FroMan's Journal: [parenting] 18 months

The last month and half has been pretty exciting with the little guy. He has been learning so many new things, some good and others are a bit naughty. It is great to see him playing new games and have fun each day.

One of his new games is to roll a ball back and forth. I am trying to get him to learn that daddy and mommy refer to people. So I will roll the ball to him and when he is about to roll it back say, "Roll the ball to daddy!" I haven't gotten mommy to play the game with him, but hopefully I'll get her to sit down with him and do that for a while. Hopefully while playing these games we'll help him figure out a number of words.

A couple weeks a really icky illness hit both the little guy and my wife. They could barely hold anything down and what they could came out the other end shortly afterwards taking the express route. I took a couple half days at work to help nurse them back to health. The little guy lost about 3/4 to 1 pound during that time though.

He was really picky eating after he started feeling better though. The day he started being able to hold things down about all he would eat was chocolate chip cookies. He would just scream and holler at us if we even tried to set him in his high chair or tried to give him anything else. But since he lost so much weight and was drained in energy we let him have his way that day. It was probably about 3 days before we had him eating normal meals.

He is learning a number of ways to communicate with us, some of which do not require crying or yelling. We have a bag of crackers and other munchies which we leave on the table. He will now bring that or his sippy cup when he gets hungry and set it in our hands or at our feet. We'll then get him something to eat or drink. He knows where we keep his videos and will go turn on the TV or start reaching up for the videos if he wants to watch one.

This last weekend we had a picnic after church down at a park. He thought this was great. He would run around like a little wild man exploring. He also got to spend a fair bit of time on the playground. He did get a little bit red from the sun, but he isn't doing too bad. We put some lotion on his arms afterwards and that seemed to help him cope a little better.

The list:

1. Sand is cool. Tough to walk in.

2. Rumor weeds are funny. Desparados are scary and should come to their senses.

3. Clackity clack clack clack goes the clacker. And then it clacks some more.

4. Petting cats is for chumps. Grabbing cats is for men! Chumps spend more time with cats.

5. It is funny to shut daddy into a room. No so funny when daddy shuts himself into a room.

6. Sometimes daddy praying at night is funny.

7. Book spines are weak and must be punished for their frailty.

8. Toys are exciting when thumping and rolling down the stairs.

9. Late to bed and early to rise makes mommy and daddy with bleary eyes.

10. Who knew that sippy techonology would ever advance in your child's lifetime? Old and Busted meet New Hotness which doesn't leek like a sieve.