The Bunting Chronicles

...for I have been a mega-slacker, and this is going to be a long one.

somebody knows how to relax

Hi there, friends of Bunting. What, pray tell, have you been doing instead of composing blog posts about our hybrid friend, you ask? Let's go to the tape.

Developmental Milestones, aka Stuff that Bunting can do now that freaks us out-slash-makes us proud:

Our boy is officially a toddler. A walker, no more of this babes in arms nonsense. This is a delightful development, our delight in his company and antics continues to grow every day. He is a funny guy.

He adores his daddy, and they revel in one another's company.

Sound asleep in Daddy's arms. He has not fallen asleep in my arms since his nursling days.

My boys, how I love them. Note crib tent on far right. A new addition, for despite the mattress being as low as possible, monkey boy can get his leg over.

his favorite word is 'outside', nothing makes him happier than 'helping' his father garden

walking to Gigi's front door. He is a walking guy now. A hand-holding, I don't-need-to-be-carried, thankyouverrrrymuch kinda guy. *Mama bites knuckle in disbelief*

We drove to LA to visit our cousins in late July. This was our first long car ride with Bunting, and he was a trouper. There was a shaky 45 minutes when the sun was streaming directly into his eyes (his car seat faces backwards, and we neglected to consider the angle of the sun at that hour), but we took a break and ate some string cheese and danced along to 80's music on the radio and all was right once again.

We had a marvelous time with our cousins in LA. Cousin's K and S are 4 years and 6 months old, respectively. Bunting had a grand time running around with K, and was so tender and sweet with the baby.

We went to Zuma beach while in SoCal, our first real beach experience.

He loved it.

Sheer delight when he realized that no one was going to tell him to put the sand down.

Building with Cousin K. I once commented to her father that K was born to order minions around. She is a preternaturally bright, composed, and confident little girl. Well, the minions have arrived, and I wasn't mistaken.

In August we went to brunch at Aldo's, and then again to the beach to play.

Mepher love

If you're not a West Coaster, lemme tell you- our Pacific is cold. Didn't faze our boy one bit. He absolutely loved the water, but displayed a healthy amount of caution and did not venture close unless in our arms. But in our arms...

Totally unfazed by that last wave. Just kept laughing with glee. Pardon the shriek-y commentary. We get a little excited.

Two weeks ago he sprouted 3 molars at once. As I type the fourth is making its debut.
This ridiculous 'three at once' development resulted is some fractured nighttime sleep, which was not cool. Not cool AT ALL.

Oh. But let's rewind a minute. Did I tell you about the PG Tips incident? No. Okay then.

So, FRK made a pot of delicious mint tea; fresh mint leaves from our yard, black tea-

and a bit of sugar. Delicious. I put some milk in mine.

Bunting is eating dinner, and with his ridiculous octopus arms (this kid is huge. We have to stop feeding him protein or something, I mean look at this)

Oh hi. I look 11, and am in desperate need of a hair cut. You got any tea on you?

I digress. So octopus arms grabs my mug, which is on the counter. Takes one gulp before I wrest it away from him. And then, AND THEN-- he is up until 5:30 am. Five-thirty!!! That is over 9 hours past his bedtime.

Long story short- he ends up in his crib, in the dark, babbling and running in circles until 5:30 am. I couldn't take it, I was so tired and so perplexed. Thank god for my saintly husband. FRK stayed up with him, calmed him down, and ended up sleeping on the floor next to his crib. It was so bizarre, Iike our child's body had been taken over by some insane alien.

So, you say, he must have reallllly slept in that morning, after that crazy night. Right?

No sirreee. Up at 8:45 (which is sleeping in, actually), ready to party.

It's a good thing he is so dang cute, or I would've given him to the gypsies.

Look at this grubby, grubby boy. He looks like a Dickensian street urchin. I think there was a lump of charcoal involved, I can't recall. Too tired.

Anyway, the teething began just as we recovered from the ghastly PG Tips incident. But now it is mostly done, he is back to sleeping through the night as per usual. Praise Jesus!

