16 months

More teeth are finally, finally sprouting for Squirt after months of waiting. In the last month, we counted at least 3 upper teeth making their way out of his gums all at the same time. That being said, Squirt has also been drooling a lot but so far, has not quite lost his appetite for food or get ultra-cranky from his teething bouts.

He is still one of the happiest little tots I have ever come across; one who is always smiling, laughing and quite generous with his hugs and affection. He even enjoys getting his teeth brushed and always look forward to that – a very distinct difference from his sister who used to cry bloody murder for a good month before she would willingly allowed us to put the toothbrush anywhere near her mouth.

Squirt still babbles and although he does not seem to be in any big hurry to belt out his vocabulary just yet, he does have quite a good understanding of what we mean when we speak to him,. For sure he understands being scolded as he would then break out into the most miserable, saddest and weepiest cry he could muster. With tears too!

He is happy to just troop around as he busies himself with stack-up cups, his little car or whatever else he could find to amuse himself. He tends to suck him thumb when he is hungry, tired or sleepy and of late, and we have noticed several times now that he has got broken skin on his hand because of his thumb-sucking habit.

I am not sure if this is something I should worry about, and I do hope that this is something that will pass soon enough.

From time to time, I find such amusement when I watch him feed himself. At this point, I am no longer bothered by mess and it is quite a joy to watch him explore his food. He seems to be enjoying what is put on his plate. Mess and all. I can only hope that he continues with this and not give us any problem with food and chewing as those fangs make their way through!

At 16 months, the traits of being a boy has started to make quite distinct mark on our lives.

15 months

As Squirt is getting more proficient at picking up speed while walking, climbing over furniture and into toy boxes as well as pulling, grabbing  to sticking his fingers into anything that he is not supposed to, I sometimes wish for a spare set of eyes at the back of my head.  In fact, I sometimes wish my limbs could transform to that of Inspector Gadget’s just so that I could intervene in time from wherever I am in the house to save him from himself.

Squirt is vocal, quick, agile, and he is determined to get what he wants.  Nothing escapes him; every drawer needs to be opened and inspected, every buttons needs to be turned and pushed, and any small objects found on the floor needs to be stuffed into his mouth. He has been quite a handful and just minding him for a few hours can be extremely exhausting. It is of no surprise that I have been coming home to a very weary-looking nanny of late who spends most her day running after him and making sure that he doesn’t get his tiny little body into trouble.

He recently made me rake up a bill of more than 23,000 THB (>700 USD) for the repair of my precious watch. He had somehow managed to get his hands on my not-so-cheap watch when we were in Singapore and had callously dropped it on the floor, causing a huge chip of the crystal glass cover. I then had absent-mindedly wore it into the pool and then it was history. Oh! Not to mention that he had also callously dropped my jade bracelet which broke into 3 pieces some months ago (my fault! what was I thinking giving him my bracelet!). I am contemplating to take the costs of repair from his savings...

Despite being such a busy 15-month old, Squirt is still that happy, smiley and affectionate little boy. He laughs heartily and will always, always give us a big, fat grin when we open the door to his room every morning. He is our little Mr. Happy-go-lucky and does not fuss too much. He does have his cranky moments especially when he is over-tired, but they tend not to last for too long or be much of a drama.

Squirt certainly has a very different temperament from his sister and both me and Silver Bullet had quipped before that if we have had Squirt first, having Spud would be a shock as we probably haven’t got a clue as to how to handle her.

Still a proud owner of 2 bottom teeth, Squirt doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to expand his vocabulary beyond “Mama”, “Papa” and a set of cavemen language. He is still quite adventurous with food and is very willing to try the food on our plates; always a joy to watch.

Recently, he discovered the fun of spinning himself around in circles and then stands still while trying to maintain his balance. Quite a delight to watch him laugh at himself after every attempt and seeing him wobble happily around like a drunkard. He loves his stuffed toys and can't get enough of the remote control.

Squirt having a little conversation with Tom the Tiger

He could be distracted with something else, but his hands are glued to the remote - and don't you dare try to pry if off him!

