Amazing Memory

For a 21 month old, I think Noah has an amazing memory.  Couple of stories:

-We hadn't seen my brother's family for 2 months before we saw them on Boxing Day, so it's not like Noah really knows them.  But almost 2 weeks after the Boxing Day gathering I was showing Noah a picture of their family on Facebook.  I hadn't reminded him of any of their names before showing him the picture, but when I pointed to each person he said each of their names.  Correctly.  Nick, Hilary, Elijah, and Josiah.  I was seriously impressed.

-Lately Noah is randomly thinking about his grandparents a lot.  He'll just start saying "Nana!  Papa!  Granny!  Gramper!" (or, rather, Nana, Papa, Ganny, Bamper).  Tonight at dinner he was doing that, so I started asking about other people in our family, like Uncle Matt, Aunt Lynsey, etc.  I asked about Josiah (my 14 month old nephew), and Noah looked at me very seriously and said the following:

"Siah.  Soodah.  Yittle.  Cying."

Translation:  "Josiah.  Soother.  Little.  Crying."

Yes, Josiah always has a soother in his mouth, he is little, and he cries.  A lot.  No, I have not been saying any of these things to Noah.  It's been 2 full weeks since we saw them, but he remembers exactly what Josiah was like.

He never ceases to amaze me.

~~~~

Tomorrow is our RE appointment... I'm equal parts nervous and excited.  We're bringing Noah.  I'm hoping everything will go according to the little plan in my head, but I have to remember to prepare myself for things not going that way.

Bubbles, Circles, Colours and Snow

Yesterday it was freezing out, but Noah and I went outside to play, anyway.  It was 4pm and I was trying to kill time until Justin got home at 5:15.

It was sunny right when we went out, so I opened the van door to get my sunglasses out.  Immediately Noah started saying "Bubbles!  Bubbles.  Bubbles.  Bubbles."  Oh crap, I forgot.  Whenever he sees me open that door, he sees the bubbles that have been sitting in the lower water bottle holder since July.  And even though we haven't actually blown bubbles since July, he knows exactly what they are, and always wants to play with them.

I don't know if it's because he actually remembers when we blew bubbles in July, or if he knows what bubbles are from that episode of Sesame Street, and because he is obviously a genius, he somehow knows that that green bottle in the van door is a bottle of bubbles.

Regardless, I decided to stop being a mean Mommy (Don't judge me. The bubble wand drips on your clothes, and your hands get sticky from the bubble solution.) and actually let him play with the bubbles.

To my surprise, it didn't take him long to perfect his bubble blowing technique and actually blow proper bubbles!  I was very impressed.

After playing with bubbles for about 45 minutes, we went on a wagon ride, during which it started to snow.  Gross.  I feel like my whole fall was wasted with being so sick with my colitis flare up, and then Noah breaking his leg and not being allowed to run around.  Then when his leg was better, we got sick again.  And then we got better.  So now we can go outside to play.  You know, now that its 3 degrees outside.

Continuing with the randomness:

Noah is not a big fan of vegetables.  Last night at dinner he put a piece of broccoli in his mouth, said, "Gross," and pulled it back out and put it back on his plate.  I tried suggesting he eat carrots instead.  I had cut his round carrot pieces in half, so they were semi circles.  I put one in his mouth, and he was not thrilled.  I said, "Yummy!  Look, Mommy is eating carrots, too!"  My carrots were not cut up, so they were circular.

After Noah saw me eat the carrot in the shape of a circle, he said "Orange circle," pointing to the carrots on my plate.  And after that he ate tons of carrots, as long as they were in the shape of a circle.  It's not as if he can't say "carrot," but every time he wanted another one from my plate, he pointed to them and said, "Circle."

I am impressed that he knows several shapes in many different contexts without being prompted or reminded.  He is 19 months old and knows all his colours and some of his shapes.  He even can identify colours properly when they're not in the deep bold hues.  The difference between dark purple and pastel purple is pretty huge, but the other day I was wearing a pastel purple shirt (and Noah usually plays with dark purple blocks or crayons, so that's what he learned purple was) and I said "Noah, what colour is my shirt?"  He gazed at it for about 3 seconds, then looked at me and said "Purple?"

Again, I was impressed.

Ok, enough bragging.

I Wanna Wear Orange!

This morning before I got Noah out of his crib I was going through his drawers getting him something to wear.  When I told him I was going to get him a shirt and opened the drawer, he immediately said "Orange."

His only orange shirts either had summer pictures on them (not appropriate for 5 degree weather) or were size 4, which is still large on him.  So instead I lifted up a blue shirt and said "How about this blue shirt instead?"

Noah shook his head and said "Noooo!  Orange!!"  So I picked up the size 4 orange shirt and he smiled and nodded.  "Yes.  Orange.  Yes."

I knew he loved the colour orange, but I thought this was hilarious.  I never would have expected my 19 month old son to make any sort of fuss over what colour he wanted to wear.

19 Months Old

It has been extremely difficult getting around to writing Noah's 19 month stats.  I just sent him off with Daddy for an hour, so instead of taking some time to relax or make dinner, I'm doing this. 

At 19 months, here is where Noah is at:

-I haven't weighed or measured Noah this month, but I assume he is just slightly heavier and taller than last month, when he was 27lbs and 35 inches.

-He is in size 4 diapers during the day and night.

-He wears size 2T and 3T clothing.  Most 2T clothing is too short, though.

-He wears size 6 shoes.

-He nurses on demand, 4-6 times a day.

