krisalis

The scene:

Alexander is playing with two neighbourhood kids, a girl who is about 7 years old and a boy who is 5. They are running around on the lawn.

The girl turns to me and asks “What’s your little boy’s name?”

I answer, “His name is Alexander.”

“Alexander” she says, as if trying the name out. “Huh. Do you call him Alexander?”.

“Yes.” I say, wondering what she means.

“He needs a nickname”, she says, very matter of fact.

“Oh, really? What do you think we should call him?”

She ponders this for a couple of seconds before answering, “He looks like an Alex. Or James.”

18 month stats: height 34.5″ (95%), weight 26lb 12oz (65%), head circumference 49cm (95%).

If July was the month of ‘CAR!’, then September is the month of ‘NO!’.

‘No, no, no!’ is Alexander’s standard answer to everything these days. Everything. Even things that he actually does want.

‘Is your nappy dirty?’
‘NO! NO! NO!’

‘Are you finished eating?’
‘No.’

‘Would you like some more?
‘No.’

‘Would you like some milk?”
‘Nooooo.’

‘Let’s take Rosie for a walk.’
‘No, no, no.’

The only question that doesn’t immediately illicit a NO seems to be: ‘Shall we go in the car?’ Which tends to get the enthusiastic response of ‘Car! Car!’ as he runs in the general direction of the garage to clamber into the car.

Alexander likes to sing. His favourite song is one we sing to the tune of “We’re All Going To The Zoo Tomorrow“, except we sing different words.

We sing: Alexander likes to ride in the car, ride in the car, ride in the car
Alexander like to ride in the car, every single day.
He goes in the car, car, car
To visit grandma, ma, ma
It’s not very far, far, far
When we go in the car, car, car.

Or some other similar variation on this theme.

Alexander will request a rendition of this song by bobbing his head up and down and saying car! car! car! in a sing-song voice. It’s lovely.

Poor boy has a bit of a cold at the moment, and is producing great quantities of snot. Of course, he HATES having his nose wiped, so it’s a bit of a battle. Also, his resistance to having his nappy changed has suddenly escalated to new heights. He’s never been one to lie down quietly, but now he will actively fight against being changed, complete with flailing limbs and bawling tears. For the time being, the best action seems to be to distract him during the changing process with a toy. The two best toys are currently a little beanie baby cricket playing bear and a toy mini (a car! what a surprise!).

Alexander also seems to be cutting some more teeth, which is making him uncomfortable. I think his eye teeth should pop through soonish, and once they are in, I think we should be all set on the teeth front for a while? Hope so, anyway.

Alexander seems to be falling over a lot recently – I think it’s the combination of a growth spurt and his need to run everywhere as fast as possible. Fortunately, he rarely cries when he takes a tumble. He mostly just says “ooooooooohhh” and then gets up, dusts himself of and gets on with whatever he was doing.

A future challenge that I can foresee on the horizon will be tackling Alexander’s first haircut. Mark, however, is adamant that Alexander does not need a haircut. So we’ll wait a bit longer on this one for the sake of marital peace, and also because I’m pretty much dreading trying to get Alexander to sit still for an extended period of time.

I’m sure there’s more I could say. But this will have to do for now. Pictures to be added as soon as other commitments (read: work) stops sucking out my soul up all my time.

Just a few samples of the things that google knows….

Noodles
Originally uploaded by krisalis.

The Asian food erst continues. Tonight I made yellow noodles – my version of Hokkien mee. Now where is the sambal olek?

Laksa
Originally uploaded by krisalis.

Going through a major ‘need Asian food’ phase. Made laksa for dins. Sooo good.

This video was made at around 7.30am this morning. Alexander thought it was pretty awesome that he got to play on his trike that early in the day. I am still bleary eyed and feeling half a sleep, and hopeful of getting some sort of rain from the fringes of hurricaine Ike (it didn’t happen).

Here’s a little Happy Birthday Auntie Katie video of Alexander singing and babbling away in the bath.

Alexander tries to identify his Dad in a photograph.