Growing up, I always spent 2 weeks at Piseco camping. It was a wonderful place where kids can roam around and swim, hike, canoe, and get very dirty. Stanley took to all of these very well except for the canoeing. He hated the life vest.
All in all it was a great adventure. We had to watch Stanley like a hawk because we didn't want him to put rocks in his mouth. We gave up on dirt and let him eat sand and dirt like a good little kid. We had to pick our battles and the dirt/sand was for sure a loosing case.
Here is a collection of photos from our adventure.
Big Dan giving Stanley some 'good' but I'm sure not at all baby food.
Stanley loved playing with all of the other little kids.
A beautiful loon sang almost every night.
The crowded beach
At 5 Simone was a good helper
Sleeping was an adventure in itself. Stanley did not want to go take naps. He would stand at the door and smile if it was open or scream if it was closed.
For night, he would be so exhausted that we would put him in his sleep sack and just let him cry and move about the tent till he fell asleep. Usually, this was in a very convenient place right by the door to the tent or in the middle of mom's sleeping pad. It was never near his own sleeping pad. We all survived, but we sure were happy to get back to Stanley sleeping in his own crib.
Stanley took some baths in the lake, but was so dirty by the end of the week that he could have quite the mohawk.
Stanley always had a group of people with whom he could talk.
The last night before leaving we spent the night in the lodge so that we could be somewhat clean for the flight home.
I've very behind on Stanley's 10 month's blog post. This won't be very detailed, but at least I'll say that it is complete.
I feel as though 10 months is a big turning point for Stanley and for Steve and myself also. Finally we are getting much more sleep, Stanley is much easier to care for, and he gives us so many laughs and entertainment. I always use to think it was odd that new parents would stay inside and watch their kids rather than go out to see the parent's friends. Now we find ourselves doing the same thing... just watching Stanley develop.
Some of the major accomplishments were all thanks to Lolo. Stanley has learned to go down stairs feet first or off the couch feet first. He now does it instinctively. We did find a little problem when he decided to go off the raft into the water feet first. He hasn't yet figured out that somethings are a little high or in this case deep for him.
Stanley loves peek-a-boo. He gets so excited his whole body just wriggles and he can hardly control himself. Sometimes he has to turn away just to calm himself down. It is quite a funny thing to watch. Here Steve was outside and Stanley inside.
Lolo also taught Stanley how to turn on and off light switches and open and close things. He is entertained now by anything that moves up and down or turns something off and on.
Another helpful development is that as soon as Stanley sees something new, his first instinct is not to put it in his mouth. He has changed his instinct to bang it with his hands. He goes around banging/hitting things. We need to make sure he doesn't do this to his friends or other people.
As you can see from the below video, Stanley will make anything into a make-shift walker. Toys, chairs, nice furniture.
At 10.5 months, Stanley can
- Turn on and off switches
- He just started to cruise around like crazy. (This is really a 10.5 month item--he barely cruised at 10 months since crawling was just so much faster)
- Eat more than Lolo or Papa Doug
- Pick up almost any food with his hands and get 50% in his mouth. (He still always eats with his left hand.)
- Crawl up and down stairs easily
- Pull himself up on a couch if he has a toy below his feet or hold himself hanging from a rail
- Talk and talk and talk. Though if he is around people he doesn't know, he will just look and watch and then when they leave or he leaves, he will spend many minutes 'talking' about it. I guess he is a bit shy.
At Lolo and Papa Doug's house, there has always been a tradition of kids playing with this little bus. Stanley is too small to sit on it, but he found this a remarkable make-shift walker. A few times he got it stuck in a corner or under the table and somehow would get it out to keep on pushing it. Plus, he really enjoyed the little horn in the middle. It was wonderful to see a new generation playing with it.
And a video
In addition, for my entire life, I remember kids playing with the pans. Stanley took to this quite well.
Stanley has been quite the little traveler. He has been on around 7 round trip flights in his little life. At 10 months; this is by far the hardest. He wants to crawl and move all of the time. Lolo and I traveled with him to Rochester and the poor kid never slept. He was just too hyped up at seeing all of the new things. Thank gosh that Lolo was around so I could pass him off to her once in a while.
