Weekend

Today was a big birthday party. We celebrated for Jason, Amy and Omar today with a lunch out, cake and presents. Joshua did great at the resturant. This was his first time out since Jason's birthday Oct 12. We vowed after that day to only take him out when necessary. While at Grandma's we dressed him up in his costume for Halloween so that everyone in Eldersburg could see him.



Joshua is responding now consistently to 'Old McDonald'. You need only say the name of the song and he replies with 'ee-ei-ee-ei-ee-ei". He hasn't gotten the 'o' part yet. But, if he only hears the tune he will add the chorus at the right time. If you sing the song, he will chime in when appropriate. It is so fun! Also, when listening to his car music cd he laughs after the tong twisters because the little boy resiting them laughs.

He is distinctly saying the words door and shoes now and we think he said, 'Josh' today. He has about 20-30 words now that he will say or sign.

Frosty Walks

Joshua has been enjoying the cool weather and we are still going out for walks. We just bundle up before we go...



He has been waking in the middle of the night for some reason and having a hard time getting to sleep on his own. However, this morning after his 4:30am waking and going back to his bed at 6am. He slept until 8:45am when I finally went in to get him up!! He is down for a nap now and has been asleep for almost 2 hours.

He is a photo for the magazines, the soft light and silouette makes it wonderful!

New Words

Today was story time at the library, same as every Tuesday. There are a few routines that we have in place :) He has been saying lots of new words. Recently, it has been almost one a day. Yesterday, I handed him the Bible that he received from Mom Beam for his baptism. I said the word, 'Bible' and he said "Bible.... Bible, Bible, Bible" :-) It was cute. He has repeated that one a number of times since then. He likes 'B' words. He said, 'kitty' today and 'upstairs' today. On Sunday, he said 'magnet' but I don't expect he will repeat that one for a while. Sometimes he just repeats what we say but doesn't really understand the word.

Yesterday, we visited Pop-pop in his new home. The ladies there liked him :-) We also visited Nanny and had dinner with her and then went over to Grandma V's and Grandad's to say 'hi'. Grandad fed Joshua lots of grapes and bananas which he liked.

He is getting a bit pickier with his food choices recently. Things he liked last week he will no longer eat this week but in general he is still eating well. He likes most fruit, yogurt, ice cream, whole wheat bread, chicken, brocolli and PEAS. He likes to spear his peas with fork.

He is beginning to understand relationships, hats go on your head, shoes go on your feet, etc. For fun, Joshua will spin around until he is dizzy, or shake his head and walk. Yesterday he nodded, 'yes' instead of just the normal 'no' shake.

He is in bed now for a good night's sleep, hopefully :-)

'Round and round he goes, where he'll stop, nobody knows!

Joshua had a busy day today. First he visited Gr' Goshmommy Beam :-) Although, much too short, we had fun playing with kitty balls as rattles, the piano and a flute/recorder type instrument. He received his first Bible and wonderful board-book version with latch and handle. After that visit, we went to Trey's (born 4 days after Josh) First Birthday Party. Josh at a fantastic lunch, which he hasn't done in days, and had fun playing with the other kids. Then we stopped at Trader Joe's on the way home.

At home this evening, while getting ready for bed, he started spinning around in circle. It was cute and he got himself a little bit dizzy, also funny :-) He said two new words yesterday, 'bottle' and 'banana'. He likes 'b' -words. He is getting really good a the word 'balloon' of which he has two left over from his party last week. He pulls on the ribbon attached to the balloon so he can bring it down to his level.

Last night, while watching tv, because a ball came bouncing at us, we turned to find him sittin on an end table with his legs dangling over the edge. It must have taken some effort to get up on top of the table but he did it quickly and quietly. He is generally very careful during these adventures and doesn't bump or fall. He very stealthly slipped off the table moments after throwing the ball.

He is also able to open doors. We have the kind with lever handles. Nothing is safe.

He had a very good dr.'s visit on Thursday. He weighs 22 lbs 7 oz and is 32" tall. The dr. was impressed with his language development and motor skills and he seems to be healthy.

Happy FIrst Birthday, Joshua!!

Today, Joshua Lang turned one year old today. We had a wonderful weekend with family and friends. Grandma and Papa, Uncle Josh and Aunt Trina came into town on Saturday morning. After turning Joshua's car seat around to face the front, we all hoped in the car to go pumpkin pickin'. We found a farm that had bins of pumpkins as well as some on the ground and Joshua had fun wondering around through them all. Grandma help him pick one that was just his size and he proceeded to carry that little one all over. We also picked up apples, cider and acorn squash. Next we stopped at a dairy for fresh, home-made ice cream. It was a fun, rainy afternoon. Later we went home for soup, bread and wine. A perfect ending. After Joshua went to bed, Trina and I iced the cake (a dog, like blue's clues) and made favors.

Sunday was the big party day, Joshua knew something was up and was very irritable and wouldn't take a nap. The big event took place at 1:30 in the afternoon. We had lots of fun games planned. Everyone came, Aunt Jill, Aunt Tara, Aunt Amy, Tio Omar, Dylan, Stephanie, Noella, Great Grandma, Aunt Jo, Neighbor Stephanie and company, Mom-mom and Papa Cameron as well as Uncle Chris and Aunt Carie. In between games, Joshua had his first piece of cake and opened presents. After the party, with those stayed, we had a cook out dinner. The day couldn't have gone any better. It was wonderful.

Today, for Joshua's real birthday things were more laid back. We took a nice long walk with Papa, Uncle Josh, Aunt Trina and the doggies and then went to lunch when Grandad and Grandma V arrived to celebrate Daddy's birthday. After lunch we had brownies and cake at home before The west coast gang had to had back home. Ellie and Miss Kim came over for the desert and Joshua tried to feed Ellie his bottle. Daddy took everyone to the airport, Grandma and Grandad V. when home and the house was quiet. It was a good day but it was sad to see everyone go.

We are excited to see what this next year will bring. Joshua has been the most wonderful gift in our lives and brings us joy every day. I suppose every parent knows that but how awesome to experience it!

Lots of updates

Joshua is just full of new things these days. We have been playing lots of games with him. One of them is to put several objects (ball, boat, duck for example) in front of him and ask him to point to each one. He has that down. We can now ask him to bring us a ball and he will go and dig one out of his toy bin. Another game is to hide a toy under a cup and nothing under another cup and see if he can find the toy.

We have been showing him a magazine photo of a baby every day for at least a week. Every day we point out the baby in the photo's feature and the corresponding ones on Joshua. We then ask him where the baby's nose, eyes, mouth, etc are. He has take no interest and usually just crumbles the photo up. However today I asked him where the baby's nose was and he pointed to it and said, 'nose'. It was awesome! So I guess he has been listening.

As of Sunday he has been trying to feed himself with a fork. He has decided that he doesn't really like to be fed by someone anymore. Unfortunately, he is easily frustrated and it comes at a time when he is already hungry. But he is making great progress. He started out Sunday, spearing peas and then gagging himself with the fork. Now he can usually get something on the fork and the fork into his mouth pretty well. Today he started using a spoon with yogurt. WHAT A MESS!! He had a great time and eat just about the whole container on his own.

I am sure there is more but that is all I can think of now and it is getting late. I'll post more photos tomorrow...