Little man on campus

From Carolyn--

Pete and I have been taking advantage of the amazing weather and taking walks on campus in the early evenings. Erik and I started doing this over break (when it was finally warm enough), but campus was pretty desolate. Pete is loving seeing people and exploring. He's oddly obsessed with the Harris Center (including the disco balls hanging from the ceiling of the concert hall) and game for any flight of stairs that he can find. If you're out playing wiffle ball or catch and hear a little voice saying "ba[ll]?? ba[ll]?? ba[ll]??" over and over, it's probably Pete.

Pete Art #4

Pete art hearts.jpg
Originally uploaded by Childe_Erik.

Valentine
2006
Peter Simpson, 2005-
Mixed media

My first mixed media piece using an opaque background, Valentine creates two literal and metaphorical levels. Slightly above the surface, a loose triangle of naturalistic postage-like stamps intersects with a rough circle of mass-produced stickers like those given to schoolchildren on holidays. These geometric forms are linked by the pure, bright red that creates its own circle of the six leftmost stickers. The machine-made precision of that layer contrasts with the similar but muted coloring and abstract forms of the canvas layer, inviting the viewer to consider the two layers' interrelationships.

Assuming a position

From Carolyn--

We've been reading to Pete a lot recently. He has an insanely cute way of turning the pages and then folding his little hands together in his lap to listen to us read what comes next.

Pete Art #3

Pete art clouds.jpg
Originally uploaded by Childe_Erik.

Clouds
2006
Peter Simpson, 2005-
Natural and synthetic materials

This piece, a companion to Raindrops (see Pete Art #2 below), creates a different kind of tension between tradition and postmodernity. Here the clouds of the title appear as something like cotton balls, reminding the viewer not only of the hackneyed metaphor of cottony clouds but also of the common use of cotton balls to represent clouds in children's crafts. The piece jars the image away from conventionality by encasing that substance in a flexible plastic that reveals the tension created by the pressure of the clouds within.

Rarrrr

This evening, I was giving Pete his bath, as usual, and we were looking at his favorite bathtime book. (Pete now has strong opinions about books, bathtime and otherwise.) It's an alphabet book, with big capital letters accompanied by illustrations--a queen for Q, a rabbit for R, and so on. As Pete turns pages, I look for illustrations that lend themselves to sounds and read along, as in "Snake! SSSSSSS!" or "Lion! RARRRR!" (If anybody knows sounds to make for, say, queen or giraffe or rabbit, drop me a line.) For a while, Pete has looked at the last page, found the ball of yarn for Y, and said, "Ba!" which is not surprising, since ball has been his best word for a while. (For a few days, he would look at that page, say ball, and point to the xylophone. Happily, he sorted that one out.) Tonight, he added a new trick: he looked at L and made a growly little "AAAAAAA" sound. I didn't catch on at first, but he did it again the next time, and I got it: he was roaring! He was, in fact, making his very first animal sound! It is a wonderfully unintimidating little baby roar.

I must note that this development is grossly unfair. Carolyn and I read many of the same books to Pete, but we each have our specialties, and one of Carolyn's strengths is animal sounds; some of the books produce magnificent, convincing, fast-paced animal jamborees. (As they tend to be farm-themed, these books seldom include lions, though it would be fun to do the sounds of terrified antelopes and cowering chickens.) There's no way my very ordinary nightly roar should have prompted Pete's first imitation.

Pete's vocabulary to date:

Hi (the original, seldom used now)
Bye-bye
Mama
Papa (baba--not nearly as solid as mama, but coming along)
More (in sign language or as "moi," both if he's really hungry)
Ball (ba)
Roar (aaaaaa)
Uh-oh (formerly meaning "oops, I dropped something," but now more like "ha, I threw it down," or even--just today--"just so you know, I'm going to throw this down")

Pete Art #2

Pete art raindrops.jpg
Originally uploaded by Childe_Erik.

Raindrops
2006
Peter Simpson, 2005-
Watercolor on wood fiber

Though abstract and monochromatic, this piece claims a place in the tradition of naturalistic painting in its title and the organicism of its patterns. More specifically, the appearance of dabbing the paint directly on the canvas recalls pointilist technique, here taken to an extreme that capitalizes on the dramatic effect of the empty canvas between the two painted areas.

