Spelunking at home

Another funny story about Joshua. Now that he is more mobile, he has discovered spelunking (cave exploration) in the maze of kitchen table legs and chair legs. It really is a confusing and strangely tempting place to venture for a baby/toddelr.

Joshua likes crawling into these little spaces and making his way through to the other side. The only problem is that sometimes he crawls into places and he can't get through! But he doesn't know how to back out, so he cries because he's stuck. That's funny to me.

1 more of Joshua's recent exploits: Joshua has also recently figured out how to open the top drawer in the bathroom and how to reach in and pull things out of it. Mike baby proofed everything EXCEPT for the top drawers because we thought that there was no way Joshua was going to be able to get into the top drawers before Mike got back. Boy, did Joshua prove us wrong.

Amazing Feat

I don't know how he did it, but Joshua composed the following text message to Mike today.

I let Joshua play with my phone in the car to keep him occupied. When I took it back from him, I noticed that Joshua had written a text while he was pressing all the buttons. See below for the content of the text.

It was so amazing I sent it to Michael. It's a pretty neat trick, whatever he did!

-----Original Message-----
From: 8583528544@txt.att.net [mailto:8583528544@txt.att.net]
Sent: Sunday, July 15, 2007 9:15 PM
To: LT Henry D. Michael/N8
Subject:

33 We love you! I love you!--==================================================================

1 year old!

Joshua and Chinmayee

Joshua's first birthday party with Chinmayee, who turned 3. She is the daughter of a co-worker from India. Joshua loved eating Indian food!

Biter, Dentist or just Baby?

Joshua bit me today. Again.

He has been doing this since he found out he had teeth. He doesn't do it too often and I haven't seen him bite another child, but he definitely has some biting tendencies.

I wonder though if these oral tendencies are possible indications that Joshua may grow up to be a dentist. He has been fascinated with mouths for a long time. I realized how much he liked mouths several months ago when he couldn't stop trying to put his fingers in the mouth of another little girl (she WAS a biter and she was more than willing to open her mouth for Joshua's delicious little fingers). Since then I have noticed that he really likes to put his fingers in my mouth also and he likes any face I make at him which involves me opening my mouth (usually also making a "blah" type sound) or sticking my tongue out at him.

But this could also just be a normal part of development - when babies explore the world with their mouths and are just figuring out what everything is.

I am still undecided. I guess we'll find out eventually!

First Steps

Hello everyone! Thank you for tuning into Joshua's blog!

My slow start to Joshua's blog in February sputtered to a halt when life became hectic with Mike deploying, a new project in LA, and all of the health issues in March. However, Monday night's big event has jumpstarted my motivation to continue posting stories about Joshua's exiciting life.

I will try to be better about posting pictures and stories. Your encouragement and (gentle) reminders will help me be better. Hopefully.

So, here's the big announcement: Joshua took his first steps! And I have video to prove it. Feel free to disagree privately, but as his mother, I officially declare these Joshua's first steps. (BTW, his first word was "mama" - also by similar decree).

He still has a way to go before walking, thankfully. I'm sure Joshua will be walking before I'm ready and before we've baby-proofed another 3 feet of vertical sqare footage. We'll catch up one of these weekends...

Well, I hope you enjoy Joshua's Journal as much as I do. Come back to visit periodically and please feel free to post complimentary comments! :)

Roly Poly Baby

So I am a little behind in getting Joshua's blog started.

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I think it counts even if it takes several months to getting around to imitating something. Well, this blog is inspired by our dear friends, the Hakes and their beautiful daughter Annika who is the heroine of the "Adventures of Annika", http://adventuresofannika.blogspot.com/.

January and February have been big months for Joshua. He figured out how to roll over from his back to his stomach on January 24th and he has been rolling non-stop ever since. As you can see from the picture, Joshua has a Roly-Poly body so once he gets some momentum going, it's pretty easy to roll across the whole floor.

Our poor doggies are sad because they are now banished to the dining room only when Joshua is on the floor, but this is only temporary until Joshua figures out how to walk - and maybe until Joshua outweighs the puppies.

Another big development this month is Joshua's 1st tooth! Granny Lydia, our babysitter, found the tooth last week. It's just a little white spot on the inside of his bottom gum for now, but our baby is well on his way to having a full set of teeth for eating!

Something that has not happened yet is that Joshua has not really figured out how to sit up by himself on the floor. He can sit for about 30 seconds, but then he falls over. And it would be okay if he fell over if he knew how to put his arms out to catch himself. But he doesn't. Instead, Joshua face-plants into the carpet (usually carpet) instead. We are going to have to work on this.

Well, that's enough about our roly-poly baby for now. I'll leave you with some more pictures though, because they are my favorite part.