Growing and growing!

I have so much trouble finding time to blog. Very sorry!

Benny is growing and growing. We put four pairs of shoes in the giveaway bag this week and we need to go buy some more. He is definitely a little boy now and no longer a baby. I almost don't want him to grow up.

His favorite things this week are
- milk, milk, milk (he asks for "more milk" all day and we try to trick him into drinking water, but he sometimes won't have it)
- lemon-lime Gatorade (my least favorite flavor). He can spot the neon yellow concoction in a glass or water bottle from a distance (in the kitchen or on my bike) and begs for it.
- taking long, meandering walks in the open space behind our condo. On one walk, he tried to push me into the ditch several times, kept pointing to it and saying Ba. I finally realized that Tim must have found some golf balls in the ditch on one of their walks and Ben wanted me to find some more. His memory is amazing.

His least favorite things this week are loudly flushing toilets in public restrooms, and lawn mowers.

He has joined the American consumer culture: He has fallen in love with Thomas the Tank Engine and holds onto his little Thomas 24 hours a day (yes, he sleeps with a little hard, plastic toy), and begs to be read his three Thomas books over and over.

He is already watching too much TV and we need to work harder at limiting him. He begs for it, though, and will bring the remote to us in the kitchen or bathroom to indicate he wants it turned on. He will also ask us to change the channel if it isn't on a cartoon channel. The show Wipe Out has huge balls that people try to jump across and of course Benny likes to watch that.

He jabbers nonstop, and quite loudly sometimes. When he sees the alphabet or numbers on a page of a book, he imitates my reciting of the alphabet by pointing to them and saying "E, E, E, E, E..." He can now say Go, but I'm not sure he knows what it means, he can almost say Cat, and he has full use of the words Mom and Mama now, and definitely knows what it means. He can still say Da for daddy when I ask him, but doesn't call out to Tim like he does to me.

He uses his special hand signal for "I love you" (fingers crossed) and will now do it spontaneously without our doing it first, which is just so sweet. He did it to Rebecca yesterday! He has personalized the All Done sign into the cutest funky chicken movement - we'll have to get video of it.

When he sees a monkey of any kind (photograph or cartoonish), he says "ooh ooh ooh" and he will sometimes say "moo" when he sees a cow.

He loves to push his stroller and grocery carts and gets so furious if we try to help (steer). He screams "No!" at us and waves us away.

I never imagined a little boy could be so sweet and entertaining and fun!!