So, working in the field that I do, I had many sleepless moments when I was pregnant, thinking about all of the what-ifs. I'm sure all expectant mothers have these moments, but perhaps mine were a little more intense, a bit more frequent, due to my aforementioned profession.

Bunting keeps hitting his milestones, and with every one that gets ticked off, that wee little bit of internal tension and worry unravels a bit. I also have to remind myself that he is not a genius. That this is normal. Blessedly normal.

He refuses to be fed any longer. If you try to feed him, he shakes his head back and forth, tiny, distinct shakes, and says no. He looks like a pitcher shaking off a pitch from a catcher. Fortunately he has a full complement of teeth, and pretty good utensil skills.

This was a month ago. He's even defter now.

Very serious Playdoh happenings.

Gigi bought him these wonderful, old-school wooden blocks. Half of them live at our house, and half at her house. He loves to stack things, and is a pretty good block engineer. When I worked in Early Intervention, I spent hours teaching children how to stack things. Watching him do this still blows me away.

One slow Saturday morning (hence the shirt and no pants look he's sporting) I left the kitchen for a moment, and when I returned he had done this:

No big whoop, Mom. But whatever, take a picture.

Another activity that is a current favorite is Putting Things Inside of Other Things.

That is a brand-new double boiler that I got for my birthday.

Actually, the above photos combine two current loves, for Love of Vehicles has made its debut.

Our best bud SRR has loaned us his push car (a mega favorite when he was a wee one), and Bunting continues the tradition. He adores the thing, with the heat of a jillion suns. We take a ride around our neighborhood most evenings, and today we took it to the park. There was a little girl there with the same car, only in pink and purple, and Bunting was delighted to meet another with such excellent taste in vehicles. He was absolutely beside himself, he shrieked and waved and hollered "Hi!!!!" repeatedly, and pointed and yelled "Car!!!" as if to say Mama, can you believe she has the same car?!

We continue to see Gigi every week for dinner. They are great pals.

Our house is one level, and we have only three steps up to our door. Gigi's house has stairs galore, and it is here that Bunting has always practiced his stair skills. He can now navigate the stairs upright, instead of sitting on his bottom.

Mepher and UJ's house also has lots of stairs, being one of those very charming but very stair-intensive Victorians. It has always been a slog up those stairs, holding our slab of boy, but now he can manage them on his own with great aplomb.

It goes without saying that he continues to adore his Mepher and UJ.

Admiring the tree canopy.

Upping the cute quotient of the Haight Ashbury

Look at those faces. Two peas in a pod.

While spending the day together in SF he fell in love with the timeless 1-2-3, swing! game.

Our little monkey boy has long been far more interested in moving around than talking, but in the last few weeks he has begun to reliably say words that are intelligible. His current favorites are water, shoes, outside, sky, what is that?, all done, please, more.

Don't worry, we thoroughly washed our hands the moment I turned the camera off.

"Sky!!"

He was keeping me company as I did dishes, hence the freaky gloved hand.

He continues to love music, dancing and bopping when he hears a beat that catches his fancy. Recently he has begun to attempt to snap his fingers, which I don't have on video, but I can assure you that it is devastatingly cute.

I have a little Casio keyboard from my childhood that still works perfectly. Bunting discovered it the other day, and it was love at first sight.

We had dinner at Auntie Jay Jay's recently (Gigi's sister). She is a pianist, and also a great friend of Bunting.

Bunting loves animals, his sitter G has a wonderful, mellow black lab named Duke so he has become a big fan of dogs.

offering a toy to Mamaji's German Shepherd, Adeline.

of course our Cairn pal Herbie is like a member of the family.

Make no mistake, our boy remains a funny, wacky kid.
He recently discovered the water bottle that I use to flatten my hair in the morning.

Vietnamese food. Note cup of ice, the key to keeping a Bunting happy and stationary.

