Anecdotes: Affections and Affirmations

1. Riley is very affectionate, even with inanimate objects. For example, he really likes Pirate’s Booty. He’ll press a piece of it to his chest, saying, “mmmm… I love you, booty.” Then he’ll gobble it up.
2. Riley’s first love language seems to be Words of Affirmation. In fact, he so appreciates receiving affirmation that he gives it to himself during most activities. Even when he’s playing alone in a room with, say, his Legos, we’ll hear him click two pieces together and then exclaim, “good job!” while clapping heartily to further applaud his achievement. He’ll also do this sort of thing in front of a mirror, as he gazes upon how cool his face looks in it.

Central Park Zoo

A couple more images from the Central Park Zoo visit two weeks ago. In the tropics with Mimi (top), and amazed by the sleeping polar bear (bottom).

Anecdotes: Grandparents and Toilets

1. After hearing all the horror stories of potty-training, we were pleased to see Riley learn the process extremely quickly. His mother did greatly in teaching him, and he totally “got it” in less than one day. The “number 2″ training took more like one week, but we had anticipated that being longer too. Good job, Riley! (And yes, we know he might regress, but for now we’re proud of him).
2. As you saw in the previous post, Riley enjoyed all four of his grandparents’ attention last weekend. We celebrated Mimi’s birthday as well as his. It is wonderful how they all love him. He would tug Mimi’s finger and say “more play”, every five minutes. On Saturday, we visited the Central Park Zoo, which he enjoyed. Each time we would stop for a moment, he’d say, “more aminals.”
3. The 2yr visit to the pediatrician went very well. The doctor is impressed with Riley’s verbal skills and physical health.
4. Speaking of verbal skills, I’m impressed too. He knows the whole alphabet and is learning to count, and seems to know new words or phrases every day. Sometimes Nancy and I look at each other and say “did you teach him that?” He’s like a sponge; he often needs to learn something only once before he knows it as fact. (Some words are quite difficult, though, like octopus and hippopotamus–see the video below).
5. He is obsessed with seeing the moon.

All the Grandparents, All the Love – Part III

This was the third January in a row in which Riley enjoyed all four of his grandparents’ attention on his birthday weekend.
Here we were in 2009.
Here we were in 2008.

He turns 2yrs old today

You’ll want to watch this video in full screen so you can read the subtitles. (Some background: He’s wearing his new underwear, which has pictures of little Elmo heads.)
Bonus video:

Yoda

Anecdotes

1. Riley has started adding the word “ya” to the end of some of his sentences. We’re not sure where he learned this. Example: “Play legos, ya?”
2. The boy just LOVES the alphabet right now. We travel through the City and he finds all the letters he can (which are quite a few here in Manhattan!) and shouts their name and their sound: “A, ah!” “R, Riley!” “H, huh huh huh.“
3. He has begun calling strangers “friend.” He’ll say “hi, friend” if he sees someone he doesn’t know on the sidewalk or elevator.
4. Whenever he sees a picture of a whale, he thinks of Baby Beluga. But he pronounces it more like “Baby Buddha.” So now we have Baby Jesus AND Baby Buddha in the family pantheon, although only one gets prayed to every night.
5. About a week ago, we realized that we had to introduce Time Out for when he disobeys. It turns out, he loves it. He puts himself in Time Out before we can even say the words. Example: This morning, he struck one of toys against the wall. Nancy said “no no” but he was already putting the toy on the floor, heading toward the front doormat (his Time Out zone), saying “time out, no hitting.” Then he stayed there for about 20 seconds and called out “Time out all done?” And we said, “just a few more seconds, buddy.”

Pregnancy Exercise… for toddlers.

I wish I had gotten some better footage of him during this. I’m quite impressed with his posture, and you should see him do some of the more “interesting” exercises!

Pebo Nanooch

(We love the way Riley pronounces “peanut butter sandwich.”)

From Whence He Came

Riley saw that I was taking pictures of Nancy’s belly and just had to jump into the shot too. He’s a real copycat, that one. (PS. Some minutes earlier, he had insisted on wearing ONLY his diaper and his boots).