory does indeed like mangoes.

However, the thing he wants most in his mouth is mommy's iPhone ....

On the town

Jory's starting to get really worked up if we do something without him. Eating is especially problematic, because he gets enraged if we eat a meal and he's left out.

Last week we went to a bar to watch hockey, so of course Jory had to have something in the bar too:

 

The ground was littered with carrot sticks when we left. It was a bit embarrassing. 

Surface

Daddy just got a new gadget for work called the Microsoft Surface. It's basically a desk with a 40-inch display as the tabletop embedded with thousands of sensors that enables the desk to "see" what's going on above it.

I'm pretty sure my first application of the Surface was unique: there's a pre-loaded program that responds to motion on the table by acting like it's the surface of a pool of water. Jory enjoyed splashing around...

Note that the desk has a fast response when Jory's drool falls on it.

Shopping trip

Jory is now old enough to sit in the front of the shopping cart, and as you can see, we went straight for the most important section.

My purchases ended up being 6 bottles of wine, a carton of baby formula, 2 bottles of champagne, and a Mother's Day card. Pretty normal shopping trip...

Airport ping-pong

The Milwaukee airport has a few cool things, including a ping-pong table. Since we actually made it through check-in pretty smoothly, we had time to play.

Jory actually let us play in peace for a few minutes before -  predictably - demanding to be part of things.

Although he enjoyed bobbing about in Daddy's arms while Daddy maneuvered himself around the table, Jory dedicated himself single-mindedly to getting the grungy airport ping-pong paddles in his mouth. Also predictably.

Sleeping like a baby

When Jory was very small and not able to move around so much, he usually looked like he'd been flopped flat on his back and forced to sleep that way. Which, of course, he was.

Now that he's older and somewhat mobile, the term "sleeping like a baby" is a joke. While he no longer emits the preemie grunts all night, he still snores and manages to explore just about the entire space of his crib. In this next picture, he's managed to get both an arm and a leg out of his pajamas, as well as smash himself up against the edge of the crib.

When you take your new parent classes before the baby comes, the hospital staff spend most of their time trying to convince you that unless you worry obsessively, your baby will succumb to SIDS. Because you're a terrible, terrible parent. What they don't tell you is that once the baby can move by himself, he can generally also unmove. So I managed to not panic when I found Jory like this one afternoon:

I pulled his hand away from the bumper, but he stuck it right back up there and hung on. We figured that since he can move himself, protecting his giant head from the constant beatings it was taking against the crib slats was more important than worrying about him somehow managing to suffocate himself.

Parenting is exhausting. But at least Jory's getting the sleep he wants. ;)

First slide ride

The Milwaukee airport has a children's area, so we thought we'd send Jory for his first ride on the slide.



As you can see from the video, he's totally uninterested in slides. Huh.