weekend update

this was an educational weekend.

first ... mommy and jack went to music class to make up one of the classes that jack did not attend with roxana on a friday. it was a chance for mommy to see what they do in music class and for jack to run around, dance with scarves, play tambourine, drums, maracas and egg. we had a blast ... so much fun, in fact, that mommy was unable to take any pictures until we were walking out the door



see ya!

when we got home, jack enjoyed a raisin snack ...


i heard it through the grapevine ...

and daddy revealed to us what he found behind the television while we were gone ...


a plastic dalmation, part of a gear toy, a wood triangle, and part of the "goblin truck"

i mean ... what do *you* have behind your tv?

finding these missing toys made jack pretty happy ...

jack enjoyed riding his horsey ...


giddy up!

... and vacuuming with it??

i think i'll keep him!

here kitty, kitty ...

trucks don't run away like kitties do ...

that's part of why they're fun to play with

after lunch and a nap, mommy and jack went to the linguistics department of the university of maryland to participate in another study. jack played in the waiting room while mommy filled out some forms ...

the experiment had jack watch a short video where they showed him a series of actions and then asked him a question about it.

for example, the video showed a hand wiping a toy camera with a cloth. then, the narration would say, "look, she's wiping on the jub. wow, she's wiping on the jub. yay! she's wiping on the jub." finally, they would show a freeze frame of both the wiping cloth and the toy camera and ask, "which one is the jub?"

it was his eye movements after this question which they were monitoring to figure out if children jack's age can understand new words through context alone.

like most experiments, they couldn't tell me much about how jack performed individually, but we'll get survey results in the future to see how much young kids can pick up through contextual understanding.

and, for our trouble, jack got to pick out a new book to take home. we've been enjoying reading it, but daddy said, "couldn't we find a book about going to sleep?!?"

sunday morning it was time to go to zoo class. mommy was pretty down on zoo class, after the first class was postponed and the teacher for last week's class failed to show up. the zoo sent an apology email, saying there had been a confusion between the regular teacher and the substitute teacher.

so we intrepidly set off ... only to find out that the teacher stood us up, again! needless to say, we are getting a refund and the zoo is never contracting with this group again, but jack was disappointed nonetheless ...


i want to learn animals signs!

but, we made the best of it, watching the zebras and maned wolves before heading home. in the afternoon we watched some of the redskins game (before they choked), took a walk in our neighborhood, and played at the playground for over an hour!

as we headed for home in the gloaming, it was time for a bath and then nana and grandad showed up to feed jack dinner, play with him, and put him to bed while mommy and daddy went to see bruce springsteen! hopefully some pix from that in a future post.

it was a great weekend for all ... and in case there was any doubt, baby ... jack was born to run!