There goes Zoomer.

This is an update of sorts, as well as a documentation of the life of our little speedster, Everett.

Everett is 15 months old, nearing 16 months here soon. He is just a little joy to us. If you couldn't tell by my title, he's fast. People ask me if he's walking yet, and my response is, "He's running." The kid doesn't idly walk somewhere. Wherever he wants to go, it's a full out baby sprint. He always looks like he's going to fall forward. Sometimes he does, but for the most part, he has that balance down.

The title of this post, while a testament to Everett's speedy demeanor, is a good segue way into Everett's main interest in life: books. The post title is from a book by Sandra Boynton (who writes EXCELLENT children books) by dinosaurs. If Everett was a dinosaur from that book, he would be Zoomer. Anyways, we read through 10-15 books a night. All he wants to do is read "bops". We have a basket of books on the floor he goes through every night and then he requests several top shelf books that he must pick out himself. I don't think the kid even needs his toys. Usually, when we travel, we don't bring toys. We just bring a stack of books and that will do him just fine.

He's talking some. That, ball, cup, cat, bop (book), mama, dada, up, down, all done, off, on, apple, cheese, dog, Jessica (funny - the older daughter of our daycare, who we have been using as our babysitter as of late), keys, car, baby, eat, shoes, socks, hat. His favorite word is that - everything is "that" as he points because he wants it now(!). My favorite word of his is snow. It's precious. He also does sign - baby when he wants to watch baby signing time, bath, eat, hat, shoes, and sleep are a few that come to mind.

And we are just starting to get into tantrum season. It's funny. He literally throws himself on the floor. It's too bad for him that we don't fall for it.

A few funny things Everett related:
1) We use a tupperware bowl for the cat water. A couple times in the past day, Ev has gotten a similar bowl out of the cabinet and placed it right next to the cat's bowl. Maybe he thinks they need more water. It's probably true.
2) We have to diligently watch the trash for magnetic letters that magically end up there. Everett's only going to learn 2/3's of the alphabet as a result.
3) We have a water cooler, since we are such avid water drinkers. Sometimes Everett will take his cup over to it and try to fill his up too. Thank goodness he hasn't quite figured out the button, or there would be water EVERYWHERE.
4) The kitchen rug is a great hiding place for old CDs and expired credit cards.
5) The couch is the most fun place to be in the entire house. Who knew.
6) Bath time is the coolest time every day. He loves to play bathketball and wear the lobster on his head. On days he doesn't take a bath, he gets pissed and throws a tantrum. Everett would be in heaven if we could only combine bath time and the couch. Sounds like a bad idea.
7) He has finally been able to go down the family room step. He tried for a while and always ended up on his face, so he gave up. But after a month of trying to teach him to "sit (down by the step) & scoot (your butt close to the edge so that your feet can reach the floor)" method, he finally gave in. And now he expects a round of applause every time he does make it down that step!
8) He's gotten very good at saying "All done" when he doesn't want to eat what we gave him.
9) Remotes double as a play phone. Remotes are also what you hand Mom and Dad when you want to watch baby signing time.
10) This kid loves to dance like a white guy. I'm glad he likes my music, and not Kirk's, much to Kirk's dismay. But he has certainly taken after Kirk's dance moves (oh, Snap!).
11) We have a Melissa & doug puzzle where pieces get placed behind doors (i.e. dog get placed in the dog house, car in the garage, turkey in the oven). Kirk took 4 or 5 pieces out and Everett was able to place them in their appropriate places on his own.

In short, he's a funny, fast, and smart boy. You know, just like every other kid. But he's ours and that alone makes him special. :)