talan loves to make a mess. everywhere he can. and once he's made a big mess in the living room, he simply walks to his room. then hayden's. then ours. then usually back to the living room which may or may not have been cleaned up by that point. the other day i was getting dinner ready and knew he was either in his or hayden's room. i walked in to find him in the midst of his masterpiece. and yes, that is one of dave's shoes for no apparent reason. and a water bottle that no longer has any water in it, but a few books do! and really, this isn't even half of what he can do.
for years we've wondered how people are able to take their babies/children anywhere where they need to sit and be quite. hayden was NEVER that kid. we took him to his first wedding last august and even then we sat in the very back row and i packed tons of snacks, coloring books, mazes, etc. and we also bribed him, i'm sure. when talan was born we were able to understand what parents of "normal" children are actually able to do. talan was calm as could be and would happily (and quietly) sit with you for pretty much as long as you wanted. oh how things have changed. taking after his big brother, talan now hates to sit still. quite a bit different than how we thought he'd turn out. when people see him them comment on how much energy he has. but really, as parents, it's all we've ever known. now that he can get around, he never wants to stay in one place for long. and that includes while he's eating. he really would rather just walk around and eat, but sometimes we actually force him to sit in his high chair to eat with the rest of us. we recently have started strapping him down, but that just means he twists, turns, groans and yells trying to get free. if i leave the room i'll hear hayden warning me "talan's starting to stand up again!" and i'll come in to find this: oh yeah, and did i mention that he thinks it's hilarious?!
(his shirt is soaked simply because he's been one big walking drool machine. every shirt has looked like this for a week now.)
wearing funny glasses and blowing a train whistle: wearing funny glasses while drinking milk: lookin' cute by the garbage can while drinking milk: showing off his tongue. no matter what's in his mouth:
quite a bit has happened in the life of talan this past month. the biggest being that he is now a full time walker! it was pretty shocking how quickly it happened. he has never had any interest in walking, even while pushing something. then suddenly one day he took a step which lead to 2 steps which led to 5, then 10 and then just walking. i am relieved, as it came just in time for summer so he doesn't scrape up his knees with all of that crawling nonsense. when he falls, he typically will crawl over to something to help stand himself up and then he'll just keep right on walking. although, there has been a few times where he has stood up all by himself. he continues to take two naps a day and goes to bed around 7pm. since hayden's school has let out, talan has been sleeping in a little more than usual which has been great for me! he'll get up anywhere from 7am-8am. he loves to eat and has finally become quite a bit better at chewing. he had a tendency to put something in his mouth and just swallow it. he loved chips but the faces he made, you knew they were just scraping his throat all the way down. it's been nice not to have to cut everything into microscopic pieces for him! he eats more then hayden does at a sitting. for example, last nite i fed him before we ate. he ended up eating a couple of crackers, 3 chicken nuggets and some melon. then, when dave brought dinner home for us about 15 minutes after he had finished his dinner, he, of course, wanted more. so then he ate a small piece of cheese bread and a half piece of pizza. AND about 2 cups of milk. we went to trader joe's a few weeks ago and he had a sample of raspberries which he LOVED and then started mooching the mango lemonade i had. ever since that day, anytime he sees you drinking out of a cup, he opens his mouth and starts breathing like darth vader until you give him some. i usually don't give him any unless i'm totally done with my drink because he's gross. and he makes a huge mess. but i have been giving him the tiniest amount of water in a dixie cup so he can start learning to drink that way by himself without making such a big mess. he does an ok job, but many times he prefers to just chew on the cup. it has become official. he is a climber. his newest thing is to stand up in his high chair. he'll eat a little bit and then suddenly he's standing up surveying the land. yes, there is a seat belt on the high chair, but i always forget to belt him in as we never had to with hayden. and it's just a pain, really. but i suppose we'll be getting used to it as he refuses to stay seated anymore. he also climbed further up the baby gate yesterday then i have ever seen him do. so far i became a bit nervous. that's just wonderful. he also loves to climb up the slide outside and has almost made it all the way to the top. and just yesterday while dave and the boys were in the basement and i was just getting out of the shower, talan managed to climb up the whole set of stairs before dave even realized. he loves to make messes. he'll go from toy basket to toy basket pulling out pretty much everything in them, play with each toy for a couple of minutes and then crawl (oops, i guess that would be walk now) away leaving a trail behind him. i tend to have 3 major clean-ups a day...nap times and bed time. there is no point in putting anything away while he's still awake....if he notices you cleaning up, he'll just come right over and take it all out again. he likes to say "mama" and SOMETIMES i think he realizes that i am mama...but not usually. he also continues to say "up" when he wants up or down, although the other day at mom and dad's someone said "down" to him and he repeated it. justin was there and said "awww, i've never heard him say that before!" well i hadn't either! he continues to sign for milk and more and will still