Growing Up

It has been several weeks of changes here for Mr. Tyler. Some major, most minor and others precursors to bigger things but they all point to the same conclusion: Our little boy is growing up.
I've talked recently about how Tyler is on the verge of walking. While we're still waiting for those first steps it's definitely not from lack of trying on Ty's part. Just tonight, I would beckon him into my arms from where he was standing, either on a chair or his learning table. He would bravely let go and heave his body at me, without moving his feet of course, giggling the whole time. After each attempt he'd pick himself up off the floor and race back to where he started to try again.
His language and comprehension development has been just as exciting. He's spoken his first real word, "hot", and will repeat it throughout the day, especially in the morning when Jim and I are drinking coffee. He's attempting other words such as "Tyler" and "socks" and can say Hi, too, although it sounds more like a drawn out "haaa". More phonetic sounds are making an appearance, including "ma ma ma" which he just started 2 days ago. Woo Hoo!! We know his vocabulary is growing as he shows recognition of more and more words. Some words he knows the meaning of are: pup, drink/milk, horsy, book, up, all done, goodbye and no.When he hears the word goodbye he will wave at whoever is nearby.
Tyler's play has gotten more and more organized over the past several weeks. Before, his favorite game was to bang two objects together or open and close doors on his toys. Now, he's very into moving toys from one place to another. For instance, he'll methodically empty his school bus and place all the contents up on an end table, then turn around and move them all back inside the bus. This goes for emptying out his toy boxes, puzzle pieces, books and even his dinner. A few times I've been putting food on his tray from a bowl and he'll pick up a piece and try to put it back in the bowl! His stacking rings have also fallen into this game. Instead of dumping them out and smacking them together he'll actually work very hard on placing each ring back on the post. This caused him great frustration at first as he learned how to move the rings flat so they'd fit back on the post. Now he's a pro!
Tyler has now mastered drinking milk out of a sippy cup, which he does during the day. We'll work on getting rid of his morning and nighttime bottles in a few months when his intake of milk decreases. Switching to milk from formula has definitely increased his appetite, especially at breakfast. It's not unusual now for him to gobble up 2 waffles plus a bowl of cereal!
With all this positive change going on there are bound to be some negatives too, namely his sleeping. Historically, when on the cusp of new tricks, Tyler will wake up in the middle of the night or super early in the morning for a few weeks. His routine would fall right back into place once he'd accomplished his latest milestone. Jim and I recently looked back over old blog posts to confirm this. The last time we experienced this I wrote about it in early November, just before he started sitting up and army crawling. For the past 2 weeks Tyler has been doing exactly that: waking up at 3, 4 or 5 in the morning-sometimes not falling back asleep until we finally get him at 6. Making this different from past occurrences is the fact that his daytime sleep is changing too. He's able to stay up longer in between naps, sometimes missing a nap altogether, leaving us to believe that he's nearing the time when he'll drop his morning nap and just have one nap a day. From everything I've read and heard from other moms this transition is neither quick nor smooth. We'll have to take each day one at a time until his routine normalizes, which could be quite a while!
Even though the mornings have been earlier than usual Jim and I both look forward to going into his room each morning to be greeted by his adorable smile and upraised arms, begging us to pick him up. Tyler truly brings such joy into our lives and it only grows with each new change.