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!

October Update - 18 Months

Happy Halloween!

This was Liam’s first official “trick or treat” experience as he was only 6 months old last Halloween. This year the boys went with the Curious George theme with Liam being Curious George and Ian being the Man in the Yellow Hat. Ian’s outfit was so bright you could see him from a mile away in his matching pants, shirt & hat. The two of them spent the afternoon at Mall-O-Ween which involves walking around the mall and trick or treating at the stores which give out candy to all the kids. It’s mainly geared towards younger kids so they don’t have to walk out in the dark. Apparently the boys outfits were a hit & they came home with a large bucket of candy. Since our street has lots of families & is on a quiet cul-de-sac they went out for round two with Homer Simpson (Grandpa Derek) and Vampire Queen (Aunty Caylin). By about the third house Liam had caught on to the whole concept and would walk up to the door of a house holding out his bucket and say “treeeet” when the door opened. The neighbours just ate it up!

The weekend before Halloween we took a trip out to Galey Farms which is a farm nearby our house that has a large pumpkin patch, corn maze, haunted house, petting zoo, train & hay rides. After a nice train ride around the farm we hung out with the animals, played in the kids park & then took a hay ride out to the pumpkin patch to pick out our Halloween pumpkin. Liam went straight for the dirt & thoroughly enjoyed poking the squishy rotten pumkins while I madly chased him around trying to get the perfect “pumpkin photo”. By the time we got back to the car Liam was totally wiped from all the fresh air & promptly fell asleep on the way home. In the evening we got out our carving tools and the boys went to town – while Daddy desperately tried to keep the pumpkin guts out of the pumpkin, Liam would dump them right back in. Luckily I had covered the entire kitchen with newspaper, by the time the carving was over there were pumpkin guts splattered everywhere. Liam was most annoyed with Daddy that he wouldn’t let him handle the knife – good thing the guts kept him busy.

Big news in the walking world: Monday October 13th was Liam’s first official “walking” moment. We were lyng on the floor playing with him and all of a sudden he simply stood up and walked all the way around Ian to me. We were stunned for a few seconds and then started screaming “yay!” and clapping – he was most pleased with himself. Now when he does his short walking spurts we say “yay” and clap automatically – to the point where he’ll stand up, start clapping and then walk. Oh well – it’s all about the repetition!

In word world Liam is into his “oo’s” – he’ll point at the living room floor and say “wood” & if you ask him how he is he’ll say “good”. He has become a huge fan of You Tube videos and constantly requests “Wheels on The Bus”, his absolute favourite song. We cannot get within an inch of the computer without him screaming “Wheels, Bus!” – it’s almost as bad as the on and off light phase. In addition to the Wheels on The Bus, he also loves Old Macdonald (calls it “ee-ya-yee-ya-yo”) and Elmo singing songs with celebrities like Andrea Boccelli.

Liam has proved recently that he is Daddy’s boy with his new love of pizza. When we ask him what he wants for dinner he automatically says “pizza!”. We have figured out a healthy version to keep him happy & it gets some cheese into him – he still does not like pieces of cheese but will eat it in melted form. He is also nuts for ice-cream (calls it “icy”) which is Ian’s favourite food. I can see how having a toddler can be challenging from a food perspective although Liam still eats almost anything and loves vegetables. My acquisition of training cups has paid off & Liam is sippy cupping like a pro, no more straws for the moment. I don’t miss the days of sucking up the straw & spitting right out at all. In the morning we have our juice or “dooth” as he calls it or sometimes the request is for milk (we have progressed from saying “moo” to “milk”). He is also saying “yoghurt” instead of “gagu” and “badananana” instead of “yayo” for banana. Got a few more nana’s to cut off there still!

In toyland it’s all about the wheels ie: buses, cars, aeroplanes and trucks. Anything with wheels is cool. When an aeroplane is flying over he’ll point at the sky and say “plane!”. We’ve also been doing more arts & crafts as he loves to paint & draw. I’ve stocked up on construction paper, brushes, paint & art smock – it’s a seriously messy business. I made the mistake of leaving a brush & tub of black paint in front of him while he was working on his Halloween masterpiece & he ended up painting his face & hair black – even his teeth were black. I had to scrub him down for 20 minutes straight – fun!

