Torsten/Picture Catchup #2: 15 Months – Our hilarious little helper dude

N.B. Because I am so far behind with these – 6 whole months! – and I’m having to rely on pictures to refresh my memory as to what happened, I’m going to be posting pictures a bit out of order. Grandparents, godparents, uncles, aunts and friends probably want to know what’s going on with Mr. T now rather than what happened six months ago, so I’m doing the 15 month post first.

Dear Torsten Monster,

Ugh, Mama has been horrible about writing these things, and she’s very, very sorry. I’ve got a bunch of drafts piled up, but none of them make any sense, and I didn’t get all that far with them anyway.

Not coincidentally, this lack of posting coincided with you learning to crawl and walk (all of which happened in the course of about six weeks, thank you very much), leading to an even sleepier Mama and Papa.

That’s ok, though, because you, Torsten, rock.

I know what you're up to!

I won’t go back and detail the last six months here, because that’s for other posts, but I will talk about who you are now.

(More after the cut – if you see no more text and no cut here, visit the actual blog entry…)

First of all, you’ve got a bunch of words you use all on your own now – Mama, Papa, Bauch (tummy, in German), nose, belly button, Hi, car, dog, baby, Boppy, bottle, butt paste (no, seriously. You’ve had this one for a while. Blame Boudreaux’s Butt Paste, a highly recommended product here at Haus Monster), no/nein, ja/yes, ball, up, down, on, off, out, bear, Booboo Bear (you), something that kind of sounds like Torsten (toe-teh), book, cup,  go, bath, keys, vroom-vroom, and a lovely smacking kissing sound which should be a word, even though it isn’t. I’m probably missing a few, but you’re coming right along with your vocabulary. For us, understanding these things depends to some extent on context because some of your words sound the same (language geek alert: phonologically speaking, lots of your syllables have an onset and a nucleus, but no coda – totally normal for your age as far as I know), but it’s still cool. Oh, and you roll your “R”s like Charo on crack, but you’ve been doing that for a while. We do it together a lot, and it makes you giggle.

Not only is your vocabulary increasing, but you totally understand a lot of things. If I hand you something and ask you to put it in the trash can, you’ll take it from me, walk over to the trash can, open it up, and put it in. And then you stand there with a silly grin waiting for Mama to tell you you’re awesome, which she always, always does

You’re really tricky these days too – you frequently (briefly) outwit us in chasing games, and you’re able to be funny on purpose. You’re also able to let us know when you want things sometimes – for example, if you’re tired and you want to go to bed, you bring Mama your Boppy and you tell me “bottle” (our nighttime routine).

You’ve also learned how to let us know exactly how you’re feeling about something – sometimes even over the phone. Mama had to go to Chicago to take a big German exam, and you actually read me the riot act using baby words over the phone about not being home (and then started to cry, but boy, did you let me have it first). I know this will get old quickly, but knowing you could express yourself over the phone and make yourself understood even when you don’t have words was pretty amazing.

You’re really getting around, too – you can do stairs (usually with a little help going up and a lot going down, since you want to walk), you walk most of the way to the park with us sometimes, and you can chase with the best of them (though your height means your body is sometimes a little unwieldy for you and you do take a lot of falls, scaring the crap out of us sometimes). This is particularly scary for us, but it’s neat to watch you explore.

What you’re really good at is figuring out how things work. Really good. It’s too bad we don’t have a car, because you’d totally fix it. You used to only take things apart, but you’ve gotten the idea of putting things together now, and it’s lots of fun.

You’re finally starting to eat real food on a regular basis too. We haven’t pushed it very hard, because we didn’t see the need to, but we keep letting you try it, and in the last few days you’ve really gotten into it. What’s nice for us is that you like all kinds of food – veggies, Thai, Indian, Mexican, Italian, Greek, meat, grainy breads, hummus, you name it – as long as the texture doesn’t bug you, you’re game for anything. The only problem is that you constantly bite off more than you can chew, but we’re working on that. Of course, you also really enjoy making a mess with it, but that’s to be expected…

(Password for this poor-quality no-sound video is “smurf”…)

On top of all that, you are the most lovey baby I’ve ever met. You give lots of kisses and hugs to us, rubbing your face all over us like a kitty, and you’re equally kind to your teddy bears, your Moomintroll, and most of all, your true love, the Boppy pillow, which you also sleep on every night and call “MmmBOP!” (not to be confused with the Hanson earworm – click the link, Lynn… I dare you…).

Torsten and Mama's bear get all snuggly after naptime

Waking up: Torsten, Bear, Moomintroll and Boppy

And then there’s Papa. You two are silly peas in a pod, and you still worship him. Often, you’ll squeal when you see him, which is, let’s face it, just cool

Papa and Torsten watch Olbermann

You love to go to the park, play in the sand, play cars and trucks, play with finger paints and crayons (though not so much as the other stuff) and all of that other stuff that little guys your age like to do. And you love, love, love to make a good mess. You excel at it, in fact, and especially like to mess around with liquids, much to our chagrin.

Finger painting, stage one: Before the real mess

Finger painting, stage two: Getting the hang of the mess

Finger painting, stage three: Squishy! Just before you put your hands in your mouth...

Finger painting: Mission accomplished! The best part - splashing to clean your hands.

Maybe it’s silly to be so amazed by all this, but I don’t care – you’re the most amazing person we’ve ever met, and every day you do something that makes me laugh, my snuggly little joker.

Torsten and Mama mess around with the camera

I love you to bits, pumpkin. You’re turning out to be the nicest little kid I’ve ever met, and I’m really happy I get to be your Mama.

I’m sorry this is such a rotten post, but I figured something was better than nothing. Fortunately, your cuteness will surely distract from the horrors of my writing!

Love,

Mama Monster