DanPar's progress, 15 months on the outside!

All right, here it is. DanPar's progress report, and my excuse to show off pictures of the cutest kid ever.

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Communication

He's signing. WHAAAAAAT??? I started signing when he was about 5 months old, and stopped signing when he was about 6 months. But picked it up anyways.
He started pointing to cars, and moving his hand over his chest like he's got a toy car, saying "Vvvrrr!" (Thanks, gearhead grandpa!) We taught him that animals don't go "Vvvrrr," but they walk around, going "Doop doop doop!" So now, if it moves, it is either a car "Vvvrrr!" or an animal "Da da da!"
So that's weird.

Zebra on wheels? We cut him some slack on this one.
It's a car AND an animal.

Also, he goes full-baby-speed around the house saying "Woof!" (his favorite word), even when there's no toy dog, real dog, or picture of a dog, in sight. He just likes barking. And I love him so much.

 Communication conclusion: Our child is a dog.

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Social interaction

DanPar likes other people. But he likes me even more. This makes him a really hard dude to pass on to other people, so I can do anything else ever. However, it's still undeniably sweet when he lunges halfway out of people's arms to reach for me, as I try desperately to stay completely out of sight.

Making friends with other babies at the library, whether they're real or not!

It takes a bit more work to make him smile than it used to. Shuffling cards just doesn't cut the mustard anymore. But! He just started realizing the difference between normal faces and silly faces, and just a couple days ago, he started laughing with every sweep of the broom. And that's awesome.

This is DanPar's silly face, in response to my own!

We try to go to storytime at the library every week, and we've been doing well to spend time with his cousins, at the zoo and at the museum! I still feel like I'm isolating him, but perhaps that's just because I feel pretty solitary most days anyways!

He's the cute guy on the left, next to Jaina and Cody!

  Social interaction conclusion: Still a hit with the ladies!

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Sleep

I'm about 90% sure we screwed something up here.

Our adorable little sleeper.

About once or twice a week, he'll wake up in the middle of the night, and he will not want to go back down. So, I'll take him downstairs, and play with him. (Or more likely, play YouTube on a tablet, curl under a blanket, and hope he doesn't eat something too inedible.)

Such a sweetie!

We're supposed to be weaning him off of nighttime milk, but he knows when he doesn't get his dairy dose, and he screams as long as it takes. And, in the middle of the night, it's easy to just take him and lay him down next to us in bed. Which is probably also something we're doing wrong, so now he'll wake up with little baby fists smacking us in the face. But they are adorable little baby fists nevertheless!

Aunt Brittany carrying the little rascal!

 Sleep conclusion: We've created a monster.

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Food

Perhaps this isn't right, but in my head, I've got three solid food groups in regards to feeding the DanPar. Protein, grain, and fruits/veggies. So when we sit down for a meal, I'll read comics aloud while getting his food together.

Getting ready for lunch with Batgirl!

	Protein	Fruits/Veggies	Grain
Active	Freshly sliced pieces of ham.	Pineapple bits, cut right to size.	Precisely 1 handful of cereal.
Lazy	Freshly scooped scoops of peanut butter.	Carrot sticks that I bit in half.	Approximately 1 handful of cereal.
Whatever	Freshly reopened leftover shredded chicken, I think.	Here’s an apple. Good luck, kid.	Ugh, I don’t know, a handful of cereal or something.

Yum yum healthy!

Yum yum BURRITO.

He has a wonderful appetite for the fruits and vegetables, and it's weird how much he eats like a real human now. Right now, we are trying not to introduce juice or desserts to his diet. We learned our lesson about spoiling, when grandma and grandpa decided that fruity Cheerios would be a fun change from his normal fare!

I told him he had to finish his Cheerios before getting Cap'n Crunch.
He was not happy about this ultimatum.

  Food conclusion: Made up food pyramid works, I hope.

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Motor control

He walks, he goes up and down stairs, he opens ajar doors, he can take snacks from a container, he closes and opens simple lids, he throws things, he claps like nobody's business, he opens board books and turns the pages, he goes on tippy toes to grab things that are dangerous and/or fragile, he sits on stairs, and he kicks balls across the ground.

Everything seems to be in order here!

He's pretty much a full-on human. No climbing yet. Thank goodness. Right now, the hardest part of keeping up with him is that he'll walk around to play with things, and I'll sit down next to him. And then he'll go somewhere else, so I'll stand, go over, and sit. Aaaaaaaaaand repeat.

Someday when he's a famous athlete, this picture will be worth billions.

He made that blanket fort all by himself. Not even kidding.
(Okay, definitely kidding.)

  Motor control conclusion: Shrimpy little human, but definitely a human.

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So there's our precious little boy, DanPar the Magnificent. He's growing up really nicely, and I'm really lucky to have a guy like him. He's mischievous when he's done being sweet, and he's sweet when he's done being mischievous. And I couldn't be prouder.