22 Months Old

My son will be 2 years old in exactly 2 months. I can't believe it. The time has flown right by. Since he's the youngest, he's still my baby, but he definitely doesn't seem like a baby any more. He's definitely a toddler. He loves to repeat the word "boy" after I call him my little boy.

1. Ian's favorite pair of shoes are his blue Winnie the Pooh sneakers. It wasn't until Nadia was almost 3 years old that she ever made it known which shoes she preferred to wear. Ian has a meltdown sometimes over what shoes I put on his feet. Since all of his shoes were purchased at yard sales (25 cents to $1.00 a pair), I have three pairs of sneakers he could wear right now. If it were totally up to me, I'd have him wear the sneakers that matched his outfit the best in terms of color as one pair is brown, another is black, and another is blue. I've decided this is a case of "pick your battles," and he usually is wearing the blue pair even if they don't match the colors he's wearing that day.

2. His current favorite article of clothing is a pair of footed pjs that has various jungle animals on it. The feet have monkeys and so he considers them to be his monkey pjs. If I'd let him, he'd wear those 24 hours a day. I only let him wear them for at most 12 hours a day. It does amaze me how he has such strong opinions as to what he wears. I would have thought a girl would be more likely to be that way, but it's my boy who really, really cares about what he wears, and he's not even two years old yet, lol!

3. His vocabulary continues to grow every day. This past Sunday when I picked him up from the nursery they said he had said "triangle". The biggest word I've heard him pronounce is "helicopter" (4 syllables!). He says some words perfectly clearly like "Bible" (in reference to my Bible or Nadia's), "one" (when counting), "boy," etc. Another word he uses quite often is "picture." He often asks me to take his picture! And then he says "ee" for cheese, lol.

4. His two favorite songs right now are Old McDonald and the VeggieTale theme song. He is often heard singing "EIEIO" or "up and down aisle." He also will sing parts of Row, Row, Row your boat, BINGO, and the BIBLE.

5. He loves to hold hands at dinner with Paul and I while we pray. Sometimes he's the one who reminds us that we need to pray, and if Nadia's prayer is a bit too long, sometimes he lets her know her prayer should be over by saying "amen" before she's done praying. I look forward to the day when he starts praying.

6. The first instance we've seen of Ian's sense of humor was when he purposefully called a knee an elbow, with a big smile on his face. He now knows it's called a knee, but he sometimes still says "elbow" just to get me going. What a hoot!

7. He can can correctly identify a few colors (as in he will say what color it is if I point to something that is blue, red, or green).

8. He's still very much a Momma's boy. As soon as we exit the car in the church parking lot, he starts crying. He knows where we are, and he doesn't want to be there. Thankfully he doesn't cry for very long after I drop him off. He cries anytime I am the one to leave his sight, even if I'm just running to get something from upstairs. He'll stand at the gate and cry until I come back down. He cries when I leave him at home with Paul.

9. He's very affectionate. A nursery worker from the Tuesday morning ladies Bible study sent me a message on Facebook a couple of weeks ago saying how she loved taking care of him and how he wrapped his arm around her neck while she was holding him. He's a cuddler! I love how while we're eating he still reaches his hand out to hold hands with Paul if Paul is around while we're eating.

10. He loves to be outside. After I get him from his nap (while Nadia is still sleeping), he often goes over to the gate and says "mail." He wants me to take him to go get the mail as he hopes I'll let him play in the driveway/front yard. He prefers that part of our property to the part that's fenced in. When he's in the backyard, he frequently goes over to the gate and cries. In between crying he says, "door."

11. He loves to read books on someone's lap. His favorites include Spot books, books about vehicles, and Miss Mary Mack. I'm enjoying reading in his room before nap and before bedtime. If I could go back in time, I'd have started that habit earlier.

12. He weighs pver 25 lbs!! FINALLY! He's gotten close to this weight several times over the past 4 months and then dropped back down to 23 lbs. Yesterday was the first time the scale read 25! I was so happy to see this as it meant he gained more than a pound in ONE week. WOOHOO! I've cut him back to 4 sippy cups a day of whole milk in light of this trend. This means he also jumped up 10 percentiles on the weight chart in one week! If this keeps up, maybe his size 12 month pants won't keep falling down to his ankles. :-)

13. He can wreak havoc much faster than I can clean it up. He makes much bigger messes than Nadia has ever made. He also is much messier at the dinner table because he thinks when he's finished licking something (such as a pretzel), he should throw it on the floor. I am really trying to break him of this habit!

14. He's starting to learn how to help clean up. When he puts something away, he says "YAY!"

15. He loves to play with play-doh. Unfortunately sometimes he still tries to lick it. Yuck.

16. Mealtimes are going much better now that he can again have things like yogurt and pudding. He still cries at some meals. I'm hoping the crying has diminished enough that Dr. Williams will start teaching Ian how to chew at our next appointment.

17. Ian is still ever so fascinated with my purse and my cell phone. I never had to work to keep those out of Nadia's hands.

18. He loves playing with cars and trucks. The matchbox cars I got him at a few yard sales are worth their weight in gold. His four favorite places to play with his vehicles include on the coffee table, the entertainment center, the arm of our blue sofa, and on part of the frame of our sliding glass door. There are days when I'd estimate over the course of a day he plays with his little cars for upwards of three hours total. I'd love to know what he's thinking as he drives those little cars back and forth.

19. He also loves the ball popper, and unfortunately he loves to stick other things in it. He has gotten far more use out of the ball popper than Nadia ever did (it was a baby gift I received when she was born).

20. He enjoys using zippers. He does part of the zipping of his pjs at night when I'm getting him dressed for bed.
21. He got 3 more teeth in the past month. He now has 11 teeth - 6 on the top and 5 on the bottom.

22. He's still sleeping on average 11 hours at night. Occasionally he'll sleep 11.5 hours. His nap still isn't going well. Two days ago he slept a whopping 10 minutes of the 60 minutes he spent in his crib, and then he slept in the car on the way to Nadia's ballet class. Yesterday he slept for 40 minutes, which was MUCH better. You just never know how long he's going to sleep, but most of the time it's less than 30 minutes.