alexander is eighteen months

eighteen months old! whatttt? our baby boy would be off to nursery now - if we even had church right now gah. not that we actually have a nursery leader right now anyway, cause... he's the only one! awkward. my guess is, that even when church goes back, we probably won't call one for one kid. what's the point? it's literally babysitting. he may as well hang out with me in primary, or dom or nannaleah in relief society or doug in his class! easy!

anyway - over the past month, this little nugget has:

-started saying heeeeyyyy da!!!! for hey duggee and doo doo doo’s along with the hey duggee song

-fallen in love with grapes. it's like he can sniff them out and would eat dozens of them if we would let him. he always pulls open the fridge and points at them.

-pulled peoples hands to take them to places when he wants them to come and play

-started climbing up on everything, tables, couches, stools... change table, his dresser! yikes!

-is saying, more! that! grapes! (very clearly) bop it and what i think was you're welcome.

-stopped having milk... a few days after this month started... but after 10 days was still coming in and trying to pull my shirt down with his mouth open.

-cut the two bottom teeth three from the middle

-made a truck noise when pushing his cement mixer around

-loves toast and can't get enough

-waves non stop, like allll the time

and he's still crazy cute. we love you little dude!

alexander is sixteen months!

this adorable little nugget is now sixteen months old. what?!

during the last month our little redhead:

-was introduced to the cozy coupe and he loves it so much that he growls when you want him to get out of it

-started saying: grandma! joseph! nanna!

-always makes an angry growl noise when you tell him off and then stomps off

-had his first trip to the beach. ate plenty of sand and loved the water

-is obsessed with his little postbox toy and posting all the letters.

-was forced to sleep against his will and after a lot of screaming, he is finally sleeping through the night

-is into absolutely everything. empties drawers, cupboards, always has the fridge open...

what can i say? he is hard work, but oh do we love him!

baby alexander, you are so so loved.

alexander james: thirteen months

this is getting ridiculous! he just keeps growing!
baby alexander was 13 months old yesterday and during the last month:

-he has entertained everyone we meet to no end with his "spider crawling" (walking on his hands and feet, instead of going onto his knees)
-you had your one year old immunisations and barely protested. one and two barely got a rise out of you, it wasn't until the third one that you started to yell at the nurse.
-you got sick again with the most awwwwwful cough. we just can't win. another dose of antibiotics was the doctors orders
-a new word! bear! (pronounced beer at this stage hahah) he said it one morning over and over with a bear of madeline's in hand
-when madeline left the room one day he kept yelling for her maa-ee! maa-eeee!
-another one of your teeth has popped through
-you are now mostly waving on command when we say hi and bye
-if the front door or garage door is open, he tries to escape. he will race and try and get out
-he has started to stand up! just days before he was 13 months old, a few times on the first day but more and more as time went on

baby alexander, you are so loved! 

2 years old ❤️

i can't believe it, but somehow i woke up yesterday and this adorable little blonde haired, blue eyed boy with possibly the sweetest face you've ever seen got older yet again and now he is two years old! and getting cuter by the day...

he woke up to these presents on the table and was so thrilled to see they were all for him that he made quick work of climbing onto a chair and getting in to them. 

i loved watching his face light up as he opened them and saw what was inside, squealing with delight. i love how excited he gets.

this month he cut his other two molars and some nights were not very fun, because he would wake up very upset and make sure i knew all about it. some panadol and teething gel seemed to help (sometimes...) he was obsessed with a fold out book that he got from a friend of ours for his first christmas called "my big fold out book of things that go." it's full of tractors and planes and trucks and he just loved it. it was pulled out day after day until it fell to pieces (and we are still looking for a replacement copy) he even said tractor and digger one day when we were looking at it which was a real feat as he still doesn't have a great deal to say. i know he'll get there, but he just doesn't seem to be keen on talking and makes his point in other ways. it's all about the trucks and cars for sure, when we see a ute, truck.... anything on the road he squeals and points to it and always has to have something with wheels in his hands or around about him as he plays. it's so cute that you can tell what kids love even at such a young age.

he is loving the wiggles song and does the finger wave every time he hears it... and even more so twinkle twinkle. i think i have heard him humming the tune as he totters about the place at least 5 times a day. madeline started school this month and he gets so excited looking around her classroom when we drop her off and again at the end of the day when she comes rushing out to us. i love that they love each other so much even though sometimes it means i have to listen to them squabbling. he loves to love and makes a big deal of smooching me on the cheek loudly when he is in the mood and will do it over and over. i just can't get enough of his cuddles. 

