We're now trying to figure out how BB learns best....he's not the easiest kid to teach!  Anything dealing with us directing his arms is a no -no.  I have been trying to do head, shoulders knees and toes (and other body parts) and as soon as you try to guide his hands to the correct body part, he wriggles his hands away.  Same with teaching him how to sign.  He still has very limited amount of signs because he basically just learns what he feels like learning.  But if it interests him, he will pick it up very quickly.  He learned to sign "light" after just showing him a few times.  Meanwhile signs like thank you and please he has yet to even try even though we've been doing them forever.  He learned where his belly was after just a few times (he's obsessed with bellies...he always wants to lift our shirts to press our belly buttons).

We have a very hard time showing him things because he gets really frustrated if he can't do something, but he will get mad if we try to help him (he'll pull our hands away).  Same with reading.  He loves to flip through the books by himself.  But if we try to read to him, he'll pry our hands away so that he can turn the pages and then it's impossible to read to him.  I usually end up reading from across the room up on the sofa so he can't reach the book.  Not exactly the cuddly story time I was imagining.

Some of my coworkers kids were like this as well at BB's age and beyond.  I think they called it "independent" (and then followed that description with an eye roll and some sort of exasperated exclamation).  One of them told me how her daughter had woken up in the middle of the night and mom went into bed with the daughter to try to soothe her back to sleep.  And then her daughter told her, "mommy, please go away....I'm trying to go back to sleep".  hahahaha.  I laughed when she told me that.  Until later the next morning when Tyler woke up early and we brought him into bed with us because we weren't ready to wake up.  I was patting him back to sleep when I feel a tiny hand curl around my hand and push it away! 

I do have to say that his learning style reminds me a lot of myself.  I have always excelled in classes that I found interesting and have been mediocre in the classes that I found boring.  There was nothing that would motivate me to study for my boring classes.  And my parents used to bring us into bed with them on the weekends when we were little.  I remember always fighting them off because all I wanted to do was sleep in my own bed.  My mom always said that I was a tough kid to raise.  I guess what goes around comes around!

Although BB has been a toddler for one whole month , he was still a baby to us.  At 12 months, he could walk across the room without falling, but he was no where near steady and would fall all the time.  He crawled most of the time still unless he was holding onto our hands.  As the weeks went by, he built up more and more confidence and now he walks all the time.  He's relatively steady (he won't be a fantastic walking for a few more months) and can turn and change directions while he walks.   He can also bend down and pick something up without toppling over.

So today, I decided to go to the local shopping center to run some errands and let him walk with me like a big boy.  I didn't use a stroller and although I did leave a carrier in the car just in case, I didn't use it.  It was, uh, interesting. The post office was a little challenging because I had to let go of him to write the address on my package.  He is just tall enough to reach the little slips the keep underneath the table (like the delivery confirmation, express mail, customs forms etc) so he kept trying to pull them out.  I tried to pin him in the corner with my legs, but he kept getting loose and he's not the greatest listener right now, so I kept having to drag him back over.  Luckily, some customers came in and he was too preoccupied with staring at them to run away (he is the world's biggest starer).

Then off to Old Navy to return his shoes.  I forgot that there may be a line, which there was.  I also noticed for the first time that they have shopping carts at Old Navy.  I guess I never thought to look when I had BB in a stroller.  BB was mesmerized by the mannequin dog they had on display and we stood there a good 15 minutes as he stood there petting it and panting.  Finally, I had to carry him away to wait in line.  It wasn't too long, but there were only 2 cashiers.  I let go of BB's hand hoping that he would just stand there and stare at the sweaters in front of his face.  No.  First he tried pulling the sweaters through the holes in the metal rack.  Then he spotted an abandoned cart and pushed it into the racks.  Finally, I carried him in line.  Once it was my turn, I put him down and luckily there are floor to ceiling windows right next to the cash registers, so he just stood there staring out the windows.

Last stop was Borders.  He loves Borders.  We stopped by the sales section and he sat very nicely flipping through a few kiddie books.  There was a mini tantrum as I carried him up the stairs since he wanted to crawl up by himself.  He cried all the way to the kiddie section.  He stopped as soon as he saw all the toys and kiddie books.  He spotted an 18 month old and tried to be friends with him...and even went over to the other kid's mom, opened up the book on her lap and basically demanded that she read it to him.  I sat right next to them just in case she decided to kidnap my very bossy 13 month old hahaha.  Then he pooped.  I was like NO NO NO.  Somehow I've been lucky and he's never pooped in public while I was alone with him.  So I had to take him to the ladies room and use that flip down changing table. yech.  When I got back to the kiddie section, the books I planned on buying were gone.  I guess they put them back.  I didn't feel like searching for them again, so we just went home.

I learned a few things from today.  First, pack a light diaper bag.  I'm an overpacking and my shoulder was killing me.  I normally just strap it to the stroller so I never really noticed how heavy it was.  If I plan on playing and buying, play first, then buy.  I was carrying those 3 books around while trying to direct BB and those 3 books became very cumbersome.  Lastly, have fun watching BB explore new things, even if it means constantly trying to stop him from messing up store displays and from sticking things in his mouth (why does he still do this?!)

I feel like I've become such a bad blogger.  Quick updates are so much easier on facebook.  Plus I haven't had much time lately.  Life with a toddler means no time to sit down!  BB is pretty good at playing by himself, so technically I could blog, but this crazy kid is into everything and trying to reach for things that I once thought was out of his reach (but is now totally within reach).  He skipped his afternoon nap today so I was able to put him down earlier today (hence the time to blog)!

