Developmental Updates, 15-16 months old

April 25-May 24, 2010, 15-16 months old:
-started saying "baby" whenever he sees one.  This turned into calling anyone his size or smaller "baby".
-starting to run more often and running faster
-loved eating his buckwheat pancakes with a fork.  This started when he asked me for my fork.  I was surprised at how quickly he picked up this skill.
-we started weaning.  I hope to create a post specifically on our journey through weaning but for now I'll summarize and say that weaning was necessary.  I was too sick from my pregnancy to continue Ethan's allergen-free diet.  I NEEDED a cracker, toast, etc.
-he nursed one last time and now loves hemp milk
-ate hemp milk ice cream for the first time.  He made a confused face after the first bite but then loved it and asked for more.
-started eating Clif's Kids Organic Fruit Strips.  He loves them.  At first we peeled the twists apart or broke off small pieces for him but a few short weeks later he can handle the whole fruit strip on his own.
-started eating organic corn tortilla strips
-learned to blow on food to cool it down.  He touches it, says "hot", and knows to blow on it to cool it down!
-started pointing to his crib at the end of our bedtime routine.  We put him in completely awake, say "I love you" and "nighty-night" and he falls asleep on his own, very well.  This was huge for us b/c nursing made him drowsy at bedtime and we were concerned b/c there was no more nursing.
-fell in LOVE with watching Deal or No Deal.  He looks at the television and says "deal!"
-we stopped using a sound machine at night.  We used to use the Homemedics Sound Spa Lullaby set on rain every night, all night.  Matt forgot to put it on one night and Ethan didn't sleep any differently so we stopped using it. 
-he loves eating with utensils.  He eats applesauce and other pureed foods with a spoon very well.  He started to refuse to eat some vegetables such as carrots and green beans when they were steamed and cut up for him.  He gladly eats them pureed on his own so we continue to give him purees.  I know it sounds crazy to give a 16-month-old pureed food (especially one with 16 teeth!) but he's getting the vegetables he needs, mastering a new skill of using a spoon, and gaining confidence with this new skill.  It's a win-win!
-walks all over the house while kicking balls around
-started following a couple of two-step directions
-started saying "baskeeetball", especially during bath time when playing with a set similar to this.  He actually went through a stage where he hated bath time and this toy stopped the screaming and crying.
 -started engaging other children in play.  We still see parallel play during play dates but it's neat to see this social skill developing.  He tries to get other children to chase him, play peek-a-boo, and other games.
-started playing the "air piano" when he hears music.
-He loves to play outside.
-He mastered kicking balls (from golf balls to his big orange ball)

Practicing kicking/dribbling the ball. 

 Ethan's favorite game in May... Matt runs and kicks the ball while holding him.  Ethan gets to enjoy the game w/o doing any work.

Mastering using utensils

Cuddle time with Momma when I wasn't feeling well.













 He still enjoys his toy piano when he's not playing the "air piano".

 First hemp milk ice cream treat

 

12-13 months

I decided to break Ethan's development recap into one month rather than two this time since he's met so many milestones/had so many firsts over the past few weeks.

-We started off with his first stomach bug after his first birthday party :( He was quite a trooper through it all. He was hesitant to eat for a few days afterward. He only nursed and ate apple sauce for about two days. My poor baby.

-He started a phase where he loves to push buttons (including mine). If a toy has a button to push, he finds it, although his favorite buttons are on the DVD player.

{This is the Little People School Bus. Thanks Emily, John, and Brynne! He loves to push the driver's head and make the bus honk or sing.}

-We witnessed his first attempted to feed himself with a spoon. We're continuing to work on this skill.

-He learned the twinkling hand motions for "Twinke, Twinkle Little Star". He does it when you ask him to get his twinklers out.

-Ethan started stacking blocks



-He experienced more snow! 22 inches on Feb 6th and about 12 more inches on Feb 10th.









We have a great video of him laughing at Matt throwing snowballs at the storm door. I need to figure out how to upload videos to a post or upload it to our youtube page soon!

-He went bowling for the first time at his cousin Scotty's 4th birthday party


{See our ball way down there next to the gutter?}



-He went through a stage where he wanted to use his pacifier more during the day and I think it was prompted by teething. We try to limit pacifier use to naptime and bedtime.

-Speaking of teething, his Upper Left Cuspid, Upper Right Cuspid, Lower Left First Molar, and Lower Right First Molar broke through... All in a 4 week time span. The Cuspids tips have broken through but they haven't come in completely yet. It seems those are taking forever compared to his other teeth.

-His language development is progressing. He continues to say "a dat?" and point when he is inquiring about everything. He says "is dis?" too. For a few days his favorite phrase was "O Gawh" which sounded like "Oh God". At nearly 13 months Ethan said his first unprompted, very clear word which was "Bubble". We were reading this book before bed. We got to the page that says "Where are Baby's hands?" and under the flap it says "Under the bubbles". Before I could even say it, he took his pacifier out of his mouth and said, in the sweetest voice, "bubble". He is also showing word association as he said bubble when I had a bottle of bubbles out to blow for him. Most recently he has been saying "bapple" for apple, one of his favorite foods. He has started to sound like a monkey when he says "eh, eh, eh". He says this when he wants something but can't communicate what it is.

