Sort, Sort, Sort...Stack, Stack, Stack

Blake is REALLY into sorting things these days. He can almost always be found with two of the same object (or at least similar), one in each hand....or if there are several of the same toy, he is trying his best carry them all at the same time. He is so funny, he tries to carry as many things at once as he can, using his little fingers to try and pick up just one more. The other day I heard him and Jenna giggling in the playroom. After a few minutes I peeked around the corner to find them in the middle of probably 100 wet wipes. They had found the wet wipe bag, opened it and were taking turns taking them hand over hand. When I went in to collect them, Blake had beat me to it. He had fistfulls of wipes in each hand and was bending over using his clinched fists and belly to try and pick each and every last wipe up. He then marched around the playroom and was talking up a storm. I only wish I knew his language-haha.

Jenna never ceases to amaze me, the way she finds THE smallest switch, button, or knob on just about everything and digs her little finger in to turn them. She notices the smallest and finest details on toys, in books, on clothing, furniture, anything and studies them intently. She has a real knack for details. She also knows how to turn the small switches on her toys that changes the play modes and volume (the ones that are intended for parents to turn down if desired). She has favorite modes on each of her toys that she wastes no time in coming behind you and letting you know by turning them to what she likes. She has pretty strong fine motor skills for her age, definitely one of her strengths. One thing has always been certain, she knows what she likes and does a great job of letting us know as well. She is very strong willed and independent and at the same time loves to sit in our laps for plenty of snuggle time. She still has a very silly side. She loves to be tickled and loves to just be silly. I've said it before and I say it again, she has THE best laugh. Jason and I are so excited that Jenna is very much her own litle gal and is pretty darn comfortable with letting others know exactly what that means. We think her personality will serve her very well later in life...perhaps quite challenging for us for the first 18 years. LOL

Today Blake did something that really amazed me. I brought out a wooden box that had red, yellow, blue and green blocks in it. I emptied it along side a pile of various other similar blocks. Blake hasn't ever seen these colored blocks before. He came over and started placing the red, yellow, blue and green ones in the box. He then grabbed a natural wood colored one and put it in, looked back at it as it lay there and reaches back in and takes it out. He proceeded to put the last green block in. Out of the entire pile of various blocks, he distinguished the four colors that "belonged" in the box. He then sorted the others into their own piles. When I look around the house and playroom I am constantly finding tidy little piles of objects, all nicely sorted. Two sippy cups sitting perfectly aligned on the window seal, four weeble wobbles standing proudly in line on the train table, two pretend phones sitting on a large foam block. When I give them snack in the playroom, I usually put cereal or crackers in small bowls and hand one to each. Blake walks over to Jenna's bowl and stacks his inside Jenna's and they sit there together sharing snack. Sometimes he dumps the cereal and cracker mix on the floor and puts the crackers together and then the cereal together. Jenna is usually really very patient with his insistance of "order". He has also been enjoying stacking blocks. He is able to stack about seven high of the large nesting blocks we have. The largest is pretty big and then each one gets gradually smaller. We have watched him work through some frustration and learning that some blocks are too small to have large ones stacked on top and that the block's open side cannot face upwards if he wants to stack others rahter than "nest" them. He seems to be getting a better understanding of these concepts as he is planning his stacks more accurately. We have a few VERY small wooden blocks. I found him today stacking them three high! These blocks are small enough to fit in his hand and when he closes his hand you can barely tell he is holding them. His hand-eye coordination is really picking up!

Proud mama signing off for now.
~The space on the site we use for posting pics on the blog is full. I am working on finding an alternative so that I can post somem LONG overdue current pics. Stay tuned.....