17 Months

17 Months
Current Height: 79 cm/31.1 inches tall
No of Teeth: 16
ORNERY!!
Yes, he is still pretty bald! When my parents visited, my mom thought he looked more bald than before when she first arrived. After being here for almost two weeks, she had decided he'd grown a lot of hair while they were here. I think he is probably just holding steady with the same amount that he's had for a while!
Current Favorite Books: Old MacDonald Had a Farm and My Little People Farm (lift the flap book)
New Words: No, cup (pup), water (wawr), people (pepo), belly button (bee-boh), off (ahh), knee, bib, hat (haaa), A (the letter), O (also in reference to the letter)
Favorite No-No's: not coming when called and touching the computer (we are really cracking down on these!)

New Stunts: He is starting to get a little more adventurous. As you can see in the photo, he thinks the tricycle is great for standing and balancing acts. He also loves to climb up the playground stairs (a little plastic slide) and slide down, though I still have to sit him down at the top of the slide or he'd dive head first! He runs around the house a lot too, still loves to throw balls, and love to get into everything!

New Fun Things:

• He is getting more interested in singing. We try to do the motions if the song has them. This is fun. He loves reading books that we sing with (like his Old MacDonald Book or a 12 Apostles book that I sing to instead of read the words).
  
• His Aunite Livia sent him a puzzle recently; it is one that has the picture of the piece on the board to help kids learn how to do them. Canaan loves doing this puzzle. One big draw is that it is a puzzle about different types of transportation and they make noise when you put the piece in the puzzle!! Dougle has decided he will buy Auntie Livi's kids lots of noisy toys when she has them!
  
• Canaan also loves to help Mommy around the house. When I sweep, he follows me around begging for the broom. When I start to mop, he goes around sweeping everything and tries to put the broom in the bucket! He still doesn't like the vacuum- so we don't do that very often when he's around!
  
• Canaan loves to look out our kitchen window. He stands below it, looks up and says, "Truck!" He always likes to watch the little patch of road you can see, as well as the kids and animals below. The other day he was saying "cycle" but I didn't see one. I thought he was talking about something else until Dougle came over and spotted it too! He has such good EYESIGHT and is very observant- to notice dogs and bicycles from 12 stories up!
• Canaan is learning so much. He hasn't had a whole lot of new words since we moved (which to be expected a bit), but it is amazing how much he understands! He can identify many parts of his body, some in Russian too. He also can identify many animals and a few shapes. He loves to point to different objects in his word book when we ask him where they are. He can follow many simple commands and chimes in when we say words that he knows and likes to say. It is just so amazing how much he is absorbing from his surroundings. It also makes us remember just how much we have to be extra careful about what we are saying in front of him!
• One funny thing: everything that can be opened is a door. He seems to know that actual doors are a little different from drawers (they do sound similar) and lids. Yes, he comes over to us with containers and says 'door' so that we will open them for him. It is so cute!
  

Eating: I think I talked about this in a previous blog, but it is still happening: at times he will forget that he likes certain foods we eat. Just at the sight of certain new foods (or foods we've eaten), he will turn away. I have made a point to make him at least TRY ONE BITE of something before he decides not to eat it. Well, getting this first bite down is often a very difficult battle; since Canaan has realized that Mommy always wins these battles, he is getting a little less resistent about trying new things- which is nice for Mommy! Anyway, most of the time, he will gladly eat what he at first turned his nose up at, after chewing the first bite. The only thing he consistently won't eat is cheese. Oh, and it is very cool to me that he eats SOUP! I didn't know kids his age would even eat it, but he does and loves it!

There is much more I could write. Life is just so fun and challenging with a little one year old running around. But, I'll leave you with all that for now. Blessings to everyone!