Our home has never been noisier with kids screaming to test their vocal abilities in their highest frequency or us trying to outshout them as we tell them to stop torturing the cats while they are at it, and our living room has never been filthier with bits of stale food on the floor at any time of the day or toys strewn around everywhere. Yet, despite so much chaos, our home has never been filled with so much laughter. (I still am contemplating on taking his savings to cover my repair cost. Hmmph!)

Things could only get better from here on. And I think he looks better with a crew-cut. (Ok. ONE more broken item, and I might just take it from his savings!) 

14 months

Our little 14 month old trooper has turned to be this one affectionate little boy. Every so often, Squirt would come up to me, rests his head on one of my shoulders for no reason at all, and with a little soft voice, he goes, “ahhhhh” at the same time. He would usually rest his head for a good few seconds before he troops off to whatever tackles his fancy.

Sometimes, when we open up our arms as a gesture to request him to come so we could give him a hug, he willingly complies. He would then scramble quickly into our arms, wrestle his way in, pry his feet into our legs if we are sitting cross-legged, and when he finds  a comfortable position, he plops his bum onto our lap for a good few minutes before he  gets himself distracted with something else.

Last month has been a little rough when it comes to food and eating, and as I discovered, it was mainly because he has gotten to a stage now where he wants to do the feeding himself. If I give him a spoon and a bowl filled with a little food for him to practice feeding himself, he would willingly allow me to feed him at the same time. Same goes if I leave him grains of rice or yoghurt melts or biscuits on the table for him to pincer pick them and stuff them in his mouth, he would happily take a bite from me every now and then. Sometimes, he would insist on having the bigger bowl - he knows where I scoop his "real food" from and he will not relent until I give it to him.

I have since resigned to try to distract him with toys and books and what-nots while feeding him and let him make a royal mess of everything (much to the chagrin's of Silver Bullet). I also find it a lot less stressful that way as if I insist on feeding him and not want to make a mess, the affair will make us both extremely frustrated. He loves his mangoes, and has recently discovered the joy of sucking mango seeds!

With only 2 bottom teeth, I am glad that he hasn't shown any signs of rejecting any textured food. In fact, he seems to genuinely enjoy eating grains of fried rice and pasta. It seems that Squirt is enjoying his food and already is eating more or less the same, if not more, than what is sister is eating for her meals in terms of portion. His stomach bulges up so tight after each meal, and sometimes when I carry him right after that, I could hear the sloshing going back and forth in his stomach.

Squirt continues to babble, with the only audible, clear words being said in context, has so far been limited to “Mama”, “Papa”, “Bye” and “Yaaaaaaaaaaaahhhh! (said in gusto whenever he achieves something)” He loves playing stack-ups, Duplos  and he continues to improve his motor-skills by putting things together and then breaking them apart again – something which, I remember, hadn’t interest Spud one bit when she was at this age.

Whilst Spud’s more like a dare-devil, Squirt seems to be a little bit more cautious and calculated in what he does. He does not seem as reckless as his sister, and is usually more composed. While he has no qualms with exploring, he tends to carefully tread lightly with the unfamiliar until he is confident enough to do it all by himself.  If he knows that what he is about to do is something that he knows that he shouldn’t do, he would usually stretch out his little hands, pause and then look at you intently in the eye as if he is studying your face while he waits for a reaction. To his credit, whenever we cautioned him with a cautionary yet gentle “Aaaaaaacck….”, he would, 7 out of 10, withdraw his hands from the objectionable distraction; only to try it again 10 minutes later.

As cautious as he is, he has also demonstrated his confidence and capability in climbing over chairs, couches and over us just to get to what he wants. And when he doesn’t get what he wants, he would cry his saddest cry with the most saddest facial expression ever, and as soon as we carry him up, he buries his head on our chest or shoulder. (Doesn’t that just make it an awwwwwwww moment?)

This little trooper has won me over; hook, line and sinker. With his cheery disposition and an always smiling face, Squirt has really been such a joy to have around.

Caught in action while clambering over Silver Bullet, determined to get to the remote.

Aha! Buttons!