i can't believe he is two... and that he is all mine ♥

joseph is 23 months

cheeeeeeeeeeeese! i am 23 months now mum mum mum! only one more month until i'm 2! i still cannot get over how fast these past 2 years have gone, yet here i am, planning a little birthday party for this cutie! 

this month our joseph decided he had a hat obsession and spent most mornings collecting up his favourites from daddy's wardrobe, lining them up on the bed and then modelling them for me one by one. 

he got a 4 wheeler motorbike from his grandparents (dougs parents) for christmas and he loves the noise making buttons and scooting through the house at top speed.

joseph learnt (and quickly mastered) how to open doors and has made quite the game out of wandering into the kitchen everytime he is hungry and opening the pantry door (and still, as he has the last few months, the fridge door) to see what's on offer.

he cut three of his 2 year old molars and kept waking up on cue every night at 10pm to remind me something was wrong, silly mummy couldn't work out what it was until i did some investigating one night... ouchie!

andddddd, he made one attempt at climbing out of his cot and fell down smack on his bum... i think it was enough to put him off as he hasn't given it another try...

he and maddie love to play together (most of the time...) and i love to hear them laugh. i am so so lucky to be their mum. ♥

22 months old...

please little man... stop growing! somehow 22 months have flown by and here we are again... only 2 more months until my baby is 2 and this mummy is devastated at the very thought of it.

finally young master joseph has learned that bedtime is not the devil and settles happily into his bed and goes off to sleep instead of screaming for hours... when i tell him it's "bedtime joseph!" he even runs off into his room and tries to climb up the bars of the cot to get himself into bed, waiting for his daddy or i to lift him in.

this month joseph learned to say grandma, (an-maaa) after he heard madeline yelling it at the shops when we were looking for dougs mum. he also made his other grandmother laugh hysterically when we were facetiming one morning and we paused to bless the breakfast and he turned to the phone, put his finger to his mouth and shooshed her. it was too funny.

he has finally mastered please (eeeeeeeeeeee) and ta (ahhhhhh), which makes me happy, good manners are important to me, even in young children!

he is still completely obsessed with his toy cars and when his supply ran low last week, i went around looking under furniture and managed to locate 12 of them in one hit... clearly he has a good time with them.

he is one of the cutest kids alive, i am certain of it... and we are so happy to have him in our home. ♥

one of the outtakes... what a cracker of a kid!

21 months of joseph

what's that? another month down? um excuse me father time, can you slow down a little please? i would really appreciate it. our little joseph is at such a cute age and i want it to last as long as possible. 

he is still not a fan of bedtime, but he is getting there... the last few nights have been looking promising so let's keep our fingers crossed. he loves to pounce on unattended shoes and clop through the house and smile at any spectators as he does so. his current food obsession is watermelon pieces (i mean seriously, who could blame him, he obviously got that from his mama and his nanna!)

he is a little speedster and has perfected zooming through the house on madeline's little pink trike, the speed at which he takes the corners actually frightens me a little, i really need to make a video! when he wants to be cuddled, he loves to cuddle, especially first thing in the morning when he is busy watching his favourite show, "dinosaur train". he is trying to copy most of the words we shoot at him nowadays, but often misses the first syllable, meaning we get things such as um (mum) and ad (dad) even though he has got those two perfect more often than not.

when daddy comes home from work, he drops whatever he is doing and rushes for him smiling, with his hands in the air, wanting to be picked up and tickled. it's the cutest thing ever!when he is excited or sees something new he says: oooooooooooh! and... he hates to have his hair washed. let's hope that ends soon, cause it's getting old, very quickly!

he is certainly growing up, but for now he is my baby... and i am willing him to stay that way. ♥

joseph is twenty months

is it really that time again? another month has passed? well our little man is now 20 months old and getting into all kinds of mischief! he is obsessed with splashing in the fountain and throwing the pebbles into it, even though it makes his daddy angry, which makes him giggle even more. he has finally worked out the toddle bike that madeline used to ride and is scooting furiously up and down the backyard much to maddie's glee now that he can keep up with her. 