Fall is officially upon us – the weather is colder, the days are shorter & so are the clothes. Weed boy is now 33 inches long & weighs 24 lbs. So the entire closet has been overhauled & Liam has been fitted with new Winter duds. I swear he grows an inch overnight sometimes. Even his feet have grown to a size 5. To continue encouraging the walking we got him a new pair of Spiderman runners that light up when you walk – he loves them except that he constantly looks down to see the lights – I’m praying he won’t smack into a wall due to my “creative” thinking!

So I figure I'm now officially a toddler mom since my lipstick is accompanied by goldfish crackers in the bottom of my purse, I'm humming "Wheels on the Bus" while doing my 4th load of laundry & I'm constantly pelted with toys while trying to take a shower.

Aahhh yes - we have reached the one and a half year mark for sure!

September Update - 17 Months

We are on the developmental speedway this month – verbally & physically Liam is absolutely leaping & bounding – his words are amazing and he finally took his first official steps while wading across the baby pool Sept 26th – YAY!!!!!

We are settling into our new place – well somewhat. I have dubbed our new house “Demolition Derby” as renovations are still underway and we have no bathroom, no living room and a toddler somewhere in the middle collecting pieces of drywall. To create a “safer” environment and to keep Liam contained we have set up baby gates everywhere and have become expert hurdlers. Smart boy is not all too happy with our maze and has figured out that if he lies down and kicks the gate as hard as he can it will fall over. Or his other strategy is to get his leg up and try to climb over – good thing he’s too short to huck himself over the other side. He seems to be the only one unaffected by all the chaos and loves having “Gabby” (Granny), “Papa” (Grandpa) and “Aunty” upstairs.

Liam’s words are incredible – he now has a vocabulary of about 50-60 words and has started to string together sentences like “it’s a wheel”, “it’s a car”, “I want booby” or “what’s that?”. It has become much easier to communicate as he says “no” or “yeah” when you ask him a question. He loves kisses and will say “kissie” and plant one on me. It’s the best feeling ever. Other words to add to the list are “towel”, “water”, “all done”, “all gone” , yucky (for garbage can and cat litter box), “hot tub”, “vacuum”, “woo-wee!”, “pee pee”, “poo” ,“potty”, kitty”, “cat”, “pool”, “car”, "pizza", "crab boat", "wood", "Ammee" (for Emily his daycare lady), "Eason" (for Emily's son Easton who he adores)“bus”, “fan”, “yayu” (banana and the colour yellow), “gagu” (yoghurt), “moo” for milk, “juice” and “aggy” (for eggs). The list goes on!

Every day he seems to pick up a word. We’ll be driving to our house and he’ll see my parents red van and scream “Papa!” for Grandpa. Or we'll be driving to daycare and will turn down the street to Emily's house and he'll start saying "Ammee and Eason". Driving seems to be a time of verbal expression – mainly in the form of buses. Liam LOVES buses – everytime he sees a bus he screams “bus!” and usually adds in “wheel” too. His favourite song is “The Wheels on the Bus go Round and Round” – as soon as he hears the tune he says “wheel” and “bus”. He also has a big interest in cars, wheels and things that resemble that shape. We are painting his room in October in the Disney Cars theme which should look fantastic when it’s done. Liam may never leave his room there will be so many wheels to look at! Since clocks are another round item that he is interested in we have learning to tell time with his Sponge Bob Square Pants book & have bought him a Cars theme wall clock for his room.

Speaking of new items we bought – we have entered into the world of potty training, mostly because Liam is so fascinated with the toilet and flushing and says “pee pee” and “poo poo” when I go to the bathroom. Bye bye privacy! Nothing like a set of eyes staring at you while you do your business. As I love to encourage Liam’s interests, and the fact that he actually said “poo” one day when he went in his diaper, we bought him a minature singing potty that comes with a flusher and toilet roll. When you go in the bowl a red light comes on and the potty starts singing its praises which you would think would make your child want to sit on it and go. Not so. Liam was most put out when I pulled down his pants and refused to sit on the seat – not only that but he figured out how to turn the red light on by sticking his hand in the bowl. Lovely. I can see this is going to be a loooooong process. For now we’ll just settle on the regular diaper changes where Liam says “bum” and then grabs himself and says “pee pee” and then “ow”. Not sure why the “ow” part but he thinks it’s funny.

