Marcus is twenty-two months old
Marcus is 22 months old tomorrow (the 22nd). At the beginning of this month he was 34 inches tall and 23 pounds—slightly taller than average, and slightly thinner than average. That’s our boy!
At left you see him in the Moses basket he used to sleep in as an infant--we keep toys in it now, but sometimes he tosses all the toys out and climbs in, then signs "bed" and laughs as though this is the biggest joke in the world.
Marcus has been talking up a storm this month. He'll repeat almost anything you say, and then he remembers it and tries to use it next time. While we were in Minnesota he started saying "Soon!", "Home!", "Careful!" (more like "Foo-ful!"), and "Very nice!" and his "Baby!" stopped being "Bo-bo!" and instead converged on the target. He has conversations with people--he'll point to a man and say "man" and then point to his hat and tell me he's wearing a hat, and then notice the man dropped something and say "uh oh" and then say bye when the man leaves, etc. (in one case, in the post office, the man said, "Oh, he cares about my well-being!" after this, and the postal employees looked at each other and said, "Well, he'd be saying 'uh-oh' all day long if he saw us drop things behind the counter here!"). He walks around the house yelling "screwdriver!" (more like "shroo-ya!") whenever he sees something that could potentially be unscrewed. He's stringing lots of words together, making two-word utterances, but generally they're noun-noun: "Daddy tissue," when Robert blows his nose, etc. He can say "boy" and "girl" and point to Robert and say "boy" and me and say "girl."
Marcus's favorite books these days are How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight? and Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus. Birds, men in hats (the bus driver), a bus--that book has it all! He loves reading the dinosaur book and pointing to the good dinos and saying "sleeping!"
By far the biggest language development this month, though, was that Marcus started saying "Mommy" on Wednesday, June 2nd. He'd never said it before, and by now it's firmly entrenched in his vocabulary, but really, up until June 2nd I would have sworn I was never going to hear it. He says "Mama" for "Grandma" (Helena, Judy, my mother, and even Aunt Martha), but I am definitely "Mommy."
Below, you see some of the requisite monthly babywearing shots--ring slings, mei tais, soft-structured carriers, with awake or asleep baby. I wore the sling at right the weekend of Boston's Pride festival--it was really the perfect rainbow for the occasion.
I made a number of cakes this month--a cocoa spice cake with peanut butter frosting for brunch with Bob, a marble cake with a chocolate glaze for a friend's barbecue, and a two-layer chocolate cake made with tomato soup, just for fun, for a softball event (someone there, after being told the cake had tomato soup in the batter and the frosting, said that was "a 10 on the craziness scale," which, really, is often what I aim for).
Above you see Marcus licking the beaters after one of the cakes. He loved the batter, and loved the frosting, but was less than thrilled with most of the finished cakes. He did like the softball event, though--pizza and trivia and a pinata at Leon de Juda just a few blocks away.
This month we’ve gone to a lot of playgrounds, including the fun one in Harvard Square, and Marcus has become even more adventurous with climbing. He still loves daycare, but he actually only has a month left at this daycare—he’ll end here at the end of July, and then switch to the on-campus daycare near me in September.
At right, you see us posing as a family in the Zipcar at this year's Scooperbowl. We went with Howard, Debbie, Sarah, and Sean, and despite the drizzle it was a nice afternoon. Marcus ate most of a cup of Haagen Daz caramel cone, and then refused everything else. He fell asleep on my back as we were leaving, and slept entirely through dinner at Super Dumpling with Howard.
Other events of the month include dim sum with Jef, Jin Yoon, and Jayden; Robert's first softball game of the season; and a trip to the zoo with Sarah, Sean, and some of her friends (pictured below).
Finally, two quick videos: first of Marcus helping me in the garden. . . and tasting some of the dirt, of course (sigh), and second a corny I-can't-believe-I'm-posting-this-on-the-Interwebz one of me dancing with Marcus on my back and singing along to 60s tunes. We generally do this every afternoon, but I normally don't video it.