Category Archives: Letter to William

Dear William,

On March 8, 2014, you turned 27 months old. You are 38.5 inches tall and weigh 36 pounds. For the first time, you stood on the scale vs. sitting on the baby scale. Always before you’ve wanted to sit on the scale. You are in 3T sizes for shirts, pants and shorts, and 4T for footed sleepers. Your shoe size is 8.5 Wide.

NURSING/FOOD:
When nursing, you love to hum songs to me, usually starting your medley with Wheels on the Bus, and then go to Frosty the Snowman, then the Hello Song. Sometimes you’ll do Trol Old Joe or something else. You love to sing them in a higher pitch and I’ll affirm, “That’s Froggy singing.” If you go to a lower pitch, it’s Eeyore. You grin when I identify the character you’re humming as. I love nursing smiles and giggles.

This month marks 2 years that I’ve been pumping at work. Although experts say I don’t need to anymore, I still like to provide you with breastmilk that you can drink during the day, even if it’s only 3 ounces that my mom can mix with yogurt and fruit. You nurse as much as you want to when I’m home, but my brain still tells me that I’m preserving that relationship by keeping daytime pump sessions while I’m at work.

You have shocked me with your adventuresome spirit this month on the food front. You tried some lettuces from your father’s salad, some spinach from my salad, and you ate carrots and cabbage (as well as potatoes and spiced meat) at the annual St. Patrick’s dinner.  It’s progress, even if you do call them “leaves.”

SLEEP:
You average about 9 hours of sleep overnight.
Naps are hit and miss. You will usually take a 2 hour nap, but some days you are skipping them.
A couple nights you’ve had trouble falling asleep, or you wake in the middle of the night inconsolable. I don’t know if you’ve had a bad dream or if you’re too hot, but lying down with you usally soothes you. It’s hard to set aside my need for sleep or that I don’t seem to have enough time to do things (like prep my stuff for the next day), but once I make peace within myself, I’m then able savor holding you tight and stroking your head and back, for I know these times will pass before I know it.

THINGS WE DID/PLACES WE WENT:
2/8-2/9 – Mountain Cabin
02/17 – LegoLand with Mommy
02/22 – Ryan’s Birthday party
03/07 – Disneyland/California Adventure with mommy, Grandma D and Cousin Al
03/08 – Green Dinner (St. Patrick’s dinner) at daddy’s church

PLAYTIME AND CHILDREN INTERACTION:
Bathtime — loves painting and coloring and “washing the germs off” your bath toys
Playgrounds – you love all playgrounds and parks, even ones with only grass. You love to run.
Library Story Time -weekly
Music class – weekly
We did a trial gymnastics class this month

THINGS I WANT TO REMEMBER:

We went to Yogurtland one night, and the entire drive there, you were calling it Ice Cream Land and every flavor I pulled out were chocolate (according to you) and you wanted mine, even though yours was the same flavors. I just had yummy toppings, which I didn’t give you even if you wanted them. When we were leaving, there was a car parked out front with a dog in it. The dog was sitting in the driver’s seat like he was waiting for his passengers to come back. You started telling everyone who passed by that “The doggy is waiting for his mommy and daddy!”

One night, after we were done with your bath, we were playing the game of “What do you hear?” while I clipped your nails. You said you heard the cats. Then you heard the radio playing. Then you heard the nails clipping. You were resting your head on my chest and pulled away and said, “What’s that, mommy?” I told you it was my heart. You said, “Wanna hear your heart?” And so you went limp while you listened to my heart beating. When your daddy got home, you asked, “Wanna hear your heart, daddy?” Apparently, according to you, your father’s heart says, “Bom, chuck, dome!” I’m thinking he should get that checked out!

The other day you were trying to get your daddy’s attention, and “Daddy, daddy, daddy!” didn’t work. You then quietly said, “I go poopy.” That immediately got results and your father rushed rushed over and sniffed your butt. ha

You like to run away from us and shout, “Freedom!”

Not only are you obsessed with the Cars movie, but you’re obsessed with the music soundtrack for the movie which I keep in my car. When we went to LegoLand (1 hour drive each way), you wanted to listen to the soundtrack and at the end of each song, you’d turn to me and say, “What’s next? I don’t know! We’ll see!” Drawing out the word next, know and see for emphasis… and then when the new song came on, you’d tell me what it was about… “They’re up on the mountain… seeing the town” or “He’s learning to be nice” or “They’re dancing on new road.” You’re also quite passionate about the Tractor Tippin’ song, which is all instrumental… and you narrate it, “They’re sneaking up on tractors… honk! Vrroooom!” The music roars scary and you yell, “THAT’S FRANK!” And you cover your eyes and giggle. This fascination with music is great for entertainment during nasty traffic jams. Remarkably, within two notes of each song starting, you know which song it is, and you’ll excitedly proclaim, “That’s the No More Pie song!” Or “That’s the Sing Rue song!” Or if you’re looking for a specific song, you’ll say, “That’s not the railroad song!”
(Video of listening to the Tractor Tippin’ song)

I set up an old cell phone as an MP3 player and gave it to you. You handle that thing so gently and stare at it in wonderment. You love having your own tunes and being in control of your music.

You love to help pick out your clothes for the day. I’ll usually give you two options, this shirt or this shirt, and you’ll pick from those two items. For the first time this month, you wanted to wear your McQueen slippers. You’ve always treated them as toys. However, that was evened out a week later by your refusal to put your shoes on because you wanted to look at them instead.

A couple days ago, you were playing in your toy corner, sitting on your chair, rolling your trains around, You turned toward the shutters and said, “Want to open the neighborhood, mommy?” You wanted the shutters opened.

You like to get on your rocking motorcycle and start rocking. You tell us, “I’m going to Big Bear!” or “I’m going to Walmart!” or “I’m going to the post office!”

I love your imaginary play, it’s a great mirror of what we say to you… you roll your trains around and have them converse with each other, “That’s so cool! That’s so amazing! Oh, I can’t do that… you did it!” You also make your Cars toys say the lines from the movie, which boggles my mind.

You like to role play with your characters, “Hi! I’d like raisins and oranges and salad! That’s Froggy.” You’ll say. Then in a low deep voice, with your lips pursed you’ll say, “Hi mommy, want mommy to be Eeyore?” Any variation in the pitch of my voice immediately becomes Eeyore or Froggy talking, and same for you.

There’s a playground we go to at the Spectrum (local mall) and the kids tend to get pushy and shove past other kids when going up the stairs to the slide. If someone starts shoving you, you’ve taken to stopping entirely and turning to them and saying, “Excuse me… excuse me…” If they don’t respond, you tilt your head and get right up in their face to meet their eyes and repeat yourself, “Excuse me!” It’s kind of funny to watch, but I don’t trust those hooligans, so I’m right there to enforce your politeness. ha

There’s a sign just outside of the playground listing all the rules, like, you know, “no pushing.” You think it’s a menu and run up to it and order your dinner. “I want pancakes and yogurt and mac-n-cheese and grapes and chicken. Iced tea, please?” Then you run away to keep playing.

You love to say, “Want Tuggy to get on my lap, please?” And then instruct “Mommy, sit down please.” Then you crawl on my lap and pat your legs and say, “Come here, kitty kitty kitty.

At Denny’s last night, we finished our dinner and as we were leaving, you stopped at every occupied table and said, “Hi!” Once they said hi in return, you said, “How are you?” And they said, “Fine, how are you?” You replied, “I’m running away!” And then ran to the next table on the way and repeated the entire scenario. Thankfully, everyone thought you were cute and not intrusive.

In your music class, they sing the Hokey Pokey song. Now you try to get our cat to do the dance with you and you were seen talking to Tuggy through the stairwell gate and saying, “That’s my right leg. Tuggy put your right leg in.”

We went to Walmart the other night, and as we pulled into the parking lot, your father spotted the Walmart semi-truck driving to the back of the store. He broke all speed records driving through the parking lot (heart attack for me!) to get behind it so we could watch it back into the unloading dock. You were beyond thrilled. After we shopped there, we went across the street to Target and, behold, there was Target’s semi-truck who had arrived minutes before. Out of the darkness of the backseat, we heard you say, “I’m a lucky boy!”

