Little Man

In all the ups and downs of potty training and teething lately, I probably haven't focused enough on how big Jack is getting and how fun he is to interact with. Let's see .... lately, Jack's big thing has been reading. He really loves to have books read to him. He loves the same books read to him over and over again. :). I've decided that I really love some childrens' books, and appreciate the fact that the authors took the time to write and illustrate in such a way that I really don't mind reading it 1,000,000 times. Some of Jack's (and my) favorite books are: Go Dog Go by PD Eastman, Animalia and The Water Hole, by Graeme Base, all of the Curious George books, I Am Pushkin (can't remember the author!), Get to Work Trucks by Don Carter, and The Red Hen (the author's name escapes me again!). Jack has listened to most of them so many times that he says the words along with me at each page. And sometimes he says "Jack read you, Mama!", and he proceeds to turn the pages and recite what he remembers about each page. It's really cool!

On the other hand, some childrens' books are terrible!! Jack had one book (that was a hand-me-down from another family) that I ended up tossing out altogether. The whole book was about this little boy who kept making excuses for the bad things he did, like "I didn't mean to!", "I forgot!", "It wasn't me!", and stuff like that. I was totally floored one day when Jack was tipping his drink over again and again, and after I scolded him he said "I didn't mean to!" (when he definitely did mean to) just like the kid in the book. So, out the book went.

Jack also takes special joy in making Thomas laugh. He usually does something crazy like dance around or make funny faces, and Thomas starts giggling, and then Jack refines his actions to get Thomas into full-on belly laughs. Sometimes when Thomas fusses, Jack runs in and announces "I coming, Thomas!" and he tries to cheer him up.

Finally, Jack is expaning his repertoire of songs. He likes singing "####### ####### Little Star", "Go Tell it on the Mountain", "Old MacDonald Had a Farm", "We Three Kings", "You're Beautiful" by James Blunt (ack!), and any of the songs from Mary Poppins. He usually muddles the words up a bit, but it's heartwarming to hear him belt out songs in his little voice. One of these days I'll have to catch it on video :).