Jake is definitely not a baby anymore. He is becoming more interactive and independent every day. Lots of changes to report, so here goes
- Counting - he counts to 10...in Thai. I taught him to do the Thai equivalent of hip, hip, hooray when he gets to 10 and he loves it. He says each number with the perfect Thai accent. However, when he counts in English he only counts 2, 5,7, 9. I'm not sure why he doesn't like the other numbers.
- New daycare room. We decided to move Jake to a different room at daycare. We are sad to separate him from his little friends - there are at least 4 others who were born within 2 weeks of Jake and they have all been together since he started at daycare at 3 months old. They love each so much - they hug each other when they say hello and goodbye it is so sweet. But there is a girl in his room that has bitten Jake 6 or 7 times over the past year and I am worried that he will turn into a biter. Jake starts in the new room on monday.
- Story telling. Jake kind of told me a story related to the biting incident. I asked him what did he do when M__ bit him. He replied, 'a kicking' which I think means he kicked her.
- Singing - Jake loves to sing and I can actually make out a few of the songs he sings. mostly they are wiggles songs but he also sings baa baa sheep (he doesn't get all of the words but you can figure out what he means).
- Guitar - Jake's favorite toy is his new guitar, which he acquired when we visited Jack's house (Jack is a couple years older than Jake). Jake loves his guitar more than anything and he even sleeps with it. He loves to sing and dance with the guitar and does a great job strumming it as if it was a real guitar. Here he is grooving to Justin Bieber.
- Playtime - Jake is much more interested in playing with others, including us. He takes us by the hand to lead us to play. At daycare, the staff report that he takes his friends' hands and gets them to dance with him.
- Caring - Jake is beginning to express his affection for us and others more now. A few times, he spontaneously ran up to people to hug them. He hugs and kisses us more and when he sees us hurt (like if we stub a toe on the chair or something) he asks, 'are you ok?' Also, when he doesn't see us, he says, 'where are you?'
- Sleeping - Jake has been co-sleeping with us since he was about 2.5 months old. This was a great arrangement in the beginning - we bought a 'nest' that we put in between us that he could sleep in safely when he was little. When he was still feeding in the middle of the night, I could feed him without getting out of bed. But we started having problems about a month ago when we finally took his pacifier away for good (he was using it to help him fall asleep). Without his paci, Jake would jump and sing and dance around in our bed, sometimes for over an hour, before he fell asleep. This meant I couldn't fall asleep as I was worried he would fall off the bed. On Friday, I finally had him sleep the night in his crib. He is sleeping in his crib again tonight. It took longer for him to fall asleep but it means that I don't spend an hour waiting to catch him if he falls (at least as long as he doesn't learn how to climb out!).
