Toddlerhood Transitions

That time has come, much sooner than I would like.  Ryne started climbing out of his crib last night, which has changed our lives dramatically, yet again.  We had a two hour battle last night of putting Ryne back in bed over and over again, and thus keeping him from banging on the door and opening it to escape sleep!  Today at naptime, it was just as bad, if not worse because I was having to deal with the mental exhaustion all on my own.

I called the doctor this morning to see what they advise.  The nurse told us that it's time to transition Ryne to a toddler bed, for safety concerns.  She said that a lot of kids end up breaking an arm or leg when they start climbing out.  She also said that we have to continue to put him back in bed over and over again until he learns that he HAS to stay in his bed.  She told me that this was VERY important given Ryne's previous sleep issues.  Maybe one day Ryne will take after me and LOVE sleep!

Another transition we are making is with the potty.  We did not take Ryne's potty on vacation, since we figured he'd be at the beach during the day most days, and we figured he wouldn't stop long enough to actually go sit on the potty when we were in the condo.  However, now, he's decided that he wants to pee standing up!  It's the cutest and funniest thing EVER!  It's like a tiny grown man standing there!  So far he hasn't actually gone standing up, but he has been telling us when he needs to go.  Adam assured me last night that Ryne was just making a game of it again, but as soon as we let him off the stool he stands on at the potty, he peed in the floor!  He did the same things again this morning...on my foot!  So we are trying to figure out a way to overcome the issue of distraction while standing to potty.

My little boy is growing up so fast!  It doesn't help that he does so many things like a big kid or grown up.  He haven't used a stroller in almost a year.  He haven't used a high chair in about 6 months - now the toddler bed and standing to potty!  AHHH!  Can we just freeze time for a little while so I can keep my little boy?!

22 Months

I'm a little late on this post...about 3 days late.  We have been incredibly busy, even though we shouldn't be  (more on that later), but my weekend will be even busier so I'm stealing a few minutes to post now.  This past month seems to have gone by so fast, and with not much change in Ryne.

Ryne has spent the majority of this past month OUTSIDE!  We've had very warm weather here lately and Ryne just can't stand to be inside.  A lot of the usual day-time play-time/teaching activities have gone by the wayside.  Ryne doesn't seem to have changed much to the extent he has in the past months.

Weight:  rougly the same - 25ish lbs!  It's amazing because he eats a lot and eats almost anything we give him.  The nickname of "the goat" seems to be quite fitting!

Language Development:  Ryne still knows over 200 words at this point, but he's not learning a new word on a daily basis - that we can tell.  Ryne is still VERY reserved with language and seems to use it mainly when the occasion specifically calls for it.  Adam and I feel his enunciation is getting worse to some extent, but the rest of the family says it seems to be getting better because they can understand him more.  The reason Adam and I are a little  concerned is because Ryne is dropping the end of a lot of words that he has been able to say fully in the past months.  Apple has become "app", etc.
However,  I did come across some research recently that discussed use of pronouns in toddlers around the age of 2.  Ryne has been using pronouns correctly for several months now - since roughly 16/17 months old.  He uses "I", and "me" correctly.  He also seems to understand possession quite well, but then again he seemed to understand that at 13 months when he started saying "my baba", "my dadda", etc.  He likes assigning seats now or telling us which items belong to whom.  All in all, Ryne is still doing quite well, but I'm eager to see if he has another language spurt before in the next few months.

Comprehension:  I think I say this every month, but it is truly amazing what children this age understand.    You can explain complex things, mumble, talk to casually to yourself, talk to someone else and he understands every bit of it.  He just soaks it right up!  He also seems to understand time to some extent.  He knows "tomorrow" is not today and "later" is not right now.  We are going to start working with an actual clock and days of the week soon to see if he can understand it better.  He also knows that when I say "Mom" or "Dad" it means my mother or father.  So if I ask him, "who is my momma?" or "who is Momma's momma?" he will say "Boo Boo," which is his name for my mother!  He does the same when I ask him who is my daddy.  He's a huge PaPa fan, so any chance he gets to say "PaPa, " he's a happy boy!

Puzzles:  Still rocking the jigsaw puzzles!  We are trying to move him more into puzzles with no board underneath and he will assemble some off their board.  It is getting harder to find puzzles/toys that are age-appropriate since he is still so young, but seems to fly through them.

