wysereeser + 1

I thought it time to start listing all the words that Nathan is saying, be it repeating or coming up with on his own.
Go
Don’t
Cuddle (R)
Tractor (R)
No
Ya
Drop (used while playing fetch with Bailey- He would throw the ball, she would fetch and he would say drop)
Outside (R)
Mama
Dada
Angie
Hi
Bye
book (R)
“a” “b” “c” (repeated with leapfrog learning catepiller)
Of course all these words aren’t totally clear, expecially the ones he repeats (R means repeats). But he is making an effort none the less at saying them. I believe he has repeated other words, but I am not able to recall them all at this time.

~Nathan’s comprehension is also becoming more obvious. He has done or will do the following.
~He will come and bring something to us when requested (usually it has to already be in his hand)
~He has looked at the hose outside, seen that it isn’t on and put his hand on the spicket to turn it on and then looked at the hose again and then made a sound while reaching the hose towards dada.
~ The other day I was sitting at my desk downstairs and he was playing and out of the blue I said let’s go upstairs (without making any motion to do so) He quickly stood up and ran to the stairs.
~On Monday I was reading a book. Nate climbed from his rocker onto the recliner, sat on my lap, pointed and made a comment that I couldn’t understand, got down, grabbed a book, handed it to me, wanted back up and sat while I read the book to him. Daddy heard this later that day, tried it himself and got Nathan to bring him a book too.
~ Nathan actively plays fetch with Bailey independent of our help.
~ Nathan is attempting to use the railing while going up and down the stairs, sadly it is too dangerous because he isn’t tall enough
~Nathan is starting to want to be where the action is. If we are washing the dishes, he also wants to stand on a chair and watch. Also if we are at the bathroom sink or brushing our teeth he wants to be up with us to participate.
~ Nathan takes pride in whatever he does. He will do it then smile really big. He likes getting up on the furniture. He is not quite able to do it independently unless the footstool or his rocking chair is next to it. He knows how to get on the bed, but again he is not tall enough. He will put his foot on the side board of the bed and try to push himself up, but he can’t quite get a good hand grip.

I just have to add that it is amazing what Nate says, because he picks up on things such “go” that I don’t recall saying on any kind of regular basis. He often says it when we are in the car too. Very interesting.

That is the Nate update. We are going on our first family trip (just the 3 of us ) for 4 days this weekend. The last big trip included my siblings and their families. We are camping, so Nate should have a good time. He loves being outdoors.

Oh and on a growth standpoint Nate is 24 lbs approx. and his 3rd and 4th molars are coming in. The 3rd one has almost broken through ( I haven’t checked today, so it may have).

Nate is gradually starting to say more and more words. I think he is saying more that we understand, because he often talks in sentences, as if he is having a conversation. It is just that we can’t seem to understand what he is saying. He now says hi fairly frequently. Just yesterday he tapped Miriam on the shoulder made the come gesture with his hand and said “tum”. He then turned and started to walk away. At one point he stopped to see if she was following. Nathan also says Dog on a regular basis.

Nathan continues to grow and understand many things. It seems as if he is understanding concrete things. Yesterday, I said “look at what Miriam has”. He turned around to see where she was.

Nathan’s 1st molar grew in last week. The 2nd one is on the way. The only sign that there was growth was a fairly high fever. After a few days the fever went away and the tooth was totally through the gum. Nathan now has 9 teeth.

Nathan is still in the average as far as his growth chart. He is almost 24 lbs.

Nathan is starting to shake his head when he doesn’t want something. He has even been known to say “no” a few times, but seems to prefer the shaking of his head. He also has figured out that if he lifts up his butt and stiffens as you put him into the car seat, that it is challenging to buckle him in. He seem to do this from time to time, but once he is buckled in, he is fine. Yesterday, he even climbed into the car seat himself.

Socializing continues to be one of Nate’s favorite things to do. (swimming too). He isn’t afraid to entertain and be entertained by many different people. If mommy is around he will periodically not want to go to someone else, but I don’t believe it is b/c he is being shy.

Nathan is a big cuddle bug. This morning Nate woke up and just wanted to cuddle for about 40 minutes. We just sat in the recliner together, chatted and cuddled. Once during that time, Nate got down, but quickly changed his mind and wanted to be back on my lap. I ended the cuddle session because we needed to get ready to go to Joanne’s today.

That is the Nathan Henry Wyse Reeser update at 14 months.

