My First Diploma!

I am so chuffed! Today I got my very first diploma. I finished my Level One baby swimming class after nine weeks. Mommy says I was a star student, whatever that is. I guess it's because Miss Claire picked me to demonstrate lots of the techniques.


“John Morgan, Ready, Go” says Mommy. That’s my cue to hold my breath. Then Mommy dunks me under the water and even lets go of me sometimes so I can swim on my own. I start kicking and head towards the surface or to the teacher or whoever is waiting to catch me.





"Tada!” I say, as bubbles come out of my mouth.













Up I swim, heading for the surface as Mommy tries to catch me.
















Whew! That was fun. It’s nice to get a piggyback swim on Mommy after all that hard work. It also helps me to practice my kicking.

My first trip to the beach!

On Saturday Mom and Dad took me to a beach for the first time! We went to Bournemouth (well, actually to a stretch of the beach near Boscombe). It took about two hours in the car to get there. I slept most of the way there and back. Mom says it's on the south coast of England and that across the water is someplace called France. We had lots of fun! Here are some highlights.....

Left: Here I am getting my first look at all that water and the big waves. Wow! It made my eyes big!



Right and below: I head closer to the waves.....



Cowabunga!!! The surfers look like they're having fun!

Then I got to help make some sand castles. Well, actually, I mostly enjoyed playing with my stacking cups! And eating the sand!

I let Mom and Dad hold me when I wanted to go in the water. Even though I go under the water at the pool, this water was a lot colder. I didn't cry (well, I maybe whimpered a little once), but I wasn't sure I wanted to get in too deep this time.

Dad's call-sign in the Marines was "Sandman"--Like father, like son!

When Dad plays "Up Down" he doesn't normally let go! But at the beach, he let me get some airtime! As you can tell from my grin, I didn't enjoy it at all. Nope. Not one bit. He He He! Guess it's those pilot genes!

Then Mom and Dad said we had to go. My face says it all. I hope we get to go back soon!

More, Up, Down

Daddy plays a game where he lifts me high and says "Up" and then lets me back lower and says "Down." When I want him to lift me again, I say "Up" and he gets right chuffed that I can say such a thing.

On Friday night Daddy was feeding me and when he took too long to give me another spoonful, I said "Up" and he gave me another spoonful. Daddy was being right slow about giving me my dinner, so I started saying "Up" louder and louder. Finally Mommy came in and explained to Daddy that "Up" means do that again! I don't know where Daddy learned English, but I'm glad that Mommy finally explained to him that "Up" means hurry up and do that again!! I guess I should learn to say "More" so Daddy won't be so confused when Mommy is not around.

My turn!

Finally, I'm getting to type rather than dictate..... Here's my latest unedited effort at the keyboard!

rc6 v ftrf6vgc azA,, n yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy d
hwwwwwwwwwwwwwwe bvvuuuu,.qwrAwe.,eeeeee

My weekend

Despite still being bothered with digestive troubles and being pretty uncomfortable and having to go back on the stronger medicine for a few days.... I had a pretty fun weekend. On Saturday we drove out to a place called Snowshill Manor, a National Trust Property in the Cotswolds. We met up for lunch there with our friends Peter and Alison, who then played with me on the grass in the garden, watching me getting ready to crawl and helping me walk.






We had lots of fun outside while Mommy and Daddy took a look at the inside of the house. Then we went for a short walk around the countryside. After Peter and Alison went home, Mommy and Daddy and I went to another town, Chipping Campden, to look around at the beautiful thatched houses.

This one's old....














...and this one's new!
On Sunday we went to church. One of my friends, Lucas, was being baptized as it turns out. I get to wear some of his clothes as he's a few months older than I am. I fell asleep during part of the service. When I woke up, Mommy took me to a side room to feed me, but I was too distracted by the new babies in there with their mommies and by some of the toys!