if something frightens him, he comes rushing to me calling, "mama mama mama!!" it is so adorable. i was nearby when he accidentally turned on the dryer the other day playing with the buttons and he quickly rushed off to me calling me. i love hearing his little voice and i am hoping he learns more words soon... he learned to say emma this month and everyone thought it was his cousin emma, but it was actually from watching the wiggles mini show emma, maddie used to sing the song over and over and over e-mm-a emma! e-mm-a emma! until one day he just her off and screamed emma himself as if to shoosh her. hilarious. 

he still loves his toy cars and everywhere we go he seems to have at least one wedged in his hands, more if he can manage it. he loves all his toys though and when he wakes up in the morning if there is nothing waiting to lift him out of his cot, he reaches over the end to grab the toys that are there and plays with them in his cot for a while. 

he is such a bundle of fun and energy, running everywhere and is so very rarely still. we love him so much and so glad he is ours ♥

nineteen months

again? wasn't it the 20th last week? this kid is growing up far too fast and it is frightening the heck out of me! 

he is completely toy car obsessed. he always has one (or two or three or even four, as many as he can fit!) clutched in his little hands and loves to drive them up and down any surface he can find, including my face! he is a real little boy, and loves dinosaurs and cars and making noise and getting dirty. we have only been at the new house for one day and he is already out the back at every opportunity possible throwing rocks into the fountain, splashing about in it, and running around like a mad man. he is definitely a boy. he also loves to make the brmmmmmmmm noises for his cars and clipclop noises for his little toy horse (bullseye from toy story)

he loves his cocoa pops for breakfast in the mornings and is that obsessed that one morning when i forgot to buckle him into his high chair (oops mum fail) and left the room for a minute with madeline in tow, he climbed out of his chair, down into the chair maddie had been sitting in and polished hers off too. crazy town! i nearly had a heart attack when i saw what he had done.

when we serve the food up, we call "joseph! prayers!" and he quickly pushes his arms together and squeezes his eyes shut (most of the time into a squint so he watch what we are doing) then waits patiently for us to say amen! before he gets into his food. adorable! 

he also loves to wave at people, he still doesn't say much, other than to yell and point to get what he wants, but as soon as you tell him "say bye joseph" he instantly breaks into a huge smile and waves madly as we walk away. 

cutest boy ever! ♥♥

18 months old ♥

it's happened again! baby joseph is another month old, and it is now a year and a half since this little one joined the kendall crew. your favourite song is "if your happy and you know it" and if you hear someone in the house singing it, you immediately begin to clap your hands along to the tune and smile that huge smile of yours. you love all the nursery rhymes you hear and always want your mummy and daddy to put on the 'mother goose club' (a channel with a group of children singing nursery rhymes and childrens song) and you would watch it and dance along all day long if we would let you. you love to dance along to music and your newest move is to stand still and stomp with one leg and use the other to dance in a circle. adorable.

you love to (sometimes!) play quietly in your room and read your books and occasionally i'll find you in there quite content and playing all alone. you've learnt what it is to be quiet and if we tell you to shoosh, you'll place your finger at your lips and make the shooooooosh noise. 

your last two teeth (for a while i hope!) have popped through just this week, completing your little set of 16 baby teeth. you have the sweetest toothy little grin and those dimples! to die for. you're still having troubles with your teeth though and you've become very clingy again... to the point that when i try and take you to nursery at church you cry and cry and sob until i have to come back and get you. sigh. attached to mama much?

you love your morning fruit and vegetable juice with mama, so much so, that sometimes when you finish the cup (seriously, he downs those in 20 seconds sometimes!) you'll come running back into the kitchen waving your cup and pointing it at me, waiting for a refill,

you've finally given up breastfeeding, we got down to one feed a day and then finally none, amazingly enough, it was exactly the same time wise that your big sister gave up. how funny!

you still don't talk too much, just a few words and not often.., we spoke to the child health nurse about it today and i mentioned that you understand everything we say, point at what you want and really make yourself known... thankfully she gave me the answer i had hoped for, that she also thinks there isn't anything wrong and you'll speak when you're ready, most probably when your chatterbox sister isn't there to say everything for you! haha. 

we adore you! you are sweet and cuddly and just our little joseph! ♥

seventeen months ♥

another month has raced by and now he's another one older! :( where is my sweet little baby going?

he is obsessed with switching power points on and off, slyly looking at us while he does so... on off on off on off on off... he also loves the tv remote, turning the tv on, changing the channel, turning the volume up load! 

