Boy Oh Boyers

Rowan and I are sitting at the dining table having breakfast. Rowan is efficiently munching down some bananas and Cheerios with a big cup of milk alongside. I'm having a bagel and drinking some coffee, and it seemed like a good time to write the update of little things that have been going on lately.

The biggest new thing is that Rowan is making the transition from saying "that?" about everything he comes in contact with to naming things as he encounters them. He still only says the first syllable of pretty much all his words, but he strings the syllables together now. For instance, when we've finished reading a book, he says "all done", which sounds like "ah-duh". When he picks up a ball, he says "bah", and when he wants juice he says "joo". When he pets Angel he says "dah", and when I ask him what does the dog say, he makes a forceful airy woof that comes out like "eff", usually with lots of spit.

In addition to increasing his verbal fluency, Rowan has started some of the classic little-kid physical games with Tom and me. For example, Tom lies on the floor and Rowan walks up to Tom's feet and gets an airplane ride. (Mommy's feet are a little too small and Rowan turns red in the face from lack of air if we try to play this game!) Of course there's an awesome game that Rowan and Mommy have learned, and it's great fun (at least the first 10 times). Rowan sits on my foot and wraps his arms...

Well, I'm being told "ah-duh", and surely enough the bananas and Cheerios are gone, so Rowan is "all done". Guess I'll finish this post a little later!

Ok, it's now many hours later than I originally started this post, and I'm getting down to some business of working since Yolanda and Kayla are here today, as usual on Wednesdays, having an awesome time with Rowan. I'm in the loft at the desk with earplugs in (also as usual). Their joyous shrieks still come through, which I don't mind a bit. :-)

Oh yes, the "riding Mommy's foot" game is where I left off. You can picture it, right? He sits on my foot and wraps his arms and legs around my leg, and I walk around, one foot laden with his weight. Rowan doesn't hold on reliably enough to be lifted off the ground as I walk (and the physical therapist who's treating me for back trouble would probably wring my neck if she saw us playing that way anyhow), so it's more of a drag-Rowan-across-the-floor-on-Mommy's-foot game. It's a real winner in his book, though!

Another little update is about preschool. Rowan is really thriving in his classroom where he spends Tuesdays and Thursdays from about 8:30am until about 4:30pm. His day includes morning snack, play time outside and inside, lunch, nap, afternoon snack, more playing inside and outside, and "group learning time" several times throughout the day where the children work on learning colors, numbers, singing songs with motions, and reading books. His musical interest is even higher since starting preschool: he does some motions to "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star", and he clearly sings the first two words (and mutters the rest of the first line) to "Row, Row, Row Your Boat"!

The last news I'll give (lest guilt overwhelm me for not working this very instant) is about how Rowan has become quite the climber. A few months ago he started climbing into his child-size rocking chair. A few weeks ago he started climbing the ottoman in his room, that has a pull-out footrest, as if it were a rock climbing wall. Today brought the best climbing action yet. The scene was set beginning last night, when I decided to sleep on the couch with the television on mute so I could wake up in the middle of the night and see election results. (Mind you I went to bed at 9pm so the "middle of the night" might not be what you think.) Anyway, the election was decided when I woke up for a midnight potty break, so I abandoned my nest on the couch and joined Tom in the bed. This morning Rowan discovered my pile of blankets and pillows on the couch, and he pulled them down to the floor where he proceeded to use them as a launchpad for speedy climbs onto the couch, a step he had never been able to make unassisted. I was preparing his breakfast and watching him climb up and down, up and down the blanket pile. He'd go up, reach the couch, sit triumphantly, turn around, and go back down. Then he decided sitting was too boring, so he climbed up, stood on the couch, tagged the headrest, then climbed down. Then, it got really interesting. He climbed up, crawled across the couch, proceeded to crawl across the end table (shoving coasters to the floor as he went), and then flop into the neighboring recliner! I made a quick trip to supervise more closely, because I figured he might just dive head-first out of the recliner since there was no pile of pillows to climb down. He didn't, though. He crawled back across the end table and onto the couch, and back down the mountain of fluff the same way he had come. Look out, hiking trails! Here we come!