Time To Lay Down

Eli's new favorite thing to do is sit down on the ground and then slowly lower himself to lay down. He puts his arms behind him and tucks his chin into his chest while he leans back. Sometimes he gets himself stuck because he'll start doing it and then realize there's toys behind him. So funny.

He's really starting to get into pretend play. He walks around the house playing with his farm animals and sings Old MacDonald at the top of his lungs while dancing them around.

The hitting phase seems to be subsiding, but it has been replaced with pushing. Last week we were at the mall and playing in the children's area. A few kids approached what he was playing on and he tried to push them away. Then earlier this week we were at playgroup and he was trying to push his friends away from the slide. Oh my. It's just one phase after the next. To get myself through I just keep telling myself that. He actually pushed his friend Talia down too. How embarrassing. I just keep on correcting him. I guess that's all I can do is be consistent.

Eli and I have been practicing taking of his pants. He was almost able to do it all by himself today! I got them started and he pulled them down the rest of the way, sat down, and took them off. Woo hoo!

I have been trying to think of things that we can do indoors and out of the heat. Last week I bought some playdough and that passes some time. We try to stay busy in the morning and usually stay home in the afternoon. It's been a very hot summer!

I have been keeping busy with the MOMS club. I am on the new board of our chapter, secretary thank you. I am responsible for taking our meeting minutes, helping with the monthly calendar and newsletter. It's pretty fun and it's nice to be part of planning fun activities for our club. It also keeps me busy and using my brain.

Flash Flooding

Eli splashing around in the puddles under cover

Today in Edmond we got nearly 10 inches of rain in about 7 hours, most of it within 4 hours. A lot of the rivers/creeks in our area and low lying areas are flooded!

We got a lot of rain and our ditches filled up pretty quick, even coming up into the yard. After the rain stopped though, it quickly receded and the neighborhood is doing fine.

Eli and I went out for a bit while it was raining and I snapped a few pictures. After the rain stopped and the sun came out, we walked around for a while. Eli really liked walking through the puddles and the streams. I held onto him for dear life while he was walking through the water. We also saw two tiny frogs hopping in the street and Eli went crazy with laughter. I captured one of them and brought it back to the house so we could watch it in the driveway. Eli was hopping around on the driveway and kept saying "ribbit, ribbit." It was so funny.

We went inside after about an hour, took a shower, ate lunch, and Eli passed out.

We are supposed to get more rain today, tonight, and tomorrow. I hope it doesn't cause anymore flooding. I can hear it thundering as I type.


Facing our house, this is to the left of us. This is the most water we got in our yard.


If you look closely you can see that the water is gushing out of the tunnel.



Ditch is filled with water, maybe two feets worth?


Facing our house to the right, you can't even see my neighbor's tunnel anymore. And looking even farther in her yard you can see the water creeping up.

This amount of water in our yard seemed crazy to me but it was really just a puddle's worth compared to areas that had creeks overflow!

All toddler at 20 months

Okay, so I have been putting off this post for awhile because honestly, Eli has changed so much and so fast it seems daunting to remember everything! I'll try my best.

We recently got back from our trip to Arizona. That's going to be a whole separate post, too long. Although, Eli did pick up a bad behavior while we were there. Yes, unfortunately he has started to hit. Mostly me and mostly when he is mad, which I guess is the worst. I don't think it is out of hand at all. When he hits me, I tell him firmly that we don't hit, it's not nice. We love each other, or kiss each other, not hit. Basically a variety of things, but I'm very serious about it. He actually tries to apoligize right away by saying hi and smiling very big. Or gives me a hug. I have been trying my best to watch him and his attitude and sometimes I can tell when he's going to start getting into tantrum mode.

Last week was a rough week as far as tantrums go. I think his teething was bothering him a lot and that always seems to make everything worse. He has his two bottom canines coming through right now and his last incisor! The one the doctor wasn't sure about is already through and looking fine. So after these three (which they have already broke through the gums so I think we will be fine now) we only have the four two year molars to go. That's really exciting to me :) Although, not looking forward to those molars coming through, the one year molars were rough.

Okay, so on to the fun stuff. Eli is such a musical boy. He loves to dance and especially sing. I have a CD in my car that we listen to every time we drive. He can hum along in tune to EVERY song. EVERY song! I mean he hits the high notes, low notes. He is always walking around the house singing a song and for the most part I always know which one it is. I gotta get him into a music class. It's so cute.