Potty:  Ryne pooped in his potty all on his own the other day!  It scared him a little, but he got several Elmo stamps for his accomplishment!  He actually covered himself in Elmo stamps!  In the next few weeks we are going to make the move to real underwear.  Last week (before he did the aforementioned accomplishment in the potty) Ryne was playing games with us when it came to potty time.  He would say he had to go and then he'd run into the bathroom, lift the lid to his potty, take his diaper off and then he would say he wanted to get in the bath...but he wouldn't.  Then he'd try to make a break for it and run through the house naked!  If we mentioned a diaper, he'd say he had to pee pee again and go back to the bathroom, only to pull the same trick on us.  What we've found with other activities that Ryne does, he gets bored of an activity before he even masters it.  He gets bored very easily!  He pulled tricks on us when he was doing puzzles, ABCs - anything.  It's as if he has to make a game of it to make it interesting, even though we read, sing, etc to him when he's on the potty to keep him occupied.  
Several mothers have told me to stop potty training because he's too young, but if that's the case and if that is what we had decided to do, what do you tell a child when they tell you they need to use the potty and then actually go use it?  I don't feel like it's the best thing to tell him "No" when he can actually use the potty on his own.  I feel like if we up the ante with underwear, and Ryne meets the challenge then he's obviously ready.  If he doesn't...then he's obviously not and we can stop for awhile.  Either way, I don't feel like he's too young.  Our pediatrician, the nursing staff and a specialist all recommended we start trying months ago.  I know some think we are probably pushing him but we really aren't.  This has been in the works for 5 months now, so we are taking it rather slow and we don't really have a deadline set for when we'd like for him to be potty-trained.

Arts and Crafts:  Ryne is really enjoying coloring, drawing, making things, etc.  He almost holds a pen correctly, which is great.  I'm hoping to make a felt board soon so we can teach him some Bible stories and do other fun felt activities on there.

Pretend Play:  This has really taken off this month.  Everything becomes a car these days - a shoe, a block, anything that he can move and say "vroom vroom" to!  He likes pretending to talk on the phone by holding his hand up to his ear.  He will also pretend play with his stuffed animals, which is the cutest thing ever!

Outside play:  Do you need your yard mowed (with a toy mower that only blows bubbles) or mulch strewn about wildly distributed in your flower beds?  Well Ryne's your man!  Do you need some handy man work done?  Ryne loves playing with is toy tool box set - driving nails, turning screws, etc.  We bought a nice wood toolbox from Smart Toys and Books and Ryne can't seem to separate himself from it!  He has been digging in my parent's garden, helping plant some flowers, and watering the trees we transplanted at our house.  Our pool also opened last week, so Ryne and I spent a day splashing around in there as well!  Ryne just wants to be outside!  Ryne already has a insane farmer's tan and apparently he's inherited my Native American blood because he's getting DARK on his arms.  Can you imagine how gorgeous he'll be by the end of the summer - dark skin, his hair will lighten up, and those deep navy blue eyes!  Get ready to swoon!

Sports:  Ryne is really getting into sports now too.  He has an arm on him for sure and his aim is getting MUCH better.  However, what's most impressive is his ability to kick a ball!  He's been able to kick well since 15/16 months, but he's getting better!  Ryne still stumbles and falls some when he's running, but if you give him a ball to kick, his balance seems much better!  He looks like a little soccer player when he runs and kicks a ball - so fluid, so effortless, so efficient.  I wish I could get some video of him, but every time we pull out a camera or video camera, he just wants to play with it!  I also plan to teach Ryne some swimming skills this summer too.  He kicks very well, but we need to work on some other skills.  Adam and I are adamant about Ryne learning to swim at a young age and not relying on arm floaties or life jackets to swim in a pool.  There is a time and a place for life jackets.  But from what we've seen and experienced, especially as lifeguards, the moment your lifejacket-wearing child is around a pool without a lifejacket on, they forget they aren't wearing the lifejacket, jump in as usual and almost drown.

Well that's all I have time for this month.  Seems like a lot considering it seemed like a rather slow-learning month!  I think Ryne is learning A LOT from being outside - physics, technical skills, etc.  He seems to understand time to an extent.  He's also having a lot of FUN outside, which is probably the most important thing!

Until next month...!

Mornings with Mommy

Today has been so crazy and it's only 1 o'clock!  Ryne JUST went down for a nap (spoke too soon - he's still awake)!  Emphasis on "JUST" because he's been up since 5:30 this morning!  Ryne keeps me constantly running throughout the day, even on rainy days like yesterday, when we were stuck indoors.  I will admit that I do not usually wake up until he does in the morning, because I'm SOOOO TIRED everyday!  Days like today are even worse, because I've been up since way earlier than usual.