Speaking of lights – if there is one thing Liam loves more than buses, fans & doors, it’s lights. As soon as we moved into our new place we started the “light phase”. Everytime he sees a light he says “on”. So you turn it on. Then he screams “on”. So you turn it off. Then he gets mad and says “on” again. So you turn it off. And so it continues. On and off, on and off, on and off. It’s enough to drive me up the wall. At first I couldn’t understand why he was getting so frustrated with me when he said “on” and I kept the light on. Then I figured “on” also meant “off” but he only occasionally says “off. How I figured this out I don’t know – we were driving home one day and Liam was screaming his head off pointing at the lights above the rear view mirror so to keep him calm (and keep my sanity) I started flicking the lights on and off with one hand on the steering wheel and one hand creating a strobe light effect. He instantly calmed down so I did it all the way home and just about went into muscle spasms in my arms – I can’t imagine how I must have looked driving down the street with one arm above my head flicking like a mad woman.

So you know your child is getting older & you are getting to the end of your breastfeeding days when they actually say “booby” and get really mad at you when you don’t comply right away. I am working on weaning boob man off but it will be a tough process – he loves the boob. I however am done with a capital “D”. Breastfeeding with a 14 tooth nibbler is just not comfortable anymore – it is much more about the comfort than the necessity. La Leche can kiss my behind – I am not one of those “my child is five and still sucking” kind of moms. Liam is still waking up during the night wanting “booby” and mommy is tired of dragging herself out of bed at all hours to provide a milk snack. Good news is that Liam is now drinking plain milk (no chocolate needed – yay!), bad news is he still won’t take a bottle and probably never will so it will have to be a straw and a soother as a substitute. Wish me luck – I’m gonna need it. At least he still eats well so I can stuff him before bed. Oh and did I mention he eats with a fork or spoon out of a bowl or plate? Yep, my kid is a big boy now!

Although we are still getting up in the middle of the night, Liam is sleeping in his big boy racing car bed and seems to be very happy. We got him a Cars theme fleece blanket that he loves to snuggle into and helps to drift him into sleepy land. If only it would keep him in sleepy land…..Doesn't help that he cut 4 more teeth this month and all within a couple of weeks - hello second set of bottom molars and nasty eye teeth! We are now at a total of 14 teeth and are halfway there - I better start saving up for when the tooth fairy comes. Wait -do boys do the tooth fairy or is there a manly version? Like a tooth elf or tooth gnome or something.

So in walking world Liam has now taken his first steps – the first week after we moved into our house we were in a store arguing over curtains and duvets for our bedroom when all of a sudden we realised we weren’t paying attention and looked over to find Liam standing up and pushing his stroller around the aisle. We both stopped dead in our tracks – go figure he would do something big when we weren’t looking! The second week of Sept (Thurs Sept 11th to be exact), Liam transferred from my leg to the patio and let go in the process and then the following day was pointing at the computer and took a step towards it. Apparently this was a big deal since he did not do anything again except try to stand up from a squatting position or letting go of our hands and standing in one spot for a few seconds (thinks that it’s funny when we let go) until this past Fri Sept 26th when he was wading with Daddy in the baby pool and all of a sudden walked across on his own. Then on Sat he walked from Grandpa to Daddy and on Sun he walked for Granny. I of course missed ALL of this since I was at work. I have been trying desperately to get him to do it for me but everytime I say “let go” he collapses to his knees and crawls to me. Since he loves to be picked up and says “up” I think it’s a way for him to ensure that I keep carrying him around. Maybe he thinks if he walks for me I won’t give him a free ride anymore. He’s probably right since my back is breaking!

So I’ve gone back to doing my own housecleaning and apparently I do a lot of house work since Liam has started imitating my cleaning habits by pretending to sweep and wipe things. Plus he loves helping me with the laundry and watching the washing machine fill with water – I usually fill the loader and he shuts the door and turns the machine on. Very entertaining. Vacuuming is his favourite though – we both grab our vacuums and go to town – now if only I could train him to dust and do dishes…….

