The Inland Empire

We went to Spokane this weekend to visit friends. Eastern washington is just beautiful, and we had a great time. Several of my college friends live there -- they all have kids so it was fun to hang out in all of their very sunny, wide-open, unpopulated spaces. My friend Sarah has twin 4.5 year old boys who have many, many cool toys. Jack fell in love with their guitar and played it constantly.

Mr. Personality

Jack's personality seems to be evolving. I have described him as mellow but now he is much more jovial. He laughs all the time. He also seems like a bit of a ham. When meeting someone new, he likes to show them all of his tricks -- sticking out his tongue, clapping, kissing them, imitating a giraffe ( I have been trying to get that on video for such a long time -- I have hours of video of me following jack saying 'what does the giraffe say?' over and over). He also likes to imitate an elephant but that looks more like he is spitting and gets fewer laughs so he seems to be phasing that out. When meeting new kids, he's a little cautious but he eventually jumps into the action. He doesn't show other kids his tricks -- I imagine it's because they never react the way adults do. Adults have BIG reactions .. they are just delighted with his responsiveness to them. The other new-ish thing with him is that he thinks he is mr. independent. When we go places, he just walks off like he has a meeting or something. I try to give him a little space but I am still amazed at how far he will go without wondering where I am.