My own car!

On Sinterklaas evening Tobias received several gifts. Previously I put a picture on of Tobias playing with a shapes puzzle. That picture was taken on Sinterklaas evening. On that evening he also got this car. He didn't like it as much at first. He was a bit scared to ride on it. He has been for a while, but since this past weekend he has started to like it some more. He actually laughed while riding it. This picture was taken today. We increased the speed a little and that was a lot of fun! Also driving by mommy was a big laugh... So, it took some getting used to but now he is able to enjoy his own car. Mommy took this picture while Tobias was zooming by...

Tobias is doing great. His waterpokken are pretty much gone. He has a few scabs left, but it doesn't seem to bother him that much. Overall it has not bothered him much. I think it should be gone by this weekend.

I was thinking the other day.... it is funny how you give your child all sorts of nicknames over time. Of course when we tell about him we refer to him as Tobias, but there are names we use to refer to him when Lisa and I talk about him to each other and there are names we use to talk to him if we want to comfort him or something. And recently we even had some names to refer to him while he had chicken pox (Google is ambiguous about the spelling of this word, I found that both pox and pocks are used frequently. My initial educated guess was pocks, I had never seen the word written. I saw it spelled pox on a friend's blog. That friend is American and a good writer, so I figured I'd use pox this time following her, undoubtedly correct, example. Maybe I should consult the dictionary at some point...). Anyway, some examples are:
- Buddy Boy
- Buddy Buster
- Buddy Bus
- Snicker Doodles
- Toabster
- Little Man
- Knulletje
- Klein Mannetje
- Lieverdje
- Tobias de Bobias
- Toabs
- Speckles
- Speckly Face
- Krentebolletje

I guess many more will follow. I am sure every parent uses nicknames just like we do. I find the etymology of these nicknames quite confusing, inexplicable and interesting.

What is also interesting is the rapid development of Tobias' language. He now has quite some sounds he uses. He uses the syllables "pa" and "ma" and repeats those a couple of times (sometimes two times, which of course makes us think he is calling us :-)). But also "da", "ba", "wa" and some more things like that. I am sure there is nothing deliberate to it, but sometimes we can make it deliberate by making him repeat it after us. That does not always work, but sometimes it does and that's cute.

It is also very interesting to see how he starts to link certain words we use to objects an people. I think I told you before he sort of knows what "kiss"means. Well, now he knows what "ball" means because when we ask him "where is the ball" he will start looking for it and he will start playing with it. He also recognizes the words "mama" and "pappie". He looks at us when we say "where is mama" or "where is pappie".

I am sure the amount of words and sounds he uses and understands will keep increasing. Before we know it he will be talking and listening. Again, like many times before, I am amazed by the speed of his developments and I guess I could say proud of it as well...

Waterpokken

Past Friday Tobias was going to the day case. I was going to take him to the day care so I was the one getting him up and dressing him. While I was doing that I noticed a red spot on his tummy. I didn't think much of it, but closer inspection revealed a blister-like spot. I am one who pops things that are on my body so I popped the blister, just to make sure it was a blister and just to see what was inside. Well, there was a water-like substance inside. I still thought it was just a blister. Maybe his diaper had been rubbing on his tummy or something.

Anyway, I got him dressed, fed him, gave him a bit to drink and everything was fine. Then, when I got him ready to go outside by putting his coat on and everything, I felt a little bump on the back of his head as I was holding him. It was very similar to the little blister on his tummy. This is when it occurred to me that it might be something other than a blister, that it might be waterpokken (chicken pocks). Closer inspection of Tobias' head revealed more spots behind his ear. My diagnosis: waterpokken. Just to make sure I called the expert on such matters... mommy... and she had her colleague confirm it: chicken pocks. I decided to take him to the day care anyway because he was in good spirits and didn't seem to be bothered by it. They took him in because if he had infected other children it would have already happened before the spots started showing. She warned me though that by the time we'd pick him up he'd probably be covered in red spots.... and he was...

Tobias didn't start feeling bad until much later. He had a good day at the day care and saturday was fine too. The night from saturday to sunday is when he was not able to sleep. He woke up at one, as did we, and didn't go back to sleep until six or so, as did we... Sunday he was not feeling well at all. He was tired an did not have much of an appetite. He was so tired that he did sleep quite well that day. He also slept through the night on sunday but still was not feeling well on monday. Monday night he slept well again and today when I got home from work he was back to his happy self.