We are loving the new neighbourhood - very family oriented with lots of parks and schools nearby. So much quieter than our old neighbourhood too. There is a resident family of deer consisting of a mom and her 3 little ones that graze on all the lawns - although they seem tame enough she always watches me when I get into and out of my car which scares me - have you seen those shows about tourists who get hurt because they thought the wild animal they were getting close to was nice and gentle and then get attacked? Well I'm not one of them. So I choose to use my Rambo moves and slink along the wall till I get to the shortest route to my car. Ian thinks I'm hilarious but I don't trust Psycho Bambi. Anyway, during the day I've been taking Liam in his little red wagon up to the parks - his favourite is one that has a giant lounging swing - he hangs out in it saying "weeeeee" and pretends to go to sleep. Too funny. It's great to be a neighbourhood with so many kids - we fit right in. Plus our neighbours are super friendly and wave at us (even though they have no clue who we are) when we go by. So I'm dubbing our street Pleasantville - next thing I'll start wearing skirts and ribbons and baking pies instead of running around like a mad hatter wearing dirty t-shirts & jeans and sporting drywall dust. Now that's attractive!

August Update - 16 months

Happy BC Day everyone! For me I was happy simply because I had an extra day off to spend with the boys - there is no such thing as just a "day off" when you're a toddler mom. We walked downtown to join in the festivities which included live entertainment in front of the parliament buildings, food stands and craft stalls. The museum also had a free admission so we thought we would be cultural and take Liam for his first visit. Apparently the rest of Victoria had the same idea - there were so many people inside it was like a sardine tin - rather uncomfortable. The only thing that interested Liam was the giant woolly mammoth - he kept pointing at it and saying ooooohhhhhhhh everytime we went by. Other than that all he wanted to do was crawl around on the floor and was extremely put out that we wouldn't let him for fear of being trampled by the mobs of people. Despite the museum madness it was a rather hot but enjoyable day of strolling around - the best part being the parade of fire trucks which both fascinated Liam and made him cry at the same time when they got too close - everytime the horns beeped he would jump. Our neighbour had restored one of the original Victoria police paddy wagons from the early 1900's & it was parked outside our house early that morning - got a few pics before it was towed downtown to be a part of the parade. Took him 8 years to complete the restoration - now that's dedication!

On Tues Aug 5th Liam stood on his own at daycare for about 15 seconds in front of Ian and Emily (who he calls "Ammee" - he recognizes her street when we turn down it and yells "Ammee!!") - Ian let go of hand without thinking and Liam just stood there. He did it again for 10 seconds at my friend Natalie's house - Of course I missed it since I was digging around in my hand bag for a diaper. Darn it! Then he did it in again in front of Grandma Marg on Sat evening -what gives? I spend all this time with the kid and he decides to do a milestone moment three times and I miss them all! What I don't ever miss out on is things like teething - he finally cut his bottom two molars after weeks and weeks of drooling, biting and fussiness - those suckers are huge! God I hope that's it for the teething for a while - who am I kidding! It will be a snowball of chompers I just know it. I'll just have to hold onto my pearly whites hat and hang on for the ride.

The second week of August was Granparent week - Grandma Marg was visiting for the weekend and Great Granparents Maureen & John arrived from Scotland for a three week visit. They gave him two very cute t-shirts that say "small but loud" and "blame the parents" as well as a marshmallow Loch Ness Monster lolly and a gorgeous traditional Scottish knitted sweater that will be oh so cute in the Winter. Made me want to run out and get him the whole kilt, knee high socks and black boots but I think the other moms at playgroup would think I was nuts!Grandma Marg bought Liam two new books - a talking one with different pictures and corresponding buttons that name the item and an animal picture and sounds one. Between my parents, Granma Marg and the Great Grandparents our little monkey is definitely spoiled - suits our budget too!

Liam's word bank continue to grow. He loves poking Ian's nipple and since it usually hurts Ian and he says "ow" Liam pokes it and says "ow". He also has named my boob and calls it a "be-be". At least he isn't calling it a "booby" - YET. We've been hugely into watching the Olympics on TV and he says "pool" everytime the swimming events come on. His favourite word still is "apple" and will instantly call something an apple if you point at it and say "what's this?", especially if it's round. He can say "ball"or "bubble" but prefers saying "apple". I think he just like the sound of the word itself. Since he is so good with his words we have started teaching him the alphabet. He has a set of wooden blocks that we play with a lot and I've been working with him on recognizing A, B & C. I also sing the alphabet constantly and tickle him on "LMNOP" which he loves. He has a huge love of music too and has recently got a thing for the Wiggles - when he hears music on the radio or CD he starts dancing which involves moving up and down using his upper body while his legs stay still. It's hilarious. When we wake up in the morning he says "Hi mommy", gives me a kiss and then we turn on the stereo and start dancing. It's a great way to wake up in the morning no matter how tired you are!