Related post(s):
Spud's 14 months update
Squirt at 13 months

13 months

Ask any 13 month old if they are having the time of their life now that they are no longer that helpless little baby they once were, they’ll probably crinkle up their faces and tell you to go to hell.

Well, at least that’s what I think my 13 month old Squirt would tell me. If only he could talk!

With Squirt now successfully embarking on one of the most annoying stage of toddlerhood, he has been showing a side of him which I have never really seen before. He has been displaying a wide range of moods and behavior – from being super affectionate to frustration to full-blown stubbornness. He is much more vocal in expressing his frustrations, and when he doesn’t get his way, he voices out his opinion in the form of temper tantrums that could no longer be mitigated by a simple distraction.

He throws things around, he gets really, really cranky whenever he doesn’t get what he wants  and he wrestles when you try to pick him up to remove him from the situation. And he is a big boy! When he struggles and wrestles while I try to hold him, every muscle in my body ache after that.

He’ll get extremely annoyed when he vocalizes while pointing at stuff to us, and if we didn’t get it right the first time, he WILL scream his head off impatiently. He doesn’t have much patience for “guessing games” when he sets his mind on something, and often,  it would then escalate into quite a major crying feat in pretty much no time at all.

The I-have-only-one-tear-drop-cry

I forgot how annoying this period of his life is – we struggle to understand what he is trying to say, and he gets so easily frustrated because he just couldn’t quite tell us exactly what he wants.  It is not the most pleasant period, and every now and then, I can feel my patience thinning away.

He is getting a little bit more difficult with food (even thought our Nanny says otherwise!) and distracting him with other stuff does not seem to be effective these days. While I try to encourage him to self-feed, his interest would usually last no more than 5 seconds before he starts screaming his guts out pointing at random things which he wants me to get for him, which includes my GLASS of water.

I cannot tell you enough HOW.BLOODY.FRUSTRATING.THE WHOLE.FEEDING.BUSINESS. CAN.GET. It brought me back to the dark days of when Spud was being difficult with food. I remember Spud being much worse, but at this point, I don’t think I should under-estimate Squirt. I have to keep reminding myself that if he doesn’t want to eat at meal times, then, fine. He just doesn’t eat. He will eat when he is hungry enough to eat and I shouldn’t fuss too much about it.

Urgggh!

The I-only-want-the yoghurt-cry

The upside of all this is that I know Squirt is developing normally. It is what most every healthy 13 months old does as they become more independent and trying to explore their ways about in their own little world. He is a very active little toddler who, like his sister, is always busy and could not keep still. He gets steadier and more confident is his walking, but still stumbles around every now and then. He is more possessive of his toys, and these days, would scream bloody murder and would have none of it when Spud decides to sit on his Buzz Light Year car while she tries to get him to do the pushing.

My only consolation is that he still naps quite OK (fingers x) and he is still that smiley little person (when he gets what he wants). When not frustrated, he can be a very affectionate boy - he would kiss and he would cuddle and he would hug, and he lights up the room with his gargantuan smiles

For the record, after 13 months, Squirt is still is a proud owner of ONE bottom tooth.  And he loves to shake his bon-bon to the tune of this Dutch cartoon called Woezel and Pip.

Related post(s):
Spud's 13 month update

Pushing thin

My life has been such a bed of roses raising a 3 year old toddler whom by now, is much easier to handle. It gets easier to explain things to her as she understands better. She makes my heart swell. She is such an angel - she is able to articulate her needs better, and she never, ever misbehaves. She is the cutest thing there is.

That, my friends, was in my frickin’ dreams.

And, today just happened to be one of those days where Spud’s week-long defiance is wearing me out. And today is when I felt that when the going gets tough, the tough just wants to run far, far away and not have to deal with a toddler’s ridiculous behaviour. And today, is one of those times in my life when I just want to quit being a mom.

Sigh. If only copping out like that is so easy.

My yelling and screaming at Spud whenever I lose my head with her have been kept in check for quite some time now.Something in me snapped a while back; scared the living daylights out of me and since then convinced myself that I need to get a grip when Spud gets the better of me. I haven’t done that (yell) in months and I have to say that was quite a feat!

