He isn't running yet, but he's walking a lot more. He can get 10 or so steps in at a time without falling and it's so cute. We got one video of a few steps (including an impressive magazine throw) and I'll work on getting more. Here's a video of him practicing at the Farmer's Market with daddy's help. He's talking more, using more sign and vocal words, and just communicating better in general. He loves to dance and often when I start singing or put on music he'll just start dancing. He does it at school too.
He has been sick, like babies are. He managed to get a bilateral ear infection followed by a recurrence in one ear 2 weeks later. He had 2 rounds of antibiotics and the second hurt his stomach a lot and caused diarrhea. He also had hand, foot, and mouth followed soon by roseola. Basically, there's a checklist of things babies get and he's ticking all the boxes. He's also started to get toddler angst. He'll try to do something (today it was putting a toy into a bag) and he doesn't quite have the coordination so he'll have a melt down. Lay his head on the floor and cry. Or throw his head back (which ends up hurting when he hits the floor). It's cute but also really frustrating when we just want to help him eat or play with his toys. It's a new and exciting stage!
He participated in another baby science experiment. This one was on perception of negative emotions. They want to see if babies can differentiate sad from angry from scared, etc. He watched a bunch of videos of people reacting and they video taped him. No skull cap this time.
We're spending more time outside since the weather has improved. We've been to the playground several times. He tries out the cuisine: pine cones, sand, and sticks. His favorite is the swing. He cackles when he goes high. He likes swinging on my lap too (they have a molded plastic seat swing). He is fascinated by dirt in other contexts too. He likes to liberate it from the confines of the planters and help it search for a better home on the floor, the window sill, and his mouth. We have over 50 plants so it'll take him a while to make much progress. We tried to go canoeing at the UW waterfront last weekend. They have a weight cut-off of 25 lb and he just missed. We fed him a big lunch and lots of water but he was only 24.2 lb. Oh well. We'll try again in a few months once I've fattened him up.
We taught him to get off the couch (and bed) backward so he doesn't hurt himself. He's very good at that and has started applying it to many other situations. He crawls down hills backward, climbs down steps backward, and even goes down the slide backward....It's so cute I'm not going to bother trying to correct him. He's nothing like Pip in this regard! I'll enjoy it while it lasts.