What's the Haps? (Part 1)

So before I did a drive-by post about death and loss, there wasn't a whole lot to really tell about life going on in the ATX. That's not totally true and I'm sure if I tried really hard, I could pull out some interesting tidbits to share. So working from July 2009 until now, here's how I think everything was going down.

July 2009 -

• Ben turned 18 months on the 28th. He had been walking for about 4 months and was getting really good at it. I mean really good. And fast! Why is it that all toddlers are born with some Houdini-like disappearing ability? I needed some kind of sixth sense and super agility training just to make sure he wasn't dashing into six lanes of raging traffic or the open jaws of a rabid Rottweiler.

• Ben started to use his words. Lots of words. This was such an exciting milestone for me! I was really becoming tired of the grunting and pointing and throwing things because of his terrible frustration that I just wasn't getting it and, "WOMAN, ARE YOU DEAF OR JUST FROM ANOTHER COUNTRY WHICH WOULD EXPLAIN WHY YOU CAN'T UNDERSTAND ME!?!?!" Except...the words he was speaking with this new confidence sounding exactly like the words I was speaking - only to him. I was still just a dumb, deaf, foreigner and we were back to grunts, points, and throwing.
  

• My husband turned 32 on July 31st. He's old. I remind him daily.

August 2009 -

• Ben turned 19 months on August 28th. He was still grunting and pointing. I was beginning to decipher his words a little it better and then one day, like magic, he said, "Mommy, may I have a sippy cup with milk, please, if you would be so kind." I couldn't believe it! Not only was my child speaking in full, comprehensible sentences, he had also developed an English accent and sounded, quite surprisingly, like Colin Firth (okay, not really. That was a dream I had one night and yes, I, too, am creeped out that a grown man, nearing 50, would call a strange woman "Mommy.")

• Ben started a twice-a-week Mother's Day Out program. I'm only mildly embarrassed to admit that Tuesdays and Thursdays can't get here fast enough sometimes.
  

Stay tuned for "What's the Haps? (Part 1) - September & October or How I've Learned To Accept That Sometimes All The Love a Toddler Can Give Is The Swift Pitch of A Block To Your Head"