Jay and Julie: What is Theo Passionate About?

A few weeks ago I had mentioned that Wendy seemed to be getting bigger and catching up to Miri a bit in size. Theo told me, "Yes, I have to look at their faces to tell them apart."

I'm glad that Theo can now tell them apart by looking at their faces. He didn't used to be able to.

On Saturday Oct. 17, Wendy pulled herself up to stand using the side of the pack and play and then took 3 toddle-y steps to me. It was so cute and amazing. She hasn't really repeated and I don't know exactly when she'll start walking around, but she's been working on it.

Written Oct. 8

Yesterday Theo and I were reading a chapter book together where Dinosaur Boy was given a school assignment to write about his passion. I stopped and Theo and I discussed what a passion was. He told me that he had lots of passions, but would only tell me one. He said he was passionate about the song, "Alphabet Soup." I'm so glad.

I may have told him I was passionate about eating cookies.

A week ago we were reading a My Weird School novel and someone used the word genius. I told Theo what a genius was and he quickly decided that he thought he was one. What confidence he has! I told him not many people are geniuses, so he might not be one, but he is very smart.

Both girls now hold blankets to their faces and play peek-a-boo. Miri learned first and now Wendy has learned too.

They are eating more and more solids. They eat 3 good meals a day and like most anything we put on their trays. They used to love Cheerios so much but now prefer other things they can feed themselves, including chili, pasta with a cauliflower puree sauce (which was a new recipe that I don't think we'll ever make again), chopped broccoli, diced tomatoes, banana pieces, toast, muffins, sweet potato pancakes, and anything else they can convince us to give them. They also like being spoon fed purees and baby cereals.

Miri loves working on figuring out toys. She is also able to pull herself up to stand and then let go for some seconds. Wendy is better at standing, sometimes for 5-10 seconds. She also will grab the to of her pack and play and try to do a pull up.

She's so active I often have to put her down in her crib when she's tired and leave her a few minutes and then she goes to sleep. But if I try to nurse or rock her to sleep, some of the time she won't stop trying to climb down to play more. Other times I can get her to sleep in the rocking chair, so it just depends.

Neither girl sits as still as Theo did when I read to them. I really think I would read 10 books each night to Theo at this age and also read them periodically throughout the day too. We do books occasionally (like once a day, just one book) plus one bedtime book and sometimes a book before nap. But mostly I just recite Goodnight Moon as their book and we don't always look at the actual book because they are so wiggly and distracted from bedtime things. I memorized it because when Theo was little I heard that a bedtime routine with the same book and song at the end of every night can help your child go to sleep. It didn't. Theo didn't sleep, but I know that book really well, and he still requests his song, "Goodnight My Someone" most every night. He sometimes will go sing it himself to the girls at bedtime because he's a sweetheart.

The girls have been waking up a bit more recently, but they sleep much better than Theo did at that age, and there are 2 of them, so that's impressive. I think they might be teething right now. Miri still has 2 teeth and Wendy 0, but maybe that is changing soon.