Micronaxx

1. The Happy Lion by Louise Fatio and Roger Duvoisin. We read this book several times a day, at Finn’s urging. He just starts saying “Happy! Happy!” until we get the picture. Thanks to Anne Nack for giving us this terrific book!
2. “Dak-oh-Dahs” (Corn Flakes) for breakfast. This is Finn’s way of saying “cock-a-doodle-doo!” when he sees the cereal box.
3. Hooks of all sorts. He sees them on the drawings of tow trucks in our Richard Scarry books, and has found a few in the back of our neighbor’s truck. He refers to them as “No Pat No,” recalling a cactus-sitting character in Hop on Pop.
4. Tubes. Paper towel tubes, toilet paper tubes, straws, anything tube-like that Finn can stick objects in.
5. Stroobs (our name for strawberries). He really enjoys eating and talking about them.
6. “Peek!” He loves to hide behind chairs or other objects and slooooowly peek around the edge, then shout “PEEK!” when we see him.
7. Pow-wow walking. When he’s being silly, he kind of crouches down and takes lots of little bitty steps, which makes me think of the Native American dances you see at pow-wows.
8. Daddy blowing bubbles in the bathtub water. Finn grabs John’s head and pulls it down towards the tub until John starts blowing bubbles. It looks a bit strange, but Finny absolutely loves it.
9. “Ham and DumDum”, a.k.a. our neighbor Kim and her dog Samson.
10. His Chicken Shirt, which, when putting it on for the day, inspires our boy to start saying “bok bok bok!”

It’s getting really fun to see and hear Finn string concepts & words together. Lately he’s been enjoying watching our neighbor Steve building a treehouse for his boys in their back yard.
Finn narrates the goings-on in staccato bursts: “Steeb! Saw! *Cut*!” He got a little confused when I tried to explain that Steve is a daddy, too: Finn started patting my chest, reassuring me (and himself) by saying “Dad-o!” (In fact, we get into a nice little call & response flow, with me patting his chest and saying “Finny,” and him replying with some pats on “Dad-o.”)
There’s also been some confusion with Stevie, the blind and moronic dog that lives over our other neighbors’ fence. Stevie howls when we enter our back yard, giving Finn a chance to do his killer coyote impression. Things get funny when Finn confuses the two names: “Steebie! T(r)eehouse!” and “Steeb! Yawwowooo!” I enjoy the image of grown man Steve & blind dog Stevie howling & operating power tools together.

Finnegan Ascendant! The young guy is getting serious about climbing things, all on his own (if you’ll let him). Just today he completed the first-ever San Jose Invitational Bi-Level Traversal (i.e. he climbed all the stairs up from basement). At lunch outside, he learned to pull himself up onto curbs using an overhead railing, and afterwards he decided to inaugurate his toilet-scaling practice.
Hey, great ideas, Finny: I was just saying how bored we’d be with a new baby in the house; good thing you’ve added a whole new dimension to your mobility! 😉
PS–Later in the evening he started trying to climb our stepped tonsu chest. The kid is becoming the human fly!

Yesterday after Finn got up from his morning nap, he was very focused on obtaining one thing, and one thing only: “Maca!” (macaroni and cheese) He started saying it the minute he got up, and kept saying it as we walked into the kitchen for our post-nap snack. I figured we’d dispense with mere snacking and go all the way to an early lunch, complete with Maca.
As I put Finn into his hopper and started boiling the water, measuring out the milk, etc., I was explaining to him that the Maca was coming soon. He was watching with some interest as I drained, dumped, and stirred.
Once the macaroni & cheese was made, I spooned some into a bowl for him, turned around, and said “Here it is!”. The sight of the piping hot Maca knocked our boy right off his horse! “Binny” became “Finny” as the scales fell from his eyes, and he exclaimed breathlessly and excitedly, “MACAAAAA!”. It was as if he had witnessed a miracle, and he was smiling from ear to ear.

Kraft Mac & Cheese: $1.19

Milk & Butter: $.30

Finn’s reaction to seeing his lunch: Priceless!