The past few weeks, Ryne has been taking his diaper off before I can get to him, every morning and peeing in his bed.  It's not the end of the word, but a little annoying to change his sheet every day and sometime again after his nap...for the same reason.  Today was much the same, but much different.  From what I can assume, Ryne probably removed his diaper last night before he fell asleep, because when he woke up screaming this morning bright and early  before the crack of dawn, his crib mattress was soaked completely - hardly a dry spot on it.  I think that was the work of multiple pees.  His pj shirt was soaked.  His blankets were soaked.  His stuffed animals were soaked and there was a good size wet spot in the floor!  That's a lot of pee, my friends!  I figured Ryne would probably take a little nap around 7 or 8, but NOOOOO!  He was rip, roaring and ready to go!  I was so tired, I just let him sit and watch TV for awhile because I could barely keep my eyes open.  On the few occasions that I did doze off, Ryne would come by and poke me in the eyes!  Nothing says "Good Morning" like a little eye gouging!  Needless to say, Ryne and I had a looong morning together.

Also this morning was our first time going to an event called Mornings with Mommy that a local Lutheran Church does twice a month.  I had considered taking Ryne there back in November, but we got caught up in all the Holiday hustle and bustle.  Again in January, I considered it because Ryne's semester at The Little Gym ended then and I wanted him to have another activity to do outside the house.  He got RSV shortly after, so we couldn't go then and after that, I just flat forgot about it.

A few weeks ago, my friend, Brooke told me that she had taken her daughter Brylee recently and was going back this week, so I signed Ryne up to go also.  Then about a week ago, another friend of mine mentioned she was wanting to go to Mornings with Mommy and I told her that we were signed up for this week, so she brought her son too.  It was a nice little gathering!  There are different stations set up with different activities such as arts and crafts, a sensory station, a gross motor development station, felt story boards, books, etc.  They also provide a snack at the end.  It's only $5 and lasts an hour - that is awesome!


During today's activities at Mornings with Mommy, Ryne colored some acorns, and he actually held the markers correctly quite a bit of the time!  I was so proud of him because we've never explained that to him!  He colored a cut out of a watering can, which had "Happy Mother's Day" written on it.  He also added a few stickers and some glitter paint to jazz up the watering can cut-out.  Then for sensory development, they had some big storage containers full of dried lentils and silk flowers.  The kids could dig around with plastic garden tools in that.  Ryne was wild with the lentils!  Then at the end, he made me a flower pot for a gift!  They painted his hands and put his hand prints on the pot for us to take home!  It was so fun and so cute!  Ryne didn't participate in the group stuff at the beginning (which he never does), but he did have fun at all the stations that he went too.  It was hard to get him to leave one station and go to another.  He gets so engrossed in an activity, but I wanted him to experience as much as possible.  If I got him to another station, then he didn't want to leave that one!

Oh well, it was a great experience, and lots of fun and I think we will be going back as often as we can!

Update:  Ryne didn't actually fall asleep until 2!

Potty Time

Well Ryne peed in his potty again today!  Adam was here, even though he stepped out of the bathroom moments before Ryne actually peed.  However, Adam still came in and got excited and gave praises, hugs and kisses!  It took about ten minutes or more for Ryne to go, but he went and that's what's important!

Ryne has a few different pee pee cues that I've been noticing.  Sometimes he will tell you that he has to "pee pee" and then we go to the potty.  Sometimes, like today, he will start trying to take his diaper off and when I ask him why he's doing that, he will tell me that he has to pee.  As you probably know, if you've ever read a blog posting about Ryne, he is an extremely high-energy child, more so than most toddlers, so it's hard to get him to stay in one spot of longer than a few seconds (unless he's doing puzzles or playing with trains).  He actually sits on the potty quite well, especially for the length of time it takes him to actually go.  Adam asked me today if it always takes "this long" and I said, "yes because he doesn't know how to make himself go all the time."  Ryne does get up off the potty every so often and I ask him if he wants to put his diaper back on.  He immediately says "I pee pee" or "I need to pee pee" and sits back down.  I also sing silly songs to keep us both occupied!

Potty training is definitely a process that requires patience, but Ryne seems so excited about it...and getting Elmo stamps for doing it.  Hopefully Ryne will be potty trained soon, but we aren't pushing him. We want him to continue to get excited about using the potty!