Later we went to lunch with my buddy from swim class, Liam. We sat next to each other in high chairs. Our mommies and daddies came along, too; they were talking so much, though, that it was hard for us two to get a word in edgewise! (The photo is from Dad's phone.)


That evening I had a good ride on my donkey Eeyore. Well, actually, he's Mommy's hot water bottle cover. I held on to his ears but eventually he bucked me off. That's okay, because it gave me a chance to show off my almost-crawling. I learned this week to get up onto my hands and knees and even to do some pushups [press-ups] on my tippy toes. I have been skootching backwards for awhile and am now very quick at it, but am finding it a bit more complicated to go forwards for some reason. I get one knee to move forwards up to my hands, but then I get a bit tired and have a little lie-down.

Maybe later this week, after a good rest!

My webpage

In case you didn't know it, Daddy made a webpage for me when I was born. He hasn't really had a chance to do much updating of it because his computer, which has all the helpful software for dealing with photos and the like, stopped working right after I was born! But if you missed out on what I looked like when I first arrived, you can find some pictures here on my webpage here. (Click on "here" in the previous sentence to go there!)

Up Down

One of my favorite games is Up Down. Daddy lifts me up and says "Up" in a high pitched voice. Then he lowers me back down and says "Down" in a low pitched voice. I think he is trying to teach me about opposites.

Mommy was playing Up Down with me tonight and I said Ubp about six times. She was very excited and went to get Daddy so he could hear me say my new word. I got shy at first, but when Daddy started lifting me up, I started saying Ubp again. It sure was fun to see Mommy and Daddy so excited. Mommy said she thinks it's the first word I have said that I actually understand. But really I think it's just the first thing I've said that THEY'VE understood. Finally!

I better go to bed now. Tomorrow is a big day. We are going to a town called Broadway to meet some friends and go for a walk at a National Trust site. I will blog about it later.

July 4th Celebration!

Yesterday was the 4th of July and Mommy sure made a big fuss about it. After my swimming lesson, we went to the store to buy groceries and then we went to the party store to get decorations, sparklers and some big sticks called roman candles. They did not look like candles to me. They looked like something I would love to chew on though!

Mommy made Tabouli and something called Corn Pudding. She decorated the picnic table in the backyard and Daddy cooked hamburgers on the grill. I’m not big enough to eat hamburgers yet because I still don’t have any teeth to chew them with. I can’t wait to try one though. I didn’t get to try the Corn Pudding either, but Daddy sure must have liked it because he ate three helpings! Instead, I got to eat broccoli and cauliflower. It was yummy though and I almost ate the whole jar’s worth.

After dinner, Mommy and Daddy lit sparklers. That sure was fun! I like shiny sparkly things. I sure wanted to hold one for myself, but Mommy wouldn’t let me. Daddy is always saying I need to learn the laws of physics before I can do things for myself.

Later on after we put away the dinner dishes, Daddy lit one of his Roman Candles. It was loud and it scared me at first, but then I calmed down. Daddy said these ones are not like the ones you get in America. They shot all kinds of sparkly, twirly, noisy things up in the air. I don’t know what all the fuss was about, but I guess July 4th is a pretty important day. I just hope the neighbors didn’t mind the noisy celebration too much!

JoMo's BIG Week

It has been a very BIG week for me!

All week long I’ve been getting much better at sitting up on my own. I still can’t get into a sitting position by myself, but if someone puts me there, I can sometimes stay there a while now without toppling over! It makes it easier to play with some of my toys. I’ve also been waving “Bye-bye” to people. It makes Mommy and Daddy and my departing friends really happy. I have also learned to stand up and hold on to the side rails of my cot [crib] when Daddy helps me up.

Another skill I've started working on is drinking from a cup. The doctors keep telling me I need to drink more water and juice for my digestion (more on that later), but I don't really like them as much as the milk I get from Mommy. Mom and Dad tried using all kinds of funny cups with lids called "sippy cups" and tried bottles, but I just pushed them away. Then this week Mommy started helping me drink from a cup just like them, and I think that's pretty cool! I even took some orange juice from a box with a straw: Mommy squeezed the juice into the straw to get it started and then I just kept at it for a few sips, but it's hard work!

