18 months and counting!

Danny,

It's been a while since I've addressed you in a letter, so here goes. Yesterday was your 18 month birthday and I didn't even realize the day had come until you opened your 22nd window on your advent calendar last night. Happy year-and-a-half, little guy!

Your daddy and I have been so proud of you lately. You're really becoming a little boy. You love to play basketball and throw your football. (Although catching is another story...but that's OK. You'll be a quarterback. The Bears could use one.) If fact, whenever you see a football game on TV, you start squealing and jumping up and down and "throwing" a pretend ball. You LOVE reading -- something that will make your grandma so proud. In fact, I would say we read about 5-6 books about 20 times a day. Whenever you just want to relax and take a break from playing, you'll grab one, bring it over and say, "book" or "ah-me" (which is your way of saying "help me"), crawl up onto my lap and settle in for the story. That's, of course, when you're not asking me to turn on the TV to watch the PBS Sprout channel, which we've also done a little TOO much of lately. (Hey, a pregnant lady needs a break here and there, right?) Oh, and you love building with your blocks. Perhaps a future architect once you've retired from football?

You're a champion at going to bed and taking your nap. You still like to wake up at 5 am, but you usually fall asleep for another hour again if I tuck you in and whisper to you that "It's not time to get up yet....be nice to mommy and daddy and go back to sleep." Of course, some days you don't go back to sleep (like this morning) and mommy just has to get up and check some email until it's time to get you. I still can't stand to hear you cry or complain! Daddy doesn't seem to have a problem falling back to sleep, though!

You love going to school on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. You get so antsy to get out of the house by the time daddy's ready that I can barely get you to say goodbye to me. You'll stand at the door, blow me a fast kiss and say "BYE" before taking off to daddy's car with a sippy cup in one hand and a bag of lunch in another.

One of your biggest accomplishments lately has been the sheer amount of words you know. It's been so great being able to understand each other. Let me just list some of your adorable words so far:
Mommy, daddy, dee-dee (that's what you call yourself...which is a little strange for me because that's my sister Denelle's nickname), milk (sounds more like "balk"), juice, pizza, cup, please ("pease"), bus, car, truck, ball, down, fall down, puppy (referring only to your stuffed animal), doggie (all other dogs), baby, turtle, banana ("nana"), cookie, book, bowl, STUCK! (which has been especially useful lately since you can get yourself into some interesting situations), socks, eye, hat, uh-oh, MINE (I'm not a fan of that one), hi, dance, bath...really, the list is longer every day!

You ARE starting to exibit some terrible two tendencies lately. The tantrums you're capable of throwing at any given moment are quite impressive. But they usually happen mostly at home for now--except for that toy store incident yesterday. You know "time outs" very well and you do a good job sitting in the corner pouting until they're over. Then, you flash me a big smile and throw up your arms for a big hug...successfully helping me forget how on Earth you could have possibly gotten in trouble in the first place.

The next 6 months are going to be great...and challenging. You're going to be a big brother before you know it. I know we'll all have our patience and good humor tested. Big time. But I can't think of a better kid to share the adventure with. LOVE YOU, STINK! -- Mommy