19 Months Old

Listening to music on the pc

It's been 11 months since his last weighing and height measuring session. After many queries about his weight (such as "he's so heavy! is he 20Kgs?!"), I finally brought him to the baby clinic today.

Weight: 13.24Kg
Height: 85cm (head to heel)

Weight wise, he's at the 91st percentile. A slight drop from the previous measurement of about 98th percentile. Height wise, he used to be around the 95th percentile, but now only at the 75th percentile.

I discussed with the nurse about his slow speech development. She straight away knew that I am comparing him to little girls. She said that girls tend to be much faster in picking up speech and thinks that Tobey is "normal" for a little boy his age.

Like any other 19 months old, he loves play. He copies us till the very last detail. That's why we are pretty careful in what we say and do in front of him. He copies us in driving, dressing up, cleaning, reading, writing, talking on the phone, using electrical equipments, dancing, locking and unlocking doors. He can literally turn on the correct socket switch to the DVD player (there are like 4 others ) pops his Balamory CD in and presses play. The only way of stopping that is to pull the plug off the socket.

He loves the company of other kids, but his personality of a big bear with a gentle and calm demeanour is not doing him much good. He's prone to being bullied. It's typical of toddlers to snatch toys or even push or pull to get what they want, or to establish territory. But my boy, he doesn't do that. He very very seldom pushes, snatches or screams at another. For example, If another tod snatches a toy he's playing, he would move on to another toy and wait for his turn on the toy that was snatched from him earlier.Then 10 mins later, he would readily share his precious biscuit with the same kid! When someone pushes him off a riding toy, he would bounce up and move on. He very seldom came running to me crying, except when he was hurt really badly. Although we are generally proud of his happy and mature behaviour, we really do hope he would learn to strike a better balance soon. At least for his own self-defence! But how??? How do you teach a kid to retaliate?! headache.

He doesn't seems to see himself as a baby anymore. When asked "how a baby cries/plays/dances/sleeps?" He would start pretending out his own interpretation of a baby. Funny. He loves music, like his daddy. Both of them can spend ages in the study listening to music and just chilling out together. He dances to catchy music. But loves relaxing to Vonda Shepherd, just like his daddy. He's very methodical and loves routine. Every night before going to bed, he insists on turning off the hall lights, the tv, put away several toys, shut the doors to the hall and pull down the blinds to his room. When I cook without my apron, he would get the apron and hand it to me, and stand beside me to make sure I wear them before going back out to play.

He still loves fruits and vegetable. We were in a restaurant in Birmingham the other day. The couple at the next table were surprised that we said "Tobey, if you take another scoop of rice, we will give you this carrot" Let me explain, we now boil slices of carrot or broccoli florets and bring them with us when we eat out, as a bribe/reward/incentive system when he finishes his lunch/dinner. Recent favourite is cucumber. He hyperventilates from excitement when a bowl of cucumber is placed in front of him.

That's all I can think of at the moment :)