One and a Half

[Note that I wrote this first section almost 3 weeks ago - it's been a crazy sort of fall.]

Alas, we are photo-free here recently - the camera has gone walkabout. We hoped for a while that it would find its way home, but it's starting to seem unlikely.

But birthdays should be documented, regardless of whether there is photographic evidence! So a few notes about SA's august new status:

• 26 pounds 13 ounces, and 33 1/2 inches tall. He's a big guy, but not enormous.

• Climbing! Up onto the coffee table, to delight us all with a dance. Using the box of cat food as a stool, to climb into the window sill. Up onto the computer desk, to grab the phone and make a few calls while surfing the net. The parks seem to be full of things he can finally appreciate properly, now that he knows how to boost himself on top of them.

• Vocabulary: No. Uh-oh. Oh no! Kitty. Yay (with clapping hands)! E-I-E-I-O (this gets interjected into all songs.) Mama and Dada. Choo choo (very high pitched, I think it's the whistle on the Thomas & Friends trains.) Ball. All done!

• Vocabulary he understands: Brush teeth! Thomas, James (trains, of course), ball, car, firetruck. Many many others.

• RB and I now double as jungle gyms - a hug or a snuggle session usually ends with him trying to get a foodhold somewhere on my body to boost himself somewhere higher. I've explained that he'll probably fall on his head, to no avail.

• We watch the Teletubbies and Thomas & Friends pretty regularly - when they get to the part in the Teletubbies where the Tubbies all say "Big hugs!" and have a group hug, he runs to me for a hug.

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Since I wrote the above, we've obtained a new camera!

Time for carols:

And climbing! On anything he can find!

A little drama:

And helping Mom at the office: