16 Months

I'm starting this 16-month post 2 days late and suspect it'll take me the best part of the next 2 days to finish it, but I blame it on jet-lag and sleep deprivation. Without further ado...

16 months is so much fun and there is so much about our little X-Man this month that I want to capture, remember and file away in my memories forever.

He eats meat! And every mouthful of food that he eats no longer needs to be just a single-texture or single-taste experience! Our persistence has paid off and now he chomps down on spoonfuls of rice/fish/veg or chicken/veg/macaroni mixtures and enjoys it! As you can tell, I am very happy! Yes! (LOL)! And it makes me so incredibly happy to see him enjoying the healthy home-cooked food that I cook for him, even though it's the simplest of fares. Like last night's dinner of macaroni and chicken soup with peas and corn. After devouring the whole bowl of food, he slurped up the soup from the bowl and demanded "MORE!" Gratifying, to say the least. Now I'm pretty sure he's getting all the nutrition he needs and I can happily ignore comments that he "needs to gain more weight". Pfft.

He is starting to eat like a big boy now. Give him a whole biscuit while he's seated at the table and he would take a bite, set it back down nicely on the table, then pick it up again when he wants more. No more throwing food on the floor or tossing food aside when he is done eating them. Food goes back onto the table nicely. Either that or he grabs our hand and puts it there, and says "no no no no no!".

Funny story - he was eating chunks of apple that still had some skin on it when we were in Auckland. He spent the good part of 15-20 minutes chomping on it in his mouth. His ah ma asked, will he choke on the skin? I said no, he would probably just spit it out when he's done. Not a couple of minutes later, I heard his ah ma giggling from the back seat of the car. So turns out, he grabbed her hand and put it to his mouth. Next thing she knows, he had spit the apple skin out into the palm of her hand, with the apple flesh all gone, just the skin left. Haha! I'm just happy that he knows not to just spit it out at random and create a mess :)

Sometimes when he needs a snack, I would pass him his little bowl and he would hold it gingerly with both hands while I get out the Cheerios for him. Then he would take the bowl of Cheerios and very carefully walk over to the coffee table, and put it down. Then he picks out one or two pieces, pops them into his mouth, runs off to play, then comes back intermittently for more. Gone are the days when he would simply toss EVERYTHING onto the floor and the table and the sofa and... You get the point.

Xander is going through a massive language explosion phase now. In the past 2 weeks or so, his vocabulary, both spoken and signed, has expanded exponentially. He picks up new words and sounds and signs on a daily basis. Especially with the signs, he now only requires one or two demonstrations to pick it up and a couple of reinforcements to really get it. Of course his limited dexterity means that he can't do the signs perfectly, but it really is not difficult to tell what he is trying to say. Where he lacks in signs, he tries very hard with the spoken word.

Like he can't sign or say chicken. So he says "kawk!" As in the sound that chickens make! I don't even know how to spell it out :p

When in Auckland with Jude's mom and uncle PS, within 2 days he learned how to say "gong" and "ma" as in "ah gong" and "ah ma". Super cute! And he repeated it over and over and over again every chance he got, much to the delight of the old folks ;)

He learned the signs for rabbit, keys, apple, orange, socks, etc (etc because I can't even recall off the top of my head what other signs he knows now).

I love love love the way he repeats after us when he is trying to learn a new word and each time he is able to make it sound a little bit more like the real thing instead of just babbling. It is so cute to see him work so hard to sound out the words and the look of pride and satisfaction on his face when he gets it is so lovely to see.

Oh and a couple of weeks ago, at the dinner table, we were having our post-dinner fruits and we were feeding him some mandarin oranges. Each time he wanted more, he would sign "more" and occasionally say "more" at the same time, or he would sign "orange". Out of the blue, he signed "more" and "orange" consecutively, forming a 2-word sentence with his hand signs. I was completely stunned. As was his papa. We were not expecting our little 15 month old baby/toddler to be able to construct and communicate in 2-word sentences so soon! Everything we've read about early childhood development tells us that this doesn't happen until much much much later. Colour me surprised! He makes me so proud :) And the pride is amplified a million times by the very fact that I know he is learning mostly from me and his papa, not anyone else. So we must be doing something right on our fumbling journey through parenthood thus far :)

I absolutely love being with him and spending time with him (most of the time) because he is such a joy to communicate with and hang out with (again, most of the time). I believe it is because we have set up our relationship such that communication is important and respected within our family. When he whines, I know it's because he needs something. A bit of attention from mommy, some food to eat, water, a diaper change, some cuddles, a walk outside in the fresh air, or a nap. Sometimes it's one of those things, sometimes it's all of it. It takes some effort and can be tough sometimes, but I make it an effort to get down to his level and give him my full attention whenever I can when he starts whining. It usually prevents a full-blown tantrum and really helps to calm him down very quickly.

