Waterworld

As the family dives into summer, a morning pattern is developing. More or less, while I exercise (mostly tennis) Shana has Nate until about 8, whereupon I take Nate out to a playground until about 10, whereupon Nate naps and I go to work. As June already has seen some scorching hot days, NYC's playground's fountains have come to life. Nate darts in and out of the water and mostly gets soaked. One of his words is "weh" for wet.

It is often empty at the playgrounds in the morning, which is why I think I enjoy it so much. It's peaceful and Nate can explore without big kids having water balloon fights around him.

Eating...Not

Nate is not that into food. He is not a foodie. He likes his yogurt ("yo yo") and his cheese ("chee") and of course his bottle of milk in the mornings and evenings ("ba-ba"). His current culinary passion is pirate booty. This is all much to Shana's consternation.

This pic was taken at Mike and Nicole's apartment in Clinton Hill, where Shana, Nicole and Aimee, founding members of Brooklyn Based Cookbook Club, were cooking a feast.

Nate was not impressed...

Park in the Morning

As we roll into summer, Nate has hit kind of an angel phase. He's just -- I don't know -- delightful. He's sleeping better, communicating enough to sidestep major frustration, and displays a sweetness that we bath in giddily, like we might if we found ourselves in a Jacuzzi filled with whipped cream. Or pudding. Anyway, I'm looking forward to being outside with Nate, traveling around with him, etc. Here's a nice photo sequence of Nate at McCarren Park. Did I mention that he's in an angel phase?

Boating

This is Nate and me on the boat in Love's Folly, a somewhat stressful little ride captioned by the unconquerable Jimmy, which we took with our friends and their kids on a lovely Memorial Day weekend holiday. Nate's life jacket situation was so intense that it practically swallowed him up. There was really little room for him to turn his head let alone move about and enjoy the sea or the wind. So he just hunkered down, his goal really being to essentially not drown. He didn't mind as long as we fed him pretzels.

Our friends -- Marc/Aimee/Ari -- had it worse. Ari kind of shut down. Before that though, he may have indicated some sea sickness or something, and Aimee rode most of the way holding a plastic bag under Ari's face, waiting to catch the vomit should it fly. Meanwhile, Aimee's folding chair slid back into Marc's legs, causing him severe pain. They look good in this pic but suffice it to say they were in some choppy waters.

Waterfront

Nate is starting to get comfortable moving around. On this chilly May sunday, we went to the waterfront in Williamsburg, the first time I've taken him there this Spring. Although Nate seemed a bit tentative on the grass, he was left to wander and explore, and that made me happy, to watch him going more or less where he pleased. We rolled a ball to each other some. He got excited as we got close to the water, screaming DUCK! DUCK!! DUCK!!!, pointing to an aloof seagull floating in the water. People were walking by and Nate would look at them and point to the seagull, as if it was just the most amazing thing ever. DUCK! DUCK!! DUCK!!!

There's an industrial kid's playground type of thing, down in this area of the Williamsburg waterfront park, with large objects on which to climb. There was a kid's birthday party going on; children were wearing capes. In this picture, Nate was eyeballing 3 girls on a bouncy wooden circle. Then they were gone. And Nate and I headed to the Brooklyn Flea where we had french fries before meeting Shana for a fun Mexican dinner at Taco Chulo.

True stories from 20 months

Nate turned 20 months yesterday!! Here are a few funny stories from the past few weeks:

Nate loves to sing into a microphone which could be anything--a lamp, a doorknob, a toothbrush and most frequently, the knobs of Michael's keyboard stand. His standard song is sort of a punk rock riff--very gruff and passionate. It's hysterical. We're not sure where he got the microphone idea. Maybe from seeing the kids bands? Occasionally he sings quietly, like when he's on the swing and is right now very into the song "Goodbye, goodbye" from Yo Gabba Gabba.

Nate is also really into remarking on big trucks, or other cool things he sees, with the following expressions: "whoa baby!" "oh man." "oh no." "wow." He often points out "mess"-- almost everything seems to be a mess to Nate right now. Not sure where he picked up this fastitiousness. Probably not from us.

Funny story--I'm standing with Nate on the sidewalk in front of our house when a car pulls up and the high school age driver says hi to some kids who are passing by. The guy on the sidewalk goes "Hey N—. that's a fat car." the driver responds "Yo N--where you going?" They exchange a few more words and then the car drives off and which point Nate, who has been observing this whole conversations yells "BYE!!!"

Nate Walks Music Video

This is a music video of Nate, more or less his journey to walking. It's sappy but so what. As Nate walks around more and more confidently, his reluctance to crawl followed by his insistence on crab-crawling until about 19 months old, seems funny now. But Nate had weekly battles with a physical therapist -- Jackie -- and that was no laughing matter. Well, it is now.