This picture was taken on monday night. As you can see he is doing OK, but covered in spots. Most of those spots had not opened yet at tha point although he already had some scabs too. The funny thing is that when he checks out his tummy he does not touch any of the spots but goes right for his belly button, as if the spots weren't there... odd...

Well, if nothing else I learned a valuable lesson: Do NOT pop spots, speckles or whatever on your child's body (the one I popped is the bigger one just above his belly button...)

Zwarte Piet

On the actual Sinterklaas day there was a "Sinterklaas breakfast" at the day care that Tobias goes to. We all went (although I had to leave a little early) and had a nice time, particularly enjoying seeing Tobias enjoy himself.

Tobias made himself a "zwarte pieten muts" (a black pete hat (a black pete is a helper of Sinterklaas)) last week that he got to wear for this occasion. The yellow stuf are his handprints, the blue thing is supposed to depict a feather that a "real" black pete wears on his hat. The black facial paint is the finishing touch, isn't it?

Tobias, zwarte piet, is unwrapping his gift here. He got a wobbly seal with a ball on his nose and a draw string to pull it forward. I don't know what he enjoyed more, the gift or the wrapping paper... But he had a good time, and his group leaders were so proud because he did not take his hat off once!

Sinterklaas

Hmmmm... how do I explain a guy in a red robe with a red mitre riding a white horse and tons of black helpers in even funnier and more colorful outfits handing out gingerbread dough balls (pepernoten) and presents to children on his birthday. On top of that you have to know that he rides the horse on the rooftops and the helpers go down the chimnies to put the presents in the shoes where the kids have to put a carrot for the horse......

Well, I guess Americans would have an equally hard time explaining a fat guy in a red suit with a hat riding a sleigh with reindeer through the air putting gifts in stockings.... The Dutch guy, who supposedly comes from Spain, is called Sinterklaas. That sort of sounds like Santa Claus and maybe they are similar, except Sinterklaas is celebrated on the 5th of December.

For practical reasons we celebrated at my parents this past sunday. Here is Tobias enjoying one of his gifts. It is a geometric shapes puzzle. He knows how to take it apart, but putting it together is a bit more challenging. I am sure he will figure it out soon. We had a nice time enjoying pepernoten, hot chocolate and gifts.

Brushing our teeth

Like I told you before, Tobias has his first tooth now. Well, even one tooth needs to be brushed, right? So I went out and bought him a tooth brush and some tooth paste. This past weekend we tried it out for the first time. The funny thing is that Tobias actually liked it.

I was prepared for a struggle, because as you can see I am sitting in the floor. But there was no struggle at all. I fact as you can see in this picture he is brushing his teeth (well, tooth I guess) all by himself.... Of course he had a little help from me too. I think he even enjoyed it! Now I am hoping he will keep liking it like this when more teeth come...

Tobias Crockett

Tobias is becoming quite the explorer. He is able to stand up and grab stuff. Sometimes he crawls into the kitchen and he will start banging one of the kitchen doors. This is not because he enjoys banging it (or maybe he does) but mainly because he will tip over when he tries to open it all the way. He can stand, grab, move a little, but not all together at the same time. So that's what makes opening the cabinet door all the way quite impossible....

He demonstrated that yet another time when he tried to open a drawer of our dresser in the bed room. He was standing against out bed with his back to the dresser. Then I grabbed something from the dresser so he got curious. He turned around and tried to grab a knob. Then he lost his balance and fell with his face on the carpet. That scared him a little bit, but not enough to keep exploring...

Here he is opening a kitchen drawer. Of course here he only has to sit and pull, but well, it is fun to watch him take every single thing in that drawer out an spread it out over our kitchen floor... 

Filling the Tub

I guess we all have some of those pictures that were taken when we were unaware, but embarrass us when we are older. I guess this would be one of those for Tobias. I will allow him to be mad at me, but I guess even he will have to admit that this is cute.... isn't it? I just couldn't resist...

As I have told you before, Tobias loves taking baths. Until now one of us would fill up the bath while the other would undress Tobias and get him ready for the bath. Recently Tobias started taking more of an interest in the process of preparing the bath. He especially enjoys watching the bath fill and bubble up. As he is able to climb pretty much everything now and stand up against it, he is also able to climb up the side of the bath tub and peek over the edge. That way he can enjoy the whole process first hand! And he loves it, as do we :-).