At Disneyland, we had just finished eating some ice cream. You handed me a napkin, which I thanked you for. In response, you said, “I’m so sweet… I’m so precious.” We had a great time at Disneyland and California Adventure Land. You got to see your most favorite characters — Eeyore, Tow Mater and Lightning and, OH MY GOSH, RED! We were also surprised to see the snowman from the movie, Frozen, and got to ride the carousel and pet goats and dance with mice characters. In California Adventure, we rode the tractor ride twice and discovered a heretofore unknown to us ride, Luigi’s Tires. Such a fun time we had! My mom’s cousin, Al, is visiting, and our friend, Sonia, let us into the park (thank you, Sonia). You were obsessed with Al the entire time we were there, even when we split up, you wanted me to call Grandma so you could find out where Al was at.

My mom said the other day she went to the bathroom, when she came out, you were eating something. She asked you what you were eating and, around your mouthful of food you replied, “Grapes.”. Surprised, she said, “Where’d you get those?” You replied, nonchalantly, still eating, “Out of the bag.” In the kitchen, sure enough, there was a bag of grapes on the counter. She said you reminded her of a teenage boy helping himself to snacks. If you disappear into the kitchen and things get quiet, I know you’re probably digging in the fridge trying to help yourself to snacks. We make sure to latch the pantry door, because otherwise, you help yourself to anything within your reach in there, too.

We walked through the bra aisle at Target the other day… at first glance, you said, “Wow! Look at all those nah-nahs! That’s amazing!” Then you started calling it the “belly aisle” because of all the bellies in the pictures. And then you didn’t want to leave the belly aisle. I finally told you we were going to look at daddy bellies. A ruse, for sure, there’s no daddy belly aisles in Target. Now every time we go to Target, the first place you want to go is the belly aisle. Should I mention how you disappeared in your room over the weekend and closed the door? I figured you were in there reading books, so I went up to the door and knocked and gently opened it, since your books are right behind the door. Instead, you opened the door, no books were off the shelves and your shirt was askew. I asked you what you’d been doing and said, “I can see your belly!” You had this look on your face like you’d been caught doing something you shouldn’t and you pulled your shirt down. haha

You noticed that I was wearing glitter nail polish, asked me “What’s on your fingernails, mommy?” I said, “Glitter nail polish.” You held up your hands and looked at your fingernails and said, “William doesn’t have any glitter nail polish.”

We were driving one day, and you said, “Want mommy and daddy to kiss!” When we did, you said, “Want mommy to kiss William?” Then, “Want daddy to kiss William?” Then, “Mommy and daddy kiss again!”

At the Green Dinner event, you ate well and did a lot of running around. You watched the Irish dancers and then did your own version of what they were doing, up and down the side aisle for the entire time they were dancing. Everyone who saw you started laughing, you were definitely a side show for people to watch! (Video of William’s Irish dancing)

I had opened my vitamin sorters to do my vitamin project. I left them there (empty) and you found them and said, “I want to shut them!” You then spent the next five minutes entertained with shutting every single compartment on the sorter. No wonder I feel like I can never get anything done! haha

In response to something I said, your father jokingly said to me, “What do you want me to say? OH MY GOSH, YOU’RE A GODDESS?” I told him that would be a good start. We laughed and moved on in the conversation. About 10 minutes later, out of your mouth came, “Mommy? Oh my gosh, you’re a goddess!”

I tell you, I love you ten times a million. In response, you started saying, “I love you, ten times a William.” Indeed. In numerical sequences we have million, billion, zillion, trillian.  I like to imagine that in the far reaches of the mathematical universe is an undefined value called “William.” Because, yes, I love you ten times a William.

Love,

Mama

Dear William,

On February 8, 2014, you turned 26 months old.

I took you to the doctor this past month for your 2 year appointment. You weighed in at 35 pounds and were 38.5″ tall. The doctor was impressed with your size, and said you were taller than most three year olds and weigh more than most 4 year olds. He was not concerned with your size since you are consistent with your overall growth curve. I had delayed your shots this past year, because every time I wanted to take you in, you seemed be coming down with something… after awhile of this, I finally just decided we would wait until all your teeth were in. Now, here we are, all your teeth are in and we’re playing catch-up. So, this past month you were given your MMR vaccine and a flu shot. I expected side effects, and sure enough, 8 days later you started running a fever of 102°F, a common side effect of the MMR vaccine. It lasted 3 days (the doctor said it would), and then you seemed to be OK, just a bit fussy, cranky and clingy.

LANGUAGE:
You continue to excel in mastering the English language. You fearlessly tackle the pronunciation of most any word and own it with a grin. You eavesdrop on any conversation around you, including those of people in the store, and like to repeat parts of it to us. For this reason, I love to talk to you while we’re nursing, because I know you’ll regurgitate it at some point later. For example, the other day while you were nursing, I was trying to keep you awake, so I told you, “When we’re done nursing, we’re going to Costco to get gas. And THEN we’ll go inside and maybe get some raspberries. We might get some blackberries! And when we’re done shopping, we might get some ICE CREAM!” Sure enough, after we were done nursing, we headed out and when we parked you told me, “We’re going to get raspberries, dude! And blackberries, dude! AND ICE CREAN!!” (You still say “ice-crean.”)

You tell me about your day with Grandma when I get home, that you go to library storytime, and what activity you do.

You are also putting words to your feelings, which kind of boggles our minds. Example: When we were driving around this past weekend, you didn’t want to go back to the cabin for your nap. You told us so, and when we continued on our journey to the cabin, you screeched and then, mid-screech, you stopped and said, “I AM SO ANGRY!”

You correct yourself and make jokes when talking… for example, you will say, “That is red car. No, that’s NOT red car, that’s BLUE car! haha That was funny!”

NURSING/FOOD:
You are doing well with your food. You continue to be willing to try most anything at least once and are curious about what we all have on our plates. One evening I was packing my lunch for the next day, and you wanted to sample my protein snack mix. It was the funniest thing to hear nuts crunching in your head as you sampled my mix and decided you really liked my freeze dried black eyed peas. The cashew you sampled came right back out, though. ha
You continue to enjoy nursing, and request it when you need to be reassured, or if you get hurt, if you are cranky, and when you wake up or for naps or bedtimes. I enjoy the blessing of nursing you. You love to hum your favorite songs to me while we nurse and, oftentimes, I join in the humming just to see you smile.

SLEEP:
Your nighttime sleep is great. You regularly get about 9 hours per night… you just won’t sleep longer than 9 hours at night. Your morning wake time has moved to 6am.
Naps — at least once a week, sometimes twice, you skip your nap.

THINGS WE DID/PLACES WE WENT:

01/15, 2 year doctor visit
01/18, mini train rides in Costa Mesa
02/01, breakfast with Grace & family
02/02, mommy & son date to California Adventure
02/08 weekend, we went to our family’s mountain cabin

PLAYTIME AND CHILDREN INTERACTION:
Library story time on Mondays and Wednesdays.
Music class on Tuesdays.
Neighborhood kids, Josh and Melody, Abigail and Connor… and a whole bunch of other kids down the block that you love to play with and use their toys.
You continue to love your Cars and trains. When we’re out to dinner, you put the Cars in the “garage” ( the triangle food advertisers on the tables) or drive them on the window ledge or booth dividers.
Your favorite movie continues to be Cars.  Your second favorite is Frosty the Snowman.
Your favorite song is Trot Old Joe.  You also like to sing Frosty the Snowman, the ABC song, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Zoom Zoom Riding in the Car, Working on the Railroad, No More Pie, Jingle Bells and the Hello Song.  You also really like the soundtrack from Cars the movie.

THINGS I WANT TO REMEMBER:

How you love to give “character” to your toys, often calling me over to “be” one of them. “Mommy, be Eeyore, please?” You’ll ask. Then you will often involve another set of toys; blocks, for example, and then you will build the blocks and Eeyore is supposed to knock them over.

How, for the first time this month you said, “Mommy, watch this!”  You came running in the kitchen with a beaten up box and a car and you showed me how the box acted as a ramp and the car rolled back and forth on it because it was bowed in.

