17 Months Old

First, the out takes...
Then, the real pic...

I'm so far behind on blogging... sorry my faithful readers!

Samuel turned 17 months when we were out of town last week. Thus being behind on my posts. He is at such a fun age right now. He continues to change so much each month. I wasn't sure if I would continue to make his monthly update posts after a year, but there's so many new things each month still. I write these more so I can look back than anything, but a few of you might care :) They have come in handy when trying to remember certain things! So, here's how Samuel grew in his 17th month of life...

- He said "gigi" and "g'dada" (my parents) a couple of times. He's quite stuborn and most of the time just keeps his mouth closed and says "Mm-mm" when asked to say anyones name. But, a couple of times he said "tje-tje" (Gigi) and "tje-da-da" (G'dada). He also said "wo-wo-wo-wo" for Lauren (as in Aunt L0Lo). Anyone whose name starts with "k" is "k-k-k" right now too. And, he once said "ga-pa" when asked to say grandpa. We're still working on grandma, "Aunt Alyssa in Africa," Gretchen, Tim and other friends and family's names. I love hearing him try new words... he has the cutest voice.

- He also says his name... or some version of it. When asked, "what's your name?" He says "buel" as in saMUEL, but with a B :). It's so cute!

- He continues to enjoy looking through pictures and books and pointing to everything having us label whatever or whoever he sees. He points to something, says "mm-mm" until we tell him what it is. It's fun to have him figure out that everything has a name.

- He loves to play "ah-ah" (outside), although with the massive amounts of snow (by Arkansas standards) we've had here lately that hasn't happened much. But, when I do bundle him up and let him go out (while I watch through the window), he likes to kick the snow with his boots and watch Clara go CRAZY running around in it.

- His love of Baby Einstein has hit a new level. He asks for it constantly, whenever he's awake and even attempts to put it on himself if I won't do it for him. I found 3 cd's in the DVD player yesterday that he had put there... one on top of the other. He's a pretty smart little boy!! I'm finding it difficult to not let him watch it all day long... especially if I have stuff to do. But, for now, we limit it to once or twice a day. I've tried other videos from the library, but nothing is nearly as facinating to him as the Baby Einstein collection. Which is fine with me because they are a lot less annoying for me than many of the other options out there!

- He's figured out praying before meals. He used to just put his hands together when we said "amen," but now does so for the whole prayer.

- His new favorite game is to ride on Papa's foot around the house. I let him walk in walmart today and he went straight to my foot and sat down on it. I'm not nearly as good at it as papa, so he fell off after a couple of steps. It's quite a good workout though!

- He loves to "sing" (do the motions to nursery rhymes and dance while we sing)... "itsy bitsy spider," "patty cake" (Grandpa's version), "open shut them," are a few of his favorites. He'll even do "patty cake" by himself. We'll hear him from the back seat of the car saying "boom boom boom" (part of patty cake according to Grandpa Lutz's version :)) and then throw his head back giggling. He tried to do "itsy bitsy spider" motions by himself today at the lunch table and ended up with cranberry sauce in his hair when he got to "out came the sun" :). We sang our way through Walmart today. I often wonder what people think of me when I pass by them singing "twinkle twinkle little star"... Oh well, I don't care :)

That's all I can think of for this month. Stay tuned for Christmas and New Years posts!!