17 Months

Justin turns 17 months today, and what a month it has been. He is talking up a storm, using more words than we thought he knew. After realizing that he was using sounds to express himself more than words, we decided to really concentrate on having him use words, and it has definitely worked. He now tries to say "Love you," "So sweet," "Mine," and will even say parts of the Five Little Pumpkins poem, most specifically "oooooh went the wind and out went the lights". Norah and Justin have started having real conversations too.

He is also starting to use his imagination. In the past I think he was mostly mimicking Norah, but now, he will sit and pretend to cook something, being careful to hold the pot by the handles as he moves it to the toy stove. He also pretends to eat, pretends to lock doors with his keys, and pretends to be a puppy dog. It's all really cute and very fun to watch.

He has also been trying to mimic everything going on around him. For instance, if he hears someone cheering on the television, he will stop what he's doing, and start clapping too. Of course he will also stop and cheer when he's proud of something he's done! He sometimes tries to whistle when he hears Jeff or I whistling or hears Norah try "whistling".

Justin still uses a "pluggy", but really only at nap and bed time. However, plugs tend to disappear on a regular basis. They get mixed in among the toys, fall under the crib, are left in another room, or just dropped in the middle of the hall. When nap/bed time rolls around we tell him to go find his plug, at which point he goes around saying "Pluggy...........wooohooo!" Which is how he "whistles" for it! If he doesn't find it out in the living area, he will head to his bedroom, get down on his tummy, and repeat "Pluggy........wooohooo!" and peek under the bed.

While Justin is definitely using more words now, it doesn't always mean he knows what he's saying. Lately he has been saying "down" when he wants up. We correct him saying, "I think you mean up. Say up!" to which he responds, "Updown". We think he is just covering his bases! He also just figured out how to climb onto our bed. It sits pretty far off the ground and I think he got tired of us correcting his choice of words. I'm sure watching Norah do it, only encouraged him to do something he already wanted to do.

We have also gotten a kick out of listening to him hum. He knows the tune "This is Halloween" from Nightmare Before Christmas and will hum it occasionally. However, over the last few days he has been humming it continuously. Since it's obviously stuck in his head (which is pretty funny when you think about it) we have been singing lots of new songs to try and help him out.