-Ethan's new foods this month were black beans and turkey lunch meat. Both are also current favorite foods. We attempted chicken breast, ground turkey, and ground chicken but he didn't care for the textures. As soon as we put them in his mouth he spit them back out. While grocery shopping one day I asked the deli counter if they had any dairy and soy free lunch meat. They suggested "Just Turkey", no butter injected, no added flavoring, no preservatives. I worry about cross contamination but so far Ethan doesn't seem to be showing any reactions and he absolutely loves it. He ate an entire slice as we finished our grocery shopping and continued to sign for more. Also on the food front... I have been able to introduce decaf coffee with coconut milk into my diet. What a treat! Unfortunately, Ethan showed a reaction to rice. We attempted giving him bananas and rice. Although he enjoyed eating it, he had black bowel movements afterward. Ethan's pediatrician stated that it was not a good sign and for both of us to stop consuming rice.

He loved the tastes of the homemade marshmallow he had for his Valentine photos.

-He also started making a cute, scrunchie nose face when he smiles. I love it.



He started sharing his food with us too. I can't tell you how many slightly soggy Kix I've eaten from his hands.


-He crawled backwards for the first time and started crawling on his hands and knees much more often. Now, at the end of the month he has almost completely given up his army crawl. Once he realized that he can crawl just as fast on his hands and knees he stopped moving to his army crawl. I miss it.

-He learned to cruise around the furniture very quickly and has gained enough balance to stand on his own for a few seconds

-He was given a ride on/walker toy as a first birthday gift from friends. It's an ice cream truck and has treats under the seat. He loves to hide just about anything that will fit in there. He started walking on his knees while pushing it and is up to his feet now. After he became more comfortable walking with this toy he allowed us to hold his hands to help him walk. Previously he wanted nothing to do with that. If we attempted holding his hands and encouraging him to walk, he would plant his feet or sit down in refusal. He knows what he wants and doesn't want and is not afraid to voice it.




{The serious, determined look on his face makes me smile.}

-Unfortunately he started having more aggressive tantrums. He started hitting me, toys, and friends out of frustration, curiosity, and anger. This has been a challenge because of his age. He isn't quite old enough for the discipline methods we had in mind for dealing with behaviors like these (think timeout). At first we tried holding his hand and saying "We don't hit." or "No hitting." in a calm but stern voice. That only seemed to encourage the behavior. He would hit again and more forcefully. If we continued to address the behavior that way it lead to a full-on tantrum with arms, legs, and head flailing. At that point I put him down and the tantrum intensified. I sat on the floor next to him. Once he calmed down and wasn't aggressive, I picked him back up. We took opportunities when his hands were near our faces to say "Nice" and show him soft touches. That worked for a while. Anytime I said "Nice", he stroked my cheeks instead of hitting me. We decided to try to ignore the hitting. This tactic seemed to work much better. His hitting has decreased tremendously. Sadly, he still hit a friend several times last week (so sorry Jackson!). I can't ignore that so I took Ethan away from playing and encouraged him to play nicely when we returned (BTW, Kim, I really liked how you said "Welcome back Ethan" each time. That is a great positive tool). We had a play date yesterday with Reagan and he did not hit her once. He patted her head when he was trying to move around a toy and she was blocking his way. Either it was a good day or he knows not to hit girls :) Either way, I'll take it!

I didn't anticipate having to deal with these behaviors this early. At his one year appointment his pediatrician stated "Children like Ethan grow up to be wonderful, productive, successful adults ... but they're difficult to raise.". I wasn't really surprised by her observation because I know he can be a challenge. A wonderful challenge but still, a challenge. He is determined. That determination can be difficult to handle but at the same time it gives me so much pride and hope for him. If he had a different personality then we could have had even more problems during his infancy. I believe that he survived so well through all of the digestive issues and allergies because he is a fighter.




{First facial bruise as a result of his tantrums. He threw his face to the floor three times during two separate tantrums. Natural consequence?}

The party details

I'm not usually much of a theme person but I thought the idea of a Winter ONE-derland theme was pretty cute. This was the photo we used for his invitations:


I was excited when I came across the idea to have a hot chocolate bar. I made homemade marshmallows for it using this recipe and let me tell you, that recipe results in DELICIOUS marshmallows!


I'll be making another batch for Valentine's photo props (picture my sweet Ethan taste testing a heart shaped marshmallow popsicle -- IF he'll let me take the pictures).

We had crushed candy canes, soft candy canes (some dipped in chocolate), white chocolate chips, mini chocolate chips, chocolate sprinkles, whipped cream, vanilla wafer cookie sticks, and fudge and caramel toppings as 'fixings' for the hot cocoa bar. The restaurant where we held the party let us use these carafes. If they had not offered I planned to use a crock pot to keep the hot cocoa warm and a ladle for serving. I used this recipe for the hot cocoa. It's similar to the recipe on the Hershey's Cocoa container.

