Toronto Star Update on Tuesday

For the past two weeks I have gone to the computer early Tuesday morning to check the Toronto Star. The Star is doing an update article on Parker in the GTA section and it had been slated for the Tuesday paper. I did get confirmation this evening that Parker's article will be in tomorrow's paper. For those of you who are interested in reading the article you can check the paper online at www.thestar.ca

I had recently taken back something we had gotten for Parker several months ago and exchanged it for a new toy. If you have not figured it out yet, Parker enjoys playing with his plastic balls. He has always been very good at grasping them with his fingers and can even throw and roll them occasionally. With that in mind, I brought him home a toy that shoots balls in the air and then they land on a slide that twirls around until the balls return to the blower where they may shot up into the air again. Parker absolutely loves watching the balls shoot up into the air. He loves trying to catch them before they make their way down the slide. Now, at nine and a half months old he has not completely figured out how the contraption works and as a result finds himself getting hit by the same stream of air that is meant for the ball. I am not sure if he enjoys that too much and as a result I am pretty sure that the stream of air will act as a deterrent for his pulling the contraption over as he tries to remove the balls from it. Today we worked on putting the balls onto the slide instead of taking them off.

I had purchased Parker a puzzle of shapes a few weeks ago. The pieces were made of wood and had handles that allowed him to pick up the pieces. I figured it would be a great way for him to learn about shapes and how to put a puzzle together. However, all he wanted to do was take the pieces of the puzzle and shove them into his mouth. We started getting worried since the pieces were getting wet from his saliva and we found cleaning the wood very difficult. As a result, we removed the shape puzzle from his regular repatoire of toys. Actually, it was Parker's mother that removed it. Just in case Parker reads this ten years from now.

That said, when my wife was busy yesterday, I decided to reintroduce the puzzle to him. Yes, he put the pieces into his mouth occasionally, but he was much more interested in grabbing two pieces and banging them together. Every once in a while, Parker would even try and bang the puzzle piece against the board. I saw this as a developmental opportunity and decided to show him how the pieces went into the puzzle. Parker was not completely interested in what I was doing, but none-the-less, the puzzle has been returned to his mat as one of his favourite toys. Today, I saw him take two pieces, one in each hand and crawl off with them.
Unfortunately, Parker was playing in his room this morning and bumped his head on the beak of his little ducky stool. I don't hear the little monkey cry very often but he did shed a tear or two. Mommy was with him so by the time I got to his room where the crying was coming from, it had turned into very contagious laughter as mommy had baby Parker sitting in front of her across from the ducky. Apparently she and Parker were scolding the poor little duck. Bad Ducky, mommy shouted, Bad Ducky!

Last I checked, Parker is doing very well, and the ducky has quite the complex.
*Pictures are from Saturday.