16 Months Old

Drew turned 16 months a few days ago. It doesn't really feel like a milestone date, but I had some cute pictures of him, so I thought I'd also take the time to write down some of his latest tricks. I'm not taking the time to look back at previous posts to see what I've already written, so some of this may be redundant. Sorry.

He's saying a few more words now. One of the latest I've noticed and understood is bubble. While he's pushing his little lawnmower and bubbles are coming out, he says, "Buh-buh." Other words he says include uh-oh, bye, Mama, Dada, and it seems like there's something for Thomas, but I can't remember what it is. Oh, and he also seems to sort of say goodnight, but I'm not exactly sure how he does it. It's consistent, though, so I think that counts.

While Drew originally did the more sign as one of his first signs, once he learned the sign for please, he pretty much quit doing more. Suddenly today, he did the more sign again. He also signs for water, help, dog, and thank you, but I can't think of any other signs. He used to do milk, but since he still won't really drink milk from a cup and I am no longer breastfeeding, he really never gets milk, so we never use the sign.

Drew still screams when he sees something exciting, like big trucks, vans, pick-up trucks, basketball hoops, birds or other animals, and some other random stuff. He is obsessed with trashcans, the big kind that the trash truck picks up. Our next door neighbors keep their trashcan outside their garage, and Drew gets pretty excited whenever he sees it, which is pretty much every day. Anytime he sees a trashcan, he immediately picks a few blades of grass and heads straight for it, and he won't be distracted until he's thrown the grass in the trash. It's cute, but can be annoying. For example, on a Wednesday or Thursday afternoon, when all the trashcans are out on the curb, it takes us about 30 minutes to walk the 4 houses down to the mailbox, because we have to stop at every trashcan at least 2 times. If I let him walk on his own it takes even longer, so eventually I have to just pick him up and carry him. When Drew sees a trashcan, he makes a sound like "aaaaachhhh," kind of an exaggerated "ack" sound, which is what we say when something is yucky, like trash. We'll say, "Acky, Drew," or "Ack!" It's really funny to hear him make this sound. I will try to get a video of this tomorrow, maybe. When Zach was about this age, he got obsessed with trash, too. He would pick up the tiniest thing off the floor and say, "Tash!" and head straight for the trashcan. The great thing about Drew is that after he throws something away in our kitchen trash, he's always sure to replace the child-safety lock so that he "can't" get into the cabinet next time. So considerate. Yesterday Drew got a kleenex from Zach's room, wiped his nose with it, and then took it into the boys' bathroom to put it in the trash in there. On his way back into Zach's room, I told him, "Good job, Drew!" So he grabbed another kleenex, barely wiped his nose, and threw it away in the bathroom. This time he was his own cheerleader, and on his way back into Zach's room he clapped and said, "Aaaaaah!" Then he grabbed another kleenex and just took it straight to the trash, with none of this fake nose-wiping. This happened a few more times. I know, it's not good to just waste kleenex like that. It was just too cute to stop, though, and it was only a few kleenexes overall.

Drew really loves his dogs. He very often just hugs Maggie and Foudy, or if they're laying down, he goes up and rests his head on them. They're good sports about it, and it absolutely melts my heart. I have always hoped I'd pass my dog-lover gene on to my kids, and I think maybe I have.

Drew's new favorite toy is the Little People bus. He thinks it's pretty fun, but he needs help putting the people in their seats sometimes.

Drew started trying to kick balls. I posted the video of him dribbling the soccer ball, but now he actually tries to kick it.

Drew seems to be more fearless than Zach was at this age, though it's hard for me to remember just what Zach was like. Some of it is just circumstantial, I think. For example, Drew likes to climb up on all the step stools we have for Zach to use. Zach couldn't do that because we didn't have the step stools then. Drew also loves to climb up the ladder on the playset in our backyard. Last week he started turning around and going down the slide, too. That is sometimes a little tricky, because I can't just let him climb up on his own, and there are two levels to the clubhouse at the top, so I'm sure to stay up there with him to make sure he doesn't fall. Of course if I put my hands out to make sure he doesn't fall, he pushes them away. Then as he goes to the slide to go down, I have to quickly get to the rock wall, where I can stand on some of the supports and reach over to the slide to make sure Drew doesn't fall as he turns around. Then I quickly jump down to stop him from flying off the slide (it's really fast) and landing face first on the ground. I have no idea if Zach would have tried all this at 16 months because we didn't have the playset then.

Zach has never enjoyed getting his face wet, but when we were playing in the swimming pool yesterday, Drew slipped and went on his back in the water. If it were Zach at 16 months, I'm sure there would have been crying, but Drew just quickly flipped himself over to his tummy and laughed. Then he purposely tried to do it again, and again, and again. Then he tried to climb the slide so he could slide down it and land in the water. I've heard that second children are less fearful than their older siblings because they see the older one do everything and figure they can do it, too, and I'd say this definitely holds true for Drew!

Oh, I almost forgot- Drew now has a whopping 5 teeth! His fifth tooth broke through about a week ago. So now he has two on bottom and three on top.

Here's Drew a week or two ago. He discovered this tupperware container and put it on his head, and whoa! he could see through it! So he decided to wear it around for a while, to see what the world looked like through a tupperware lens.

Then he decided he wanted this tiny Playmobil pirate boat paddle in his mouth, but there was a slight problem.

Aahhh! That's my boy! Good problem-solving, Drew!

And here he was just being cute at the table.

Thankfully Drew still makes his "silly face" when we ask him too. I wonder when this will change. I hope never!

And this is just a random picture from a few weeks ago when my sister Sandy, brother-in-law Will, and my adorable nephew Anders stopped by on their way home from Iowa City. I love how Zach is playing with the baby toy while the two babies watch. Typical big brother/cousin.