Getting Old, Quick

So yesterday, AJ added a new sign to his vocabulary - hungry. I was so excited when, after I'd helped him climb up next to me, he started rubbing his hands across his chest. Since that's pretty far from the actual sign (you trace your esophagus with one hand), I went out on a limb to ask if he was hungry. He responded with his affirmative "huh, huh," so it was off to the high chair for us.

He didn't really seem all that interested in any of the food I offered him except for his "crunchies" that he's been getting the last couple of days, but we tried valiantly and with great frustration all around.

After a while, we cleaned up (including him "helping" me wipe down his tray) and went back to play.

The same sequence was repeated roughly 52 times yesterday.

And so far it's been about four times today. It probably would have been more, but we went out for a while. Plus, he ate almost half of what he normally eats in a day during first and second breakfasts. One would hope that he'd be mostly full from that. He's also had most of a banana today in addition to lots of crunchies, steamed squash, steamed zucchini, freeze-dried apple bits, and his Os. Oh...and he had most of what he eats for lunch too.

So, either I've been starving my son (which could explain his off-the-charts low weight) and he's finally figured out how to get his stupid mom to feed him more, or he's in a growth spurt.

I'm hoping it's the growth spurt.

But seriously...while it's adorable to see him pounding his chest like Tarzan (which is what his sign for hungry looks like most often)...or doing the "hungry" sign on _my_ chest when I don't respond fast enough to him, it's really getting old, REALLY fast when he signs it every half hour or so.

Forget "wolf," my kid cries "hungry."