3 Years 3 Months

1)  Fuzzy's vocabulary is really expanding - reading a book with fold-out characters, he looked at me knowingly.  "That's vewee complicated!"

2)  Our new neighborhood has a pool club, which houses both a regular pool and a baby pool.  Fuzz has been characteristically cautious of the big pool, but his joy when he finally got in was tangible: "MAMA, MAMA, I IN DA BIG POOL!! BECAUSE I A BIG BOY!!"

3)  Although Fuzzy is very sensitive to certain things, he is oddly unaffected by others.  I avoided reading him The Gingerbread Man fairytale for a long time, thinking he wouldn't like the ending.  However, when I finally read to him about the gingerbread man getting eaten, the kid was unmoved:  "Oh, dat woman is going to have to make anodder one."

4)  While staying with my mom, Fuzzy picked up her habit of saying 'oh god.'   Except he says it with her Russian accent and exact intonation: "Oh got!"

5)  The other day, Fuzz announced that he wanted to pee standing up.  He pulled down his underwear, got ready, and then looked at me with a little confusion.  "But Mama, I can't operate my penis."

"What do you mean, you can't operate it?"

"When I operate it, the pee goes there, there, and there," he said pointing all around the toilet.  "How do I operate it?"

Kid, if I knew, lots of ladies would want the secret.

6)  Fuzzy is getting very good at pretend play.  For example, he pretended to be dolphin in the pool.  "I have a tail and flippers, and I have one two free fou five dolphin fwiends.  We like to splash and make bubbles in the water, and we go on a dolphin caraswheel - we sit on the horses with our tails, and hold on with our flippers."

7)  In a triumph for our new dentist, she finally got Fuzzy to start brushing his teeth with real fluorinated toothpaste, like a big boy.  He only swallows it about half the time.

16 Months

1) New words this month:
nigh nigh = night night
moo = cow
mooooon = moon
mine! = mine! (always said very definitively, with that exclamation point on the end)
hi = hi, or high, or occasionally butterfly
eye = butterfly (usually, except when its 'hi')

2)  We're still sort of confused about down and up.  Sprout will often say 'dunnnn' and hold his arms to be picked up.  However, he gets an insane amount of joy from saying 'buh bye' and waving.  Seriously, the grin on his face is worth somebody leaving.

3)  For the first time, I heard the baby utter two words together this month, and in multiple situations.  For example, pointing at my mom's bed: "Baba nigh nigh," or when leaving a fountain: "buh bye wawa!"

4)  Despite his still limited vocabulary, Sprout understands pretty much everything that is going on, and can point to relevant household objects, as well as parts of the body.  I can usually get him to point to eyes, nose, mouth, hair, ears, hands, feet, tummy before he grows bored of our game.

5)  Perhaps because he understands most everything but can articulate so little, he's settled on a really unfortunate banshee scream when he wants something.  Everyone on our new block is hoping this passes soon.

6)  Sprout continues to be the toughest baby on the block, not taking any shit from his big brother.  If Fuzzy pushes him, accidentally or on purpose, Sprout will come back twice as hard with his little fists.  For the most part though, the baby adores his older brother, and tries to copy everything he does.