Zachary has reached a new level of independence lately - quite frankly, I was not expecting it at this point. In some ways, its really cool to see cause he is learning new things almost every day now, but in some ways - it is quite trying...
He will plop himself down on the ground if he doesn't want to walk where we are steering him. He will thrust himself around to keep from being put in his carseat, and he will throw things on the floor if he is mad at us for some reason. Oh - and all of these while SCREAMING.
Now, this attitude doesn't make up a huge part of the day -he is still generally a happy and content baby...or toddler I guess I should say...who even listens when we tell him no. But now all the time anymore, no sir!
Needless to say - he gets picked up and carried when he refuses to walk, he still goes in the carseat no matter how much he thrusts his chest and legs, and he doesn't get toys when he decides he feels like throwing them...no matter how much he screams.
We are learning how to respond as we go because disciplining an 11 month old is different since his understanding of situations and consequences is not extensive, but I don't want to raise a brat so we have to respond - and do so in a way that he can somewhat understand (which at this point seems to be being consistent and hoping he will realize that his behavior is not going to alter the outcome in any way). I am not interested in completely ignoring these things now so that I end up with a 2 or 3 yr old who doesn't know that its not ok and that hes not going to get his way with that behavior. It's annoying to deal with when he is this age, but it would be much more ridiculous if he still thought he could get away with it when he is a year or two older.
Some of these lil outbursts, we realized, were not just out of defiance. For example - Zachary went through a short phase when he would not eat much at meals and was very fussy the whole time. I could tell that he was frustrated about something and trying to express something to me but I didn't know what. I was getting really stressed about it, but we figured out that he wanted to be able to feed himself. For a while, he didnt get any food to his mouth but was perfectly content to hold a spoon that he could try to dip in his food while we fed him with another spoon. Problem solved and no harm done. I just wasn't expecting my baby to be ready to feed himself so soon!!
Now he is able to feed himself things like applesauce and yogurt that stick to a spoon on their own and he actually gets it into his mouth! Is it messy?? OH YES! But it cleans up and he has to learn sometime, even if it is sooner than I expected!
Heres a lil preview.
PS - the way the spoon contorts his face is quite hilarious.
While I was pregnant time was dragging on and on...
