25 Months Old

Ian's major accomplishment over the past month was certainly being daytime potty trained. He's learned how to keep his underwear dry (even during his nap) and pee on the potty every 1-2 hours without crying. Whenever I put him on the potty, he pees within one minute. Woohoo! Of course he still has many things to learn - how to poop on the potty, to tell me when he needs to go so I don't have to watch the clock, and how to stay dry during the night. However it was really easy to accomplish this first stage of potty training. We definitely had to use a LOT more carpet cleaner when potty training Nadia.

His vocabulary also continues to expand at a rapid pace. If I pause while reading one of his favorite books, he can usually tell me what the next word is. Some of his current favorites include Polar Bear, Polar Bear What do you hear?, any Spot book, Llama Llama Misses Mama, nursery rhyme books, and books that can be sung (such as Down by the Bay, Lady with the Alligator Purse, etc.). If he's having any sort of trouble with a toy, he either says "It's stuck" or "It's broken" (even if neither word accurately describes the situation). He sings All The Time and is now singing the majority of the words to many songs including a few Christmas carols such as "Joy to the World." Another phrase that is said many times a day is "call Grandma." That boy is obsessed with talking to his grandmas on my cell phone! He's also just started to say his own prayer at dinner time. It's so sweet!

He still often cries when we put him down for a nap or at night. I can't wait until he outgrows this. Karen (OT) is amazed that he's still crying for about 10 minutes on average before he takes his nap. His nap is on average 30 minutes long. At this point I have pretty much given up hope that his nap will ever be longer than that. The good news is that he sleeps almost 12 hours at night. Most days he goes to bed between 7:45-8:00pm and gets up around 7:30am.

He gained 1/2 pound over the past week (weighs 26 lbs), which means he currently weighs one pound less than what he weighed at his 24 month doctor appointment and 2.5 pounds less than what he weighed on Dec 12 at his allergy appointment. He's made a lot of progress over the past month in terms of not crying as much when I feed him. This is largely dependent on what I am feeding him. I don't have to hold his head any more when I feed him.

He's still very obsessed with shapes. All day long no matter where we are he is constantly pointing out shapes that he sees. He will say what the shape of the object is rather than the name of the object (ex. Nadia's change purse that is in the shape of a rectangle - he calls it a rectangle). He also is very obsessed with letters. His favorite letter is "B." If he doesn't know the letter, he calls it "B." He's also very interested in matching up words with letters for example he'll say "P is for Pop Pop" and such like that. He also enjoys (rote) counting.

Daddy has definitely moved up the totem pole with Ian. He now cries when Paul leaves just like he's done for most of his life with me. He gets very excited when Daddy comes home! He also is doing really well at playing independently in the church nursery. He used to be the one to start crying, and now I am told that he's usually the only one not crying when one of the other kids starts the crying chain effect.

He almost always has several items in his hands (vehicles, small plastic animals, or stuffed animals). My mom noticed this over Christmas. If Ian is walking around, he's sure to be carrying on average 3-5 toys in his hands. He's also still in the very destructive phase. He loves to dump bins of toys, bins of books, clear off bookshelves, empty the toybox, etc. I need to teach this boy how to clean up after himself!! Nadia never went through that phase (thankfully!).