Aug 11th (Mon) - I left Liam unattended in the bathroom to quickly check emails which of course was asking for trouble. After a few minutes I realised that he was being extremely quiet - never a good sign - so I went into the bathroom to see what he was up to and was met with toilet paper world war III and a baby in the middle of it. Due to my lack of supervision, Liam had managed to get a hold of the toilet paper roll, unravel the entire thing, shred it to bits and create a toilet paper fort for himself. So I waded myself through the mess and suddenly realised that our white bathroom floor was not supposed to be red - apparently the fort floor had been interior decorated with red bathtub crayon that Liam managed to grab from on top of the toilet. The toilet had been interior decorated too. Thank God for porcelin, laminate and easy wash off crayons. I could see the "never leave child unattended" signs flashing in my head while I scrubbed on my hands and knees - I really need to pay more attention those!

To encourage the walking process (nuts I know but my back is breaking) we got a pair of shoes that have squeakers in the heel - Laim was fussing while we were trying on various pairs in the store but as soon as we put the squeakers on his face lit up and he did about 10 laps around the store at top speed. Worth every penny for the reaction we got. The squeakers come out in case we start going crazy from the noise. We were so pleased we also bought him a miniture vacuumn cleaner - the Dirt Devil Junior - it looks exactly like a real vacuumn cleaner, just a smaller version and even turns on. Since Liam loves to pretend to vacuumn and sweep he thought Christmas had come early when he spotted it in the store. There was no way we were leaving without it, the screaming tantrums just wouldn't have been worth it!

Aug 24th was my birthday and I had a really fun day - the girls at work decorated my chair and computer with balloons and brought lots of treats - didn't feel like work at all. Later that evening we celebrated with dinner at the grandparents and I got thoroughly spoiled with manicures, clothes, a diary (pocket sized so I can carry it around in my purse and attempt to keep my life in order) and a beautiful gold necklace with an "L" on it that I really wanted. That and a few glasses of wine and I was a happy mama!

At the moment we are in a packing frenzy since we move into our new house the last weekend of August - so far Liam has not been affected but we'll see how he does when we're in our new home. Since he likes things that are new and exciting I don't think he'll have a problem with it - plus there's the added bonus of having the grandparents a.k.a "built in babysitters" upstairs - woohoo!

July Update - 15 months

We are finally iinto Summer and the weather has been hot and sunny - the perks of working evenings is that I get to spend my days with Liam at the beach & parks so I have that "relaxed" tanned look. Even Liam with his factor 55 baby sunscreen has a nice bronze glow to his hands and arms. We are still doing playgroups every week but most of our time is spent enjoying the outdoors. Liam loves the beach and it's nice watching him play with his bucket & beach toys while sipping my morning coffee. It's not California but Summer in Victoria is stilll pleasant once it arrives.

Liam's vocabulary has sky rocketed. He now has a consistent set of about 30 words and is like a small parrot - he likes to repeat things we say so we have to be extremely careful with the swear words. He's very intersted in learning body parts and can say "eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hair and toes". If you ask him what a body part is he'll point to it and name it. He also calls his u-know-wot his "pee pee". Yesterday he strung together his first sentence while pointing at Ian's feet and said "it's a toe". We have been upgraded from "mama" and "dada" to "mommy" and "daddy" - if I say "mama" to him he says "mommy" back. Clever boy. His favourite words of the month however are "beep beep" and "hot". Whenever he hears our keys rattle or sees the car he instantly says "beep beep". "Beep Beep" also refers to the car being locked or to the horn being honked. Even toy cars are "Beep Beeps". Whenever I am holding tea or coffee he points to it and says "hot". He also uses "hot" if he finds the play ground to be too warm or if the inside of the car is roasting when we get inside it. I constantly say "hot tea" when he comes too close to my mug and a few days ago he actually said "hot tea". We still read an average of six books a day and it's starting to show - if you pojnt to an item like an apple and ask him what it is he'll say apple. I've taken him to the grocery store and shown him different coloured apples and he still gets it right so he seems to understand what it is as opposed to it just being a word he likes to say. I have now started to teach him "ABC" using his wooden alphabet blocks. If he's anything like Ian he'll be reading by the time he's three. He is getting pretty good at his animal sounds and can do "Baa", "Moo", "SSSS" (for a snake), "Twoo Twoo" (for an owl), "Meow" and some his own variation of "Woof". When we read books I ask him to turn the pages or open the flaps which he does himself. He's going to be a book worm when he's older for sure.

