Mad Skills

Bryce has changed dramatically in the last two weeks. I recall Aubree going through a similar experience where it seemed like things in her brain went *click*click*click* all at once and at the time I dubbed it a "skill explosion." It still seems like an appropriate phrase, although with Bryce it seems to be even more than just skills involved. It's like a little awareness light bulb flicked on in his mind and he's developed a strong opinion as well. There have been multiple times in the last week where I've caught myself thinking, "I'm getting to know you [Bryce] all over again!"
I mentioned last week about how Bryce had started to try to cruise along the couch. Cruising independently is apparently hysterical and Bryce can't help but laugh uncontrollably as he flies with abandon from one end of the couch to the other. I don't think it's nearly as funny, because his lack of fear means that he frequently does nose-dives to the ground. That's extremely different than how Aubree approached standing and cruising on her own. On the right is a picture of Aubree's reaction when she realized she was standing and couldn't get down. Bryce's lack of fear, however, seems to have helped him progress at a relatively rapid rate. He's begun to stand on his own and has even taken a couple very off-balance steps. His crawling has also improved, but I'm beginning to think he won't ever master that skill because he's much more interested in being upright. I pulled out his box of shoes so we could take a walk outside and was shocked to find he's wearing a size 4 already! As we help Bryce walk around he no longer is content to go where we lead. Nope, now he has an opinion and pulls and turns and steps where he wants to go. Usually this means we end up at a pile of shoes, or the garbage can, or near his stash of Little People.
The other night after Family Home Evening we were having a treat of Aubree's choice - popsicles (okay, they were Throat Coolers I got free at CVS, but they're essentially popsicles and that's what Aubree wanted...). Bryce started grabbing at mine and I pulled it away. Again, he reached out, this time almost begging for some. "Sorry, Buddy," I told him, "you can't have this because it's got honey in it." Bryce let out the most heart-broken sob. It wasn't the typical "I-want-what-you-have grunt," or even a "I'm-mad-I'm-not-getting-my-way yell." It seemed, more than anything, he realized that he was being left out. I felt so bad! All along I've seen him as a baby and have been treating him as such. This was really eye-opening and reminds me he's growing up. We quickly rounded up a treat that was more appropriate and then he happily joined in with the rest of the family.
Aubree is also doing really well. We've been doing a fairly good job keeping up with "school." We spend about 10 minutes a day following the Hooked on Phonics program she got for her birthday. She finished all the upper-case letters and we're to letter "l" on the lower-case letters. The program is fun and the activities are short which helps maintain her interest, but I was getting a little bored. So, we added a "letter of the day craft" to our school activities. We got a little bit of a late start, but eventually we'll go back and do a-e. In the picture to the right you can see a "furry and fluffy f," a "green, glittery, googly-eyed g," ... a "king k," etc. This is now my favorite part of school and I think it's Aubree's too.
My mom gave me a good idea to let Aubree practice her writing and drawing on the sliding glass door with dry-erase markers. I finally remembered to let her do it and she had a blast! It makes me a little sad I didn't start earlier. It's very easy to clean, the only problem is there's no permanent record, so I took a picture of her first set of masterpieces. If you look closely you can see a couple people, a snowman, a tree, a flower, and her name (she can write "A-u-b-r" but the lowercase "e's" are still too hard).
I've mentioned numerous times in this blog how much Aubree likes to sing. Well, I finally got around to taking a couple videos of her singing her favorite primary songs. Here they are for your listening pleasure...