Too Bad Lowe's Doesn't Carry Groceries...

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Because Isaac really likes their shopping carts.

And I would get a pretty good workout pushing that enormous shopping cart all around the grocery store!
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18 Months

I hope that when Isaac is old enough to read & understand what a blog is, he isn't too mad that I neglected to write anything about him here for over three months.

Isaac turned 18 months old last week. Sometimes I can't believe how fast he has grown up! I see other mom's with little babies and I almost can't remember Isaac ever being that small. He isn't much of a baby anymore. I think he might even be a toddler!

Waiting for the elevator at our hotel in South Beach

He is a fun & happy kid and seems to really be taking in everything around him. He doesn't say any real words yet but he points to everything and says "DAH!" And he only has one volume: LOUD. While we are driving he loves to point to all of the trucks and buses "DAH!" He loves trash cans and everywhere we go he seems to find one "DAH!" We bought him a little metal one with a swinging lid to play with at home. He loves the trash truck too. Lucky for him it comes to our condos three times a week and he always wants to go outside and watch. But he loves to go outside regardless. Several times a day he runs to the door and wants to go out. We go on a walk to the lake everyday with Cracker and see the ducks. Whenever the ducks see us come they swim over from across the lake to see if we have any food (sometimes we do) and Isaac always gets a big smile on his face when the ducks come to see him.

Cracker & Isaac on our daily walk to the lake

He loves to look at books with us and point out the things in the book. His favorite is a big book of animals and he knows over 40 different kinds of animals in the book. It is pretty impressive. And his greatest love of all is his pacifiers. They are mostly reserved for sleeping, but if he gets the chance he will take as many as he can get and carry them all around taking turns sucking on each one. He can even do two at a time!

Double pacifiers! This was while he was sick

He's down to only one nap a day (and it is usually less than an hour), but his appetite is good as ever. He has started going to the cupboard and bringing me food that he wants to eat. He also loves to drink more than any kid I've ever seen. Whenever he sees Charlie or I drinking something he just HAS to have some, even if it is just water, but especially when he sees a soda in a cup with a lid & straw. He LOVES soda. I know it is not the best thing for an 18 month old, but he really goes crazy for it.

Sneaking a drink of Dad's soda at the airport

Dipping his chips... or maybe just his fingers... in nacho cheese

He loves to watch the Backyardigans, and his "Underwater Adventures" DVD. It has all kinds of fish, seals, turtles, dolphins, etc. and he will watch it over and over and over again. We used to listen to a CD of Toddler Tunes in the car, but a month or so ago Charlie's brother gave us a CD he had burned of some current hits. Every time we turn it on Isaac gets a huge smile and starts "dancing" and he looks so funny! He just kind of bounces up and down in his car seat. It is really cute. He also recently added some hand movements when he hears music. He waves his hand with the beat of the music.

Watching Backyardigans on the iPhone with Dad & Cracker

And speaking of waving, he really loves to wave. He waves every time we, or anyone else leaves the house, and he always waves to the cashier when we leave the store (whether they are waving to him or not) and he'll also wave to any random person he happens to see walking around. He is an excellent waver.

And Isaac likes playing with Cracker. His favorite games are to either pull Cracker's tail or sneak up on Cracker while he is lying on the couch and jump on top of him. Both of these games result in a little whimper from Cracker and Isaac being sent to time out. His other favorite thing is to take a bite of food and wave it in front of Cracker's nose and then get Cracker to chase him around to try and get the food. Except then when Cracker does get it Isaac is mad. He points at Cracker and screams like "Hey, he took my food!" But I really can't feel too bad for the little stinker. He likes us to chase him around too, and he loves to be tickled, hung upside down, and any other type of wrestling around. He is all boy!

Tackling Cracker

Finally

Isaac is finally walking. He started taking steps a few weeks ago and has been getting better and better at it. He now walks more than he crawls, even though he is still a little unsteady. Charlie calls him Frankenstein. Here he is showing off his new skills on the streets of Paris!

14 Months

Isaac is 14 months old today! He is growing up quick. The last few weeks have been really fun. September was a rough month for him, but he is feeling better and is a much happier kid.

Isaac has learned how to climb and is reaching new heights! He loves to climb on the couch (with the help of Cracker's little stairs) and bounce around, but now he can also climb onto our big high bed and bounce around up there too. He pulls himself onto our office chair and thinks it is really fun to bang around on the key board. And not only can he climb onto the kitchen chairs, he climbs right up onto the table. We are a little worried about where he will decide to climb next!

He is not walking quite yet. He is funny because he has never wanted to have us help him or hold our hands and walk with us. If we try, he just tucks his feet up and hangs instead. He does stand up on his own though without pulling up on anything else. And in the last couple days he has gone from crawling on his hands and knees to crawling on his hands and feet... It looks kind of like a bear crawl or something. We can see that he is teaching himself to walk in his own funny little way. He goes from bear crawl, to standing, and then last night he even took a few steps! So we think he should be taking off any day now.

Isaac loves to be wild and bounce and jump around. He likes to play wrestle mania with Cracker... except Cracker doesn't really get into it. He just lays there. Isaac is definitely our little wild child though. We haven't heard many words from him, but there is still plenty of noise and plenty of laughter. He is such a funny kid and makes us laugh all the time.

Most parents try to keep their kids from watching too much TV but we are really trying to get Isaac to WANT to watch TV. See, we have this really long flight coming up next month and we think it would be great if he would just sit still and watch a movie for a little while. (Yeah right.) We have started turning on The Backyardigans for him. It is a cute cartoon and I kind of enjoy it myself! He really loves the opening song and gets the hugest smile everytime it comes on. After that he is not really interested unless he is strapped into his high chair with something to eat or drink. Then he will watch for 20 minutes or so.

Isaac loves books, the ceiling fans, bath time, pulling things out of cupboards and drawers, little collections of things that he can put in containers and take back out, shredding up toilet paper, pushing boxes and things around the house like a car, eating graham crackers, cheese, grapes, yogurt, and ground beef, drinking from cups with straws, and tackling the dog. We love this guy!

Haircut

We decided this time that Isaac should get a real haircut. We found a kid salon in Newport Beach and I took him there this week. I thought he would have fun sitting in the airplane and watching cartoons on the TV, but as soon as I set him down he started screaming. He ended up sitting in my lap the whole time instead and looking at an Elmo book. He did hold pretty still which was good. We put him back in the airplane afterwards to take some pictures but he really wanted nothing to do with it. At least his hair turned out cute.

Before...

After...

Feeding the Dogs

Isaac is usually a very good eater but sometimes he gets bored with whatever is on his tray and decides to share with Cracker. The other day we got to watch Lucie for awhile so Isaac had two dogs to feed. He thought this was hilarious. (Lucie is a black dog so you can't see her very well in this video, but if you look close you can see her jumping up to eat out of Isaac's hand.)

Sometimes this kid drives me crazy (like when he is feeding his dinner to the dogs), but I still just have to laugh at him.

Ready for the Cold

This cute puffy vest was one of the gifts we got for Isaac when he was a baby. He was too small to wear it last winter and of course it was too hot to wear in the summer. I was afraid he would have grown out of it by now (it is marked as size 4-6 months) but luckily it fits him just fine!

We are headed to Chicago next week and are looking forward to some nice cool weather and a chance to bundle up!