More interactive

Jared is becoming a lot more interactive.  While reading his books, he makes the sounds from "Mr. Brown Can Moo," he does the motions for "Itsy Bitsy Spider," and he likes all of the things to do in "Pat the Bunny."  He is naming a lot of things right now, like wall, ball, block, frog, gu-gurt (yogurt), ooo (cheerio), apple (any fruit), truck,  among others.

Jared has hardly ever been sick, but he got an interesting one last week.  Sunday and Monday he was running a low grade fever that we were blaming on teething.  Monday night he spiked a fever, and Tuesday, he had a fever all day.  He was not sleeping well, so he was tired and cranky, but otherwise he was fine.  There was no sneezing or runny nose or anything.  We took him to the Pediatrician on Tuesday, and she said that his tonsils and throat were a little red and swollen, so they swabbed for strep throat.  That came back negative, so it was deemed a generic "viral infection," and we should call them again if it doesn't get better.  Wednesday he was better, and then Thursday he got a rash.  They were flat pink bumps, mostly on his chest and belly.  He wasn't itching them, so that was good.  Steve looked this up on the internet and found out that Jared had roseola.  It starts with a low-mid fever, the fever breaks, then the rash starts.  They can't diagnose it until the rash shows up.  The rash has since gotten better and Jared is fine.  It was just bad timing, since we gave Jared a bubble bath just before the rash appeared, so we didn't know if the rash was related to his sickness or the bubble bath.

While he was sick, Jared became super picky, and barely ate anything.  He has since regained his appetite, but the pickiness is still there.  He has some good meals, like he ate everything for dinner last night, but he only eats his blueberry oatmeal for breakfast.  (Not that I can complain too much about him eating fruit and grains.)  I believe that part of the pickiness stems from the fact that he now understands that he can ask for certain foods, and that he doesn't have to eat what we give him.  He (usually) nicely puts his spoon into his dish, and hands the dish back to us if he is done or doesn't want it.