For the Grandmas...

A word before I start...I uploaded these pictures to blogger in the wrong size...so they are a little fuzzy (the actual pictures are much clearer)...but because our electricity has been off and on all day today,  I am not taking the risk of trying to redo them...so please forgive the fuzzy photos. That said...

In honor of Mother’s Day, I thought I would share a post about Little t…I was going to post this a few weeks ago, but never got around to it. Now it is nice that I can use it as a tribute to his grandmas for Mother’s Day.  We are so thankful for the wonderful women in our lives.  Thank you Moms for investing so richly in the three of us…you have shaped us in so many ways and we treasure who you are. We love you. 

Okay, enough sentimental stuff…onto the good stuff.

In case you were wondering….

He is still stinking cute.  

Stinking stinking cute!  The boy just melts our hearts, every day.  Notice I said boy because it feels like he is getting so big.  Each day he is learning something new, exploring different things and his personality just continues to shine through loud and strong.  Here are some of his latest antics. 

Blue Dog is still near and dear to his heart.  If Little t had it his way, he would go everywhere with that little blue dog blanket.  We work hard at keeping him in the house i.e. not making trips to the garden, or the bazaar, or the swimming pool.  It takes a lot of persuasion at times because they are such good friends.  Usually after he wakes up, we can hear Little t gabbing away to Blue Dog in his crib.  Sometimes, we have been able to peek in and see him holding B.D. up and talking right into his face.  He also insists on having him at the table while he eats (another thing we are trying to phase out) he shares his food with him and gives him drinks, making sippy sounds as he puts the cup up to his mouth.  

Little t getting ready for a swim...with Blue Dog in tow. And you thought I was kidding!

Speaking of sippy sounds, Little t is big into tea parties and cooking right now.  He especially loves the real tea pot and his plastic cups.  He carries them around the house and pretends to pour tea into the cups.  He then hands out the cups and we all pretend to drink them.  He has also taken to “drinking” directly out of the spout (putting the spout in his mouth and tipping it up) which local friends find hilarious because old people here actually drink like this, so they love it. 

 While I am cooking, Little t is usually in the kitchen. He pulls pots and pans out and asks for utensils and will sit and stir the pots, put stuff in them, etc.  He has a thing for kitchen utensils and even when we go to other people’s houses, he asks for utensils to play with.  Today he got into a bag of beans and (under supervision) strung them all over the kitchen, dumping them into different pots and bowls. I am sure we will continue to find them in the days to come.  Thankfully he is good about not sticking stuff in his mouth! He is discovered that he would much much rather be standing on a chair that is pushed up to the counter than anything else…so he is quite the ‘help’ now.    

Helping make cookies/eating all of the raisins out of the batter.

In other culinary-related news…Little t now is using a fork and/or spoon when he eats!  It took quite a while for him to get the hang of this…and we didn’t push it, to be honest.  I didn’t have the patience or motivation to work with him, and he wasn’t interested in using the utensils for anything other than flinging food all over for quite a while.  In the last few weeks,  however, he has really gotten the hang of scooping stuff up with the spoon and putting it in his mouth.  He makes a big show of it.  Scoops it up and then looks at both of us with a big grin on his face to make sure we are watching before he puts it in his mouth.  We then cheer like crazy and he gobbles away.  It is progress that we are all excited about. 

The little man continues to be quite the talker. He babbles constantly and is picking up new words and signs all the time.  He now has signs he uses to say more, please, thank you, all done, washing his hands, eating, and bye-bye.  He also says the words all done, please and bye-bye as he does the signs.   

I recently read that around 18 months of age a child should have a vocabulary of around 50 words. Little t isn’t to that point yet, but we aren’t worried. Especially considering he is immersed in 3 languages (with the occasional Finnish thrown in) every day…we are cutting him some slack. Like I said, he talks all the time.  kAkA is always asking if we know what he is saying, and we don’t, but he always has a story to tell. The intelligible words he does say include: mama, daddy, car, shoes, cheese, please, all done, dog, yes, no, oh no!, that, keys, nan, tickle tickle, ball and water. He also makes the sounds for animals when asked. He does a pig, sheep, cow, donkey (and horse are the same for him), dog, cat, monkey, elephant, and chicken/bird.  He also points to his head/hair, eyes, ears, nose, mouth, belly, bottom, feet and toes when asked.  We continue to be amazed at how much he ‘gets’ and how well he listens.  He doesn’t always obey, but is always listening. He has started saying yes or no when we ask him questions (i.e. do you want more raisins?) and now says please for everything he wants to do (ride on the motorcycle, go swimming, go outside, have a snack).  He is a little communicator and we love it!

