So I can remember 18 months

Pat just did the official 18 month update and I usually just add whatever details I can think of to his posts, but this time I had too much to say to try to fit it into his post. So here is what a day at 18 months is like:

When Ted wakes up in the morning he usually just kind of whines and moans until I go and get him, but as soon as I get to his crib he starts pointing at things and naming them. Usually different things every morning- shirt, dog, baby, bear, etc. Then he starts saying “Moses, Moses, Moses.” Sometimes Moses is actually there, sometimes Ted is just wondering where Moses is. Then we come downstairs and most weekdays he says, “tee,” which is Ted’s way of asking for tv. So we watch some Blues Clues and then eat breakfast. Ted has baby oatmeal or baby multigrain cereal mixed with baby food fruit or sweet potato. He feeds himself, but gets a lot of it all over, including behind his ears and on his knees.

After breakfast we head upstairs so I can shower and we both can get ready for the day. While I shower Ted colors all over the bathroom. Today I decided I would just give up on trying to stop him and deal with the fact that we will have to wipe down the graffiti every day. Before I kept telling him, “no Ted, keep it in the coloring book” at which point he always holds out his crayon and says a color (frequently the right one) and then starts coloring something else. Since I don’t want to go back to the days of him whining and crying while I shower I have no interest in taking the crayons away, but I seem to be teaching him there are no consequences to my saying no. I guess I will have to deal with the graffiti and just teach him we have to clean it up.

Next we head out to music class, story time, the park, or playgroup. When we go to the park the child has no fear. And unfortunately no sense. He gives me a heart attack and makes me look like I am totally over protective every time. He goes to the top of the tallest play structures and dangles a leg over the climbing wall or flips himself over a metal bar, etc. Yesterday at the park he fell down a couple of stairs and scraped his head. Today he climbed off a picnic table bench and bonked his head on the cement. He is totally accident prone. Luckily he handles it well, although there were tears today, since he bonked his head in the same spot as yesterday and it must have really hurt. But after a few minutes of tears he was ready to head back out to the play ground. He is definitely not a clingy kid. Every where we go he runs off and joins right in the action.

We stay out till lunch time and either eat where we are or in the car. He has some yogurt and sometimes lunch meat and/or fruit or veggies. Then I drive home and he falls asleep. When we get here I carry him up to his crib. He usually naps for about two hours. When he wakes up we have a snack and play with his toys until Pat comes home.

Then we all have dinner together at the table. Ted eats what we are eating, sometimes with additional veggies, avocado, or black beans if he doesn’t seem to be too interested in the main course. He calls green beans, black beans, and pinto beans all the same thing, “bean-beans.” He is a big fan of bean-beans.

After dinner we usually go for a walk around the neighborhood. Ted insists on pushing the stroller rather than riding in it, so we just bring the free umbrella stroller, while our fancier strollers sit in the garage. He pushes the stroller most of the way down our street and then when he starts getting distracted we make him sit in it, which he protests. Then when we get to the safer street with no traffic we let him out. He jumps out and starts running and says “run, run, run” or “go, go, go” or “fast, fast, fast.” Then without fail he starts looking for the moon. “Moon, moon, moon?” Throughout the walk he continues to check in on the moon every couple of minutes whether we can see the moon or not. He points out all the airplanes and helicopters and watches them till they are out of sight and then says, “bye bye.” He alternates between running and dawdling to look at rocks. Then when we get to the end of the safer loop we put him back in the stroller and head home.

At bed time Pat gives him a bath and then its story time with milk, brushed teeth, and off to his bedroom. Either Pat or I will sing him a couple songs and rock him in the chair and then put him in his crib. He goes right in without a peep. And that is a typical weekday in our life.