say "mi" for both of them. when you ask him what a dog says and then you say "woof woof" he will repeat it. i have heard him do it a few times on his own, even when he just sees a picture of a dog. he babbles a TON. and while he's doing so, he walks around with his finger in the air and yells quite passionately . dave now calls him "cwack cwaa" as that's what he is typically running around yelling at us. he continues to LOVE music and loves to dance. he has learned how to open the glass door on the entertainment center and he will go over and turn on the cd player. when i tell him no and sit him down away from it, he'll start moving side to side, dancing, to tell me he wants music on. the other day while i was downstairs i suddenly hear the music blaring upstairs. he had somehow managed to turn on the cd player, tuner and turn the volume all the way up. i ran up there and he just looked at me and smiled and started to dance. although not many, he does have some similarities to hayden. the other day we were outside playing with the neighbors. they had brought chalk over and talan got ahold of a piece. i noticed he was putting it in his mouth so i went over to take it away from him. he had taken a big bite out of it and his whole mouth was blue. so i take it away and tell him no and show him what you're supposed to do with chalk. then i walked back over to where my neighbor was sitting. talan then proceeded to pick up a piece of chalk, bring it to his mouth, open his mouth and stare at me. not in his mouth, just acting as if he was going to put it in there. then he'd put it down, pick it up and do it all over again. yeah. he loves to sit and kick his legs, especially when you say "kick, kick, kick!" he loves to open ALL of our drawers and pull everything out. he likes to carrying around pens and could play with a capped pen quite contently for long periods of time. he continues to love his baths and continues to hate being laid down to get changed. he likes being read to a bit more then before, although he'll still try turning the pages before you're done. the wheels on the bus is still is favorite book. he loves to go "bye bye" although i think he really only wants to go outside, and not necessarily to the car. he LOVES it outside. he loves pushing cars or trucks around. he likes chewing on a toothbrush. when he gets mad or upset he can become quite dramatic. he'll start to cry and then from his knees he'll throw himself down and bury his face in the floor. if you pick him up when he's mad, he'll kick both legs as hard as he can. he recently learned to fake laugh and will do this back and forth with hayden for long periods of time. he can also fake cough but because he continues to have his 90 year old smokers cough, even his fake cough sounds bad. as soon as we get to a store he wants snacks. NOW!!! he loves to hold dave's football whenever he's in the fusion and when we passed one in target the other day he had to have one to hold. although he can be quite needy and whiny while we're in the room, he can be left alone to play by himself for long extended periods of time. he continues to be happy most of the time and has a sense of humor the way hayden always did. we wondered about this one when for awhile he just seemed to be a bit serious. we weren't sure how a serious kid would do living in this family, but he has quickly adjusted. he is always on the go but still goes with the flow. and he somehow gets cuter every day. we love you so much, talan! happy 14 months!!!
the other day talan didn't take a morning nap. it happens sometimes. either he doesn't fall asleep or we run to a few stores and he misses it. then he'll just go down quicker for his 1pm nap. so i feed the kids lunch and i come down to the basement to check emails or whatever. i had heard talan playing with the blinds and then a bit later it was completely silent up there. of course in the back of my head i'm thinking "what if he got ahold of the cord to the blinds and choked himself?" and then i stayed downstairs for a few minutes longer because let's be honest, if he had choked himself and was dead there wouldn't be anything i could do about it. so when i finish with my emails i go upstairs and find that he is not dead, but he was unconscious:
whenever someone sees you have a baby and you mention ANYTHING about wanting said baby to walk, they will all say "oh, just you wait. you'll wish you didn't say that. just enjoy the crawling because it will all be over when he learns to walk" and i just don't understand that. why is crawling better then walking to most people? it's not. they can get anywhere by crawling just the same as walking only it scrapes up their knees, puts holes in their pants and shoes. so why wouldn't i want them to walk? talan has been loving the outdoors, but since he's crawling he finds EVERYTHING on the ground and ends up trying to put it in his mouth. pebbles, preen gardening fertilizer, dirt....you name it. if he were walking, at least he'd be that higher up off the ground and would miss at least some of those things to put in his mouth. after having ZERO interest in walking, even when holding on to someone's hand, talan has jumped right in and is now able to walk from couch to couch. yeah!!! obviously he prefers to crawl since he has crawling turbo jets, but hopefully he'll keep practicing and realize he can soon get around as fast walking as he can crawling. after giving him a few drinks, i was able to con him into stumbling for me and the camera today. enjoy!
yesterday, while at mom and dad's house celebrating mom's birthday and mother's day, talan took his first 2 steps all by himself. all day he kept letting go of things to stand by himself, usually for much longer than normal. at one point i was feeding him pieces of cake. he'd crawl over to me, stand himself up, take a forkful, let go of my leg and stand by himself. then he started getting braver and eventually took a step. a bit later, 2 steps. no steps today, but i did convince him to stand alone for a photo op first thing this morning.
