It has been a long time since I've last posted anything on our blog. The last month and a half have been pretty crazy with holidays and work trips and non-stop illness (colds for all of us, an ear infection and croup for Calvin, pink-eye for Bryan and me, some weird nausea/vomiting yuckiness that affected me, Bryan, and visiting family over the last four weeks, etc.), so blogging has been pretty low in the priority list. Overall, though, things have been going really well. Through it all, Calvin has been delighting us with all his new tricks, giving us heart attacks with his fearlessness, and melting our hearts with infectious laughter and super-slobbery kisses.
(added note, 15 Jan 2011 - Calvin is happy and playing and making funny faces in this picture.)
It amazes me how fast Calvin is growing! His development started to pick up back in August when he first sat up, but over the past couple of months it has accelerated quite a bit. No longer do we have to wait weeks to witness a new trick; now it happens every day or two.
Calvin is standing steadily now, so long as one hand has something sturdy to hold on to. He'll even occasionally let go and stand unassisted for a moments before slowly sitting. He is cruising around pretty well, walking while holding onto the couch or table or whatever 1-2 foot high stationary object is in his path. He can sit on his knees and squat on both feet, and he crawls so fast that the dogs run to get away (because he has also learned to pull hair and tails, and to bite. Poor dogs!). He can climb the stairs, all 13 of them, pretty quickly if properly motivated (i.e. if Skylar-the-cat is sitting on the stairs just out of reach. He also knows how to get down the stairs (so important!) in a careful backwards feet-first on-the-tummy one-step-at-a-time slide, but he still needs help getting started and with speed control. Of course he won't be scaling any mountain of stairs solo for a long time!
His fine motor skills have also improved dramatically. He still likes to imitate
Bamm-Bamm - the more noise the better - but it is not the only way to play anymore. He is now much more careful and thoughtful with his play.
He will spend long stretches of time stacking objects: blocks on tables, dog bowls on top of the dog bowl stand, a spoon on top of a cup on top of carrots, toys on top of the dogs (for as long as they hold still), etc. One of his favorite toys is a stand of large plastic rings (in the background in the picture above) - he takes the rings off and on and off and on and off, over and over and over.
Calvin still eats just about anything you put in front of him, and his food repertoire has expanded to include a variety of fruits, vegetables, beans, yogurt, and toddler cereals. We're currently working on getting him to pick up the food with his hands and feed himself, but he rarely cooperates.
He has been holding onto his own bottle for months now (here Calvin is 8 month's old, 17 Oct 2010), and loves to hold onto his spoon (more on this in a future post). Banana, peach, and carrot pieces are more fun to throw onto the floor than bring to his mouth, though he has demonstrated this ability several times. No, when it comes to eating solids, Calvin is making sure we are still a necessary part of the process.
Calvin was saying a few words back in late-November and early December, including "daddy" and "all-done" (that started halfway through a course of antibiotics (yucky!) for an ear infection in early December). We say "all-done" all the time around Calvin, after diaper changes and meals and baths and getting dressed and everything, along with a wave of the hand as if shaking off water - the baby sign for "all-done" - so he gets that phrase a lot. But Calvin stopped saying distinguishable words a couple weeks later. The book What to Expect the First Year says that it is common for babies to "forget" a skill they recently learned while working on another new skill. Calvin does sign a few words. He waves goodbye (to everyone). And he'll wave (almost the same way) to say all done after eating and when he wants a diaper changed (did it twice today!). Anyway, I'm on a campaign to get his next spoken word to be "mommy".
Bryan has some exciting news - he is on the short list for an Olmstead Scholarship that, if he gets selected, will send us to another country (most likely somewhere in Europe) for Bryan to get a master's degree (in the local language!). The purpose of the scholarship is to give military officers more a worldly experience and a greater appreciation of other cultures and customs. Calvin and I would go with Bryan for this "assignment", which would be very exciting. If Bryan does not get selected, we'll be heading to Washington D. C. in spring/summer for Bryan's next assignment, which would also be very interesting and fun. Bryan will find out of he's been selected for the Olmstead Scholarship sometime in March - we'll keep you all posted.
I have been working on finishing up my degree. There is still so much to do, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. The ideal plan would be for me to finish and successfully defend before Bryan starts his next assignment, whether in DC or somewhere else. If the timing doesn't work out perfectly, Bryan may go on ahead without us for a few weeks. Or I may finish up writing my dissertation long distance. We know our lives will be changing in the coming months, but we really don't know when or where or in what order all this will happen. All we can do is be flexible and optimistic and hope for a lull in sickness so I can freaking get my work done!
Calvin loves bath time. When we upgraded him from the infant/toddler bathtub to the real thing a couple weeks ago, he couldn't contain his excitement. He explored the entire tub on his bottom, knees, hands, feet, and belly while I desperately tried to keep him from drowning in the two inches of water that filled the tub. 
Now, every time I set him in the bathtub one of the first things he does is roll over onto his tummy and splash around like he's ready to swim a few laps. This, of course, causes me to have little moments of panic, but by now I've realized (with lots of reassurance from Bryan) that he's fully capable of surviving bath time. Of course I still spot him through the entire exercise, just to be sure he doesn't actually put his face under water (I have no idea what he would do if he did!). Although, he doesn't really mind having water on his face when I rinse off his hair, and he holds his breath through that pretty well. But I'm not ready for baby scuba or freestyle swim meets yet.
Last weekend I splurged on a bunch of bath toys and accessories, including a mat to keep him from sliding everywhere, a faucet-protector in the shape of a whale, a mirror (babies love mirrors!), and a corner basket to hold all his toys. 
When I put him in the tub last Sunday evening, he immediately noticed the mat. He attempted a few scoots on his bottom, but wasn't sliding around like usual. No problem, a quick rotation to the tummy for swim mode fixed that!
Bathtime is so much fun, and I know we are lucky to have a baby that doesn't cry and scream through the whole ordeal. Other than the heart attacks I have trying to keep up with him as he splashes from one end of the tub to the other, it's one of the highlights of our evenings.
