Every day with Finn brings new accomplishments. Just this morning, Finno started waving to us! John was waking him around the house, and when he saw me, I said “hi” and started waving, and Finn started waving back! It’s like a switch got flipped, because now he’s an unstoppable waver–waving hello at every opportunity. It’s a super cool new way of communicating!
Finn is moving and grooving all over the house these days. He’s an avid scootcher, crawler, and cruising enthusiast. He’s mastered the ability to flip himself over from a sitting position to crawling mode, then he just takes off, scooting his way across the living/dining room. Once he reaches a parent, he’s all about grabbing on, hoisting his patoot up into the air, straightening his legs, and getting a little support to stand. Once he’s up, he’s off to the races–holding on one-handed to one of us, or cruising along the couch or coffee table. I think it’s officially time to get those baby gates up…independent locomotion can’t be far away!
In Douglas Adams’ Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, protagonist Arthur Dent finds out he can fly, but he can only stay aloft as long as he’s not thinking about flying. The minute he realizes he’s flying and starts thinking that it’s impossible, that he shouldn’t be able to fly, etc., he comes crashing back to earth.
We’ve been calling Finny “Mr. Dent” this week because he’s in a very similar situation when it comes to standing up unassisted. If he’s focused on manipulating a toy in his hands, or is paying attention to someone nearby, he effortlessly stands still on his own for up to a few minutes…but as soon as he realizes what’s going on, he starts to wobble and teeter, ultimately landing on his (well padded) bottom. Every day he stands longer and longer, and has attempted to take unassisted steps. We think he’s thisclose to walking on his own!
Finn’s bath tonight turned out inadvertantly super-sudsy. I must’ve gotten distracted while I was squirting in the soap! Our boy quickly turned into a snowy, sudsy-bearded baby as he started picking up the bubbles and trying to eat them. Hilarity, of course, ensued. 🙂
[He’s the C. Everett Koop of babies! –J.]
Last Sunday our pal Clare accompanied the three of us to the neighborhood park. In addition to helping squire Finno around, she put her pro photography skills to use, snapping some great shots. When we got home, she captured the Finnfatha enjoying a story with Mom (and wielding his hair brush like a mic). Here’s our gallery (HTML).
I’m happy to report that Smilin’ Finn Nack is back in town. He’s been working really hard at crawling this week, and he’s graduated from constant frustration and immobility to happy, excited attempts at crawling across the room. I got some rubber floor mats that snap together, because I thought it would help him get some traction–the wood floor is too slippery! Apparently that did the trick–Finn’s been much more willing to flip over on his tummy and start scooching and crawling towards his toys or us.
It’s terrific to see him smile and get excited as he inches closer and closer. He has made such incredible progress this week! One nice side benefit is that he’s been working so hard he just wears himself out and sleeps like the dead during naps and at night.
We recently let our living room go the way of Lawrence Welk, blowing bubbles everywhere. Bubble Boy Finn seemed to approve. 🙂
I am
too darling for for my bib
too darling for for my bib
so darling in my crib…
Fashion icon Finn has been sporting all kinds of great duds lately. In our latest gallery (HTML), he starts out wearing a pair of shirts (one dinos, one lightning) given to Dad by a Web/clothing designer in San Francisco. He finishes up clad in the beautiful hand-knit sweater created by Great Aunt Judy.
Coming soon: Finn in an Argentine poncho. 🙂
We refer to our friend Maria as “Maria-upon-Hallmark” due to her employer (and to distinguish her from my boss Maria). As you might imagine, Maria (-upon-Hallmark) is a master card-sender, and she recently sent Finn a Candy Corn-infused greeting. I snapped a few frames of him opening it (HTML), while Margot captured him trying to feed it to me (one of his new tricks). A careful observer can see how much gnawing he’d done by that point. 🙂
Meanwhile Mom captured our flightless-but-cute buddy going on his very own March of the Penguin on Halloween:
Our usual chuckling, happy-go-lucky Finn is on hiatus this week, replaced by serious, furrowed-brow working man Finn. He’s putting all of his energy into trying to crawl/walk. Yes, he’s trying to do both at the same time. Or maybe he’s really just trying to walk and we keep encouraging him to crawl. In any case, he’s none too happy about any of it. He has figured out how to push himself up (with a little boost from me, Dad, or the nanny) to standing, and therefore gets really angry if we refuse to play along and instead encourage him to try scooting on hands and knees.