-He exclusively feeds himself his solids, either with his hands or with a spoon and fork. If he is given a utensil, he will always use it.  He also drinks out of a regular cup quite well, although we try to use a sippy cup as often as he will let us since we run less risk of him purposefully pouring out his water.

-He has 16 full teeth. The only ones left are his 2 year molars.

-He broke his leg on Saturday, September 24, 2011.  The diagnosis wasn't confirmed until the following Thursday.  He is doing a lot better now, but he is still limping.

-As of his 19 month birthday, he had been on a nap strike for 15 days, where he absolutely refused to nap unless he was actively nursing or in the car.  I think we might have beaten that now, though.  Update on that separately.  Soon, hopefully.

-Half of this month he was been sleeping 11 to 11.5 hours at night, getting up to nurse twice.  I went along with this because it started happening right after he broke his leg.  But when naps went to crap and Noah woke up wanting to nurse already at 11:30pm, I buckled down.  Since then he has been sleeping straight through the night 2/3 of the time and getting up to nurse sometime after 5am 1/3 of the time (one nurse a night is normal for him and I don't mind it).

-Bedtime is after 8:30pm most nights, and we've been sleeping in until about 8am or later every morning.

-He no longer signs to nurse, eat, or for water.  He's strictly verbal.

-At 15 months Noah was saying 18 words. At 16 months he was saying 42 words. At 17 months he was saying 79 words. At 18 months he was saying 137 words.  

-At 19 months Noah is saying way over 300 words.  However, I am not very good at writing them all down, and I need to find a way to automatically alphabetize them on the computer because it's really hard to go through the list to see if a new word is really a new word or not.  As a result, I have only recorded 281 words.

His old words that he's still saying are: Mama, Dada, uh oh, more, this, that, cat, night night, hot, up, yes, woof woof ("what does a dog say?"), baa ("what does a sheep/goat say?"), moo ("what does a cow say?"), car, ball, shoes, cracker, Noah, water, orange, clock, blech, hi, done, dirt, Bert, puff, swish, fluff, book, buzz, Papa, Nana, boo, fish, phone, again, home, sunglasses, Gramper, sit, stretch, glasses, food, laptop, love, hair, quack, bye, tshirt, shirt, aunt, poop, slide, cheese, Colton, danger, banana, feet, please, clock, cold, toes, ooo-ooo-ahh-ahh (monkey sound), bad, burger, boo-boo (as in, an owie), nurse, block, fly, stuck, chalk, out, fit, hat, bye-bye, and shit (yeah, I'm not proud of that), pool, eyes, nose, rice, pour, no, apple, bath, heck, help, eat, T.V., pup, corn, cook, moon, sun, on, off, mouse, brush, ice, neigh, push, yay, peach, buddy, you, hi, mess, flip, hose, toast, home, see you, pieces, pear, foot, me, tape, open, meat, ok, out, street, outside, keys, bits, pee, flies, away, whoa, cheerios, cut, gas, wet, hey, bless.

-Some of his new words are: plate, baby, kick, acorn, grass, light, dark, medicine, horse, cake, after, bar, house, two, three, go, doctor, windy, lid, hide, Elmo, get, it, fix, button, thank, beep, one, cookie, high, chair, highchair, whack, walk, tower, cute, breakfast, bawk (chicken), back, moose, lion, tiger, dinner, pocket, Ernie, draw, wall, welcome, Granny, Matt, Lynsey, aunt, Giliane, Nick, Hilary, cuddle, boat, pen, puck, ready, picture, coming, dude, cool, clothes, soother, green, purple, blue, both, you, I, love, fries, toys, red, playdoh, stick, hockey, hit, ribbit, frog (which comes out as f#ck), colour, found, plug, pizza, coffee, cricket, broke, ring, hug, rice, watch, arm, leg, ear, closet, open, dukie (dutch slang for washcloth), chicken, Abby, sweep, music, Emmie, Lexie, other, room, welcome, rain, clap, table, yellow, crayon, crib, music, lotion, cube, self, ice cube, new, giraffe, bite, blanky, dance, meow, cow, dog, rabbit, tomato, tree, bathroom, cup, window, honk, pretty, grape, fork, spoon, knife, goose, bang, Scout, peek-a-boo.

-In case you didn't read through that long list (I don't blame you), Noah says frog, but it comes out as "f#ck." Quite perfectly pronounced, too.  It has embarrassed me several times.

-He is putting many two word phrases together.  For example: thank you, bless you, get it, get you, got you, hang on, etc.

-He knows that poop and pee go in the toilet, and he shows interest when we go to the bathroom, but I haven't gotten him a potty or even started to bother training him.  I am in no hurry.

-His verbal comprehension continues to be amazing. He understands everything we say to him. We can even reason with him.

-He still wants gets into everything, but he is continuing to obey the word "no" more consistently.

-Currently, his favourite "toys" are our Dyson vacuum cleaner, my hair dryer, any cleaning implement, or anything electronic that isn't meant to be played with.

-He just jumped for the first time, actually getting air.  We weren't trying to teach him, he just suddenly decided to stand there on two feet and figure out how to jump up and land again.  And he did it.

-He loves to colour with us.  We colour with paper and crayons, or on his big AquaDoodle mat.  I love AquaDoodle.

-He knows most of the main colours: green, orange, blue, red, yellow, purple, and black.  He spends most of his time concentrating on green and orange, though.  Especially orange.

-He'll count "one, two, three..." but most of the time when he's counting he says "Two, two, two, two..." as he points to different objects.  This slays me.  It's hilarious.

-He loves to play with playdoh.  I bought it when he broke his leg and wasn't supposed to walk.  I bought a Sesame Street set of shapes and cutters and things, so when he wants to play with playdoh he'll usually say "Elmo!  Cut!"  

