19 months

1. Still loves Cheerios and yogurt, eating more solid foods now.
2. Can repeat the alphabet one letter at a time. Sometimes he can anticipate and say on this own the next letter. Has a hard time with the letters L, Q, and R. If he's distracted, we usually lose him halfway to the end, around K. Loves to say the letter O like he's howling at the moon.
3. Can follow simple commands like, "put your shoes away," "put it back," "give this to Daddy," and "just look with your eyes." For awhile when we told him not to touch things and just "look with his eyes," he'd stiffen up his entire body, lean in close to whatever he was interested in, and open his eyes really wide, rolling his eyeballs around up and down and back and forth to get a real hard LOOK at it. It was hilarious but he's stopped doing that now.
   
4. Showing signs of being ready for potty training. Last month (?) he started running into the bathroom whenever Davis or I was in there doing our thing. He'd watch and scream and point, "pee pee!" These days, when he pees (we assume he's peeing), he'll stop whatever he's doing and look down at his diaper and grab his diaper. This morning when he was walking to the car to go to daycare, he yelled, "PEE-PEE!!!" at the top of his voice, stopped midstep, and stared at his diaper for a bit, then continued walking to the car. When he's in the bathtub, he'll stand up and stare down at his crotch. When Davis tells him, "no no, don't pee-pee," he'll hold it. At the end of the bath before draining the tub, Davis says, "okay, Devin, go pee-pee," and he'll pee in his bathwater on demand (eww...). This weekend, we are going to find some books on toilet training...so far, we've just been winging it.
5. Is learning his numbers, though it's hard to understand what he's saying. When we say, "one," he responds something like "thwoo," then we say, "three," he says, "coor." After that, it's pure alien dialect.
6. Allows us to clip his fingernails if he's somewhat distracted (like with a book). Sometimes he'll even watch Davis clip his nails, but he gets frustrated and can't watch more than two fingers at a time. HATES having his toe nails clipped. We have to do it WWF style - basically I sit on Devin, and Davis clips.
7. Allows us to brush his teeth without much struggle. In the mornings, he walks up to me when I'm brushing my teeth and begs for the "buhsh" (brush). I usually give him my toothbrush after I'm done. He sticks it in his mouth and pretends to brush his teeth with it, and then he runs around using it to point at things around the apartment (like the dog). Next time I brush my teeth, I have to go hunt it down (usually I find my toothbrush somewhere under the couch or behind the TV set, covered in dog fur).
   
8. Lately has been crying whenever we leave his crib at night before he falls asleep. I try to walk away to teach him that crying won't help, but it is HARD TO DO. He's been waking up around 5 in the morning, too, crying until one of us goes in to stroke his head. Eventually he'll fall back asleep, but sometimes it requires one of us to sleep on the futon in his room. He'll periodically sit up in his crib to make sure we are there, then he'll go back to sleep.
   
9. Loves to ask for "Yeh yeh" when he sees my computer. He's asking to see his grandfather on the webcam.
10. Loves to look for loose coins and put them in his golden piggybank.
    

Think: "Rocky" Theme Song

Every night after his bath...

Me and the moon

Santa Monica beach, 2/24/2007