April Update - 24 Months

They say that time goes by fast when you have a baby and truly it does! Hard to believe that this past week we celebrated Liam's second birthday, he really is a little boy now. On Tuesday 21st, we dropped him off at daycare with cupcakes for all the kids and they made him a "Liam is 2 today" hat. We celebrated with a big pasta dinner (since "noodles" as Liam likes to call it) is his favourite and ice-cream cake which resulted in him zinging around the house until 10pm. Granny, Grandpa and Aunty Caylin spoiled him with a fire truck, dinosaur fork & spoon and a proper wheel barrow for the garden, while Aunty Jo bought him a ton of Thomas the Tank Engine stuff including train sets and acd which he went nuts for. Now when we're in the car we sing Thomas all the way to work. From Mommy & Daddy Liam got an outdoor climber and slide and a 6 kid Thomas tent which he had a great time in since he LOVES Thomas and LOVES tents.

The following Saturday was his birthday party and the theme was fire engines. We decorated the house and deck with red & yellow streamers, balloons and banners and put all sorts of riding toys, slide and the Thomas tent (also filled with balloons) out on the deck so the parents could enjoy drinks while the kids ran around and burned off some toddler energy. The weather turned out to be nice so everyone stayed outdoors and the kids had a ball. When it was time to sing "Happy Birthday", the kids crowded around the table oggling the cake while Liam's buddy Kai started picking off the smarties off and eating them. By then Liam had caught on to "blowing out the fire" and blew hard at the candles (with a little help from Gabby). There was total silence while the kids devoured their pieces of cake and then it was gift opening time. Liam got thoroughly spoiled with lot of reading and sticker activity books, a kite, a train whistle and more! That should keep him going for at least a few weeks.

Liam is talking like a two and a half to three year old in long sentences, his average is about 5-7 words long. It's amazing to hear him express himself or join in a conversation in his adorable hight pitched little voice. He'll say things like "I want to have that piece of cake" and is really into his "please's" and "thank you's". If you ask him to say please he says "PLEEEEEAAAASEEEE" really loud. It gets him what he wants most of the time, although he tends to know it and will say please if he wants something he shouldn't have. Then I feel guilty for not giving it to him when he's been so polite! He is also really into his singing, especially with nursery rhymes and Thomas, we'll hear him singing random exerpts from various songs and will join in like an off tune choir. I don't think I've sung songs on such a consistent basis since my school days. It's a great stress reliever (except when an encore is requested ten times for "Happy Birthday"). When we drive to work in the morning we have to play the Thomas CD and if it's not loud enough or we start talking Liam will say "louder" until the volume is to his satisfaction. 25 mins of Thomas every morning and every afternoon. No wonder I can't get the theme song out of my head!

This month we said a sad goodbye to our daycare lady Emily and Liam started his new daycare downtown. The first couple of weeks went fantastically as he was so stimulated by his new environment but now we are going through the "novelty is over, I'm going to scream my head off if you leave me" phase. Fortunately dropping off is Daddy's job so he has to deal with the trauma while I get to do pick up at the end of the day. Apparently it only lasts for a few minutes but it doesn't do much to calm Daddy's nerves. Since I did it for a year with Emily, I figure Daddy is due. Hopefully we'll get out of this phase soon for his sake and sanity!

This has been a busy month of celebrations with Liam's birthday and also Easter. Easter morning we heard a knock on the door and we we opened it there was an empty basket and a trail of eggs leading up the stairs to Gabby & Papa and Aunty Caylin's house. Since Liam had been exposed to chocolate "eggies" (as he likes to call them) from his outdoor Easter egg hunt with the daycare at the parliament buildings a few days before, he was ready & willing to pick up the eggs and stash them in his basket (at the same time requesting to eat them!). By the time all the eggs had been found his face was covered in chocolate and he was zinging around the living room. I think chocolate is by far his favourite food, he just LOVES the stuff! I can see Easter as being top on the favourite holiday list in the future.

Aunty Caylin is a HUGE Twilight fan and so Gabby & Papa took her & a friend to Forks, Washington (where the movie was filmed) for a weekend getaway. Along with the Twilight paraphanalia, they picked up the most adorable fireman rain jacket for Liam who wears it constantly. He loves anything to do with clips and straps of which the rain jacket has three so it kept him occupied for quite a while. Bonus - a jacket that entertains!

