Тигр Тигр, зубастый зубастый

Now we know why Oscar has had so much trouble sleeping lately!

Last night Oscar woke up crying about five times in the first hour, and this whole last week has been difficult. This morning he woke up to two shiny, tiny, sharp little teeth! This photo was taken this afternoon, and it's amazing how much they've poked out in half a day. Although we can't see or feel anything yet, I have a feeling the top ones are on their way, too - my guess is in about a week or so.

The last week has been tough on the little guy. Besides the teeth, he's been getting over a cold. Oscar has gotten a lot stronger, and can lift his whole body off of the ground, going up on knees and elbows or feet and elbows. He's done a complete 360° roll, and he's managed to crawl forward about an inch or two, but he hasn't really figured out how it all is supposed to work yet.



Oscar LOVES his big sister! I think Clara gets the biggest smiles from him out of all of us.


And who wouldn't smile around a silly turkey like this:


One thing I hadn't expected about toddlers is the binary-style acquisition of skills. For example, I would have expected that Clara would learn to throw and catch badly and then get progressively better, but instead she just couldn't do either and then BAM! today she can suddenly do both. Last weekend Clara picked up a pencil crayon like an adult and drew two ovals and then added lines to them to make balloons, whereas beforehand she had never done anything but scribble. And I thought surely there must be some intermediate stages between learning to count and "Oscar needs a new pair of shoes!"

I hear that the title of the blog post comes from a Russian children's story. Tanja can't remember much of the story beyond that line, so Clara and I are going to have to ask Oma or Opa to tell it next time they're here!

UPDATE: I talked to my Mom this evening, and she told me that I got both of my bottom teeth on the same day too!