Tyler: 19 Months

December 24-January 23, 2012 (18 to 19 months old)

Well visit @ 18m:

• Weight:  22 lbs. 5 oz.  (24th %tile)
• Height:  32"  (36th %tile)
• Head Circumference:  18.5"  (39th %tile)

What's new with Tyler?

• Dragging me all over the place has continued, now by my finger instead of my pant leg.  If I'm not available, he drags around the next available person.  He definitely knows how to show you what he wants.  He'll take me to the fridge, say "open it" and point to the cheese drawer.  If he's wanting milk, he walks me to a chair, pushes me into it, puts the boppy pillow on my lap and says/signs milk.  
• He's starting to bounce (trying to jump) on furniture, does downward dog and is trying to do a backbend.

• He can now throw a ball overhand.  His brilliant parents taught him how to do this in the house!
• He started putting blankets over his and our heads to play peekaboo.  He'll put one over our head and say "Mama?  Dada?" like we do with him.
• He loves putting things over his neck; purses, scarves, his diaper bag.  I now have to keep everything with straps, cords and scarves out of reach, for obvious reasons.

• He has a new dance that consists of running in place and spinning in circles.  All we have to say is "happy feet" and he starts dancing.

Video:  Tyler's new dance

• He's getting his first canine tooth.
• He refuses to drink from a sippy cup most of the time now and insists on drinking out of my big Klean Kanteen stainless steel water bottle, so we bought him a little Klean Kanteen.  He's so excited and proud of it.  Sometimes he'll hand me my Klean Kanteen when he drinks from his.  He'll push it to my mouth and then take a drink of his at the same time, all while having a big grin on his face. It's our special moment brought to us by Kleen Kanteen, lol!
• He tells us his food is hot (even when it's not) and then blows on it.  It's so stinkin' cute!

Video:  Tyler blowing on his food and saying/signing hot

• He now tells us "yes" by nodding his head.  It's the most enthusiastic yes I've ever seen, the range of motion goes from putting his head back as far as he can to touching his chin to his chest.
• He had his first hair trim.  I had no intentions of cutting it, but his 18m photoshoot was coming up and his hair was craaaaaazzzzy.  I just took about an inch off in the back.  I'll post his professional photos soon.
• He is becoming such a sweet, loving little boy.  He gives the biggest hugs and kisses.  
• He has his own peeps that he loves, everyone else gets ignored as if they're not even in the room.
• He is all about being fair.  If he kisses one person, he has to go around and kiss everyone else in the room.  If he gives me a bite of food, he has to give everyone else a bite as well.

Language:

New sounds:

• Dog (oof oof)
• Duck (guck guck)
• Pig (sounds like he's hawking a loogie)

New words:

• Choo Choo
• Car (he watches out the window and yells "car!!!" every time one goes by)
• Boat
• Cat
• Cow
• Goat
• Duck
• Owl
• Mouse
• Fish
• Lion
• Turkey
• Animal (am-mo)
• Bubbles
• Balloon (ba-oon)
• Moon
• Other Side (other sy)
• Gate
• Door
• Stop
• Go
• Open (he hands me all kinds of containers/bags and says Open!)
• Off
• Hot
• Mail
• Boppy
• Poo Poo / Poop (points to toilet when he says this)
• Underwear
• Coat
• Grapes
• Ice Water
• Addison (nanny's son)
• Tyler (Ty-ter)

Tyler loves playing peek-a-boo and hide-n-seek.  Anytime he covers his eyes or hides behind the curtains, we say "Tyler, Tyler, where's Tyler, have you seen Tyler?".  One day he covered his eyes and said "Ty-ter?  Ty-ter?".  It is the cutest thing ever when your child says their own name for the first time.

Video:  Ty-ter

He loves the words and signs for stop and go.  He'll look at me and say and sign "go" and take off running.  Then he'll say and sign "stop" and stop in place.  He then wants me to say/sign it for him while he runs and stops over and over.

Video:  Stop!  Go!

He has finally added the word milk to the sign, well if you could call it that.  Milk is now "maa, maa". Water is still ba-ba.

He says "Ahhhh" when I ask him to open his mouth and show me his teeth.  He also does it after taking a big drink.

He says "Shhhh" while putting his finger over his lips.  It's so stinkin' cute!