March Update - 23 Months

This has been the month of big changes. I have survived my first month of being back at work 9-5 and Liam has survived his first month of full-time daycare. All in all it has been a big success. Not only do I love being back to a more normal schedule but Liam is loving his time at Emily's and has an absolute ball. He doesn't enjoy getting up early (like his Mommy) but still wants to go to bed really late. Hopefully this will change at some point as it would be nice to have some time to ourselves in the evenings, but since he consistently sleeps through the night I guess I can't complain too much!

I know I keep on saying every month how Liam is talking so much more and how his vocabularly is leaping and bounding, but we have really noticed a BIG difference this month, especially in the last couple of weeks. He is talking like a 2.5 year old with his average sentence being 5-7 words long. He says things like "I don't want my pants on" and " I don't like the cheese" or "I want the yellow playdough". When Ian tries to wake him up in the morning he'll say "go away Daddy, I'm still sleeping". It's just adorable hearing all the funny things he comes up with. he can now say the entire alphabet and count to twenty without a hitch. I've been teaching him how to spell his name and simple words like "cat", I bought him some alphabet letters that stick to the walls of the bathtub so we spell while he's having a bath. he totally loves them. We've also been learning how to count to thirty. At this rate he'll be reading by the time he's three.

Potty training has become a challenge as Liam is interested in the toilet and talking about pee and poo, but still won't do anything when he sits on his seat. He does however enjoy taking off his diaper and throwing it onto the ground saying "I don't want my diaper on, take it off". I had draw the line when he made a number two and then proceeded to rip off his diaper and chuck it. That was not fun cleaning up! While Ian grabbed our brown child and madly scrambled for the shower, I scrubbed our beige carpet ten times over. Potty training when you have a beige carpet is not the best combination.

Liam has fallen in love with Thomas the Tank Engine, mostly due to the Thomas toys his buddy Easton has at daycare. We have gone off Noddy at bedtime and are now reading Thomas books. We also got him a Thomas train that sings the theme song and a Thomas set from the toy library. I can see the dollar signs flashing before my eyes. Thomas is a very expensive hobby! Good thing Thomas train tracks are compatible with oh so much cheaper IKEA train tracks. Bonus!

I have started party planning for Liam's second birthday which will be a Fire Engine theme. I ordered invitations and supplies from a store upisland that had all fire engine type paraphanalia so we will be set when the big day arrives! As an early birthday present (and due to a 50% off sale), we got Liam's first present which was a tiny tykes climber and slide. He went nuts over it and did about twenty slides in a row! Good for burning some late night energy. We have given up on trying to get him to bed early, he simply will not do it. Only problem is that he's super tired after daycare and gets really really cranky so it's a few hours of screaming and crying before he finally calms down and goes to sleep. Makes for a bit of a frazzled evening for us but what can you do! Napping on the weekends has also gone out the window. While nap time at Emily's is a total breeze, we have to go for a drive to get him to conk out. Then one person does shopping or errands and the other drives around in circles for an hour and a half. Bye bye free time!

So this is Liam's last month of being a one year old and we are definitely entering the phase of the terrible two's. It's like a switch suddenly flips and your sweet & innocent child is replaced by a Tasmanian Devil. Liam has a fiercly independent streak and will do the complete opposite of what you want him to. There is no way to reason with him and bribery does not always seem to work unless it involves chocolate. He loves chocolate! Almost as much as he loves saying NO! If he gets mad enough he lies on the ground and screams his head off or drags his feet so we both have to hold onto him to walk. Looks rather interesting when you're on a busy road. On the flip side he is a very funny little boy and says things that make us just howl. Plus he loves to dance and will turn into the boogie king when music comes on that he likes. Yes life is a constant up and down roller coaster but it's all worth it when Liam comes to me, gives me a big wet kiss and says "I love you Mommy"!

