Charlie at 18 and one-half months…

Physical Dimensions:

• 36 inches tall (Our doctor says if he keeps this up he could end up being 6’4” when he is full grown!!!! yikes! )
• 32.25 lbs ( he has gained one pound a month since his last checkup)

Preferences:

• Outside (instead of inside)
• Running
• Food: peas, blueberries and strawberries, smoked salmon, rice and peanut butter
• To see: Construction equipment, tractors, trucks, visitors/friends
• To do: Balls, kicking, throwing, reading books, coloring, bike riding, swimming and wrestling
• Toys:  soccer ball, stuffed moose, cars, crayons

What we are working on: (And oh boy, could we ever use your prayers for wisdom here!)

• mastering stairs, recognizing colors and shapes, drinking with a regular cup, brushing teeth
• saying the ending consonant of words
• sleeping past 5:30 am (he used to sleep until 7 or 8—and we are not sure what changed)
• saying “please” instead of grabbing, whining, pushing or yelling “NOOOOOOO”
• saying “please” or “more” instead of whining out “eye-wanda” (I want that) over and over again at increasing volume.
• waiting, sharing, listening and obeying

Best Parlor Tricks (or the things he has done all on his own that make us drop our collective jaw in amazement):

• When we have visitors who take their shoes off at the door, he finds them, picks them up and invariably brings them to their correct owner.  This has happened even with somewhat large groups of people.  I certainly don’t pay that much attention to people’s feet!
• We had Jonathan’s parents in town this last week.  One afternoon, after they had eaten several meals with us, Charlie walked around the table and named each chair, telling me who had sat there.  He got them all right, from memory!
• Charlie often tells me he is drawing something.  For instance he will be scribbling furiously and then announce, “ca” (car).  Since we often draw objects with him,  I can only assume that means that he was drawing a car.  That’s cute and all, but then he took it a bit further.  One day, he woke up early while Jonathan and I were still having our devotions.  So I set him up with the easel and crayons, while we finished.  I was distracted from praying, by him making stipple marks with the crayon.  And I was about to tell him to be more quiet/gentle, when he murmured his word for “rain” as he worked.  He was making little dots of rain!  No one had ever drawn rain for him….he came up with it all by himself!!!  I was shocked, and let’s just say the rest of my “quiet time” that morning was spent with a crayon in my hand too!  
• Imitation:  He looks around and notices peoples actions and positions and copies them.  You can see him focus in for several seconds, and then he arranges his body accordingly.  My favorite instances are when he sits next to me on the couch and arranges his legs carefully to be just like mine.  Also, I wondered why Charlie had started “talking” for long animated stretches of time, while waving both arms in large circular gestures and then ending it all with a booming laugh --- until I saw him watch his Grandpa  do the exact same thing across from him at the dinner table! 

We are just gobbling up this fun time of Charlie’s life.  More pictures soon!

“base…(three second pause)...ball”

From the minute he wakes until he goes to sleep, balls occupy most of Charlie’s brain space.  We have juggling balls and tennis balls flying through the air from dawn to dusk.  But “base…..ball” has stolen Charlie’s heart.   You might be surprised to learn that our version of “baseball” involves a black and white ball, toes and a lot of kicking.  That’s right!  Soccer, or Football, as the non-American part of the world calls it.  But Charlie has decided that such a glorious sport deserves more than the already confusing two names it already owns and had dubbed it Baseball.  Though we have tried over and over to correct this, Charlie knows he knows best!  So, for the foreseeable future, “base…..ball”  it is!

Some highlights of this obsession are when Charlie discovered Jonathan’s soccer cleats and insisted on wearing one to kick the ball.  That was the slowest game of soccer I have ever seen.  It went like this.  Try to put on Dada’s shoe.  Loose balance.  Cry.  Get help from Mama.  Kick soccer ball with soccer cleat.  Look at Mama with triumph and glee.  Try to follow ball to kick it again while keeping soccer cleat on.  Enjoy a 25% success rate.  When cleat comes off, try to put it back on.  Loose balance.  Cry.  Carry shoe to be near a chair or wall.  Lean on chair or wall while putting on shoe.  Success.  Look at Mama with triumph and glee.  Walk to the ball.  Kick soccer ball with soccer cleat.  Repeat process!

Another highlight has been family soccer games in our living room.  This tradition started because it was 115 degrees outside, and Charlie and I had to stay inside all day.  (This is pretty much the same as torture for the mama of a toddler.)  We were trying to keep ourselves amused and then Jonathan saved the day by coming out from the office to take a 15 min break and challenged us to a game.  Charlie learned to put his arms up and yell “goal!”   Indoor soccer is pretty fun for all of us, I must say!

new used wheels

After Charlie loved his bike ride so much in PA, we went ahead with a plan we’d been throwing around for months and started looking for a good used bike for me on Craig’s list.  We found a great one last Saturday afternoon.   Sunday afternoon Jonathan found a used child seat too.   He stayed up that  night assembling it all.  Monday morning we loaded the bikes and Charlie into the truck and took my ‘new’ used red Schwinn out for it’s maiden voyage with Charlie on the back.  (We hadn't had time to get a helmet for him, so we chose a pedestrian/bike trail around a lake nearby that had no car traffic near it.)Charlie was so excited that he got to ride in Dada’s truck.  

