18 months and counting

laying down with mommy

as i’ve probably said a million times, i can’t believe how old this kid is getting.  although, the doctor’s visits are starting to get farther and farther apart, which i guess is also nice.  we took nathaniel in for his 18 month checkup on wednesday.

he spent the couple minutes waiting for the doctor pointing out all of the stars, circles and squares on the wall paper for us, as well as the bears and balls on the paper on the tables.  i have no idea where he picks up half of these words (i am guessing daycare) but it’s fun to hear him talking more with words instead of only babbling.  he continues to grow since his 15 months appointment (a few pounds and a few inches) so he’s going in the correct direction.

relaxing with some cheerios

nathaniel had the pleasure of getting the next series of shots.  luckily he hasn’t gotten to the point where he knows what is happening until after it happens.  also, luckily, his doctor is super awesome at giving shots so he doesn’t freak out about it.  in fact, after he got his shots, before nathaniel had a chance to scream, i asked him ‘what do you say, nathaniel?’  he then said ‘thank you’ to dr. fisher and waved and said ‘bye bye!’  like i’ve been saying all along, if nothing else, this kid has pretty good manners.  in fact, he was more upset about me not letting him play with his bandaids than he was with anything else.

what do you mean i'm not supposed to wear the box of the new toy i'm playing with?

the other night we took nathaniel over to my grandparents house for dinner.  he wasn’t too excited by the actual food, but he LOVED feeding himself (as well as his clothing) soup.  my grandmother made a vegetable soup that nathaneiel would not let us feed him, he had to spoon it himself.  he didn’t do a terrible job with it, considering it was his first experience with soup.  the only thing he didn’t eat (which surprised us because he loves them normally) were the carrots.  he would take them out of his mouth and put them back in the bowl.  he also ate a few pieces of chicken cutlets, tried some turkey and roastbeef (we had cold cuts for dinner) and also ate a lot of my fruit salad (if you’re in the teaneck nj area, go to julio’s on queen ann road, it’s seriously the best fruit ever).  he then had a fun game of catch with my grandfather before he got exhausted and it was time to get going.

that there, that there is me!

i’m glad that there have been a few days where the weather has gotten into the 50’s so we’ve been able to take nathaniel on a couple walks with us.  there’s still snow most everywhere so we haven’t taken him to the playground around the corner yet, but it is still february.  i think he’s going to enjoy it much more this year, now that he can climb and do some more things on his own without me or julia having to carry him up everything.  not to mention it’ll be nice to have him running around like a madman in a park instead of inside my house.

someone has a new trick

i was led to believe that there would be pie ...

in the continuing saga of things we have to pay attention to, nathaniel has a few new tricks up his sleeve.  we have a new gate up at the bottom of the stairs because he not only climbs them, but flies up them if we turn our head for a minute.  luckily he’s still unable to do doorknobs, so we have a little more time before we will have to get the childproof doorknob things.

his newest trick?  he LOVES climbing up onto the couch.  not only does he climb up on the couch, but he does his best julia imitation while up there.  today julia was laying on the couch under a blanket with her head on the cushion.  she left the room for a minute, nathaniel climbed up on the couch, pulled the blanket over his legs and layed back onto the cushions exactly like julia.  it was adorable, of course, especially when julia came back into the room and saw him like that.

i don’t normally do this, but i wanted to give a shout out to some of my closest friends for welcoming the adorable baby violet atsuko fourre into the world on the 11th.  it’s a shame they live so far away because nathaniel is eagerly awaiting meeting his future wife.

snack time with nathaniel

what? can't a guy chill in front of the tv in a fedora?

another funny exchange with nathaniel took place yesterday morning between julia and nathaniel.  he was getting a little cranky because he was hungry, but it was nowhere near lunch time yet.  julia asked him if he wanted a snack and nathaniel hurried off to his high chair and put his arms up for her to put him in it.  the following was the conversation they had –

julia: ‘so you want to have a snack?’

