Yesterday marked 18 months that Reed has been with us. We left him for the first time overnight last weekend and it was bizarre to be away from him for 24 hours. He is my companion all day, every day, and boy do I love him!
-Nearly every night we go into his room, take him out of his crib, and hold him. I finally convinced TJ (who was so worried about waking him) to hold him and now we're hooked. We take turns snuggling that sleeping boy every night before we go to bed, commenting to each other how much we LOVE this little boy, how sweet he is, and how full our hearts are to have him. It is a tender moment of every day.
-Reed has really taken to music in the past couple months. We have a little radio/CD player in the kitchen and almost every day while he's eating he points to it to ask us to turn it on.
-Reed has started dancing. :) His fanciest move is turning in a circle (slowly) but he also sways and bounces. Our favorite is his signature dance move: rolling his wrists. TJ texted me when he took Reed to an "introduction to the opera" a couple weeks ago and said that as soon as they entered and heard the orchestra Reed started "revving his engine." It is a funny thing to see both his hands raised, twisting in circles.
-I'm guessing we're at about six months now that his syrup containers are some of his most treasured toys. He's loved them long enough that we've gone through two, washed them, and turned them over to him to play with every day. He screws and unscrews them, bites the top part open, sticks things in them, and carries them around. He has a specific way of saying syrup ("gyup") and whenever we open the fridge he hollers "gyup!" and makes a beeline to grab the full one in the door. It was so fun to take him to Costco and show him a whole pallet of syrup bottles.
-Construction continues near our home and frequently he'll look at me and point to his ear to say he hears something. "What is it?" "Guk."
-This little guy loves trucks. I think it must be an innate love because we are not truck aficionados. :) On walks he points out trucks of all types, even recognizing that pick-up trucks are not the same as other cars.
-Now that Reed is a pretty capable walker, he's decided he should probably learn to walk up and down stairs. He is teaching himself by holding tightly to our banister and going up and down slowly. Given that it's probably the safest way to learn I let him practice, reminding him to please be careful!
-Reed is a vegetarian. He refuses meat (in all forms), even going so far as to spit out foods he loves if his dad has tried to hide minuscule amounts of meat in them. He won't eat eggs either. Foods he especially loves: black beans, roasted chickpeas, pumpkin seeds, pineapple, bananas (recently he's been holding the banana himself, which is about the greatest thing on the planet to him), apples, clementines, Cinnamon Chex, Cheerios, granola, Gogurts, cheese, and - thanks to his Grandpa Milar - candy corn and M&Ms. He still loves chocolate chips and points to their cupboard to request them.
-At 18 months he still loves to be swaddled. He sleeps with all four swaddle blankets each night (and in two layers of pajamas) and laughs contentedly when he has his binky in and gets wrapped in his swaddles each night.
-Reed takes one nap each day (he probably switched to one nap around 14 months old). We try to keep him awake until about noon, he naps until 2:30 or 3, then goes down for the night between 6:30 and 7:30. He almost always wakes us in the morning, sometime between 6:30 and 7:30 AM.
-Reed still continues to point to people as his greeting, often tilting his head onto his shoulder when he does.
-He is learning more words. He's excellent at truck and syrup and now knows (and says) Mom and Dad. He's great at saying baby and zoo, though he has no clue what a zoo is, as well as ball, pumpkin (ba), boat, and light.
-We love hearing Reed make animal noises. :) He's quite proficient at lion, duck (which sounds the same as lion - vicious things), cat, dog, cow, horse, seagull, velociraptor twins :), and chicken. They're basically all darling.
-One day when Reed was about 17 months old I randomly asked him, "Reed, can you smile? Show me how you smile?" I was thrilled, delighted, surprised to see him grin right back at me! On TJ's birthday I grabbed out the actual camera for pictures and Reed sauntered over, tapped it, and smiled at me. :) We love when we capture his cheesy grin.