Unfortunately, that no-yelling spell was broken as of Monday evening at bedtime. (Hell! I tried.) She behaved alright before that, and just as I closed the door, the little imp decided not to only get in and out of bed while I was undressing to get to the shower, but spoke to me in some gibberish language which she expected me to respond to. I not only have to send her back to bed while I was half naked, I also had to keep asking her what she was trying to say – only to have her repeat a different version of the gibberish to me. Obviously she thought it was a game, but after 10x of trying to be gentle, understanding and empathetic, it was not going anywhere. The more I tried to be patient, the more she pushed me to the brink.I had to yell.

It wasn’t my usual ear piercing yell, but it was loud enough. She immediately stopped, asked me for some water and then she went to bed without a peep.

Today, she upped her ante. She refused to get out of bed. I gave her an option to a) get up and let me shower her together with Squirt, or b) get up a bit later and when I’m done with Squirt, she would have to shower herself. She told me, “later”, closed her door on me and then locked herself from inside.

An (almost) 3 year old closing the door on ME! Isn't it a bit too early for such defiance? ! (Although I think that in all fairness, she didn't realise what she was doing)

It was THE trigger for me to scream the house down. I was boiling mad, but I somehow managed to keep my cool and it took all of my might at that point in time to not get mad. Instead I ignored it and I let her be.

Three minutes passed and I was hoping that she would come out soon after as that’s what she usually does since she likes being showered at the same time. But the little imp didn’t this time. Even after I was done with Squirt, she refused to show up. I had to bang on her door hard to get her to unlock it and literally pulled her to the bathroom. Needless to say, it was a rough start to the morning – we were running late, Squirt was getting impatient, Spud decided to do peek-a-POO (telling me she needed to poo, but didn’t) while I was preparing breakfast and I was all alone.(Silver Bullet was out of town)

It was pure relief the moment I dropped her off at school.

When I came home, the Nanny told me that Spud has been rather defiant. She put herself in the time-out corner whenever she did not want to listen to her Nanny and she jokes around with her.I didn’t want to dwell on that piece of information, and thought that since Spud has been nice to me when I got home, she deserved a little TV time of her favourite cartoon when she finished her milk. That was short-lived – she was mucking about and I had to put the cartoon on pause while waiting for her to drink her milk.

She then sat on the floor, legs apart and put the cup of milk between her calves. She then tried to drink by lowering her entire head to the cup (which I watched in bemusement), and then decided to dunk her hair into the cup (me not so amused!).

I gave her a minute or two to immerse herself in it, but not without reminding her several times to please start drinking her milk whilst I grit my teeth to not get mad. When that didn’t work, I tried positive encouragement with a  "Finish your milk= TV”. By now, I had taken a deep,deep breath to try to not yell as she got more impressed with her milk-dipped hair. Being the fortune teller that comes with motherhood, I foresee that she would topple the full cup of milk over. And lo and behold! Just as I was walking over to remove the cup (with Squirt attached to my hip), she knocked the cup over, spilling all of its contents on the floor.

She then looked up at me with a somewhat apprehensive look, clearly realising that she was about to get into trouble, and probably expecting me to belt out another yell. Instead, I took another set of deep, deep breaths, told her to clean it up and then decreed that because she didn’t listen her TV time was over and it was time for bed.

She didn’t fuss about going to bed, and I had every intention to read her ONE story. But when we got to her room, she hit one of the cats again (another recent habit of hers which we are trying to nip) which got me pretty mad. Something which she KNOWS she is not supposed to do.

I still didn’t yell, but I told her there wasn’t going to be any bedtime story. I then told her rather sternly that I was upset with her, gave her a good night kiss and put her to bed. I wasn’t feeling lovey-dovey.

As I left the hallway, I felt defeated. I didn’t know what to do anymore.

In fact, I felt more detached than attached. All those Gentle Parenting and Attachment Parenting advice I read made me feel like I am being such a crap parent. I’m trying so hard not to yell, but I keep on punishing her when she didn’t listen , I take away all her privileges  when I don’t get what I need from her and it makes me feel like I wasn’t being a good listener and for the life of me, could not understanding her emotional needs or respecting her like Gentle Parenting style suggests.