In addition to working on physical skills, he’s mastered several new styles of what I call “advertisement crying.” This is the type of crying that isn’t really crying, it’s complaining, or trying to get your attention, or indicating that any further activity will be postponed until he gets a chance to boost himself up on you and then walk around. The histrionics are wearing us all a little thin, to be honest. Every day he gets a little closer to independent mobility, and every day he gets more frustrated that he’s not there yet. We know he’ll figure it out, we just wish he’d start crawling already!
Today marks Der Finnster’s 8-month birthday. To celebrate (well, mostly coincidentally), he balanced on his feet unassisted for the first time! I had him up and tottering for a couple of seconds this morning, and this evening he was up for even longer. (I’d like to think it was for 8 seconds, a la bull riding. ;-))
In miscellaneous news, we’ve coined more Finn argot lately (building on the first installment from earlier in the year):
P.S. We can now add another “ocho” to The Big Ocho. Another tooth, his 8th, just broke through. –Notorious M.O.M.
Today marks Finn’s first Halloween! Though he’s too young for candy, he’s definitely up for sporting a cute penguin costume and being strolled around town by his parents. All the shops along our neighborhood’s main street take part in a big Halloween trick-or-treat event, so we got Finn suited up and ready to show off. Margot strolled him down to Lincoln Ave., where they were met by at least a few thousand parents and their costumed children.
The orange Bob made a perfect penguinmobile, and they wove their way through sidewalks choked with pirates, Elmos, ladybugs, princesses, monkeys, lions, tigers, and bears–oh my! (There were even a couple of Dorothys and Scarecrows.) Our Finny was the only penguin on parade and got many compliments on his soft, fuzzy outfit. Margot and Finn ran into our friends Mira & Anja (dressed as a strawberry), and Heidi & Liam (a sock monkey). Here are some pics (HTML) from the day.
Soon we’ll be facing the onslaught of trick-or-treaters that descend on our neighborhood every year. We’re stocked with 400 pieces of candy, so hopefully no one will go home empty-handed!
From pediatrics.about.com:
“At 8 months: your child is 22.5 pounds, and that is at the 97th percentile for weight.
your child is 30 inches, and that is at greater than the 97th percentile for height.
your child has a head circumference of 18 inches, and that is at the 93th percentile for head circumference.”
RAAAWR!
“He is a two-and-a-half-foot, seven-toothed man-mountain,” says Dad, shaking his fist slowly with delight. 🙂
Meanwhile, and probably not coincidentally, Finn has taken to trying to climb up me while I hold him. Seeing him kicking at a bee today in the stroller, I was reminded of the mighty Kong swatting at planes!
Loving wordplay as I do, I sometimes (okay, often) morph Finn’s nickname “squirrel” into “squire,” making him our little Squire. The other day I decided to learn what, exactly, a squire is and does (or did). According to Wikipedia, “The typical duties of a squire [i.e. things Dad will now expect of Finn] included:
Alright! I think I’m really going to get into having my own squire. 🙂
This weekend, Finn made some new friends. John’s friend Abbas, from Adobe in Toronto, is in town with his wife Kaniz and their super-adorable daughter Samarah. Samarah was born 20 days after the Finnfatha, and Abbas is an avid blogger, so while Finn and I have seen Samarah and her parents in many pictures online, we hadn’t met them in the flesh! It was so fun for both families to meet–it was like a mutual admiration society of cute kids and their obsessive parental photo bloggers.
