I'm a 'Mama'!

Colin finally started using some words (appropriately without prompting)! Among them are 'Mama' and 'Dada' and they are some of the sweetest words in the world. I'd say he's been using some words appropriately for a couple of weeks now; he even was brave enough to say 'Nana' to Nana and 'Baba' to Papa over Google hangout the other day. Probably somewhat related is his ability to sign more words as well. He's picked up 'please', 'all done', 'food' and 'drink' appropriately as well, whereas before, he knew some of the signs, but only used them when prompted, if at all. Looks like his language center is finally started to develop :)

He's also been reading lots and lots of books. His current favorites (besides Pout Pout) are these 8 board books that came as a set which are about nursery rhymes. We've done some of the rhymes as part of storytimes at the library, and others we just do by ourselves, but he loves them. He'll sit down with the books, open the first page and just look at you expectantly. His overall favorite currently is probably 'Itsy Bitsy Spider'. He knows 90% of the signs that go along with the song, and he will sign them along with us. It is super cute - I need to remember to take a video of him doing that while he still does :) Of course he isn't that picky, he'd read 50 books a day if I let him/had time to help him. As it is, we probably only read 20-30 :)

Another funny thing that developed this last week was that he needs to say 'bye-bye' or 'good night' to EVERYTHING. He waves at cars in the street, planes in the sky, trucks down the road, you name it. For example, two days ago we were getting ready for naptime, and he literally waved to every drawer in the kitchen and to all the toys in his bedroom before he was ready. I would think it was a stalling technique except he does it for everything. Last night at dinner he took a bite of pancake, 'asked' what was in his mouth, and then when I told him, he waved bye-bye to the pancake half-chewed in his mouth. Not sure what this phase is about, but doesn't seem to be anything but a little strange.

Peanut butter pancake makes a huge mess!

I believe that Bob and I are starting to feel a little bit more settled in our house. We've unpacked enough that we can function pretty well in the house and that there aren't boxes lining every wall. We are still needing some storage like a dresser and some shelving in the garage, but at least we've made progress! Colin and I have also been exploring the neighborhood. We live about 2 blocks away from one of the main streets of burlingame which has a lot of restaurants and shops. We also live about 3 blocks away from a small playground with a sand pit which he loves to shovel sand into his play truck. Last week we went to the Burlingame public library. It was a little bit of a walk at about a mile one-way, but it was nice :) We still need to make it to Washington park which is one of the large parks in the area and I also want to visit Mills Canyon which is definitely more of a bike ride away.

I am getting very excited for the fall. Even though we probably won't get much fall here, there are still pumpkin festivals, halloween cookies to make, jack-o-lanterns to carve, and scary movies to watch. I'm making Colin's costume (simple project), but should set up a crafty area enough to run my sewing machine in the next few weeks :) Hope everyone is enjoying the fall where you are!