-He L.O.V.E.S. Sesame Street.  He either asks to watch "Street" or "Elmo".  He absolutely adores Elmo, and his second favourite character would probably be Abby Cadabby.  He even knows that if I spell "E-L-M-O" that spells Elmo.  I tried spelling it so he wouldn't hear the word, but he figured it out pretty quickly.

-This is the very first month he has shown an interest in loving stuffed animals.  Before now he was only attached to "Pup," his lovey.  And that was only after having him in his crib for months and months.  This month he fell in love with a puppy at Build-A-Bear, so we made one for him.  He adores that puppy.  He hugs him and kisses him and cuddles with him.  We call him "Scout," which Noah pronounces something like "Suck."

-Time outs are still extremely successful around here. They've been so successful, we don't need to use them that often anymore.

-No illnesses for Noah this month. The count is at 13.

-He is getting much less shy, but he still has separation anxiety from me.

-He is such a smart, sweet, gentle little boy who just loves other kids and babies.  He shares, he's nice, he's empathetic... I'm so proud of him!

18 Months Old

At 18 months, here is where Noah is at:

-He is about 27lbs.  This shocked me this month.

-He is about 35 inches tall.

-He is in size 4 diapers during the day and night.

-He wears size 2T and 3T clothing.

-He wears size 6 shoes.

-He nurses on demand, 5-7 times a day.  When he nurses he is constantly playing with my face and ears, especially when he's nursing to sleep.  He will be sleeping, but he is reaching up with an open palm that just gently strokes my ear and earring, over and over.

-He exclusively feeds himself, either with his hands or with a spoon and fork. If he is given a utensil, he will always use it.

-He's cooperative about drinking from a sippy cup early in the day, but once the afternoon and evening hits he wants to drink from a regular CUP, darnit, just like Mama.

-He has 16 full teeth. The only ones left are his 2 year molars, which I think he is actually already starting to work on (although I am mostly in denial about this).

-He has one nap a day, usually about an hour long.

-This month he's been sleeping 11 to 11.5 hours at night, getting up to nurse once, sometime after 5am. Bedtime is after 8:30pm most nights, and we've been sleeping in until about 8am or later every morning.

-He still signs for water and to eat, even though he says the words just as easily.  He almost never signs to nurse anymore.  He said asks "Nurse?"

-At 15 months Noah was saying 18 words. At 16 months he was saying 42 words. At 17 months he was saying 79 words.  At 18 months he is saying 137 words.

His old words that he's still saying are: Mama, Dada, uh oh, more, this, that, cat, night night, hot, up, yes, woof woof ("what does a dog say?"), baa ("what does a sheep/goat say?"), moo ("what does a cow say?"), car, ball, shoes, cracker, Noah, water, orange, clock, blech, hi, done, dirt, Bert, puff, swish, fluff, book, buzz, Papa, Nana, boo, fish, phone, again, home, sunglasses, Gramper, sit, stretch, glasses, food, laptop, love, hair, quack, bye, tshirt, shirt, aunt, poop, slide, cheese, Colton, danger, banana, feet, please, clock, cold, toes, ooo-ooo-ahh-ahh (monkey sound), bad, burger, boo-boo (as in, an owie), nurse, block, fly, stuck, chalk, out, fit, hat, bye-bye, and shit (yeah, I'm not proud of that).

His new words are: pool, eyes, nose, rice, pour, no, apple, bath, heck, help, eat, T.V., pup, corn, cook, moon, sun, on, off, mouse, brush, ice, neigh, push, yay, peach, buddy, you, hi, mess, flip, hose, toast, home, see you, pieces, pear, foot, me, tape, open, meat, ok, out, street, outside, keys, bits, pee, flies, away, whoa, cheerios, cut, gas, wet, hey, bless.

-After he poops (and sometimes beforehand) he will inform us by saying "Poop! Poop! Poop!" He still doesn't really care if you change his diaper or not, though. I think he might actually be content with a poopy bum all day long.

-I'm pretty sure he knows exactly what pee is, and he knows it goes in the toilet.  He'll open any bathroom door, point to the toilet, and exclaim "Pee!!!"

-Noah still loves to point out things that are hot. He waves his hands around saying "Hot! Hot!" and then blows air out his mouth like he's trying to cool something down. He really pronounces the "t", and the way he says it is sooo cute. He looks so proud of himself for knowing everything that is hot.

-His verbal comprehension continues to be amazing.  He understands everything we say to him.  We can even reason with him.

-He still wants gets into everything, but he is continuing to obey the word "no" more consistently.

-He hardly ever plays with his toys.  Currently, his favourite "toys" are our Dyson vacuum cleaner, anything electronic that isn't meant to be played with, any cleaning implement (like Swiffers), or kitchen/bathroom gadgets.

-He loves to run, climb, swim... anything active.

-Time outs are still wildly successful around here.  They've been so successful, we don't need to use them that often anymore.

-One mild illness for Noah this month.  The count is at 13.

-He still has a thing for pretty blonde women:)

-He is such a cuddly, affectionate little monkey. He loves to hug and be hugged, loves to get and give kisses, loves to sit in our laps. He such a sweet little boy.

18 months old!  I just can't believe my little guy is a year and a half!  I still think of him as my baby, even though he is such a toddler.  The nursing, cuddling, and snuggling him as he falls asleep in my arms really helps us both ease this transition.  Everyday he does something that just makes my mouth hang open, because, "Oh my gosh, he is a little boy now!"