February Update - 22 Months

I am enjoying my last month as daytime Mommy - I accepted a position with my company at one of our sister recreation centres as supervisor of the staff starting March 1st. Liam will be going to Emily full-time for March and then starts at his new daycare April 1st. Lots of transitioning for him (and for me) so hopefully it will go ok! I'd be lying if I said I wasn't just a tad anxious about the whole thing but I know often times it's harder on the parent than the child, especially when I've been with Liam every day for almost two years. I won't miss the late nights and exhaustion though and Ian is super excited about having me home in the evening and on weekends. All in all it will be a very positive change for our family.

Liam is taking off again in the vocabulary department and is really starting to put together his sentences, mostly 3-4 words at a time. Some things he may say is "no like that", " where's my sucky"or "Daddy is funny". We have been reading longer books at bedtime including Noddy which is his favourite (same as Mommy). The drone of my voice seems to put both Ian and Liam to sleep, usually after about 10 mins Ian will start snoring. Liam has almost mastered the alphabet, missing only a few letters here and there and recognizes all the letters thanks to the help of the alphabet book I've been reading him and his new wooden puzzle. He is also almost at 20 in the number department, impressive for a not quite 2 year old. Shapes have progressed from squares and ovals to crescents and octagons and colours now include black, white and purple.

We have noticed more interest in the potty world but Liam seems to think of his expensive singing potty as more of a toy than a place to deposit so I gave in and got him an inexpensive "fit on the toilet seat" potty seat that he has far more interest in. Go figure. One afternoon after I sat him on it he said "bye-bye Mommy" and made me walk out of the bathroom so he could have some privacy. So I sat behind the wall and listened to him singing songs for about 10 minutes before I came back in and was promptly told to leave again. Gotta love the independent streak.

Liam's love of wheels has expanded to include garbage & recycling trucks and there is the beginnings of interest in trains. We went to the beach one day to play at the park and see the ocean, another interest. Thinking I was clever, I dressed Liam up in his waterproof Elmo suit, thick socks and boots and let him splash at the edge of the ocean. Sure enough after about a minute of splashing, he decided to wade further out to see how deep he coud go and lost his balance, falling right into the water on his bum. Ice cold ocean water seeped into his pants and down inside his boots, absolutely soaking him. This prompted screaming and a quick as a flash change into warm dry clothes. Mental note to self, buy a wet suit or wrap him up in plastic before attempting ocean exploration again. It's just not the same as the Caribbean. Luckily Mr. Miserable was instantly distracted when a giant recycling truck showed up the parking lot. Forget the playground or the ocean, hello big truck! The truck driver was super nice and let Liam sit in the driver's seat, the look on his face was priceless! The grin was like the Cheshire Cat, ear to ear. We spent about 45 minutes hanging out before a second truck arrived. It was recycling truck heaven. Liam was most upset when we had to leave and screamed harder than the ocean incident. Such is life!

January Update - 21 Months

2009 has started with another nasty round of the flu bug. This past week we took an overnight trip to Vancouver to watch a hockey game - Liam had been coughing slightly with a runny nose which took a sudden downturn to violent coughing coupled with vomiting. On our ferry trip home he decided to upchuck all over the cafeteria and Ian’s work outfit. While Ian tried to calm him down I grabbed napkins and starting wiping his shoes and the floor – definitely not the highlight of my day. To top it all off he went for round two and barfed all over his car seat while we were driving off the boat. This upset him so much he screamed for 15 minutes and then promptly passed out only to be woken up 20 minutes later to go to the doctor’s office. At this point I was feeling immensely frazzled and Ian had to go back to work so I was left to deal with my screaming, vomit covered child wrapped in a blanket outside the clinic. The doctor felt so sorry for me that I got in to see him right away and it turns out that Liam has a double ear infection and fluid on his lungs so he’s on antibiotics for a week three times a day. Poor little bugger. After getting his prescription at the pharmacy (where Liam got mad at the bubble bath bottles and smashed one on the floor) we finally made it home, drugs and broken bubble bath bottle in hand. What a week!

In some ways things are so much easier now and in others so much harder. Taking Liam to grocery stores or other places of the shopping kind is always a challenge. We have become the type of parents that bribe in order to keep him happy – to the point now that he knows that a grocery store trip equals a cookie. Recently he’s taken to pushing around the kids sized shopping carts which keep him occupied – only problem is that he is still learning to steer and prefers to crash into the sides of the aisles taking out products along the way. Typically you’ll find myself running around after beans and his tiny cart picking up items off the floor while Ian madly grabs things we need. Eventually we’ll learn to have one person go out and do the shopping.

