The New Dad Blog

Jude Keeps Anna Warm and Cozy

 
Jude will get on the couch these days and ask to hold Anna. He says he is going to keep her warm and cozy as he gives her a hug. Marcy shot this photo earlier this past week as they snuggled together on the couch. Adorable.

A couple of new developments from Jude this week. One thing I have just noticed is that Jude will say "watch this" when he wants to show us something he can do. He was hammering in his pegs tonight when he called for me and then said it. He was very proud of himself for being able to use the hammer to bang in all eight pegs. No doubt we will be hearing that a lot in coming months and years and I hope we always give Jude our full attention when he says it.

We have designated a quiet place for Jude when he gets really upset or when he does something naughty. We put him in the basement bedroom and close the door, he has a couple of books in there and a little chair so he can calm down. For the past month if he does something wrong we will just say "Uh-oh" and take him down to the basement bedroom. It has worked well we thought, until tonight. We were all sitting down to dinner and Jude wanted to keep playing but we told him it was time for dinner. He had a complete meltdown and he asked to go down to his quiet place, we didn't even need to mention it. He seems to like it down there a lot, so I am not sure if he really sees it as punishment any more. We will need to monitor this in coming days and see if we need to change our discipline strategy.

Jude is very much into togetherness. When the three of us sit down to the table for a meal he will say "Dinner with mommy, dinner with daddy, we are having dinner together." He says it in a lilting voice that makes it quite clear he loves this togetherness. And if we happen to get eating the same food, such as tonight when Jude and I were each having an orange. He looked at me and smiled and said, "we are having an orange together."

A Trip to the National Western Stock Show

Every January in Denver the National Western Stock Show takes place. This show is a big deal with people coming from all over the world to see the latest and greatest in the agriculture and livestock industry. We thought Jude would like it because there is a kids area with lots of animals. But as you can see from the photo above the big attraction was the farm equipment area. This was heaven for Jude. There were about 10 big pieces of equipment on display and Jude made the most of it. While Marcy was off breastfeeding Anna, Jude and I spent about half an hour with this equipment - him climbing all over them and me taking pictures.

They also had a parade downtown with horses and bulls earlier in the week that Marcy took Jude and Anna too that he talked about all week. But Saturday was really exciting for him. He couldn't stop talking about the big diggers and tractors he saw, and he occasionally mentioned the animals.

Jude has now started sharing with us his preferences. He will now say "climbing on the diggers is fun" or "I like playing with my dump truck" or just simply "that was fun!". Most of the time none of this is a surprise to us, but it is nice to hear him articulate his feelings about something.

A few weeks ago I mentioned Jude asks this question a hundred times a day, "Zis is I won know" as in "this is I don't know." Well recently he has been saying this for things we know he knows. So now, we will just say "what do you think it is?" and he will smile and provide us the answer. It has become a bit of a game.

How Come Jude is Upside Down?

I have played this game with Jude since he was about six months old. I grab him by the ankles, dangle him upside down and say, "How come Jude is upside down?" Jude laughs and he now asks for "upside down" on a regular basis. Marcy took the photo above when I met them at the park during my lunch hour on Thursday. It was a glorious 60 degree day in Denver and we made the most of it at the park. The Thursday lunch meetup has become part of the routine - with Beatriz at home doing cleaning it is easier for Marcy to get out of the house for a meal and I can usually get away for an hour. If the weather is nice we meet in a park before getting lunch.

Another game we often play is "Get Jude," where I will say "I am coming to get Jude" and he will squeal and run away from me. Then I will run and scoop him up then throw him down on the couch. We sometimes play this game 10-20 times a day, particularly if I am watching football or golf. He will watch with me for a few minutes then he gets bored. So a mischievous smile comes on his face and he says to me, "Get Jude."

A couple of new things that we noticed this week for the first time. Jude spends a lot of time with his books and he knows many of them word for word. We still ask him about things on the pages sometimes and this week we noticed him joking with us. When we asked what color the balloon was (blue), he would smile and say red, knowing he was wrong. What does the garbage truck carry, and he would say milk and laugh. You can see he knows he is fooling around and he thinks it is funny.

With language he is getting better at differentiating between Jude, I, me, and my. Now, when we ask him, "Jude do you want eggs or toast," he will say "I want eggs" whereas before he would say "Jude wants eggs." Similarly, if we ask "Where is your milk?" he will say "My milk is...." These are subtle changes but they show that his language skills continue to develop well.

One last thing is that yesterday for the first time he actually blew his nose. We would always ask him to blow it when he had a snotty nose, but he never knew what we meant, This time he understood and breathed hard through his nose.

One of Jude's favorite pastimes is to read books on the couch. Now, Anna is getting in on the act. No doubt she will become an expert in diggers and dump trucks before too long.

Mommy Do It

We started off this week with some glorious 60 degree weather and Jude was able to get out in the backyard and play for the first time in weeks. He thoroughly enjoyed his time outside playing with his shovel and wagon.

Jude will often say "Mommy do it" or "Daddy do it" when he can't do something or he wants something changed. Most of the time we can oblige him but earlier this week he said it and we both laughed. There was a beautiful sunrise and the clouds were all orange and pink. Then eventually the sun came out and the clouds turned to white. This was a little disappointing for Jude and he wanted the clouds back to orange. He said "Mommy do it" referring to making the clouds orange again. He really does thing we are like Gods at this age and we can do anything but we just had to tell him we would have to wait until the next morning.

He is getting a lot more playful these days. He has just started asking to "play together" and he will want to play with his cars, diggers or puzzles on the floor with us.

This weekend the big outing was to the Colorado Railroad Museum. Jude loves trains and we had never been to this museum. It was a really cold day and most of the trains are outside so there was hardly anyone there. We spent most of the time inside with the model trains that Jude loved but he also wanted to get outside to see the "big trains." He had a blast climbing all over and exploring these trains. I snapped this photo below of Jude in the engine compartment of one of the trains there.