Another week has flown by, this time with some extra travel for young Puff.
Lots of trips around the place, visiting people. Here he is enjoying some playtime in a food court while distracted by an empty soft drink bottle (somehow these work better than teaspoons at the moment, and even better than the toys that he’s too used to).
He also made a trip to a friend’s house. When in a new environment, he is a bit stressed for a while, wanting to be close to whichever parent he can get near. After a while, though, he calms down, and is happy to explore the environment.
The best part about visiting friends is playing with new toys. When confronted with a new toy, it’s really exciting for a couple of days, but then disappears into the fray, it seems. The toys he keeps coming back to are the ones that he can chase around a room.
On the weekend, we went down to Bowral markets, where we found the world’s friendliest dog. With Dad carefully placing him out of the danger zone, Puff was cautiously allowed to pat the dog: despite his expression in this photo, he seemed to really enjoy it!
In one of the stores in Bowral, we saw these toys on the wall in a little play area. He was too small to be able to play with them by himself (he’d need to know how to stand up), but he had a go at them once suitably propped up.
Overall, we were really pleasantly surprised by how he went when we took him away for the weekend: he was getting a bit tired and frustrated during the day, but managed a solid 12 hour sleep in the portable cot, and then a 3 hour nap later in the day. It was also fun for him to spend some extended time with his aunt and uncle.
In other news, he knows the answer to the questions “what does a duck say” (“kwa, kwa, kwa”, sometimes spoken, sometimes whispered) and “what does a dragon say” (this amazing growling noise). It’s great to see him understand language enough to answer questions, and to start experimenting with words.
On very rare occasions, he’ll try and pull himself up a little bit: not to stand, but more to get a better view of what’s going on. The hint of later tendencies to explore. Thanks to his sleeping bag, though, he hasn’t tried to escape his cot yet: this too, I fear, is only a matter of time!