I am not cut out for this Gentle Parenting crap. I am not a frickin' saint, could never, ever be and my child who looks like the absolute angel in this picture isn't necessary one. When I try the gentle tactic, my child walks all over me! So much for bloody damn gentle parenting.

Damn. I wish toddlers come with a manual.

Sigh.

Maybe, one day, I’ll find this post I have written to be really funny. Maybe I over-reacted and maybe, one day, I can reflect back and think that they are all trivial.Or maybe, I shouldn’t be taking all that I read on Gentle Parenting too seriously. Or maybe I just did the best thing ever for my child so she knows boundaries. Maybe it doesn't even matter 5 years from now.

But today, I felt like crap.I don't know what's the right thing to do anymore, and sometimes I feel like giving up. It scares me that I may screw up as a parent, inevitably screwing up my children’s life and not know till 25 years later.

And that would suck.

And it would have been all my fault.

But I didn't yell. I felt helpless and I did not yell. And at some point, I am sure I would be screaming my head off again.

Ahh...the joy of parenting.

Squirt's post birthday

A week late, but better than never!

We had a few friends over for brunch/lunch, couldn't be bothered to buy him birthday cake and bought some cupcakes instead. But, Squirt (us) got lucky; the staff from our apartment building gave him a really nice strawberry-covered cake as his birthday cake and everyone loved it! We even forgot to take any pictures from our little party at home.

Squirt enjoyed playing with the strings on one of his presents and this Buzz Light Year car is a hit not only with the birthday boy, but with Spud as well.

Here are a few pictures from the aftermath of Squirt's little birthday celebration we had at home last weekend.

These moments are so precious. The smiles, the giggles, the laughter... it is such a joy to see them so happy playing and laughing together. 

Oh! And Squirt finally has A tooth sprouting. About bloody time. 

12 months

We did not screw up with #2 – Squirt has indeed turned ONE!

The past 12 months flew faster than I could ever anticipate, yet when I look at Squirt now, I somehow still see him as a baby. A walking, forever-smiling little baby.  

I still remember the hard jabs and the constant kicks he subjected me to when he was in my tummy. It was not fun and neither was it an “awwwwww” moment, yet I often wondered how he looked like. Would this little tummy –wrestler has blue or dark brown eyes? Would he be hairless or have loads of hair?  Would he have stubby, button nose like I do?  What is his temperament like – would he be cranky or chilled? Would he give us more curve balls than his sister ever did?

While I was curious about him, I also could not wait for him to come out of my stomach mainly because I could not stand being pregnant anymore. 12 months later to the day, this little chubby person is walking- almost-running, blabbering and very much his own little person while starting to develop his own personality.

Here’s a video of him when he started to walk independently from about 2.5 weeks ago:

He seems to enjoy music and tries to dance to the beat whenever he hears music playing in the background. He looks at you rather intently when you sing to him, and smiles his biggest smiles if he is familiar with the songs.  He pushes knobs and buttons that he isn’t supposed to touch and he repeats that throughout the day even after you remove him from the knobs and buttons 100 times in 2 minutes. He chases the cats and grabs their tails when they were not looking, leaving us in a constant red-alert to save the cats from his grasps.

He kisses plush toys whenever he sees them, but refuses to give kisses to us when we ask for it. He loves waving bye. He is eating a lot more in terms of portion size and much more than what Spud used to eat when she was one (fingers x), and has so far has not shown any signs of slowing down.  He is all energy and plays all day; practicing his sprints and climbing in and out of the toy box. He is also not showing any signs of slowing down.

He still sucks his thumb when he is hungry, wants to sleep or when he does his own self-soothing; and he has been doing that since he found his thumb at about 2 or 3 months old (I'll start worrying if and when he continues to suck his thumb when he turns 10). Teething has been quite slow for this little boy, but otherwise, is developing like most one year olds do.(I'll start worrying when they do not pop when he turns 4)

Things could only get better and more interesting from here on. Meantime, here’s a photo collection of Squirt in chronological order for your viewing pleasure…

1 month: First few smiles

2 months: Held his head up strong

3 months: Turning over

4 months: Sitting up (some support)

5 months: Doing push-ups, knee-and-stomach-scoot

6 months: Crawling

7 months: Pulling up to a stand

8 months: Assisted walking

9 months: Standing with little or no support

10 months: Took his first few steps independently

11.5 months: Officially walking!