"Boom Boom Outside"

I think Ryne's version of tornadic weather is pretty accurate!  All evening long he would say "boom boom outside" for thunder and "light outside" for lightening.  I'm just glad storms don't scare him, and he actually sleeps very well when it is storming!  We were fortunate enough to not have as much serious weather as some of the surrounding areas.  We did have gumball sized hail, but luckily all our cars were in the garage!

The past few days have just been full of excitement, good and bad.  Tuesday the compressor on our refrigerator died!  We had a repairman come look at it and said it would cost almost $500 for a new compressor with labor!  While the repair guy was finishing up, Adam told me to get online and start looking at refrigerators.  Then the repairman mentioned that some companies have warranties on things like this for up to 5 years, so I pulled out the warranty info and found out that we had purchased a 4-year extended warranty plan through Lowes for under $90!  Thank you, Lord!  That's probably the only time we've purchased an extended warranty on anything!  We were supposed to have the Lowes repairman come yesterday, but they apparently overbooked him, so he called to tell me he couldn't come until today.  So, I'm patiently waiting...with all the refrigerator contents in coolers in the kitchen floor!

We had some good excitement, yesterday during the lighter side of the storms.  Ryne used his potty again!  He's been doing well to sit on it for awhile, but he couldn't seem to go...until yesterday!  He told me he had to pee pee, so we went to the bathroom and I took his diaper off.  He sat down for a few minutes.  Then he got up to play a minute and then I noticed a little dribble going down his leg, so he sat down on the potty again and peed in the potty!  We were so excited!  He got two Elmo stamps, one on each hand, for using his potty!  He really enjoyed dumping the pee from his potty into the toilet, so much so that he tried to dip it back out!  Boys will be boys!

I am thankful for the good aspects of yesterday and praying for those who didn't weather the storms as well as we did.  I did manage to take a few pictures yesterday evening.  These are by no means great pictures.  I didn't want to get my tripod out while these storms were going through because I didn't want it to become a lightening rod, so pardon the camera shake, night shots!

Scary clouds last night! 

 Somber sky this morning

A little blue peeking through!

21 months

I cannot believe that Ryne is 3 months away from being 2!   Ahh!  It's killing me!  It seems like yesterday that we celebrated Ryne's first birthday.

So here are his stats:

Weight:  25lbs 2 oz.  Really this kid eats like a horse and barely gains an ounce.  His level of physical activity is through the roof so I guess he's burning calories like crazy.  We recently started buying summer clothes and we've had a bit of a change in size.  Ryne is wearing 9 month shorts and 12-18 month shirts.  I'm going to assume since Adam wears a size 36 in the waist of his pants that Ryne has my waist!

Language Development:  During this age, it's so hard to keep up.  We know Ryne says over 200 words at this point, which is wonderful.  He is using some interjections like "wow", "whoa", "yay" and conjunctions like "and."  He is getting a little better about naming things when we ask what they are, but he is still quite reserved with his language.  He talks to me and Adam the most, but when he's around other people he uses less words and shorter phrases.  He also likes pretending to be asleep and making the snoring noise...through his mouth!

Comprehension:  At this age, the level of comprehension is quite astounding!  It's hard to believe kids this age even understand half of what we say and do.  He understands complex directions, details and storylines.  He has for quite some time, but his understanding seems to be evolving even more.  He is very good at problem solving, but sometimes solves problems so well that it's actually quite scary.  He wants to be a grown up so bad that he will do almost anything a grown up will do.

Speaking of doing things that grown ups do, he can undo almost any babyproofing device.  He can completely unbuckle himself from his carseat - which is a BAD thing.  He can also put car keys in the ignition and start a car and buckle himself up in the front seat, with no carseat.  We did not teach him this, so obviously we NEVER leave Ryne alone in the car, even if it's turned off with no keys, because that's just a dangerous combination with little Houdini Knies!  He can unplug the HDMI cord from the DVR and put it into the PS3 all by himself because he wants to watch Elmo.  He can put his shoes on the correct feet, do a zipper and button pants.  He can almost completely dress himself and tries to put on his own diaper - which means it's time for training pants!

Potty Time:  or "pee pee time" as Ryne calls it.  Ryne is working hard at potty training.  He is still not consistent enough with potty training over an extended period of time, but there are days when he does quite well!  Some days he will only tell you when he wets or dirties his diaper.  Some days he will tell you that he has to use the potty and he will sit on it patiently, but we wait and wait and nothing comes out!  Either way, he's getting there and I think he could be in mostly training pants by 2, but we aren't pushing it.

