Wow, I feel like the last month went by pretty slowly but here we are at the 17 month mark! He has definitely become more driven in what he wants. I don’t think I’m wording that correctly, but you get my drift. He’s becoming a toddler and he wants things when he wants them, and he’s not afraid to scream about it. Sometimes I have no clue what he wants and he points at the counter tops and I just have no idea! My patience is tested often these days and sometimes it really tires me out (most times, I should say). I’m trying to learn to help him help me if that makes sense. When he’s really irritable or fussy I try to stop whatever it is that I’m doing and put my focus 100% on him. I put the phone down, get off the computer, whatever it is…I stop and I play with him. Or I read to him or just engage more with him. I feel guilty about it too because it sucks that I wasn’t already paying enough attention to him but sometimes I need a mental break and if he’s playing by himself I think that’s okay to do. But toddlers will be fine by themselves and then out of nowhere need you so quickly and it’s a bit of an adjustment for me.
Shopping trips are no longer as fun for me or him. I used to love bringing him everywhere with me because he behaved so well but now he doesn’t find the shopping cart or stores as amusing. He wants snacks and he wants out! I started bringing snacks with me a long time ago anytime I went to stores with him in case he started fussing and I used it to calm him down throughout the stores but now it’s become that he associates being out with snacks I think. As soon as I put him in the cart he whines and cries for my purse because that’s where the snacks are. So I feed him throughout the store. I’m not sure if this is any better than being the mom who whips out her phone or a video game for their kid to play with, lol. Also, whenever we shop with Jesse, he’ll let him out of the shopping cart to walk around. This also is an issue because then Levi thinks if he cries he can get out of the cart which, to me, is NOT okay. So we had a discussion about it and Jesse will try to stop doing that since it causes issues for me when I’m out with Levi by myself. I don’t think it’s okay to let Levi do whatever he wants or get out of a situation just because he doesn’t feel like being in it (obviously I’m talking about an easy situation…like grocery shopping). It’s like, how do you discipline a child who doesn’t know any better? It’s hard! And you don’t want to be naïve and think you shouldn’t and then as they get older they’ve never known any structure or discipline and they become some out of hand kid.
Anyways, we’re working on it. A lot of days are hard for me and I’m really tired most of the time but we’re hanging in there. I can’t wait for the weather to cool down so that we can play outside in the middle of the day since we’re either playing super early in the day or after dinner because it’s too hot for me to handle in between. An update on the neighbor that I spoke about in an earlier post, we see her and her son about once a week and Levi doesn’t really care about kids his age so they don’t do much together but it is nice to hang out with someone and get him used to being around other kids. He loves playing with older kids at the park (2-3 years old). I think he likes older kids because they play with him like an adult would…like playing chase or tag or just running around whereas a kid his age wouldn’t necessarily do that.
Oh yeah, we’re fostering three kittens right now and Levi loves them! Mostly he loves playing with their toys but same thing, haha. He really loves cats for some reason and he lights up whenever he see’s them. It’s really cute. They’re pretty gross and poopy though so I don’t think I’ll foster anytime soon after I’m done with them. I think I took on way too much with them. Before I got them I thought, “I can totally do this! I have so much time on my hands!” And then I quickly got overwhelmed and realized I was taking on an extra three lives to care for when I’m already doing everything else around here. Whew. Stressed and exhausted is an understatement for sure. Sorry for complaining about being tired but that’s all I feel these days. I’m sure many others can relate (moms or not! Life is tiring for everyone).
Well the next thing we have going on is searching for halloween costumes! We have no idea what we want Levi to be this year. I want to dress him up but then I also don’t care but we’ll see. Thinking about all of the holiday’s makes me excited for him as I personally don’t care about any of them but it’s fun to get excited for him and to create fun memories!
Liz With Type One 