Chatterbox

Brennan has always been a talker. We've reached an exciting period of extreme language acquisition. It's so exciting! He'll regularly repeat the last word you say and his pronunciations are almost always spot on. In addition to labeling objects in books, he also enjoys naming items in his environment. It's not uncommon for him to go from one object to another, to another ("blocks, bubbles, milk, bread, shoes, door, car...").

Amongst all of Brennan's talking, Mommy is finding it difficult to talk to others on the telephone with him around. As soon as he hears me talking on the phone, Brennan will immediately run to me and quickly repeat "Daddy? Daddy? Daddy?" and will become upset if he isn't given the phone. As found in an experiment this evening, this behavior will occur even if Daddy is in the room when Mommy is on the telephone!

First This, Then That

Brennan has always benefited from routines and is able to anticipate what comes next. We've noticed that he's also verbalizing and initiating his routines. Just two examples from today:

~While in the kitchen, I asked Brennan if he wanted to go to the mailbox. He immediately stopped what he was doing, ran to me, exclaiming "Up! Up!" Before I had a chance to pick him up, he ran to the garage door, stating "Door! Door!" Seeing the mat of shoes by the door, he began saying "Shoes! Shoes!". Brennan grabbed Mommy's shoes, brought them to me, and put them on the floor. Thanks, kiddo!

~I asked Brennan if he wanted to go to Mommy and Daddy's room while I put away our laundry. Instead, he went into his bedroom and approached his changing table, pointed to the changing pad, calling out "Boop! Boop!" Thinking he had soiled his diaper, I followed him into his room and asked he if needed a new diaper. Next, Brennan exclaimed, "Book!", picked out a book from his bookshelf, and returned to his changing table. While he hadn't "booped", he was due for a fresh diaper!

17 Months!

~New word in Brennan's vocabulary: "No." I'm somewhat impressed that it took this long and that "Yes" was in his vocabulary first. Now, "No, no!" and "Oh no!" are regularly heard!
~He frequently repeats words we say. He does a great job! Some recent examples are "Bue" for "blue" and "Bees"/"Bush" for "please". Daddy and Mommy (usually pronounced "Mondy" or "Monny") are heard a lot!
~He can identify his mouth, nose, eyes, ears, belly, belly button, and feet. He also likes to identify these body parts on Mommy, Daddy, and characters in his books.
~Sesame Street characters continue to be a favorite. He enjoys labeling "Elmo", "Cook-Cook" (Cookie Monster), "Osca" (Oscar), "Do Doot" (Big Bird), "Erna" (Ernie), "Dert" (Bert), "Verver" (Grover), and "Addy" (Abby). He occasionally requests to watch "Elmo" on television or the computer, but loses interest after a few minutes.
~In addition to Hop on Pop, he also asks for "Hamma" (Green Eggs and Ham).
~Current animal noises include dog ("woof woof"), elephant (raspberry), duck ("quack quack"), sheep ("baa"), lion ("raa"), snake ("ssss"), monkey ("ee ee"), and cow ("moo"). He can also identify and name fish ("ish"), goose ("goose"), moose ("moose"), cats ("dats").
~Today is Mommy's first day of summer break! I'm looking forward to extra time with Brennan, including play dates with friends and family!
~He loves to dunk or dip his food. He'll ask by stating "Do-dit" and repeatedly dunking his food in the air. Current favorite foods include all fruits, carrots, green peppers, peas, corn, cereal, pizza, chicken nuggets, crackers, yogurt, spaghetti, and cookies.
~Brennan regularly laughs at himself. It's adorable! He's quite the ham!
~He loves all things electronic. He enjoys pushing buttons on the remote ("Mote") while watching the screen change. There is no interest in the remote when the television is off or if the batteries are removed. He also enjoys pushing buttons on the computer keyboard, a forbidden activity since his random keystrokes results in bizarre things on the computer!
~Brennan goes to sleep between 6:30-6:45pm and wakes up between 5:00-6:30am. He takes two naps during the day. He does a fabulous job putting himself to sleep. After putting him in his crib, he'll turn on his music soother, lay down, grab his blankie/blanket, and say, "Night night!" Sometimes he'll also blow kisses. When awake and ready to get out, he continues to throw his blankie and blanket over the side of his crib. During a recent visit at Grandma and Grandpa Mealy's house, it was discovered that it is acceptable for Grandma to return his blanket/blankie and go back to sleep. It is not acceptable for Mommy or Daddy to return his blanket/blankie and not get him out of bed!
~While in the act or just after, Brennan will state "Boop" to let us know that he is soiling his diaper. This could be very helpful for future potty training, especially if we can teach him to tell us before he does the deed! He'll also say "boop" after passing gas.
~If he notices that someone is taking his picture, Brennan is very likely to say "Cheese!" and flash a goofy grin.

Love to Label, continued

Brennan continues to enjoy labeling objects in his books, but maybe a bit too much! As with many toddlers, Brennan's sippy cup ended up on the floor during lunch. While cleaning up the kitchen, I asked him, "Where's your milk?" Brennan immediately went to the family room, picked out one of his books, turned through the pages, and pointed to a small picture of a carton of milk and exclaimed "Milk!" Impressive, kiddo, but I was referring to the cup of milk 2 feet away from you!

In other book news, Brennan has started to refer to "Hop on Pop" as "Bop Bop Pop", reciting the phrase repeatedly as he flips through the pages.