today talan turned 13 months old and he's still not walking. he is finally, however, walking while holding onto our hands. at least most of the time. he is completely steady and makes it seem like he could just let got and keep walking on his own. he probably can, he just won't. the other day jessica and justin came over and we tried getting him to walk back and forth between us without holding on to us. he took 1, maybe 2 steps but most of it was him basically throwing himself to the person across from him. he continues to let go of things and stand on his own but once he realizes, he slowly and gently lowers himself to his knees. as with last month, his favorite book continues to be "the wheels on the bus" which robin, sara and josh sent him for his birthday. he makes us read it over and over and he'll do most of the motions with us as well. while changing him, i often sing it to keep him relatively still. the other day he repeated me and said "beep beep." dave walked in and said "great...so this kids entire vocabulary is all sound effects!" which is true. he continues to say "woah" and "wow" at all things. he will sometimes say "beep beep" and will saw "awww" when he sees an animal or a soft toy/blanket. he has, however, been saying "mama" as well. not necessarily to me, just to repeat me. i highly doubt he even knows that i am mama. if he wants to eat, instead of putting his hand to his mouth the way you are supposed to sign it, he will slap himself on the right ear....hard. he has occasionally signed it the correct way but he prefers hitting himself in the ear. i correct him every time by showing him how i do it and then doing it with his own hand but then he'll just slap his ear again. whatever. we know what he wants. he does like to eat, but he doesn't do it very well. he isn't the world's greatest chewer, so there are things that i just can't give him to eat or else he'll choke himself. it seems like he'll suck on things for a bit and then try swallowing it. he LOVES chips but after many times of seeing him make a face like "woah, this really hurts going down" and then coughing, we realized no chips until he learns to chew. he loves chicken and continues to love sweet potatoes. he also loves to eat pea pods, but typically i'll find pea pod carcasses all over the kitchen floor. which leads me to another thing. he loves to make a mess with his food. he'll swing his arm back and forth across his highchair tray to send food flying through the kitchen. either that or he'll simply drop it, piece by piece, onto the floor. the other day he was eating a grilled cheese. apparently he was done so he picked a piece up and dropped it on the floor. i looked at him and said "NO!" and he stared me down, the same way hayden always did, picked up another piece and dropped that one on the floor never taking his eyes off of me. this continued until every piece was on the floor. i went from just saying "NO!" to then saying "NO!" and slapping his hand. but the end result was the same. the slap made no difference. he seems to not really enjoy the stroller very much. i don't remember hayden being like that. it seemed like hayden could just get in and enjoy the ride, even though he was especially active. with talan, he wants nothing but to get out. i keep telling him maybe if he learns to walk but that doesn't even work. the second you put him in he is squirming and twisting trying to get himself free. if he does sit still he immediately starts signing "more" so i give him food. both he and hayden have learned if they are out in a store i feed them to keep them quiet and occupied. talan continues to be a good sleeper, going to bed at 7pm and waking up around 7am. he still takes 2 naps...most of the time. one at 9:30am and the other at around 1pm. he has finally decided he will drink milk so the only formula he gets is a cup in the morning and that's just so we can get rid of it! he loves to babble, and it seems at times, to lecture you. the whole time he has a very serious and stern look on his face and he'll be waving his hand or just one finger in the air. he tries to climb on everything. he climbs up on the lip of the entertainment center and the molding in the bedroom to look out the window. he has been trying to climb up on the couch and into the tub as well. he learned very quickly, just on his own and not because he took a big fall, to turn around when he's going down a step. if he's up on our bed you'll see him turn himself around like that's going to help him land safely off the bed. he loves to go outside and will cry when i walk hayden out to the bus in the morning simply because he wants to come too. we finally changed car seats and he is now sitting front facing which he loves. the first 2 days he would get in and have this look on his face like "i am the coolest thing around." it's much easier not having to carry him around in that 40 pound car seat now, and it's nice that the weather has been cooperative where we haven't had to bundle him up to get him in and out of the car. it is a pain when he falls asleep in the car seat and then we just have to wake him up to get him out of the car and into a store though. he still isn't that into tv or movies, he still loves to dance to music. he's still the happiest baby around but he can get mad. when he gets mad, if you're picking him up, he'll jump/kick his legs really hard and it's pretty funny. he crawls super fast. he loves the cat. he still loves super soft things. he now takes his blanket with him around the house, making sure to always take it out of the crib when we get him up. he recently started making a scrunchy smiley face, especially when you take the camera out. papa discovered he cracks up when you say the word "blue" (i think he thinks we're saying "boo" or "boom" either way, it gets him every time.) he loves to play in hayden's room with or without hayden. he likes to play peek-a-boo but still covers his ears instead of his eyes when asked "where's talan?" he LOVES to wave and will wave to everyone he sees, sometimes for up to 5 minutes. he loves baths but has recently decided he doesn't like us washing his hair. he still coughs like a 90 year old smoker and it's even worse right now because of his cold. he doesn't care if another kid steals his toys. he's still the most chill baby there is. he still loves jumping. he loves going down to play in the basement. he also loves playing in the kitchen. he can play by himself for long extended periods of time. you can leave him upstairs while typing a long blog and know the only trouble he'll get into is removing all of the dvds. oh, and sometimes ripping a huge hole in the living room window screen. happy 13 months, baby talan! we love you!
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