On Monday I learned to say “Dada” and “Daddy” for the first time. Mommy thought that was really cool; she was so excited that she sent Daddy a text message about it on his mobile phone.

On Tuesday I went to my swimming lesson. I’ve been taking them for about 6 weeks. This time I swam under the water twice in quick succession, which is supposed to help increase my lung capacity for longer swims, like maybe the English Channel one day! Here I am swimming on the surface with the instructor, Claire, just before I go under the water, but mostly I swim with Mommy (that's her head in the way...) and sometimes on weekends Daddy gets to help me practice.

On Wednesday I went to the doctor for a checkup. While in the waiting room, I was playing Patticake with Mommy and surprised her when I actually said “Patticake!” while clapping her hand. Well, I was trying to say it, and it sure sounded crystal clear to Mommy! Mommy then did lots of errands around town while I relaxed in the stroller. We went to the Wednesday Market for fruits and vegetables and other odds and ends. On the way to a big store, we stopped to listen to a man making really pretty music with a funny shaped instrument. I thought it was really fascinating. I guess I stared and smiled a little too intensely, because he kept laughing at me! Later I took Mommy to the pool along with my two friends Julia and Amanda and their mommy. It was the first time the two little girls had been to a pool and we had lots of fun splashing and floating about. Later in the day, I also shook my head “No” when Mommy was trying to get another spoonful of food into me.

On Thursday I spent most of the day filling my nappy [diaper] after weeks and weeks of inaction in that department. Mommy kept smiling and telling me what a good boy I was. She didn't used to smile when I filled my nappy like that! The strong medicine (normally only given to big kids) that I’d been on for a few days finally worked. I won’t say anything more about that, other than Daddy was surprised to come home to a full nappy pail after emptying it the previous morning!

On Friday I had a really big adventure. Mommy and I went to London to see Uncle Bill. He flies great big airplanes (Daddy calls them triple sevens or something like that) for American Airlines and he gets to come see us every couple of months or so. We went and saw some pretty pictures by a man named Constable. Before we went in, we had a nice picnic on the grass outside the Tate Britain galllery (see how well I'm sitting up!)

On Saturday when Daddy was leaving for work, I said “Bye DaDa.” He was really chuffed about that! So was I. After Daddy got back from work, our friend Auntie Jacqui came over and brought a great big bag of cherries. Mommy and Daddy sure liked them. Daddy took the stones out of some and chopped them up real small for me. I did not quite know what to do as I have only eaten smushy food so far. Daddy put them in the spinny, choppy machine and made them smushy and tried to feed them to me that way, but I was too busy looking at Auntie Jacqui to be bothered. Finally Auntie Jacqui fed the cherry mush to me and then I ate it. I got it all over the place though. If anyone knows how to get cherry juice out of my clothes, please send an email to Mommy and tell her the secret! [ed. note: Apparently boiling water works pretty well....]

We watched England play football [soccer] in the World Cup (well, parts of the game), but they got beat by Portugal. Wimbledon was on at the same time and we kept switching the television back and forth from it to the football match until it was over. Then we just watched Wimbledon and finally someone from the UK did well. Auntie Jacqui sure was cheering when Andy Murray, from Scotland, beat Andy Roddick from the US. Mommy kept saying she was rooting for "Andy."

I also learned to reach through the end rails of my cot and grab a Kleenex box. I have almost figured out how to lift it up and over the top so I can bring it inside and play with it. Lucky for Mommy that it is an empty box or I could have made a BIG mess with Kleenex. I love to chomp my gums on paper and cardboard. I don't have any teeth yet, but that hasn't stopped me from eating part of a page out of one of my board books already.

Well, that’s all I have time to write down for now. I have to get cleaned up to go to a wedding. This will be the second one I have been to!