Tobias, I hope that I have not embarrassed you too much with this picture and that you will agree with me that it is a cute picture. If not you can always claim it is not you because I discretely left your face out of this picture :-).

Aunt Shelli

Like I told you before, aunt Shelli was over for a week during the week of Thanksgiving. That was a lot of fun. Tobias an aunt Shelli got to spend quite some time together. As a matter of fact, they got to spend a full day together, without me or mommy there. So, Tobias gave his aunt the full experience, including smiles, sleep, walk, poop, barf.... the full monty! :-). Shelli loved it (right? :-)).

Anyway, they had fun together and we had a good time too and enjoyed Shelli being around. We all hope she can come over again sometime soon. Fortunately, we will see her again in about three weeks when we go over to the US for Christmas.

The only thing is, we (almost) forgot to take any pictures of Tobias an Shelli together. Just before she left, literally because in this picture they are all set to leave for the airport, we remembered to take at least one picture... I guess we'll have to do a better job of taking pictures at Christmas.

First Tooth!

It is official.... Tobias has his first tooth!

It took quite a while for it to come out but it is now definitely there. I think Oma was the first one to really notice because last week he spent monday and tuesday with Opa and Oma. We noticed it on tuesday night when he came back home.

There is only one big drawback to this.... As I told you before Tobias sometimes confuses "give me a kiss" with "bite my nose". Well, that may become quite painful for us now.... But, well, we'll get over that. This past weekend I bought him a tooth brush and some tooth paste :-).

I think that the tooth coming out did not improve his cold and also bothered him in different ways. He did not cry a lot, but he was not as happy and a bit more tired than usual. Also he had his hand in his mouth a lot and drooled like a madman. Here he is chewing his teething toy, which came straight from the freezer. That I guess helped to numb his gums a little. Currently he is pretty much back to normal, except that now he has one tooth! Up to the next, hopefully a little less painful, one...

Tobias Lee Lewis

Tobias is becoming more and more of an independent musician. A while back I posted a picture where he is playing his own instrument. He also still loves when I play the piano and really wants to be a part of it. He doesn't really fit on my lap anymore when I play, so he crawls over. Then he climbs my chair. His latest move was moving himself over to the keyboard and holding on to the piano. Now, as you can see in this picture, he is able to reach and even play the keys with his hands. He doesn't need any help anymore, well, I just need to turn on the piano for him, that's all. And I have to tell you he enjoys it too! He laughs whenever he manages to actually play a key and make the piano make a sound.

I think his biggest problem right now is that he is unable to see what he is playing.... I guess it will take a while before he can do that all by himself. For now all he needs to do is wiggle his butt a little and he could be mistaken for Jerry Lee Lewis (as long as you are not listening :-)).

Thanksgiving in Gouda

Last week was Thanksgiving. We celebrated in Gouda. We had my parents, my brother and Lisa's sister over. Shelli was here for a week. She went to Paris with Lisa for a few days. She also visited Amsterdam and took care of Tobias for a day. That was nice for us and for her. She did that on Thanksgiving, pretty much while she was preparing the turkey for the oven. Tobias still had a cold he has had for more than a week. It was already a bit better, but it makes him tired, especially in the evening. So, he was tired when everybody was here too and I think it was a little much for him. He did like the company though as you can see here. He is having fun with Opa and Oma! And of course Tobias had both an uncle and an aunt over all at the same time! What a lucky guy huh? Unfortunately he was in bed while we were having Thanksgiving dinner, but then again he probably wouldn't have been able to enjoy that anyway. Shelli cooked most of the dinner. She prepared the turkey, made mashed potatoes and stuffing. Shelli and I made pumpkin pie together. So, all the main ingredients for a true thanksgiving dinner were there. Of course there was way too much food, but the dutchies enjoyed it too :-). Tobias' first Thanksgiving was nice, but I guess moreso for us than for Tobias himself...

My own instrument!

