Angkota Adventure! It worked!

Well today Jonathan and I had another first -- quite an amazing one!   We have been out of cash for a few days and a trip to the bank was in order. 

An angkota is a little blue city minibus.  It travels a loop on a certain route all day.  The seating inside is benches all around and the door never closes ....EVER.  One way to anywhere is 25 cents.  (Not my picture.  I got it off the web.)

(Background information) When Jonathan was little, I used to wear him in an Ergo baby backpack.  It worked well on the angkota and he could be content in it for 3 hours at a time, with a break here or there.  Then he started getting too wiggly, bored, and fussy.  For a time I just decided not to take him to town in the angkota at all.  Then my mom got us a nifty little stroller that folds up easy-peasy.  I can roll him down to the bus-stop, fold up the stroller with one hand, heft him onto my hip with the other, get on, hold him on my lap to destination, and do the reverse steps getting off.    This required knowing the location of the stroller friendly sidewalks in town.  There are not too many of them, but I could manage from the bus-stop to the bank to the pharmacy and back across the street to catch the bus home. 

Now in advanced pregnancy, it hurts to even think about going to town on the angkota with Jonathan.  Everything seems so heavy and my pelvis just isn't as strong as it used to be.  I usually am limping the next day.  Not many of our friends have cars though and motorcycles are not an option for us either .....so on the angkota we go....just not as frequently as before.

Now that Jonathan is such a big boy, I decided to try something new and you know what?  He IS a big boy now and he did just fine!  We left the stroller at home and HE WALKED all the way to the bus-stop and around town and on-and-off the angkota several times, in and out of several stores, and all the way up the hill from the bus-stop to home!  We used his favorite red Elmo toddler harness, which he loves, but he also held my hand about half the time.  The only time I carried him was crossing the street.  It really decreased the physical burden, there was no fussing, and we both still had energy when we came home!  He even had dry pants!  I was so proud of him! 

Sorry, I don't have any pictures from today -- I haven't yet figured out how to manage Jonathan and myself and my belongings AND a camera.

But for those of you who are wondering how the belly is growing, I'll attach a picture from this last week.  Enjoy!

30 weeks pregnant with Baby Brother! 

Baby Problem Solving: Evidence of a developing Mind!

Every day it seems like Jonathan is learning and experiencing new things.  More and more we see that his mind is at work, thinking about things, figuring it out, how life and people work.  Although he can't yet talk, he's starting to do some sign language ("eat, more, enough") and often will imitate our vocals sounds -- whispering, coughing, blowing out a candle, smacking his lips. 

Dave says "What are we going to do when he becomes smarter than we are?"  I wish I knew!  I just answer "We have to pray hard that he loves the Lord and wants to obey!"  We pray for God's wisdom how to raise up this little developing mind.

Here he is at Pizza Hut last week.  I had gone with a friend to the big city for a doctor appointment, which means we also get to eat the good food there!  Jonathan was on my lap and I guess he was thirsty.  He reached for my glass and accidently dumped the water all over the table and onto my plate.  No problem for Jonathan, all the better!  He just slurped the water out of the plate and quenched his thirst!

The Pizza Hut slurp -- you should try it!

Here's another example that showed us that he is starting to think -- he's starting to modify his toys.  The green sticks are just about his favorite toy -- they are from a plastic shelving unit that we are not using.  They make excellent drumsticks, trumpets and stirring sticks.  Anyhow, the other night in the bathtub, he made THIS (drumroll please............) !!!

I call this "Molecule by Jonathan"

Pretty cool, huh?  Well, we were impressed.