How you love to help us and one of the chores you’ve taken on is to take our empty water bottles and put them in the recycle can, which is inside a lower cabinet. Sometimes, in the interest of cleaning speedily, your father and I will put them in the fruit bowl which sits on the counter above… apparently we do this more often than I thought, because last week, you took our empties (ha ha, empties) and promptly walked over and put them in the fruit bowl and walked away.

How you love shapes, and you’re very “into” drawing shapes (with a little help from me). You adore your chalk board on the fridge and your bath crayons, and really like to draw houses and neighborhoods. One of your favorite YouTube videos is a train that teaches the various shapes.

You really like houses and cottages. We purchased on clearance a Little People’s Santa’s cottage at Toys R Us last weekend. It has a bathroom, bedroom, kitchen and office, and the first thing you do when playing with it is to make sure Santa goes in the bathroom and you stick him on the toilet and tell me he’s going potty.  ha

How you take initiative and will put your toys away when you’re ready to move on to the next thing, singing “BOM BOM” as you do so (that’s what they do in music class). You also will clean up with a paper towel after you spill something.

How you love to go outside and run around, or just play with your toys outside.

How you are now articulating that you understand the schedule changes of weekends and weekdays. On weekday mornings, you now say, “Grandma D. is coming… grandma’s not here yet. Mommy and daddy go to work.”

How you love to choose if you want to go in back carry or front carry with our Tula carrier, and then you giggle and dance and move around, or sometimes you just snuggle in and lay your head on me.

How we met your father in Walmart one night and you were singing, quite loudly, a medley of all the songs you know. We wandered over to the toothbrush section and that’s how your father found us, by following the sound of your songs. What was even sweeter is that every person we passed grinned at you, and you grinned right back at them, singing your solo to your audience.

How we went for a walk over the weeked in the mountains looking for snow. The first day there, your father took you for a walk and you guys found some snow deep in the forest in shade. The next day I took you for a walk, but it had been warm and there was no snow to be found, as it had all melted. Suddenly you started yelling, “Santa! Where are you Santa? Santa will fix the snow! Frosty!? Where’s Frosty?”

As I write this closing paragraph, we are currently at our mountain cabin for the weekend. I’m listening to you run in the living room, your feet making a rapid fire sound as if you’re running on top of a drum. I close my eyes and just listen… I hear your feet, I hear you jump, I hear you laugh. How do I put into words how much these things mean to me?

Love you forever,
Momma

Dear William,

On November 8, 2013, you turned 23 months old.

One of the biggest things this month is that we’ve having been working with you on your fear of water in the bath tub. Since you were 12 months old, I’ve been washing your hair with just a damp washcloth. A week before you turned 22 months old, something made me think you were ready to work through this. So, I started then asking you to lie back (while I hold your head) and rinsing your hair with water from a container. This was coinciding with your desperate need for yet another hair cut, because when you’re hair is longer, it’s difficult to get the soap out with a damp washcloth.

While we worked with you on this, I knew it was impacting you, because at various points throughout the day when it crossed your mind, you would say, “I laid back! You did it! Yay!” But when it came time to actually do it, you would start to cry and I would reassure you, “Mommy has you! Trust me! We’re just rinsing your hair.” And then praising you, “You did it! You laid back!”

Now, at 23 months old, you can’t wait to get in the bath tub. All the way home from running errands in the evening, you say from the back seat, “It’s not bath time yet!” Then when we get home, and get you in the tub, you start laying back on your own to rinse your hair, first thing. It looks like you’ve truly overcome your fear of water on your head, at least in this instance. Coinciding with this notable development is your love for “washing cars.” You rinse and rinse your bath cars and say that you’re washing them. You have very clean bath toys.

You now love bath time so much, that I have to set a timer and tell you, “When it goes ‘beep beep’ it’s time to get out of the tub.” Ridiculous, I know, but it really helps with the transition through the bath time routine.

STATS/TEETH:

You are weighing in at 33 pounds 14 ounces this month. You are 37 inches tall. You are in 3T clothing.

Teeth: Your two year molars are moving in. Often when we brush your teeth, we get blood on the toothbrush. I think both sides are coming in, because blood comes from both sides of your mouth. Poor baby.

THINGS YOU SAY:
Con-toy is guitar. Bicycle, you say the “y” with a long “i” sound. Police car – Podeece car. Ambulance is amubance. You stopped saying “s” in front of words for some reason, kind of weird.

The first week after having turned 22 months old is the first time you started regularly saying “mommy” when you woke from your sleeps, instead of crying. You still cry out in the middle of the night. This is to be expected, I suppose, given that your molars are coming in. It also appears as if you’re gaining control of your emotions or frustrations… if you’re crying and upset, I usually ask you to please stop crying and use your words so I can help you. Sometimes, you’ll stop mid-cry, sniffle and tell me what you want. Then you say, “Yay! You stopped crying!” That is not something I’ve ever told you, but apparently you apply praise liberally to any occasion.

You know your right and left. When I ask you for your right or left hand, or right or left foot to wash in the bath tub, you lift it for me.

You hear the cat’s collars from upstairs and say, “That’s a cat downstairs.” Indeed.

You know by sound what is going by on the street, a bus, motorcycle, fast car, or our neighbor, Michael’s car. ha

You know your primary colors… we ask you what color your diaper is when we change you or get you ready for your bath, and you always say the correct color. Red, blue, green, white, yellow… you know them. Also, your various cars, you ask for your purple car, red car, blue car, etc. Even though you’ve been doing this for awhile now, it never fails to surprise me.

You request specific songs from your music class CDs… “Want to hear the car song, please? Want to hear the train song, please? Trot Old Joe song, please?” So we often drive down the road listening to repeat of the same song over and over again. Just this past month you’ve started singing the words to some of them. I came home one day for lunch and you serenaded me with B-I-N-G-O. I was so shocked, not believing what I was hearing. We still have some to go before you sing on tune, though.

Also, when you have a stuffy nose, communication is helping you when I need to use the nose frieda on you. Instead of screaming and fighting us, and instead of just sticking the thing up your nose, I ask your permission first… “May I suction your nose? Are you ready?” And you reply, “Mommy suction nose! I’ll feel better.” And then you always like to see what I get out of there, and same for when I clean your ears, you like to see it. A human curiosity, I guess.

Your memory is amazing… we decided to stop at Kentucky Fried Chicken for lunch one day, as we pulled into the shopping center, you said, “I go to Monkey Class???” Your gymnastics class is in the same shopping center, you recognized it despite not having been for a couple months. We went to JoAnn’s shortly before Halloween and there was lots of motion sensor, scary stuff. You talked repeatedly about “the scary aisle.” Just a couple days ago we went back, you looked around and then looked at me and asked, “Where’s the scary aisle?”

One evening I sat down to nurse you and you repeatedly requested your blue car. I repeatedly told you I didn’t have it. It turns out that technically, I did have the blue car, I just didn’t know it. When I stood up after nursing on you, I was sitting on the thing.

You tell me, “You’re my baby.” I have no idea where you get THAT from. ha

NURSING/FOOD:
You still nurse a lot, and enjoy it. I’m grateful that I have this comfort that I can give you. I still pump whie I’m at work, although I’m down to 2 sessions per day instead of the 5 sessions I was doing a year ago. Those two sessions give me a mental break, too, and I spend the time reading eBooks on my netbook.

