Giving it Grace: Drew: 21 months

Drew loves: helicopters, trains, boats, cars, puppies, and kitties. For the most part, he's a very agreeable little boy and seems to like whatever it is I have planned for the day. Some favorite activities of his: watching "goo-goo" (Thomas the Train) after breakfast in the morning, playing with his train table, playing with his cars, baths, and going "ide" (outside).

Drew hates: like a true toddler, his "hates" go in phases. Last month it was food. The month before that it was diaper changes. Who knows what it will be this month. We're learning to take his aversions in strides and not think too much of them. The food one really threw us off (I pureed my own baby food so my toddler should be a perfect eater...right?!). One thing that helped was switching to serving him dinner separately before adult dinner (instead of with adult dinner). He seemed to be getting overwhelmed at the dinner table (probably because it's near the end of the day and he's just about had it with his emotions...and I'm right there with him!). After doing that for a few weeks, the dinner tantrums stopped and he's (mostly) resumed eating dinner with us.

Milestones: He is adding a few new words to his vocab by the week, and it's really fun to watch him make connections with language. He probably knows 3 dozen words at this point (that I can understand anyway), and he uses them all frequently. Non-stop. Running dialog. He's also just started piecing two words together, like "momma car", or "hi daddy". He's also still using a lot of the sign language we've taught him, and I like being able to have a conversation with him from across a room without exchanging any spoken words (really helpful when I need him to stop or not do something and we're somewhere noisy like a play gym!).

He's still pretty obedient with following commands, which I treat as a milestone because it demonstrates his willingness to obey those in authority over him (for now, anyway). The emotional outbursts are about the same, and we are still handling them the same. I give him his space to get it all out, and wait calmly for him to finish. Once he's done, it seems like a little switch goes off and he'll usually come running over for a hug...it appears that maybe his emotions scared him, or he suddenly became aware of his disobedience. Either way, I relish the hugs! For whatever reason, he has not yet entered the phase where he thinks it's funny to keep doing something once we've said no. Or maybe he's skipped that phase all together...please, Jesus?

I'm probably the most excited to share that he is finally doing Room Time successfully! This is something I tried to implement from birth, but we got off track at the condo (there was not a good space for it), and then we moved, yada, yada, yada...Drew didn't necessarily have trouble playing alone, but he did have a huge problem if I tried to tell him when to play alone. I tried implementing Room Time when he was 12 months old, and it was a fail. I tried again at 15 months, still no go. Finally I tried again just after 18 months, but this time I limited it to his crib. Bingo! Every morning after Kyle leaves, Drew goes up to his room and waits to get back into his crib. I put a box in his crib of a few toys (one interactive toy, a few books, and a stuffed animal...all of which stay in his closet other than crib time), turn on the iPod, set a portable timer, plop him in his crib, and close the door half way. So far we're up to 30 minutes. The first two days, he cried the whole time. By the third day, he figured out he liked crib time and we haven't really looked back. My goal is to work him up to 45 minutes, and then perhaps implement a shorter additional crib time in the afternoon. At some point he'll transition to actual playing in his open room for Room Time, but not right now. Something about the crib is less overwhelming to him than the entire room, and it works for me!

Our weeks are still very routine. I've adjusted the balance of his days to include more at home time as he seems to really like fiddling around with toys in his room right now. I'm nannying the first 2 days of the week right now (one day outside our home and one day inside our home), so by Wednesdays he's really ready to have playtime in his room without having to share his toys. When we're at home, I break our morning into predictable chunks: room time in his crib, art/activity time (as he gets older I plan to transition this into a teaching time where I work on the basics with him as he approaches school age), free play (outside if we can!), lunch, books, nap, and then afternoon outing either to the gym (they have a great kids club at our gym) or grocery shopping. I'm starting to plan ahead of the months when baby Mary's napping needs dictate that we are home most of the day. I've got a game plan for getting the back deck ready for summer play, the garage better suited for rainy day play, and freshening up his toy rotation for inside play (I don't keep all of his toys out at once, he only has access to about 25% of his toys at any given time).

Some pics of the last 3 months:

The jaguar is Drew's favorite exhibit at the zoo. He likes to visit the "kitty" :-)

Taking a neighborhood morning walk

He's very into "helping" me unload the groceries

Family Starbucks date

Visiting the "indoor gym" (aka Petco)

Classic cry face

Enjoying a family dinner with his cousins and 2nd cousins - fun group of kids!

Zoo for my birthday!

Art time with mom - we work on colors, matching, and dexterity (via stickers)

This boy loves puzzles and he's really good at them!

First big boy hair cut

After church service, Drew likes to help clean up the pews by picking up all
the stray garbage. I know it doesn't mean much at this age, but I'd like to think he's
got a heart for service.