I love how when he sees something that he wants but we say no, that he can't have it for xxx reasons, he would accept it and walk away, without seeing the need to whine and beg and scream and throw and hissy fit to try and get what he wants. Our persistence and determination in being constant and unwavering in what we say is paying off now :)

I love how when we are out for our walks or simply standing at the window and looking out at the lake, I can see exactly what he is seeing and know what he is looking at when he turns back to me to tell me about what he sees. Sometimes he sees a bird fly by. Or he hears the crow squawking. And he turns to me and signs "bird". Or he hears a baby cry, or sees the baby food packaging on the shelf at the supermarket with a baby on the box and he signs "baby" to me.

It is so incredibly fascinating to have that window into his mind to know exactly what he sees in his surroundings since I've always thought to myself that the world through a child's eyes must be so different from the one I see and the things I take for granted around me everyday could hold a mysterious power over a child's attention. Like I might feel irritated when the bird chirps outside our window. But for Xander, it's fascinating to hear the birds singing! I've always wanted to be able to take a glimpse at our world from a child's perspective, and now I've got it. It's so precious :)

Speaking of singing, this past month, he has developed a real love for nursery rhymes and songs and such that I sing to him. Especially the ones that I can make up actions for him to take part in. His favorites are:
- I'm a little teabag
- Row row row your boat - which he calls "row row" with the r sounding like a w, and when I say "if you see a crocodile, don't forget to scream" he say "ahhh!"
- The wheels on the bus - which he calls "bump bump bump" because the last verse I usually sing to him is "the children on the bus go bump bump bump" and I bounce him on my knee. He also swings his arms open and shut with the "doors on the bus swing open and shut" and sways his arms side to side with the "wipers on the bus go swish swish swish".

Sometimes I catch him humming random tunes to himself and swaying from side to side or "dancing" on his own. Or when he notices that his daddy is singing or humming to himself, he would quietly observe and start humming on his own too. It's so darn cute to watch :)

We are almost ready for potty training for real I think. A few weeks ago he started to sign "poop" to me after he has pooped and we would go clean him up and change his diaper. More recently, he is starting to sign "poop" just before he actually poops. A few times I wanted to change his diaper and he protested loudly - "no no no no no!" and then signed "poop" to me. Meaning "don't change my diaper yet! I still wanna poop!" And when he is done, he signs "poop" and says "diaper" to me. If that is not an indication that he is approaching readiness for proper toilet training, I don't know what is.

To be honest, I'm dreading it. I know I shouldn't dread it because he would pick up on my underlying emotions and tension surrounding it and it'll make it harder but I can't help it! This may sound weird, especially since we are using cloth diapers, but diapers are so much easier to handle than a toilet trained toddler! It's easier to change his diapers when it suits me (like after I'm done cooking or after I'm done showering), than to have to drop everything like a hotcake to rush to the toilet before he can have an accident when he says he needs to go. Know what I mean? Sigh. Just one of those things we have to go through as parents and I know that at the end of it all, it'll be much easier when he's 100% toilet trained. It'll just take some time and I don't intend to rush it, but to just go with the flow. So to speak. We'll see. Montessori philosophies tell us that children reach their natural sensitive period of potty learning between 18 to 24 months of age. Before this, they are usually not ready. And after this, it will usually be harder to start. So I guess we can run but we can't hide for much longer.

Molars. One day in the midst of our Auckland holiday, I looked into his mouth and spotted 2 upper molars. Just like that. The gums around it were swollen and I saw some slight bleeding, but he was just a tad bit more fussy than usual, which could have been the travelling that we did too. Shocking. And funny thing is that now he has 4 front teeth, and 2 of the upper molars, with the 2 "tiger teeth" (as we Chinese like to call it) missing. But so far, he has the straightest teeth EVER. Seriously, they are straight and gapless. I'm jealous. And happy!

Oh my. I still have so much I wanna write about but I really really need to get started on my assignment, which is due in 6 days.

Let's just end this post by saying that 16 months is challenging, but so much so much fun. Every challenge pays off sooner or later and we are seeing evidence of that now. All the effort we've put in in the last year or so is starting to really pay off. Hopefully this trend continues. Many people tell us that we are so lucky to have such an easy child who would listen to us and all that. But I will always say, lucky? Not so much. Maybe a little. But all this is a result of ALOT of hard work and tears and self-doubt and perseverance. We didn't just get here by chance, we worked really hard to make sure we got here. Not much is left to chance and "nature"... Nurture plays a big part too. I love the friendly, confident, thoughtful, empathic, and charming little boy that he is turning out to be, and I'm so incredibly grateful that he's my son.

 

Learning how to tumble...

Giggles with mama...

Busy busy busy little bumble bee...

New shoes!

Nursing...

Big boy at the park

Xander & Papa

Xander and Mama...

Xander and Claireen...

Sleeping beauty...

For the love of reading...

Little puppy dog.

Early bird...

At Lake Pupuke in Auckland...

And just because...

This month's videos:













I love you, little man. Happy 16 months to all of us <3