toddler bed

The new bed arrived on Monday and was immediately put together by Daddy, and none too soon! After we ordered the bed, for a while we felt like we might have over reacted and that perhaps there was no need to jump the gun. One escape attempt doesn't mean he is going to try it again any time soon, so what's the rush? But it turned out it was a good thing we acted quickly. It took about 10 days for the bed to come, and the last two mornings before it arrived Elijah tried to get out of his crib (one time to retrieve a blanket that he had just thrown out of the crib, and the second time he just woke up, said "Ah-doh", and wanted out right away).

I read somewhere that it's a good idea to keep the crib handy when going to a toddler bed just in case the child doesn't take to it well right away. It wasn't really an option for us, but it worked out just fine anyway. Elijah LOVES his new bed. When Ryan showed it to him for the first time, he immediately knew what it was, and wanted to play "going to sleep" for a while. He'd climb onto it, lie down, then get off. We were concerned that since he could now get up himself he wouldn't stay in bed when we put him down for the night or just his nap, but he hadn't gotten up once in the few days that we've had this new sleeping arrangement. Although we can no longer prolong our mornings in bed. As soon as Elijah is awake, he gets out of bed and turns on the lights.

Funny enough, finding a top sheet to fit this toddler bed turned out to be quite a chore. I finally found one at Amazon, but I feel like they are overcharging, so we are using a twin-sized pink-striped one for now. :) As for a pillow, Elijah seems to be plenty comfortable without one, so we figured no need to worry about that one quite yet.

All in all, the transition has been a smooth one. It appears it was harder for me than for Elijah. He has slept in the crib since he was less than two months old, and moving him out of it gave me this sad my-baby-boy-is-growing-up feeling. (I took a few pictures of him in the crib after his very last nap in it.) But he doesn't seem to miss the crib at all. And I have pretty much gotten over it by now as well.

a near escape

A few days ago we had one of those break through days when a child all of a sudden makes a leap in his development. Or it least so it seemed. We woke up to a string of impatient "HI, HI, HI, ...". As usual, we hoped to ignore the greeting and steal a few more moments of rest. Our basement bedroom is usually pretty dark, which makes for great sleeping any time of day, but also makes for difficult waking (at least for the two adults in the room). However, that morning Elijah was not inclined to wait. As Ryan looked up at the crib, it looked like Elijah's arm was hanging over the rail, which is often the case. But we quickly realized that it was no arm. Elijah was straddling the rail. We think he got a little startled to discover himself in such an unstable position and froze for just a moment, which gave us just enough time to throw off our blanket and retrieve him before he fell down. Talk about a quick awakening and an adrenalin rush!

About a half an hour later he surprised us by saying two new words: ball (bah), and car (cah). We never coached him to say these words, unlike many others. Yet all of a sudden he just used them like it was normal. And even that wasn't the end of his tricks.

That same morning he finally figured out that he doesn't have to beg us to hold him up so he can turn the light switches on and off (a fascination he's had since before he turned a year, and it doesn't seem to wear out). He climbed on the couch and happily played with the lights for quite a while. Up and down, up and down, like a little monkey. Was it his Halloween character that inspired him?

It was a fun day. I love watching him do new tricks and say new words. You should hear him talk on his toy phone (or a remote control) in his gibberish, and giggling as if someone was cracking jokes on the other end.

And, by the way, a brand new toddler bed is on its way.

animal sounds

You can probably guess which animal sounds he is making, even though the animals are named in Russian. But just in case, they are: monkey, dog, sheep, and snake, in that order.

monkey

It all started when we decided that two pairs of pajamas weren't enough. Somehow we kept finding ourselves out of clean PJ's for Elijah, and decided we needed more. The cutest pair Costco had at the time had monkeys all over it, and for some reason Elijah instantly fell in love with it. His other PJ's have a bear on them, and he likes bears, but somehow doesn't really think it's all that cool to have one on his PJ's. But the monkey pajamas are a whole different ball game. So, when Grandma asked what costume she should get for Elijah for Halloween, it was a no brainer. He was meant to be a monkey this year. (If you look closely, you'll see that even his shoes have monkeys on them.)

Elijah didn't go trick-or-treating, but he did visit Grandpa and Grandma's office in the morning (below), and then helped hand out candy in the evening. He was quite interested in the bowl of candy, mostly for the sole purpose of dumping it out on the floor, but we kept it well out of his reach. And if you are wondering if he got any candy, the answer is no. The only desert type thing he gets once in a while is jello (unless you are counting the carrot cupcake from his first birthday).