I think this might be my favourite age so far, at least since he has become a toddler.  He is so incredibly entertaining.  I love watching him do such grown up things.  I love listening to him talk and learn new words.  I love his long gibberish sentences.  I love observing him as he assimilates new information into his existing knowledge base so quickly and easily.  I love how he is just so darned silly.

I am not going nearly as crazy as I was a few months ago.  Noah is much more obedient now.  He still does things I don't want him to do, of course.  But it's no longer only going from one restricted activity to another restricted activity.  There are a lot of things he will stay away from now.  And when he's not listening, times outs really work for both him and me.  I rarely end up at the point where I want to bang my head against the wall, because a quick time out stops me from having to stop him from doing the same thing 200 times in a row.

Everybody is telling me I should be buying Noah a potty.  He is showing so much interest in poop, pee, the toilet, and seems to be grasping the whole concept.  He definitely grasps that we use the toilet for poop and pee, anyway.  And he'll wipe his diapered crotch with toilet paper.  This made me laugh so hard.  I am in no rush for this.  Potty training was something I wasn't even thinking about until sometime after he turns 2.  Next summer seemed like a good time to try, because he could run around outside all day with no clothes on.  Maybe if a good potty goes on sale I will pick one up and see what happens.  I'm not convinced, even though all his aunts, uncles, and grandparents seem to be.

I'm looking forward to what this next month will bring.  I am constantly reminded that my Mom and sister in law both had their second babies when their first was 19 months old (my mom actually did that 4 times in a row).  I just can't even imagine having a newborn in a month.  I'm happy to be able to concentrate on Noah for awhile longer.

17 Months Old

At 17 months, here is where Noah is at:

-He is probably about 24lbs.

-He is about 34.5 inches tall.

-He is in size 4 diapers during the day and night.

-He wears 24 month clothing, for the most part.  He still fits into 9 month shorts, but they have gotten pretty snug.  I'm trying to get through the rest of the summer with what I have, though.

-He nurses on demand, 7-8 times a day.

-He pretty much exclusively feeds himself.  Using a spoon and fork has become less messy this month, and he really enjoys it.  I can get him to eat pretty much any vegetable if I give him a spoon or fork to eat it with.

-He has 16 full teeth.  The only ones left are his 2 year molars.

-He has one nap a day, usually about an hour long.
-This month he's been sleeping 11.5-12 hours at night, getting up to nurse once. Bedtime is after 8:30pm most nights, and we've been sleeping in until at least 8:15am every morning.


-He still gets up to nurse once a night, but he seems to be consistently pushing this later for the past week and a half.  Almost every night he has slept 10 hours straight before getting up, sometimes sleeping until 7:30 (and then going back to sleep until 9:30!).  I'd like to think he is maybe night-weaning himself, but I know better than to think this will last.  Over a year ago he was consistently sleeping 10 hours straight before nursing, and that didn't last!

-He still does just three signs: nurse (the sign for milk), water (waves his hand up and down), and eat (sticks his finger in his mouth).  I don't do any other signs, because he picks up language easy enough.

-At 15 months Noah was saying 18 words. At 16 months he was saying 42 words.  At 17 months he is saying 79 words.

His old words that he's still saying are: Mama, Dada, uh oh, more, this, that, cat, night night, hot, up, yes, woof woof ("what does a dog say?"), baa ("what does a sheep/goat say?"), moo ("what does a cow say?"), car, ball, shoes, cracker, Noah, water, orange, clock, blech, hi, done, dirt, Bert, puff, swish, fluff, book, buzz, Papa, Nana, boo, fish, phone, again, home, sunglasses, Gramper, sit.

His new words are: stretch, glasses, food, laptop, love, hair, quack, bye, tshirt, shirt, aunt, poop, slide, cheese, Colton, danger, banana, feet, please, clock, cold, toes, ooo-ooo-ahh-ahh (monkey sound), bad, burger, boo-boo (as in, an owie), nurse,  block, fly, stuck, chalk, out, fit, hat, bye-bye, and shit (yeah, I'm not proud of that).

-After he poops (and sometimes beforehand) he will inform us by saying "Poop!  Poop!  Poop!"  He still doesn't really care if you change his diaper or not, though.  I think he might actually be content with a poopy bum all day long.

-Noah still loves to point out things that are hot.  He waves his hands around saying "Hot!  Hot!" and then blows air out his mouth like he's trying to cool something down.  He really pronounces the "t", and the way he says it is sooo cute.  He looks so proud of himself for knowing everything that is hot.

-His verbal comprehension continues to be above average.

-He still gets into everything and anything, but he is starting to obey the word "no" more often (up until the past few days, he seemed to think it was optional).


-He is a super-climber.  He wishes our entire house was his jungle gym.

-He loves pools!  He loves to swim.

-We started doing time outs this month.  Just 1 minute in his crib when he's been disobedient.  I resisted this for awhile because I didn't want him to have bad associations with his crib.  But then I figured it was much better for both of us if I did it anyway, rather than letting my frustration turn to anger and build to a boiling point.  The time outs are working, and I stay very calm.  I've felt much more 'in control' for the past month than I did before.

-Every month Noah gets better with strangers and with separation from Mommy.  He's much better when it's on his own terms, though.  He's still not okay with being left in the church nursery, but we're working on it.  For now, I'm spending most of the church service in there with him.  I'm not going to force it and make him scream for an hour and a half.  It will come.

-No more illnesses this month!  The count is still at 12.

