17 months

It's hard to get a 17 month old to sit still for very long:

In other news, month 16 was, like month 15, another month of inconsistent napping and restless nights.  There is, as I'm sure you've noticed, a direct correlation between Elias's sleep patterns and my blogging.  And, speak of the devil, someone is waking up from their nap (it was actually a pretty good one...I just got to this part of my weekend to-do list a little late).  Another brief post it is, but I'll try to add a little more to this before we fly north to spend Thanksgiving with Elias's Grandpa Dale and great-Grandma Rose. 

Oh, and in case the blurry images above don't satisfy you, here's one of the few clear images taken in the past month, when we took Elias for a ride on the steam train at Tilden Park recently.

Despite the very serious look on his face the entire time, Elias loves his trains and did not want to give the next group a turn.  Which, of course, is code for, he screamed his head off as we got off the train.  Yes, folks, I belive we have a toddler on our hands.  More on that later...

16 months

My last post was a pretty good recap of month 16 in that it focused on sleep, sleep being the focus of the month.  It's official: Elias is just not the world's greatest sleeper.  I think I'm finally accepting this little fact and trying to control as many other things about my sleep environment as I can, turning the monitor down at night so I won't hear every little peep he makes, going to bed earlier, and bugging Neal about getting a new mattress (it seems to take him about a year longer than me to feel the aches and pains brought on by an old or, in this case, just downright crappy mattress).  Elias is sleeping about as well as he was sleeping during the last post.  It takes him a long time to settle down for a nap, while bedtime has been considerably easier.  But he's still fairly restless through the night crying out briefly one or two times a night, not enough to warrant a visit from one of the parental units but long enough to thoroughly wake me up and make me feel slightly anxious about the whole thing.  On top of that he's been waking up earlier than usual, some mornings as early as 5:45 or so.  I'm still holding out hope that all of this sleep drama will settle down eventually.

When not fighting sleep, Elias continues to practice his verbal skills, adding "boom boom" (for balloon), "dabo" (for dipping, something he would do at every meal if it were up to him, even if it means dipping his apple in my split pea soup), "lello" (for yellow, although I'm not sure he's made the connection between the word and the color), and "baby" to his vocabulary, which now includes the very satisfying "mommy" and "daddy" in place of the variations he'd mastered during month fifteen. 

In other major news, Elias will be starting a very part-time daycare schedule tomorrow, giving me Mondays and possibly another drop-in day here and there to maintain my two Etsy shops (here and here, if you're interested in the little bit of time I spend not entertaining Elias), continue to look for that elusive teaching gig, make and try to show art, and just generally maintain my sanity.  One day oughtta be enough, right?  Okay, maybe not, but after 16 months at this job, one day will definitely help.  Not surprisingly, I'm feeling equal parts excitement and apprehension this evening.  Motherhood, man.  You just can't win.

Oh, and, by the way - Happy Halloween!

More fall fun to follow...