nathaniel: ‘yeah’

j: ‘do you want to have a banana?’

n: ‘no’

j: ‘do you want to have some blueberries?’

n: ‘yes’

j: ‘do you know what blueberries are?’

n: ‘nope’

j: ‘but you want some?’

n: ‘yup’

as it turns out he did not like the blueberries.  julia says they were pretty tart, but watching nathaniel go from real excited about having them, to real disgusted with how they taste was pretty funny.  he ended up eating a banana after all.

actual conversations with nathaniel

i have your toy, what are you going to do about it?

now that nathaniel is getting older and his vocabulary is growing (well, at least his understanding of words is growing) he’s becoming more amusing.  that is, if the definition of amusing is that he has the ability to be really cute and really mean at the same time.  here are some examples of a few recent small conversations that nathaniel and i have had recently.

julia:  nathaniel, are you thirsty?

nathaniel:  yeah.

j:  do you want milk?

n:  uh, nope.

j:  do you want juice?

n:  yeah.

j:  you want juice, not milk?

n:  yes.

j:  (bringing in his juice)  what do you say?

n:  (does the sign for ‘please’ until julia hands him the juice)  THANK YOU!

j:  you’re welcome.

crazy dancing nathaniel

if nothing else, we’ve been trying to teach nathaniel to always say please, thank you and you’re welcome.  he’s becoming a pretty polite little fella, but that doesn’t stop him from knowing how to hurt my feelings.

aaron:  nathaniel, is pickles your best friend?

nathaniel:  (nathaniel is hugging pickles. pause to think) yeah. (he goes back to hugging pickles)

a:  could i be your best friend?

n:  (without hesitating) NOPE!

a:  really?

n:  NO! (he shoves me away)

i must say, it’s a pretty nice feeling when your son basically tells you to screw off.  he made up for it later when i told him i was sad and he came over to me and gave me a kiss.  let me tell you, i really can’t wait for him to be a teenager.

so nathaniel will not freeze

i made my own poposan!

so with all of this snow and ice that we’ve been getting, pseg issued some warnings that there may be intermittent power outages during this next wave of storms.  the downside to this is that if the power goes out, so does the heat.  nathaniel is notorious for kicking his blankets off of him during the night.

yes, this is a fact known the world over.

since the time he was first born he has found ways to un-swaddle himself, un-tuck himself and un-cover himself every single night.  this made us slightly nervous when the power went out in our house around 8:50 tonight.

the first thing we did was head into nathaniel’s room and cover him back up with the blanket that he had already crumpled down by his feet.  after a little bit of debate we decided that he should be good for now, but before i went to sleep i’d check on him again and decide if that one blanket would be enough or if i should tuck him in tight and add a second blanket as well.

you'll notice these two goofballs are pretty much always together now

so as luck would have it, just after that discussion was concluded, the power came back on.  so far it’s been back on for about an hour.  hopefully it stays on after i go to sleep, but i’m pretty sure the little guy will be ok.

last night we also discovered that nathaniel LOVES meatballs.  julia made her escarole egg-drop soup for dinner, and we decided to let nathaniel have one of the meatballs as sort of a 2nd dinner.  we gave him two small pieces to see if he would even like it and before we even took our hand away from putting them down he had scarfed them down and was asking for more.  i’m glad he’s back to eating everything.  it’s probably that he’s going through yet another growth-spurt. actually, at this point, i think everything is a growth spurt.  every time i pick him up i swear he’s bigger than he was the time before.

the downside to this is that i have recently injured my back.  while i’m still not exactly sure the extent of my injuries (still back and forth to doctors while having more tests done before i start physical therapy), i do know that i cannot really lift any weight.  how do i explain to a 17 month old that i can’t carry him around or let him jump all over me like i usually do?  it’s been rough, but the pain meds have been helping.  the only thing i have to distract him is by saying ‘yo gabba gabba!’ anywhere near him and he repeats it a few times and says ‘yay!’ and claps.

that show seriously is a life savor.