Ant diary: Sixteen months

Talking: Well, I stopped tracking words this month; I could have kept it up a bit longer I suppose, but it was getting hard to know which words Ant was just repeating vs. which ones he really knows. Although now for the most part anything he repeats he often will use again in the right context very quickly. The two major changes this month were starting to call us "daddy" and "mommy" instead of "dada" and "mama", and saying "S"s properly (F has now also been replaced with S in a lot of cases, so 'fan', which used to be "han", is now "san". And washing machine has gone from "heen" to "sheen". Some of my favorite words this month have been that Santa says "ho ho ho", mixer (maser), beater (beatah), food processor (pasah), oregano!, climbing, coaster (coaser), flashing (hashi), bannister (bansa), and thermometer (mahtah). He's got almost all the animal sounds now, and when we tell him a new one he picks it up quite quickly. He w as also walking around saying "ay BEE see" for a few days. Occasionally "dee" was thrown in there as well, but mostly it was just abc. Couldn't ever figure out what the trigger for that was, it seemed to be quite random. Finally, he's just starting to put together three word phrases - the other day he said "mommy's car keys", Mark's dad says that Ant said "papa hold bansta", and there have been a few other things that pop out from time to time. He's also started using "it" - as in 'open it' (open-ah), 'dropped it' (dop it), 'find it' (hind it). Okay not quite finally - he's also started saying more and more when we read his books with him. The Elmo lift the flaps book is really cute, he'll say "Oh no!" which is what Elmo says when he can't find his blanket, as well as "hewwo" for the lady talking on the phone, "sinky" (stinky) for the lady holding her nose in the car with Oscar, "dump" for the dump truck, and "cuckoo" for the clock.

Movement: Not too much new here. We've seen lots of walking on tiptoes in the last week or so, which is quite cute. Also he twists his hand back and forth, and says "tatah" (as in the agitator in the washing machine), both when we're down looking at the machine, as well as just randomly. He also has started doing that for the 'wheels on the bus' song.

Mental: One of the things that really astonished me this month was that Ant seems to have memorized at least one of his books. We have the Boynton book "moo ba lalala", and after he learned some of the animal sounds, I started reading to him, leaving spaces for him to fill in the sounds. He got the first two no problem; "A cow says Moo, a sheep says Ba". With no added prompting, he then contined filling them in: "Three singing pigs say La la la"... "little dogs say Ruff Ruff Ruff", "Some other dogs say Bow Wow Wow". He mostly says that dogs say 'woof', so the fact that he filled in the ruff and bow wow, was amazing! Another fun discovery was that one day he was holding the triple paste which goes on his bum, and said "paysht....bum!" again with no prompting whatsoever. He's also started calling himself a baby when he sees pictures or himself in the mirror - although at Mom and Roy's house the other day he pointed to the pictures o f himself and said what I thought sounded very much like Antony. The last big change this month is that he finally seemed to start paying attention to the music playing in the car. We've been having his kids CDs on for a long time, but this was the first month he gave any indication he was listening - after each song ended, at first, he would say "mowah, mowah!". I would respond "more coming, more coming". Now, at the end of each song, he says "coming!". And was incredibly angry when I tried to take him out of the car when we got home the last two nights. I have never ever seen him so upset before! He and Sami seem very enamoured of each other, talking about each other all the time. And they were so excited at Christmas to see the other again, and are really starting to play well, almost together. (The absolute best was when they gave each other a mutual, unprompted hug).

Toys and games: Bowls, pots, pans, thermometers, spoons, wisks were the big favorite this month. Taking them out of the cupboards and putting them into the living room; stacking and unstacking them, and mixing inside them. Also very very happy with the trucks, cars and trains he got for Christmas. As well as the coaster from Mom and Roy! He also is drawing a little bit, and mostly just on the paper. Right handed.

Teeth: Nothing to report.

Feeding: Ant has become a bit more fussy as far as feeding goes. Doesn't seem to like chunks (and spits them out immediately). The beans in minestrone, for example - no way! If I put them through the food processor they go down just fine, so perhaps he has my texture issues. I kinda hope not! He went through a few days of eating very very little, during and after a stomach bug he had, but seems to mostly have improved.

Sleeping: We're mostly on one nap these days, although still two on occasion, especially when he gets up early. We have had a number of days where wake up time has been closer to 7 than 6, which is nice!

Daycare: We went for a transition visit this past week, spent 1.5 hours there. Ant seemed to enjoy himself, particularly liking the windows that let him see into the rooms next door, with the infants and older toddlers. He was saying "hi" to them quite a bit. He also sat at the table with the other kids and had a snack while they had lunch; I was a bit nervous that he wouldn't sit still for long as we're still strapping him into the high chair for meals at home. He starts for real next Thursday.