15 Months Old!

I am so thankful for sweet Oliver. Seeing him grow and mature is more bittersweet for me now that I know he's my last baby. He's such a delightful little guy!

1. Although all of my kids love to cuddle (PTL!), more people have made comments to me about Oliver in this regard than my other two. For example, at his first urologist appointment when the urologist was done examining him, he put his arms toward Dr. Canning to indicate he wanted him to hold him. Dr. Canning was very pleasantly surprised when Oliver put his head on his shoulder and gave him a little hug. Dr. Canning said this was a really nice way to end his day and threatened to take Oliver home with him, ha ha! He said it is very unusual for a patient to give him a hug. My other two kiddos have never done such a thing with any medical personnel. What a sweetheart!

2. When Nadia and Ian were toddlers, they were terrified of the lawn mower. I tried letting them play inside the fence while I was mowing outside the fence, and it was a total failure. Last Friday I mowed most of the lawn while Oliver cruised back and forth along the inside of the fence. He kept waving to me, and if I blew him kisses, he would give me the biggest smile.

3. I thought he would be walking by now, but he's not. He can stand without holding on to anything for more than a minute. He can even get into a standing position without using anything to pull himself up. He can walk if you hold one or both of his hands. I am guessing in the next several weeks he'll start walking all over the place. He can crawl very quickly and also cruises whenever he can. He also can climb up and down the staircase correctly.

4. He has four teeth - two on the bottom in the middle and two molars on the top. He wasn't too cranky when the bottom two came in, but I was very aware that he was teething when the two molars came in on top!

5. He is now drinking cold whole milk in his sippy cup. He will also drink just about any type of juice in a sippy cup, and I've begun teaching him to drink water from an open cup.

6. Aside from cream of wheat and yogurt which I feed him, he feeds himself pretty much everything else that he eats. He will eat just about anything thankfully! Nadia has been know to give Oliver a piece of fruit or vegetable that she's not wanting to eat. He's our little garbage disposal!

7. He's getting a little bit better about not putting things in his mouth (toys, paper, mulch, Kleenex, etc.) although he still has a long way to go in that regard.

8. Almost all of his clothes are size 12 month, but he's wearing a little bit of size 18 month clothing now.

9. Multiples times a day he empties my Tupperware cabinet onto the kitchen floor and empties the sock drawers in his room, Ian's room, and Nadia's room. If you see socks all over the place, you know Oliver was there recently! Sometimes it's hard to watch them grow up, but this is one of those phases I am anxious for them to finish.

10. According to our scale, Oliver currently weighs 20.5 pounds (5th percentile). His 15 month check-up is scheduled for tomorrow morning.

11. His expressive vocabulary is unchanged; he still only says "hi," "mama", and "dada."

12. He's gotten better about me leaving him in the nursery. Yay!

13. He's enjoying being read to more. Previously he was more inclined to eat or rip books than let someone read to him.

14. Of our three kids, his ball throwing and rolling skills are by far the best at this age.

15. The change in the clocks has messed him up, but we're working on getting him back to sleeping about 11 hours each night (8pm to 7am). Yesterday he woke up according to the new time, but this morning he woke up way too early again. As for his naps, my rule is that he must stay in his crib at least 30 minutes for his morning nap and at least 60 minutes for his afternoon nap.