Not only does Tobias like to play my piano, he also has his own instrument! It is a keyboard/xylophone and of course it is much nicer and much more colorful than my piano... Fortunately for us it does not make as much noise. But Tobias likes it all the same. It even has some sheet music (not in this picture because one of Tobias' favorite things is to play with the music stand that is attached to it....) and xylophone drum sticks (or whatever you call those things...).

Here he is enjoying it and playing me quite the symphony. I really hope he will enjoy music as much or maybe even more when he grows up. At least he is off to a good start....

Reading skills

We try to read Tobias a story every night before he goes to bed. He seems to like that because usually he sort of smiles. Although, now that I am writing this I realize that he smiles particularly when the story is "uit", which means over. Then we "tap" the book and say "boom boom" and he loves that. I wonder whether that is because he liked the story so much or because he knows his bottle is coming :-).

Anyway, he now not only bites, drools on, waves, and smacks the book anymore, he also knows what "omslaan", which means turn page over", is. As you can see in this picture he also knows how to open up a book. So, I guess he's got all the moves involved in reading a book down. Now he just needs to learn how to read.... :-).

Piano lesson

I am glad that Tobias loves it when I play the piano for him. What is even better is that he enjoys playing himself. I guess he loves to make some noise because that's all he does right now. Although, he has made some improvements over time. He now plays with two hands and as you can see here he puts all his energy into it. It is fun to watch but good that we have a digital piano so we can turn the volume down because sometimes it is not so much fun to listen too, especially when he gets over-excited. Let's hope he doesn't figure out how to adjust the volume by himself anytime soon....

Making a mess

Tobias has found a new game: making the biggest mess possible.... He has discovered his own diaper bag. He was sort of pulling on it and then he pulled the strap and it fell over. When pulling the top he heard funny sounds, probably the toys that are in there. This aroused his interest even more and he started pulling the top until it opened. Then he found the dirty diaper baggies and man are those fun! So he started pulling them out, one by one. Then he started playing with them one by one. Then they flew all over the place one by one. Man, did Tobias have fun doing all that! In this picture you can see the result, one big mess... and in the middle of it a happy Tobias checking out his work. I have to admit it was quite a show to see.....

Daddy's Crib

As I told you before, Tobias spends one night a week with my parents. Sometimes a little more, when my parents allow us to go on a long weekend :-), but the regular schedule is one night a week, which is wednesday nights these days. My parents have a big attic and on that attic they store a lot of stuff. Most of it is stuff that has been in several attics through several moves but has not been touched (other than for the purpose of moving) in years. Well, now that there is a grandchild some of that stuff is allowed a second life, like some of my old toys. I think I have put some pictures with some of my old toys on before.

Anyway, on that attic they also found my crib and some baby blankets. That is what Tobias is sitting in and on in this picture. Nice huh? My son is sleeping in my crib :-).

Kissing

Tobias now seems to understand the word Kiss.... at least that's what we think or hope or something like that. Anyway, his kisses sort of constitute licking really. But, it is cute. Here we both had to laugh so hard that in mid-kiss Tobias started laughing too. Not only that, but he made it really hard to capture one of his kisses. And sometimes he confuses "Tobias, give me a kiss" with "Tobias, lick and bite my nose". He does this because we made a game out of that. He sort of bites your nose and then expects you to rub it on his tummy. For some reason that is loads of fun because he laughs and laughs whenever we do that. Great fun for us too by the way, although it may sound a bit disgusting, but hey, he's our kid you know :-).

Anyway, in this picture you can sort of see how it works an how much the participants enjoy it.

"Reading" the paper

Tobias loves reading, or should I say that he loves tearing apart the paper, magazines or anything else made out of paper that he can get his hands on. Here he is "reading" the newspaper with his greatgrandmother. Her house was the destination of one of his biking trips with my parents. My parents house is only 6 miles from her house, so that was a nice trip for them. My greatgrandmother also loves seeing him and as she does not see him as often she is always very surprised and amazed by how fast he grows and develops. I hope that she will be around long enough for Tobias to remember her. For now she is doing fine and she really enjoys when we visit with Tobias.

Well, those were some of the pictures my parents took during the past few weeks. It is nice for us to see how he spends his time when we are not around.... :-)

Tobias Biking

For the Dutch biking is pretty much as natural as walking. I think I mentioned before that biking is "poured into us with a porridge spoon" as we say, meaning that we start young. Moreso, we do not only bike for pleasure or sports, biking to us is also a very important mode of transport. For example, we don't really have a schoolbus, we ride our bike to school. To give you an idea of how important biking is in the Netherlands: there are more bikes than people in our country.

