Another nice weekend. Last week we did the aquarium on Saturday and the local Botanic Gardens on Sunday. This week a bit quieter, but that's what I need.  

Had some progress last Sunday on the "hand holding" front.   Eli worked out that holding my hand allowed him to walk down steps in the park without having to go down backwards or on his bottom.   Still can't get him to hold hands walking along a path though - he seems to think he's being grabbed and protests violently.

He is growing and learning so fast now.  Every word we say he understands.

"Shall we go in the car? It's time to go!"
"Out door!" he shouts as he runs to the front door.

Or this morning, I asked him where Daddy was and told him Daddy needed to get him dressed to go out, he immediately ran through the living room calling for "Dada!"

His book obsession continues, although it's slowed down from the 20 books per day we were having a couple of weeks back.   He now often stops after four or five!   He also now sits quietly looking at pictures and reading to himself, which is adorable.  I guess he's always done that a bit - his good ole reading in the car as a 4 month old!  But much more seriously now.  

Perhaps as a result of all of his recent development - new words, new activities, lots of fun - he is particularly clingy to me at times now.  Not always, he's more than happy to be dropped at Reggio Emilia for the day, and loves to play in the yard.  But he is convinced the only way to sleep at night is next to me.   Quite frankly I don't mind, it's cold and he's a great snuggle buddy!   It's been over a week now.  And when we ask if he's ready for bed he's running to our bed not his.   Even if we insist on him having his bottle in his cot, he will only stay there as long as we're next to him, and as soon as he finishes gets out and runs to our bed - even if he's half asleep.   So we'll see how long that goes on for.   He has been teething off and on, it may be he just wants us nearby for reassurance.  It's certainly easier to resettle him quickly in the night without having to get out of bed!  

In other news, this morning we had a gender scan to confirm, and it's definitely 100% a little sister on her way to join us.   Scary!  I will write my thoughts on that in a separate post.