He is pretty stable on his feet and walks the majority of the time.  He loves carrying his halloween bucket while he's walking around.  We switched his shoes to Rileyroos and we love them.  They still have the leather sole, but they have rubber pads sewn into the bottom to make them non-slip and to protect his feet a little more when it gets wet.  It's the best of both worlds, a soft soled shoe combined with a sneaker.  It's sort of like Robeez with 3 rubber pads on the bottom.

He spends most of his time walking in big circles around our living room holding onto one of his stuffed animals.  He has grown VERY attached to them.  He munches on them and they are damp and they STINK.  I feel like we are constantly washing them.  Luckily, he doesn't really care which animal he has...as long as they fit the general size and floppiness requirement.  So we have a 3 animal rotation.  They are pretty sad looking now...so we may have to replace them.  He will not sleep without one and when he's distressed, he looks around for them.  We introduced them so that if he woke up at night, he wouldn't feel lonely.  I think it helped, but now we have to make sure we always have one with us when we go anywhere.  Eh, it's okay...there are worse habits to be had!  (Plus Mama Bear had a lovey for a REALLY long time when I was younger too and I turned out okay hahaha).

We're starting to really try to sign with him more consistently.  He can learn them pretty fast, but he has to be coaxed to use them.  Usually he just points/reaches and whines.  But when asked, he can sign: more, eat, all done, fish, dog/flower (we do panting and sniffing respectively, which I guess to him sounds the same so he pants for both), bath, up, so big, and he can point to a couple of body parts.

I'm really trying to decipher his babbling.  There are a few sounds that he says all the time and I still have no idea what he's saying.  So far, we have: mama, baba, ball, bottle (which is also baba) and we think he's trying to say Tyler (he says, "dye der").  He does clearly try to imitate what we say, which is cute, especially when the word is long.  Then it's just a bunch of random sounds with 1 correct sound among them.  I was saying "refrigerator" and I hear bahehJERmababa.

The terrible two's are getting worse.  Sigh.  If you even steer him away from something he wants, he'll produce this "EHHHHHHHHHHHH" and collapse to the floor.  Then he'll either bounce back and forth in despair, slapping his hands on the ground in front of him, or sometimes he'll stay standing and bounce up and down as he wails.  In the beginning I would sort of panic and try to soothe him, but that got old pretty quickly.  So now I just make sure he won't somehow smack his head on anything and then I ignore, ignore, ignore.  Taking anything out of his hands is an automatic tantrum.

We have sort of taught him to know that we don't want him touching anything.  PB took it from Ceasar the dog whisperer...when he makes a sound to distract the dog from doing something bad.  I know, it sounds bad that we're training him like a dog, but it works.  PB came up with a very annoying, "EH EH" sound that he'll do right when BB starts to do something bad.  Usually it'll startle BB enough to look our way and then we'll do the Supernanny kneel to his level and explain why it's bad.  Usually we have to combine that with physically removing him from the area.  So now, when we say, "eh eh," he'll draw his hand back from whatever he was reaching for....usually (but it's quickly becoming only sometimes!!!)

He is quite a daring little boy.  He can go up and down the stairs with no problem.  We let him go down the slides by himself at the playground by teaching him to turn around and go feet first on his belly (he still hasn't mastered how to remain upright the entire way down).  Yesterday, our sitter told us that he started out feet first on the biggest, spiral slide in the playground and when she ran down to the bottom to meet him, he had turned around and decided to go head first on his belly!  (The slides in the playground all have an extended flat section at the bottom, so there's no way he can fall on the ground).  When we push him on the swing, he always wants to go higher.  We push him pretty high and he loves it. (Always a tantrum now when we take him out). Same with being thrown in the air.  The boy is nuts.  He isn't afraid of any animal despite not having any in the house.  He will pet any dog or cat he sees no matter how big.  I'm trying to convince PB to get a small dog, but he's not a pet lover.  Boooo!

Mealtimes have become a nightmare.  He HATES the highchair now and will not sit in it.  So we put him in the Summer Stage infant seat (now turned booster) and it's a little better, but EVERYTHING is thrown on the floor and he won't let you feed him yourself.  The only time he eats well is if he's up and walking around and you kind of feed him as he plays.  We didn't want to make that a habit, so we force him to sit in the booster seat and it's like an hour long  production each meal...usually with a lot of crying and tantrums.  You literally have to entertain him the entire time for him to eat anything.  A little bait and switch is usually needed, but he's catching on now and will look carefully at what's coming his way.  If it's not something he likes, he clamps his mouth shut.

On the flip side, he loves bathtime and will even tolerate having his hair washed.  We just run the shower over his head and he sort of gasps and rubs his eyes and no crying!  We set up a suction bball hoop in our tub that he just loves.  It fixed the whole standing up thing since he's too busy slam dunking the balls.  Usually there is a tantrum when we take him out.  He loves playing with his um...privates during the bath hahahaha.

We have him on soy milk with a tiny bit of formula right now.  He didn't do well with whole and 2% milk because he would get really really constipated and then get a few days of diarrhea afterwards.  He seems to be doing okay with soy, but didn't really like the flavor right away, so we mixed it with formula and we're slowly taking the formula away.  He should be all soy by Friday.  We're going to try to see if maybe 1% milk may work better with him.  He's still on 3 bottles since we didn't want to introduce the soy and take away the bottles at the same time.  Once he's okay for a few days on all soy, we'll start switching to sippy cups for his milk in addition to the water sippy he already gets.

I can't believe how old he is now!  He definitely has his own personality now and is so so stubborn and headstrong.  His stranger anxiety is slowly starting to get a tiny bit better, but he needs some time to warm up first.  He has to watch from a distance before making up his mind!