“The system goes on-line August 4th, 1997. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 AM Eastern time, August 29th…” — Terminator 2

6:48 PM Pacific time, June 15th: “Binny!” — smiles — “Binny! Binny! Binny! Binny! Binny!!” — The Finnster, earlier this evening
Yep, our little guy is now (essentially) saying his own name–with extreme gusto. Fortunately, unlike the artificial villain in the Terminator series, he has yet to unleash nuclear war on us. 🙂

Our little hombre is able to get more and more specific about what he likes/dislikes, and what he would prefer to be doing at any given time. He’s taken to grabbing my (or John’s) hand and leading us around while providing other clues about what he’d like.
For instance, this morning after breakfast we were playing in Finn’s room, and he started saying “Hat! Hat!”. He took my hand, led me to the kitchen, and pointed to the basket where we keep our sunhats (a requirement for going outside these days). Then he pointed to the back door. We put our hats on, but since I was still in my PJs, we went upstairs so I could put some clothes on. Believe me, at this point in my pregnancy, walking around outside in my PJs is not something any of the neighbors need to see…
We then went outside and did the usual rounds–a stop off at Richard’s fountain for some splashing and gato viewing, then a walk up and down the block to explore fence gates, ants, and plants. Thank goodness he didn’t poop out until 2 houses away from home, at which point he turned to me, raised his arms and said “UP!”. Once inside, he started saying “mo mos, mo mos!” (code for pretzel bits with cream cheese…he loves them and just says “more more more!”). So we were off to the kitchen for a few pre-nap mo mos. I’m sure he would have been content sitting there stuffing his face for an hour, but Leo was getting sleepy, so I packed them both off to the crib for a rest.
Once he’s up from his nap, I will await further instruction 🙂

Finn is picking up the few Spanish words we use around the house just as quickly as he is the English ones…common Finn utterances include:

• Boca (mouth)
• Agua
• Coche (car)
• Ga-TO! (cat–with a lot of emphasis!)
• Queso (cheese)
• Sucio (dirty)
• Matematicos (crazy wrestlers; his pronunciation of this one is, uh, “impressionistic”)

We’re trying to limit the crazy Nack-branded Spanglish we use all the time and stick to *real* Spanish words. He’ll have enough kooky English slang to deal with, thanks to us!

• Hughes: “So, has Finn wrapped his head around the whole ‘new baby’ thing?”
• Me: “Well, he very sweetly hugs Margot’s belly and says ‘baby,’ but I don’t know how much he gets it. It’s like him seeing the Corn Flakes box and saying ‘cock-a-doodle-doo.'”
• Hughes: “Yeah, if you pulled a live chicken out of there, he’d probably freak out!”

Big adventures this Memorial Day with Finny. FIrst up was brunch at the Pawligers’ house, and some quality playtime with their son Adam, and another little friend, Lazlo. All three piled into the backyard hammock for some R&R after chowtime. After Finn’s afternoon nap, we pit stopped for some frozen yogurt at the neighborhood yogurt hut, then we headed out to the Emma Prusch Farm Park.
The park is a city park not far from us. It used to be a working dairy farm, bequeathed to the city from the woman who owned it in the first half of the 20th century. We’d heard that there are all kinds of farm animals roaming around, a nice playground, and even a large vegetable garden and orchard. Needless to say, we thought Finn would love seeing and hearing the *real* animals that he sees in books.
As soon as we got out of the car we heard the “cock-a-doodle-doo” of roosters, which were wandering around the parking lot! Finn had a great time, and was fascinated by the chickens and goats. Here’s a little gallery (HTML) of our adventures from the day, including the roosters, goats, and Finn’s excited *squeeeeeezing* of some weird fruit from the orchard. We wrapped up the day with some sweeping in the backyard, and some goofando in the bathtub.

Okay, okay, I might be overselling it a little, but today Finn strung together words for the first time I’ve heard. His first sentence was (drumroll please)…

“No Coke.”
I tend to grab a can in the morning while getting milk for Finn’s AM bottle (with him riding shotgun on my hip), but this morning I struck out. I muttered something to that effect, to which Finn replied “No Coke.”
At lunchtime, he followed up with a second, more insistent pair of words:
“Mo’ Gok” (translation: “More Guac(amole)”)
I don’t know what I’ll do with it (new logo, maybe?), but I have to say I like the sound of “No Coke, Mo’ Gok.” 🙂

{{ We interrupt our regularly scheduled Finncast with breaking news about our own MLN }}

I’m delighted to report that the little guy and I now share a home with Margot L. Nack, Project Management Professional! Despite much squirrel-chasing and pregnancy-induced fatigue, Margot has been devoting many hours over the last few months to studying for this exam, and today she passed! This certification should be a great help when she returns to the job hunt after El Segundo arrives.
Way to go, hon!! We’re so proud of you.