Pete Art #1

Pete art bite.jpg
Originally uploaded by Childe_Erik.

Pete Simpson here. I've decided to begin posting comments about my art, which I have been creating for public display for a few months now. This was my first professional piece.

Boundary
2006
Peter Simpson, 2005-
Watercolor on wood fiber

The main field of composition in this piece is understated, subtle almost to the point of fading into a blank canvas. The light marks in the middle of the piece, made with only a brush of the fingertip, evoke gentle human contact. That gentleness makes the bitten tear on the edge fiber more startling in its suggestion of unmeaning violence. Boundary unsettles the viewer with the suggestion that threats lurk at the edge of even the most reassuring human moments.

Art bitten

Today, Pete moves up a room in daycare, to the land of one-year-olds who can walk. It might be a little bit of a shock for him, but he knows the teacher in the room, and every day he'll get time in the gym that involves throwing balls and is therefore a wonder. We hope for a smooth transition.

Later

After descending into utter despair when we dropped him off, Pete seems to have had a good first day in his new room. When we picked him up (after his primary teacher had left), we found with his other things a piece of gray construction paper. Upon closer inspection, we discovered a number of barely perceptible pink smudges in a kind of random blast pattern and a much clearer mark left by a baby-sized bite out of one edge. At last, we read the listing of the day's activities: Fingerprint Birds! Of course! Genius baby.

Return of Pete

From Carolyn--

Pete got quite sick at school today--fever as high as 102.7. He's so different when he's sick--so passive and glazed. All he wanted to do was sit and watch the basketball on TV. (By which I mean he wanted to watch the ball itself whenever it was shown on the screen.) And then in a matter of minutes around 7:30 tonight his fever must have broken and he clicked back in to being his old self. (By which I mean that he wanted to toddle around and throw his own ball about 250 times.) A small miracle: our own Pete returned to us.

Nose

From Carolyn--

Forget balls. Now Pete is obsessed with noses. Or, more specifically, with nostrils. First he tries to stick one index finger up our nostrils, and then he tries to stick the other index finger up our nostrils. There's an odd urge for balance that I haven't noticed with other activities. We're currently trying to discourage him, but could we get this all out of his system with one exhaustive explorative session? Or would it just fuel his passions and lead to a life of obsessive nose picking? Parenting is stressful in unexpected ways.

At any rate, I am currently trying to skip the pages in his "First Words" book that deal with body parts, including noses.

I have started spelling a few words in front of Pete to keep him from wanting "P-U-F-F-S" (tasty star-shaped puffed corn baby snacks) or "M-O-R-E," which at certain times is a synonym for "P-U-F-F-S." "N-O-S-E" is also now on this list.

Pete unendeared

From Carolyn--

Has Erik mentioned that Pete is obsessed with balls? "Ba" is Pete's most-said word, he loves throwing balls, and he is getting better and better at it. Today, when Erik was holding him, he was doing a great job of throwing a small rubber ball bounce-pass fashion me, six feet away. Suddenly he caught sight of our cat Kirby, off to the side, and squealed as he does whenever he sees one of the cats. Before we realized what he was doing, he threw the ball hard at Kirby--a direct hit. Just one more way Pete has found to un-endear himself to poor K-man. We were torn between disapproval and pride at Pete's accuracy and strength.

Step one

Whoa! First step! As reported earlier, Pete has been standing up pretty solidly, and sometimes he has appeared to think about walking. This evening, we set him down in front of us to practice standing, as we have many times, and boom! That little right foot popped forward and set itself down again. He fell on his little bum almost immediately, of course. Then he did the same thing two more times. Waddya know--I guess that's the last of the big firsts, isn't it?

Oh, and Pete's vocabulary has now expanded to four words, with "uh-oh!" (after he drops something, usually on purpose) joining hi, ba[ll], and mama.

Ba[ll]

Pete now says "ba" for "ball"--and also "mama." The usage is imperfect in both cases, but he gets them right often enough that I'm willing to say he has a three-word vocabulary of varying reliability. He's also getting really close to taking that first step.

