Liam is 17.5 Months

Liam's social skills have really been blooming lately.  He has always scored the lowest in this area on the Dr's questionnaires, so we are thrilled to have him really developing these skills.  He is consistently saying bye to us when we leave, although it's more like 'Bah', it is so cute.  He also will give us kisses.  We say, can I have a kiss? And he will lean in and say 'mmmm' and give a little kiss!!  One of his new words lately has been 'phone', and he will pick up a toy or real phone and put it up to his ear and say 'hello', or what sounds like it anyway, then he will babble a conversation, and then say 'bah'.  It's really cute!  I know I've mentioned before that he LOVES ELMO, but I just have to say again that he REALLY LOVES ELMO.  He asks to watch him now, and we also found an Elmo movie on our Roku that really keeps his attention for a long time.  He also loves to splash in the water.  He kicks and splashes a ton in his bath.  We got him a water table for summer time, and he just LOVES to play, and splash until he is drenched.  At night time we will ask if he wants to go to bed, or go to sleep, and he will do part of the sign for it by putting his head to the side, and he smiles.  He just is so smart and cute, and we are so impressed with him all the time!

Liam is 17 Months

Here is a list of Liam's 17 most common words

Shoe

Kitty

Fish

Dada

Mama

Book

Bear

More

Please

Food

Elmo

Ball

Milk

Bottle

Coco

Fan

Gobble

Liam is 16.5 Months

Liam continues to surprise and amaze us.  He has really got the hang of the buttons on his toys.  He knows how to turn them on and off, turn the volume up and down, and how to switch it to Spanish.  He's also started to climb up on some of his toys, and he will stand on them and clap.  We had to take away a few of them so that he doesn't hurt himself falling.  He absolutely LOVES to be outside, and loves to explore.  He often gets bored of his play room, and wants to go explore elsewhere.  He will take our hand and lead us out of the room when he wants to leave.  He also LOVES his bath time, and even has asked for one, by saying 'bath' and doing the sign for it!!  I taught him to plug his nose if he has a stinky diaper.  So far, he will plug his nose if we ask him if he's stinky, he will do it even if he's not, but we still think it's funny!  He really seems to be picking up new words too.  His new word lately has been 'shoes'.  Our time with him is just flying by, and we just can't believe that he is nearly 1.5 years old already?!

Liam is 16 Months!

Liam is changing in leaps and bounds.  He has been a chatterbox lately and is 'talking' all the time, and starting to say new words, like 'fan'.  He likes the ceiling fans in our house, and wants them turned on most of the time.  If they are off, he will point to them, so we will turn them on.  He also likes to have cabinets and doors closed, and if they are open he will point to them and say 'uh-oh' until we close them.  He is also starting to use more signs that we have taught him.  Grandma taught him the sign for 'please' and he picked it up really quickly.  So we have been learning more signs this week, so we can teach him.

He also has started to use a spoon, although we tend to still feed him most of the time.  We also have to be careful how much food we put on his plate because he tends to stuff his mouth, and then has a hard time chewing.  For the past few months Mike has made us breakfast on Sunday mornings.  Liam loves the pancakes, hash browns and especially the veggie sausage!!  He asks for more of the sausage before he will eat anything else.  He also likes the OJ that we share with him.

He has also found his belly button, and thinks it is quite interesting.  He will also point to it if we ask him where it is.  He is just learning so quickly and we are really excited to be able to communicate better with him.....we often wish we could understand what he's saying, and know we will be able to soon.