So, I guess my parents thought that Tobias should also start young.... My aunt gave my mom this bike (if you can call it that) for Tobias to use. I think he is a bit to young for it though, hence grandma's helping hand, but it is a good start! And it looks like he is liking it too, or not?

Biking with Opa

My parents also love to go biking with Tobias. They courteously waited until I had biked with him first, but then they took him out as well. As you can see Tobias is loving it and so is Opa. And Tobias has his own little steer, which he doesn't when he rides with me.... My parents live near a sugar beet factory and hence pretty much in beet country. That is what you see in the background, a mound of beets.

That brings me to an (maybe not so) interesting fact about the Netherlands: we eat beet sugar, as apposed to cane sugar eaten by most of the rest of the world as far as I know. At least I am sure about the Americans because I could only find cane sugar when I was there.

Anyway, this picture was taken not too far from my parents house.

Drinking without hands...

I think I have written about Tobias' weekly schedule. So, as you know, one day of that schedule (currently friday) is spent with Opa and Oma de Pee. This is great for Tobias, because he really gets to know and love his grandparents, for Opa and Oma because they really enjoy being grandparents, but also for us, primarily because of the advantages described above...

At Opa and Oma's Tobias also has a playpen. My dad likes to play around with him as he did here. He stuck the bottle between the bars where it would be stuck enabling Tobias to drink without hands. Some, or maybe even most of the toys in there belonged to me when I was a baby. I don't quite remember that, but there is one wooden rattle that he absolutely loves. That is probably his very favorite toy and according to my parents I also loved that thing.... Interesting huh.... I'll see if I can find a nice picture with Tobias playing with it.

By the way, the pictures I am posting today are taken by my mom and dad on the days Tobias spent with them. I just got them recently. This was taken about a month ago.

Higher grounds

Ever since Tobias started crawling around he has really been noticing the cats. But not only that, he has also been trying to get them or catch them or grab them or pet them or whatever it is he is trying to do but never succeeds at... His ability to get up and stand up, in addition to his ever increasing crawling speed gets him closer and closer to his goal, or so it seems.... The scratching post was always a safe haven for the cats. They would lie on that thing and observe Tobias from higher grounds. Well, those days are over.... Tobias is now able to reach those higher grounds as you can see in this picture. As you can see, Jip is not amused and getting the hell out of there. I guess the window sill is next....

Getting up!

You may wonder what is so special about this picture. Tobias has been able to stand for quite some time now, right? Well, for the past two weeks or so, Tobias has been able to get up and stand by himself without us assisting him. Of course he still has to hold on to something, but oh well, fair enough... He usually sort of drags himself up although he is getting better an faster every day. Anyway, whenever he gets up like this he starts giggling. Apparently he likes his newly acquired point of view. Until last thursday, whenever he did this I never had the camera close at hand, and by the time I got it the opportunity was already gone. Fortunately he can stand like this a lot longer now and that's what enabled me to take this picture. As you can see he is really enjoying it. Here he is using the couch to hold on to, but he also uses the chair, the play pen, his daddy, and basically anything else that will allow him to do so :-).

Here comes Tobias...

Tobias LOVES taking a bath. He has one of those seats that stick to the bottom and he really enjoys using that. We have all the other stuff too, you know, a tummy tub, a baby bath, a stand for both, but so far we mostly put him in the regular bath and one of us is in there with him. In this case mommy who I discretely left out of this picture. She was having some fun with Tobias as you can see. I heard lots of laughter as I was making Tobias a bottle and I thought I'd go check out what was going on. I found this little man with foam hair and beard..... As you can see Tobias was lauging as well!

Car Seat

I guess biking wore Tobias out... As you know Thursday is my daddy day. Friday Tobias stays with my parents. On Thursday afternoon/night I take him there. Last weekend we tried the car-seat, instead of the Maxi-Cosi, for the first time. This was in Lisa's car. We only had one seat, but we had already ordered a new one. That arrived yesterday so Tobias got to try it out today in my car, on our way to my parents. Well, I guess he liked it because to me he seems pretty comfy here.... :-). By the way, he also likes it when he is not sleeping, because he can look out the window now. That was not possible before, in the Maxi-Cosi. When we went out in Lisa's car this past weekend he was really enjoying the view and laughing as we rode along.... From now on when he is in the car, not only does he have a good view, if he chooses to enjoy that, but he is also riding forward like a normal person, instead of backward like a little baby in a Maxi-Cosi :-).