His newest thing, just the other day he started showing me every bite of his food before he would put it in his mouth and say "Woah". But he was insistant I look at each biteful. Silly boy. He has also started to notice if the slightest thing is out of place. For example, he had a tiny speck of black lint on his white pillow tonight and he noticed it immediately. Wanted me to get it off of there. He also wants his hands wiped while he's eating dinner before he will take a drink, doesn't want to dirty his cup....lol!

His favorite things right now:

Dinosaurs

Chasing squirrels at the park

Signing for more, mommy and daddy (he's so proud)

His toy lawnmower

Going outside

Looking for froggies


This is the spot we go to when we look for frogs, just down the street. See the froggie? Eli jumps and smiles when they see us and hop away into the water. They make that little "woot" sound, it's so funny!

Walking in Mama and Daddy's shoes

He loves looking for the Target dog (the one that's on the doors at Target) we even have to say goodbye to him when we leave the store. Target also has many farm animals in the dairy section.

Taking off his sandals as soon as they go on

I posted recently about his move to the toddler bed. It's going pretty well. Still takes us a good 30 minutes most nights to fall asleep after light's out and stories. I think it will get better, it's only been about two weeks. It's really cute though when he wakes up from his nap or in the morning, he opens his bedroom door, walks into the hallway, closes his door, and then comes into the living room to greet me. There have been a few times when he has ninja'd his way into our room. I hear him and open my eyes and there he is! I think I need to put a bell on his door, I'm used to him crying to get my attention. Now he isn't even saying anything when he wakes up.


Here's Eli "helping" me water the plants. He can't quite squeeze the trigger yet, but loves playing in the water. I let him get completely soaked yesterday.

Big boy, big bed!

A few weeks ago I put Eli in his crib for a few minutes while I was tidying up his room. I was walking in and out of his bedroom and his bathroom when I caught him hiking his leg up over the side. I couldn't (and could) believe it! He had never made an attempt up until this point. I firmly told him no and put his leg back down and took him out right away. I didn't want that thought to stay in his head for long :) I put him back in a few minutes later to do one more thing and he did it again! Oh boy, this was way earlier than I had anticipated making the change to the toddler bed. But with everything I've read and considering how tall he is already, they say as soon as they make the effort to get out--it's time to get them out of the crib. I'd rather deal with the hassles that come along with transitioning to a big boy bed than deal with broken bones or worse.

This gave me something to consider on our recent trip to Arizona. While we were there, Eli and I slept on a cushy, comfy, feather bed on the floor. He didn't do to well in the pack and play last time and there is no way he can sleep in bed with me cause he rolls and kicks and turns. So we decided to make up a bed on the floor. During our stay in AZ, Eli loved laying on this bed. He would lay on it in the middle of the day, I think he liked the material it was made of. Well, he loved laying on it so much, he no longer wanted me to rock him to sleep at night. He wanted to lay on the bed and toss and turn til he passed out. It seemed like a step in the right direction. Not that I even minded rocking him to sleep, actually I already miss it.

With all this new found freedom of an open bed and falling to sleep out of my arms, I thought maybe it was really time to move to the big boy bed. Why take a step backward? Go home and back to the crib and rocking? Probably wouldn't work out too well. And maybe he'll be more accepting of it now while he's younger.

He was actually waking up in a more pleasant mood from his naps than he did at home. As soon as he would wake up, he would walk right out of the room and come and greet me and Grandma. He loved it, like he was so proud of himself.

So the day we got home from Arizona, I decided the crib rail was coming down. Eli was really excited to get in his bed all on his own. The first evening went pretty well. We did are same routine as we normally do: bath, brush teeth, jammies, stories and then songs or talking about our day. On average, it's taking him about 40 minutes to fall asleep each night. I definitely hope this time gets shorter, but it's a work in progress. I sit by his bedside and rub his back until he falls asleep.

He has been walking out of the room when he wakes up. Which is okay for his naps, but at night I'm afraid he's going to get scared in the dark. I still have the monitor on at night so I can hear when he opens the door and heads out into the living room. It's actually really cute right now, but I'm sure it might get old soon. The way I look at it is, if he was still in the crib, he would just be crying for me so now he meets me halfway!

It's kind of exciting moving him to the big bed, he's getting so big!