Can I hear an Amen?!

Andrew is now heavy enough to trigger the bathroom scale on his own. He apparently weighs in at 25 pounds. He only weighed 24 pounds when I weighed him with me and calculated the difference. So.. he must weigh somewhere between 24-25 pounds.

Andrew is 17 months old today.. but the size of a two year old. He's so tall and lean! People are always surprised when they hear how young he is for his size.. I guess like how surprised I am at how old some tiny kids are! I'll think they're six months old and they're 9 months! Anyway, a lot of his size 18 month clothes are too small or too short now. So I guess we're full on into the 24 month and 2T sizes.

He is saying: up, down, out, off, on : very well when he enunciates.

He is very smart, but still a sucker for bribery. He LOVES being outside and touching the tires on the car and garbage can, running in the backyard to touch the trees, and climbing on anything and everything. I love it. But sometimes.. I just need to go inside and he will arch his back and twist and turn and yell if I try to take him inside. The easiest way to get him in is ask, "Do you want to go inside and get a snack?" And it's a sure thing if you ask him if he'd like to watch one of his videos.

The same with the toilet. He'll tell me no he doesn't want to go sit on the toilet. But if I remind him that he gets chocolate if he sits on the toilet - it surprises me how often he'll run to the bathroom and try to get the seat onto the toilet. And, as soon as he sits on the seat he points to the bag of chocolate. He knows the deal! Getting more chocolate doesn't always entice him to go pee or poop though. Sometimes, but not always. It's a start.

He seems so fearless to me. He'll be playing by himself someplace, and randomly stand up and just fall straight backwards. He doesn't hit his head or get hurt.. but its strange to see. Other times he just falls back but sits down hard. Put a pillow in front of him or place him on our bed and he'll just fall flat on his face. We put a stack of pillows on the floor tonight and he fell into them and then continued to head butt them over and over again. He still prefers to go down the slide head first too. I have also caught him a couple of times debating whether or not to drive his firetruck down the stairs. Despite his fearlessness while he's playing.. it impresses me that he is so careful when it comes to going down steps on foot. I just love him.

I think it is neat that when he is watching one of his reading videos, he will also sign the words he has signs for. This morning, we were playing with his little activity station on the Spanish setting. He was very interested in the A and the Spanish equivalent of "Ah" but I noticed he was starting to raise his arm in the air thinking it was perhaps saying 'up' instead. (you know how if you can't hear it perfectly clearly your brain tries to find a word you know and then that is what you think you hear?) So I sat and corrected him over and over again by repeating it correctly. Soon he got it. Later in the day he pressed the letter A again and then turned to me and said, "Ah" so he did remember! And when he is listening to Muzzy in Spanish, he repeats some of the numbers. I think ten, Diez, is his favorite to say - he says it with great authority. And he can hold up one finger when you ask for one, and five when you ask for five fingers. He's been quietly practicing three fingers on his own but hasn't shown me that yet.

I asked Nana if there was anything I should add to the blog. This is what she said, "I find it amusing that when we read books...he likes to point at the words and have ME read them...just as we do with him. He will go back and forth between two or three...as if he were testing me." And it is true, he does that with me too. Other times he points to each word in order, and sometimes he takes my finger and makes me point to each word. He will get stuck on a couple of words, though, and just go back and forth between them. Personally, I think he's just storing them in that brain of his and apparently he can learn two words at a time.

He is SO well behaved when we are out and about. I hope that never changes. Earlier this week I had a business lunch to attend and invited Nana to sit at a different table with Andrew and have lunch at the same place. It took an hour and a half and he was so good. Even the waiter told me how good my little boy was! I love that I dont have to worry about taking him places. Sure, he has his moments where he wants to bang his sippy cup on the table or smear the food or squish it. And he is very adamant and persistent when he is telling you he is done and wants down. Yet - I usually can reason with him or explain to him the situation, or at least distract him with something else until I am done too.

A new kids consignment store opened in town today! I was too excited not to go. The store is super cute and had so many great toys and nice clothing at very reasonable prices. Andrew about rearranged the place. I think he played with EVERY single toy!! They said they didn't mind so I didn't worry about it. I did pick up a few t-shirts and a pair of shorts for him. He only had I think two shirts and one pair of shorts that match nothing for the warm weather coming. But I also bought him a Kawasaki toy four wheeler that actually works. You plug it in to charge it, and then just get on and press a red button to go. It took him about two minutes to really figure out the button pressing thing, but he seemed to like it. He's growing up so fast!

We decided to try a one nap schedule today. Yesterday he had a shorter morning nap, was ready for his afternoon nap after a couple of hours of running errands - but for some reason wouldn't fall asleep. He was in his crib laughing and giggling and rolling around for half an hour before deciding he wanted out. Then we had meeting so he was actually awake until 10:30pm! Today he slept in until 7:40am and then I wasn't able to get him down at the time he started getting tired because we went to lunch with Papa and Nana, but he napped between 2 and 2-1/2 hours this afternoon and was ready for bed half an hour earlier than usual. We'll see when he wakes up in the morning. But I think he is showing signs of being ready for one nap a day. I'll try it I guess. I will miss those mornings when I'm not working and would be able to take a nap at 9:30 myself.

He walks around laughing.. which is hysterical. I have no idea what is so funny when he does that. Guess he's just practicing laughs until he finds one he likes.

Whenever Flash is outside at the door crying to come in - Andrew points and runs to the door whispering "Tat" and sometimes doing the sign for Cat.

At the table, when I tell him we're going to talk to Jehovah and pray, he often makes a fist and rolls it forward so his knuckles touch the table and holds it there until the prayer is over. He wont hold my hand but I have my fist rolled over the edge of his table so I think he's just trying to imitate me. ? Oh, and he says, "Ho" for Jehovah. We're still working on an Amen. He says something, but it doesn't sound like anything in particular or recognizable.