We have been teaching Liam to say his name – at first he would say “Nemo” if you asked him what his name was, but over the course of the month he is now saying “Neeman”. “L’s” and “R’s” are the hardest syllables for him to say so it’s a good thing we didn’t name him Larry or Leroy. His communication skills are amazing and it is so nice to be able to ask him a question and for him to answer back. He consistently speaks in 3 to 4 word sentences and a couple of days ago said “no thank you” when I offered him a snack – what a polite little man! Well polite to Mommy anyway – Daddy tried to get his hair cut a few weeks ago and when the hairdresser came towards him with the scissors he pointed his finger at her and said “don’t!”. Most of the time I can understand what he is saying to me, and if I don’t I’ll ask him to show me which helps. Sometimes the things he comes up with are too funny – the other day Daddy was talking to him and apparently he wasn’t in the mood for listening as he suddenly interrupted him and said “too loud Daddy”. Another time we were walking down our street and he was going up and down the neighbourhood driveways saying “up goes Boo Boo” and “down goes Boo Boo”. Yelling is a favourite and he likes to yell “mooooommmmmm” and “mommmyeeeeeee”. Daddy gets the yell too. The funniest thing is to hear him yell out when he counts – he starts quietly at one and by the time he gets to six he yells out at the top of his voice – “six!!seven!!eight!!” - makes me laugh! Other words that are cute are “abudah” for ambulance and “helicopet” for helicopter.

In word world we have been working on letters and Liam can recite almost the entire alphabet – gets stumped on “LMNOP” and “QRSTUV” but otherwise can say all the other letters. He also recognizes almost all the letters when you point to them and will say them out loud. I think his magnetic fridge phonics have also been helpful as he plugs a letter into the phonics base and a voice says the letter and how to say the sound. This coupled with the animal farm phonics and it’s enough to drive you batty. Not only that but Liam is in full throwing mode lately and everything gets chucked everywhere. Once again I spend more time with my face close to the ground than not. If you’re back doesn’t give out carrying your heavy bundle around everywhere for the first year, the constant picking up of tiny objects will get you.

Now that Liam is older we have decided to start looking at going back to the regular 9-5 Mon to Fri work schedule and have some semblance of normality back in our lives. We accepted a spot starting in April in the toddler program of a really nice daycare that has a wonderful arts program and lots of great activities for the kids. Liam’s big brain would definitely be stimulated all day and Mommy & Daddy would be happier with evenings and weekends off together. So I’m putting out my feelers and we’ll see how my work situation goes.

Since my New Years resolution was to “preserve our memories” I have been working away like mad and so far managed this month to create 3 albums of our recent vacations as well as a first birthday book for Liam. My biggest project is his storybook which will take me all of February to complete. In addition we finally got to see our professional photos from our shoot back in November which are amazing. I’ll be dropping some big bucks for the prints for sure! The goal is to have all of the albums, storybook, photos and baby book done by April 1st – no pressure! Now if only I could find time…….

December Update - 20 Months

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone!

We were lucky enough to have a white Christmas this year - the week before it started to snow and ended up being more than a foot over a few days. The temperature has mostly stayed below freezing and our street looks very pretty with all the Christmas lights and snow men on the front lawns, exactly what I picture a Canadian Christmas to be like. We took Liam out a few times but he did not seem to be overly enamored with the snow and mostly cried - the only place he would walk was the path way that Ian shovelled, other than that he would fall in the snow and cry until we took him back inside. We did manage to get some nice photos in the short period of time he did go out and inbetween cry sessions. We also tried skating for the first time at a children's Christmas party held by Grannys company - he seemed interested the first few laps and then had a meltdown - mostly because his giant Elmo bike helmet was covering his eyes. He definitely enjoys eating icy things more than he does playing with icy things.

