Tyler at 16 Months

Oh boy, Tyler is something!  He is sweet and amiable 95% of the time.  Then he is grumpy or fussy and demanding about 3% of the time, and that last 2% he is just trouble!  In the evenings, especially if Timmy is entertaining himself with big boy activities like playing on the laptop, Tyler will wander around and look for ways to get our attention.  You can actually watch him scan the room and look for ways to get into trouble.  His go to activity is to find the remote, steal it, and run away with it.  He also comes to me when he wants to do back flips (I put him on my lap facing me, put my fingers around his tiny little arms, and he throws himself backwards, flips, and lands with his feet on the floor.)  Or he comes to Tim to be thrown around for a while.

He is also quite happy to climb up and down the fort that has made it's way back into the living room, and to climb on top of the kitchen counter from the back of the couch.  He doesn't quite make it in this video, but he can do it, trust me.

Tyler is starting to pose when he sees me point the camera at him.  I vaguely remember Timmy doing this as well.  Tyler tries to smile, but it looks so fake, his nose scrunches up and his eyes go half closed.  It looks pretty silly, but it's still cute!  He is feeding himself with a fork now, I was feeding him one evening and he reached out to take the fork from me.  When I handed it to him, he immediately speared a piece of food and ate it, first attempt, and fed himself the rest of his dinner.  That's what I was attempting to catch in this video, but instead he poses, says, "up" and eats with his fingers!

Tyler has a few other words besides "up"  he also says, "mine!" (usually in protest to Timmy picking up a toy) "bobble" for bottle, "a-is" for Alice (our fat cat that he likes to pet and cuddle), and he says something for "all done" with a sing-songy inflection that lets me know what he's saying, even though I have no idea what I would type for the sounds he makes.

I loved the progression of his use of "up."  We had taught him to lift his arms for up to get out of the highchair, and when he was stomping around our feet wanting up.  I finally started making him say up before lifting him.  Next he would come over fussing and I would ask, "what do you say?" he would smile and say up.  Then he would run over fussing, freeze for a second, smile and say up.  Now he just runs over saying up!  I love the little things where you can see them learning!  I'm looking forward to lots more words soon!