22 months old

22 months old

I didn't manage a 21 month post before I went into the hospital and it's driving me nuts but I'm not going to let that screw up my remaining month updates. Also, I went almost 3 weeks without seeing B so pictures this month obviously didn't happen. These instapics will mostly be from his 21st month.



Sleep: I have something new to write here! Barrett has moved to a big boy bed when we travel to my parents. Since he lived there most of the month of July, you could say he permanently moved to the big bed but no way am I taking away his crib at home if he's still sleeping good in it. We had basically zero issues with the change. At first, we tried laying with him but that just makes him want to move around. If we leave him just like we would if he was in his crib, he's quick to sleep. My parents did have issues with very early wake ups on occasion but I think that had more to do with his schedule being completely rocked while he lived with them. Naps are, for the most part, the same and predictable.



Food: Barrett is what I would consider an okay eater. I've noticed that it's not that he's picky about his food, it's that he wants to know what he's eating. So unless he recognizes it, he likely won't eat it. Vegetables are touch and go. Also, I've learned that if we ask him to eat something, it makes him even less likely to eat it. If we just give him the food and let him sit there for long enough, he will usually try it.



Words: This is the biggie this month. Kid is a chatterbox. He is talking non.stop. It's probably more pronounced for me since I didn't see him for 2 weeks but it's insane how much he's talking. I try to keep a list going on my phone of new words but these are just a few of the stuff he's saying these days. This doesn't count all the words he says to repeat after us.



He says most of what I'll refer to as "good manner words" such as Thank you, Please, and his favorites, Excuse me and Bless you. Don't get me wrong, he doesn't use these all the time but he uses them. "Bless you" is probably my favorite. It can't get any cuter than hearing a toddler say it after you sneeze. Another big thing this month is him calling people by their names. He's very attached to our families and calls them all by their names. My parents, sisters and brother in laws came down on Sunday to celebrate my birthday and as each of them walked in the door, he had to say Hi Grandpa, Hi Grandma, Hi Rachel, Hi Oreck, etc. Saying hi followed by a persons name is huge right now. We can't get through a meal at the table without him saying Hi 395729 times.



I've already mentioned that he has Mickey down pat and we've added Buzz, Woody (Wooly), Jake, Captain Hook and Princess to our tv/movie words. He asks for Mickey or Wooly about every 5 seconds. Remote (memote) is requested all the time. Sigh. Barrett still loves animals and their noises and he's added birdy, rabbit, kangaroo and hedgehog to his vocabulary. I can thank "Does a Kangaroo have a Mother, too?" for a few of those. Other random words that he knows are "yum yum" when he eats something yummy, sucker, phone, and flip flops. One of my very favorite right now that he loves to say is "hiccup." At some point, he got the hiccups and it made others around him laugh so now he pretends to get the hiccups and does this weird cough thing followed with him saying "hiccup." It's so funny.



B is excellent at grouping 2 and 3 words together as well. One of his most used phrases is "I did it!" He also says "There it is" with a very excited tone. This is usually used when someone asks where something is. He also says "I don't know." It's "Help you" instead of "Help me" when he needs assistance with something. Lastly, my very favorite word he uses is "button" but what he really says is "Butt." He points to the microwave all the time and says "Butt" as a request to push the buttons. It's something that is so him and makes me laugh. I hope he never learns the real word for button.



This month we hit another milestone in that his carseat was flipped from rear facing to forward facing. I was planning on keeping him rear facing until he was 2 (as recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics) but my parents got a car seat for their car while I was in the hospital and they installed it as forward facing. Apparently, they thought he was uncomfortable with his legs scrunched while rear facing. I'm really happy to have made it this far without switching him though. The few times I've ridden with him since switching he's been content as can be to look out the window which wasn't always the case so it's no big deal. Joe's car is still rear facing which is the car he's in to and from daycare so I guess he's still sort of rear facing.



Barrett also got a special new pair of shoes this month that he is obsessed with. He wants them on non-stop. He screams when we take them off so we usually let him wear them until bedtime. I had only packed a weekends worth of clothes when we went to Pontiac before I was admitted so 3 weeks later, he has a big increase in his wardrobe, thanks to Grandma. Let's not even talk about all the new toys he got. He is spoiled.



As you can imagine, it was a big shift in his schedule to go from daycare every day to staying with Grandma and Grandpa. It was a mixture of my parents, in laws, sisters, brother in laws, friends and neighbors who watched him at various times. He handled everything fantastically. I mean, who wouldn't love to have a pool, golf cart, unlimited toys, playdates and fun trips at your disposal. He got so much attention. My sisters took him to the fair to check out the animals. He had a few playdates with the Harms girls. I think he took 4+ cart rides a day. It was his own personal vacation. I cannot forget to mention that it was this month that Barrett got his first set of real golf clubs. My dad used to make his own and did so a ton when we were younger so he took an old set of ours from the attic and cut them down to size for him. I haven't witnessed him hitting them yet, other than in videos, but he pretty much refuses to use his plastic set now that he has the real deal.



Segueing from his little vacation, I'm sure you can imagine we've had to detox a bit which has been difficult. He asks for the TV a lot which hasn't gone over so well. I can't do much for him besides sit and watch tv so he's definitely watching more than his normal 30 minutes a day. He also wants to be outside all.the.time which I can't do so unless we have help, I can't accommodate his requests. He's also hitting and saying "No" more than I would like. I'm caulking it up to the detox, him being bored, and him reaching the new lovely age of 2. The first day we were home from the hospital, B was in timeout, I think, 4 times if that tells you anything. We also got our very first biting report at school. He's bit me maybe 3 times so I wouldn't call him a biter but he decided to take his first chomp on one of his classmates. We're hoping those notices will be few and far between.



Overall, he's such a fantastic kid. I can hardly believe he's almost 2!