Sweet 16

16 months.

That’s how old Little Man will be tomorrow. 16 whole months old.

Holy cow, where has the time gone? He certainly isn’t the baby boy that I can still feel myself holding, wrapped up in a blanket, and humming to. I can’t get him to sit still that long, much less actually wrap himself in a blanket.

• You are independent. You want no help with anything. Including climbing the stairs, getting in and out of the bathtub, eating, or going to bed. Sometimes it’s a good thing {especially when it comes to going to bed} and others [like with the eating] it’s not so pretty.
• You eat everything. Seriously. You like more types of food than you have toys. I’m eager to see how long that lasts. And there are definitely no signs of you being a vegetarian. You are a Bama’ boy at heart and love you’re meat.
• You are going in and out of a snuggly phase. There are days when you prefer to sit and be held, and then there are others when you are strictly “hands off” and want no one picking you up or hugging you or holding you at all.
• You are as much a mommy’s boy as you are daddy’s. And we love it that way.
• You may not be able to communicate like an adult yet, but you do understand what we’re saying. And you do grasp the concept that daddy will be going ‘bye-bye” soon. Which is probably why you have been all about daddy the past few days.
• You still love Veggie Tales, though you are finding more entertainment in toys and real play than you do in TV right now. And that’s good. We don’t mind. Really. Not having to sing the Veggie Tales theme song 10,000 times a day doesn’t phase us a bit.
• You go to bed with your blankie, bottle and stuffed monkey-but wake up in the morning with nothing in your crib. I think that they crowd you. Because we can usually hear you throwing them out of the bed. Especially the bottle when it makes the loud “thump” on the floor.
• You have to sleep in pants. Have to. No getting around it. Because if you don’t, mommy and daddy enter your room in the mornings to find a diaperless little boy covered in pee. And you think it’s the funniest thing in the world.
• You are dwindling out of your napping phase. Morning naps are becoming less and less frequent, and if you do manage to go down for one, you usually don’t take one in the afternoon. But that’s ok. As much as mommy loves nap time during the day, I will survive. Just as long as you keep sleeping all night.
• You have recently discovered how to pick your nose. And mommy’s nose. And daddy’s nose. You think it’s funny. Atleast you haven’t decided to eat what you pull out yet. Yuck. I’m afraid that day will come too, though. Because you are a boy. And that’s what boys do.
• At your last appointment you weighed 25/5.5. You’re a big boy. And mommy’s back can tell it.
• Poptarts have become the breakfast food of choice. Strawberry or Cinnemon are your favorite. And you enjoy crushing the Strawberry poptarts up in your hands and rubbing them everywhere.
• Walking is second nature now and we can’t slow you down. You run to the door to greet daddy in the afternoons and you would prefer it if we let you walk everywhere rather than confining you to a stroller or a buggy. Oh well.
• You’ve recently decided that the vaccum cleaner is no longer something to be afraid of, and you spend a lot of time during the day ‘talking’ to it.
• Your vocabulary includes: cookie, duckie, dog, Larry {as in, the cucumber}, daddy, mama, baba, cup, huh [as in, questioning what we are saying. Boy they learn early don’t they?] juice, ball and mine.
• You understand what the hairbrush is for, how to use a Q-tip, how to help put on and take off your clothes, how to talk on the phone, how to turn up the TV [but not how to turn it down…much like your daddy], how to go get your shoes and bring them to us, which toys are which when we ask for them,  how to open up and say ‘ahhh’ when you want something to eat, and how to point-with one finger-at what you want.
• The masculine genes run deep within you because your favorite toys are your bouncy balls, your football or baseball, and your toy trucks. You spend endless hours pushing your trucks around the house and throwing the ball.