growing by the minute: 18 months

This is a couple days late, but I wanted to wait until J's appointment late yesterday so I knew how he was fairing in the growth department. He took his 18-month needle like a champ, but gave the doctor the stink eye.

Vital stats: He's a growing boy at 32.5 inches tall (50th percentile), 26.5 lbs. (75th percentile) and a 20-inch head circumference (95th+ percentile).

Milestones and firsts: Using the potty! I didn't want to mention this too early, because I didn't want to jinx our progress, but J is on his way to self-potty-training. Don't even ask me why or how. At about 17 months, he started to tell us "I pee" or "I poop" and then he started heading to the bathroom and attempting to climb up on the toilet. So, before and after his baths, and when we'd change his clothes, we'd give him the opportunity to sit on his own potty. He doesn't like to use it with an audience, so we tell him to call for us when he's done, and when we return, he shows us that he used to potty. We've now started extending this experiment to include big-boy underwear. In the mornings and evenings during the week and on weekends at home, we let him wear his own underwear, and we remind him now and then to tell us if he has to go. So far, he's had just one accident. We aren't pushing him, since he's still young, but we are encouraging his self-directed process, and we have all of our fingers crossed!

Teeth: 11 ... possibly 12. It's hard to keep track which ones have cut through, but I'd say he'll have a few more within a month or two.

Speech: He's a motor mouth, that's for sure. And a parrot. He's willing and able to repeat just about everything we say, which means we've had to try especially hard to curb our curse words. After hearing our toddler say "oh shit" once, we learned to watch our language pretty quickly.

Zzzzzzz: Jacob is still a strong sleeper, taking a nap each day around lunchtime for about two hours and sleeping from about 7 p.m. to 6 a.m. each night.

Om nom nom: He likes to tell you what he wants to eat, and nine times out of 10 that means "pizza" but that doesn't mean that's what he's going to get. Good try, buddy. Other frequent requests are cheese, cookie and cracker. He also loves to eat whole apples on his own and doesn't even want to give it up when it's down to the very last bit of core.


Likes: Balls are his absolute obsession, and have been for a long time, to the point that we're thinking that his big-boy room should have a ball theme. He's also really enjoying Legos and blocks, building towers and knocking them down over and over. It's fun to watch him concentrate on his project and dissolve in a fit of laughter when the whole thing comes crashing down.

Dislikes: He really doesn't like it when you take something that he wants, like balls that he needs to leave at daycare at the end of the day. Since the weather has been nice, he also likes to cause a scene in the yard when it's time to go inside, yelling "outside! outside! outside!" until we carry him through the front door.

Looking forward to: A summer of fun in our big back yard and starting swimming lessons in two weeks.