-He has a thing for pretty blonde women.  I'm sure it's because I am blonde.  It's really funny though, how he'll warm up to a blonde who is about my age in about 30 seconds, and want to sit with them and cuddle with them.  Actually, come to think of it, we have a gorgeous model friend who is a brunette, and he has a thing for her, too.  What can I say, my boy has discerning taste;)

-He is such a cuddly, affectionate little monkey.  He loves to hug and be hugged, loves to get and give kisses, loves to sit in our laps.  He such a sweet little boy.

For Pete's Sake, Kid, PLAY WITH YOUR TOYS!

I've heard there are children who hardly ever do things they aren't supposed to do.

I would like to know what that's like.

Noah is not a "bad boy."  But 97% of the time, all he wants to do are things he knows he's not supposed to do, or things I'd really rather he not do.  Apparently these activities are more interesting than playing with his toys.  Such activities include:

1. Opening cupboards I am unable to lock and pulling stuff out of them.

2. Opening closets and playing with the contents.

3. Opening the dishwasher and playing with knives.  And dirty dishes.

4. Climbing on top of the kitchen table to gain access to what lies in the middle of it.

5. Taking the floor vents out of the floor and putting objects down there.

6. Opening dresser drawers, taking fistfuls of clothes out, and depositing them elsewhere in the house.

7. Opening the wipes warmer and taking the wipes out.

8. Destroying my neat piles of diapers/blankets/laundry/etc.

9. Taking anything off of any raised surface (counter top, dresser top, table, whatever).

10. Unplugging a monitor/fan/lamp/whatever and playing with it.

11. Turning on all the fans in the house.

12. Playing with/chewing on the TV remotes.

13. Playing with the satellite receiver and all of the cords attached to it.

14. Opening the fridge and taking food or condiments out of it.

15. Opening the pantry and taking food/candles/unused toilet brushes out of it.

16. Opening the pantry and playing with the crock pots stored on the floor.

17. Are you getting the picture?

Now, all of these things may not seem like a big deal in and of themselves.  Or you might even read the list and think "Oh, big deal, those things aren't that harmful, except for the playing with knives part."

But if 97% of your child's activities were doing these things, do you think you might end up SCREAMING??  Sometimes Noah will go from restricted activity to restricted activity, staring at us to see what we will do.

He almost NEVER wants to play with his toys.  He seriously ONLY wants to do things he either really shouldn't do, or he knows he's not supposed to do.  And 9 times out of 10, he ignores me when I tell him "No." 

Trust me, this kid's verbal comprehension is fantastic.  He knows exactly what "No" means.  He just choses to ignore it.  He has selective hearing, apparently.

I'm not even going to get into the whole "discipline" thing, because trust me, I have tried everything.  And Harvey Karp might be a genius when it comes to infants, but his Happiest Toddler on the Block book is completely irrelevant when it comes to my toddler.

I have tried baby proofing my house as much as I can, but the only thing left for me to do is to somehow put everything out of Noah's reach, even the things that are behind closed doors.  Because, as I mentioned when Noah was 12 months old, he can open closed doors.  And closet doors.  Unfortunately, I have too much stuff to keep everything on shelves that are at least 5 feet high.  And Noah, being the child that he is, wouldn't be stopped by things being out of his reach.  He would literally drag a kitchen chair over to the closet or cupboard, climb up on it, and then reach the forbidden items.

Besides, I can't keep all of our clothes, food, and other belongs on high shelves.  It's just not practical.  The only things still out are the things that have to be out.

I am tearing out my hair.  Nothing is working.  This morning I finally resorted to doing something I didn't want to do by putting Noah in his crib after he had a string of misbehaviour.  He screamed, and I didn't care.  I didn't want to do that though, because we have had enough of a struggle getting to where we are with his sleep.  I don't want to make him hate his crib because he keeps getting put in it when he misbehaves.

I'm reaching the end of my rope.  Actually, the past couple of days I am at the end of my rope.  I want to scream.  I want to tear out my hair.  I want to bang my head against the wall.

I want to put Noah in a padded room that has NOTHING in it that he can misbehave with.

WHEN WILL IT END?!?!?!

Be Gentle - Things I Don't Want to Forget

Noah is very good at being "gentle."  He loves to stroke, pet, and hug things (his toys, me, the cats...)  When he's being rough (which isn't very often and never just for the sake of being aggressive), he doesn't respond very well to "Don't hit" or "Don't push", but he responds wonderfully to "Be gentle..."  He will stop whatever he's doing and start petting and stroking what he was being rough with, even if it was a window.

He's been doing this thing for the past month where he looks at me and smacks himself in the head.  It's usually when he's frustrated or knows he was bad.  This really freaked me out at the beginning, but the more I paid attention to it and said "Don't hit yourself!"  the more he kept doing it.

So now, when he hits himself in the head (which now makes me laugh) I say "Ohh, be gentle Noah, be gentle..." And he starts gently rubbing his head instead. 

It slays me.

14 Months Old

Better late than never, right? 


At 14 months old, here is where Noah is at:

-He weighs about 21.5lbs.  He was 22lbs even with his clothes and shoes on, carrying my big pile of keys (I wasn't about to pry them out of his fingers and have a tantrum on my hands in the middle of the doctor's office).  This is just under 50th percentile, according to WHO chart for breastfed babies.

-He is about 32.5 inches tall, 98th percentile, according to WHO chart for breastfed babies.

-He's between the 10th and 25th percentile for weight-for-length, according to the WHO chart for breastfed babies.

-His head measures 19.9 inches around.  Over 100th percentile, according to the WHO chart for breastfed babies.  Massive.  But it's not wide, it's deep, so it doesn't actually look like he has a giant noggin.

