My boy at 18 months old

A whole year and a half old and well on your way to two, my little Tic Tac. My goodness you’re growing up before our eyes. We’ve reached that magical stage where each day seems to bring something new. A new word, a new trick, a new behaviour, and it is a complete and utter joy to watch.

Your cheeky, GIANT smile, where we get to see every one of your adorable teeth, is my ultimate favourite face you pull, but you do still have plenty of expressions up your sleeve. You’ve always been known for your ability to pull the funniest expressions without even trying, but seeing you happy is the best.

I feel like we’ve turned a corner with the silent reflux, and although I think it is having lasting effect on your emotional behaviour, it’s so wonderful to see you happier. You seem to no longer be plagued by the acid that was making your life a misery and bedtimes aren’t the struggle they used to be.

You are filled with mischief and adventure, and love nothing more than gathering up as many ‘BALLS’ as you can and playing to your heart’s content. I’ll be surprised if you don’t end up playing some sort of sport with how accurate your throw is already.

Hearing your little voice starting to babble and make sense of what others are saying is so much fun. You love to say ‘ball, bubble, Isla, ‘ but not mama!!!!! I try so hard to get you to say who I am but alas, you are not even slightly interested! You are also starting to sign and like to do the signs for different animals, milk, more, please and thank you.

Your sleep is a lot better. You go to bed relatively ok each night and only get up once or twice when you’re not teething. I’ll take that after the months and months of half hourly wake ups – well done L!

You continue to thrive at nursery, where you have moved up to the bigger room. You are in your element with more space, access to the bigger garden and, of course, all the bigger boys and girls. I love seeing all your updates online.

Oh my goodness I can’t do this update without mentioning your dancing and singing of course. Your dancing is starting to become quite legendary and I LOVE it. You just can’t help yourself. You hear a beat in the distance and your little body just starts moving. It often starts off quite subtle and then builds up into a full blown little rave. Too cute. Please never stop dancing.

You love to sing wheels on the bus, twinkle twinkle and 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Although we can’t make out all the words, you definitely have the tunes down my little musical bean.

Food wise, you are loving anything and everything, but only on your terms. If you don’t want to eat your usual tomato pasta, you won’t be eating it. It will usually end up all over the table and floor!

You can see sympathy and empathy starting to come into your character, which is utterly heart-warming. If someone gets upset then you either get upset for them or you try to fix it. At nursery you walked over to another child with their comforter when you saw they were sad and crying.

Don’t get me wrong, you also have a rather stubborn side. The words ‘nononononono’ and ‘mememememe’ have started to appear, and you don’t like being told you can’t have something. Everything is very intense and once you spot something you need, the whole street hears about it if you don’t get it within a millisecond. We are trying to begin to teach you to have patience, and that you can’t have everything you want, but my goodness you don’t like it!

As much as I joke about what hard work you are, just keep being you my boy. The whole world is waiting for you and I’m sure you’ll continue to embrace every day.