Look at him go!

We had a tasty Tuesday pizza dinner over at Amy, Brian, and Owen's place this past evening. Caden had a great time playing with Owen's toys, watching Scooter the dog (or is that "da"?), and hanging out with his friends Owen and James. And then, Caden discovered how much fun Owen's walker can be....

Cruisin' around

We're savoring our last few weeks here, spending time with friends, enjoying the sunny weather, and watching Caden explore his world with increasing skill and rapidity. We've enjoyed parties, dinners, and outings with friends from the lab, including a fun picnic yesterday with Amy, Brian, and Owen in the park near our house and a hike with Matt and Sarah last Saturday. We've been wandering down to the local farmers' market at the plaza on Sundays. Caden especially likes the fountain, the kids, and the music. Today, we ran into Caden's buddy James and his mom, Randall, at the farmers' market, and we listened to some good bluegrass together. Our friend Emily also came by and chatted for a while. We're really going to miss this place and our friends.

Caden has figured out how to get pretty much everywhere in the house via a combination of frog-crawling (he kicks with both feet together), cruising, and scooting. Today, he added a new skill to his repertoire: he can now get from his belly into a sitting position. Given his rather unorthodox method of "crawling"--he still doesn't get up on his hands and knees--we were wondering exactly how he was going to learn to sit. Caden walks backward with his hands, keeping his feet planted and his legs straight. Eventually, he reaches a tipping point and falls back onto his behind. Today, he frog-crawled over to the gate in the hallway, hand-walked into a sitting position, then pulled himself to standing on the gate. Boy, was he pleased with himself!

As promised, here's an update on Caden's increasing vocabulary:

Caden-English Dictionary

(parenthetical numbers refer to the order in which he learned them)

aie = eye (8)
da da = Daddy (6)
da = dog (4)
du = duck (7)
haiee = hi (2)
hai de = hi there (3)
kee-kee = kitty (1)
ma ma = Mommy (5)

A few more pictures

With Dave, our kiwi friend

A duet with Mommy

Cozy with his teddy bear

Video of the week

Here, you can see Caden pulling up on the gate and cruising into his bedroom. If you turn the volume up, you'll notice that he is making a funny squealing noise. That's because Mommy is enticing him into the bedroom with his stuffed humpback whale puppet. How many 15-month-olds do you know who make whale sounds?

Goin' on a house hunt

The biggest event of the past several weeks has been our hunt for a house in Massachusetts. We all headed eastward on June 16th. Grandma Jo flew out from Corvallis, and it was wonderful to see her waiting for us when we exited security in Boston. Gma Jo was a great help during the week we were there, since Mommy and Daddy were spending so much time looking at houses and signing papers. The house we stayed in (called the Pond House) overlooked a really neat (you guessed it!) pond filled with ducks, bullfrogs, turtles, and huge carp, and Gma Jo and Caden had lots of fun watching all of the animals from the deck.

Our mission was a successful one--we found a really nice house in a great neighborhood. It's really close to both an elementary and a middle school, with lots of green space around it. Here, you can see Mommy, Daddy, and Caden exploring our soon-to-be new home:

From the street
Exploring the back patio

Playing with the dining room chandelier

During our week on the North Shore, we also had fun exploring Marblehead, Salem and Swampscott; poking around on the rocky shore near the Pond House; and spending time with our new colleagues at the Marine Science Center.

Exploring the intertidal zone

Walking near our new home
At our neighborhood playground

Admiring the Spirit of '76

Catching frogs with Daddy

Pond gazing with Gma Jo

Showing off my new teeth

Soooooo Big!

We'll provide a more detailed update soon, but in the meantime, here's Caden showing how big he is:

Weekend excursions

We've been enjoying the sunny, warm days of early June, especially the weekends when we get to spend time at home and exploring the area as a family. On each of the past two weekends, we've headed to a state park in the area for hiking, picknicking, and learning a bit about the history of the area. On the 3rd, we drove over to the Bale Grist Mill State Park, where we watched the miller grind rye into flour. The miller had lots of cool props to teach us about the milling process, and he made a point of involving Caden. He even let Caden turn the model millstones that showed how the flour was channeled as it was ground. Then, once we saw how the flour was ground, we all went outside to watch the miller pull the chain, open the flume, and make the giant 30-foot mill wheel turn. As you can see, Caden loved watching the water pour over the wheel.

This past weekend, we headed over to Glen Ellen to check out the Jack London State Park. It was neat to see where London wrote many of his famous novels and to wander around his old ranch. We hiked up to a small lake, and Caden had a great time checking out the world from his vantage point on Daddy's back. While we were hiking, he decided that stealing Mommy's hat was a really fun game--he would grab it by the bill, yank it off, and laugh mischevously--so we played "steal the hat" until our faces hurt from laughing so much.

Caden has been having lots of fun with his friends James and Owen on Tuesday pizza nights, and last Thursday, we invited friends over for dessert to welcome some new folks to our crew at the lab. Caden and Owen had a great time opening the kitchen cupboards and pulling things out of them. It seems like Caden is becoming more adamently mobile by the day; he demands to walk everywhere, even though he can't walk on his own, yet. What that means is that either Mommy or Daddy has to hold his hands and walk with him.

We finally managed to get a decent picture of Caden's first tooth (see right, and squint at the bottom gumline), just in time for his 2nd tooth to come in. One of the top front teeth finally pushed through on Monday, and it's much easier to spot than the bottom one.

A message from Caden

Caden the inchworm

Here's a short video clip of our little guy inchworming his way across the living room to get Daddy's keys: