Just out of Reach

So, certain people have requested more videos on our blog because they miss their nephew. Since they made that request, I've been trying to remember to take out the camera when James does something funny. Of course, as all you parents know, as soon as the camera comes out the baby tends to stop whatever it was they were doing and stare blankly at you. ;)

Despite this fact, I managed to capture something funny this morning.

James has recently discovered the buttons on the front of the TV. This makes it rather difficult for Paul and I when we want to watch a movie, but James finds it endlessly amusing. Today, James was making his morning rounds around the living room (look out the window, check and see if Mommy accidentally left something on the couch he can reach, say hi to the shoe basket, pull the VCR out onto the floor...you know, the basics ;) ). After pulling out the VCR, he decided to turn on the TV. One of his favorite buttons is the input button, so he pushed it until the DVD screen came up. At this point something else caught his eye, so he crawled away. Gotta love that short attention span.

Well, you know how DVD players have a screen saver mode? Ours kicked in, and when James saw the colored ball traveling across the screen he knew he had to catch it. It was hilarious!

I sure thought it was funny, anyway. We'll see if it's funny to anyone that wasn't here! Take a look...

Poor guy! It must have been frustrating that he couldn't pin the dang thing down! :)

The Roles are Reversed!

Tonight, James decided he had better show his gratitude for all these months that I have fed him every meal. He decided to feed me! Well, ok, I admit I did a bit of coaxing. He sure got a kick out of it, though! Way to share your Cheerios, James! :)

"Hi, James!"

James has a few new tricks, but it's been hard to catch them on camera. He has this "camera face" that he usually does the second he sees the camera and then won't do anything else.

Exhibit A:


Nice.

Well, he cracks me up, anyway!

So, we've been trying to teach James to wave since before Christmas, and something finally clicked a few days ago, and now he's been waving up a storm. He gets very excited about it and waves his whole arm around. :)

I managed to get one good wave in this video. I would have tried again to see if he'd wave more, but he started babbling away at the end of the video, and I thought it was cute. His babbling has gotten much more conversational lately. If only we could know what he was trying to say!

(By the way, the noise in the background of the video is the dryer going...sorry! Oh! And can you believe the sunshine coming in the window! It's the dead of winter in Oregon, and this is our third or fourth sunny day in a row!)

WW - Serious about Stretching

WW - I Love Food!

A High Chair and a Haircut

This was a big weekend for James. :) We FINALLY went out and purchased a high chair. You know, he's only been eating solids for 7 months now...we figured it was about time. Ha ha. I think the thing that really made us decide to buy one for ourselves was the convenience of having one to use when we were in Colorado. It was so nice to be able to put him in the chair with a cracker or cheerios and have him stay content for a while. Plus, feeding him in his Bumbo chair was starting to become downright dangerous! If we turned away for two seconds, James would try and climb right out!

Also, we decided to get rid of James' Old Man Hair this weekend. I've been hesitant to cut it because it didn't seem like his hair was thick enough. I thought if I cut it it would be sparse and patchy, and that would be even worse than Old Man Hair. Well, it's been getting thicker in the last couple months. I still didn't know if it would work, but I figured a bad haircut at this age wouldn't even phase James, and it would grow back soon enough.

It was my first time using the clippers, but I think it turned out pretty good! James was fascinated by them, and as a result he was much less squirmy than normal. Paul held him while I manned the clippers. Overall, I'm pleased with his first haircut. It's hard to see the difference in pictures, but here are a couple pictures we took when he first put him in his new high chair:

Now this he gets from his mom!

I've always suffered from compulsions to organize and sort things. Just ask anyone who has seen me eat Skittles, Smarties, M&Ms or any other candy that comes in assorted colors. It's just something I've done all my life. I sort conversation hearts. I sort my Halloween candy. I alphabetize my DVDs. I could go on and on, but this story is about James.

We noticed when we were in Colorado for Jamie's homecoming, that James really loved playing with the colored blocks my mom got out. The main thing that caught our attention was that he would be holding one block in each hand, and they were pretty much always the same color and shape.


I noticed that the two blocks he was holding were always the same color, but I assumed people were handing him blocks that matched. No one was. He was actually choosing blocks that matched!

So, over Christmas when we were once again in Colorado, my mom and I put it to the test. We would give him one block and then hold out two blocks for him to choose from. He would inevitably go for the one that matched the one he was already holding! Over and over again! We'd switch hands, switch blocks, even make him choose from the whole box of blocks, and sure enough he would pick matching blocks. Crazy kid! :)