I think I've seen this before.

I caught Hank doing this the other day:

I left him in the middle of the floor with some toys so that I could grab my water bottle from the upstairs bedroom. I come back and he has ignored all the toys I left him with and has instead focused on increasing entropy (NERD... even though I know it's not really used correctly. Whatever.)

Reminds me of someone else I know...

Johnny - 23 months

I guess I need to post something

I know. I've been gone. [insert excuse here]

So Hank is full-on crawling now. Okay, maybe not the kind of crawling you see those adorable babies doing on diaper commercials, but his crazy spastic crawl gets him where he wants to go. Which is always toward Johnny and whatever Johnny is currently playing with. Hank has yet to figure out how to move his hands and knees in sync and instead just randomly throws a hand here, a straight leg there, a knee out the side. It's actually quite adorable. However, this new ability to move means that he's squirmier than ever. This kid was already quite the handful when being held (my Uncle Charlie described it as wrestling with a 25 pound kettlebell), but now he's got motivation to get down. Which makes him fight all the more.

"Let me down so I can play with the stuff Johnny doesn't want me to have, MOM!!!" he seems to say as he arches his back suddenly as he twists away from you in an attempt to make you drop him. It certainly is a workout.

I don't have any video of him crawling, but I have a really adorable one of him showing off another of his new-found talents. Enjoy. (This was taken with my iPhone, hence the weird aspect ratio.)

Hank is 8 months old!

I'm 8 months old today!

I know, I know, you can't see my face, but isn't my butt cute?! That should count for something...

Anyway! I am thisclose to crawling. I can do a plank and some mountain climbers and I can push myself backward (which gets me stuck under furniture), but I haven't yet figured out how to move my hands and knees in sync to move forward. But I'm getting there!

My newest fun thing to do is play peek-a-boo with Mommy. It's so fun! I'll take my blankie or my burp cloth or a bib and put it on my head and then pull it down and smile big and wide while Mommy says "Peek-a-boo!" I LOVE this game! I do it over and over again especially while I'm eating in my high chair because I get the added bonus of hitting the spoon and catapulting food all over the place.

Speaking of food, I'm eating and eating and eating! I've added tahini, acorn squash and asparagus to my repertoire. Mommy has tried making the food a little thicker, but it turns out I have a rather sensitive gag reflex. If the banana isn't pureed enough, watch out! I'm guaranteed to puke. Hopefully that will ease up as I get older...

I am officially down to two naps a day and I still nap in a wrap on Mommy. It's so cozy and warm... how can you blame me for wanting to sleep there rather than the crib? At least I sleep a good 6 hour stretch most nights.

Month 8 was pretty exciting, but I'm ready for what month 9 has to bring!

26 months

 I'm now 26 months old!

So I missed the actual day that I turned 26 months, but oh well. All the days seems to blur together since I don't sleep very much anymore.

In the last month I have stopped napping, stopped sleeping all night and stopped eating healthy food. This food pyramid pretty much sums up my diet:

Source: TheDaddyComplex.com

 Now I like to spend my days counting and watching Toy Story 1, 2, or 3. I had a Lion King phase in there somewhere, but I got over that after Mommy purchased Toy Story 3. The problem with not sleeping enough is I never feel like going outside and expending energy. Mommy took me to the San Diego Zoo Safari Park this month and instead of running around like a maniac like I usually do, I just wanted to sit in the foliage and throw Blankie and Scout around. Mommy tried pretty hard to get me to run around and expend energy, but I just didn't feel like it. She still tries to get me to play by taking me to parks and the zoo and SeaWorld and stuff, but I usually bring some numbers with me so I can just sit and count them until she gives up trying to get me interested in something else.

I may not be very interested in the zoo or the park, but I am definitely fascinated by numbers! I can count from 1 to 99 if I feel so inclined (though I'm still learning the words forty, fifty, sixty, etc. Instead I just say four-one, four-two, four-three, etc). Grandpa and Grams Mitchell gave me a number puzzle to take home for Christmas and I like to take these numbers with me everywhere: to the store, to bed, downstairs, upstairs, everywhere! It's a good thing Grams insisted that I take them with me because Mommy wanted to leave them in Albuquerque. *phew!*

The joys of modern technology

I love YouTube. With a passion. When I was a teacher, I would tell students who were foggy on a concept to look it up on YouTube because without fail, there would be some great animation or rap or lecture on whatever it is you didn't understand.

And now as a mom, it's a staple. Sesame Street has thousands of videos up on YouTube for anyone to watch at any time and I take FULL advantage of it. Johnny currently has his own channel and these are his current favorites:

Sesame Street Pinball #12

Sesame Street: The Number 20

Sesame Street: Mary Sunshine #11

Sesame Street: Y do I love the letter Y (watch out, this one is really catchy...)

As you can see, most of the above videos are associated with numbers, because Johnny is OBSESSED with numbers... more on that later.