18 months

My little Champs, who seemed like such a baby still on his 1st bday six months ago, seems like a total toddler now at 18 months!  A whole YEAR AND A HALF - it's crazy to believe it's been that long since we brought him into this world and then at the same time I can't remember what life was like before him!

At 18 months Champs is full of personality and has such a love for life and exploring new things.  He is a sweet, happy, very funny boy who also has several toddler tantrums daily about the most ridiculous things imaginable such as me not letting him hold a Sharpie or go out the front door without me.  Life can be so hard at this age :)

I think I said this last month too, but he really knows his people now.  He names all of his classmates and knows all his family's names including grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins.  He really talks so much.  It's all still single words for the most part, but he is constantly talking and loves learning new words.  He listens to everything we say and will repeat it all the time.

Some of his favorite things these days:
 - Sammy his huge monkey that now stays in his crib b/c he loves sleeping on him!

- TRUCKS!  Mostly he loves talking about dump trucks and dig-digs (Digger trucks)
- MILK - I swear he could drink a gallon a day if I'd let him.
- Sliding & swinging (after a long hiatus of not liking to swing anymore!)
- Sitting in chairs - both his little chairs and big people chairs
- Climbing - He climbs on everything now!!  Turn your head for one second and he'll be up on a chair or the bed or all the way up the stairs!
- Mommy!  I mean can ya blame him!? ;)  He is actually very obsessed with Daddy too, but likes Mommy near at all times and sometimes just has to have Mommy holding him!  I will be so sad when this ends!

Decoding the Champs language:
- Ba-BLE: Loves his bubble baths and wants the water running the whole time.  We have to let it get all the way to the top and then finally cut it off when there's no room left.  If we try to turn the water off early he does the sign language for "please" and "more" and says "wa-er" (Water)
- Pooma = spoon No matter how many times I say spoon, he calls is pooma
- Dig-dig = digger truck
- Man = any little figure that goes along with the trucks that he has.  I think we originally called them the "little man" so he now calls all of them man except for this one girl that came with a boat for the bath who's in a string bikini (weird!) and he calls her "girl"
- Tees = Keys  And he is obsessed with keys
- Pone = phone Equally obsessed
- Da-eee = Daddy
- Buberry = blueberry
- Monk = if you read this blog you know this is his beloved monkey lovey
- Pa-eee = Paci
- Snap = he says this all the time b/c of a book they read at school about alligators going "snap" with the motion of a chomp of their mouth haha
- A-mal = Animal and he wants to watch a Baby Einstein video of either "wheels on the bus" or "old macdonald had a farm"

Gosh there are so many more funny things he says that only we would probably know what he's talking about.  I'll come back and add a few more as I think of them b/c I know these are the things I'll love coming back and reading when he's older and talking in full sentences!

We had his 18mo well check today and he weighed 26.5 pounds (70%) and is 34 inches (90%).

I am holding on tight to these next 6 months because I know starting at 2 he will be so much more of a big boy and I am just not ready to lose the baby stage yet!!  This morning for example, he was sitting beside me on the sofa, wearing his Firehouse Subs fireman hat, holding my hand while we read a book. It was one of those "relish it" moments that I know will be gone all too soon.

I love my baby boy with all my heart!