SLEEP:
This month has been rough in the sleep department. Often you wake in the early mornings, and then don’t fall asleep nursing. In fact, I kind of think the nursing keeps you in a light dozing state. Your sleep is much more adult-like now (since you were 20 months old). So when I’m certain you’re not swallowing milk anymore, I will ask you to unlatch. You do, but aren’t too happy about it. I put you back in your crib and then you ask me to stay with you and hold your hand. I’m OK with doing that, but your father and I need to figure out a better configuration for that because I’m lying on the floor sticking my hand through the crib siding, and that’s just not very comfortable and makes for a very long day for me, if I’m getting up with you at 3:30am. To complicate matters, we had the time change this month…

THINGS WE DID/PLACES WE WENT:

10/12 — Tanaka Farms, we saw lots of pumpkins, a pumpkin cannon, we took a tractor pulled wagon ride, went through a corn maze and pet lots of goats. The baby goats were the cutest and softest. We also met up with a couple moms from our birthing class. The one mom, Claudia, was wearing her 2 month old baby girl and I was wearing you… you wanted to “pet her” and then I showed you her tiny little toes… the next day you were saying, “Saw a baby, saw tiny toes!”
10/19 — we spent the morning at Grandma D.’s condo and the afternoon at your Grandma and Grandpa H.’s house, visiting them and your cousins
10/26 — we attended Dr. Werlin’s reunion.
10/26 — we went to the Great OC Park’s Halloween event. You visited their pumpkin patch and rode their Wild Train Ride.
10/31 — you trick-or-treated as Krypto (aka Super Dog). It took you one time and you had the routine down, knock on the door, say trick-or-treat, get candy, say thank you … visit if they want to and then move on. You loved your pumpkin with candy it, although you don’t yet know that candy gets opened and eaten. You just like to have it and add to your candy collection.
11/1 — we went to our mountain cabin for a couple days
11/3 — we visited Mason Regional Park for the morning

PLAYTIME AND CHILDREN INTERACTION:
I’m super excited to have found a less expensive music class. Unfortunately I cannot attend, as it’s Tuesday mornings, but your Grandma D. graciously takes you. It’s 30 minutes (instead of 45) long and there’s a playground right near that you can visit before or afterwards.

Since our community pool’s heat is turned off for the winter, I’ve been swimming at the gym. This is noteworthy, because we’ve taken you a couple times and let you play in the Kid’s Klub there. You love it and get all excited to “go to the gym!” You lead us out to the garage the moment mention is made of this outing.

THINGS I WANT TO REMEMBER:

How you stroke my arm while nursing.
How, when asked if you’re done nursing, you say “no” around a mouth full of boob. You’ve also started humming songs to me while your nursing, mostly identifiable by the rhythm of it.
How you go into a sing-songy voice when you’re imitating something we’ve said to you.
How you love all the Christmas trees and decorations that are out in the store. In fact, you ask to “go see Christmas trees?” or “Go see big snowman?” the second we get into the store.
How your play has gotten so creative and imaginative. You pretend eat, we have delightful snack times out in your playhouse in the afternoons, with pretend “chicken pancakes,” leaves, spiders, persimmons, and whatever other items you think might be a good snack.
How you loved my Halloween costume, that I carry a Barbie doll dressed identically to me. You called her “mini mommy!” and you wanted to carry the doll around with you all night long.
How you love your sonic toothbrush. One night you ran off stealthily with mine and I found you sitting on the guest bed leaning back with it turned on and in your mouth. That evening I bought you one of your own. Best thing I ever did!
How you ask permission to do things, but it sounds like you’re making a statement. You’ll say, “You can touch that…” But what you mean is, “May I touch that?” It’s so funny.
How gentle you are with babies… at the gym’s Kid’s Klub, I came back to check on you after I was done swimming. You were lying on the floor, your face in your hands, your eyes closed, while a 7 month old patted your face. You patiently let him explore. When he was done, you got up, ran over and got a dump truck and rolled that toy over to the “baby” so he could play with it.
How you have entire conversations while holding your play phone up to your ear… and you really do have conversations when you’re on the phone with someone.
How you love cars. Hot Wheels to be precise. You currently have over 50 Hot Wheels. That means that we’ve gone shopping at least 50 times over the last couple months and purchased you a Hot Wheel. We purchased a case for them at Toys R Us when we went there the other day (that was the item on the list). It holds 72 cars. It’s half full. You even love carrying just the case around. We are doomed. It’s a good thing I like Hot Wheels. In my mind’s eye, I can see our house getting wheeled down the street by tiny little wheels… you love them, I mean LOVE them.You know when one is missing and will ask for it specifically. You send them spinning across the living room floor (hard wood). If it goes far, and doesn’t spin out, you stand up, clasp your hands together gleefully and say, “Oh! That’s a good one!” You lined your cars up one night and said, “They’re waiting…” I asked you what they were waiting for. You replied, “Green light!” I said, what happens when the light turns green? You said, “It turns red.” Huh. I guess you’re kind of right, I’ve certainly seen lights like that! The things you think of just make me laugh.

These things you do make me wonder what you have in store for you in the future, and who you will be. I have no idea, of course, but I’m absolutely adoring watching you figure it out.

Love you forever,
Momma

Dear William,

On October 8, 2013, you turned 22 months old.

STATS/TEETH:
I’ve noticed that you’re slimming down this month, your diapers have been fitting you differently. The scale and ruler are true to my observations — you weigh 32 pounds 10 ounces. You are 37 inches tall. You wear size 3T in most everything, except footed jammies — in those you wear size 4T or 5T, depending on the brand.

On 9/28, your two year molars started claiming the landscape of your gums, starting with your lower left side (one point has come through), and your upper left side is a bump on the horizon. They must be a doozy, because you are not normally one who drools, but I’ve noticed you drooling a few times… and your cheeks turn bright red and you get a rash on your bottom.

NURSING/FOOD:
You love to nurse and I love to nurse you. You are a very well-mannered nursling, so we’ll continue our special relationship for as long as you need. This month, you have started to request “switch sides!” You’re so sweet about it, and always request it with a smile. You love all your nursing toys that I keep downstairs in the pocket of the nursing pillow and, while nursing, you fling your hand back to request each one until they’re all out, either in your hand, on the armrest above your head, or sitting on your cheek while you nurse. It’s quite a show! You hum to me while we nurse and we’re working with glisses and holding notes, and humming duets… my heart melts every time we do that. When I nurse you to sleep at night, you request Froggy and when I finally latch you and hand you Froggy, your eyes immediately start to close. Despite what you eat or don’t eat, since you’ll always nurse, I feel reassured that you’re at least getting the nutrients you need, custom tailored to your needs.

You continue to do well with table food… some days are hit and miss, though, and you display a definite preference via specific requests for the things you want to eat. For example, this past weekend, we went to Target which is in the same shopping center as Chick-Fil-A. You recognized this (you recognize where we’re at much of the time), “I want chicken nuggets, please!” and I promised them to you, only to realize as we drove over there that it was Sunday and Chick-Fil-A is closed on Sundays. You in tears and me in desperation, we went to McDonald’s for a lame substitute… you only ate one of their chicken nuggets. Clearly McDonald’s Chicken Nuggets are inferior compared to Chick-Fil-A’s.

It is with some chagrin that I share when we were in Hawaii, we were driving to Haleakala and you started saying, “I want pancakes! Pancakes!” I realized we had driven past a Jack In The box, you father didn’t even know it was there. It was notable because YOU recognized the Jack in the Box sign and correlated that with your pancakes. Since we were all hungry, it made sense to turn around and get breakfast there and pancakes for you.

THINGS YOU SAY:

Speech development is such a funny thing to watch develop.   The other thing I’ve noticed is you will sometimes speak your own language when you’re being silly, usually it’s if you’re playing with other kids… like on the airplane when we returned from Hawaii, you were turned around “talking” to them and just saying nonsense stuff.  Yet, you’ll turn and look at me or your father and speak English clear as day to us, and then go back to your “Williamism” language, and laugh hysterically at yourself.  You do it to your friend/neighbor, Josh, too.  He says, “What?” over and over again, and the more he does that, the more you laugh about it.

Words you used to say perfectly or will say perfectly if specifically requested, you now have developed a “Williamism” version of it.  I want to write them here, because I know as you get older and grow out of them, I’ll miss them.  “Wi-are” is water.  “Balicious” is delicious. “Watermeldon” is watermelon.  “Dingbell” is doorbell.  “Kank-you” is thank you.

SLEEP:
Since I’ve night weaned myself from nursing you, you’ve had some really good, long, uninterrupted nights of sleep. I, however, no longer sleep through the night. I still wake up and go in your room and check the temperature, adjust the windows and drapes and sit for a moment and listen to you breathe. Although, now that your two year molars are moving in, we’ve returned to nursing in the middle of the night, at your request, though. And while I’m tired, because it’s harder for me to be awakened in the middle of my sleep cycle, I recognize that this is but a short time in your life. I want you to know I will always be there for you — now, while you’re a child, and in the future, when you’re an adult — no matter what the clock reads or what anyone says.