Music and songs:  oh my goodness, Ryne loves music!  He loves to dance to it!  About the only time Ryne watches a show on TV is when the music comes on.  He sings songs that he makes up and he will hum other songs that he knows, but he wont really sing a song, like the Wheels on the Bus or the ABCs.

ABCs:  Ryne seems to know quite a bit of his alphabet.  He usually will not tell you what they are if you ask, but he will just bust out the letters when he's not prompted to do so.  While doing one of his jigsaw puzzles the other day, he saw the title "Picture Puzzle" at the top of the puzzle and pointed and said "P" "C" "T" and "E".  Some of the letters were lowercase, which I've never exposed him to.  He still will not say them in order, even though he knows several chunks of the alphabet in order.  Order is not Ryne's way of functioning, apparently!

Puzzles:  Ryne is doing jigsaw puzzles with little to no help.  I finally figured out a way to teach him how to do puzzles by looking at the picture some and not just the shape.  He can do puzzles that have no outlines, guidelines or pictures underneath.  Since he has mastered most of his puzzles, he is putting them together off the cardboard frame thing and learning animals names and the names of the United States in the process.  As long as he masters puzzles and enjoys them, we are going to keep challenging him.  I really recommend puzzles to any parent because Ryne is learning so much in the process.

Reading:  he is learning to read a few words.  My mother taught my brother around 18 months so she suggested seeing if Ryne could as well.  He can read a few words and sometimes we wonder if he's not reading more than we realize or if he has somehow deduced the meaning of words from other things.

Ryne is such a sweet little guy, but he is still so challenging!  It's becoming more and more obvious to us that he learns in a dramatically different way than most.  However, we are also learning that he learns VERY much like Adam!  I am blown away almost daily and challenged daily.  These monthly postings are just a glimpse into Ryne's monthly achievements and some things are leftovers from previous months.  As I'm sure almost every other mother of a toddler can attest to, there's not enough time or space to write down even half of what toddlers accomplish during this time of their life!  It's such an exciting time and again, we can't wait to see what the next month holds!

Potty Mouth

Wow!  Today was an exciting day again in the Knies house!  Ryne had a couple of 'firsts' today.  I gave Ryne a bath about mid morning because he played outside ALL day yesterday and I knew he was probably a little sweaty after all that time outside.  Anywho, Ryne said the word "poop" and I asked "Do you have to poop?"  Well of course, while I was asking, he started going!  I was sitting on the lid of his potty so I didn't have to sit on my knees to bathe him.  When I realized he was starting, I hopped up, lifted the potty lid, tried to get the pee pee guard up, grabbed Ryne and sat him down on the potty.  I wasn't sure if he'd go or not since he did do a little in the tub (ewwww!).  He sat there about a minute with a stunned look on his face and finally I got him up to see if he had actually gone.  To my surprise, he did!  I was so excited!  Ryne kept pointing at it and I gave him tons of hugs, kisses, praises and we clapped our hands!

After I got him dried off (he just came from the tub so he was dripping wet) and in a diaper and clothes, I went back in to clean out the potty...and the tub.  I dumped it all in the actual toilet and put the lid down and flushed it.  [Side note:  did you know that if you don't put the lid down when you flush, toilet water can spray out up to 6 ft in almost any direction?  Usually your toothbrush is within 6 ft.  'Nough said!] Ryne pointed to the real toilet and said "this where poop go."  Again, I was so excited!  I think he understands this whole pooping thing!  He was so excited when he got a sticker on his Elmo Potty Chart!  A big shout out to Potty Time Elmo!

I think what threw me off when Ryne first said "poop" was two different things.  We had been discussing "purple."  He has a purple octopus and a purple fish tub toys.  He said "purple" for the first time today and seems to be able to tell me what's purple.  At first though, purple sounded more like "poople" - he was dropping the 'r' sound.  So when he said "poop" I didn't know if he meant purple or poop.  He's also never said "poop" before.

Again, I know I may sound like a broken record from my last post about Ryne's language development, but it seems like he uses words when they are actually relevant.  Today is a good example of how it is hard for us to know what Ryne knows or understands sometimes.  It's as if words to him are like 'good china' - he only brings it out when the occasion calls for it!

Ryne NEVER ceases to amaze me!  I love his charisma and his passion, and all his little quirks!  I can't wait to see what the rest of the day and the rest of his life holds!