He says MAMA!!!!

Okay, so yesterday was the first day my child has EVER said Mama! It has become quite a joke with all my friends and family. The kid's first word was dog and the next was Dada (these he said at 10 months of age) and finally 9 months after his first words does he say mama. The last few weeks he started adding a few words like shoes, truck, eyes, and too too (choo choo train), but I continued to be crestfallen that he would not say mama. In fact when asked to say mama, he would shake his head and say no. Finally yesterday he said mama for the first time. He said it four different times throughout the day. This morning, Dave brought AJ downstairs while I took a shower. When I got out and was getting dressed I heard Dave say, "You little shit," (he was laughing while he said this, but I was still surprised to hear such a thing from Dave). I started heading to the stairs to see what this was about when I heard AJ saying "mama, mama, mama" while he was heading up the stairs with Dave behind him. Dave told me that AJ went to the back door and gave him the sign for "outside". Dave told him that he couldn't go outside just then because he was going to have breakfast. AJ signed outside again and Dave again told him no. AJ then darted around Dave and started saying "mama" several times while heading for the stairs to look for me. Dave thinks it's a bad sign that the kid has already figured out that if one parent says no, then he can go ask the other. By the time AJ got to me and I was making such a fuss that he was calling for me, that he forgot that he wanted to go outside. If he had signed it again, I probably would have had to give in just because my baby finally said mama!

AJ's Toddler Bed

AJ did so great on our Colorado trip without a crib or play pen that we decided to see how well he would do with his toddler bed. It's only been two nights, but AJ has done just fine. I lay him down and tell him it's nap time or night night time and he just stays in bed. I thought for sure that he'd try to get up and out of the bed. This was the first transistion. The next will be to take away the pacifier. He only uses it to sleep (except in church and on air planes), but we've decided to go ahead and try to break him of it altogether. We'll see how well that goes!

Okay, I have to make an addition to this post. AJ slept in the toddler bed just fine for the 3rd night in a row, however, when he called out to me this morning to let me know he was awake, I came in and just as he had been the previous mornings, he was sitting up in the bed waiting for me. I had assumed he never got up until I looked at him and realized that he had nothing on except the top to his PJs. I saw the socks on the floor and his PJ bottoms, but I couldn't find the diaper. I looked in the bed and all over the floor. I didn't see it. I finally looked at AJ and asked him where his diaper was. He quickly hopped down from the bed, ran to his trash can and pointed in it. And sure enough, there was one open diaper laying in the trash can. I had just emptied his trash can the night before. Thank goodness it was only a wet diaper!

Hot tub'n

If this is the first time you've read this post, then stop reading here and scroll down to the start of this series beginning with "Colorado Trip." Then you can read back up to this one. The last thing I post always ends up being at the top of the blog.

Anyway, here are a couple of pics of AJ in the hot tub with grandma and grandpa. AJ LOVED the hot tub. Once he saw grandma and grandpa in it, he wanted in too and kept singing "bath" to me each time after that when he'd see it. The first day he saw them in it, AJ and I had just woken up and came upstairs in the cabin. AJ could see them in the hot tub through the glass door and wanted to go out there. I thought the tub would be too hot for him so, I hadn't planned on putting him in. I was instead going to get clothes to bundle him up in as well as going to get myself dressed. While I was getting dressed AJ goes to the glass door and starts to sign "help" to grandma and grandpa. They see him and expect that I'll be bringing him out, but I don't get ready as fast as AJ would like and he started doing the sign language equivalent of yelling for help. AJ's help sign is to pat his left fist with his right hand. When he first started signing for help, he was doing it very gently, but when he didn't get "help" right away, he started pounding his hand down hard and fast. Grandma and grandpa thought this was the funniest thing. Once I got AJ outside, we decided that the water wasn't too warm for him to get in for a bit. I put him in, and the kid didn't want to get out. The water did get pretty warm and AJ's little legs and tush were bright pink, but he didn't seem to care a bit. On another morning grandma and grandpa took him in the hot tub while I took a shower. When I was done with my shower, I got dressed and went outside with a towel thinking AJ would be ready to get out. He just saw me with a towel and turned away and tried to get to the other side of the tub were I couldn't reach him. I guess he takes after his daddy with his love of hot tub'n it.

Grandpa, the horse!

AJ discovered that perhaps the only thing he likes better than riding on daddy's back is riding up on grandpa's shoulders! After riding on grandpa's shoulders once, I said something about grandpa being a horse. So, one time after that when AJ wanted on the shoulders, he started signing "horse." Riding on granpa's shoulders is what best consoled him after Uncle Barry traumatized him with the sledding experience.

Colorado Trip

What a great time! AJ and I flew out to Denver to visit my brother, Barry. Grandma and Grandpa Cook drove out and met us there. We had a terrific visit. AJ and I got to meet Barry's girlfriend, Sharlene. AJ really liked her (so did I). I think AJ was making a play for his uncle's girl. We spent our first and last night at Sharlene's house and the nights in between at a really nice cabin up in the mountains. It was fabulous. While in the mountains, Barry decided to take us sledding one day. We climbed a good sized hill and decided that since Barry had the most sledding experience, he was going to take AJ down the hill. The pic shown with Barry and AJ is the one I took right before the first run down the hill. AJ was leary but not yet completely terrified. That came later. AJ started screaming half way down. What does Uncle Barry do? He climbs the hill again with AJ and insists on taking him back down while AJ proceeds to scream the whole way. Grandpa got a pic of AJ crying while Barry is laughing like crazy. If he emails me that pic, I may post it later. I'm not sure AJ ever quite trusted Uncle Barry again after this experience.