More movies . . .

feel i should make this clear

In the last video that eric posted, you can hear Otto making lovely bird sounds. I have now watched the video about 100x as it is Otto's new favorite pass time. He comes into the kitchen, points up to my computer and says "that". "That" is Otto speak for "mommy will you please let me watch the silly video of me again?". So needless to say I have heard him making bird, cat and race car noises over and over again. In addition to the video he charms me with them all day as well. I feel I should clarify that he is imitating the ravens that he heard at my parents cabin a few weeks ago. He does hear birds singing sweet little tweedle dee dees in the yard all the time but he has no interest in making that sound, and who would when you could caw like a raven. So if you thought he had a strange idea of what birds were, this will clear that up.
Now if you want to hear a strange version of an animal sound, ask him what a monkey sounds like. Basically it is one big sucking in sound. Hilarious!

Part 2

Movies . . .

15 month check-up

Wow, it has been a while. The weather has been so blah lately I have had a hard time getting motivated to do much, but there is so much to do. It seems like this will be the summer of projects around our house. Good thing I like that. But Otto is what you are here to read about. On tuesday this week he had his 15 month check-up. We got there a little before the appointment, no problem. I brought some trucks to play with while we were waiting. Otto was having a grand old time and seemed in very good spirits. That all changed when the nurse called his name and we wanted him to walk down the hall. Suddenly he became very suspicious. He was not about to stand or sit on the scale without eric or I holding him. So I held him and we were weighed together, and then just I was weighed etc.. you know how that works. That was the first time I have been on a scale in a long time, thanks a lot Otto. It was actually better than I thought it would be. He screamed, flailed and generally was a wreck all through being measured and having his temperature taken. He managed to grab the measuring tape and chuck it on the floor and grab the end of the thermometer and take that too. It was good times. He is now 32" tall and weighs 23.8#. He is finally slowing down growing. But he is still on the tall skinny side. 75% for height and 35% for weight. Looks good to me. Once the nurse left the room he started to calm down and resumed playing with toys and looking for trouble. Eric taught him how to turn off the lights which he thought was a lot of fun. He did OK with the doctor as long as she didn't try to touch him. The exam part was pretty rough. He freaked when she was listening to him breathe, look in he ears, everything. At one point she had to go across the hall to get a new light and he waved bye-bye to her. He NEVER waves to anyone. We all thought that was pretty funny. He did wow her with his body part knowledge. He knows his head, hair, ears, mouth, nose, hands and feet. And he did them all. Sure beats the 9 month check-up where we had never even tried patti cake, something kids that age can do. Who knew?? As you can imagine, things were going so well the shots part was bound to be a breeze. Yeah, well lets just say we all made it out of there alive, just barely. But he is healthy and happy and that is all that matters.

Here are some photos to catch you up on the last week or so....

This is the first time we showed him that you can color on his chalkboard walls. He really seemed to like it and was very good at making marks.

It is important that every piece of chalk be unwrapped, we wouldn't want to stifle his creativity.

This is a smile, just in case you were wondering

Otto has discovered the joys of AutoWeek. He wants it read to him over and over again. The other night he scorned the usual stack of books for bedtime stories and climbed over eric to get the AutoWeek. "This" he said and wanted it read 3 times before he would go to sleep. Eric couldn't be happier.

Behold, his trike

My mom brought him this the last time she was down here. He loves it. I am hoping to get more pictures with it, but I have to wait for it to stop raining. Every time we walk by it in the garage he points to it and wants to ride.

cars going fast

As many of you may know, Formula 1 is a big deal in this house. For Otto we call it cars going fast. Eric knew he had really fallen for me when he totally spaced on watching a race and instead went to Wegmans with me. It was a major deal. Well, the racing bug has officially passed to Otto. Otto only watches Sesame Street and an occasional Teletubbies on TV. Well, that and Formula 1. This morning while eric was still in bed I said to Otto, "Do you know what today is? It is a car going fast day." I was on the floor playing with him when I said this. He immediately started pulling on my shirt, walked over to the TV and pointed and said "dat!". So I turned on qualifying and he was so excited. At this moment eric walked down the stairs to see Otto making car noises and pointing madly at the cars going fast. He looked so proud. So it's official, we are a Formula 1 family. I think we are going to try to take him to some races at Watkin's Glen this summer. He already has the headphones so he is ready to go!

Dancing Dude

Dad here: Just a short "teaser" video of Otto's latest antics. He is a Dancing MACHINE.

Recap

Back again. Things have been in full swing here. Last week was the last week for our playspace/playgroup. We normally take the summer off because who wants to be inside when you can play outside, but this year we are losing our space so it all had to be cleaned up and packed away. There wasn't a place to keep it so I offered our third floor. They really did need a place because they took me up on it. This meant thursday and friday I madly cleaned the third floor to get it ready for all of the stuff, then saturday with the help of other moms, it all was carried to the third floor. Fun... There are a ton of those nice rubber mats that fit together like a puzzle which we thought should be cleaned before being put to use. Sunday was spent scrubbing mats and toys. Luckily Rachel came to help so it went a lot faster. The kids in Otto's group are going to have an awesome rainy day play spot this summer that is for sure. It is really looking cool. I have been washing all the fabric toys over the course of this week. Right now my yard is strewn with dress up clothes and puppets drying in the sun. It looks pretty funny.
Otto has been hilarious lately. He is really into dancing. Eric is working on cutting together a video of that which will be up soon. I just saw a rough cut and it is wonderful! He is also really starting to say more. On friday before heading over to Leo's house when I asked him if he wanted to go to Leo's house he said "leo" just like that. All the time there are more words. Last night we were playing in the yard and he fell on the brick path. He was getting up and looking down at the ground, he stood up and said "Ann". I asked "did you say, Ant". Sure enough he started pointing to the mound of ants crawling on the sidewalk. It is really amazing.
I have a ton of pictures to post which I won't be able to do all right now. I will get some up from more family being here which are long over due, plus I have adorable ones of him playing in the rain. I'll see how much I can do before we have to leave.