Nick's Sixteenth Month

More often Brandi and I are noticing habits and idiocyncracies of Nick that remind us of each other. Yeah, he's talkative, flirtatious, pushy, determined, stubborn and short-tempered... just like Brandi. But he also hangs his tounge out like a beagle when he's thinking hard, chews his lip, and fidgets constantly, just like me.

After seeing him standing on the glass table in the tv room, we removed the glass surface, so it can now serve as his personal jungle gym. He's also now finding things we never knew we lost - or he's disassembling key pieces of the house and furniture that will collapse under us later. He's walking around with nuts, bolts, springs and all sorts of who-knows-what pieces and parts in his fists or mouth. He also loves to hide things in the sofa cushions like ladels, spoons and straws.

There are some pictures of him doing remodeling work, just like his GrandMoose. He can now mimic an action upon seeing it only once. And some actions we don't even remember showing him. We don't think he watched us scraping the paint from the wall, but we look up, and he's doing it.

Nick is starting to ask for things now, and we're requiring him to speak more often to get what he wants. Sometimes it works in reverse, though, and he says the word after he gets it. He can almost say 'chocolate', and if I withhold the morsel waiting for him to verbalize, he has a meltdown. But everytime I hand it to him, he says it after. Who's being trained here? Give him credit, though, he understands 'no' and stops in his tracks right before sticking his legos in a light socket or shoving his head into the oven.

The picture here is in the swing from his Aunt Megan. He'll sit in it for hours if we let him. Nick and I went out this Saturday to give mama some free time, which included a trip to the elderly home around the corner to visit a friend (oh, how they love him there!) and to the park for a ride on the tax-funded swings. He pushed his way past the other kids to the jungle gyms he wanted on, and had no fear climbing to the top. Except for eating a wood chip (Nick), and being nearly lambasted by a swing (me), we came away unscathed.

Click here for 16th month pictures.

- Jason

Nick's Fifteenth Month

We've made it to 15 months already, or 5 consecutive quarters. If Nick was a corporation, he'd finally be able to report year-over-year performance for the first quarter. His stock is rising, but if he keeps breaking things around the house, his net worth is going to roll backward. He found some old martial arts weapons I thought I had well stashed - he came running through the house with an Escrima stick and proceeded to protect us from the piano. And I finally figured out what is causing the rough edges on the leather steering wheel in the Jeep - it's Nick. When Brandi lets him play in the truck, he's gnawing on the steering wheel. Anyone else buy their kid a $40,000 chew toy? If you know me and my cars, you know it's driving me nuts.

The doctor says he has the cognitive skills of a two year old. I know he has the voicebox of a two year old, and he's using it more frequently. He's also passed all the food-allergy tests, and is clear to consume most things he encounters. He's now into eating whatever is on someone else's plate: toast, pizza, veggies, and his first Jello (it was blue). He loves garlic mashed potatoes (all real stuff here, no boxed tater flakes in our house.) The trouble is, he hates having someone feed it to him, or taking it from a untensil. Some food is just hard to pinch between his two little fingers, but it doesn't stop him.

Another proud moment for the daddy as Nick reaches more milestones towards earning his man-card. I always thought the concept of 'farts being funny' was driven by societal pressure, not necessarily natural instinct. Well, it turns out he learned this on his own, therefore disproving my theory. Along the same lines of 'tricks he'll carry with him through college' is his love for making hats out of everything, from tupperware to his mama's bras.

We were watching The Wizard of Oz the other night (which I had never seen before) and Brandi observed of the Wicked Witch of the West, "You can see why children were terrified of this character." Meanwhile, our son is pointing at the screen and laughing loudly each time he sees the witch. "Yeah, I see what you mean." We took a walk down the 'JC Penney Yellow Brick Road' (ever notice how the traffic pattern around the store is faded yellow tile?) - he loves to walk the store in circles... forever. I snuck in front of him to change my view of his adventure, and he stopped. "He wants to lead," says Brandi. Sure enough, he's already decided he's not going to follow. He either leads, or he stops and looks at you waiting for you get out of the way.

Nick and Brandi went to the Bunny Party at the local library last week. The pictures are of him pounding on another little kid about his size for a toy, and then trying to hijack the strollers of other children, sometimes with them still inside. He doesn't seem to have developed a fear mechanism yet, and his social skills could use a little polish. We're working on it.

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- Jason

Nick's Fourteenth Month

Nick loves lollipops, especially Cotton Candy Dum-Dums, so there's now something to bribe him with at the doctor's office. He'll lick that little sucker and mumble 'Dar, Dar, Dar!' until he's covered in candy stickiness from head to toe. (Of course, with such a small lollipop in his mouth, there's room to stick the other hand in at the same time!)

We sit back and he entertains us with whatever he will think of next. He pulled some toys out of his toy drawer, crawled in and layed down. He can now reach the edge of the counter tops, where he grabbed Brandi's hairbrush off of the counter and began brushing his own hair. He loves to push things, like the vacuum or his stroller. The problem now is that when the stroller comes out, we can't get him in it, because he wants to push it. Each morning after breakfast, Brandi pulls cushions off of the couch and builds a fort so he can crawl in, and on and off of the couch. Sometimes he falls on his head, but no permanent damage yet (that we can see.) And he knows that three singing pigs say, "La La La" (or so his book says - when we stop reading, he chimes in with the missing words.)

