The month of August was a bit of a hot, crazy blur, between a camping trip, a family reunion in California, and bedbugs. Micah grew up so much in the month since his birthday. He's slowly graduating from two-word phrases with an implied verb or noun, but not both, to recognizable sentences. He got a puzzle game that requires matching up pairs of related objects, and went from having no capability at all to being able to make quite a few pairs before getting bored. He became a willful toddler where he was once a docile boy, and he started to ask for food treats and to be taken to a "grey-gound". While there have been occasional exasperating toddler moments (sometimes whole hours or afternoons!) he's still mostly a very sweet, easy-going boy who can be gentle or silly or watchful, but hardly ever naughty (and when he is naughty, he immediately suggests, "time out?")
Moving from a back-ward facing carseat to forward-facing gave him a new sense of being with us in the car, with more interaction and conversations. Many verses of "the wheels on the bus" have been demanded, and we talk about the construction equipment, trucks, and other things we see from the window.
On our trip to California, he spent some time with his aunts, cousins, and grandparents, and now he understands that they are part of his family even though he doesn't see them often. He's learning that not everything goes his way, and he's learning (slowly) that he can't hit or bite when that happens. He loves to tell us what to do now, and will pick up my purse and drag it over to me when he wants to leave the house, pointing to the crook of his elbow and telling me "suitcase wight here" to indicate where it should go, or tell his daddy, "Daddy, floor trains" when he wants daddy to get off the couch and play with his choo-choos. He's become very interested in music, and really enjoyed the "instrument petting zoo" at a local fair, where musicians let him get very close to and watch them play instruments. We now try to play more classical and jazz music for him, and show him Youtube videos of different instruments (he asks "Wheels on Bus on co-peuw-da?").
We've been indulging his interest in transportation by taking him on a real train ride up in the mountains on a historic train. It was fun and exciting, but because it was a bit too long for a toddler to be confined to a seat, pretty physically exhausting for mommy and daddy who had to wrestle to keep a wiggly toddler from falling out the window or running on a moving train. We also stopped by a fire station one day last week and the firemen were so nice; they all got up from their dinner and proudly showed off the firetruck, letting a very happy little boy "drive" the firetruck and offering to take a very happy big boy (Adam) on a "ride along" for a day. I'm very happy that his interest in transportation is also mixed with a healthy dose of caution: when we're taking out and about and he hears a car, he'll remind us, "car coming" and grab a hand or shrink back, even if he's safely on a sidewalk or driveway.
All in all, we're having a lot of fun with Micah's new ability to comprehend and interact with the world.
