15 months

Well, I am a few days late on this update, but Ryan has been keeping me on my toes over the past few weeks. He has gone from an unsteady walker to full on running. Which results in quite a few trips and falls and little bobos here and there. When he gets really excited, he throws both arms out in front of him like a zombie and just charges at me. He is also loving being chased around the house right now.

Some of his other interests at the moment include his books and toys. He has really become more independent when it comes to playing by himself and just loves to flip his books, point to the pictures, and talk to himself. He loves Hop on Pop, The Wheels on the Bus, and his Colors book. He will just "ohhhh" and "ahhhh" at all of the pictures. When he wants to be read to, he will pick up a book and bring it over for one of us to read to him. He is also just absolutely obsessed with the gate between our living room and the hallway to our bedrooms. He will just walk in and out of it, swing it back and forth, lock himself in on one side of it while screaming for us to come open it back up, and then repeat.

He loves his Cozy Coupe and taking rides around our house in it. When he wants to drive around, he'll walk over to it and just moan until someone will push him around.

He also DEMANDS that music be playing at ALL times now. We have our IPod dock in our living room, and he will go over to it, point at it, and grunt until we turn it on. He is so impatient, that when there is a break between songs, he will run over there and get angry until the next song comes on. So needless to say, there is music playing all day long at out house. He seems to love the Black Eyed Peas, Michael Jackson, and James Brown. He also is quickly becoming an expert dancer. I know I have said this before, but he LOVES to dance and actually has pretty decent rhythm. He really gets crazy when he is in the mood to dance - shaking his head, bouncing up and down, waving his hands around and just acting like a complete nut.

We've recently given him a snack cup and after one day, he knows exactly what it means and that it is his. He loves to run around the house, holding his cup, and eating his snacks. When it is empty, he will go sit by the pantry, sometimes open it, and begin to pull out things he can reach - demanding that we refill his cup.

This has quickly led to some bad habits which we have now had to break. He was eating so many snacks (his favorite being Goldfish and Nilla Wafers), that he was becoming a terror at dinner time, not wanting to eat his food. So we have cut back in the afternoon, trying to introduce healthier snacks, but they haven't caught on too well as of yet. I am also proud to say, he has eaten all 3 meals in his highchair for the past 4 days. If you knew the struggle we have gone through (mainly at dinner time), to try and feed him in his chair, you would understand what a huge accomplishment this is for us. He is just so antsy, he would rather eat while playing and running around, but his Doc said we need to nip this in the bud and quickly, so we are working on it, by playing LOUD music and giving him whatever toy he desires to play with while in his chair.

We are also moving closer and closer to drinking out of sippy cups on a full time basis. Hopefully, by next month's update he will be off the bottle (cross our fingers). He surprisingly will drink his milk cold now as well (also a HUGE relief!). Next up for his homework will be to ween off the pacifier :) I am sure he would say he feels a little like this when it comes to giving up his binky.

He is just so attached to both his puppy and his pacifier, it will be a hard one to break I think.

He is turning into quite the mimicker and loves to repeat any sounds that we make. His full words are still limited to MaMa, Bye Bye, Buppy (Puppy) and sometimes DaDa, Hi, and Ball. Now that he has finally achieved the attention span to sit and watch a few minutes of TV at a time, maybe his vocabulary will expand. His two favorite shows are SuperWhy and Sesame Street. He is still loving the pool and has actually learned to kick pretty well. He really is a sweet little boy, we have more fun with him each and everyday.

He is napping twice a day for about 1.5-2 hours each (yay!!), but that is due to the fact that he likes to stay up LATE at night. We try and have him in his crib by 8 or 8:15, but sometimes he will stay awake until 10 pm just playing around, not upset or anything. A night owl just like his parents!

His doctor's appt went very well this past week. His current stats are:

Height - 33 inches (94%)
Weight - 24 lbs 13 oz (55%)
Head - 19.5 inches (96%)

Once again, his head takes the cake, which is no surprise seeing how putting clothes over his head is always such a struggle. We love you buddy, Happy 15 Months!