We had a warm enough day for him to play outside this weekend. He ran all over the yard, and played in the soap suds (I was washing a car while he played - what did you think I would be doing?) We got out to Funarama, an indoor festival, this weekend to fulfill another one of our duties as good Catholic parents - he played his first bingo.

Last week at work, one of my teammates accomplished something great, and I found myself clapping for her and singing, "Yay!!!" It's official - I'm a parent full time.

If you don't have a kid, then these things may be foreign to you. I am obligated by the unspoken parental code only to tell you how wonderful having a child is; being a part of the cult means tricking others into having children with only happy stories. For a small peek of what toddler world does to the adult mind, click here to see the Moose A. Moose video Nick loves so much. He rumbles to the TV from wherever he is when he hears Moose (not a decendant of Mr. Moose from Captain Kangaroo, for those of you who were kids in the '70s. Back then, not every character was required to be a good singer.) Be warned - once this is in your head, it will take days to shake it. It's worse than "It's a Small World." (Sorry.)

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And welcome to the world, Mason Alexander Poley! Your blog is at right.

- Jason

Nick's Thirteenth Month

(Finally got the pictures posted to this entry!) Yes, that's a picture of Nick wandering around the garage checking the car tires. If the door to the garage is left open, he bolts out the door to play with the cars and power tools.

He's doing all the little things that let you know his year-old cranium is absorbing new ideas at a blistering pace. He now points at things with intention - just a week ago he looked up the wall rug in his room, to which we say 'good night' to the animals each night by name, and pointed to them, knowing it was bedtime. He knows how to toss blocks into their box from about 2-3 feet, like a baskbetball hoop. Whenever he finds a ball, he carries it to a hard floor surface to try and bounce it. And yesterday he took one of his shoes, carried it over to one of mine in another room, held them up, and studied them - he knew they were both shoes but they were different.

And then there's the head-shakers, like lifting the lid to the throne and splashing around in the water, or his obsession with being in the refrigerator constantly. Our house is quite baby proof, and he's allowed to roam rather freely most of the time. You can tell which room he's in by the noises. Hear the piano? He's in the living room. Hear his tin pot? In the dining room. Hear bottles rattling? He's in the laudry room preparing to scatter recycleable containers throughout the house.

Nick is really starting to appreciate the little things in life. He loves to snuggle in the quilt from the bed when it hits the floor. He stole a pillow off of the couch and sleeps with it now - under his stomach, so he sleeps in the shape of an upside-down 'U'. Other than the crusty old pillow, he hasn't bonded to any stuffed creatures yet. (That's like Teddy Bears, not Taxidermy, for the hunting folks in the family. Although he was very interested in his GrandBa's stuffed armadillo.)

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We're now watching alot of 'Moose A. Moose and Zee' on television, and he's getting more into Blue's Clues. I came across a familiar beat on the radio this week and found myself singing, "Moo, Ba, La La La" to the tune. The video that teaches sign language to kids is very cool - I'm even learning a little. I'm impressed with the educational shows available to kids - we're looking forward to the SuperBowl.

- Jason

Nick's First Year

For those of you waiting for the 'Cliff's Notes' from the past year, here they are - wrapped up in one neat video (about 7 minutes, but you can cut it short. This is more for his mother to watch over and over.) Hard to believe it's been a year. (Only 17 years left to save for college.)

Nick's First Birthday included a cake made by his mama, and a neat air-pressure machine that throws plastic balls all over the room from his Aunt Megan. I'm getting my exercise with this contraption. But for all the toys he received, his favorite things at the moment are playing under Brandi's new dining room table (like a jungle gym) and playing with the steering wheel and dash in the Chrysler. Whenever we open the door to the garage, he comes running to see the car, and completely wigs out when we close the door without letting him out to play in the car. Of course, my boy.

He's jumped right into the "twos" with his new aggression and curiosity. He's into everything already, running not walking. We have to keep pulling the tea bags away from him when he digs in the cupboards - loves pulling them apart and chewing on them. Perhaps there's a connection between caffiene and the aggression, or maybe at least with the 4:30 am wake-up call every morning.

Having a kid with sensitive skin, there's a lot of trial and error with shampoos, soaps and lotions. We've had good luck with the organic stuff at www.healthytimes.com. But when Nick's skin doesn't respond well to something, it's passed over to Da-da to to use it. I've got 3 bottles of baby lotion to finish. So if you're near me and think, "Man, Jason smells really good," that's not Halston, it's 'Grins & Giggles'.

If you like the video music, I don't mind giving a plug to the artist: www.ericguitar.com. Hey, maybe you're a jazz fan and you just don't know it.

Thanks to everyone for all the support during the first year, and all the Christmas and Birthday gifts to the little man. Anyone interested in babysitting? :)

- Jason