Julie's Boggle

At 16 months Jonathan now weighs 10.5 kg and is 79cm tall. (It finally feels relevant to say “tall” because he does actually stand quite a lot).

Personality-wise, there are so many little attributes of Jon that have developed over the last 4 – 5 months that I hardly know where to start. In essence though, he’s still a really happy, laid back character, very easy to manage and mostly uncomplaining.

One of the aspects that Tom and I are really enjoying, is that he’s a lot more touchy-feely now. That’s not to say that he’s overtly affectionate, but in little things: like leaning into us (for a 3 second cuddle) when we’re sitting down or holding him, patting us benevolently on the head, and crawling enthusiastically into our arms if we crouch down and call him over.

We also love how he’s finally figured out who we are. As in, the pivotal people in his life.  It’s wonderful to see how excited he gets when one of us returns from being out. We are blessed with a very enthusiastic set of squeaks and shrilling, and Tom even gets the occasional “Da!”.

Jon’s little character is definitely maturing and this initially led to a waning of the easy smiles and laughter that we were used to. But it turns out that we’re just working with more complex triggers now, and there are still just as many ways to get Jon chuckling like a madman.

For instance, he is hugely amused by loud banging noises and the mishaps that cause them. So when half a dozen pill containers came tumbling down off the high medicine shelf onto Mommy (who was trying to extract just one of them) the accompanying thuds and crashes and a little squeal from me had Jon laughing so hard he almost fell over. To get him to smile for the camera, forget “Smile!”, the magic word is “Whoops!” or “Bang!”. Works like a charm.

Jon also takes great pleasure in the little things.  Retrieving his muslin at nap time by snagging it down from the side of his cot where it hangs, playing peekaboo with it, whipping Mommy’s glasses off before she can take evasive action; all these bring a smile that speaks volumes of his sheer happiness in the moment.

As far as it suits me, I keep Jon’s life fairly structured in terms of our daily routine. He enjoys his sleep and naps for about 45 minutes in the morning, and an hour around lunch. Sleeps which I could probably combine but it’s far too convenient having him sleep while I get myself ready in the morning.

On an average evening, we put Jon down sometime around 19h30 (he often stays awake in bed until 20h00) , and wake him (if he hasn’t woken himself) when we get up at 07h00. Awakenings in the night are very rare indeed and can usually be traced back to one of three things: (1) lost muslin, (2) painful teething or (3) having a fever.

Jon gave up his dummy quite early on, but he does have an immense fondness for his bottle.  A bottle with some warm water in it is our “last resort” when he won’t go down for his daytime naps, and he really knows how to hold out for it!

It’s been great to watch him over the last few months as he starts to develop a real awareness of his surroundings and some sort of primitive understanding of what we’re saying.  For instance, I’ve discovered that he will object to being laid down unceremoniously on the changing mat, but if I say to him “Ok, lying down now”, he’s far more receptive.

Jon’s own talking is fairly limited.  We get some babbling away to himself, often very expressively, but very little in the way of mimicking us despite lots of parental coaxing. 

Very occasionally he’ll give out a soft little “Bi!” for bye, and we like to think he’s finally pinned “Da” to Tom.  “Mum” as in “mum-um-um-um!” seems to be used most commonly for “Food!  Over there! Why aren’t you giving it to me?”

Jon has had just two little incisors at the bottom for ages now and they were certainly very cute.  (He does also have teeth at the top but they’re only gradually becoming noticeable.)

However, after almost 8 months of hanging back, the final two incisors at the bottom have broken through so the cute little two-tooth smiles will soon be changing…

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 9th, 2008 at 10:27 pm and is filed under Jonathan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.