Exploring independence

Ahh, yes...William is exploring his independent capabilities on a minute-by-minute basis. I am rather excited about this as I soon hope to pass off the tasks of preparing his own food and doing his own laundry, we just need to get a taller stool first:) Although, Will does pick out and start eating snacks from fridge, but we have to pry them out of his hand and take the apple out of the bag it's in or peel the orange before he continues to eat.

Will really enjoys dressing himself now, which consists of: setting his socks on the top of his feet, putting on mom's shoes (he has yet to figure out how to get into his own shoes), draping any type of clothing item on his head, putting on one arm of his jacket, pulling shirts over his head, hanging overalls over his neck (this one is closely supervised), and putting on sunglasses. He will work at putting his pants on for about 10 seconds, then he throws them at me in frustration, and replies "yeah" when I ask if he needs help. These are a few of our favorite fashion statements of which I know there will be countless more to come.

Will is also becoming more independent in his play, which you think would be a wonderful change for me, however, this independence usually emerges during outdoor playtime. This creates more work for mom & dad when we are in the front yard (which we do to avoid the potential playing with Maggie's messes) because Will enjoys walking down the street, into the neighbors yards, and running up and down the paved ramp next to the stairs by himself. William has also decided that he prefers not to hold onto mom or dad's hands while he is running across the bridges on the jungle gym at the park (which really freaks out grandma & grandpa). Will also loves to watch all the other kids playing at the park which could turn out to be a good or bad thing-we're starting to be more selective about our park choices. Here are a few pics of our most recent trip to the park.

Spring is here!

Sorry it has been so long since our last post, the weather has been great so we have been outside as much as possible. William absolutely loves it outside and would probably stay outside all day if we let him-we're thinking about putting him out in the back yard with Maggie each morning with a bowl of food. We have taken him to our neighborhood park about 6 times now and to a nearby state park once. We didn't think that Will would be coordinated enough to enjoy the park gyms but he has proved us wrong yet again. As soon as we got out of the car Will made a beeline for the gym and we were running after him to keep up. We are constantly amazed by how perceptive he is and by the powerful effect of visual stimuli on very young children (this has been a disadvantage on several occassions already). Will especially loves the swinging bridges and all types of climbing ladders on the gyms. Here are a couple videos of him at the park for the first time this spring.



Will has been insisting on drinking from whatever I am drinking out of, but I was able to convince him to drink out of one of his cups. As you will see he thoroughly enjoyed himself. I ran out of CD and a few seconds following this video water started to pour out of the bottom of the highchair. I think we'll continue to use the sippy for milk and juice.

We have been in a cold-snap again, which means more creativity with indoor play. Fortunately, Will is pretty innovative when it comes to occupying himself with everyday items as you will see. He has taken a strong liking to metal objects including mixing bowls, a potato ricer, a pulp strainer, and lids to pots & pans (I draw the line at the pots & pans themselves because Will has previously dropped them on his feet). Nearly everyday, sometimes multiple times per day (when I am ambitious & put things back) Will empties out the corner cupboard and composes his masterpieces of both visual and audio display. He particularly enjoys dropping a metal lid over, and over, and over to hear the crashing that it makes (I usually end up leaving the room). He is just beaming with pride in these pics.

Later in the day we were downstairs and I turned around to find Will using his chair as a jungle gym, so I ran to get the camera to get some video. This is the end of his climbing up and jumping off the chair so he is much better at it in the video than he was when he started.

Last, but certainly not least, Will has been spending more time eating. He doesn't just prolong eating, he just keeps eating and eating and eating. After Will finished lunch yesterday I was so astonished by the amount of food he ate that I recreated his plate of food. As you can see he ate 1/2 of a meatball, a helping of pasta, 1/2 cup of steamed broccoli, 2 clementines, an apple, whole milk, and water. Is this what a 17 month-old typically eats, or do we have the next Guinness hot dog eater on our hands?