Mickey D’s

We got SUPER lazy Saturday evening, and after a fun wander around the grounds of the lighthouse at Beavertail State Park, we went through the drive-thru at McDonald’s and got Jack his FIRST Happy Meal!  We let him unpack the box himself, which resulted in a cascade of fries all over his high chair tray.  He dipped his fries and his McNuggets all by himself and totally ignored the apple slices (which is a little surprising – lately he’s been all about the apple slices).

When dinner was over, we let him open his first Happy Meal toy!  It was a weird potato-looking thing that we eventually figured out was an egg that opened to reveal a dinosaur.  Jack was thrilled about the egg and totally freaked out about the dinosaur.   (It’s a 2-inch tall T-rex with jaws that open and shut.)  We put it safely away back in its egg, and he eyed the whole thing warily until bedtime.

He warmed up to the dinosaur when we tried again this morning, emphasizing that it’s a baby dinosaur, and look, it’s saying hello with a baby rawr.  I found it later, stuffed between the couch cushions.  We may have to put it away for a while.

He must be a changeling

We had a major breakthrough at the beach yesterday.  Like, BIG.

Are you ready?

Jack – wait, I don’t feel like you’ve prepared yourself enough.  I’ll give you another few seconds.

Okay.

Jack played in the water.  For reals.  He was hesitant to go in at first, but he was willing to take one slow step at a time in, his back up against my legs and his hands in mine, all the way up to mid-shin.  Then he scrambled to get up in my arms, but from there, he pointed imperiously out to sea.  “Mama, DAT!”  So I did.  We waded out together, John close behind, until I was waist deep and waves were splashing us both.  He kicked his legs and splashed with his hands, laughed when waves got him in the face (He LAUGHED!  He still wails when we get water in his face in the bathtub!), and giggled when we spun him around in circles with his hands trailing in the water.  When he got too heavy for both of us (we were taking turns holding him), we went back to where he could stand, and he marched and splashed and played, and it was like he was a whole different kid.  And he protested getting out of the water!  I promised him we would come back after the holiday weekend, and he agreed to come out.

What a nice surprise.

New cutest things

Jack keeps adding cute things to his repertoire, and I must share them:

  • You already know that Jack calls any vehicle trailer a choo-choo, any truck pulling a trailer a choo-choo guck, and any boat a boop.  Unsurprisingly then, the first time he saw a car pulling a boat on a trailer, he pointed and shouted “Choo-choo boop!”
  • A sheep is a baa, and he knows that sheep say “baa baa”, and one day while changing his diaper, he was repeating “baa baa baa baa”, so I started singing “Baa-baa-baa Baa-baa-baa-ran”.  He requests it now.
  • For a while (sadly, he doesn’t do anymore), while he was (not) trying to fall asleep in his crib, he would sing to himself.  “E-i-e-i-guck,” and then immediately “Yay!” and clap for himself.  Over and over.  He still says yay and claps when songs end.
  • He pretends to give his stuffed animals drinks from his water cup.
  • He pretends to have his Elmo doll (and others) walk and run across the floor.
  • He picks up anything that looks remotely like a smartphone, holds it to his ear, says “Hello-bye!” and puts it down fast.
  • He tells jokes!  Okay, one joke.  He looks at me, says “Hi, Dada!”, waits for my shocked expression, and laughs like a loon.  Then he’ll say “Hi, Mama!” to John.  Then we’ll ask him who we are, he’ll get us both right, and then he’ll point to himself and say, “Dada!” and laugh some more.
  • He calls himself “you”.  When the three of us are together, he likes to point it out.  “Mama, Dada, YOU!”  And if there’s something he wants to do for himself (like turn on the light) and one of us tries to do it first, he’ll say, “No, YOU!” which was very confusing at first.

 

He objects to naps with his whole being

No naps in six days, guys.  SIX.  DAYS.  And Jack has woken up four of the last six nights.  We are all still sane (we think – would we know?), but Jack has the darkest circles under his eyes.  It’s so sad.  Today, he tried the poop method again.  It wasn’t a constant barrage, but “Poop.  POOP.” was interspersed regularly with “Mama. Mama. Mama. Mama. Mama” and “Hello tree?”  (“Hello tree” is his request to open the skylight shade, which he knows signals the end of the nap.  When I answer with “No, night-night tree”, he gives a giant wail of despair.)  Anyway, he kept saying poop and I kept not smelling poop and then a half-hour later he was no longer lying to me.

Maybe it was luck (on his part), maybe he noticed he had to go and was telling me (a milestone), or maybe he willed himself to poop to get out of nap time (a superpower).  Regardless, that was it for nap time today.

Things were going so well!

Total about face

I’m back after a week-plus of silence – all my free time has been spent working or watching WorldCon panels – and I just re-read my last post where I got all excited about Robert Silverberg, and MAN do I have different opinions about that now.  After the Hugo Awards ceremony.  After the Hugo Awards ceremony that wouldn’t end.  After the Hugo Awards ceremony that wouldn’t end because two super-famous, super-old, super-white, and super-out-of-touch men wouldn’t stop talking about the past. It was mostly GRRM, but Silberberg’s segment was just as bad.  They mispronounced finalists’ names repeatedly and spent SO MUCH TIME talking about Campbell without ONCE acknowledging that the name of the award was changed to the Astounding Award, let alone WHY it was changed.  It felt deliberate, which, if it was, is super insulting.  If it wasn’t deliberate, then the nicest things you can say about them are that they’re hopelessly out of touch and possibly senile.  I’m not going to get into it much more than that (there are many people who did so online, and they go into much more detail), but I would like to take back my squee.  It left a bad taste in my mouth.

I need more nerd friends

Specifically, I need more SFF book nerd friends.  I have Erik (THANK YOU, ERIK, AND WE NEED TO TALK BOOKS MORE), but I need more.  This WorldCon thing is hammering it home for me.  Tonight, for example, I’m watching a panel about Modern SF Criticism, and Robert Silverberg, who is not a panelist, submitted a question and comment, and GUYS.  Robert Silverberg is watching the same panel I’m watching.  If this weren’t virtual, we would be in the same room.  ROBERT SILVERBERG.

I have no one to squee with.

I mean, the people I would squee with are at this convention (virtually), so I have a goal to find/start a book club.  That I don’t have time for.

All the things are happening at once

Guys, I am overworked lately and super-tired, but I am still here.  WorldCon programming started today, so in addition to taking care of Jack and working, I am MAKING time to join big ol’ SFF nerdfest panels and such.  It’s 100% virtual, and THANK ALL THE THINGS they’re recording each session, because they’re running on New Zealand time, which is 16 hours ahead of EDT.  For instance, there’s a reading I’d like to see that starts at 10:30 tonight, and there’s another panel I’m interested in that starts at 1am.  I’m going to nope right on out of those, but I’m counting on getting the recordings later.

Anyway, I’m done working, I’m done watching the two panels tonight that were on at times only slightly inconvenient for me, and I’m going to bed.

(I am so super excited about this convention.  YAAAAAYYYYY!!!!)