-He is just about to move into size 4 diapers 100% of the time.  He still fits size 3 Pampers Cruisers really well, but he is too tall for other size 3 diapers (even though they fit his waist well).

-He still breastfeeds on demand, which is usually around 10 times a day.

-75% of his nutrition still comes from breastfeeding.  He is beginning to want to eat more solids more often.  I let him lead the way.

-He will still eat purees if there are no "solid" solids in sight.  I have a whole bunch of jarred baby food to use up, so I'm still going for it.

-He loves meat and fruit.  They are his favourite.  He also really likes peanut butter sandwiches.  He does not like vegetables anymore.  Sad:(

-He still enjoys a balance of being fed and feeding himself.

-He wears 18 and 24 month clothing, depending on what it is.  Except shorts.  He wears 9 month shorts.  The little skinny-minny.

-He wears size 4 shoes.

-He has 10 teeth.  The front 8 (4 top and 4 bottom), which have been in since he was 8 months old, and now his one year molars on top are poking through his gums a fair bit.  On the bottom his gums are swollen, like he has two marbles under his gums. 

-He's been down to one nap for a month.  This nap is about an hour long, give or take a few minutes.

-He sleeps 11-11.5 hours at night, getting up to nurse once.  I have no idea when he will drop that overnight nursing.

-Did you do the math?  He only sleeps 12-12.5 hours a day.

-Bedtime is still about 8-8:30pm, despite the one nap.  I prefer to start my morning sometime past 7, and if I put him to bed earlier he does wake up earlier.

-He signs to nurse (the sign for milk), for water (waves his hand up and down), and to eat (sticks his finger in his mouth).  Those are the only signs I'm consistent with, otherwise I'm sure he'd sign more.

-He still doesn't say much verbally.  Just Dad, a little bit of Mama, uh oh, that, this...  He just started doing two animal sounds, though.  He says, "Woof woof" when he hears a dog or we ask what a dog says, and he says "Ca Ca" for what a bird says.   He totally started doing both of those on his own, though, imitating the dogs and birds that live around us.  He really is not into copying us verbally, except for those two noises now.

-I am always surprised by how much he understands.  He can follow so many instructions, even multi-step instructions like "Get your shoes so we can go outside!"  He'll run and get his shoes and then go to the door and try to go outside. 

Here are some other examples (by no means a comprehensive list):

*"Do you want to listen to music?"  He'll nod, smile, point to the iPod dock, and start dancing.

*"Do you want to go downstairs?" He'll run to the top of the stairs gate.
*"Are you hungry?" He signs to eat. "Go get in your high chair!"  He'll run over to his high chair and reach up to try and get into it.

*"Can you get Mommy's brush for her?" He will literally go to the bathroom, open the drawer, get out my brush, and bring it to me.

*"No hitting!  Gentle, Noah, gentle..."  He will start gently patting whatever he was being too rough with, be it the cats or my face or his own head. 

*He also can answer "Where's Mommy's nose?" and "Where's Mommy's belly button?" by pointing the the appropriate body part.  He'll even lift up my shirt to find my belly button.  He doesn't point to those things on himself, though.

*On his own body he points out his ears, feet, and hands when asked.

*If we tell him not to do something when we're somewhere other than home, he looks at us very seriously, nods his head, and stops what he's doing.  He also shakes his head no, when appropriate.

-He's a very sweet boy, and very cuddly and kissy.  He loves to hug other babies, our cats, and pictures of animals.

-He loves to get out our swiffers and swiffer all over our floors.  He'll swiffer the carpets, couches, and coffee tables too.  He also imitates me cleaning by rubbing cloths on the floor and tables.

-He loves to play outside.  A little over a month ago he was still not a big fan of it, but now he loves it.  He would spend most of his day outside if he could.  The weather hasn't been very conducive to this, though.

-He got comfortable walking on the grass just before 14 months.  I've mentioned that he is a very careful little guy, so before this it felt too unsteady for him and he would just stand still if we put him on the grass.

-He can open closet doors now, as well as regular doors.  Unwelcome development.

-I can leave the stair gates open without worrying that he will fall down the stairs.  I only use them to confine him to one floor or another, but sometimes I leave them open and he just goes up and down the stairs (without me there) to his heart's content.  He's very careful, and very quick.

-He is a lot more comfortable around strangers, now.  He sticks close to me for a little while, but then gets more adventurous.  He still doesn't smile much at strangers, but he is a lot less scared of them than he used to be.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A typical day in our house is very relaxed.  Noah wakes up between 7 and 8 (usually more like between 7:15 and 7:45).  I get up with him, immediately nurse him (he's usually hungry and disgruntled, so this is the reset button), then change his bum.  Then we go out into the rest of the house and play.  I make myself breakfast at some point.  Sometimes Noah wants some, sometimes he waits until later.  After we have breakfast that's usually when I unload and reload the dishwasher.  Then I get in the shower and get ready for the day. 

Sometimes after my shower we'll have time to go outside before Justin gets home for lunch.  Sometimes not, and sometimes it's just not nice enough weather.  Actually, often it's not nice enough weather.  Sometimes this is when I throw laundry in or do some other chores. 

Justin comes home for lunch from 11:00-11:30, and we hang around with him.  Noah often gets little bites to eat during this time.  Justine leaves, and we play more.  Noah goes down for his nap sometime after 12:30.  He generally stays awake for about 5 hours in the morning.  He always nurses before his nap - always.  (He also nurses whenever he asks for it all day long, but these nursing sessions are not at the same times everyday, which is why I only mention the nursings before or after he wakes up).  He sleeps for an hour, and during this time I try to take time to myself to relax.  I make myself lunch and watch something from the PVR.  The hour goes by quickly.  Noah is always awake before I know it.  He almost always nurses immediately when he wakes up, because he's usually pretty ticked off.  It's just his personality - he's rarely happy right when he wakes up.  After nursing he's good to go.

