August, Part I

August has been a wonderful month of firsts! Dylan keeps us smiling with new discoveries and developments almost every day! I've added a list of the words he has said. His favorite, by far, is wheel. He uses it to decribe almost anything that is round and excitedly disagrees when you try to explain that, yes, that object sort of looks like a a wheel but is, in fact, a button. Or a bowl. Or the top of the peanut butter jar. You can see he is also a big fan of animal noises! At his 15-month pediatrician appointment, his doctor commented on those being the most unique first words she's ever heard (this was before he had started saying mama and dada with meaning).


Aside from Mama and Dada, the only other person he's named is Papa. For whatever reason (and there are lots, we are sure!), he LOVES Papa. Poor Mimi will bend over backwards to Dylan's attention, but all Papa has to do is jump a few times, or just sit quietly on the couch and Dylan goes straight over for some hugs! Here's a great picture of Dylan with his Papa from a visit we took to Mimi and Papa's house at the beginning of the month. Also early this month was a family trip to the Museum of Natural History. Here's Dylan checking out the dinosaur skeleton in the lobby.

And here's what he was looking at: And here is the miracle of all miracles - Dylan asleep in the stroller!

We've been working on utensil use. Here's Dylan, hard at work:On Aug 15-16th we had our second sleepover party with Cy and his parents, Adam and Maya. I ran in the NYC half-marathon on the 16th and it was SO nice to be able to stay at their place the night before the race. Much closer to the 7 a.m. starting line than Yorktown Heights...and they even helped me carbo-load by cooking us a delicious dinner the night before! They also came to celebrate with Tim, Dylan, and me at the finish line. Thanks Adam, Maya, and Cy! What great friends.

Here are Cy and Dylan playing on our air mattress. Cy was instructing Dylan in the art of the BODY SLAMMMMMM!

"No, Dylan, it's face down...like this..."

Dylan up and at 'em, bright and early with Daddy on the morning of my race. First ride on the subway! Here I am at the finish line. Happy to be done.

Dylan enjoying a post-race refreshment - cheering is hard work!Another "first" for August - first haircut! Here's the before shot:Mommy, wielding the scissors:

Dylan did not like the scissors...

After shot...So handsome!!
More August updates coming soon!

The Rest of July...

July was a busy month for us! And that's not just an excuse for infrequent blogging. Here are some highlights...

Dylan checking out the scene at Uncle Dave and Aunt Michelle's block partyMy adorable niece, Scarlett. I love this kid.

Daddy disapproves of the pink car

Visiting the animals (and the farmers' market) at Muscoot

Cows

A visit from Nonna and Uncle Andrew

No diaper

Peek-a-boo!

Bowl hatBig smiles

Mimi and Papa crashed Nonna and Uncle Andrew's visit to celebrate Mimi's birthday with us and to Christen the BBQ. Terrible picture of everyone - no wonder Tim wanted to take it! Happy Birthday, Mimi!

The Fouth of July with our Friend, Cy

We spent our Fourth of July at Cy's grandparents' lakehouse in Connecticut and had so much fun with Adam, Maya, the boys, and Adam's family. Cy is the son of our friends, Adam and Maya, for those of you who are out of the loop. And Cy's is Dylan's best bud, or so Dylan thinks...Cy's not so sure. The boys in their Tufts sweatshirts (Tim and Adam both went to Tufts University)

"Yeah Dylan, the ladies will be over in a few minutes with the keg."

Daddy & Dylan

While Cy napped and the grown-ups ate lunch, Dylan hung out with his other best friend. I promise the bottle was empty!

When Cy woke up, he showed Dylan where they hide the really fun toys.

Inspecting the watermelon "Please, sir, can I have some more?"

A four-legged furry friend that doesn't run away when Dylan appears!

Hugs for Quincy the dog

First encounter with a sparkler

Thanks for inviting us, Adam and Maya! We had a great time!!

Recent Milestones

Since about the beginning of June, Dylan had been taking one or two steps on his own. Just over the past two weeks or so however, Dylan has been straight up walking! All by himself! Check it out.

Even since this video was taken Dylan has improved to the point where he's walking all over the house by himself, and even getting himself to stand without the use of furniture (or mommy's leg).

Other recent achievements include his first real word! For awhile now, he's been making a "meow" sound, used to identify just about anything with four legs and fur. But a few weeks ago, he said the word wheel (pronounced "wheeeeeeeee"), both appropriately and repeatedly, while playing with the wheels of a play car. Since then, we've decided that Dylan is multilingual. Often, for the word "yes", he likes to say "oui" (French), "si" (Spanish), "da" (a close approximation of German), and "ish" (a possible attempt at the English version?).

Dylan loves to gives hugs to the things he likes a lot. This includes mommy, daddy, any (stuffed or real) fuzzy animal, trucks, you get the picture. When he makes his toy cars and trucks roll around the ground, he makes a "vrroooooom" sound. He knows that when we go outside, he needs to wear a hat, and tells us this by pointing to his head. He can point to his hair and his toes. Less consistently, he can point to mommy's eyes and nose. He is still a big fan of peek-a-boo, which almost always elicits huge Dylan belly laughs. Which, of course, are the very best things in our world!

Upstate

We spent the last weekend of June doing some visiting upstate. Our first stop was GGMum's with Uncle Andrew, Nonna, and an old toy truck. Dylan had a blast pushing this truck around GGMum's big yard. After 12 grandsons, GG sure knows how to keep little boys busy! The next day, we headed to the zoo with Nonna, Uncle Ben, Aunt Em, and Sophia. The little penguins were my favorite part;)

Dylan liked the lions!

After the zoo, we headed to Sophia's house for dinner, playtime, and storytime.Then back to Nonna's for punk rock baby bathtime.

The next day, before heading home, we made a stop at Tim's great aunt Ginny and great uncle Bob's house with Uncle Ben, Aunt Em, and Sophia. Aunt Ginny had met Dylan when he was 7 weeks old but hadn't seen him since. She and Bob really seemed to enjoy watching Dylan and Sophia interact. It was so nice to see three generations of Youngs together.

Father's Day!!

For Father's day we headed to Aunt Lisa and Uncle Brian's house with Mimi, Papa, and the other Frisones:) As always, it was so fun and cute to see all the cousins playing together...

Gracie catching raindrops on her tongue
Playing house
Scarlett and Dylan sharing a secret

Dylan loved Gracie's rocking horse......as is evident in this pic.

In typical fashion, we took zero pics of Dylan with his daddy:( We'll try to remember to do better next year!

Noreen Visits!

Earlier in June we had a quick visit from an old friend. Noreen is a friend of Tim's from Tufts and a friend of mine from my first job out of college, at McLean Hospital. And being friends with Noreen is the way Tim and I met each other! Noreen is now living in Pittsburgh with her husband, Ben (also a former McLean employee), but made a trip up to our house while visiting NYC. It was so nice of her to make the drive up to the 'burbs and fun to introduce her to Dylan!