Toddler Ty: 18 months

Ty turned 18 months this past November and appears to have gotten a good deal taller and skinnier. He still has a litte belly pouch, but his cheeks and thighs were much chunkier in his baby pictures than they are now. With these recent body changes has come significantly increased agility. He's become much more skilled at climbing and squeezing himself into tight spaces. He's attempted and continues to attempt sliding underneath the baby gate, but his belly blocks him from going too far. He's even gotten himself stuck a few times and had to be rescued. 

He was very excited once he figured out how to climb up onto the couch and the recliners. He freaks us out a bit by standing up and leaning back in the recliners as far as possible. Fortunately he has not tried to go over the top of the recliners or tried to climb out of his crib. I fear the day he figures out how to climb out of his crib...

Here he is having lots of fun with our various laundry baskets. Such a mischievous little monkey!

Ty continues to torture our cats at every opportunity, so when Fry ended up with an ear hematoma, we had to keep him and Ty separated for 12 days. We pushed the baby gate as flat as it would go so Fry couldn't come up and Ty couldn't go down, but Fry would still come right up to the gate, and Ty would pull on Fry's head cone. Poor Fry felt so lonely, so we would let him up when Ty was asleep and give him extra loves. He healed well from the operation, but his ear is still limp. I don't know if it will ever reshape the way it's supposed to.

Otherwise the cats were good. Here they are relaxing in a pile of recently done laundry. They stayed there for hours, only moving when I finally put the laundry away.

Up until recently I had never seen Oscar with facial hair, but this year he decided to participate in "No shave November." He looked a lot like his brother William. It drove me crazy, and not so much because of the look but because of the feel. The prickly hairs in his mustache made kissing him much less pleasant than usual.

He shaved it off on the final week of November since he had an important job interview and wanted to look professional. But of course he took several goofy pictures before it was all gone.

Oscar was flown out to Fort Lauderdale, Florida for his interview. He left early on the 24th and was home late on the 25th. It was a short trip, but he did get a chance to see the recently dedicated Fort Lauderdale LDS temple. We're still waiting to hear if a job offer will be made. They've contacted him recently to let him know he's not out of the running yet.

At the tail end of the month after Thanksgiving, Seattle had it's annual snowfall. It was beautiful but short lived, like usual.

And Ty got to see the Christmas tree. I spent about 8 hours putting on the lights alone. I thread them through carefully and thoroughly to prevent either Ty or the cats from being able to pull them off (as I learned the hard way back in 2012). Ty tried several times, but never managed to pull them more than about an inch. He was delighted to see the tree though!

We ornamented it later, but only made it 3/4's of the way. After Ty got his hands on it, it was down to 2/3rd's for the rest of the year. He loved taken the ornaments off and even tried to put them back on several times, but he lacks the dexterity to do so. I ended up giving him the cat ornaments to play with. He'd often attempt to put them on the tree, but usually they'd fall right through. At least they made him happy.