21 Months Old

Ryan has developed a lot in the past month! This picture is of him showing off his daycare crafts--red, white, and blue stars on a string, and an "ice keam cone" made of cotton balls and glitter. He is into "pretending" and let's just say he has some suspicious pink glitter lips after the ride home from daycare.

Ryan continues to talk non-stop and repeat almost anything you say. A development this month is the implementation of many unprompted phrases, including some three-word phrases, including:

• Mommy do it. (Wanting me to hit the ball so he can field it)
• Read a book.
• Thank-you, Mommy.
• I love you, Milo (giving Abbie's dog a hug)
• See you later.
• Bad Dog, Nika,
• Nika, Get Down
• Nika, Go Outside. (sensing a theme?)

Here are some other memorable phrases:

• No matter how hard we correct him, he says "Uncle Abbie" but he knows that Abbie and "Weed" belong with Milo.
• He points to his ear and says "Bird", "Pickup", "Siren" or "Sunder" (thunder) when he hears these things.
• "Jellybeans" means "Strawberries"
• Before bed he runs down the list of necessities for going "nigh nigh" which include: "two my's" (because 1 pacifier is never enough), "banket", "puppy banket", "monkey", "Yi-no" (rhino).
• When watching or playing ball, he will comment with "Yay, Big Hit!" or "Try it agin" or "Oh, Miss!"

Ryan's interest in "singing" is sometimes quite comical. I've been teaching him "do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti, do" and he will often say the next one or two syllables but usually on one pitch and one volume (loud) and then flies off with a string of mi-so-ah-la-do-so-ti-do or some gibberish. His favorites are "mi" and "fa". He laughs when I sing "Wheels on the bus" but doesn't really join in. He has heard enough of "Jesus Loves Me" that when I start the song, he jumps in with "Bible say so" and will repeat an enthusiast "YES!" with a fist pump on the "Yes, Jesus Love Me" chorus.

Ryan still loves reading books and now likes it when you ask him to find something. When you say "where is the blue car?" he'll make an "oh" shape with his mouth and shake his head back and forth like he's scanning the pages back and forth dramatically. Then he'll slam his whole hand on the object and announce "foun' it!"

A comical happening this month was watching Ryan walk Nika on her leash. When we ask if he wants to go on a stroller ride, he says "Nika leash" because he wants Nika to go along too. The other night we let him actually hold the leash and walk behind her, trying to control her with LOUD commands of "Nika, heal!", "Nika, pull!" and "Nika, sidewalk!" Sometimes he got going a little too fast and wiped out, but it just added to his growing collection of skinned knees and scraped palms.

We are glad that Ryan has taken the upheaval of the past few weeks very well. He never really acted concerned about all the boxes piling up around him and has taken well to sleeping at Grandpa and Grandma's house while we wait to close on our new house. We are grateful for such an adaptable kid. Today is his last day at his daycare in our old town. I am sad he has to leave that place because they did such a great job and he had a lot of fun with his "fends" and his teachers, whom he would name off: Dee, Marvella ("Marbella"), Janet, Paula, and he's probably saying a few other names that I can't interpret. He loved doing crafts and they were great about teaching him "please" and "thank you" and how to drink out of a cup. My solace is that if we were going to make a move, it's better to do it now when he's too young to have established friends that he will miss too much. Plus, I have an in-home daycare lined up for this school year that I am very excited about and think he will have a great time.

Thanks to all of our family and friends who have been such great support to Ryan in his first 21 months!