15 month update

I'm late with this blog entry again!  I was actually thinking about stopping these updates altogether, but then I felt guilty about not documenting Josiah's milestones.  Plus, this is also cathartic for me, so I'll see how long I can keep this up!  Things have just been so busy with the work-life juggle, particularly as both have just seemed to get more involved at the same time.  It's true what they say - keeping up with a toddler is so much more stressful than a baby!  Makes me shudder at what's ahead for the future (semi-kidding).  If any indication of my harried state, I finally had a moment today to go through unread emails and unpaid (and late) bills.  This is so unlike me, but the one upside to this is perhaps my OCD tendencies are loosening up?  Or maybe that's just me trying to feel better =P

Anyway, onto Josiah's milestones.  One of the biggest turn of events was that Josiah became suddenly clingy to ME!  For 14 months, Josiah clearly preferred his daddy...now all of a sudden, he whines, runs toward and sticks to me.  While somewhat vindicating (after all, who gave birth to you?), it's actually a bit exhausting because it means having to attend to his whine/tantrum outbursts.  Those have been happening more often lately, which is not fun, and has made bedtime particularly difficult.  We were just on a good roll with his sleep routine, but as all parents have told us, nothing good (or bad) is forever!

I hope these screaming episodes will go away once he starts picking up more words to express himself.  For example, one time we discovered his screaming rant was all due to thirst.  If only he would say "water", and voila, we'd give him his sippy cup!  His vocabulary right now is still pretty limited - "bye bye", "ro?" (hello, when picking up a phone) "dat" (that?), "bobby" (baby), and "ear".  Nope, no "mommy" or "daddy" yet, although we will hear hints of it sometimes if we're lucky.  But most of all, his main mode of communication is still high-pitched screaming, especially when we take things away from him.  As the doctor told us at birth, the dude's got lungs.

Another big milestone was that he started walking!  He's still so cautious, so I couldn't imagine it ever happening.  But just last week, he took about 10 wobbly, but definite steps.  He looks visibly disturbed when he falls, so I think that's what is holding him back. But he's getting a bit more confident everyday.  Like everyone warned me, it's not always a good thing.  He's harder to contain (I hope that's not an inhumane word) and already getting his grubby hands into more things he shouldn't, which is forcing us to renovate (aka get rid of stuff or place things higher) more often.  Ugh, what's life going to be like when he's running???

He still loves music and reading.  He shakes his head and booty to his music and loves listening to the songs we sing.  He's really into "Old McDonald" and even says "EIEIE" and barks and moos with us.  He's learning "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" but is still confused with his body parts.   He loves all his books but is really into "Goodnight Moon", "That's Not my Elephant", "Welcome to the Zoo" and "Trucks".  It's cute now that he selects the book for us to read.

One personality trait that we've observed is that he's very social and likes to chat with anyone, in his minion-like gibberish.  The funniest thing is that all of our neighbors seem to know him.  During the weekend, we often bump into several parents and kids who are like "Hi Josiah!!" and he rambles something back.  Apparently he has lots of girlfriends in the building (Ella, Anastasia, Leah, etc.) too!  Mommy is not ready for that yet!