Another thing Liam is good at is his hand-eye coordination, in particular with balls (he mostly calls balls and balloons "bubbles" but will say the correct word if he feels like it). He will throw or roll a ball back to me very accurately. I also discovered at one of the play groups that he loves hockey so I bought him a minature set of plastic hockey sticks, nets and a soft ball. Ian taught him how to say "hockey" and everytime he hits the ball into the net he shouts "goal!!!!!". He understands that the ball goes into the net and it's amazing how he can do it over and over again, especially since holding the stick is a bit awkward being a bit big for him.

The obsession with buttons continues - our TV has been completely reprogrammed (we have no idea how it works now) and Mr. Nimble Fingers has figured out how to lift the tape on the contraption we used to protect the power button on the computer. The computer has been turned on and off so many times it keeps crashing. Even the microwave buttons are interesting if we let him near it - he likes to cook imaginary frozen vegetables. It's rather different taking Liam to play groups since toys don't really interest him that much - he's far more interested in things that are mechanical - like doors. He loves doors. While all the other kids play with the gazillion fun toys around them, Liam will crawl for the nearest exit door or better still; the washroom doors. He'll sit and point at the male/female signs for ages and babble at the top of his voice. It's plain weird. If anything play groups are good for tiring him out from crawling around inspecting doors, not from playing with toys.

There are only a couple of other toys that I have recently bought that interest Liam other than his hockey net and that is his new corn popper (you push the handle and the balls make a popping sound inside the attached bubble) and his magna doodle. At Ian's company picnic his bosses kids had a magna doodle and he spent ages drawing with it. The magna doodle is a magnetic white board that wipes clear once you're done "doodling" with the magnetic pen - no mess, no fuss. Since we bought it last week Liam has played with it every day. I also bought some finger paints and construction paper for him to do some art work - unfortunately he put his fingers in his mouth to taste the paints and barfed everywhere. So finger paints are on hold for a little while longer. We've had more success with the bath tub crayons Ian found - provides Liam with tons of entertainment and makes the bath tub look very colourful with all the scribbles. Plus for now they seem to be barf proof since he mainly draws on himself or the sides of the tub & does not seem to feel the need to stick them in his mouth and induce vomiting.

In the mobility department crawling has progressed from high speed to warp speed. Liam crawls so fast that he lowers his head to streamline himself. If I dressed him in an aerodynamic suit he'd leave smoke behind him. He is spending a lot more time standing and furniture surfing. He can hold onto things himself with one hand or walks around holding onto our fingers - actually he literally runs when we're holding on to him. We are getting very close to walking, it's just a matter of time.

So the sleep issues continued on from the moment we got back from San Diego. After two months of battling with trying to get Liam to sleep in his crib and him refusing to the point of screaming tantrums, we finally gave up and had him sleep between us in our bed just to keep our sanity. Even a brand new mattress didn't work. After weeks of co-sleeping we were getting really tired of interupted sleep every night so we decided to retire the crib and get a "big boy" racing car bed. So as it stands we are in the process of transitioning starting with having him sleep on his mattress next to our bed until we are comfortable enough to move him to the racing car. He still wakes up at night but the combination of a bed time snack and the lack of confinement seems to be helping. Guess being a crib jail bird wan't working for our freedom baby. I should have figured this all out when he started napping on the couches - I'll blame it on the exhaustion from lack of sleep for 2 months straight. Plus the recent appearance of two molars explains a lot. It seems that the teethings phase lasted forever this time round. Thank God for those calming teething tablets - Liam says "yum-yum" every time we go near him with them. 10 teeth down, 20 more to go. Good times!