I was in a middle seat with two unfriendly men next to me. They never smiled at Stanley and would pull away when he was near them. It seemed strange they wouldn't switch seats with my mom. Finally on the second leg, we all got to sit together.
One of the things that kept Stanley busy was opening and closing the window shade. Here is a little video of it.
We have been very behind on the blog. Our excuses are long work days, too much fun with Lolo for one week and the next week, no internet while we were camping with Lolo and Papa Doug. So, I'll post a bunch of back logged photos and stories.
For an entire week, Lolo was a wonderful nanny with Stanley. Stanley has really gotten quite spoiled by having such a wonderful grandma around. She made him her special french toast almost every day (with egg yolk and mom's milk--we were careful not to mix this up with anyone else's french toast).
And, Stanley learned to go down the stairs "feet first". He was pretty upset at Lolo at the beginning for making him do this, but he learned quickly. Now we do not have to say anything, he will easily get off couches, down stairs, or off a bed feet first.
The videos I took of him doing this are not great. I'll post another one soon.
Uncle Flounder was in town to say hi also
After his meal, Stanley would go around trying to find more of
Lolo's special french toast bits under and around his high chair.
The gate in the back room where Stanley's toys are has had a good run. We are able to put him down there, close the gate and feel pretty confident that he won't critically injure himself.
Well, it seems as if that is all coming to and end here shortly. I just got this picture sent via email from Lolo who is watching over Stanley this week. Seems we have a resourceful little bugger on our hands. Yikes.
Stanley has not been sleeping well of late and, as a result, we have not slept well either. We think his teeth are really giving him problems at night. He wakes up very frequently and wails and whines as if he is in substantial pain. Last night was better, but we are still tired as we all recover from the last few nights.
I guess I wouldn't be too happy if there were small bones slicing their way through my gums all the time. Poor guy.
Stanley loves Cheerios! I mean really loves Cheerios. It is quite a cute little obsession, however, lately he is really trying to find different ways to just eat Cheerios and not eat other items.
For a few night he would scream at dinner time and was only content when he was able to have Cheerios. We now smash them into his dinner so that at least he eats his other food while enjoying the cheerios. It also stops the crying.
Also, Halima mentioned that two days ago she looked over and Stanley had opened the drawer with the cereals and had gotten into the box and was helping himself. How cute, but crazy at the same time.
This past week, Stanley has been very moody. He will go from happy and talking to cranky and upset in just the matter of seconds. Last night we had to have to let him cry off his mood swings knowing that 30-45 seconds later, he'll be happy and cheerful again.
It might be because his first tooth has finally arrived! It took 9 1/2 months, but the bottom left of his teeth has popped out. The bottom right is just around the corner. What I saw a month ago was for sure not a tooth. It turns out a tooth is quite sharp and jagged. I've tried to capture it on the camera, but it is quite difficult.
The other change that is remarkable to notice is Stanley's ability to understand something after showing it to him. For example, if I give him a shape and show him where it goes once, he will keep grabbing it and putting it back into the correct slot. He is better with the circle, square, or oval since those do not get stuck on the corners as much when he pushes them down into the box.
Yesterday, we headed down to Mtn View to see our friends. We had lots of fun with them in the hot sun. Eric got out the water table he built and the pool. All three boys took turns playing in and around it. Stanley was a bit mystified, but then seemed to like it.
I finally downloaded from our camera the hiking trip we did around San Bruno Mtn. It was a very nice hike (well until we went on the far side where there was lots of poison oak--we avoided this by turning around). Stanley seems to like the backpack.
But, the backpack has one issue; there is no place to put the kids head when they want to go to sleep. We improvised using my arm--it was a bit strange for me to hike around with my left arm propped up, but at least Stanley was able to take a cat nap.
Stanley is still only saying 'gaga', but we get lots of fun expressions from him. And despite the fact that we stayed at home because I wasn't feeling very well, the two of us had lots of fun while Steve had to work. Our upstairs neighbor gave him lots of wonderful toys.