he's also taken up crawl around the floor with your nose down like a sniffer dog... it is hilarious to watch and makes me laugh so hard.

he loves toy cars and zooming them along the ground, swinging in your swing for hours on end and chocolate! he can't get enough of it in his little face and always point at wherever you have seen it come from and make a lot of noise in the hopes that mummy will give in and let you have more.

he stood at the side of your bath and said "up up up up up!" over and over until i put him in, so excited to get in and splash about. there are two teeth poking through in his bottom jaw, ready to complete your set of baby teeth. ouch! 

he are still trying very hard to talk and making lots of noise, but certainly getting his point across. 

as adorable as always!

we have a 16 month old!

this boy is the funniest! 90% of the time he is happy and laughing and trotting around the house making mischief. he runs quickly on the spot sometimes when he is excited, a few quick steps and then rushes off again, funny little thing.

he has so many troubles with his teeth though, such a change from madeline, hers just came through without any problems, where this baby is always grizzling and grabbing at his gums when one arrives which seems to be every second week. boo. he has 14 teeth now! someone call the dental police!

he has started to do what we call baby yoga, when he leans forward and put his hands then head on the ground and makes a triangle shape, all the while giggling and looking side to side to make sure we are watching. he and maddie are always together, up to something...

nothing has made me laugh harder than this though. joseph has worked out where we keep bowls in the cupboard and obviously associated them with food, so when he is hungry, he trots into the kitchen, helps himself to a bowl, then comes and hit me in the leg with it. as if to say, "what are you doing woman! get me some food!" it is the funniest thing!

he is still not saying much, i guess it's hard to get a word in edgewise with madeline around, but he has started to say up!

we love him!

j is 15 months!

another joseph update? sure thing:

he has popped yet another molar and grizzled non stop, then for good measure popped the tooth above it and the one next to it. 12 teeth now.

he is always happy in the morning and babbles away to me while i get him some breakfast

he listens to us and sometimes even does as we ask.

he loves to move around to music

his favourite song is "if you're happy and you know it" and when we start to sing, he automatically claps his hands

he loves to lay on the floor and put his head in my lap when i am sitting cross legged

he is always walking, never crawling

he has had to be supervised in the shower as everytime we leave the room for a second, he quickly runs out of the bathroom and we find him in the hall, the kitchen, the bedroom... what a monkey!

we love him and love to watch him grow!

14 months of goodness

another month, another shot of this delicious boy on the couch. it's now been 14 months since he joined our clan - and i can barely remember life before he came! he is growing so, so quickly and progressing like mad! as you know from my little video, he is off and walked, was a little hesitant and just took a few steps at a time, but within a week was trotting around all over the place - and now is a little speedster.

while we were away in tasmania, he spent the day with mums friend annette and was apparently an angel. they went for a walk and saw some of the neighbours animals and decided to say dog (doh doh!) and has also finally said dad! 

he claps his hands to music and babbles away to us, although he doesn't use many recognisable words, he certainly is trying to tell us something!

he also got another tooth, a big one, which took a very long time and made him quite unhappy. that brings us to 9 now! teething certainly is not his forte, which is a not so happy change from madeline, she seemed to not have any issues at all as her teeth arrived. 

he loves tank and buddy from dinosaur train and always selects them from his toy line-up in his room. it's so fun to see his eyes light up when he sees something he likes, it makes me so happy when he is happy too!

i can hardly believe it when i look at him, but he is a real little boy! no baby here anymore. :(

"baby" j is 13 months

he is getting so big! 13 months old now and still sweet and smiling away. he had his first hair cut this month (he was rocking a little bit of a mullet beforehand...) by my lovely mum and now looks more like a little boy than a baby...

he loves to eat and polishes off more spaghetti than madeline can without batting an eyelid. must be the samoan in him. he has mastered yes and no even though he isn't talking and furiously nods his heads in response to a lot of questions he is asked and has recently started shaking it as well. doug likes to sit with him and say, "yesssss, nooooo" and watch him. little cutie. 

for entertainment value, this is the little toy pram that maddie pushed him around in as a baby... he just fit when he was small - and look at him now! our big little boy.

at the beginning of this month, he started letting go of the furniture and standing on his own for a few seconds, and now is standing more and more on his own, i am positive he is just days away from walking!

