movin' and shakin'

In the last two days Jack has twice brought himself up to a seated position in his crib, opened up a cupboard door latch, crawled backwards a few paces and crawled forward one "step". The crawling backward is really funny because he looked like he was moonwalking.

The real Jack

Jack is a man of many moods, but this is how I see him most of the time. On this day he was scraping a little rubber hollow dome against the floor, and (I think) experiencing the sound of it.

The other picture is from the park today while we were waiting for Papa to meet us. Jack often turns things around in his hands very thoughtfully, like he's doing a little job.

OK, can I just vent?

I'm a new mom and sometimes I get excited about buying cute or fun clothes for my little boy. So I'll look at websites, catalogs or at a store in the mawl for a little something for Jack.

First of all, over half the store is girl's clothes. Really fun girl's clothes with appliques and prints, cool cuts and rows of decorative buttons. Boys clothes on the other hand, pretty much amount to long-sleeved (or short sleeved) T-shirts and khaki pants of one variety or another. BOR-ING!

 Then the themes: boys clothes are made to look like 1) sports uniforms or 2) military wear. OK, the whole political and gender identity things aside---from a design standpoint it's just hideous.

And the other day I noticed something else---the girls in the ads are generally standing around in front of a mirror or having slumber parties, the boys are outside playing games or doing other sorts of outdoor activities. But saddest of all: the girls hold hands, from the time they're babies through adolescence. The boys never hold hands.

It does not take a rocket scientist nor a social anthropologist to figure out what the messages are here.

The tirade will most certainly continue. 

But thank goodness once again for Angela! (You may recall she is the one who encouraged me to start a blog in the first place) For she has shown me these super cool Japanese sewing patterns where the boys get to wear clothes that are as cool as the girls and I'll be damned if I don't put an applique octopus on Jack's first shirt!

All New! Daycare log!

Jack isn't feeling too well. Apparently he has a virus that he has to work through. Starts off with a cold, moves through diarrhea and vomiting, ends with a rash. He got the rash so we thought he was on the way out of the woods, but he threw up again tonight. Funny thing is though, he seems pretty much unphased. He hasn't slowed down much and projectile vomiting only dazes him for a couple minutes, then he's smiling again. So he won't be going to daycare tomorrow and I hope he hasn't already gotten any of the other kids sick.

We went to a members preview of the Academy of Sciences today (Grandma got us a membership!) Jack seemed more interested in playing with my braid, but did notice the fish swimming in the tanks around him. 

Every day at daycare, they fill out a sheet that tells you how much he ate, when he had his diaper changed, etc. etc. The sheet also includes comments by the primary caregiver that day. So I decided to start adding the comments to the blog, to better round out the picture.

Daycare log 9/22/08:

Jack had fun today with Tim (student teacher). He tryed (sic) crawling a little bit and enjoyed making noises with his hands

Jack continues making efforts to communicate verbally with us.  He has all but abandoned his rasberry-esque beat-boxing and now tries to make a meaningful connection using African Click! language.  With eyes fixed on ours, Jack works his tongue against his upper gums Clicking! patiently in the hopes of finding intelligent life.  I appreciate that Jack's given us the benefit of the doubt; that although we aren't cool enough to speak the language of the street, we may just be interesting enough to be conversant in one of the several remaining Click! dialects.

Also, Jack is often found contemplating his hands as they open and shut before is eyes.  I suspect this is early evidence of Jack realizing his individuality and presence in the world, which should certainly be celebrated.

Jack's life

Here's a picture Jack's teacher took at daycare of Jack and his giggling friend Christopher. I've noticed that Jack is more interested in slightly more complicated toys. And Papa took him for a ride on the swing last weekend which Jack enjoyed immeasurably.

Congestion

Jack didn't go to swimming this week because he has a small cold.

He's trying so hard to crawl or walk or move SOMEHOW. I think it drives him crazy to see the other kids at daycare crawling over to things they want and picking them up.

It's awesome to come into daycare and see three or four kids, younger than one year old, playing together. Jack had a plastic spatula in his hand today. He was babbling on and on about it while he waved it around in the area and banged it on the floor. Three little kids were sitting watching him (and listening to him?) It was hilarious. I kept thinking about that baby band they used to have on The Muppet Show. Just in that babies are really funny.