My dear Caspian,

I can’t believe that you are turning 18 months old today. What a wonderful journey we’ve had so far. I can’t wait for all the adventures to come. You bring so much joy to our lives each and every day. You rival the Duracell Bunny when it comes to energy levels and you keep me constantly on my toes.

You wake up ready to go and start most days with a smile. It’s sometimes a little harder for mummy to display the same enthusiasm, when I, bleary-eyed, discover that the day has yet again begun as early as 5 am.

You love to climb – the trees in the garden, the benches in the park, the stairs in our house and Daddy when he’s on all fours doing the weeding outside.

I wish I had done more of these updates, as it’s easy to forget the little details. So I aim to do more monthly ones going forward. Hopefully you’ll have a chance to read them one day.

SLEEPING:

This week saw a big change. You’ve been sleeping in our bed ever since you outgrew your Snuzpod co-sleeper. Being a bit of boob monster it proved to be the best way for both of us to get sleep. It’s worked well up until now, but our bed is simply getting too small and you are getting too wriggly. There are only so many times I can get woken up by being kicked in the face, as cute as your feet might be.

So we moved your toddler bed mattress into the bedroom next to my side of the bed. You love it. Whether it’s sleeping on a mattress on the floor at nursery during nap time that’s made you used to it or just sensing that this is your own space, I don’t know, but luckily you’ve quite happily settled there. You sleep well during the evenings though towards morning  you still favour snuggling up with mummy. The last couple of nights you’ve been having night terrors and been waking up screaming several times.

I’ve had to get use to it though. I’ve loved having your little warm body next to me. To be able to easily comfort you during the dark night. You still wake for feeds now, but where I used to go back to sleep as soon as you had latched on, I now lie awake until you’ve finished feeding, so I can move you back to your own bed. It is a little more draining, but hopefully you’ll sleep through very soon.

I sense that our breastfeeding journey is slowly coming to an end, too. Where I was initially happy to get to six months, I was well aware of how much you loved it and therefore happily carried on. You still like your booby-milk, but you are definitely feeding less now that you’re eating so well. Though I’ll take your lead as to when is the right time to stop.

FOOD:

Except for cucumber, which I simply think you find boring, is there anything you won’t eat? It’s a delight to see you stuff anything from olives to spicy chili con carne in your mouth and often follow it with a big “Mmmm”. We wish you wouldn’t eat dirt in the garden though.

When you are full, you are full and will then proceed to throw the remains on the floor. It’s causing quite a mess sometimes. You’ve been better recently at simply pushing the plate onto the table when you are done rather than picking it apart and dumping it.

When I collect you up from nursery I always get told how well you’ve eaten, so this makes us very happy. Like me, you need your food and will get hangry if not fed, but I guess you need it to keep up that high level of energy.

WORDS:

I do my best to speak to you in Danish. I think you are doing really well for being bi-lingual and naturally understand both languages.

Here are your words so far:

When you figure out how to take advantage of his favourite word 😜 #daddy #dadistheword #mumstheword #mummy #firstword #fun #video #instragrammer #morning #scandimummy #blogger #mblogger #pblogger #myboy #toddler #toddlerofinstagram #goodstart #family #love #boy #talking #clevermummy #nailedit

A video posted by ScandiMummy (@scandimummy) on Aug 10, 2016 at 12:13am PDT

• Dada or Daddy was your first and still rank number one on the list of your favourites.
• Your utter fascination with buses has lead to “Bu” being shouted with great delight every time one passes us in the street. It’s spelt the same in Danish and English, but pronounced slightly differently. You’ve kind of chosen the middle ground and left out the S.
• Car was only recently discovered, but you say this with such enjoyment allowing it to really roll of your tongue.
• Same with ball which is not only a favourite word of yours, but also ranks high as a toy.
• Hi and hej are in there too, especially when you pretend to be on the phone (which still could be anything from a shoe to a shampoo bottle).
• You’ve nailed a couple of animal sounds too. Cats say Miav and sometimes Biav and doggies get greeted with Vov Vov, which is the Danish sounds (we think) they make.
• You’ll ask for mam when you are hungry, which again is Danish (baby) talk for food.
• And lastly there’s NO… I guess you hear it a fair bit, hmm, but you’ve not only started saying it, and you’ve clearly understood what it means too, as Daddy discovered the other day when he asked if you were ready to come out of the bath. You shook your head, said a loud NO and carried on splashing.

FAVOURITE THINGS:

• I recently found a red toy bus in one of our local charity shops. It was an instant hit.
• You don’t have a favourite cuddly toy as such, but like Wolfie and Pig very much. Both were gifts you received at birth. They do get thrown around a far bit as does the nursing cat, Nina, and her kittens from The Manhattan Toy Company.
• Shoes in general, your own, mummy’s, daddy’s and sometime I suspect you would pinch strangers’ if you had half a chance.
• You have a love/hate relationship with water. You love your baths and you have a whale of a time splashing in your little paddling pool in the garden. But when we visited the sea while in Denmark this summer, it still seemed a little too big for you and you didn’t want to go in.
• You used to love having your teeth brushed, but now you absolutely hate it. I actually have to hold you down in order to do it, though this does make you giggle as well.

Today we’re having a little party in your honour. I look forward to sharing the photos in the coming week.

Thank you for being a kind, funny, generous, energetic bundle of joy. I love you more than you’ll ever know my little birthday buddy.

With love,

Mor