High Stepping

Jonas took abunch of laps with Grandma and Grandpa this weekend. He had some good role-modeling from his Homer Simpson wearing Grandpa on the need to pick up his feet really high. Jonas was walking so well that he required a fancy shoe upgrade. He already has dirtied up his new white stride-rites at the Keva play center earlier today. Jonas got in lots of giggles and food in his travels around town and in the house. He loved to go after Homer's eyeballs on Grandpa's feet.

(Super) Chicken Suit

Jonas wore a chicken-suit costume that was intended for a dog to wear for this year's Halloween celebration. He did go out for a few late night walks to see all the spooky things around town, but didn't knock on any doors for candy treats. His favorite zoo animal the penguin got a few laughs from the chicken. Cory the elephant stopped by just as Jonas was transitioning from being a chicken to hippo. Every night after his bath he briefly is wrapped up in a hippo towel to dry off before putting on his pjs. Chickens turn out to be quite avid readers, especially when grandma sounds the voice of the gorilla.

Picaso

Jonas decided he'd rather be a ready-made designer than design haute couture, so he used his creative efforts to make a Picaso-esque pumpkin character for the front stoop.

Pumpkin patch!

Jonas spent a windy and gorgeous Sunday at the Eeplegarten pumpkin patch. He helped pick out four pumpkins, including his standard Jonas-little-misshapen-one (see last year's pumpkin patch post http://growingupjj.blogspot.com/2007/10/milestones.html).

Next, Jonas enjoyed his Norwegian heritage while looking over an embroidered panel with typical Norwegian farm activities, including "fenalar" (yelling into a turkey baster?) and "geitost" (grazing goats on the roof?). He also made friends with the Norwegian headmaster troll, who was wielding a whacking stick and who sports and interestingly-shaped nose, as Jonas points out in the picture.

Finally, Jonas got to ride in a horse drawn wagon, which he truly enjoyed to the point that he wet through his pants. The horses gave Jonas quite a ride, to which he replied "sssththth" (silly).

Leaf pile!

Jonas and Cory spent beautiful Sunday afternoon playing in the leaf piles on our street.

As the beautiful weather continued Jonas went on many outdoor adventures including a trip to Hilldale's Sundance Theatre rooftop to look over the west side fall colors.

Studying for a visit

Jonas got a chance to peak at some potential formatting issues for his presentation before his grandparents arrived this last weekend. He looked up a couple of items in the APA manual to make sure he was referencing his third party sources correctly. After he cleared up the formatting issues he was able to concentrate on snuggling and throwing stuff around with Grandpa. The grandparents are still making funny faces at Jonas, even after more than a year to get used to him.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Jonas tried on his new winter coat this week. He may be looking for snowflakes, but I doubt the rest of us Wisconsinites are!

Madison Children's Museum

Anytime is a good time to read

Jonas has become really attached to reading books. He can't put a good book down, even when he is getting things squared away below the belt. So far the books have been good enough to make sure that none of the pages make it to the restricted access zone.

Words, words, words...

In the video, Jonas has just woken up from his afternoon nap and has decided to read a book. Jonas is getting quite a vocabulary, at least of the animal noise variety. "Fish" and "bunny" are both actions the animals do, "kitty" is the noise he makes when HE sees a kitty (a scream--which he doesn't do in the video), and "doggie" is just the word "doggie", I suppose because our dogs don't make noises. One of his other favorite words and objects is "truck", which sounds like "kkkkkkk"; sort of like he's about to hack something up. Every time he turns the page in his truck book or sees a car go by he says, "kkkkkk".