(having a snooze at church)

he loves to bang things and clap hands, making noise is obviously a forte for this one. i am sure music will be in his future. he's also added to his one word vocabulary, and now says hey! as well as mum. (we'll keep working on that...)

he loves to be tickled and giggles away with his hearty little giggle whilst squirming and pushing us... clearly enjoying himself. also... his hair is still blonde, but starting to get a little orange tinge underneath. soooo adorable. he'll have the girls lined up around the block in no time at all.

we love him! ♥

joseph is one!

this bright eyed, smiley, gorgeous boy turned one today! how blessed we are to be his parents. every single day. he is still saying just one word, mama (fine by me!) but not even on command, just when he wants to, but he is learning and and growing every day. 

i am so in love with his sweet little face and just want to plant kisses on it all day long... i mean seriously, look at those cheeks! and that dimple... he is just so, so cute, i adore seeing his face light up when he catches sight of us and then his little noises as he tries to gabble away to us. we are hoping we get some more words out of him soon, but he definitely knows what's going on. he listens, then acts when we speak to him - and even follows little requests. :)

he is walking around holding the furniture and i am sure before too long, he will take his first steps... he's even taken a couple of quick steps behind madeline's doll pram, before he put too much weight on the edge and down he went... he also had a go pushing a stool along the ground the day as he walked along. he loves to make growling noises while he plays or sits with us, then giggles when we laugh or talk to him. sometimes changin his nappy is a little dramatic, but we have discovered recently that a small bear we have that chants to haka is a welcome distraction. he absolutely loves and babbles away at it as it chants. in fact, if i don't press the bears tummy quickly enough, he will start to grab for it and start yelling at it, waiting for the haka to begin. what a crack up. 

he also loves melon and stone fruit and would gladly eat nothing but. i am going through a lot of napisan, as he's been quite successful in covering himself in the juice as he munches away. and banana bread! i let him have a taste of mine one day and had the whole piece whipped out of my hand, and gobbled up. i think we can safely assume he's into bananas - as he can eat a whole one of those in a sitting too, as well as many sultanas as you're willing to give him.

we got him some sweet little gifts for his birthday, including these adorable sunglasses and some toy dinosaurs... and with some of the money doug's parents sent, we bought him his first pair of proper baby chucks which i can't wait to put him in. oh how i love sweet baby clothes. what a sweet boy he is. i am so glad we were blessed to have him join our family, he's just darling. can't wait to celebrate many more birthdays with him.

i couldn't resist showing off this picture... it's almost as if he knew last night that tomorrow was special and gave me this big cheesy picture opportunity when i put him in bed. it made me so sad knowing that he wouldn't be my "baby" any more, but i'll still love him just as much, maybe even more. ♥

eleven months old

it's that time of the month again, master joseph is another month older and growing up faster than i can comprehend.

this month, the young man finally started sleeping all the way through the night, without his top up. thank goodness for that! i was beginning to think it would never happen. i took him down from 10pm half an hour at a time over a few weeks and finally - we are here. yay! i also managed to cut out his afternoon feed... so we are making good progress! just first thing in the morning, before his morning nap and night time now. win.

he loves to smile and laugh with his daddy and also laughs non stop when madeline is around, let's hope their friendship continues once they are older.

he is crawling non stop, fast as anything - mostly in hot pursuit of his mama and standing up holding on to things whenever he has a chance. not on his own just yet, but we are definitely getting there. when he has his bath now, it's mission impossible to have him sit, he just wants to stand and grab anything in his line of sight.

doug started shaking his head side to side when joseph was watching him and now he copies and does the same thing. it is so funny, he grooves away in the car too, kicking his feet and moving away to the beat. what a little dude.

i love his smile and those dimples of his. he really is so adorable. he makes me want 10 kids, but we all know that isn't happening! haha. maybe another 2 at most.

he likes most things we feed him and loves to make a mess with his food - madeline was not nearly as messy... he looks like this after most meals. but definitely is happy when he has food in front of him. his favourite foods are sultanas, grapes and corn cakes. grumpy baby? sprinkle some sultanas on his high chair tray. fixed.

i love sunday dressups... we are always very careful to take photographs of both the kids in their sunday clothes to send to doug's parents, so i have them looking their best. it's so funny, i always thought that girls would be way more fun to dress up, but i am loving coming up with funky outfits for baby j as well. mix and match and see what i can come up with.

can't wait to see what next month brings, our baby joseph makes our whole family happy, because he is a little ray of sunshine!