THINGS WE DID/PLACES WE WENT:
09/14/2013 – Legoland. You recognized where we were the second we pulled into the parking lot. You really love LegoLand!
09/15/2013 – Church with your daddy. You held your Grandma H.’s hand when leaving and when she knelt to talk to you, you knelt down too.
Wednesdays are Library storytime… a different, bigger library. One that I’ve been informed by you has a “castle!”
09/21/2013 – Disneyland. You saw Mickey Mouse, Goofy, a firetruck, rode the monorail, Pirates of the Carribean, and the train.
09/28/2013 – we went to the mountain cabin for the weekend
10/05/2013 – visited Fire Station #19 Open House
10/05/2013 – we had a mom/son date at Yogurtland and then visited the newly opened PetCo

PLAYTIME AND CHILDREN INTERACTION:
09/22/2013 – we hung out with your cousins for Huck’s birthday
10/06/2013 – Saw your cousins at their house — you were amazed at their “LegoLand” (they have lots of Legos)
Library Story Time — Monday mornings and Wednesday mornings with Grandma D., park time afterwards.
Gymnastics and Music Class — we’ve discontinued those for the time being due to budgetary limitations.

THINGS I WANT TO REMEMBER:

How sweet you are when you don’t want us to leave the room, you cry out, “Be right back!” One evening, I needed to go upstairs, so I asked you if you wanted to stay downstairs and play with your toys or come upstairs while I changed. You replied, “Stay downstairs, please.” And you did and continued to peacefully play with your toys. How I’ve started doing the countdown to something, like putting your toys away… you didn’t get the connection the first time I did it, “One, two…” You interrupted me with a happy, “THREE!!” and then realized that it was a trick. I felt kind of bad. How whenever you walk backwards, you say, “Beep Beep Beep Beep” because that’s what big vehicles do when they’re backing up. How whenever I pick a booger out of your nose, you say, “That’s a booger… don’t eat it!” Same thing for flowers, you say, “That’s a flower…. don’t eat it!” How you still love sniffing lotions and candles, and you accompany that with, *Sniff* “Mmmm, smell good.” Also, if I turn a fan on and you feel the breeze, you said, “That feels good!”

This past month you’ve started going up and down a stair or two without needing to hold on to anything. When facing a flight of stairs, however, you still reach for my hand or a rail.

How after we finish nursing in the morning, you tell me you wanna “Go see Daddy!” “Go see Mickey Mouse!” and then when I stand up, you tell me, “Put Froggy to bed… mommy carry me.” Then you tuck your head under my chin and we go find either Daddy or Mickey Mouse, sometimes they’re one and the same.

How obsessed you are with your Hot Wheels and you keep them all in a plastic basket. We limit you to only taking 2 when we go somewhere, otherwise you grab as many as you can fit in your hands and then you leave a sad trail of Hot Wheels that you can’t carry. This past Saturday we were headed out to Fire Station #19, and I requested that you pick a toy and let’s get going… and I walked out to the garage. You followed after a moment, and when I turned to look at you, you had a huge grin on your face and were carrying “one toy” “Got my basket?”… yep, you had the basket full of Hot Wheels. Now you haul your “basket” with you whenever we go somewhere.

How you love to hold your Hot Wheels out to your side and shake them around and then tell me that “They’re dancing!”

How you love saying “thank you” to people. You practice your gratefulness every chance you get. You love saying “thank you for… ” and you look around and take inventory of everything in your immediate vicinity.  You will tell yourself thank you, if I ask you do something, when you’ve done it you say, “Thank you!” to yourself.

Your relationship with Tuggy, our cat, is progressing nicely. You have a tendency to pat a little hard sometimes, but you love him… and you TELL him, “Love you, Tuggy!” Especially after we got back from the mountains. You also have a tendency to try and use him as a pillow, so there  you are, lying on the floor with your head resting on him.  You really miss your cats when you’re away from them. You really love all cats… we went to the pet store, and you were just beside yourself with joy at all the cats they had there.  You looked inside each cage and said, “HI CAT!”   You also love dogs. And turtles. And birds.  I’m just astounded at your gentleness with other creatures, it’s amazing!

How you adore babies. There’s a new baby in the neighborhood, Abigail is her name. You walked up to her and took her tiny little hand in your toddler hand and just looked at her. Her mom was ready to arrange a marriage right then and there.

How you love to laugh, and love to make us laugh.  You have this BIG FAKE laugh that you do, and it cracks everyone up.  One morning you were playing with a Thomas Kinkade nightlight.  You were pushing on the picture part of it, and it fell out of the frame.  Half joking, I asked in a fake-horrified voice, “Did you just break that?”  You looked at me, looked back at it and replied, “Froggy broke it!”  Skeptically, I responded, “Froggy broke it?”  You replied, “Noooo-hooo-hooooo!  MUWAHAHAAA!”

In our office/guest room where Grandma D. has her computer set up. She covers it with a yellow-checkered cloth when it’s off.  You were in there playing and picked up that cloth, then looked down at it and in astonishment said, “That’s not Froggy!”  You put it back on her computer and ran into your bedroom to get Froggy and said, “This is Froggy!”

How your Grandma D. took you on a walk one day and showed you a traffic light.  Ever since then, when we’re driving along, if we come to a stop  you say, “Red light” and then when we go again, you’ll say, “Green light…  now we can go! Go Go Go!!!”

How the night of your 22 month birthday, you were playing with your “piano” that your godmother gave you. You pressed the demo key and then danced to whatever song is playing. Your father and I were being silly and we started dancing around the kitchen with each other. After watching us dance together and laughing happily at seeing us do so, you came up to me and asked me to dance. My world stood still … a sweeter moment I’ve never had, but to be asked to dance by my son. And so we danced, a rousing bouncing, twisting, silly dance full of giggles and laughter.

And how you were distracted with your DJ duties, and you would run over to check the music because you didn’t want it to end, and then come running back to me and ask me to dance again. Your bedtime loomed nearer and nearer, and I shrugged to myself, sometimes making memories is more important than bedtime.

Love forever,

Momma

Dear William,

On 09/08/2013, you turned 21 months old.

STATS/TEETH:
You are weighing in at 33 pounds 4 ounces. You are 36 inches tall and are comfortably wearing size 3T in clothes. You are wearing toddler size 8.5 EW in shoes. No new teeth have shown up this month, and I’m grateful for the respite.

We bought you a froggy potty chair this month and the first night I opened it up, I told you what it was and took it up to the bathtub bathroom. After your bath that night you asked, “Sit on froggy potty, please?” As you were sitting there, with your bath towel wrapped around you because, “don’t want to get cold!” I asked what you were doing. You replied, “I go potty on froggy potty.” And… well… you DID go potty. And so every night after your bath, our routine now is we wait for you to go potty on the froggy potty, because that’s what you want to do.

NEW WORDS:
The other day we were at Chick-Fil-A, and you were running around in there, chattering non-stop as you normally do. There was another mom in the playground area with her son who was the same age as you, and she was so impressed at your speech and how well you talk. She kept saying, “Oh, wow!” That’s pretty much what most people say when they spend any amount of time with you. Your linguistic skills are very impressive for your age. Scarily so.

People tell you the wrong name for things thinking you can’t say it. For example, we bought you an ukelele in Hawaii as a souvenir. You’ve been told it’s a guitar and I’m coming along behind trying to correctly teach you that it’s an ukelele… and you say the word just fine. Truth be told, I would rather you know the correct name for things, even if it’s harder to pronounce and challenge you to say it, rather than you be told incorrect information! After all, we (your family) are not the only people in the world with whom you’ll be communicating, and not everyone will know what “pet” names you’ve been told things are called.

