Favorite Things: September 2014

Thomas Train Table.  Jonah plays with this all the time.  For extended periods.  Wow.

"Things That Go"  For such a simple little seek and find book, this one is getting a lot of milage!  We play I spy and race to find different types of vehicles on each page.  And it turns out the redundancy of some types is great for practicing counting.

2 Year Update

Now that Jonah is 2, I thought it time to (try) record the things he is doing now:

Language:
Jonah's communication has just exploded, and I long ago stopped trying to track all his new words.  He's up to sentences, such as:

• Mommy and Daddy all done working
• I come, too!
• Mama hold this one ("this one" is a Jonah-ism for "this")

Jonah can sing the ABC song with 90% accuracy and recognize a dozen letters by sight, though he knows them by word association, so "A" is airplane, "D" is Daddy, etc.

Jonah can count to 10, and everything thereafter is 13.  When left on his own, he will keep going instead of stopping when he runs out of items to count.

Sings "ABC", "Row, Row, Row Your Boat", "Twinkle, Twinkle", "Itsy Bitsy Spider", "Baa Baa Black Sheep", "Old McDonald" and others.

Gross Motor:

Jonah can actually get off the ground when he jumps!  He climbs the playground by himself, but only occasionally does the slide.  (And holds Mommy's hand for the tall twirly slide.)  He loves anything sport, so any objects become bats and balls inside or outside.  He has some success with throwing a ball up and hitting it with a bat.  He can also throw a ball with some accuracy, though catching is still a challenge.  He can shoot a basket on the highest setting, which is just above his reach.  He loves to run, and scoots on his tricycle with his feet or sometimes tries the pedals with assistance.  He's not much of a climber, but has figured out to move the ottoman or stool where he wants so he can reach up high.

Fine Motor:

Jonah has mastered peg / shape puzzles and has them complete in a flash.  Can use a fork, but usually prefers not to.  He tries to use the side of his fork to cut food the way Mommy and Daddy do.  Brushes his own teeth, and likes to unscrew the toothpaste cap on his own.  Has a lot of trouble taking off his clothes or even socks, but we're working on it!  Loves to build with Duplos and make long trains.  Favorite craft involves gluing beads.  Hates to have paint on his hands.

Potty Training:

We have begun in earnest!  Jonah finally associates sitting on the potty with doing his business, which is a huge accomplishment.  As a reward, we sing a very boisterous song and let him play on the iPad.  Gifts of books and toys had no effect and he rejected any sort of candy treat!

Food:

Jonah is a fan of starches.  He devours multiple servings of rice, noodles and breads.  He also eats his meats and veggies, but sometimes as a trade for more of his favorites.  Jonah also loves fruits, cheese, and beans of any color/variety.  Skip the squash and potatoes.  He drinks only milk and water.  We've tried juices and strawberry/chocolate milk, but he doesn't like either.  Tries, then spits out any type of dessert, candy or sweet.

Happy Birthday to Jonah!

Jonah had a wonderful birthday party with lots of cousins and friends to share his big day!  Although I swore I would never be "one of those moms", we had a bounce house.  (Cut me some slack - it was a special occasion and we were able to borrow it from a neighbor!)  The weather was beautiful and everyone had a nice time playing in the yard.  One of my favorite moments was Jonah playing Ring-Around-the-Rosie with some of the older kids in the bounce house.  Such fun!

Little did I know, Jonah is now an expert at birthdays.  He sang Happy Birthday to himself and blew out the candles right away.  He was also quite the pro at opening presents.  We only did a couple, but the rest of the week he kept pointing and asking "more present" so we'd open a new one each night.  But nothing could top his new train table from Grandmama and PopPop!  Jonah is a regular pro at putting pieces of track together, forming super long trains, and driving them around the track.  Put on his engineer hat and it's like watching a commercial for how toddlers are supposed to play with trains.  It's so by-the-book!  Adorable.