Luke - 18 Months

Luke turned 18 months old at the end of December. He is such a fun boy! Jeff and I have loved watching his little personality develop, especially his sweet side and his sense of humor. Luke can be shy around strangers (although, on some days, he decides to put that aside and be incredibly friendly and outgoing), but around his family, he is a little comedian! The best part is that he knows he's being funny! He makes jokes and laughs even harder when he sees that he has made us laugh. I love his cute grin! It seriously makes my day! And as he has gotten older, he has become a little more aware of other people's feelings. He gives the sweetest hugs and although he can definitely be a self-centered toddler at times, I love the times when I see him notice someone else's feelings and try to make them happy. Here are a few facts about our sweet boy:

• Stats: 
• Height - 34.5 in. (95%) - This is the first time since the day he was born that Luke is not >99% in height, but he's still a pretty tall boy!
• Weight - 28.5 lbs. (80%) - Luke's 3(almost 4)-year-old cousin, Bethany (2 yrs, 3 mos. older than Luke) weighs exactly one pound more than Luke (she came to Luke's doctor's appointment and got weighed too). He's got some petite little cousins! Also, he's kind of huge.
• Head Circumference - 19.5 in. (90%)
• Luke understands a ton! I'm amazed at how much he picks up so quickly and how many instructions he is able to follow! Kids are amazing! But as much as he understands, he only says about 15-20 words clearly enough to understand: ow (when he gets hurt or pretends to and when he's pointing to an "owie"); hi, bye, light, outside, eye (they all sound like "eye," but you can tell which one he means if you listen to the inflection); love you (sounds like "low-voo" - my heart melts when he says this back to me when I tell him I love him on my way out of his room at night); no; yeah; daddy; doggie (sometimes); mama; uh-oh (his first real word); arf-arf! (dog bark); ew (when changing a stinky diaper); wa (water); mmm (does that count as a word? When he takes a bite of something yummy); my (mine - said as something between a question and a statement when he wants something someone else has); oh, oo, ee, or, eye (1, 2, 3, 4, 5); and maybe a couple more that I can't think of at the moment.
• Points out just about every body part including hair, tongue, teeth, knees, belly (lifts his shirt to show you for that one), bottom, fingers, toes, hands, feet, and all of the more commonly asked ones.
• Knows all of his relatives (mommy, daddy, both sets of grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins) and points them out when asked.
• He has a full mouth of teeth (all but the very back molars)
• Luke loves cars! He loves driving cars: his Little Tykes cars, grocery cart cars (you know, when the front of the cart looks like a car and the kids sit in it and play with the steering wheel), the neighbor's pink Power Wheels Jeep (he's finally tall enough to reach the gas pedal), real cars (he is perfectly happy to sit in the driver's seat of one of our cars while it is in the garage and pretend to drive forever! He also thoughtfully repositions the seat for us.
• Speaking of cars, one of Luke's favorite books is My Big Truck Book. It's just a book full of pictures of real trucks, not trucks with faces or names or story lines, just trucks. Like a picture someone took of a dirty, rusted tractor. Excuse me. Front loader. I just tell Luke that the whole page of "Construction Trucks" and the whole page of "Farm Trucks" are tractors. Anyway, for some reason, Luke just LOVES this book! He can look at it over and over again and chooses it before every nap time and bedtime. On the construction trucks page, there is a white truck and a man wearing a hard hat is about half visible inside it. Every time we turn to that page, Luke leans in, waves, and says, "hi!" to the man.
• Luke's other two favorite books are Llama Llama Red Pajama and My First Word Book. He chooses Llama Llama before every nap time and bedtime (I have the whole thing memorized!). Luke likes every page except for the one where Mama Llama gets mad. He always turns that page as soon as he sees her angry face. When we read My First Word Book, Luke loves to point out each picture when I ask him to. He has learned a lot from that book! Every time he sees the picture of the little boy crying on the page about emotions, he touches his face and says, "Awww."
• Luke gives the funniest and cutest hugs! He lays his head on your shoulder, gives one really tight squeeze, and then gently pats your back with one or both hands. When he accidentally (or purposely) hurts someone, he gives hugs to say sorry.
• Luke attempts to somersault the way his cousin Becca does, but he can't quite do it (I think his height makes it difficult). He puts his head down and sticks his bum up in the air, but instead of doing a somersault, he just kind of twists over onto his back and lies there with a proud smile on his face. We cheer for him. We don't have the heart to tell him he's not really doing it.
• Lately, one of Luke's favorite things to do (when we let him), is to ride our treadmill. He holds onto the bar on the side with one hand and we turn it on to 0.5 speed (the slowest). Luke holds on and walks for a few steps. Then, he sits down and rides the track until he has to step off the back. He thinks it's hilarious and SO fun and will do it again, and again, and again if we let him!
• Jeff is so proud that Luke does some serious flexing, fist clenching, and grunting/growling when Jeff says, "Luke intimidate!"
• Luke is ridiculously strong with a vice-like grip!
• Luke "pounds it" and sometimes he even makes the explosion sound.
• Luke loves to be outside as much as possible, playing with the neighbors, going for walks, playing at the the park, swimming, anything that involves being outside!
• TV doesn't usually hold Luke's attention for very long, but there are a couple of shows that he just loves for some reason: Yo Gabba Gabba! and the DVD about cars and trucks that came with his Little People toy cars and tracks set.
• Luke got a kiddie "I Spy" book for Christmas and he is amazingly good at matching the picture in the list of things to the object in the big picture! He is also very good at matching objects or people in pictures I have taken to the objects and people in real life (e.g. he points at our couch in a picture and then turns around and points at our actual couch).
• He cracks us up when he gets in a goofy mood and starts running in circles yelling, "woah, woah, woah, woah" and falling on the ground over and over.
• Some of his favorite toys are cars (especially putting them down tracks), balls, and baby dolls (he is so sweet with them and loves to hug them, feed them bottles or some of his snack, take them for rides in his cars, and push them in strollers).
• He has a serious sweet tooth, just like his mom! Lately some of his favorite foods (that aren't sweets or salty snacks) are bananas, pizza, steamed cauliflower and carrots, noodles, cheese, and hot dogs with ketchup.
• He still loves animals!
• He also loves our neighbors! After he was sick with bronchitis and stuck inside for a few days, he was so happy to see them again that he gave our 6-year-old next-door neighbor, Arailya three hugs in a row, running a few feet away giggling excitedly and then running back between hugs. He has a complete melt down every time we make him come inside after playing out in front of our houses with them.
• Speaking of melt-downs. Although Luke has gotten more and more hilarious and sweet lately, that has come at a price, because he is also much more dramatic. If he doesn't get what he wants (sometimes even just if he doesn't get what he wants fast enough) or he gets told "no" or he gets frustrated that he can't do something (e.g. drag his truck up the driveway or lift something really heavy), it is not uncommon for him to run away screaming and crying into a corner, where he cries some more. We can usually calm him down pretty quickly, but we are still hoping he grows out of this over-reacting phase.
• When he needs his diaper changed, he gets our attention or grabs someone's hand and leads them over to the rug where we normally change him downstairs and lies down expectantly.
• He loves to talk to his Grandma and Grandpa and Aunts and Uncles on Skype and on the phone.
• He loves to climb ladders and will climb all the way to the top of any ladder he can get his hands on.
• Luke really loves slides. All slides. Especially big inflatable ones.
• When his daddy is holding him, he counts "Oh, oo, eeee!" (one, two, threeeee!) before he falls backwards and Jeff catches him.

Very loooong story short: we absolutely love our little man! He makes us so happy!