Kisses and Little Misses

Welcome May and all of its promised flowers!

There weren't as many "April showers" this month as in years previous, which made outings all the more doable (and enjoyable!)  Here we are at Wheeler Historic Farm:

 

Still, we did have a few showers, here and there.  Fortunately, we had plenty of fun indoors!  Here we are on a blustery, rainy afternoon (someone's legs are getting longer, which makes this airplane and other toys a whole lot much more fun!)

That doesn't mean we didn't have some less than perfect days.  At the very beginning of the month, we took Atticus to get his MMR and Varicella immunizations.  He developed a fever two days later, which lasted for about 20 hours.  I hadn't realized how very blessed we have been with his health until then.  Watching our limp, exhausted little boy was excruciating.  Yet even through the fever, his cute little personality shone through.  Here he is, trilling away with me on the couch:

Yeah, it was both scary and heartbreaking for us parenting greenhorns.  But the fever did pass and we've been enjoying good health in our home for a few weeks now.  Hooray!

Another thing to celebrate is how communicative Atticus has become  He tries new words all the time.  Here are some of the more consistent ones (the newest ones are in red)

• hi
• dadda
• tickle
• cheese
• "hoff hoff" (dog)
• monkey sounds
• car sounds
• chicken
• apple
• nanana (banana)
• baa (sheep)
• moo
• neigh
• oink
• lion sounds
• dinosaur sounds
• sh! when we're in Daddy's room while he sleeps (he even puts a finger to his lips)
• ooole done (all done)

Even more consistent, however, are some of the signs he has learned:

• eat (twists his hand in front of his mouth)
• more (he'll often skip this and just say "eat" again and again)
• all done (waves his hands like a crazy person)
• gimme gimme (this one is a constant.  Instead of pointing with his index finger lately, he's taken to pointing with all his fingers and fluttering his fingers at them)

He's still eating lots of good food (I feel like his appetite doubled ever since he got over being sick for so long!)  He absolutely adores apples but doesn't love the skins.  Solution?  He pulls out pieces and leaves a trail of apple skin behind him as he lugs his beloved apple around.  

A new food Grandma Zoe introduced him to is ice cream.  At first she needed to use the airplane technique to get him to try it, but after just a bite or two he was fully on board the ice cream train!

He's still making tortillas with Grandpa Bob and Grandma Marti (he even rolled a couple of them out a little with his rolling pin!)

 He's still stacking and pulling anything he can get his hands on so that he can climb.  Here is one instance when he dragged a chair to our room so he could try to see Dane while he was asleep.  After working with the door knob for a little while he got back down and started knocking.

One of my favorite developments this month was his kisses!  Now the title may have been a bit misleading.  Atticus has not, in point of fact, kissed any little misses.  But he gave me his first official kiss on April 14 and he's been melting our hearts ever since.

Please ignore the mamma in this one.  Shudder!  But this was one of his first times so I had to keep it!

Often his kisses lately are just leaning in with his cheek so he can be kissed, but we still get some very sweet open mouthed, fish kisses.

 Speaking of kisses, here the poor little fellow is during a Mother's Day photoshoot I forced him into.  He certainly is patient for one so young!

Another "kissable" attribute for this boy?  The fact that he is finally showing more affection- in his energetic, wiggly, wrestling way, of course.  Here was a sweet moment I caught a second too late.  He had his arm up on Dane's shoulder and looked perfectly content to sit on Daddy's lap:

Now that we have the "Kisses" part of the title out of the way, let's move on to the "Little Miss" part...

We have a next door neighbor who is positively adorable.  She is 2+ years older than Atticus, and dotes on him like you wouldn't believe.  Every time she sees "Baby Atticus" she runs out to say hi and talk to him.  We've spent multiple afternoons with him chasing after her on his walker or having her push him around on his little airplane.

Well, this month the Little Miss got an electric car and has started taking Atticus on "dates" around our houses.  I am pretty sure this is Atticus's absolute favorite thing to do in the whole, wide world.  If you saw the way he smiles when he sits next to her, you'd agree.

Here they are on their first "date."  When it was time to stop, Norah pulled up and told Atticus, "I'll be back tomorrow for another date!"  True to her word, the next couple of days she would come and knock on the door to see if "Baby Atticus could go on another date."  I can't help but laugh every time I think about these two.  You couldn't write it better!

And now for the elephant in the room...

No, our little guy is still not walking.  We are, however, feeling way more confident now that he is letting us hold his hands to walk.  We've only been at it for a week and he looks like he could just let go and walk any old time!  Whether or not he actually will is another story, of course!

But for now, we're just enjoying the fact that he actually wants to hold Mommy and Daddy's hand.  :)

P.S.  Sooooo...  I wrote all of this during Atticus's nap today.  I promise, at the time I wrote it, it was all true.  But when he woke up, the little man was determined to prove me wrong.  Long story short?  He walked--for real-- for the very first time!