Ari will be 17 months next week. He still isn't talking much, around a handful of recognisable words. Also, he isn't eager to please, unlike the sister at the same age. So, he does not always respond correctly. I realised during the trip to India that he understands English better than my broken Malayalam, so have shifted to the former completely. In any case, Malayalam was becoming difficult for me as the level of conversation increased.
His understanding and cognitive skills seem alright for his age. I thought this would be difficult to gauge until he began to speak, as he wasn't even responding to simple instructions at 1 yr. However lately, he has being doing much better on that front. When I tell him it is time to go out, he goes to the door and gets his shoes, then points to the basket where we keep house keys and says 'key'.
Today, he came out of the bathroom while brushing his teeth. I think he may have gagged a bit on the toothbrush because he brought up some milk which fell on the carpet. I took the toothbrush away from him and went to get some tissue to clean up the carpet. When I got back he was returning from the bathroom with a roll of tissue in his hand. I was impressed that even though I hadn't said a word, he had understood the problem, thought of a solution, and gone to fetch the resource, completely independently.
He is very mobile. I hardly ever catch him sitting down. He is always trying to reach the highest place possible, the dining table, the chest of drawers and in the process having several falls.
The vacuum cleaner brush is his favorite plaything and when we are downstairs he is always heading for the cupboard under the stairs to get the brush out.
One morning i could not find my mobile phone when I was leaving for school, so I rang the number from the landline. The mobile was ringing in the bedroom, somewhere near the bed but even though it was sounding very close by I could not locate it. I told Rohan it may be under the bed but we could not find it even after moving the heavy divan bed. Suddenly Rohan opened up a tub of aqueous cream lying at the head of the bed and there was my mobile phone submerged and covered in cream! It has stopped working properly since.
If the bathroom door is left open he goes straight for the loo roll or the toilet bowl. I have lost count of the number of items I have had to retrieve from the toilet bowl (to be binned for sure)!
His way to get things he wants is to grunt and point. He can lead us from bedroom upstairs to the kitchen downstairs to the fridge or cupboard that he wants until we reach the thing he desires. So words are not holding him back.
Brother and sister get along fabulously and love each other tremendously, a real blessing.
That's it for now. Hopefully I make sure to note significant developments and milestones in future as they happen.
Oh, teething only began at 13.5 months and he has 4 teeth to date. He does not seem too troubled when they erupt.