12 months: Almost sprinting

How the boy has grown! The last one year has indeed been an amazing journey.

Related post(s):
Spud's 12 months update

The sippy transition

While we had introduced Squirt to a sippy cup when he was about 4 months in our attempt to familiarize him with sippys (read: let him PLAY with the sippy), the actual proper transition to a sippy did not happen till he was about 9.5 months.

Squirt wasn’t really too keen on it. The sippy to him seemed like it was just another toy, and even though we tried to get him to use a sippy at least once a day, he still would prefer the good old bottle to consume his milk. To be fair, which baby wouldn’t!He would take only a few sips from the sippy and then turn his head away; perhaps, because he knew that he had an alternative.

So, when he hit 9 months, like his sister, I had it in my head that it was time for him to lose the bottle.

By that, I mean going completely cold turkey and not give him a choice. We had expected that the first weekend in which we went cold turkey was not going to be very successful. It wasn’t and while he did drink some from the sippy (quite encouraging), he wasn’t too happy about it. We had to revert back to a bottle on Sunday because he was a little under the weather.

We tried again the next weekend, and below is an account of our journey from bottle to sippy.

2^nd attempt Day 1: Saturday

His first milk of the day started with only his milk in the sippy. He took a little bit but was not too keen on this. We kept up and offered him only the sippy throughout the day.

While his intake was not much, he still managed to drink at least 300 ml exclusively from it. We made sure that he had enough solids and we did not give him the bottle when he went to bed at night.

[I admit that I was feeling a little apprehensive. Despite the fact that this was something  I had done before with Spud, I somehow  was constantly second-guessing myself , questioning if I am doing the right thing by “imposing” the sippy on him. My consolation was that Silver Bullet was behind me on this one and he was confident that Squirt will pull this off]

Day 2: Sunday

Nothing, but sippy day. His first milk feed was encouraging as he managed to finish off almost half the milk in the sippy.

I alternated with him using the Doidy cup at meal times and he seemed to be enjoying sipping his milk from him. He took it like it was second nature. I was jumping for joy in my head, but managed to keep my cool for fear of jinxing it!

He took the sippy cup at bedtime and finished at least half of the content. While it was not the usual amount that he would drink from the bottle at bedtime, just the fact that he actually took is milk from it without much fuss, was certainly encouraging

Day 3: Monday

Instructed our Nanny to follow through with using the sippy.  She was completely onboard with us. While she did mention that Squirt was not too keen, he still took some of the milk from nothing but the sippy. (hallelujah!)

I fed his milk in a sippy at bedtime and again, he finished half of the contents.

Day 4: Tuesday onwards

It got easier as the days passed. He got the hang of how the sippy works as he learns to control the flow of his milk intake.

By Thursday, he started to drink from his sippy cup like a champ.  There was no looking back!

While Squirt has been generally easier with taking to different things as compared to Spud, it was however, not without resistance. I guess it also proves the theory that persistence and consistency works – and when faced with moments of doubts, having a supportive partner helps. A lot.

We have, once again, been a bottle-free zone for more than 2 months. None of the kids would be needing any more feeding bottles or whatsoever. That has got to be the neatest thing ever!

Yet, I am humbly being reminded of a saying I came across a while back,  “ When a child climbs to the next rung on life's ladder, it means the previous rung is no longer going to be trodden on”

Related Post(s):
Spud's sippy story
Sippy cup in review

11 months

With only one month short of his first birthday, Squirt is now no longer that helpless little infant, and his growing independence have become more apparent by the day. He has mastered the art of stand, stoop and squat, and has even started to toddle along confidently with only one hand gripping our index fingers. In fact, our not-so-little Squirt took his very first, unassisted, few steps at just about 2 weeks before his 11^th month birthday while we were still in Holland.