He has also started role playing (for lack of a better term) a little bit.  A few times I have caught him crawling around the living room while barking like a dog. Or a few times when I have gone in to get him from his nap, he has been crawling around his crib and mooing like a cow.  He also has a few wooden animal figures that he picks up and makes the sounds for them and walks them around the house.  A little creative genius, I tell you! J

He is also totally a people person.  He loves to give angel khAla kisses in the morning when she arrives.  He gives her a huge smile and then lifts his little cheek up so she can kiss it.  He is also getting the hang out of shaking people’s hand when he sees them and we encourage him to give salaam (hello greetings).  He is quite good about doing so with his right hand (the appropriate one).  The other day when we went outside after his nap, I told him he needed to go tell kAkA (who had just arrived for the night shift) salaam.  Little t marched right over to him and stuck his hand out.  He is also known to put his right hand over his chest (like saying the pledge of allegiance) when saying hello – this is a gesture that men do when they greet someone and Little t has picked it up.  We were at the office the other day in the women’s room and he shook the hand of every woman in the room. I was very impressed!

He is also very affectionate towards A and I. Every time A leaves the houses, Little t gives him kisses.  And each time he is going to lay down for a nap or bed, he insists on giving kisses first.  They are big open mouthed slobbery ones, that he says ‘ahhh’ for before he kisses us…but we aren’t complaining!

Little t has also learned how to walk backwards and it looks very ‘Michael Jackson-esque’ which we are totally humored by. Twirling in circles is also a new found hobby of the wee one.  He can be found twirling in a circle with his head and arms back (think Sound of Music) in the middle of the living room, or on the trampoline…again, very amusing.

Displaying a new trick - walking over the 'bridge'. (Notice how green our yard is). Also, notice the treehouse in the background that Little t now climbs into!

Always one to put on a show, Little t has the moves when it comes to dancing.  He loves to clap his hands and wiggle his little booty.  He also really gets into stomping one foot while he dances.  Whenever we turn music on, he starts to dance, especially local or Indian music.  The other day we were in the office and the administrator was playing music on his computer. The second I set Little t down he started to dance.  The men got a big kick out of this.  

On the outdoor front, Little t is a crazy man.  He loves loves loves water and mud and has a knack for finding it.  He is constantly dirty and/or wet.  We went to a teammate’s house the other day and within 15 minutes of arriving, he had found water and was completely soaked.  He played in the water for 2 ½ hours and at the end of that time had to run around naked for an hour because I didn’t even have a spare diaper for him.  He wasn’t complaining and found a great amount of joy in discovering that he could pee everywhere without a diaper on.  He loves working in the garden and is great at pulling weeds my favorite flowers. We have a large tub that we use for his baths that we have been putting in the yard so he can ‘swim’ during the day. He will spend a least an hour playing in the water, or his new favorite, laying down in it. He grins as he feels the water around the sides of his face.   He also has discovered the swimming pool that our yard-mates have and thinks it is about the best thing ever.  It comes up to his chest and he loves playing in it, splashing and walking around.  He has gone under a few times (accidentally) and was quite scared by it, but he always goes right back in after he finishes sputtering and coughing.  As you can imagine, this now means that I can’t leave him alone for a second because he makes a bee-line for the pool.  Even though it is covered when not in use, I have to constantly keep an eye on him, so it feels like a blessing and a curse.

Also, Little t has decided that he is big enough that he can ride the scooters like the big kids.  He hops on with his feet and hangs onto the handle and A or I push him around.  He grins and we get a workout. He has also started to actually jump on the trampoline.  He takes a few hops and then usually sits down on his buns.  Then he jumps up and does it all over again. He loves being on the trampoline and runs around on it and jumps.  When he and I are the only ones on it, we play a game where he chases me and I scream as I crawl away.  He laughs so hard and comes after me again.  It is quite the sight I am sure.  The big kids try to get him to play with them, but it just doesn’t get him as riled up (just overwhelms him I think).

I think one of his spiritual gifts is finding mud.  He is ALWAYS muddy.

Showing off his swimming/splashing skills

Pushing his truck around.  Check out the crazy hair!

Always observant, he never fails to point a helicopter when he hears it in the sky.  He points to the sky and says “ooohhh”

We are entering the stage of tantrums and it means there is never a dull moment at our house. He is quite good at letting those cries of protest rip as he arches his back and throws himself on the floor.  When he is really really upset he puts both of his hands on his face and shakes his head…very very cute. 

Little t has started tickling…everything. When he tickles, he says “tickle tickle” (with very clear words). He tickles everything, Blue Dog, us, his stuffed animals, people in books or on movies, his own feet or belly.  It is very very funny and so cute (and yes, it is one of the numerous adorable things that he does that we are attempting to get on film).

And last but certainly not least, he has started pray.ing.  We hold hands when we pr.ay before meals. If we ask him if he wants to pr.ay he will squint his eyes and let out a little jibberish before nodding his head to signal he is done.  We realized that he squints his eyes because he saw us squinting our eyes to watch him while we pr.ayed, so now that is standard practice in our house!  We all pr.ay squinty-eyed and we are all happy. 

So there you have it, the life and times of Little t…so cute and such a stinker!   Stay tuned for more!

"Happy Mother's Day! I love you!" Love, Little t