Music is Cool!

About a week and a half ago Lisa picked up Tobias from the daycare and they told her that they had a music session that day with a music teacher and everything. Since Tobias still is one of the smallest in the group and sometimes has a hard time with all the bigger children screaming and running around him, they expected a music session to be tough for Tobias.... well.... they thought wrong!

Tobias was in fact the only kid in there who did not cry, but instead thoroughly enjoyed it! All the others were crying and very uncomfortable with the music teacher and the music session. At the daycare they were very surprised at this but as you can imagine (especially if you have been reading this blog in the past) that I was not one bit surprised. Tobias is exposed to music every day. I play the piano or guitar (although not often enough) for him quite a lot. We play a lot of music on the stereo and I sing to Tobias a lot. According to Lisa I also whistle a lot although I am not necessarily aware of that....

Anyway, Tobias has quite some exposure to music and apparently that shows. Here he is banging my bongos, well actually sharing them because he had the small one and I had the big one to bang on, but hey, I had to take a picture... :-) As you can see he is quite into it, eyes closed easing into the music... grooving... and what else (or maybe I just accidentally shot this picture when his eyes were closed...) 

Goofing off

A while ago I wrote about the problem that once Tobias sees the camera he comes to it to get the strap or sometimes the whole thing. He reacts to every sound the camera makes, from "bling" when it comes on, to "zzzzz" when it focuses.

So, sometimes there is nothing I can do but to let it happen and start goofing off a little.... This produces goofy pictures like this one :-) Most of the times he gets so close that my compact digital camera can not get into focus. This is one of the better results....
I like it, love his eyes... but then again, I love everything about my little boy.... ;-) 

Nana, Nana

First off I need to apologize to my loyal readers... I have been "off the air" for a while. I have not minded that one bit because the main reason is that I have been on a skiing trip to France. That trip was great. Great weather, great snow, and great company. What more can you want?!

After I got back however, there was a lot of work waiting for me keeping me busy until late at night (and sometimes even early in the morning...). Tonight I finally had some time to go over my pictures and see what there is to publish... So, I am back and hopefully back in my routine... We'll see.

My previous post was about Tobias being able to stand on his own. He has become quite accomplished at that... and he is taking a liking to it. He is also walking around the house pushing chairs. I am sure he will be able to walk all by himself sometime soon. Tonight he actually walked needing only one hand.

Anyway, in this picture he is standing and holding on to the desk. This is not what I was talking about. The interesting part of this picture is that he is pointing to the phone saying "Nana, Nana", which means "Nonny, Nonny". As I have written before we have a webcam session with my inlaws every week. Currently we use the phone and a webcam (we bought a speaker phone because voice over internet is just not quite "there" yet, especially not on busy times like sunday afternoons). So, every time we talk to Nonny we use the phone, hence Tobias' association of Nonny and phone. I guess he likes our weekly webcam sessions :-)

Another funny thing he does is when we hand him the phone (connected or not) he will push a couple of buttons, put it to his ear and say "Nana, Nana". Cute huh? 

Standing up!

For months now, Tobias has been able to stand or pull himself up against something. In other words, Tobias could get up and stand, but not without support. Well, since this past sunday he can! He would sometimes stand without support by accident but that would be like 2 seconds and then he would sit back down again. Now he can stand for 10s of seconds at a time. This picture was the first time he was standing long enough for me to grab the camera and take a picture... This was during our weekly webcam session with Lisa's parents.

Yesterday was yet another milestone day! He can get up without any help or support! That is so funny to watch. First he sits on his knees. Then he gets up on all fours. Then he bends his knees. Then he tries to get his hands off the floor and balance himself and then he gets up by stretching his knees. Yesterday evening he could not stop doing that, so apparently he likes it.

The big question remains: when will he be able to take his first step all by himself?! Well, I guess that's just a matter of time (isn't it always :-)). 

Looking out the window

Tobias is a curious kid.... He loves just hanging out on the couch and look out the window. When someone passes he may laugh or try to get a closer look. When children are playing in the street he just watches them. And he loves pulling the curtains to get an even better view. It a a lot of fun to watch him watching....