Biking with Tobias

The dutch are known for many things... In order of fame, based on observations of the average tourist in Delft, Gouda and Amsterdam and reading such classics as "The Undutchables": Coffeeshops, Legal Prostitution, Wooden Shoes, Windmills, Tulips, Cheese, Hans Brinker, Johan Cruijff..... etc. Somewhere in that list must be: bicycles... because biking is "poured in with the porridge spoon" (wordt er met de paplepel ingegoten) as we say. So, rather sooner than later should any dutch kid have their first biking experience. I have been out on my bike with Tobias in my belly carrier before, but today I mounted the bike seat. We went for a ride, and although initially Tobias had to get used to the feeling of it, I think he liked it. Of course I stopped to take a picture of which this is the result. Anyway, not only did Tobias get to ride the bike in the seat for the first time today, we also improved OUR mobility significantly!

New sweater!

Just after Tobias was born his grandmother gave him a sweater she had knitted herself. Of course that sweater is much too small now, but grandmother had been busy and she knitted another one! Tobias is wearing it in this picture. Isn't it nice? Since the weather has turned a lot colder in the past week it is now appropriate to wear. Judging from the size he will be able to wear it more often than the other one because we still had to sort of roll up his sleeves a bit. I wonder how long grandmother is going to keep up with him....? Who knows, maybe she is already working on a new one.... :-).

Tobias 'Ray'

I think I wrote before about how Tobias likes it when I play the piano. Now that he is more stable when he sits, and now that het has a booster seat, he does not necessarily have to sit in my lap anymore to play the piano by himself, and he likes that! Initially, I guess he had to get used to the fact that if you bang a key it makes a noise, even when daddy is not there, and that the piano is not made to drool on, and that the purpose is to hit the keys, not to eat the sheet music, and stuff like that. He seems to get all that now and he just plays, or maybe I should say pounds, the keys. It doesn't sound like much, but he is having loads of fun. When I took this picture he was actually enjoying himself at the piano for like half an hour or so, without interference, well, except this "staged" impersonation of Tobias 'Ray'.... :-)

Hurricane Rita: Back to normal

We 'webbed' (chat with webcam) with Lisa's parent earlier tonight. Of course the aftermath of the hurricane was still an issue we discussed. The sole fact that we were able to 'web' is a sign that things are back to normal. Lisa's dad is back to work at the UTMB hospital in Galveston and the entire UTMB campus has been left unharmed in terms of storm damage and flooding. The patients were moved to other hospitals but they have returned. Tomorrow Lisa's parents will have new furniture delivered (they already ordered that before hurricane Rita came along...) so logistics in the are seem to have been restored as well.

In conclusion, everything in the area where Lisa's parents live is pretty much back to normal. Of course many others further east are still struggling to recover from the massive damage hurricane Rita caused. I guess we, but of course mainly Lisa's parents, have been pretty darn lucky......

This concludes my 'coverage' of hurricane Rita.

Falling asleep...

This week Tobias is suffering from a cold. His nose is kind of stuffed up and he is sneezing a lot. This results in him having trouble going to sleep. Also he doesn't sleep as long as he normally does, that is, during the day. Fortunately, his night sleep is quite regular. Anyway, because he hardly sleeps during the day he gets really really tired. He does not like to sleep during the day anyway, so he fights it. Today he was fighting it too. I put him in his play pen and he tried to stay awake and keep playing or at least doing something.... That something ended up in screaming so I picked him up and sat him down on the couch. Well, that did him in and I think he took the term "falling asleep" a bit too literal, because, well...., he doesn't seem to be sitting in this picture now does he? In this case I can honestly say that he "fell asleep"! Now, how cute is that?! (By the way: notice the shoes. His mommy got him those this week... nice huh?)

