Leaps and Bounds

I don't know if all the new people and places is good for him, if he was just due for some developmental steps, or if the new environment has given him the chance to display skills he already had and hadn't had an outlet for. But, whatever the cause, Nicholas has gotten much more expressive and interactive in the past couple days. He is a child who knows what he wants and is coming up with ways to express it.

It has actually been such a dramatic jump that I'm not entirely convinced that all of these things are intentional. In fact, when he answered "Yeah" when I asked if he was ready for bed tonight, I was positive it was not intentional. But when he was fussy and I set him down and told him to walk where he wanted to go and he walked straight for the high chair, I think he actually may have been trying to tell me he was hungry. He certainly was excited to eat when I then fed him.

He has also started moving our hands to get them to do what he wants. So when he couldn't figure out how to open a cabinet, he grabbed my hand and put it on the handle. And when he was sitting and playing and wanted to walk over to something on the other side of the room, he grabbed my hands to pull himself up. And when he thought I was holding him back, he pulled my hands off of him. (In this last case it was counter-productive, because if I had actually let go of him he would have fallen, but he didn't get quite that far in the thought process.)

He has also been talking up a storm in the past couple days. He has a couple sets of sounds that really sound remarkably like real words and phrases, but we really aren't sure about intentionality. He says "hi" a lot all of the sudden. Is it just his syllable of the week or is he actually saying hi? Who knows. The other two phrases of the day seem like they have to be coincidence. When Joe asked "How are you?" it really sounded like Nicholas replicated it. But that seems way beyond his capability. And he has been saying a string of syllables that sound remarkably like "I get it." He then does usually reach for something, but he is constantly reaching for something, so I'm willing to chalk that up to coincidence as well. Even the proud mother I am, I seriously doubt these are actual words. Mostly I'm just excited that he is babbling a lot more, likely from being around lots of people constantly for a week.

Another new discovery in Nicholas-land is that whoever is holding him when he is looking in the mirror is in two places. He suddenly has started looking at us in the mirror and then turning to look at us in person. And looking back again. It is as though he has suddenly realized that Mommy (or Daddy) is both holding him and in front of him and is trying to figure it out.

He has also gotten much more active at looking around the person who is holding him to see the people and things beyond. And squirming out of your lap when he wants to be somewhere different.

You can also see it in the peas incidents Joe wrote about. Nicholas figured out he couldn't cry with his mouth open, so was whimpering with his mouth closed. But when he grabbed the spoon from me and had his hand over the scoop part he started crying with his mouth open, having put together the pieces that if he had the spoon I couldn't sneak peas in while he opened his mouth. I've been outsmarted by a 7-month old.

I haven't done a very good job of articulating the change because in many ways it is hard to put my finger on. But at moments during the past couple days it has been like I could see the baby being replaced by the little boy in front of my eyes. These developmental changes seem to come in such spurts.