The thing is that it is probably even more fun now that he is a bit taller. It is much easier to look out the window now and much easier to reach the curtains.... and much easier to reach the plant! He likes plants, but sometimes a bit too much to our liking... The plant in this picture has not fallen.... yet, but as Tobias gets stronger... I still think his main purpose of standing like this is looking out the window.

The window sill is also a favorite spot for the cats, so sometimes Tobias is standing there playing with the cats. He likes grabbing their faces, but they don't. I guess they'll have to compromise. In thins picture he is just concentrating on something that is happening outside... 

Sharing Toys

Lisa has a break from school this week, which gave her time to do some catching up with her friends. Liesbeth and Annalief came by our house this tuesday. For Tobias this meant that he had to share toys with Annalief, for example this "sound table thing" that they are sharing in this picture. Normally this would not be in our kitchen, as it is here, but Annalief is rather close to walking and she pushes anything she can hold on to and move around the house, including this toy. So, they ended up playing together in the kitchen. Apparently that was quite a funny scene, but I wasn't there to see it. So, I am happy Lisa was there to take a picture.....

That reminds me of the story I tried to put on this blog before but couldn't because it failed to publish. That caused me a lot of frustration, but what I was saying is that sometimes I wonder why I take pictures. I titled the post "To Camera or not to Camera?".

Of course I know why I take pictures, in fact, there are several reasons. One is for my own records, and those of Lisa. Another one is for Tobias. I know how great it is for me to see pictures of my childhood and I would not want to deprive Tobias of that pleasure. A third reason is to put them on this blog :-). And there are probably many other reasons. Not only do we take pictures of Tobias, we also shoot film every once in a while. I know there is very little footage of me as a child. I think it is a total of about 30 minutes or so, but it is valuable to me. So far we have about three hours of film of Tobias and I intend to make even more. So, when he is older he will have plenty of footage to watch.

The thing is, there are also some drawbacks to taking pictures and shooting film. One is that Tobias is very aware of a camera. That is why I wanted to write this story with the candid shot of him playing with his snake toy. Most of the times when he hears the "bling" or "beep" of a camera switching on he turns to look at it. And then suddenly he is more interested in the strap or the lens cap than he is in whatever he is playing with.... I guess he wants what daddy has or something :-).

A second drawback is the fact that you don't "live" the moment you are capturing. You are "viewing" it on a very tiny screen, which creates a distance. This is especially the case when filming. In my experience the richest pictures are pictures taken by the mind's eye... Somehow a camera of any kind disables or demotes the mind's eye. It is hard to explain, but a moment's experience is so much richer when there is no camera in between. So, sometimes I regret "having" to take a picture.

Don't worry though, I myself enjoy my pictures, movies, and blog a lot. Also, I want Tobias to have pictures and movies of himself when he grows up. I have enjoyed that a lot and I am sure he will too. So, I will keep on filming and taking pictures, but at the same time I will definitely keep on capturing moments and experiences just through my mind's eye.

(I hope this post makes sense...)

Farm Animals

Last week Tobias got a belated birthday gift from one of my friends from school. It was a playmobil set with farm animals. He loves it! In this picture he is holding the cow and the boy. There is also a sheep and a pig in this picture and in the little container in the background is a tree, a horse, a girls and a wagon. Loads of fun.

Being on the subject of farm animals, Tobias has mastered the sound of a cow. In Dutch a cow says "booh" instead of "mooh". When I ask him (in Dutch) "What does a cow say?" he answers "bvvoooooah". He puts a lot of enthusiasm into it too! It is really funny and of course yet another sound/word in the vocabulary. The most amazing thing was though, when he had the farm set for just a day or so, I held up the cow and asked "what does he say?". To this question Tobias also made the cow sound! Apparently he not only knows the sound a cow makes, but also what a cow looks like..... or so it seems :-).

What makes it even more interesting/convincing is that when I hold up another animal or ask for what another animal says he does not answer..... So, there must be some association between that brown thing with the while patches, the word "cow", and the sound "bvvooooooah".