If we are going to go do anything out of the house, like running errands, this is typically when we do it.  Occasionally I can fit errands in before nap, but I rarely have the motivation to rush around to shower and eat and get ready in time to do errands and then be home for when Justin gets home at 11.  I don't have to be there, but I think it's nice that we can all spend a little bit of time together in the middle of the day, especially since we don't see him in the morning before he goes to work.

For the rest of the afternoon it's always different.  Sometimes chores, sometimes hanging out with Justin if he gets home from work early, sometimes visiting with my Mom or Dad or a friend.  Sometimes just hanging out and doing nothing in particular.  Of course, I make dinner in the evening and clean up the kitchen and dishes immeidately afterward.

I tend to have the most motivation to do chores in the hour before I am supposed to start bedtime routine (I aim to start that at 7:30).  That's when I'll suddenly decide to catch up on laundry, vacuum the entire house, and give Noah a haircut.  And those overly ambitious nights are the nights that Noah doesn't get into bed until 8:30.  I generally aim for 8:00, but I'm often a bit later.

I almost always have my house cleaned up and tidied before I start bathing Noah.  I also wash my own face and brush my teeth before I bathe Noah.  It's just this thing I have.  I need to be ready for bed and need everything to be in its place before Noah goes to bed.  I nurse Noah to sleep every night.  I usually cuddle and nurse him for about 20 minutes... I love holding my sleeping little baby.  I really cherish these times with him, especially since he's already 14 months.  Before I know it he won't be sleeping in my arms again - ever.

(I want to clarify that although I do nurse Noah to sleep, he can put himself to sleep, and he does that on a regular basis. If he doesn't show signs of falling asleep in the first 10-15 minutes of nursing, he goes in his crib awake, and is usually asleep within about 5 minutes).

After I put him in his crib, I do whatever little things need to be done, like finishing cleaning up the bathroom after his bath, or put away the things he threw around the house as I was wrangling him into the bathtub.  Then I collapse on my bed and watch TV.  Justin is usually around by then, with no more clients to train, so we hang out and watch TV until I feel tired enough to sleep.


So that's my day!  Sounds nice, doesn't it?  I love spending all my time with Noah, cooking, cleaning, and playing.  It's not amazing every single day, but it's pretty darn close:)

Opening Doors

A few days ago, at 12 months 3 weeks old, Noah learned just exactly how to use door handles to open doors in order to gain access to restricted areas.

This was not a welcome development in our household. 

He now reaches up, pulls the door handle down, and waltzes right into the rooms he is not allowed in.  I pick him up, close the door, and take him across the house, and he proceeds to walk right back over, open the door, and enter the same room.  Over and over.

We have the lever handles on our doors, and the baby proofing things for those types are doorknobs are very hard to come by.  So we are going to have to baby gate the upstairs hallway.  Except that I can't find the kind of babygate I want.  We have another extra tall walk-through gate that's still in the box, but I hate that gate.  We have one at the bottom of our stairs.  It's too tall, it's hard to carry a laundry basket over, the door of it is so skinny and it swings shut instead of staying open.  I don't want to have to maneuver my vacuum and deal with that beast.  That would lead to less vacuuming.  I would much rather use a regular pressure mounted gate that you can put up and take down all day long if you want to.  We have one of those, and I actually love it.  It's from when my husband was a baby, and it's so easy to use.  But we use it when we're downstairs so Noah doesn't get into all of those bedrooms and bathrooms and the laundry room/litterbox room.  All of the other gates that seem similar have really bad reviews.  Erin has one and we have never been able to figure the stupid thing out, so it's never securely attached to the wall.

Honestly, I didn't think my 12 month old would be walking through closed doors.  Seems a tad early to have to deal with that.

11 Months Old

I don't think I've ever been so late with a monthly update.  Noah turned 11 months over a week ago, so I'm going to keep these updates restricted to those things he was doing at that time.  Some things have changed quite a bit in this past week.

At 11 months old, here is where Noah is at:

-He weighs 20lbs 9oz totally naked, but after a lot of nursings.  That's about 25th percentile.

-He is 31.5 inches long, about 100th percentile.

-He is less than 5th percentile for weight for height (he has tall, slim parents - he can't help it).

-He wears size 3 diapers during the day, and size 4 diapers at night.

-He wears 18 month clothing. His sleepers, onesies, and shirts fit perfectly, maybe a little on the small side.  His 18 month pants are a perfect length.

-He has 8 teeth, the four top and four bottom.

-He started signing 'nurse' at 10.5 months, and ever since then we've been nursing much more than every 2 hours.  He often wants to nurse again 5 minutes after we just finished.

-He still has just one formal "meal" of solids - mostly purees - at dinnertime.  The rest of the day he snacks on various things, usually what I'm eating.  He's still about 90% breastfed, with solids making up the other 10%.

-He goes to bed at about 7pm, sleeps until past 4am, nurses, and goes back to sleep again until about 7am, give or take.  (This has changed since a couple of days after he turned 11 months... that post is still to come.)

-He has two naps a day, ranging from 30 minutes to an hour.  The first nap is about 3 - 3.5 hours after he wakes up (he can make it to 4 pretty easily), and the second nap is 3.5 - 4 hours after he wakes up from his first nap.