Liam is 15.5 Months

Liam's personality continues to grow everyday.  He has started to throw little tantrums, which so far we think is cute.  The first one we really noticed is when he was having a good time in his bath and we were in a bit of a hurry so we got him out.  He wanted to play some more, and he started to cry.  The next one was he was playing outside with G'pa and Dad and it got cold and dark, so they brought him in, he again started to cry because he wanted to stay outside.  To us this really indicates that he is realizing that he is an individual, and can say whether he is happy or not about a situation.  Although, we're sure this will start to get harder as he gets older, but right now we think it's an interesting development.  His language skills have really grown lately.  One weekend I was flipping through the channels and stopped at the 'Little Einstein's' show.  The kids on the show said 'Raise Your Arms' and he did!  I hadn't watched this show with him, but realized he must have seen it at G'ma's house.  He also does the 'Pat, Pat, Pat' on the legs that they do, it's pretty cute!  His new word this week has been 'Book' and if we ask him to bring us a book, he will do it.  The other word he says a lot is 'Koko', (who is G'ma's and G'pa's dog) that he plays with while we are at work.  I will ask him if he wants to go see 'Koko', and he will start to say it back to me.  Then when I pick him up after work, I will say do you want to go see Gretchen (who is our dog).  He can't say her name yet, but he does understand who I'm talking about because he starts to smile.  He and Gretchen just LOVE each other.  When she comes to see him, he gets this HUGE grin on his face, and then he will stick his tongue out like she does and try to give her a kiss.  We got him some flashcards that have the Alphabet and a word on one side and a picture of the word on the other.  When I show him the picture of the Bee, he does the 'Bzzzz' sound.  We are just amazed how quickly his language skills are developing, and we are excited that we will be able to communicate better with him.  We were invited for brunch at our friends house this past weekend, and the new foods we discovered that he likes is Goat cheese, and Kalamata olives!  That kid has a taste for fancy and different stuff!

Liam is 15 Months

Liam is starting to understand things that we say.  One day we asked him to help pick up his blocks, and he surprised us by actually doing it!  He even grabbed a few from across the room that were with some of his other toys!  We were pretty impressed by that.  The other day I asked him how old he was, and he put one finger up, and today I asked him where his nose is and he pointed to his nose!!  I also asked him where Elmo was, and he pointed to Elmo.  He has gotten pretty good about asking for more by doing the sign, and saying 'more' or 'mmm' and pointing at what he wants.  So far, some of the words he can also say and/or recognize are 'Cheese','Fish','Kitty','Bear','Dog','Ball','Balloon' and  'Koko' (who is G'ma and G'pa's dog).  If he's hungry he will do the sign for more, and if I ask him if he would like some food, he will do the sign for food, and get really happy and excited because we understood him.  He's getting really good at climbing and can just about get on the couch by himself.  He also has discovered that if he stands on something he can get higher up which makes climbing up on things easier.  One of his new tricks lately has been walking backwards.  He really loves books, and will sit on the floor and turn the pages, and also bring them to us to read to him.  He especially likes to have a book to look at right before bed, and it will usually help calm him down if he is crying because he doesn't want to go to bed.  We got him some baby safe toothpaste that is fruity flavored, and since then he has been much better about brushing his teeth (knock on wood). Some of his favorite foods lately have been mango's, kiwi, strawberries,tofu,hard boiled eggs,veggie hot dogs and sliced turkey. He had his 15 month check-up today, and he now weighs 21 lbs. 13 oz. (15th%), he is 30.75 inches (40th%) and his head is in the 91%.  Yes his head is BIG!!  We love having Liam in our lives, and are grateful he is with us each and every day.

comment by Star on 03/14/2009
baileys only a pound more!

Liam is 14.5 Months

Liam is starting to copy some of the things we do.  He sees us hiding the TV remotes behind our back, and then he will hide a toy behind his back, it's really cute!  He also has started to fake sneeze when we sneeze,  he will put his hand over his mouth and make a sneeze sound.  Although if we try to trick him with a fake sneeze, he knows it. Sometimes when I check his diaper and it's stinky,  I will make a 'KKKKKK' sound, and he started to copy the sound.  I didn't even realize I was doing it until I heard him do it.  Now he does it randomly, it's pretty funny.  He is a pretty independent kid most of the time, although lately he has been wanting a little more affection and being a little more social.  He has started to come up to us and put his arms up to be held, or walk by and sit down in our lap.  He also has also started to wave and blow kisses more often.  His motor skills have always been pretty advanced...he started to stack his cups this past week.  If we hand him the right cup he can get all 10 up!  We were pretty impressed with his balancing skills too, he will even hold the other cups in place so they won't tumble down.  He is eating all sorts of food now, but we do find that the ease of the task can be hit and miss depending on how tired he is and his mood.  One day he will love something the next he will hate it, we are guessing this is just age related.  Another thing we have struggled with is brushing his teeth, he absolutely HATES it, but we just have to get it done!  We are hoping that one will get easier soon!  Anyway, he is such a joy in our lives, and we can't imagine life without him.