New signs:

• Hot
• Cold
• Bath
• Phone (he says "haa" and signs phone every time he wants my iphone)
• Flower
• Up
• Down
• Stop
• Go
• Tree
• Leaf
• Bubbles
• Balloon
• Boat
• Bike
• Coat
• Wash Hands
• Sleep

He signs please like crazy when he really wants something.  It is sooooo hard to tell him no when he does it!  He drags the nanny to the gate near my office and signs/says Mama and then signs please.  I can hear him and I just want to run and scoop him up!

He surprised me with signing a few 2 and 3 word sentences such as "cheese please", "water please", "cheese thank you", "mama please" and "more cheese please".  He's a very polite signer and hmmm, loves cheese I'd say.

Letters:

• A
• E
• O

He completely shocked me that he knew a few letters.  One day after drinking some milk, he sat up and pointed to the letter E in FIBER on a package of fruit leather and exclaimed "E!!!!".  I couldn't believe it and soon realized he also knew A and O.

Temper:

His temper has really improved lately.  He'll still throw an occasional tantrum when I take something away, but they have really decreased in frequency.  I'm not certain what exactly made the difference, but I think it has a lot to do with his increased communication skills.

Asking him questions and getting a reliable answer has improved drastically now that he can answer yes instead of just no.  This has helped significantly with meeting his needs.

I've been working with him on the concepts of first, then, before and after.  "We'll go outside after we eat lunch".  "We're going to brush your teeth first, then we'll read".  He seems to understand and it has helped him with delayed gratification.  I also started giving warnings when something he's not thrilled with is coming up.  "Mommy's going to change your diaper and you're not going to cry".  It works.

We've been really involving him in things that need to be done around the house.  He loves helping prepare food.  He helps crack eggs, tear up spinach, butter toast and stir things in bowls/pans.  Involving him in food prep has nearly eliminated the whining and needing to be held the entire time I'm in the kitchen issue.

Helping Daddy make pancakes

As far as Dyson goes, we finally found a solution to his frantic begging for Dyson.  We simply leave the vacuum sitting in the living room where he has full access to it any time he wants.  Within 2 days, he no longer even noticed Dyson and hasn't played with it in weeks.  As a test, I put Dyson up and sure enough he started asking for it again.  Dyson is now on permanent display in our living room.

Video:  Unfortunately this doesn't work at Sam's:

Parent and Me class:

So you've probably heard me state before that one of the biggest downfalls of being a full-time working mom is that I miss out on all of the mommy and me classes and play groups.  This has been something that has really left me with a lot of sadness as I don't get to do all of those fun things with my little guy that I hear all about from my stay-at-home-mommy friends.  So my sweet, sweet husband surprised me with a parent and me gymnastics class.  I was so so so excited!  It was extra special since I was a gymnast, ummm, let's just say a long time ago.  It brings back special memories of dad taking me to gymnastic practice every Sat morning.

The class is every Sat morning and Tyler loves it.  The first 30 mins is open gym where we get to jump on all the trampolines, jump in the foam pits, swing, etc.  The last 30 mins is structured where the children go through an obstacle course and learn to follow directions, wait their turn, stay in line, etc.  We also do bubble time and sing.

Video:  Swinging high

Video:  Flying high

Video:  Jumping on the trampoline with Daddy

Video:  Running down the tramp track

The only downfall is that the gym has darn vacuum cleaners everywhere!  We'll be playing and all of a sudden we hear "Dyson!" and there goes Tyler.

This month in photos:

Going through Mama's purse

We were hanging ornaments on the tree and turned around to find Tyler walking around with this on his head.

Dyson-Claus!

He hates Santa, so he was not too happy about us doing this to his beloved Dyson.

Yee-Haw!

Furniture jail

So excited about wearing my belt

It goes around his waist twice

This month in video:

Video:  Tyler wearing Mama's boots

Video:  Tyler stumps Siri

Video:  Tyler dancing to the drums

Video:  Tyler dancing/head banging to the drums

Video:  Tyler jammin' on the drums

Video:  Tyler laughing hysterically

I'll end with a little Tyler funny.  Kerry, the nanny and I were all standing in the kitchen chatting away as Kerry was about to leave for work.  I was holding Tyler and he was demanding milk the entire time, signing away, saying maa, maa, maa!  I finally acknowledged him and said "just a minute, we'll get some milk as soon as Daddy leaves".  Tyler pointed to the door, looked at Kerry was a very serious look, said "Bye Bye!" emphatically and waved to him.  He couldn't get Kerry out the door fast enough.  We all laughed so hard.