When I yawn, you tell me, “Mommy tired!” When you managed to reach into the plastic container which held grapes, you informed me, “It’s kinda sharp.” You are very good at opening closed boxes of food that are left within your reach, by the way. I watched you open a box of ice cream cones the other day in 20 seconds flat — I was impressed. You love to tell me about the “container” that you managed to grasp, there’s no secrets, even when you do something you shouldn’t. You love to turn the water on in your bath tub. You also love to turn it off. And then you tell me, “I turned water on!” The reason for that is that you love to “wash bath cars” and stick them up the water spout. You tell me “car parked. It’s home.” Indeed. I guess, with a little imagination, the water spout does look kind of like a garage. I was reading a book the other day, and you walked up and bent it back, looked at it and said, “No pictures.” I replied, “Correct. It’s a word book only.” You said, “Word book, no pictures.” That’s right. Some would tell you those kinds of books are boring, but that’s not me. I say, “Some books have only words, and in those books you make pictures with your imagination.”

NURSING/FOOD:
You love to nurse and one of my favorite things to hear from you is, “Wanna nurse? Please?” Or at night or naptime when the thrill of nursing overcomes you, your whole body goes crazy with glee and you say, “NAH NAHS!” I learned this month while we on vacation, and I nursed you to sleep with no white noise machine, that you do still make noises, and moan and groan while you nurse, it’s just much softer than what you used to do in the first 13 months of your life. I was glad to make that discovery.

A week ago, I made the determination that I needed to end our middle of the night nursing sessions. It appears that your sleep pattern has changed this past month to be more like an adult’s, and that what was intended to be a “dreamfeed” was actually serving to wake you up for the day. It happened twice and so now I leave it up to you. It will take about 3 weeks for my supply to adjust, and until then I’m waking several times in the wee hours of the morning, uncomfortable due to engorgement. This decision makes me sad, as that session was, hands-down, my favorite nursing session of all of them. But you are growing up and the timing feels right.

You do well with table food and enjoy a lot of variety. You will try most anything, and walk up to us and say, “Wanna bite, please?” You also desperately love to eat out at restaurants and one night this week we ordered our food to go, and when you figured out we were leaving, you got very upset that we were not eating there!  You’ve also fooled many waitresses when they come to take drink orders.  Your father always says, “Iced tea.”  I always say, “Iced tea.”  And then the waitress looks at you and you respond, “Iced tea!”  The waitress this weekend paused, looked at you and said, “Seriously??”  You grinned back at her, she wasn’t sure what to make of you.  ha

I’m trying to be conscious of my word choices when talking to you about food. So I’m cognizant of using the word “enjoy” instead of the word “like” … sometimes we enjoy our food, and other times we don’t, but we still need to eat. I also am uber-aware of simply telling you what the food is and not adding any qualifying statement. For example, “This is turkey.” and then DON’T say, “You really liked/enjoyed/didn’t like/didn’t enjoy/should taste this, etc.” Whatever you choose to do with it is your business.  If you’re hungry, I expect you to eat, if you’re not, then don’t. Also, if you’re done eating, I don’t negotiate with you. I simply confirm, “You’re all done?” “All done,” you’ll respond. I say, “OK. We’re still eating. I’ll clean up your plate in a moment. Please wait. Here’s a car to play with.” And that’s that. Sometimes you’ll eat some more, other times you’re not happy with sitting there, but I firmly believe that good table manners are an important part of life. Given all the food issues I’ve had in my life, I want to give you the opportunity to do better.

SLEEP:
When we traveled this month your sleep was simply awful. You were overstimulated by all the things we were doing and seeing, and woke multiple times a night with nightmares. There were a couple nights when I brought you into the big bed with me and we snuggled/slept in the wee hours of the morning.  I’m not big on co-sleeping, as I don’t rest well, but turns out those moments are some of my fondest vacation memories.  The first morning we were on vacation, you woke at 3:45am and was so surprised there was no sunshine. You looked out our lanai windows and said, “I see lights.” You were looking across the way at the security lights on buildings. I told you that’s what happens when you wake in the middle of the night, you see lights. The second morning you woke at 4:15am and without missing a beat, you said, “I go see lights?”

You napped well, better than I expected, while we traveled. Even on the airplane, as we flew, you took solid 2 hour naps in my arms. Once we got back home, it took a few days for you to adjust to being back home, but then (now that I don’t dreamfeed you) you’ve started sleeping solid 10 hour stretches. You wake ravenous in the morning and drink all the milk I’ve been storing away, and would like to go back to sleep in my arms, and do on the weekends, but during the week I don’t let you because I want to keep you on a somewhat decent schedule.

THINGS WE DID/PLACES WE WENT:
08/17 – we went to LegoLand and its waterpark.
08/23 – we flew to Maui (Hawaii) for 6 days/5 nights… it was a 5 hour flight each way.
09/05 – First Emergency Response Vehicles event at Chick-Fil-A – got to sit in a police car and ambulance; that same night you went into the playtubes all by yourself.
09/07 – breakfast with your godparents at Bruxie’s, and saw your cousins
You had gym class and music class, as well this month.

PLAYTIME AND CHILDREN INTERACTION:
You frequently request to see your “Cousins! Huck and Milo… friends” and your “Grandma and Grandpa H.”

On Labor Day, our neighborhood had a block party which we stopped by for a few minutes. You were playing with a ball. Another boy, a 4 year old, decided he wanted the ball and so he grabbed it out of your hands. Then, for good measure, he then turned back around and shoved you and knocked you straight on your butt. I ran across to you, as it looked like the kid was getting ready to kick you … and yelled, “Hey! No pushing!” I was behind you, and moved another kid out of the way to get to you. I could hear you saying something, over and over again, but couldn’t make out what it was. I finally got to you and picked you up, only to hear you saying repeatedly, “Oh goodness! Oh goodness! Oh goodness!” in the saddest little voice.  Your sweet spirit always touches me when I least expect it.

You are definitely in the little boy phase of being obsessed with cars, trains and airplanes. Your father pulled out his remote control car after you spent the evening previous chasing the neighbor’s. When your father finally let you “get it”, you were in awe of it and inspected every minute detail of it, telling us that, “It’s a car! It has wheels! They turn! It has lights! It goes fast!

THINGS I WANT TO REMEMBER:
~How you love to stand at my nightstand and push the buttons on my clock/radio/CD player. When you finally get the right button and the radio turns on, you turn around and look at me and exclaim in a wondrous voice, “It’s music! It’s music!”
~You love to get into my bottles of lotion and walk around sniffing them, saying, “Mmmmm. Smells so good!” And then you found the vanilla scented one and told me, “It’s green!” And then, “It’s yogurt! Yummy, yummy, yummy!” Because the bottle is indeed green and it does smell remarkably like vanilla yogurt.

~The way you take roll call of those around you, constantly, “Grandma D.? Mommy? Daddy?” And wait for us to respond to you so you know we’re there.

~How you recount sitting in a police car and ambulance to me every time it enters your mind.

~How when people come over you love to show them all your special toys. I remember doing that as a child… it’s adorable.
~How, last Saturday, we had breakfast with your godparents. You were so excited about it that every time we left the house that day, you asked, “Go see Grace?” Funny thing, we went to Costco later that day and you asked, “Go see Grace?” I told you that we were going to Costco… and wouldn’t you know? Grace was there! ha
~How you love stampers and getting your hand stamped, this started because of gymnastics class, so I stamped your hand with a pumpkin stamper one day and you spent the entire day, even after it had mostly washed off, walking around showing people your pumpkin. You also really enjoy stickers and so we stuck a bunch of stickers on a piece of paper, and you happily show everyone your masterpiece, and constantly asked to “see it!”
~How you are obsessed with getting out into the cat run so you can pet your cats. This is not a particularly endearing thing, by the way.

~The way you love to love on Tuggy and lean way over him and rest your head on him, gentle as can be. He tolerates you well, and this relationship you have with him might even turn into a true pet type relationship as you get older.
~How when we were driving home from Costco, we heard you saying in the backseat, “I see sunset! I see sunset!”

Sure enough, you were seeing the sunset and sharing your world with us. We probably wouldn’t have seen this amazing sunset without you alerting us to it. Which makes me wonder how much more beauty I would have missed if you weren’t here?

Love, Momma

Dear William,

On August 8, 2013, you turned 20 months old.

STATS/TEETH:
You are weighing in at 32 pounds 6 ounces, and measuring 36″ tall.

