RUS 16 Months

Dear RUS,

You are the most delightful little 16-month-old! We are having so much fun communicating with you: your sign language vocabulary continues to grow at a decidedly faster rate than your spoken vocabulary, but you have started saying quite a few words lately. New ones just this week include "Daiyah" and "Rhodah" -- Daiyah is a girl who used to be in your daycare class but graduated to the Toddler room around Christmas time, and Rhodah is your teacher, who you absolutely adore.

You are pretty decided on what you like to eat, and you nod your head yes or no when we put food on your high chair tray. Thankfully you're not too picky--yet!--and I think you get a fairly balanced set of meals. You walk EVERYWHERE and new developments are that you know how to open doors (NOOOOOO!) and climb on top of a lot of things you shouldn't be climbing on top of.

Your favorite thing in the whole world is reading books. I love it. I absolutely love it. It's so funny because you already know which books you want to read and which ones you don't. If I pick up a book you either nod yes or shake your head no, and if I try to read a book and you've shaken your head, you will swat it out of my hands until I find a book that you nod yes to. Your favorites seem to rotate but you've been really in love with: Five Little Monkeys; any and all of your touch-and-feel books; a pair of lift-the-flap 123 and opposite books that R received for her first birthday, I can't even describe your love for these two books; Jamberry (you love to shake your head and raise your hands when the canoe tips over and all the blueberries fall out!); Goodnight Moon, and Baby Cakes. But your absolute ultimate favorite? Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb. That's the one that if anyone asked me, I could recite the entire book word-for-word.

Daddy taught you to do the wheels on the bus, and when we sing B-I-N-G-O you love to clap along. Drums are your favorite instrument, and we have to dig up R's toy drum she got from Uncle A and Aunt M for her first Christmas for you to start playing with.

You are still my little cuddlebug, and you are always walking around holding a stuffed animal on your shoulder cuddling with it. You love to have us hold you and cuddle and you take little "cuddle breaks" throughout the day to just curl up close to something or somebody and suck your thumb for a minute or two.

I love you, my sweet sweet boy,

Love,
Mama