Our boy is 21 months old as of yesterday, and we just can't believe it. Every day we declare that he simply cannot get more fun and cute, that we simply cannot love him more than we do at this very moment.

birthday, holding Daddy's hand

4 1/2 months

1 year

15 months

And every day we are proven wrong.

my priceless view, dozens of times a day

You guys. It is summertime!!!

our ghetto fabulous kiddie pool. We will acquire a proper one...but when a heat wave hits, you do what you have to do.

We all love these long summer days- our boy continues to love being outside, playing in the water, hanging out with his daddy.

In this heat, we need to water the plants frequently. And the boy, apparently.

Soaked to the skin, engaged in some critical "put all of the rocks inside of the fountain" tasks

Helping Daddy wash the car. Very serious business.

Oh wait. Sorry.

Excuse me, I should take this call.

Hello, this is Bunting.

The love affair with Daddy's iPhone continues. My Blackberry, with its miniscule non-touchscreen he has no interest in.

We have been hard at work in our yard, making it pretty and a safe place for Bunting to run around. By 'we', I mean mostly FRK and our friend Josh, while I am tasked with keeping the little darling away from machetes and chainsaws.

When blades and saws are not involved, Bunting is a tireless worker and an enthusiastic helper.

The warm, long nights mean that we are able to have dinner outside, and putter around in the fresh air until bedtime.

Note that our little piglet had a cob in his hand, yet wants mine.

Hmmmm. Can't tell if he enjoys the ride. Will keep you posted.

Our doodlebug is still a peppy, busy boy. He is a little billy goat- he reminds us of our dog Fanny, who always wanted to be on the highest point possible. While we were at work, she would drag and stack throw pillows and when we returned home she would perched atop the summit of the pile. We always meant to set up a surveillance camera so we could see what she was up to while we were away. Bunting has similar tendencies. He loves to climb up, up, up.

The other day I heard a 'scraaaaaape, scraaaaape' sound, then ominous silence. I crept toward the kitchen, and peeked around the wall; I had left out a stool that I used to reach some cobwebs. He had pushed the dining room chair that has his booster seat attached to it over against the patio door. He then pushed the stool next to the chair, and when I busted him he had one foot on the edge of the chair. He was trying to reach the rolled up blind at the top of the sliding door.

If we are foolish enough to leave a stool or footrest out, he will climb it. This was a Saturday; FRK and I were doing housework and yardwork, Bunting was busy doing his work- wandering about and pillaging. Please note filched car key and lip balm in his hands. The pink cheeks are due to a cow's milk experiment. He does fine with yogurt and cheese, but straight cow's milk does not agree with him. So for the time being we are sticking with goat's milk.

Up high? Check. Snack? Check. Up to no good? Oh, you betcha.

Have water wand, will travel. Sidenote: How did my child suddenly become 7 years old.WTF?!

As busy as our boy is, when he is ready to rest, he is ready to rest. If we lose track of time, he lets us know that is bedtime, dammit!

He dragged a pillow, a blanket and sippy cup over and put himself to bed on the carpet. Subtle.

Slumbertime. We still sneak into his room every night to watch him sleep.

The spirit of Snuffy Smith lives on. Snuffy loved him a bowl of ice cream, and his great-grandson does too.

We see Gigi every week, and her condo is Bunting's own personal amusement park-cum-gym. He learned how to safely ascend and descend stairs there (our house is all one level). Going up and down is old hat, now he is working on speed.

And of course Mepher and UJ (Uncle Josh) are over every week. Bunting adores both of them; he now says "Meh-bah" and "Jah" very distinctly when he sees them.

thumbs up to family time

No one makes him laugh like his Mepher

Though we try:

Mamaji's birthday was last week, and we all went for a visit.

Mamaji and her mama, Gigi

This is a scrapbook of sorts- I would be remiss if I didn't note that in the midst of the great joy and fun of life with Bunting, we are very sad, in limbo. We are all waiting with dread and anxiousness for an inevitable conclusion, though we don't know when it will occur. I guess that is the human experience in a nutshell. But this nutshell is really difficult to bear sometimes.

Most of the time we have no time to wallow, and instead are busy trying to keep up with a kid who can already do this:

And though sometimes we feel like just putting a container over our heads and calling it a day...