Actions with purpose

Tobias loves to just sit and play. He can do that for long periods at a time. Of course now that he can crawl faster and faster he wants to do that too, but I love to watch him "investigate" his toys. Today I introduced a new toy for him, this lovely train. When you push the yellow thing, depicting a dog, it rides and plays a song and it whistles. Of course Tobias did not know that when I first gave it to him. After I showed it to him a couple of times he figured it out for himself and had to laugh and laugh, especially because not only does the train rides and plays a song and whistles, but also because in the exhaust pipe in the front there is an orange thing, depicting a cat, that goes up and down.... He loves that! I guess what I am trying to say is that Tobias is getting more and more purpose to his actions. He crawls towards something and then picks it up to play with it, he throws stuff on the floor counting on us to pick it up (that's so funny, right...?), and in this case he realizes (or at least seems to realize) that if he pushed the yellow thing something happens with the train (or maybe in his terms; the big blue thing.....)

Hurricane Rita: House intact

We received a phone call from Dickinson earlier this evening. Since power was back on in Dickinson they were allowed to return. At first glance everything seems OK with Lisa's parents' house. No windows have blown out and the roof is still in place and intact. Like I said, power is on and the telephone is working as well (how else would they have called us...). The only thing they don't have yet is hot water. My take on that is that the gas must have been turned off for safety reasons...

This news is a great relief to me, to Lisa, but most of all to Lisa's parents! We only had a brief conversation. They just wanted to let us know everything seems OK, but they had to go back to Lisa's sister's to get their stuff. They want to do that as soon as possible and preferably before traffic starts getting bad... So, I guess they'll be sleeping in their own bed tonight and waking up in their own house tomorrow. Once again, a great relief to all of us!

Hurricane Rita: Everybody safe

Last night we spoke to Lisa's parents and sister and they are and have been safe throughout the hurricane. We spoke to them when they had the worst behind them. They had power and there was no apparent damage to the house or cars. There was stuff flying around, like tree branches and stuff, but that was about it. They are not allowed to return to Dickinson yet, but it is clear that the Dickinson area was hit much harder than where they are right now. So, now we're waiting for the green light for them to return to Dickinson.

Standing up!

As I have told quite a few times before, the milestones seems to be passing by in a very fast pace. Today we reached another big one.... standing up! As you can see he has to hold on to the play pen. Also I had to put him up like this, but once in place he can stand like this for minutes at a time! I have my hands around him, just to catch him in case he falls but I really don't have to hold him or adjust him at all while he is standing... he is doing it all by himself. Once he gets down he just sort of "throws" himself onto his butt and he seems to be fine with that. Personally I was really surprised and impressed by his stamina... This picture was taken when he stood by himself for the first time. He stood there for over three minutes, just holding on to the play pen with two hands (sometimes just one hand) and laughing and giggling most of the time he was standing there.... Once again, a moment of great parental pride for me.....

Interactive play

As Tobias is rolling, crawling and sitting around he is improving his skills in all those fields, including stability when he is sitting. This enables him to undertake various activities when he is sitting, like playing with his multiple headed ball thingy.... (or whatever you want to call that thing laying in front of him in this picture). Initially he just wanted to pick it up and stick it in his mouth, but recently he seems to be more interested in daddy rolling it towards him, because whenever I do so he rolls, hits or pushes it straight back to me. So, with this developments it has become possible to have some interactive play with Tobias and that is tons of fun for the both of us!

Crawling around

Tobias is really crawling now! He is getting faster and is increasing his reach every day. Not only that, but he is loving it too! He will go after a toy, after electrical wires, after a magazine laying around, after the cats, after mommy or daddy, or just aimlessly crawling around..... This is lovely to see and it is obviously amusing to him as well because most of the times he is laughing as he goes. It seems that he sometimes understands that we want him to come to us when we call him, although any distraction when he is on his way may stop him and change his direction instantly. His crawling endeavors will also take him to funny places at times, like here where he ended up right under mommy's chair :-).

Cuddling with mommy

As I have told you Tobias is moving around more and more and of course that makes him tired at times. It is at those times there is nothing more comforting to him than to cuddle with mommy or daddy. Here he is cuddling with mommy and loving it. A lot of times he will just fall asleep like this. I can tell you it is nice for mommy and daddy too! Don't they make a cute pair like this? That's what I thought when I shot this picture.