So dad was lounging around watching a little TV, the boy was running around doing a good job staying out of trouble, when Nate decided he’s come back into the living room. Give me a mischevous grin, and say “HI!” The first or second time I didn’t quite catch it, since there have been several times when Nate just decides to wander around babbling or saying whatever he feels like saying. This time was no different other than me recognizing what he was saying as clear as day. He had a great big grin on his face when he said it too. Who knows if he actually understood what he was saying. I’ve been trying to get him to wave “bye bye” several times on occasion and he doesn’t seem to want to do it. As soon as he said “Hi” I grabbed him and we said “Hi” to each other a few times more. I tried to take him to the basement to show Mom, but he must have already been burnt out a little and decided not to be quite so vocal.

Another fun dad moment, usually when I leave for the day Nathan and Angie are still in bed. Many times Nathan seems to sense that I just left because he usually wakes up within a minute or so after I depart. Nate’s in his own room so the fact that he knows somehow is somewhat remarkable. This morning however he woke up before I left and Angie was kind enough to hold Nate up to the bedroom window so he could see the driveway. She said he was looking at me and said “Da Da Da Da” As I backed up the car to drive away, he had both hands on the glass with his face pressed against it. It was kinda hard to drive away, but fun too. Like I said, I always miss out on seeing him wake up most mornings.

So I’ve been yelled at by a few folks for not posting photos recently. And rightly so! So I looked back at the photos we’ve got so far and tried to add a six month update. Selections of our favorite boy from the past six months have been uploaded for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy and feel free to comment.

Yesturday morning Nate and I were hanging out before his one year doctor appt. He was sitting in his chair eating breakfast when suddenly the dog barked outside. He turned his head and pointed and said “dog.” I am going to officially say that this is his first word even though he has only said it once. He has said twice what sounds like ‘What’s that” but due to the complexity, we are skeptical. He is into repeating words. We will look through his picture word book and he will try to repeat the words after me, but that is usually the extent. Last week he pointed out balloons and planes in the sky. He tried to mimic a crow sound, when I said meow, he tried to copy me. He is going through alot of mimicking. Walking is old bag to him now. He started to take more than 2 steps about 2 weeks ago. He now walks and stands up as if he has done it for a long time. It is quite the joy to see the daily improvements.

At Nathan’s doctor appt. yesturday he weighed in at 23 and 1/2 lbs. He is still average on the charts. Everything looks good.

Nate is drinking well with a sippy cup and a straw. I think it will be a bit challenging to ween him from the bottle for bedtime. We need to make more of an effort.

Nathan likes to dump things and put them back into the containers. He also likes to put things (like stacking cups) into other things.

Nathan’s eating repertoire continues to be good. He eats pretty much whatever we give him. Sometimes he may not be in the mood to eat something, but other times he will eat it, so it may not have to do with dislike.

After 1 year we finally quit the diaper service, b/c it was just too expensive for how many diapers Nate was using. The nice thing about disposables is that they are less bulky.

That is the update for now. Off to find sunscreen…….

Nathan’s been taking a few steps lately. Very Frankensteinish in nature (staggering about), but he seems to be gaining some confidence in his ability to ‘go’. His problem is that he tries to go to fast (of course) because he gets so excited. I was having fun yesterday chasing him around a little bit last night. He’d topple over (and not cry) pretty dramatically because he’d try to run a few steps and couldn’t maintain his balance. It was kind of funny to watch. He was a little fussy last night, but his energy level at times is fun to be included in on.

We can’t seem to keep up on everything that Nate is doing. Since our last blog I will mention the new things. I am not sure exactly when some of the things started but it will hopefully give people a general idea.

Talking
Nate is still not saying anything too audible other than mama and dada. I have heard him on occassion say mommy and daddy, but nothing regular. I also heard him say “what’s that” as he pointed to pancakes. I have not heard it since but it was as clear as day. He will try to repeat sounds. The one word that I have had the most success with him repeating is stick. He likes to play with sticks. Of course he doesn’t quite get all the hard consonants, but it does sound like it. There is a fine line with what we think he says and what is just gibberish.

Walking
Not yet…. however he has taken a few little steps and each day he seems to have more confidence. It almost seems like he thinks about it too much so he collapses. He usually has gone the farthest or stood the longest when he was preoccupied. He will hold our hand but really it doesn’t feel like we are more than just security. He does get everywhere he wants to go and he does it really quickly.

Behavior
Nate is starting to manipulate. OK, he has been doing it awhile, but it is now more obvious. He will fuss a little when one of us leaves the room. He will go after something even when we say no. Example: last evening he was going towards the dog bowl. I told him not to, but with a big grin he snuck his hand in the bowl. He was looking at me the whole time as if he wasn’t doing anything. Sometimes he will crawl faster. If we take him away from something he also will fuss for a second to see what we do.