-He is totally done with the soother, now.  I take very little credit for this, although I recognize that my actions inadvertently got him to this point.  He always needed it when he was being rocked to sleep.  Then we had a few weeks where he was either nursed to sleep or put in his crib awake.  I would give him his soother when I put him in his crib awake, but he never fell asleep using it.  So after seeing if he still wanted it on several different occasions, I have come to the conclusion that he is definitely over it.  It holds no appeal for him anymore.

-He's getting better at the sippy cup.  Sometimes he'll drink a couple of ounces of water out of it in one sitting.  He likes water now.

-He stands alone, takes a few independent steps (this was just an occasional thing still when he turned 11 months), cruises really well, speed crawls, and climbs.

-He loves to throw balls, play with his baseball bats, score points on his basketball hoop, and practice stick handling with his mini-sticks and hockey puck.  His athlete father is so proud :) 

-He's become extremely cuddly lately, often hugging us and laying his head down on our shoulders, draping himself over us, ect.  He'll even fall asleep sometimes with his head laying on my shoulder, which he hadn't done since he was about 2 months old.

-He loves to give Mommy kisses (sometimes Dad gets one).  He gives me probably a hundred open mouth slobber kisses each day.  Sometimes he just seems overwhelmed with the need to kiss me.  It's adorable.

-He's still a big mommy suck.  He's getting a bit friendlier with other people (smiling, making faces, giggling), but will freak out if I start to walk away. 

-He still has horrifyingly awful separation anxiety.  He still can't handle if I'm not in his sight when we're at home, so I have to plan chores and things carefully.  I can't even go to the bathroom without him.

-He just started doing this hilarious scrunchy face, sometimes doing it with a closed, pursed mouth, other times "showing off" his front teeth.  He breathes really fast in and out of his nose when he does it.  It's hilarious.

-He just started to lounge on the floor like a lazy toddler.  Not for long periods of time, but before this he would never ever sit still or lay down during the day, but now he'll sometimes lay his cheek on the floor, or recline on some pillows in front of the TV (terrible... I blame Dad).

-It's always hard to know exactly how much an 11 month old understands, but we know for sure he knows the meanings of: Mom, Dad, nurse, up, night-night, hug, kiss, no, this, book, "say hi," and "say bye".  He demonstrates understanding of those words through his actions.  I'm guessing he knows a lot more, but I can't tell.

-He just started saying "Uh oh," but its often more of an "Uh uhhh" or an "Oooh oooh." Sometimes he does "Uh uh uh ohh." He mostly does this after he drops something and we say "Uh oh."

-He says "Dis," "Dat," "Mamamama," and "Dad" or "Dada".  It seems like he says all these things in the right settings, but he also uses them at other times, so I don't know if he's really using them as words or just sounds.

-He loves to "read." He pulls out his books and sits and flips through the pages. His two teacher parents are thrilled:)

-We have this book called Who Do You See, and after "I see a bee" I say "buzzz" and he ALWAYS says "zzzzzzzz" as he strokes the bee.  After "I see a lion" I say "Rooaaar!" and he sometimes gently goes "Raaaaa."


I'm sure there is much, much more I could say, but I am already 9 days late with this post.  I am just going to finish it before I waste another day ruminating about it. 

But, as a last thing, I have to say, Noah is becoming hilarious.  His toddler personality that is beginning to emerge (although I still think 1 year olds are babies) cracks me up.  I seriously could not love him any more.  He is the most amazing thing that has ever happened to me, and I am incredibly, deeply grateful for him every second of every day!

"Put the Ball in the Hole..."

(Noah is 9 months, 1 week, and 5 days old)

Today we were visiting my parents, and my cousins with Ottawa were over.  We haven't seen each other since my brother got married 7 1/2 months ago, so Noah is obviously very different than he was back at 8 weeks old!  Their son Tyus is Noah's second cousin.  He loved Noah, and Noah loved him.

My parents have tons of toys, and one toy they've gotten since Noah was born is this thing that looks like a tree house.  It has 4 balls that come with it, various places to stick the balls in, and two discs that spin around at the bottom when you press a button or the balls go through the "paths" to the discs (I hope I'm describing this toy so you can kind of picture it).  Noah has always loved this toy.  Pretty much right when they got it back when he was 5 or 6 months he understood that if he pressed the big red button the balls would spin around on the disc, music would play, and it would make a bunch of racket.  Us adults would sometimes put the balls in the hole at the top, but Noah wasn't really ready to purposefully put a ball through a hole, so we haven't pushed it.

Today Tyus was playing with Noah with this toy.  Noah was holding one of the balls and banging on the toy.  Tyus took another ball and said "Take the ball and put it in the hole, Noah," while showing him.

A light bulb clicked on in Noah's head, and he suddenly was picking the ball up and putting it through the hole over and over again.  He would watch the ball spin around on the discs, then when it stopped he would pick the ball up and put it through the hole again.

It was SO cool to see him make that cognitive connection.  He obviously has been understanding cause and effect for a long time.  But to know that if he puts this ball through this hole, things will happen is different from knowing that if he presses this button things will happen.

I was so impressed.  So was Justin.  Then we laughed, because we know that in a month Noah will probably be doing stuff like that all the time and we'll look back on how amazed we were the first time he did it and laugh at ourselves.  Just like we laugh at ourselves when we think back to our reactions the first time he rolled over, sat unassisted, pushed up on his hands and knees, or pulled up to stand.  Everything becomes so "normal."  And that is why I'm so happy to have this blog, where I record all of these "silly" little moments.  I get to look back and remember how monumental Noah's life really has been for me.

He's a pretty rad kid.