Tater Ramblings

Well, the Tate man has just been cracking us up lately. He is adding words and speaking short sentences and I am amazed at his ability to pick up words. I think in reality he is right on target for language development for kids his age, but to me it is just incredible, as he is really my first experience with a child in any manner.

He is also a great mimic. For example, whenever we color with him, Cael and I write his name out for him and say each letter for him. Well today, he was looking at a magnet on the fridge that had writing on it, and he said "T-a-t-e." It was so funny! He was spelling his own name and he didn't even know it.

He is adding words constantly, and today he was looking at one of his books and I believe he said "chicken." I just adore it when he says monkey, which sounds more like "ockey." And Thomas has finally turned into "Ta-muus," rather than "Ta-bus."

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but Tate is in love with the song "Smoke on the Water" and every morning when he wakes up he hums the tune. He also hums himself to sleep this way at naptime. He learned this song because it is on the Guitar Hero game for Playstation. Well now everytime we go downstairs (another of his favorite words-"dowstairs") he points at the tv (in Tate speak, the "tb") and asks for his "song."

He is putting together really short sentences, and there are a few that I hear alllll day long: "Mommy, o cup." "Mommy where daya go?" "Mommy, where T go?" "Oh no, Thomas!"

In an interesting turn of events, Tate has given the binky up partially--during the day. He has been so nonchalant about it that I am amazed. Since he was six months old, I've been hearing from friends, family and complete strangers about Tate and his binky and that I need to take it away from him and I worried a bit because he loved it so much. But I also didn't feel the urgency that everyone else felt. His pediatrician suggested just taking the binky away during the day for now, and that at naptime and nighttime he could still have it.

So with this in mind, we decided to do it gradually. When Tate would pop it out of his mouth to eat breakfast I would whisk it away and hide it until naptime, and then a few days later I begain hiding it during his afternoon snack as well. Then a couple days ago I just started asking him to gather his Thomas engines (he sleeps with them all in his bed) and leave his binky in his crib. And to my surprise, he spits it out everytime and gets out of bed like its no big deal. During tantrums and times of frustration, he does ask for it but we just tell him it is for bedtime and try to distract him. I am amazed (repeatedly) by his ability to adapt, and I think he 100% takes after his dad!

Now I guess we will see how adaptable he is when we start potty training....and putting him in a big boy bed...oh boy. This should be fun. :)