Eating
Nate is eating pretty much anything we give him. Some nights he eats better than others. He definately enjoys eating when we do. Sometimes we make him wait until we are ready to eat, because he will just play with his food until we are ready anyway. He is starting to bite food and will bite when I ask him too. Last night on a whim, I put mashed sweet potato on his spoon. He then proceeded to correctly put the spoon correctly in his mouth. He repeated this. Then I gave him the bowl and with my help by modeling he put the spoon in the bowl and was able to get some potato on it and then put it in his mouth. He didn’t do this more that a few times before he realized that it felt nice to squeeze the potato between his fingers on his other hand. He is starting to want to eat what we eat. This forces us to really think about what we eat.

Riding
Nate recieved a radio flyer for his birthday. It is the prep-tricycle- tricycle. Where you have to power it with your feet on the ground. He is able to propel it by himself. We aren’t sure he will stay on it, so we still keep a close eye and hand near him.
Body Language: Nate is mimicking things that we do. He saw Scott hitting something this evening when I was holding him and he started to hit me. (gentle pats). He claps on command with no visual cue only verbal. He gives a hi 5 and he waves hello on goodbye when he is in the mood. Sometimes he is preoccupied. Nate dances when he hears music or singing. (he also likes to sing)

Playing
Nate knows how to push trucks around correctly. He still likes to look at books. He is into pointing at everything.

There are so many things. I will give Scott the opportunity to add to this if he feels. I think that is all for now.

UPDATE: I’m planning on writing up a page that describes Nate’s first birthday and what we did….and maybe include some of how things went for the party we threw for him, but I haven’t gotten around to it just yet. Will do so soon. –scott

A Nathan update is much needed. Nathan has not said any audible words, but he makes many different syllable sounds at the same time. He definately is conversing in his own language when he is playing. He even makes the sound that little boys make when they push trucks and cars around. He pushed one of his cars from one room to the next in the correct manner.

Nathan has been able to look at what we are pointing at instead of looking at our finger for at least a few weeks. He comes when we call unless he is playing a game of getting into the dog dish. He just crawls faster and laughs when he knows he is not suppose to go that way.
Nathan knows the difference between MaMa and DaDa.

He likes to play another game with us that is mainly a pass back and forth game. When I am holding him, he will reach for Scott and then when Scott is holding him, he will reach for me, and if we let him, he would just keep going back and forth.

Nathan has been sleeping through the night in his own crib since early to mid april. I still however keep waking up and can’t get used to the new schedule. His sleeping through the night however means that he no longer sleeps in. He usually gets up now between 6 and 7 a.m.

Nathan has been able to play by himself and be entertained for quite some time. We can just leave him in his room and he will keep himself occupied. Of course we watch him, but it is not always necessary to interact. He still likes to look at books. Sometimes his attention span is longer than other times, non the less, he likes to look at them and point at the pictures. The other day he would point to the bear, so I would say bear, the he would point to the duck and I would say duck and he kept going back and forth. (He had a big grin on his face the whole time).

It is fun to listen to Nathan laugh. It doesn’t take much to make him laugh. His feet are very ticklish. I am sure he gets that from me.

Nate is all over the place these days. He doesn’t seem to want to walk too much independently, but he sure likes to use the walls and furniture and his walkers to get places. He uses whatever he can.

He still gets joy out of the dog. He laughs when Bailey gets excited and fetches. Sometimes he just likes to sit next to her and pet her. He hasn’t tried to crawl over her in awhile. He used to make that a game too where he would crawl over her, then turn around and crawl over her again and again.

So that is the Nate update for May. He is just 13 days away from turning 1! This year has gone by so fast. Scott and I are planning on taking his birthday off. We have not yet made plans, but I am sure they will consist of things such as being outside, walking somewhere etc. (Things that Nate enjoys doing)

So I found myself pausing for a moment last night and marveling at how far we (all three of us) have come in the last year. The cause for thinking back came from taking down and removing the small crib we’ve had attached to the side of the bed. As many of you know Nathan’s slept next to our bed for some time in an extension of sorts, co-sleeper is the correct term. It was the easiest solution given the times Nathan needed attention during the night off and on.

Within the last few weeks we finally made the transition to move Nathan into his own bed/crib in the room across the hall given he was mostly sleeping through the night (he would maybe wake up once and need a binky inserted to calm him down). We made the transition over a weekend some time ago, so far its been working well. At the most these days he’ll wake up a couple times throughout the night (Angie can correct me), and one of us’ll need to go over and spend a minute or two calming him down. There’ve been several days where Nate manages to either sleep entirely through the night or calm himself down after a few minutes. The end result has been us deciding to take down the crib in our room.

And to be honest….I’m not happy about it at all.

I miss seeing the little bugger there next to me, and it makes me downright sad to take that crib apart. I know it can’t happen forever, but he is almost a year old and I just can’t believe it.

So in retrospect I’ve decided that this being a dad thing just isn’t my bag and we’ve decided to sell Nathan on eBay. All bidders welcome.
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