The face and help around the house...
Paulchen is getting so much more interactive now. We've been working on pointing to parts of the face and he's getting better. I have to point to a part first and tell him to point, then he does. We're doing really well on the nose and the mouth, but he's squeamish about his eye. When I point to my eye, he overshoots and points to his ear. Paul figures he doesn't want to poke his eye. But we're getting there.

He's also trying to help around the house more. When Paul put him in his seat in the car earlier, Paulchen held the little buckle so he wouldn't sit on it. It always falls under him when we pop him in the seat.

He also helped me wrap Paul's birthday gift the other day. He tried to pull off pieces of tape, though he didn't get the ripping motion down, so I ended up with a few long pieces. I'd place pieces of tape on the gift and let him press them down the rest of the way. He also tried to help fold the wrapping paper. It was really cute.

Then after the gift was wrapped, I sat him at his little table and chair and he colored a birthday card. Then I brought out the stamps and ink pad and helped him stamp the card. Once he got the motion down, he did a bunch of stamping. The card is hardly up there with Botticelli, but it's art to us.

Crafts and chatter
Yesterday at playgroup, Paulchen made a little snowman with falling snow out of paint. Granted I had to help him maneuver the sponge and paintbrush, but he enjoyed himself and made the sound effects along with me as we swirled circles with the sponge. The snowman has replaced his snowflake on the fridge.

It's great that he's accumulating crafts now. I picked up a bin so we can store them for the future. I write his name and date them all on the back, so we keep track of these memories. But I just love that we're starting a scrapbox for him and already have a few things in it. Over the years it will fill up nicely with memories.

Paulchen is also getting chattier. When we were at work yesterday he spoke with Mike, our photographer. None of it made any sense, but he had the inflections in his voice and was chatting and asking questions. Mike got a real quick out of it. And it's the next step forward. Now he's willing to talk more, so eventually his chatter will turn into real words.

He did the same thing last night. I caught him bouncing down on his bed and scolded him strongly. He gave me excuses and asked what the problem with it was. At least in his own language it seemed that's what he was saying. So I had a nice little conversation with him, as to why he couldn't jump on the bed. It was fun.

He's also eager to talk on the phone now. Granted, he likes to listen more than talk, but he does get the occasional words out. Unfortunately once he has the phone, he doesn't like to give it up. Since our phone system is a little odd here, I have to find out if I can have two lines somehow, so he can be part of the conversation, while I still talk to the family each week.

Parts of the Face and Camping
I finally figured out how to teach Paulchen to point to the different parts of the face. I would point to my nose and ask him to point to his. He just looked at me blankly. So I finally formed his finger to point and helped him point to his own nose. Now when I point to my nose, he'll point to his. We've also added eyes to the list of body parts. After he points to the part of his face, he'll point to my face as well. It's really cute. So not only is he learning the body parts, he's learning what is the same.

This morning I placed three chairs in a circle, evenly spaced. Then I threw our Queen-sized wolf blanket over the backs and made a tent. Paulchen loved it! He kept entering and exiting the tent. I sat inside the whole time and we had a snack. Then when he would sit inside for a bit, we'd play clapping games. Paul was outside the tent and I kept teasing him with our password for the tent. "Mommies are better than Daddies." But we eventually let Paul into the tent as well. Then all three of us had fun sitting inside. I'll have to make little tents more often for Paulchen, since he really enjoys them.

First Geocache
Today was a fun and VERY busy day. I had an ultrasound in the morning. For 20 minutes they hooked me up to a fetal monitor to get a long term heart rate. Paulchen sat next to me the whole time and had the oddest look on his face, as if to ask, "What the heck is that sound?" Considering he only pokes at my belly button when I try to have him feel the new baby kick or move, at least this was something he could show an interest in for a bit.

After that, we went geocaching. I'm not as keen on it as letterboxing, as letterboxing has some crafting associated with it, in making the stamps, but there's tons of geocaches in our area and very few letterboxes. So this is an incentive to explore new trails in the woods and get out more.

I've had bad luck so far with two boxes I've searched for, but I also wasn't very well-prepared, so that may have contributed to our lack of success. Well, today I had the prinout of the clues and the local map which also has all the wooded trails neatly marked, like regular roads. They even have "road signs" on the trees here.

Paulchen and I went looking for a box and eventually ended up in the right area. There were a few landmarks listed, so it was easier. Then we spent 20-30 minutes looking for the box. Okay, so I looked for the box. Though it might not have taken so long if I wasn't so easily distracted.

Paulchen was out in the leaves and running around. He was so cute and small looking among all the tall trees and vast land. I finally found the box and opened it up. I took a cute photo of Paulchen with the box and the timing was perfect. His mouth was open and he looked surprised, as if he were excited about our first find.

I wasn't going to do the typical trade with items in the box, just sign the logbook, but Paulchen kept trying to put our pen in the box. Then he was hooked on a golf ball in the Cache, so I placed a dinky Spongebob character in place of the ball. So we did the trade after all. It was a fun treasure hunt and Paulchen got a new toy out of it. I'm guessing now I'll have to keep a handful of little trinkets in his stroller in case he wants something from the boxes.

The three of us are going to look for a few local boxes Sunday morning. Hopefully this time Paul will be able to find some with us. It's a fun hobby.

Table Manners & Hot Babes
Our little man is growing up into quite the suave fellow. He gets his own napkin at meals, as he's very good at wiping his mouth. Granted, he doesn't have the dexterity we do, but it's really cute. He uses his whole hand to move the napkin over his mouth in a clumsy, but adorable manner.

He's also using a spoon by himself. When the food gets low in the bowl he has trouble scooping it up, but he mostly has the hang of it. He had his own bowl of oatmeal this morning. Of course he eventually became lazy like his father :-) and had to be catered too. After about half the bowl, he kept handing me the spoon to feed him. He's almost there.

I also took the journal entries I had typed earlier in another area and put them into this blog. It's easier if I just keep everything together, instead of all over the place.

We're also looking into putting away his booster seat until the new baby will be old enough for it. Paulchen sits a little low on the chair, but he prefers it over the booster. He likes to do everything like we do and we don't use boosters, so he must think they're babyish.

There is however, one table manner we're seriously tring to break him of. It seems he thinks the table is for climbing on. Now that he can get into the kitchen chairs himself, he uses them to climb on the table. I found a large mess this morning that involved Paulchen and a salt shaker. Grrr... We keep correcting him everytime we catch him, but we don't always see him. At least Paulchen understands now when we tell him to get down and sits back on the chair.

I also taught him a crazy habit last night. I raised my eyebrows at him, as if to say "Hey baby!" Now he likes to raise his eyebrows at Daddy and me. It's so cute, kind of like he's trying to pick up a hot girl with a lewd look, but on him it's too goofy and his face is in an expression of surprise.