15 Months

Will is 15 months old and he just gets funnier and smarter each week. His most common words are "DAAD!!" and "Um?". He can make lots of animal sounds. His first one was a cow (low mmmm) but now he mixes that up with cat (high mmmm) most of the time. He can bark like a dog ("Wu, wu"). Yesterday there was a dog at Taylor's mom's house and Will looked out the window for ten minutes barking at it. Later we saw a cat and he started barking at it, too. He growls like a tiger/lion/anything that he doesn't know the sound for. He can also make sheep sounds ("Aa-a-a" instead of "Baa"), snake sounds (usually comes out as "Shhh"), and can open and close his mouth like a fish. Other sounds that he can make are fake laughs, fake coughs, saying "Aaaah" when we tell him to relax, a firetruck siren (MMmmMMmmMM) and of course his favorite: car sounds (mostly just blowing raspberries).

He knows where his toes, his belly button, his nose (or at least one nostril), his ears, and his head are and will point to them when we ask. (He won't do this for other people yet though.)

He keeps me on my toes. He's a climber (which makes my life more interesting and terrifying at the same time). He can open doors (but thankfully our front door handle is higher than the others). And he loves to destroy things. For example, we were playing with big legos and every time I tried to build something it was a race against Will who was trying to take it apart.

He loves his teddy bear. This is his comfort toy and sleeping buddy. He grabs it around the neck, holds it by his face and puts the middle two fingers from his other hand in his mouth. Tuck him in with his favorite blanket and he usually goes right to sleep.

He loves books. This is one of my favorite things, too. He picks up a book, hands it to me, runs over to the couch and we snuggle and read that book over and over and over until I can convince him to go pick another one. I now have "The Foot Book", "The Nose Book", "There's a Wocket in My Pocket" and "Five Little Monkeys" all completely memorized.

He's starting to go through a "Cars" phase. He has a toy Tow Mater from the movie and he loves to crawl around the apartment pushing his car everywhere and making his car noises. He's also totally content to push the car back and forth between his legs when he's in his carseat. We recently got the movie and he likes that too.

He loves to give and get hugs and kisses. He's started to figure out that hugs are a two-way thing. He's still working on getting his arms around my neck, but he's very good at running towards me when I put my arms out. I love it.

He is just the sweetest little boy. He loves to snuggle, but always in short spurts because he is so busy all the time. He is always doing something, going somewhere, or making some fun new noise. He gets shy around new people or in big crowds and won't make eye contact with anyone. He's very confident and thinks he can climb down the stairs like a grown-up without any help (thank goodness we don't have any stairs in the apartment). He throws his head back and laughs whenever I give him a stern look. He is our main source of entertainment, frustration, laughs, tears, and joy and we just can't imagine our lives without him.