No new teeth this month, just your canine teeth continuing to grow in.  I’m suspicious your two year molars are intermittently starting to move, because there have been a couple days when you’ve had your hand shoved WAY back in your mouth pressing on your gums.

NEW WORDS:
It’s impossible to keep track of your new words.  You’re currently working on your pronunciation and sentence structures…  it is so cool to finally know what is going on in your brain.  When you have trouble falling asleep, I now know why — you’re reliving your day, from stories at the library to seeing the new baby in the neighborhood.

NURSING/FOOD:
Nursing continues to be a source of comfort to you, it’s also a time for me to connect with you.   Sometimes we play and laugh, other times we just close our eyes and enjoy the focus time.
Food, you are doing well this month.  You have an adventurous spirit and are willing to try anything we put on your plate. Sometimes you make a face, but you eat it anyways.  Other times you gobble it up and ask for “more, more!”

SLEEP:

You continue to be a consistently deep sleeper at night.  Sometimes, though rare, you do awaken but usually only one time and nursing puts you right back to sleep.  Your day time sleep is not consistent, though, and it’s a bit maddening for me.  One day you’ll take a 2 hour nap, the next day you’ll wake after 45 minutes or an hour.  Then there’s the (very) rare day that you aren’t able to settle down for any nap at all, and so we end up skipping it altogether.

THINGS WE DID/PLACES WE WENT:

July 13th, we went to Legoland and spent most of our time there at their waterpark
July 14th, you went down a slide at the playground all by yourself for the first time, and then got off and ran around to the start again… saying “Fun!” the whole time
July  20th and 21st, we went to our mountain cabin.  We had a really nice time, but you didn’t sleep very well. Neither did I for that matter. There was a huge thunderstorm Saturday night that kept me awake.  I think you had trouble sleeping because you’re too long for the Pack-N-Play and are unable to stretch out.
July 27th we had breakfast with your Godparents and they gifted you with a bunch of rubber snakes and frogs and geckos.  You LOVE them.
August 3, we had breakfast at Ruby’s in Tustin (after family portraits were taken) and they have trains there.  It was so much fun!

PLAYTIME AND CHILDREN INTERACTION:

You are enrolled in Music Together classes every week and you really love attending them.  You are doing better about staying with me and not roaming the class.  If you do need to roam, I instruct you to “stay in the group” and if you roam outside of it, I pull you back in.

Gymnastics classes are either on Thursdays or Saturdays.  If on Thursdays, your Grandma D. takes you, if on Saturdays, your father and I take you.  You are doing better every week… you look forward to them and say, “Monkey Class” (the mascot is a monkey) the entire drive there and as you walk up to the door, yet when class starts (up until the most recent class) you would cry through the first 5 minutes of it.  Not sure why… the only thing I can say is if we do something like this again, I think either your father or I will be sure to take you to your first couple of classes until you’re more comfortable and settled in.

Your Grandma D. is really good about taking you to the local park and letting you play with all the kids and equipment there.  She has also taken you to a few “trial” gymnastics classes out in another city, which we think has helped you settle into your Monkey Class.

You have really come to love books, even more than in months past.  You would happily sit on someone’s lap and look at books for hours.  I’m hoping that this love of yours continues.

THINGS i WANT TO REMEMBER:

How, one morning after your wake up nursing session, instead of saying “Go see Daddy!”  You said, “Go see MIckey Mouse!”  I was so startled, but you did indeed want to go see the stuffed Mickey Mouse that we take your monthly pictures with… and every morning since then, you want to “Go see Mickey Mouse!”  You like to sit up next to him and check his diaper for poopy.  One morning you claimed, “Uh oh.  Poopy!”  “Go change Mickey Mouse diaper!”  So off we went and changed his diaper.  How your  Godmother gave you a whole bunch of toys that her daughter used to love, including some rubber snakes and geckos and frogs.  I put them out in your water table and I knew the second you found them, “Oh Gosh!  Oh my Gosh!” was your reaction.  They have now taken over our backyard, they swing with the princess, they sit on the chairs, they hang out in the doorways, they “walk around.”  I love how imaginative you are!  How sweet you are when you ask, “Water on, please?” in the bathtub because you want to “Wash car!”  “Wash truck!”  The way you melt your head into my shoulder when I ask you to give me a hug… your hugs are the best thing in the world.  How even when you’re super tired, and this.close to a meltdown, you’re still the sweetest boy in the whole world.

One day this past week I had a dentist appointment.  The office is near our home and I intentionally scheduled it so it would be finished just near your naptime.  I hurried home, I couldn’t wait to see you.  You knew exactly what I was there for, to nurse you for your nap.  All the way up the stairs, your pleas of “nah nahs!” echoed.  And I put you in your bed while I got situated and you said, “Night night, Grandma. Sweet dreams.”  And my heart melted, even though Grandma was downstairs and couldn’t hear you, I shared with her later and tears came to her eyes.

You are pure sweetness.  Sweet William.

Love,

Momma

Dear William,

On July 8, 2013, you turned 19 months old.

STATS/TEETH:
You weigh 32 pounds and are 36″ tall. You are wearing 3T in shirts and 2T in shorts, although any clothes I purchase now are a size up and for bottoms I put a stitch in the waist so you can wear them longer.

Your canine teeth are finally through. Your right lower cut through 5/31, right upper cut through on 6/3. Your left lower cut through 6/12 and your left upper cut through 6/17. They’ve been on the move since the end of April, so it took a solid two months to cut these canine teeth. I hear the two year molars are next, and I’m a bit horrified by that thought.

NEW WORDS:
It’s as if all of a sudden your tongue is cooperating with your brain this month. All the words you’ve been saying, and words you’ve been trying to say, and words I had no idea you knew, all of a sudden, you’re stringing them together in short sentences. The BIG new words you’re saying, “William.” You are saying your own name. You also say, “Froggy.” You’re finally saying your lovey’s name. You say it all the time, even in the middle of the night as you’re hunting for it, I hear you saying, “Froggy, froggy, froggy!” When we changed your diaper and you’ve pooped, your father always exclaims, “OH MY GOSH!” Well, now you’ve started saying it, as soon as the diaper comes off, “Oh my gosh!” or “Oh gosh!” You say “HI!” to everyone, you say, “Hello!” If I tell you to call some one. You see a phone and say, “Call daddy!” “Call Grandma” “Call Mommy!” You pretend call those same people from your playhouse’s phone. Rain, breakfast, momma car, up, down, out, zebra, elephant, cloud, flower, mommy, William, kick, hands down… ready, set, go!, grandpa, grandma, grandma D., kick, goodnight, night night, get it, got mommy, there you go, see-saw, coming, going, cold, hot, love. If we’re leaving to go for a walk, you remind us to “get phone!” and “shoes on!” When you settle to nurse, you say, “shoes off.” When you want to nurse, you tell me to “Sit down momma. Na na momma, Pleeeease?” Outside, inside, playhouse, ladybug. Red, blue, green and you point to the correct colors. I say, “five,” You say “six.” You say, “one, two, three.” You know some of your letters (especially the letter “B”) and how some of your numbers look, 5 and 6. You looked at me one day last week, pointed at your teeth and said, “Hurt, momma!” I found a scabbed over blister on the bottom of your foot and said, “Oh! You have an owie!” You took a look at it, and then anytime anyone touched your foot, you proclaimed, “OWIE!” You say, “out” and “stuck.” You also say your cousin’s name, “Huck.” You love to tell us when we’re going to the bathroom (“Potty!”) and when you’re going to the bathroom in your diaper, you say, “Poop!” and I’m pretty sure you know when you’re peeing because you randomly say, “Pee pee” throughout the day. Broken, fix it, music. Belly, belly button, him, mine, yours. “Loud” and “noisy” are adjectives you associate with loud sounds. Also, you say “messy” when you’re eating plums or anything that makes a mess. “Froggy to bed!” “Ready, set, go!” “Costco.” “Got mommy “It’s broken!” “Fix it.” Laugh (when you want us to laugh), cough (when you want us to cough, or if you want cough medicine), Medicine when you want Advil or Tylenol. There are so many more things you say and do, but if I were to categorize them, they would take up more space than I’ve already taken up. I will just say that, once again, it seems like you’re going to be a chatterbox.