Hurricane Rita: Evacuation

As I am writing this we have had a couple of days of holding our breath. This has to do with Hurricane Rita because Dickinson, where Lisa's parents live, is right in the affected area. Initially the predictions were for the eye of Rita to pass straight over Dickinson, but "fortunately" (if I may say that...) it hit a little further east in a much less populated area. Lisa's parents, her brother and the cats evacuated on wednesday to Lisa's sister's place to the north west of Houston. We spoke to them this morning and they are fine where they are. They had a brief power out and lots of rain, but that's it. Of course there is no way of knowing what shape their house in Dickinson is in at this time, but judging from the path Rita took is seems that it could have been worse... We're still holding our breath somewhat until we find out.

Using Utensils...

Every wednesday Tobias goes to the daycare. I take him in the morning but before I do that I write in his notebook. This is a way the daycare communicates with parents when the children can't tell the stories for themselves (which means until the children are about 18 months old). It is a nice way to communicate, because not only does it help the parents and the daycare to communicate, it also creates a sort of a diary. So, I try my best to keep them posted on his developments every week and so do they (of course we also communicate in person... :-)). Yesterday they wrote that Tobias had eaten a slice of bread using a fork. That was hard to believe or imagine and kind of cool. So today I thought I'd try that at home..... As you can see here it worked fine, although I had to cut the bread and prick the pieces on the fork. Also I had to make sure the plate with the bread on it was out of reach so he would not grab a piece with his free hand... I do think he likes eating this way, but I am not sure if he likes the bread better than he does his oatmeal, but then again "a change of food makes one eat" (which is a literal translation of a dutch saying...) so, we'll keep trying different things.

Restless Sleep...?

Judging from how we put him to bed and how we find him when we get him out of bed Tobias must be a restless sleeper... Most of the times we put him in bed laying on his back like a normal person, head on one end, feet on the other. A while back I posted a picture where he had turned himself over. Well, before that he already started turning himself around. Now he is also moving around and if you add all these motions together there is no telling how we find him in the morning. Today he added his newly acquired capability of getting himself into a sitting position.... resulting in me finding him like this when I got him out of bed... cute huh? Not only that, but it is also time for me to lower his mattress a notch before he manages to drag himself out of bed....

Cowboy Tobias!

Here is Tobias sitting on (or is it in?) his rocking horse. Well, on what he may now consider his rocking horse... Why do I say that? Well, this rocking horse was given to me by my grandfather when I was Tobias' age (or maybe for my first birthday, I don't remember that accurately :-)). It was relatively recently used by my cousin Carolien's daghter Sabine and yet even more recently returned to me for Tobias to use. So, technically speaking it is my rocking horse Tobias is sitting on or in here. Since I am not using it that often anymore I guess he can consider it his as you can see he does. I think it is important for Tobias to keep all options for future developments and plans open, including becoming a professional cowboy... It looks like he has got what it takes :-)

Can I sit on the couch?

As I have said quite some times before, the development of Tobias is going really fast. Sometimes though, I think he wants to go a bit too fast. OK, he has been able to sit by himself for about a month now and he is getting better and better at it. He is becoming more stable when he sits, but also more agile. He can move from one toy to another, grab it while sort of laying and then come back into sitting position. Also he can crawl and them get back in sitting position in a different place. I think his intention in this picture was to sit like the "big people" sit... He must have been sitting like this for 15 minutes or so, just pulling himself up on the couch, making noises and, every once in a while, look around him so daddy could take a good picture... :-)

Cool dude!

On most of my daddy-days I take Tobias into town for a walk. This gives him the opportunity to be outside and me the opportunity to get some groceries and stuff. As summer approached and came, the sun in Tobias' eyes became more and more of an issue during our walks. So, I decided to get him some sunglasses... At that time (that must have been July I think) and the weeks to come the sunglasses seemed totally wasted on him... Whenever we put them on his face, he would take them off immediately. Today is a beautiful and sunny day so, when we went into town I thought I'd try the sunglasses again. Well, he didn't take them off. As a matter of fact he enjoyed having them on and I think he even realized why he was wearing them. I didn't even have to readjust them during our walk. I only had to take them off whenever we went into a store because, you know, that's just common courtesy, right? And of course Tobias is a descent kid who knows good manners :-). As we were walking, not only was Tobias enjoying his sunglasses, but also lots of attention from everyone because, well... he looks sooooooo cool! Doesn't he?