It was a BIG month for this little guy.
At the start of the month, right after we returned from NZ, we weaned!
We decided to just go cold turkey and stop all breastfeeding. I was so worried that it would be a big drama but in fact, Toby totally accepted the change. Luke started putting him to sleep and giving him a sippy cup of milk before bed. We told him he’s a big boy just like Jude now and that was it – he was totally cool with it.
Yay! What a relief. It was great we kept it up this long but I was well and truly over it and I think Toby was ready to embrace being a big boy. 
Once we finished breast feeding, it felt like we really turned a new corner. Everything with Toby seemed to get easier. He started playing heaps with Jude with or without me being around.
He also started initiating play on his own- especially with Legos. This kid is obsessed with them much like how Jude was obsessed with cars and his train set at Toby’s age.
It is so cool to watch these two really start to play together.
As I mentioned, they are starting to have little conversations. Toby’s vocabulary exploded this month and keeps growing everyday. Some of my favorite new words of his: cookie, let’s go, night-night, please, thanks, balloon, wa wa (water), milk, this, there, cheese, banana, apple, spoon, bay bay (baby), helicopter, dinosaur, yogurt, bubbles. He is non-stop repeating us.
Toby also loves running through body parts. He is always pointing to and saying: nose, eyes, ears, mouth, belly, knees, etc. Him and Jude love to play doctor so I think this has helped Toby learn body parts.
Even with all these words his favorite by a long shot is ‘no’ (‘dinosaur’ and ‘roar’ are a close second). He is totally into defying us. I wonder where he picked this up from…
Toby’s ability to control his body has really improved. He can run fast. Really fast. He especially loves running away from us when its time to get dressed or change a diaper, yelling ‘no’ over and over.
Toby loves hanging out with friends. He is super kind on play dates – always sharing toys (although as I know with Jude, this is just a phase!).
Like Jude, he’s super social and not shy in new situations.
He is so much more relaxed than he used to be and now he really loves going for car rides. The stroller is still hit or miss.
He continues to have a huge appetite. This kid really could eat all day long if I let him!
He loves to hit. He thinks its hilarious so we have really been working on this with him and have even starting giving real time-outs (albeit very short).
He had 8 new teeth pop through over the last 2 months! With it came some whiny days.
Something he would just cry and cry no matter what I did so I could only think it must be his teeth.
Toby still loves his cuddles.
He hugs Jude a lot more than us these days and it’s so sweet.
He has also started asking to have his ‘bo-bos’ kissed which is pretty adorable.
A big month for our busy little guy indeed! We love you Toby and all your crazy antics and facial expressions to go along with them!
It was a very ‘terrible twos’ month for us. Jude drove me pretty crazy – some days he would dish out naughty behavior left and right and then there were other days where he super helpful and compliant. I never knew what to expect.
We tried out a few new discipline techniques but nothing seems to work as well as time out.
The hard thing is that we know Jude knows what naughty behavior is (pushing, throwing toys, etc) but sometimes he gets so caught up in the moment and so passionate about getting a particular toy that he will land himself in time-out. We did make a few changes which I think have helped. We moved the time-out to another room. That way when he acts up we physically remove him from the room where he was playing. It means less attention from us and him being bored. We also stopped saying ‘Jude is naughty’, etc. If he hears this enough times maybe he will come to think, ‘yes, this is me – I’m a naughty boy’ and behave accordingly. We also are working a lot on telling him to ‘use his words’ when he is frustrated or angry. This causes him to calm down and explain why he wants to hit Toby.
Having said all this I do think his natural default is to be helpful and kind but the toddler emotions can be powerful and overwhelming at times. Towards the end of the month this behavior pretty much disappeared and he seems a lot calmer now. So he was probably just going through something.
Fueling the fire might have been his napping. This month he was skipping a lot of naps. It rained most of the month and so playtime was always inside. I think the lack of fresh air and running around contributed to him being not as tired as usual and so at nap time he still had a lot of energy to burn. Thankfully missed naps usually meant early to bed, where he will sleep soundly until is 7:30am (except for a 3am pee break).
Mealtime battles with Jude continue. Its exhausting as I am continually trying to negotiate with him to take a bite. He helps me cook and bake a lot which I thought would help. Sometimes it does, but most of the time I end up spoon feeding him as he will just ignore the food in front of him and chat/sing about something else.
Speaking of baking, Jude helped out with making the cake for my birthday which we celebrated in January. He devoured a few pieces of it so if I fed him cake at every meal we’d have no problems.
Jude continues to ask to see his best friend Kate everyday and we pretty much do. If he doesn’t her one day he will ask where she is and if we can go to her house.
Kate really is like a sister to Jude and Toby.
We are already so sad thinking about having to say goodbye to her one day when we leave Taiwan.
Speaking of siblings, these two keep me so busy. They have figured out the art of ganging up on me and Jude will coral Toby into whatever scheme he has come up with.
They are even beginning to start to talk together a bit. Toby can say enough words now where he can respond to Jude and Jude has noticed. He will ask him to fetch things for him or ask him to go and hide with him and Toby complies. It is so cute and funny when Jude asks him a question and Toby says ‘yes’ or ‘no’. We certainly have quite a noisy household with these chatty two around.
There are so many sweet moments throughout the day between these two. I upgraded my phone this month so I had more space to take pictures. I just can’t get enough.
Jude is still super into role play- he’s really into being an astronaut at the moment and making helmets and spaceships.
We’ve also started making up stories at night and telling them to him when he gets in bed. Speaking of stories, he is loving reading fairy tales which have been fun for us to revisit.
Luke and I love how Jude can express himself now. He will tell me I look pretty (while stroking my hair) or that daddy looks cute (before he leaves for work) and then will wish him a good day. Despite acting outing on occasion, we absolutely love this age and Jude has been such an amazing son to us and big brother to Toby.
Five years in Taiwan 