Monday: change of plans

Today's activities ended up being completely different than I expected when I woke up this morning.  We ended up spending the morning with Abby and her daughters...first going out for breakfast and then playing at the park.  It was hot out!  It was still mid-morning when we were at the park, but we were drenched in sweat.  The kids probably would have happily played longer, but the mothers said it was too hot.  (As a side note, the high today was 100 degrees and probably felt warmer.  It's currently 10:30 pm and 85 degrees but feels like 90 degrees.)

Then this afternoon my aunts unexpectedly stopped by!  It was lovely to see them.  Isaac was just waking up so it took him a little bit to warm up to them, but by the end he was laughing at Aunt C and "talking" to them.   At the beginning I had given him some puffs to help him wake up.  Aunt C gave one to Aunt Sue on the other side of the room and Isaac immediately got off the couch and retrieved it.  She was not allowed to have his puffs!

Saturday: unexpected results

So we ended up with some unexpected results with potty training.  After some early successes he didn't continue the trend.  But I did discover that Isaac is more than willing to sit and read while on the toilet.  Since I've been having problems getting him to read while in the chair in his bedroom, I think we're going to have reading time on the toilet for a while.  And if he happens to do his business...that's even better.

Friday: pool, food

We went to the pool with Betsy and Ethan again today. Isaac walked in the pool up to his armpits! And he probably spent about half the time in the pool...a significant improvement from before.

At dinner Isaac started to throw his food. The immediate response to this is to remove all his food. Except he only had his vegetables left...so this may not have been the punishment that I was going for. He did get a little mad though, so I may have lucked
out.

Thursday: puzzling

A few days ago I decided to get out a puzzle.  I'm not really sure what I was thinking...it's not an easy puzzle and I have a toddler!  But it's worked out a lot better than I expected.  We've done a lot of puzzling together; he'll do his puzzle and I'll do mine.  Once in a while I'll let him sit on my lap while I'm working on mine and he keeps trying to move my arm and tell me that I'm not putting the pieces together fast enough. Mine isn't as easy as his!

Wednesday: 18 month appointment

Today was Isaac's 18 month appointment.  He's doing well and there's nothing that we need to be concerned about.  He's weighing in at 23 lb 1 oz (33%), and is 31.75" (17%) long.  He got two shots and didn't cry!  For that, he got his first sucker.  Luckily the nurse gave us a clear one (coconut flavored or something) because Isaac did get it all over himself.  He also had some blood drawn.  He cried a little bit for that, but probably because we were holding him so that he couldn't move.  The crying didn't start until about 30 seconds after the needle was put in.

On the potty training front, there was some more success today so we'll try again tomorrow.  I didn't work it too hard in the afternoon/evening due to the doctor's appointment.

Tuesday: potty training, day 1

Well, I thought we'd try potty training this week.  There were several reasons that I thought this might be a good week; if things seem to work I'll go into why.  Today didn't go great, but we did have some success.  I'll give it another day or two and see how things are going and whether I want to continue trying right now.

Isaac has also decided that Flurry makes a good pillow.  She was actually purring on the bed when he was using her as a pillow.  Then later in the afternoon Isaac followed her around and tried to lean over and lay on her.  That didn't work quite as well.

He did wear pants for part of the day...

In other other news Ben and I have noticed a lot of new things that he can do over the last day or so.  It was pretty cool to compare notes tonight.

Monday: 18 months

Before we went on vacation, I took Isaac's 18 month photos.  This month I asked him to stand in front of the quilt for pictures and he did!!

Sleep has gotten better than last month.  He sometimes has been talking himself to sleep, but hasn't needed as much help again.  Naps are still a little bit of an issue, but he still goes down at some point during the day.

His vocabulary has exploded during the last week.  Still not a ton of actual nouns, although he did add ball, but he also can meow, neigh, moo, beep, whee, and say amen.  Amen is only one syllable and really funny. He's been noticing a lot of sounds in the environment.  When he hears a train or a car beep he'll beep and say woof when he hears a dog.

I'm not sure what else to talk about with regards to being 18 months.  He still plays well by himself, although he often prefers to play with us.

Isaac laughs easily and has great faces.  He hasn't enjoyed reading as much this month.  Curious George is still a favorite.

He's been waking up still between about 6:15 and 6:45 most mornings pretty happily.  He often hands me all of his stuffed animals to get out of the crib first.