Our new favorite pastime: making noise music.

Sean was playing with his blocks. His mom wanted to record the playing on camera. She got out said camera, turned it on, and recorded Sean. Who suddenly had no interest in his blocks whatsoever. I believe this demonstrates the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle somehow. The proof is left to the reader.

Flying to Austin, Sean was fascinated with the goings-on on the runway.

Grandma came to help us all out in our first few days here.

I bought Sean some new blocks. He pretty much just puts them in his mouth and bangs them on things right now. But I’m enjoying them!

Much more interesting to Sean is the camera, which he’s dying to get his hands on.

Hi, Mom! Dad’s reading to me. But you’ve got that CAMERA thing! Ooooh…

Hmm, let me think. (No, I didn’t put the bowl there; it was my Mom.) What food to start with?

Here are a couple clips showing Sean moving around at the end of September when he was eight months old. It’s amazing how much more he’s moving now just a couple weeks later.

We’ve been scouting out a good soft place to sit out on a blanket here in Austin, but the ground is very rocky and grass in the shade is littered with acorns and sticks. Not good for practicing moving around. We found one decent spot in the local elementary school playground, but can only go there on weekends. Still searching…

At our temporary digs in Minneapolis during September, there was a great playground just a few blocks away — all wood-and-metal stuff like we used to have when we were kids. The kind you could actually fall off of if you weren’t careful. None of this plastic everything with railings that they have now-a-days.

Anyway, there were a few baby swings there, and we quickly discovered that Sean loves to swing! Here’s a clip of one of our daily playground excursions:

Sadly, we have not found a playground with baby swings yet in Austin. There aren’t so many playgrounds around period.

Sean on his eight month birthday, which was a couple weeks ago.

I am 100% convinced that people are evolved to eat fruit. Several weeks ago, on a whim, I handed Sean a plum — a whole plum — to see what he’d do with it. What did he do? He ate it. Almost all of it. Quickly and with relish (and quite a bit of mess). Since then he’s actually gotten pretty efficient at eating fruit and makes less mess. He really loves plums, which fit his hands well, but the other stone fruits are right up there, as are pears. Here he eats a plum:

Some photos from Sean’s eighth month of life:

Sean loves his baths, although he’s starting to try to climb out of his little baby bath these days…

He’s now able to stand holding on to something. The corner of the Pack and Play is perfect for practicing.

And, he’s still a happy little guy.

He really loves standing, so he doesn’t spend much time down on the floor. But when he’s there, it’s clear he’s trying to get the hang of crawling…

Pictures on a couch have become trickier, as he wants so badly to be mobile. This past week’s pictures were hard because he didn’t want to sit for the camera. He wanted to crawl and move and fling himself off the couch.

Sean has started waving ‘hi’ at people. He’ll even initiate it himself.

Here he is practicing his suave look: (the ladies adore him)

There’s a playground a few blocks away. Sean enjoys the swing the most.

Happy birthday, Sean! (More pictures to come…)

I think he’s got it! Today we walked up the stairs and past the closet mirror. And as we passed, I said to Sean’s reflection “hi!” And he waved at my reflection! A tentative wave, I’ll admit, but a distinctive wave none-the-less. Ben and I tested the wave again this evening, and sure enough, a definite wave back. Super cool.