Mini Me

First off, have to share this picture of Miles's souvenir from Italy. For those of you keeping track, I've added our two days in Tuscany to the blog. Only 3 days in Rome left!








Last Friday our parent educator, Jackie, came to play with Miles. She's part of this fantastic program from Knox County called Birth to Kindergarten. Once a month she visits us, brings a book and teaches me some activities I can do with Miles to maximize whatever developmental stage he's hitting then. So now at 18 months the focus is on imagination and pretend play. I hadn't realized, but he has already been doing some pretend play. Other ideas were letting him help with dusting, sweeping, picking up toys, reading to his bears. The aspect of pretend he's really picking up on is copying mama and daddy. He loves wearing my sunglasses now and see him carrying wipes? At least he hasn't started going through diapers on his bears like cousin Kate!


And this morning I showed him how to step into daddy's shoes. He can't get around in them yet, but he had some laughs looking in the mirror.

We went to his eighteen month checkup this morning and he's weighing in just a hair under 30 pounds and 32.5 inches tall. It wasn't a pleasant exam since Miles remembers the visit last month. Thank goodness we don't have to check back until he turns 2!

No means no

A little sample of Miles's favorite word right now. All the time.

"Do you want dinner?" "Noooo."
"Wanna go read a story?" "NOE" (long O sound)
"Bath time!" "NOOOOOOOO!"

But it sounds so sweet when he says it!

Can we bring some food next time?

Finally we had a day that was warm and sunny enough to go outside. We took a wagon ride down to the park and had it all to ourselves. We hit the usual slides and swings, then Miles noticed the tunnels. What a hoot! They're attached to tires in the ground so they kind of sway and bounce when you crawl through them. Talk about giggle-inducing!

As we made our way back to the slides, Miles decided it was time for a Bears' Picnic. He went over to the wagon and grabbed his blanket, spread it out and took a brief rest. While I sat there, he made a few more trips to get both bears and his water. It's too bad he found the puddle and sat in it or we'd have enjoyed afternoon tea for a while. Of course today it's back to drab and cold. Hopefully we won't have to wait too long to get back out to the park.

That's gonna leave a mark

I know I said Miles felt like he grew 5 inches when we got home, but I don't think I'm far off. We've had to retire lots of footie pjs and some other clothes that just don't fit the big boy anymore. He learned a few new tricks while we were away too. He's quite a climber now, in fact that's how he got that lovely bump on his forehead. He climbed onto the little plastic picnic table and tumbled off. His favorite climb tactic is "King of the Chair" - climb all the way to the top, stand up and giggle. I also busted him crawling along the hearth. He hasn't yet tried to climb out of the crib (that I know), but I'm preemptively getting the crib-tent and installing it this weekend. He'll love that!

Another change we noticed is that instead of saying "dada" he has started saying "da DEEEEE". It's super cute and I know Wayne loves it. I've heard "ma MEEE" a few time too, but usually I just answer to "aiiiiiiigh".

Miles went to the beautiful Kate's 1st birthday on Tuesday night. Mommy didn't get to go since I'd run a fever that day. I think it was just the lack of sleep and travel wearing me down but I went to the MD anyway. They did the strep and flu swabs which both were negative. Must've worked on my subconscious because Wednesday I felt much better.

I've been working on gettig the Italy pictures online, but shutterfly is being a little beastie for me. But I have started a separate blog [link at right] with the stories of our travel and a few photos. It may take me a while to get through the whole trip, but we'll get there!

We're baaack!

Oh wow, was that a long journey home. We had a fantastic trip and I'll will post a link to pictures when I get them up. Miles did well with his grandparents this week. YaYa said that by Friday he was starting to ask about us more, and liked to look at our pictures. We were looking at his every day too!

When we got home he was already asleep. We woke him to get a hug and he teared up a little (so did mommy - maybe even daddy!) but then we just hugged and kissed and told him we were home. He went right back to sleep. He felt like he'd gained 10 pounds and 5 inches in height! The above picture is from the day we left - check out his cool new quilt from my dear friend Stephanie. Below is this morning.

He popped up at 6:30 and was so excited to see us! We played and ate breakfast and talked about school today. While I'd love to be playing with him all day, I'm taking advantage of his school day to do laundry, nap, go to the grocery, and oh yeah, blog. Today is the Valentine's party for the Tues/Thursday class. Thank goodness I planned ahead and had his cards ready. At breakfast I told him about the party and seeing his friends. So when he got out of his chair he immediately went to get his coat and went to the door. Well okaaay!

As I said, I will post pictures and maybe even blog our trip journal for anyone who is interested soon. but for now, about that nap....