-Reed is learning more body parts. He knows nose, tongue (sticks it out), teeth (chomps them together), fingers, toes, and hair. It's fun to see him pick up on more and more.
-This little guy still loves to read, which is fabulous. We read lots of books together and it's amazing to get glimpses of how much he understands! There are several books that he will call out lines to before we turn the page. A few that come to mind: saying "Stop!" in Little Red and the Very Hungry Lion, saying "bomp bomp" for the velociraptor twins in Dinosaur Dance, saying "bow" in Barnyard Dance, saying "strong" and "cold" in Sandra Boynton's Opposites. There are times he'll make a noise in a book that we didn't even know he knew and we'll test him (by reading it over and over) to see if he's really quoting the book. :) A fun discovery when he is.
-When TJ leaves each morning Reed gives him kisses (either blows him kisses or just kisses the air, usually) so now when I tell Reed, "Okay, Bug, time to go!" he'll start blowing kisses. :)
-Reed absolutely adores our next door neighbors. We are devastated they are moving next month, but no one will be more so than Reed, when he realizes that Jodi (the mom) is no longer behind the door he pounds on so often. He loves loves loves Jodi.
-Reed made the cutest dinosaur in all the land for Halloween. The first time he tried his costume he sobbed. On Halloween I told him, "Time to put on your costume. Hold still and we'll go see Jodi." He held still, no tears, and kept his costume on happily! We took him to Jodi's, Nana and Papa's, and Grandma and Grandpa's for his debut trick-or-treating.
-We try not to focus on them, but he is starting to throw more tantrums! It's tough to have an opinion and wants and no way to clearly communicate them. Sometimes we are flabbergasted trying to figure out what on earth he wants (while other times we understand completely the answer is still no, ha!) It is interesting to try to reason with a toddler. We have a lot to learn!
-Reed provides entertainment for a good chunk of the congregation at church each week. He and I sit on the front row on one side of the chapel and I let him walk around our bench. He also does laps up and down the wheelchair ramp and goes to visit TJ on the stand, sometimes 4 or 6 or 8 times during Sacrament meeting. Church currently starts at 1 - right during his nap - so he usually eats lunch during Sacrament meeting and by the time we get home he and I are both exhausted!
-If we ask Reed to sing he will (quietly). If he sees someone conducting music he also waves his arms. If I play the piano it's a battle for the keys and recently he's started just pulling the lid closed while I play. Oh boy.
-Often when something is missing around the house I'll tell Reed, "Call it. 'Binky!'" and we walk around the house looking for the item. This means that now when I say, "Let's call Dad," Reed responds by yelling, "Dad!" :)
-The other day at the grocery store I said, "Okay - we've got our produce, let's go get some chicken," to which Reed immediately responded, "Boh, boh!"
-At the grocery store Reed has gotten quite good at putting items on the conveyor belt at the checkout stand. It's probably my favorite part of grocery shopping. He's also VERY particular about wanting certain items right next to him on the little bench in the cart (chocolate milk always has a spot by him) and he frequently insists on holding items for a few minutes before they go into the cart.
-Reed continues to be a big time observer. He frequently just stands and watches others interact or play (even kids). He is recently starting to sometimes play also, but often he just likes to watch. I also see this in how he "plays" with things - he stays busy and he enjoys himself, but he is often studying things out and figuring out just how they work.
-When we have a prayer we ask Reed to fold his arms and he clasps his little hands together in such an endearing way. Sometimes it's his turn to say it, but so far he doesn't repeat anything we say. :)
Okay - I'm sure there are a million more things I will wish I recorded, but that's a good brain dump for now. Maybe I'll come add more as I think of it, but as I read back on past posts about him I'm just so grateful for all I have written (because I already have forgotten things!)
Broken record though I may be, I am absolutely, completely in love with this boy. It has been a bit hard to realize he's a little boy now and not just a baby, but he is still my baby and I love him more today than even the day he was born. We feel lucky, lucky, lucky to have this boy in our lives. I love you, Reed Baby!
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