Samuel Update!

There have been so many things I've been wanting to write down and mark as milestones for Samuel lately. He just had his 18 month check-up last week and now weighs 25 pounds, 10oz! His height, weight, and head circumference are all around the 50th-75th percentiles for his age, and HALLELUJAH! no more shots at doctor's visits until he's 4 years old (though I'm told the 4 year old shots are really bad...but we'll cross that bridge when we get there).

He is starting to use so many words in everyday speech, it's very impressive. He can point out and say cup, bowl, bath, paci, Marble, mouse, moose, duck, fish, bubbles, shoes, socks, and lots of body parts without any prompting! He loves saying explatives like "Wow! Hot! or even Ow! when he has a minor booboo that doesn't necessarily require any attention, but he still wants some. He also loves making animal sounds and besides all the barnyard animals he can do a lion, tiger, or bear (those all sound the same -ROOAAR!!), a goose (honk!), a dog, a mouse, and Marble, where he sneaks his voice up really high and says Meooow! The other night, Daniel taught him to answer "what does the turtle say?" by silently opening and closing his mouth, and he does it now and thinks it so funny! Cracks himself up!

We've really been working on naming his colors (I think they're working on it at Day Care, too). He's been able to point to the color you name for a while, but now if you ask "what color is this?" he can say many of them without you saying it first! He can say lots of names now, too, but his favorite at the moment is "Wyyy-git!" with an exaggerated accent on the t! Whenever we get in the car to go anywhere he assumes, or at least hopes, that we might be going to visit his cousins and repeats "Andi? Andi? Andi?" Hers was one of the first names he could say after mama and papa, and he can say "Laina" now, too. But whenever I tell him that we're going to go see Aunt Andi, he says "and Wygit?"..."yes and Wyatt. And Dellaina"..."and Wygit?"..."yes, Samuel, and Wyatt."

It's similar to when I try to get him to count with me. He knows two and eight. He may know more numbers, but those are the only ones he'll say when prompted. :) I count "one..." he answers "two!" then I count 3...4...5...6...7 and he'll immediately shout "8!" but waits for me to finish with 9 and 10. :)

He loves to lay on his belly in the bath tub and he's starting to understand what I mean when I encourage him to blow bubbles in the water. It funny to watch him, looking curiously and almost timidly up at me as if to make sure he's doing it right, as he slowly lowers his face down to the water, blowing out air. He usually stops before he gets there, but every once in a while he gets some bubbles out of his efforts.

He also likes to blow on his food and call it "HOT!" even if it's just luke warm. He watches me blow on the spoonful and them mimicks me and shoves it in his mouth. :)

He is ELMO CRAZY! Loves everything to do with Elmo and will do basically anything for Elmo. I want to find him a big soft stuffed Elmo doll, but haven't had the time to find one, yet. I think it was just go ape over it!

He has now cut 4 molars, one on each side top and bottom. Our pediatrician said it is going to be a little harder now to tell if he's pulling on his ears because he might have an ear infection or if it's his back jaw and his teeth just hurt now that he's cutting molars. Great!

Daniel and I are sort of planning a last minute trip down to the beach this week. I work tomorrow, but then I have off until next Tuesday, so we'll hopefully head down Thursday or Friday to go stay with the Grandparents at their condo. Yay! Hopefully we'll have an uneventful car trip down there and the weather will cooperate while we're there!