Toddling around

Early morning with a bump on
his nose from when he fell
while trying to walk 

He's a toddler! Raghav is 15 months now and is well on his way to becoming a fiercely independent toddler who wants to do everything himself.

Eating
He eats only by himself now, even managing to use a spoon (somewhat). The most difficult thing to feed him is cous-cous, when he wants to eat it himself and it's just impossible for him to hold it in his hands. But he tries!

I usually give him some food on a plate, and have a bowl of the same food with me so that I can continue feeding him while he tries to feed himself simultaneously. But it's on very rare days that I get a couple of spoonfuls of food into his mouth. He usually catches on very quickly that his food is just a buffer, and the real thing is in my hands, and grabs the spoon away from me. No matter how many new spoons I get to feed him, they all end up with him, and soon enough on the floor.

He also takes the bowl away from me and then starts dumping his food from the plate to the bowl and then finally from his highchair table to the floor. He keeps experimenting with textures and the concept of putting in and taking out.

I get very angry when he throws food on the ground, sometimes for experimental purposes but mostly when he doesn't want it any more. I try to tell him he shouldn't do that and that mamma will get angry if he does, but he then looks to see if I'm looking and then when he sees that I'm looking drops the food on the floor.

He's also becoming very picky about his food. If he sees a new-looking product, he sticks his tongue out and tastes it. Only if it meets his approval does he proceed to eat it. There are times when just sees something coming towards his mouth and shakes his head to a "no" when he doesn't want it. Sometimes he just spends all his mealtimes playing with his food, and shakes his head vigorously when you try to put something in his mouth. But those are usually times when he's getting sick.

It's when he doesn't want to eat any more that his games start. He starts picking up the food and feeding us. He does the scooping and dumping, and finally starts quietly dropping it off to the floor.

I'll show you how it's done, daddy

Sometimes he's so involved in exploring or practicing his cruising, that he doesn't eat on the highchair, but is more amiable to it when I give him while he's exploring or practicing his cruising.

He still continues to put a big chunk of banana in his mouth, but has started taking smaller bites from a bun.
He also knows which one the snack cupboard is, and when Nalin gets back from work and opens the cupboard to take out something for himself, Raghav makes says a string of baby words spoken in such a manner that it appears he's scolding Nalin for not getting something for him, too. These are usually followed by agitated hand gestures, too. But he's happy when you give him his own biscuit and doesn't mostly insist on having exactly what we're having.

New-found independence
Since the last week, Raghav has even stopped lying down on the changing table for a change of diaper. So one has to literally run after him to change it. I have had to learn to clean his poop while he's standing and exploring the net bag that his hung on the wall behind his changing table. But he is cooperative in a bugged sort of way. He does keep offering his hand or leg when I demand it to put on a t-shirt or a sock. He mostly does it so that the whole thing is over and done with as quickly as possible and he can go back to exploring without mamma running behind him with a sock in hand.

Although he loves going for walks, he refuses to sit in the pram. He stiffens his body or just stands on the pram, refusing to be made to sit in it or be strapped in. Perhaps he wants to crawl all the way to the supermarket.

I usually have to give him a rice cake or a biscuit to keep him occupied till I strap him in. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

Sometimes it works better if I take him outside and then put him down. But that too mostly depends on his mood at the time.

But once we're out, he just seems like in a trance. If he was having his biscuit/rice cake before getting out of the house, that too lies uneaten his hand. I have to check often if he hasn't gone off to sleep, but he never does. He just becomes very still and just gets busy taking in the world around him.

Even on the tram he's become very patient most of the time. Maybe it's because he suddenly finds more things to notice now. It's only when the tram stops that he makes a bit of a noise.

Sometimes he also waves his hand and says "bye" to everyone who's getting off.

Yet when you ask him to say "bye" at the end of a skype conversation, he gets shy and will often just say it quietly, or even sometime after the call has ended.

Meanwile, he's a perfect showoff on Skype. He understands that he's talking to someone as opposed to a TV which he doesn't try to interact with. He also knows when that someone is talking directly to him (because he smiles every time he's addressed, even though his name might not directly be taken).