NURSING/FOOD:
You have been nursing well this past month, I don’t foresee that anything will be changing in this area for awhile and that makes me happy. I love nursing you. Food is hit and miss and is usually pretty predictable as to whether you’re teeth are hurting you. If they are, you’re generally only interested in nursing. I say calories are calories and breastmilk provides some of the best customized nutrition around. You continue to love chicken, decline to eat beef. You don’t like carrots. You love any type of fruit or berry. Vegetables are hit and miss.

One evening, your father and I were discussing what we were going to have for dinner. It was a Friday night, and we’d pretty much decided we were going to eat out. From the back seat you requested, “Pizza?” And so your first sway vote happened, we went to an Italian place and you had pizza.

One morning I made some oatmeal for us to share. I asked you if you wanted some. You looked at me with really big eyes and said, “Noooooo? Pancake… pleeeeeease?” Your father had made pancakes the day before, so you ended up having leftover pancakes for breakfast.

SLEEP:
You’ve hit what everyone affectionately terms the “18 month sleep regression.” What this looks like for you is, it takes you an inordinate amount of time to fall asleep, and you won’t fall asleep before 6 hours of awake time. So, you’re often going to bed at 9pm, because you don’t wake from your nap until 3pm. You wake at 7:30am on the weekends (generally) and I wake you to nurse at 6:40am on weekdays before I leave for work. Some days you’re able to fall back to sleep, other days you’re up for the day at that time.

THINGS WE DID/PLACES WE WENT:

LegoLand: 06/22/2013. You really enjoyed the Storybrook Boat ride. Favorites were “horsey” and “Nah-nahs.” You got your first sunburn.
Music Class (every Monday). You love to sit right in front of the teacher. You also informed the teacher that the drums were “loud” and “noisy.”
Gymnastics Class, 06/27/2013. This was your first class… you are exhibiting some new behavior (discussed below)
Parade: 07/04/2013. You really enjoyed the parade and all the people and animals.
Pool & Block Party Playtime: 07/04/2013, your cousins came over and partied with our neighborhood. Such fun!
Fireworks: 07/04/2013. You were not a fan and after one or two, you declared firmly, “All done.”
LegoLand: 07/06/2013. We spent a lot of time in the water park, and you loved the slides and music.
Haircut: 07/07/2013. Let’s just say, I’ll be making appointments and requesting “Yanna” to cut your hair from now on.
Library story time: 07/08/2013. You pay attention well to the stories.

PLAYTIME AND CHILDREN INTERACTION:
Gymnastics class, first session on 06/27. From just one class (so far), you have picked up balance beam and hands down and trampoline. You made a trampoline out of a blow up innertube, you took it to the side of the coffee table and proceeded to start bouncing on it. You balance on one leg. You will also climb halfway up on something, a chair for example, and start kicking your legs and say, “Kick! Kick!” All of this from one gymnastics class. So worth it. I wonder now if you just didn’t know you *could* do all those things because no one ever showed you?

You love to step up and step down, stairs, curbs, speed bumps and the like. You even invented an up/down game with a roll of carpet I was working with to recover the cat’s scratching post. You walked up the carpet and narrated, “Up!!! Ready???” and then a delay, and then you walked down it and said, “Down!”

When I took my car in for its oil change last month, you saw a bunch of cars up on the lifts getting worked on. Ever since then, you’ve been putting your ride-on up on chairs to “work” on it, too.

On July 4th we attended our neighborhood’s block party. There were lots of children there, including your cousins, who we invited over to participate in the party. You had a great time and were so overstimulated that you weren’t able to fall asleep until 11pm. There was lots of toy sharing going on, and I was glad that we participated because I was able to observe you with several toys and now I think I’ll hold off on ordering them, if I order them at all.

You are very much into pretend play this month. Pretend eating… you used your sand bucket and shovel as a pretend bowl and spoon. In music class, you were pretend eating out of a pan with a stir spoon. And one night after bath time, you were pretend eating things off the bugs on your room’s wall. I have NO idea where you came up with this, but it is hilarious. You also love to pretend phone people.

THINGS I WANT TO REMEMBER:

How cute you are when I tell you we’re gonna go to the store, you’ll be playing with your toys and I’ll head out to the garage and put my stuff in the car. I look up and you’re waiting at the garage door so you can hold my hand to go down the steps. I love holding your little hand when we’re walking around, and it’s so sweet when you reach your hand up and ask for “help.” How you love to lift you Lightning McQueen ride-on up on the chair and inspect it… you started doing that after you saw cars up on the lift at the auto shop. How you get up on the chairs in the back yard and yell at the fence between us and the neighbors, because that’s what you see us do when we’re talking to the neighbors over the fence. How you love to go outside and play in your playhouse, taking all your toys with you in innumerable trips. How you saw my blueberry bush in the back yard and recognized them and just started picking and eating them and saying, “Mmmmmm!” The way you start giggling when you’re about to do something you know you shouldn’t. How you love to play ball with someone, you throw the ball and then giggle like crazy when someone bounces the ball back to you. You grabbed a ball, one that flashes instead of bounces. You threw it to the ground and it plunked there, you looked up at me and proclaimed, “It’s broken. Fix it?” I love how anytime a temperature is noticeably different (food or bathwater, particularly), it’s either “hot, hot!” or “cold, brrrr!” The way your hands flutter and move as you nurse and then, gradually, they still and you rub the corner of Froggy on your ear or the palm of your hand as you fall to sleep.

Sometime over the last couple of months you stopped moaning while you eat or nurse. This makes me very, very sad. It was, hands down, one of my favorite things you did that you brought with you from infancy. When we flew with you at 11 months old you moaned so loud while you were nursing during take off that the guy in the seat in front of us turned and looked at us oddly. I just smiled and said it was my son nursing. He laughed, and nudged the person next to him and told her that it was a baby nursing. (sigh)

A few nights ago, nursing didn’t put you to sleep. Frustrated, and at my wits end, I asked your father to take over so I could get a few things done. He went in, tried snuggling, tried rubbing your back, tried wearing you in the bathroom with the fan going. All tools that he used to use when you were much younger to help you fall asleep. After 45 minutes had passed, I had finished my chores and you were still awake, so I prepared to nurse you some more.

After you were asleep from nursing, your father told me those 45 minutes were such a blessing to him. These days you either fall asleep on your own, or with me nursing you. Your father said he envies me that I get to hold you as you go to sleep, because he doesn’t get to anymore.

My mom told me, around the same time, how nostalgic she was about how rapidly you weaned from the bottle. She used to be able to hold you, and you would fall asleep on the bottle, and how special that was to her. Not anymore.

A friend of mine shared that she got to hold her 3 year old for his nap one day. She said her son was so tired that he just fell asleep on her. She was savoring every second of his nap on her, because it was so rare.

I remember when you were a newborn, all you wanted to do was sleep on me, and most of the time I savored it and traced your ear with my finger, or just sat there and watched you breathe, or put my hand over your chest to feel your heart beating. But there were certainly times I just wanted my freedom to do a couple of things here and there. I would take pictures of you sleeping on my nursing pillow and call them “The Great Escape!” pictures. Gradually you began to sleep in your crib. Now you go to sleep on your own for my mom. And I know the days are numbered that you’ll fall asleep nursing with me. And so for those nights when I just want you to fall asleep already so I can go take care of my stuff, I’m reminding myself … someday, The Great Escape will be you leaving home for college, and I don’t want to have any regrets that I didn’t take the time to hold you when I could.

Sometimes I just feel like there’s a huge push for our children to be independent at such a young age. But for me, since I waited so long for you to be my baby, why do I want to rush you to the next milestone when you seem to be getting there in the hugest hurry all by yourself? So, I’ll just hold you and wait for you to get there by yourself. It will happen soon enough.

I find myself praying when you’re nursing that God will make the time I am away from you speed by quickly, and stretch the time that I am with you into eternity. These precious, fleeting moments, into eternity. You’re here in my arms, so I know for a fact that God does answer prayers, after all.

Love you into eternity,

Momma