Christmas morning we woke up, had our coffee and milk and headed upstairs to unwrap our gifts with the rest of the family. Liam got thoroughly spoiled and was entertained for hours with his new tow truck, yellow Tonka dump truck, yellow school bus, African animal drum set, animal farm and books to name a few. We saved his big present for last; a singing Elmo tricycle - he totally loved it! We hid it in my parents bedroom and brought it out with a big red bow on it. His face just lit up and he went straight for it. As soon as he sat on it he wanted to go "fast" and would yell out "fast!" up and down the passage. It was great! Ian and I both got spoiled too but it is so wonderful to watch your child's excitement when they open their presents. Granny got Liam practicing on how to unwrap presents by putting cookies in gift wrap for him to open. By the time he got to his real presents he was a pro! After presents we had a late brunch and then turkey dinner -yum! All in all a very relaxing day.

Our month started out with another bout of the flu - both Liam and I got quite ill but Liam ended up getting gastroenteritis (viral stomach bug) and after a nasty vomiting episode and 7 diarrhea diapers, we took him into the hospital to be assessed. He was a bit dehydrated but otherwise ok. We had to wait for 2.5 hours to see a doctor which was immensely challenging - although Liam was sick he was still active enough to not want to stay in the waiting room and so he proceeded to take off down the hallways in his Elmo pajamas and white socks while holding pedialyte popsicles that the nurse gave us to get him hydrated. By the time we left he had collected goodness knows what from the hospital floors and had a face covered in various popsicle colours - he ate 3 of them while we waited. The nurse was really nice and did his best to keep him occupied with gadgets - Liam particularly liked the ear thermometer. Most of the other patients were older so Liam was definitely the minority but old folks loved him and didn't seem to mind his outbursts when we tried to keep him contained. Good thing too - the kid has lung! A few days after the hospital visit he had another vomiting episode and while he was in the bath told us his tummy was "tight" and then said "poo" after which he shot diarrhea into the bath water. That was fun to clean up. It seems that his system was doing it's final clean up since he has been healthy & happy again. Till the next flu bug hits of course. Stay tuned: As the World Turns with the Wards Health will continue.

We are on another verbal & mental growth spurt - Liam can now count from 1 to 14 and knows when he has two objects in his hands (e.g. says "two sucky's"). He also knows the shapes rectangle, square, circle, oval, diamond, star and triangle. He has also expanded his colours to red, green, orange, yellow and blue. He had an aptitude for wooden puzzles and puts all the shapes, animals and objects into their respective slots at lightening speed. Time to move onto something more difficult to keep his brain stimulated. We are reading like crazy and the length of the books are now increasing - he still loved flap books, but has moved on from touch & feel type books to ones with longer sentences like "Red Fish Blue Fish". His two favourite books at the moment are "Digger Man" and "Big Fire Engine" - we read them every night before bed. It's nice to have reading as part of our bed time routine now - it relaxes all of us, especially Ian, the stories put him to sleep. Liam is still riding the late night party train and usually won't go to bed before 11:00pm - even then it's a huge struggle. The only saving grace is that he sleeps through the night and doesn't wake up before 8:30am. He is also still sleeping in our bed but we are trying to change that. We have become lazy since we are sleeping so much better, but 3 bodies in a queen sized bed is not very comfortable, especially when the middle body turns sideways and kicks you in the head!

Fire trucks are Liam's big passion this month - he still loved buses but is intensely interested in fire trucks. We bought him a fire truck and he plays with it constantly. Ambulances are also high on the list - he calls then "Neeners" - just like Ian did when he was little. Too cute. I can't even begin to tell you how many toys with wheels we have in our house. Little cars, big trucks, dump tricks, lego trucks, you name it. Everything and anything with wheels. Typical little boy.

We are still into Wheels On The Bus - I have resided myself to the fact that this phase will not be over anytime soon. Liam now sings lyrics from the song in his tiny high pitched voice - it's dead cute. He also sings the alphabet and can do the whole thing except for "QRSTUV" - he does all the letters till that point and then skips to "WXYZ". I'm convinced we'll have him spelling out letters by the time he's two and maybe even starting to read.

We have become creative with having to listen to Wheels on The Bus all the time in the car and have now downloaded various songs interspersed with Wheels On The Bus. Makes us a little more sane while driving and Liam doesn't seem to mind. As long as we can get him into his car seat we're golden. You Tube has also expanded to include videos of fire trucks and diggers so we are not always listening to nursery rhymes. Bonus!