{What you can't see in this pic is that the ribbon wrapped around the topping bottles and glasses holding the cookies say Let it snow and Winter Wonderland!}

The beverage table with the favors to the left:


The favors came from another idea that I read about online...Hot Chocolate on a Stick. The Giver's Log has the recipe here. I decided to follow Sprinkles Bakes idea of using the brownie pan.

I was very, very tempted to also copy her idea of using those birchware spoons but I stuck with cookie sticks to save a few bucks and so that they were still Hot Chocolate on a Stick b/c I like the name.
I wanted to make them prettier on top so I tried a powdered sugar and water combo to create icing. I also tried melted white chocolate on the tops but wasn't thrilled with how either looked. I attempted a not so successful snowflake design using the icing too. I only made a few of those because, let's face it, it took time and my time was limited due to a certain someone. I had a lot of other projects that I wanted to accomplish.

I ended up facing them down anyway and topping them with two homemade marshmallows since the recipe made SO many.



Ethan's daycare teachers transformed their room into a winter wonderland and they were kind enough to share how they made these amazing 3D snowflakes. I thought they would be perfect for Ethan's party. I thought they looked difficult to make but they were a breeze.


I loved how they looked in the windows. Thanks to Charlene for hanging all of them!


I wish my photo of the banner I made had turned out better. Thanks to Charlene for hanging this too!


The dessert table which included chocolate & sprinkle dipped marshmallows on a stick, vanilla cupcakes using this recipe, chocolate cupcakes using this recipe, Ethan's giant cupcake using this recipe and this frosting, and cookie/candy that tasted like Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies (so I hear), which I did not make. Initially I was just going to have the vanilla cupcakes but when I was finished making them I feared that I did not have enough so I googled a chocolate cupcake recipe and randomly chose one. It sounds like I chose a good one because I heard they were really good. I look forward to trying the recipe when I can eat them, someday. I have a feeling it will be my go-to chocolate cupcake recipe since it was very, very easy.


Monthly photo display


O-N-E collage that I put together. Ethan was done putting up with my photo taking by the time we got to the E.


I made cupcake toppers with a snowflake stamp, circle punches, and toothpicks. The snowflake cupcake wraps were part of a Wilton kit I bought after Christmas on clearance at Target.


We brought a bunch of Ethan's toys to the party to help entertain the little ones. I loved looking back there, seeing the babies playing, and parents chatting.


Friends brought a projector and speakers to hook up to our laptop so that we could play Ethan's first year slide show at his party. Ethan danced to the music while the slide show played :)

Edited to add that we asked our guests to write a message to Ethan in the book On the Night You Were Born by Nancy Tillman.

I didn't get a picture of the good food. The appetizer was called Tuscan Sun and it seemed like it was a tray of breadsticks with dipping sauce. Pizza was for lunch. This was my lunch:


Ethan and his lunch:



Ethan and his cupcake:


This party was a lot of fun for me to plan. I spent time reminiscing about the past year and being thankful for our blessings.

Of course, no event goes off perfectly but we're fortunate to have friends who help save those moments of chaos. For example, Charlene and Steven graciously offered to arrive early to help me set up. I'm sure they were surprised to find me 3/4 of the way dressed, my hair 3/4 of the way blow dried, two gallons of hot chocolate yet to be made, and two car loads of stuff waiting to be loaded and transported to the party.

These moments help to create some laughs and memories though, right?

I had forgotten to order balloons. Ethan fell in love with balloons at the parties the prior two weekends so we HAD to have balloons. Matt made two trips across town to order, then pickup the balloons.

How many Tablespoons are in 1 Cup? See the hot cocoa recipe above. We followed that recipe x32, twice, to make sure we had enough hot chocolate (we had about a gallon too much).

We used nearly 2 containers of cocoa to make the carafes of hot cocoa. I had planned to make a mug for me using So Delicous Vanilla Coconut milk (which Ethan has NOT reacted to, btw). When we realized we had used all of the cocoa, Steven was sweet enough to scrape together what probably would have been enough for me in the bottom of the Hershey's Cocoa container. I turned around to use it and accidentally dumped it in the sink.

We arrived at the restaurant and discovered that we needed more ice for the beverage tins. Joe offered to go get some more. We later learned that Joe walked several blocks, bought 4 bags of ice, lost one on the run back to the party (I still laugh picturing this) and saved our ice dilemma. We thought he drove down the street!

I saw friends ask the waitress for things while setting up, to make sure we had everything that we needed. I saw Charlene, Steven, Jen, and Joe helping to hang all of the decorations and set everything up. Other friends joined in to help set up the dessert table. Wow, we have wonderful friends. Thank you all!

I'm sure Matt will be happy to have our house back in non-party planning mode. Some pics... too bad I didn't take any of the HUGE kitchen messes I created while preparing the favors and cupcakes.




Previous post with pics of the party.