Noam's News

Okay, I know, we've been bad. But I really wanted to be able to post pictures! Anyway, in the meantime, we're back due to popular demand.
Noam is almost a year and a half, and he is quite a big boy. Here are some recent (well, and not so recent) developments:

- for several weeks Noam has been walking down the stairs by himself (he's been walking up for months). When I say "by himself," I mean that not only does he not hold anyone's hand, he will actually push me away if I seem like I'm about to reach out to try to balance him. The closer he comes to falling, the more delighted he seems. The other day he teetered on the edge of a step and actually laughed out loud. "Can I help you, Noam?" - "NOOOO!"
Okay then.

- Noam has another favorite stair trick. Sometimes, while walking down the stairs, Noam will receive an imaginary phone call, on his imaginary phone. Yes, some children have imaginary friends; ours has an imaginary phone. Anyway, he will pick up his imaginary phone, sit down on the steps, and talk quite seriously for a minute or two. It sounds something like this:
"HI!"
"mmmph"
"gii!"
"neh!"
"bigii"
"BYE"!
He then puts his imaginary phone into his imaginary pocket and continues down the steps. A moment later, the process repeats. It is not unusual for it to take us ten to fifteen minutes to get down the stairs.

- Noam has a favorite song. A disclaimer: It is NOT our favorite song. Nor will it ever be...this was so not our idea. But somehow, Noam is obsessed with a (Hebrew) song called "Kol Hamitpalel", sung by the Yeshiva Boys Choir. He first fell in love with the music video on youtube. Having decided that our son was too young to be watching music videos all the time, Daddy bought him the CD. Today, in the space of two hours, Noam made me play it for him (just that one song) approximately fifteen times. Thanks, Daddy!

- For about two weeks now, Noam has been climbing the ladder on the climber all by himself. Not that I've seen him do it - when Eema is present he prefers to be lifted. But Yael (his babysitter) reports that he is quite the little monkey these days!

- Noam is a tiny bit OCD. This has actually been developing for quite some time: when his hands get dirty, he says: "hand!" and waits for you to wipe it off. When something falls on the floor (a cheerio, a cornflake, etc) he says: "uh-oh" and will not rest until it has been picked up. When he finishes eating, he insists that we clear his plate away before he can leave the table. And he loves to wipe the table, floor, or chair - whatever he can reach - with a wipe or towel Lately, he has taken to closing any drawers or cabinet doors that we have left open. No matter what else is going on, Noam cannot walk through the kitchen without making sure everything is as it should be.

- (related to above) Noam is obsessed with laundry. When I say: "Noam, want to do laundry?" his eyes light up. "Yeah, yeah!" he says, and runs to the hamper. He helps me fill the laundry basket, which we then carry (together) to the washing machine. There, I must hand him each article of clothing, one at a time, so that he can put it in the machine. Unfortunately, he hasn't quite mastered the idea that once a full load is in, there can be no more laundry for at least another hour. "More, more!" he begs. So then he has to be satisfied with putting away the laundry.

- Inanimate moving objects in Noam's world fall into two categories: "Choo-choo" and "beep-beep." Everything must make one of these two sounds, including airplanes and bikes.

- Last but not least, Noam does occasionally consent to talk on the real phone a little bit. He will say "Hi" and "Bye." This morning when he was saying goodbye to his Daddy he tried to hug the phone!

Talk to you all soon!