Just Vander

Today Vander is 20 months old.

We are in the phase of the "cheese" face.  About 90% of the time when I try to take a picture of Vander, I get this:

 

He had been needing a haircut for a while.  I kept holding off because I love to see little boys with lots of tousled hair.  But Vander's never quite made it to tousled.  It was just messy.  And a perfect place to hide food.

Here's the before picture:

And I didn't take a specific "after" picture.  But this was taken soon after when the boy and I went to Lowes for something.  The little turkey wiggled and whined the whole time I was cutting his hair, so it didn't get blended very well and is a little crooked in back.  It looks great from far away!

The other day he woke up from a nap with a cute little handprint on his cheek!  Oh!

Recently he has learned to drink the rest of his milk out of the cereal bowl by watching Annalee.

He's actually pretty good at it.

Here's Vander on his soapbox.  The important issue he would like to bring to the public's attention:

"All the fun things are hard for me to reach!"  One day I watched him pull out my Primary lesson binder and push it over to the sink to use as a step stool.  He cracks me up!

This kid sure knows how to get messy.  I think his skills are only improving with practice.

But he's also pretty good at cleaning up.

Without prompting, he started scrubbing his hair with bubble bath.  I ran to get the camera, and by then, of course, he'd stopped.  But a little encouragement scored a repeat performance.


We went to Vander's 18 month checkup six weeks late because of scheduling.  They asked me how many words he can say besides "mama" and "papa".  I wasn't sure, but I thought maybe 25.  "Oh, that's fine," the nurse said.  "We only care that they know at least 3 more words."  That got me to wondering how many words Vander really knows.  So I taped a paper to the wall, and over the next two days Nathan and I would run over and write down a new word every time we thought of one that he says.  We got 95.  Then we had to stop counting because it's obvious Vander has hit his word explosion.  He learns several new words every day.  I love this exciting time!

Words he can say at 20 months:
button, go, up, night-night, outside, other side, uh huh!, sissy (nickname for Annalee), sister, Annalee, sorry, wow, uh oh, grapes, plum, sleep, hi, hello, bye-bye, mine, my turn, spider, sweep, book, cool (so funny when he says this!), camera, strap, bop, silly, yes, dadda, mama, dog, where ARE you? (when we're looking for someone or something), no, diaper, poo poo, pew pew (it smells), stinky, buckle, yeah!, play, amen, shoe, sock, on, off, plane, papa (grandpa), grandma, cheerios, cereal, okay, ow, oh! (he says this when something is sweet or cute--so darling!), that, what, song (when he wants me to sing to him before bed), sit, treat, boo!, sneak-sneak (he chants this while sneaking up on me--very effective), teeth (time to brush them), ball, balloon (he falls all over himself whenever he sees balloons and urgently tells me "bloon!  bloon!"), bubbles, yum, hot, soft, yuck, messy, jump, sauce, noodle, and why?  (Everytime I tell him to do something, or why he can't do something, he says "Why?"  Isn't that supposed to happen a lot later?!?)

Words he can say and sign:
cheese, light (he has to point out EVERY light he sees), down, help, milk, water, gracias, thank you, more, más, please, cookie, eyes, nose, all done, apple, strawberry, and banana.

Words he only signs:
cracker, arriba las manos!

Animal sounds:
moo, pbbbt (a horse), bock bock (chicken)