Useless flippers

From Carolyn--

This I miss: Do you know those little wind-up toys that move around if you put them in water? Do you know how silly they look if you put them on the floor and let them unwind there instead, flippers flapping uselessly? When Pete used to get really exited, he'd collapse on the floor on his stomach and kick his legs and pump his arms over and over, just like those toys. Now that he's able to stand up, he really doesn't do it any more. He still gets excited, but he shows it in different ways.

However, he does now occasionally give big sloppy open-mouthed un-puckering kisses, which are pretty great.

New sets of photos

Here are the Petey pix including his first Christmas, first big trip east, and first birthday. Again, I recommend the "view as slideshow" function.

Happy birthday, Pete!

Happy birthday to Pete! The big oh-one! We explained to him this morning how he amazes us with all the things he can do now, and also, by contrast, what an utterly incompetent human he was a year ago. Man, you couldn't even eat right! Fortunatly, Pete has a wonderful sense of humor.

Pete says hi.

First word! First word! At Saints Rest this afternoon, Pete started saying "hi" to people, in the right context, with a little wave. He kept it up through the evening, greeting [cjacobso], her dad, me, my mom on the phone, his new rocking horse. For the almost-year he's been alive, I've probably asked him "Can you say [x]?" thousands of times, always rhetorically. "Can you say amphibious? Can you say Oscar Peterson trio?" Tonight, I said, "Can you say hi?" And he looked at me, gave me that little wave and a smile, and said, "Hi!" Wonderful boy.

Pete hits the road

Since that last update on December 22nd, we've taken our first big trip east (an annual winter event before last year) with Pete. Two and a half weeks and 2,800 miles later, we're back, enjoying getting used to our house again, and trying to catch up on a lot of things at once--including notes to some people who might be reading this. Soon!

Pete has gone through one of his phases of hyperdevelopment. When we left, he couldn't climb a stair; now, he can climb a flight. (Only up--he's eager to go down head-first, so we have to work on that.) When we left, he was eating prepared baby food and some training puffs, perhaps with a Cheerio here and there; now, we can hand him a hunk of bagel, and he'll cheerfully pick away at it on his own. When we left, he was babbling but seemed not to have the sound of words yet; now, a set of words--prominently "mama," "baba" (bye-bye), and "light"--are contending to be the first that he definitively and exclusively connects to their referents. He stands himself up with ease and releases his grip for quick moments without falling. If someone playfully falls from a sitting position, he falls too, and laughs. It's a whole new world for the whole new year, with a first birthday approaching in less than two weeks.

One great trip moment: we walked outside of our hotel building in Allentown, PA to get some breakfast. We were surprised by a sunny morning (rare on the trip) and a big flock of Canada geese making its way across the sky above us in a series of groups. We directed Pete's attention upwards, not knowing whether he could see or would notice the squawking birds, but he did--he pointed up, tracked groups of them, grinned, and squeaked himself, making a sound generally reserved for sightings of cats and dogs. Sky puppies! Every morning should start so well.

Dadaism

Pete has seemed to be getting the idea of language lately. He picks up his books and pages through them while babbling. He points at things around the house, generally the Christmas ornaments and ceiling fans, and likes it when we name the things.

And THEN. Yesterday evening, I went to get Pete at day care. He was with another baby (Ezra, the younger son of [praitis] and Roger Hill) and two of the women who care for him. When I arrived, Pete was uncommonly cheerful; he smiled and clapped and reached for me to pick him up. When I did, he turned to the other adults, smiled again, and said,

"DADA!"

The bell of the proverb could not have been clearer. The other three adults were agog.

And then I had to explain that we don't call me Dada, or even Dad. (I'm Papa.) Pete might hear other people call me Dad occasionally, but not often, and almost never Dada. "Dada"--in keeping with the movement of modern art that goes by that name--is just a sound Pete happens to be able to make.

It was a great moment, though.

Chuck of the upward persuasion

From Carolyn:

Pete just threw up a l l o v e r m e. And all over himself. Repeatedly. There was nothing to do but step right into the tub with all of our clothes on. We have both recovered, though. And Erik was a hero who brought towels and helped take my watch off and collected the messy clothes in a bag and wrapped Pete up in many towels once he was clean. Thank goodness there was no chain reaction vomiting. And thank goodness for washing machines.