It was pure bliss for all of us.  The heat hadn’t caught up with the day yet, and we ended up riding all the way around Creve Coeur Lake in the early morning light.   Every time I asked Charlie if he was having fun, he’d answer with an enthusiastic and drawn out, “daaaaaaaa (yeah)!”   And I knew exactly how he felt because I felt the same way! We’re headed out again before breakfast tomorrow morning (before church).  I think I feel the beginning of new family tradition! 

Diddle diddle dumpling…

Baby boy walked around in one blue shoe all day today.   As he roams our home, balls of all shapes and sizes, matchbox cars and dusty raisins collect and eddy about in the corners like driftwood.  At the end of the day I collect them from their various resting places and am reminded of conversations I’ve had with Charlie this day.

Each time his eyes rest on his soccer ball (about 50 times a day) he feels compelled to tell me “shoo”, which is how he says ‘toes’ and means he is explaining to me, yet again, that a soccer ball is meant to be kicked with your toes.  I complete the conversation by saying “That’s right, you kick the soccer ball with your toes.”  Then we play a game of soccer which involves me kicking the ball to Charlie.  Then Charlie runs after the ball, picks it up, turns around, places it carefully in front of him, gets frustrated when it rolls out of place even the tiniest bit, replaces the ball, and kicks it back to me, always and only using his right foot.

“Baseball” is his first two syllable word.  He says it with a three second pause in between, “base…….ball.”   Then he looks at me, points to the palm of his hand and says “ha.”  So I say, for the twentieth time this day, “Yes, Charlie, you throw a baseball with your hand.”  Then he goes into his windup, which involves holding the ball behind his head, staring me down with an intense look on his face and abruptly releasing it, just when I’ve decided he is not, after all, going to throw it.   It usually hits me in the face.  I admit it, I’ve started cringing when I play catch with Charlie.   If he were a pitcher, I think he could strike someone out based on the suspense alone!

He has discovered colors.  He proudly points them all out as “lu”(blue).  His colorblind vocabulary extends to letters and numbers, each of which he will adamantly identify as “E.” 

At night, you have to hold him carefully while singing, because the minute you stop, he lunges out of your arms for his mattress.  Stomach down, he nestles into the sheets, his hands tucked under, his whole body wiggling—as if to say, “thank you for  finally putting me in my bed!”

Cousining in Pennsylvania

Once upon a time, Charlie visited his cousins named Rebecca, Andy, Anna and Emily.  They lived together with his Aunt Marla and Uncle Andrew in a white house with blue shutters.  Charlie loved being in the house with his cousins because there was so much to do.  He spent hours wrestling with his cousin Anna.  It looked very fierce, but they only hugged very tight and never once hurt each other.  Charlie liked cousin Anna very much.  He spent all his meals and snacks sitting next to baby Mee-Mee (Emily).  They shared a passion for blueberries and cheese sticks and  escaping up the stairs alone.  Sometimes Emily followed Charlie around and sometimes Charlie followed Emily around.  Charlie liked cousin Emily very much.He spent time outside in the bubbly pool with Andy.  Andy gave his helicopter and dinosaur book to Charlie, along with lots of clothes he has outgrown.  Charlie thinks the helicopter and dinosaur book are the best things he has ever owned.  Cousin Andy knew just how to take care of Charlie so he wouldn’t get hurt and always had exactly the toy he wanted.  Needless to say, Charlie likes cousin Andy very much. Charlie played in a water balloon war outside with cousin Rebecca.  When they were outside in the back yard together, she made sure he didn’t fall out of the wagon or get lost in the woods.  Charlie likes his cousin Rebecca very much.  

While Charlie was staying with his cousins, he did a lot of things for the first time.  He drove an RV for the first time.  He was so good at it that he only needed to use one finger.  Didn’t he do a great job parking it between all these trees?He rode on a seat on the back of a bicycle for the first time.  He loved it so much that he just kept laughing the whole time.  He went on a hike in the woods to visit a Pooh tree.  He loved being outside and walking on the trail so much that he galloped and chortled as he went along.

He also fed a horse for the first time.  That was a little scary, and he decided not to do it again!  And last, most importantly, he learned all the names of his cousins.

Uncle Erik Visits

When Uncle Erik and ‘aunt’ Catherine came to visit us for a couple days last month, we played as much and as hard as we could. Charlie got us all up and going around 6:45 each morning. And we started each day off with coffee and family reading time on Uncle Erik’s blow-up mattress in the living room.

The reading was usually topped off with a certain amount of wrestling encouraged by the bouncy surface! Those boys love to wrastle!

After breakfast, we squeezed into the car and hit the town running.

We visited the Citygarden to play in the sprinklers,

We toured the History Museum,

Where Eric took lots and lots of pictures!

And then raced home again to relax over lunch while Charlie took his afternoon nap. In the afternoon Uncle Erik took Charlie to the park.

Our whole family loved having Catherine and Erik come to visit, what a blessing family is!

a little showing off

It was a rainy day today, so Charlie and I turned to the video camera for some entertainment. We started making silly movies and I thought you might like hearing this song...

...and all of these sounds!