As you’ll see in the accompanying gallery (HTML), everyone was feeling a little feisty after lunch! Samarah makes the same “baby monster” growls that Finn does; they just come out a little cuter and pinker :). She also enjoys chomping on Abbas’s nose when it’s nearby. Abbas and Finn were also cracking each other up. Between the two of them it was a dimple jamboree!
When our friend Maria visited a couple of weeks ago (man, time is flying), she decided to try her hand at a little squirrel-feeding. Finn sang for his supper throughout, then sought to wash down the potatoes (aka “praties” in our book Jamie O’Rourke and the Big Potato) with a delicious bite of video camera.
Major physical developments today, folks! We put the little Mr. down for his nap this morning, and lo and behold, as we watched him on the monitor, he sat himself up and laid himself down three times! This is a big first for Finn. He has been working diligently to figure out how to get to sitting from lying down, and it usually entails grabbing one of our hands so he has something to pull against. Not anymore!
Next step (we hope): coordinating all the movements that result in crawling. He’s got all the individual pieces nailed, he just hasn’t pulled them all together into locomotion yet.
I’ve been adding more and more items to Finn’s diet, since he seems keenly interested in all things edible. He is always lunging for our food, and since that’s not really an option (tortilla chips anyone? How ’bout an apple or cup of hot tea?), I figure I can at least start offering some more advanced baby-friendly chow than he’s been eating. I’d be getting a little weary of pureed everything if I were him.
Yesterday he got to try some Yo Baby banana yogurt, as well as some Cheerios. I, of course, was trying to get Finn to pluck the Cheerios out of my hand with his fingers…practicing his fine motor skills and all. Yeah, well that lasted for about 2 Cheerios and then our boy just cut right to the chase. Leaned over and stuck his open mouth right on top of my palm, hoovering up the few remaining Cheerios with gusto. Take that, pincer grasp! It was absolutely hilarious.
Big news from Finnland, today, dear readers!
Finn’s been working on “talking”, by mimicking us, hooteling, and practicing different sounds. Carol, our babysitter, has been trying to get him familiar with “mama” and “dada” lately, and…drumroll please…Today while Carol and I were “talking” to him in the crib, he said “mama”! Twice! And very distinctly!
Now I realize that he may not associate that word with me, but I have to say, it was absolutely thrilling to hear it come out of his mouth. Now I’m obsessed with trying to coax him into saying it again!
[Man, I feel left out! I missed the alleged utterance (though I could hear something going on in the other room), but in any case, I now have to work on getting Finn into his “Dada-ist” phase! –J.]
Finn is discovering that he is a “me.” Over the past couple of weeks, in ways subtle and obvious, we’re seeing him realize that he has a self. He has gotten mad a couple times when we–or another child–have taken something out of his hands, either because it wasn’t a safe thing to chew on, or the other kid wanted her toy back. He furrows his brow and gets frustrated when he doesn’t get what he wants (“Gee, I wonder where he gets that trait?”, I asked, knowing that the answer was “from both parents!”).
He can’t talk yet, but we can tell that when he gets frustrated, he’s thinking “Hey! You’re taking that from ME! You’re walking away from ME!” We’re trying to encourage him to crawl during the few instances where he rolls onto his belly, and he just doesn’t want any part of it. “Hey! No fair! You’re not picking ME up off my stomach so I can practice walking! What gives?”
And tonight, for the first time in several weeks, he had a bedtime meltdown and got so absolutely Angry (note the capital “a”) when I would come in to check on/try to settle him but not pick him up out of the crib. I could see in his eyes he was angry, thinking “You’re leaving ME alone to cry in here! I don’t care if it’s bedtime! Don’t leave me alone!” I love the little bugger and we’ve had such uneventful, lovely bedtime experiences with Finn that we’re not used to him doing anything but rolling over and going to sleep. It killed me to see him so mad. Thank goodness he finally fell asleep…leaving us to wait for more “me” sightings tomorrow.