I am Raising a Cave Man

Let me start by saying that I ADORE my Big Man. Really I do. But man, he is such a boy. My first two are girls. And while I will laugh at this 10 years from now, they are pretty easy going. Even as toddlers, they both listened, they could follow simple directions, they could talk. Big Man is completely different.

I knew it from about 3 months. He would happily sit in his car seat cooing and smiling - but at all times his toes and fingers were wiggling and jiggling. Like he had so much energy in there. Well, its out. At 17 months he is a maniac. No really, I mean its not like I expect him to be a gentleman, but it would be nice if he would be a member of the human species instead of some kind of rabid bear.

He climbs, he throws, he grunts, he whines, he hits, he eats. He is, basically, a cave man. He has words, but the only ones he chooses to use regularly are mama and dada. Other than that, you can hear a word one time and not again for 3 weeks. He said MILK on Saturday - a word I have been trying to get him to use for MONTHS. He said it because I apparently gave him a malfunctioning sippy cup. I handed it to him, he tried to drink, then banged on his tray, said Mama - MILK and thrust the cup at me. I was so excited! I was like, yes, Big Man, that is MILK! But he kept banging his tray and I finally figured it out. Its like he will only talk when he wants to. He said Bye Bye clear as a bell to his caregivers at school about 4 weeks ago - one time and never again. He said Blueberries on Saturday night - when he was demanding more. Mostly he grunts and points.

Except when he has a speech to give. Every once in a while he will stop what he is doing and with a lot of gestures and pointing will give a 2 minute oratory. Of course it is in Big Man-ese and completely unintelligible to the rest of us, but I am sure it is the next Gettysburg Address. I particularly enjoy it at 3am.

He climbs on everything. If he can't reach what he wants, he will pull and push furniture around til he can get enough stuff together to climb onto to get to what he wants. He got to a big carving knife around Christmas. And when we saw him with it he thought it was a game to see how far away he could run with it without us catching him.

He likes lifting heavy things and throwing - such a great combination! He lifts chairs, stools, big boxes, etc. Then he usually hurls them to the ground. The other day he kept throwing a stool into the bathtub, while the girls were in it. He throws smaller things too. Its like he thinks if he smashes it on the ground perhaps it will open to reveal the secrets of the universe.

He LOVES the toilet. Seriously. His favorite thing is to grab the extra roll of toilet paper, dunk it in the toilet (which may or may not have been flushed by my 3 year old) and then drag pieces of it around the house. We had to get toilet locks which have resulted in several accidents by my 3 year old, cuz she can't get it off. He also dunks stuff in the toilet and drinks the water. So lovely.

Its a good thing he is such an adorable cave man. How could you not love this face??!!!