The look on his face when he realised that he could actually walk …. priceless! He was so pleased with himself after every successful attempt towards unassisted walking that that could not stop smiling and laughing – clearly happy at his accomplishments. (I have been trying to shoot a decent video of him taking several steps, but so far have only managed a really, really short video)

Since then, has been busy toddling around and trying his darnest to perfect the art of walking. He is still a tad unstable, and often, tend to fall backwards like a tree being chopped, but I reckon, all he needs is practice, practice, practice. Like Spud, I guess he would know and learn when to let go when he is ready to.

So.

At 11 months, Squirt is more mobile than ever, babbles non-stop (even more than Spud ever did at that age!), enjoying gumming on biscuits, and yet, despite several bad nights and some other signs which may have pointed to him teething (drooling, bright red cheeks and chins, big and smelly poo, days that he did not really want to eat,  as well as crankier than usual…), Squirt, to date still has not cut any teeth! I know I shouldn't be worried and there is no reason to, but I cannot help wonder what the hell is taking those little teeth so long to cut through. I mean, come on already! Just pop - especially when he has been showing a lot of interest on the food we have on our plates.

Squirt is also learning to wave goodbye and, each time he successfully "waves" (he does it in a stiff, weird sort of way), he usually laughs heartily. It has been a pleasing sight to see a chuckling baby do simple things.

Apart from that, Squirt has been pretty apt in saying no by shaking his head vigorously. It has been a few times already that I thought I heard him say "Nee" (means "No" in Dutch and pronounced as "Nay") as he shook his head from side to side (But, I could also have been imagining it).

In exactly 31 more days, Squirt turns 1. And what a major milestone that would be!

Related post(s): 
Spud's 11 months update

10 months

Woooohooooooo! Squirt’s 10 months old; just only 2 months short of turning one. TWO. TWO whole months! Beat that. It’s amazing how all the memories of his first few weeks of life seemed so fuzzy now.  Time really flies.

Gone are his reflux days, and Squirt is no longer on his reflux medication. He has been completely weaned off Prevacid when he was about 8+ months, and he seems to be holding up really well without any medication. Another reason to go Woooooooohoooooo!

Squirt is still as smiley as ever, if not more. He laughs so easily too, and even when he is tired and sleepy, he still is able to flash you his grins just by us talking or chatting with him. He has got these tiny little dimples on the corner of his lips whenever he smiles, and that makes his facial expressions ohsocute.

This little boy needs distraction when it comes to food, but it still is a joy to see him enjoying his solids. We still haven’t been offering him finger food consistently - that means, he is not yet trained to feed himself. That means, I'll probably still feeding him when he is 20.

He seems to be more adventurous to try new things though, as it is looking like he is enjoying drinking his milk off a Doidy cup at meal times. He gets upset if we take the cup away from him, and would scream if we don't give him the cup. At the same time, he has somewhat figured out how to use a straw when he started nicking off Spud’s water bottle whenever he gets his hand on that, resulting in a very whiney Spud who gets upset that he is taking her things away.  

At 10 months, we are now officially a bottle-free zone, too! He has been completely weaned off his bottle when he was about 9.5 months, and has been using the sippy cup since for his milk intake. One more reason for me to go Wooooooohoooooooooo! (A post on weaning him off the bottle in a separate post)

Squirt’s certainly getting more vocal and tends to want to engage in a “conversation”  especially with his sister every now and then. He blabbers, grunts, screams and gets really, really excited when he sees the cats. He has been properly hyper too these days; even I am finding it hard (not to mention exhausting) in trying to keep up with him.

The good thing about him is that he still does a much more decent nap than Spud ever was – napping at least 2x a day for at least an hour each time, and sleeps better in his own cot. A norm for most, but for us, having gone through Spud almost napless period for over 8 months, having a baby who naps is god sent!

Squirt still hasn’t got any teeth just yet, and as for walking, he is still working on it! I reckon him walking will not be too far away now given that he is already able to stand up without any support for a few seconds.He is going to be a bumbling little toddler, soon.