This weekend, Joshua & I went to the annual Fall Festival which is put on by the Heart Institute at the Children’s National Medical Center.  It was held at the National Zoo, so we made our third trip there in 3 weeks.  I’m a part of the family advisory board which helps to put this event on (although I only recently got involved so I can’t take credit for how well the event went this year).  It’s sort of a reunion of cardiac kids & their families, complete with a catered lunch, arts & crafts for the bigger kids, a clown, & raffles.  Even though we didn’t win anything, we had a great time.  Joshua loved running all over the place & playing with the fallen leaves.  We even saw orangutangs climbing on cables overhead which we’d missed on our previous trips.  It was nice to see some of the people who helped us get through the ordeal that was Joshua’s heart condition a year ago.  I even got a photo of Josh with his surgeon, who was sort of like a celebrity at this event since he saved the lives of most of the kids there.

As for the other things that Joshua is up to, he’s basically finding new ways to get into trouble everyday.  He’s got so many little scrapes, bruises, & scratches lately, but I’m sure that’s only the start of things since he’s a curious little boy so we’ve got to get used to it.  He’s discovered how to climb over the side of the couch, only to land inside his pack-n-play (most likely on his head but I don’t know because all I heard was the thud followed by a scream).  So far, his injuries are quickly healed with a hug, so it’s probably more traumatic to me than to him, fortunately.  Joshua has learned to climb down the stairs finally.  We’ve worked on it for some time but he’d usually go down a couple of steps before looking up & realizing he can climb up to the top again.  The first time he made it the entire flight, it took over 20 minutes & 4 attempts because he kept going back up.  Now he can do it all at once in ‘normal’ time with only the occasional stop to consider climbing up before continuing going down.  But now, if I put him down on the landing in the middle of the stairs, he really has to think if he wants to go up or down (apparently it doesn’t matter which way I plan on him to go).

Josh has learned how to nest his stacking cups inside one another.  He has a set of 8 cups & he’s able to get 5 of them nested pretty quickly.  Eventually he takes them out to throw all over & start banging them together.  But he’s really gotten the concept of big & small which has been amazing to watch him figure out.  Joshua is also becoming better at playing ‘fetch’ with Mommy.  I’ll ask him to bring me a certain toy & he’ll go all over the living room to look for it & then (usually) pick it up & hand it to me.  Sometimes he’ll hand it to me but not let go as if to say ‘ha ha, it’s mine.’  He also likes riding on his little push toy from Erick’s mom.  The legs attach so it’s a ride-on toy which Joshua will sit on & put his feet on the footrests so I can push him forward on the hardwood floors.  Then he’ll use both feet to push himself back to me, put his feet up, & I’ll push him forward again.  We’ll do this for up to 5 minutes at a time before he’ll get distracted by his other toys.

Joshua seems happy that he can finally stick his tongue all the way out of his mouth now.  We’ll make faces at each other & it’s the cutest thing to see him be able to stick it out.  It does make feeding a little more difficult because if it’s something he doesn’t want to eat, he’s better able to push the unwanted food out of his mouth!  After we brush teeth before going to bed, we’ll look at ourselves in the mirror.  I will try to get him to show off his clean teeth by making a big toothy smile, but he’ll counter with a big tongue sticking out.  Then he’ll wave at himself & we’ll go off to bed.  That’s how we end our days lately—with a smile.  And surprisingly, he’s been incredibly easy to get to sleep lately.  He’ll just lie in the crib & smile, rather than cry when I start to leave.  It’s so refreshing.  I wonder how long this will last…