It is hard to believe that another year has gone by and we are into a new year. I finally completed a DVD of Liam's life from birth to now for all of my family for Christmas. It made me cry the first time I saw it completely done with music. It's hard to believe I was once pregnant, gave birth to a beautiful little boy and have watched him grow up from a tiny baby to a gorgeous, bright, wonderful toddler. I cannot wait to see what adventures lie ahead for the Ward family in 2009.

Happy New Year!

November Update - 19 Months

Liam is going through an immensely cute phase. We’ve always thought he was cute but right now everything he says and does seems so sweet. We hit a big moment this month when he suddenly started to count and went all the way from 1 to 10 in one go. Since then he’s been counting things like the number of circles on our bed spread or the number of wheels on his cars. We’ve also been working on colours of which he recognizes red & green. He has developed an interest in Curious George so we got him a Curious George shapes and colours book that he really likes. In the morning we wake up and watch Curious George on TV while he has his juice and I have my coffee. It’s become our ritual and is quite relaxing. Liam’s attention span only lasts till the end of my coffee so I take advantage of the relax time before we kick into high gear and get our day started.

Liam is walking much more than crawling which is such a relief – now that I look back on how much I worried about him never walking it seems so silly. He is still a little unbalanced but has made huge progress and I’m sure he’ll be running around before we know it.

We are back to reading tons of books again which is definitely boosting Liam’s word power – one of Liam’s cute phases is to say “Bless You’ when we sneeze in his little high pitched voice. He’s a walking, talking human sponge. I can see him analyzing everything I tell him and then he repeats it back to me so he remembers it later on. So far his longest sentence has been “Gabby I would like a cookie”. Pretty remarkable for a little boy of his age.

The You Tube novelty has definitely worn off by now – we can’t get within an inch of the computer without being spotted and then it’s a melt down if we don’t start playing Wheels on the Bus. We have expanded to alphabet songs, 5 Little Ducks, 5 Little Monkeys and Row Row Row Your boat which adds some variety to hearing Wheels On the Bus 50 times a day. The only way to get Liam into his car seat is to play Wheels On The Bus - as soon as he gets into his seat he starts asking for "Wheels" over and over again. If you ask him what the horn does he says "beep", the wipers he says "swish", the money he says "clink", the baby he says "wah-wah-wah" and the people he says "up and down". I'm eally not surprised considering how often he hears the song. Going on the real bus with Ian every Mon & Tues does not seem to be all that appealing anymore and has become very challenging - not only will Liam not sit still but he goes for the emergency brake and brought one bus to a halt after he successfully pulled hard enough to crack open the window. The highlight of his bus rides however was when him & Ian were the only ones on the bus and almost home - the lady bus driver had a nephew the same age and Ian told her how much Liam loved buses so she pulled over to one of the stops and let him sit on her lap while operating the door and steering wheel. He was super upset when it was time to go and cried the whole way home. Speaking of big vehicles - Liam's other highlight this month was the Santa Claus Truck Parade - he absolutely loved all the lights although the horns scared the heck out of him when they got too close. I am having visions of us spending our weekends in the future frequenting fire stations to stare at wheels, ladders and lights.

I am now into the whole play-doh phase and have been creating home made batches for Liam to play with - a co-worker gave me a bucket full of play-doh tools so we have been having a great time creating shapes. Liam does occasionally stuff some in his mouth but I figure a little play-doh ingestion is not a big deal since it's really only flour, salt, oil, water and food colouring. Doesn't taste pleasant but he's an "everything in the mouth" kind of child so it was bound to be taste tested sooner or later. In addition to the play-doh we have been collecting tons of art from daycare and our weekly play groups so I now have an art display board on the wall that I will update every few weeks with new pictures. My next thing to get will be an art scrapbook for all the artwork - it's collecting all over the house since he does something different every week. Artwork is currently flowing out of his closet, is all over the fridge, on the display board and in the cupboards. It's everywhere! I guess I have to let some of it go and some point - I do have years and years of more painting and crafts ahead!