Seventeen months old!

Tyler and I loved having a baby in the house, but let me just say, having a toddler is so much fun! I can tell Ben is getting to the stage where I'll be saying "You can do that?!" on a daily basis. For example, even though he can babble with the best of them, he is definitely learning effective means of communication. He's started putting his signs together for "more" "please". You've never seen a kid get another cracker so fast!

Ben's new words:
hot (hot food, hot car, hot oven - he knows heat)
hot (hat)
dah (duck)
dah (dog)
dah (dinosaur...you see, it all depends on what he's looking at on these...)
ow-ide (outside)
ma (milk)
ma (more)
sease (please)
ow (out, as in the command for Zoe to back up)
duhnoooo (no - can't really type it how he says it...gets his lips in the smallest little "o" shape, pouts out his lip, furrows his brow and shakes his head...precious)
uh (up)
papaya (the fruit. I fed it to him the other day and asked if he could say it. As it turns out, he can!)
nack (cracker, snack)
ch (chip)
eye (eye)

And he can't say peanut butter, but he sure can eat it!

...or wear it...

(This is what happens as a result of licking PB straight off the cracker!)

And he knows his shapes! I drew a circle, triangle and square on the bathtub (with special markers that have made bathing a happy time again), and asked him where the circle was, not expecting much of a response. Well, he showed me by pointing right smack in the middle of it! Then he did the same for the other two shapes. I was so excited and had Tyler come in to see our genius. Tyler was very proud,with cheers and high fives, and then started working on colors. Setting that bar high, Ben. Fortunately, so is his daycare, who tells me that they are currently working on learning the "ABC's". Wha?

Another thing he's just about mastered are body parts. Loves to poke you directly in the eyeball, up the nose, in the mouth, etc. to point out parts. And he's very proud of his own...

...especially his belly button!

He likes to climb on chairs, "draw" with pens - both of which can be a little unsettling - jump and stomp, and make really funny faces. But even though he seems like such a big boy, I know that he is still a baby in many ways,

and that is just fine by me.