some attention for the baby

Sometimes I think Ben gets a little overshadowed on here because there is so much going on with Josh.  He deserves a little time in the blog lime light, though there is no missing his presence if you know him in real life.

I think he will be one of those goofy class clown kids one day.  He loves being the center of attention.  We can't help but laugh at all his drama, though he doesn't mean to be funny yet.  I took a remote away from him (he is OBSESSED with remotes) and he first flopped his head down on the couch, let out a body shaking sob, then limply fell to the floor and let out a long whine.  He also has this little eye squinting and nose crinkling thing that he does when he wants to make a funny face.

Ben is really starting to show a lot of intelligence.  We ask him what he wants and he will crawl to the fridge or pantry depending on if he wants to eat or drink.  He will get his milk cup and throw it at you if you're not quick enough.  We've heard three new words lately.  "Uh oh" "Go" and "Yeah."  That last one I'm not really sure about, but when we ask if he wants to be picked up it sure sounds at times that he's saying "yeah" to us.

When he was saying "Go" at school the other day (in response to my 'ready... set...' for pushing him on the swing) I told Josh's teacher about how I wasn't as worried about Ben having autism because he is doing so much more than Josh did at this age.  She asked if it actually may be in part to us demanding more of Ben than we did with Josh.

That really got me thinking, and she is totally right.  We ask Ben to tell us what he wants.  As a new parent, I never expected Josh to 'talk' to me as a one year old.  We of course talked to him all the time, but we didn't demand responses of him like we do with Ben.  Siblings do have higher odds of being diagnosed with ASD, but I really don't see the delays in Ben that I did with Josh.

One that that Ben is doing right now that confuses the heck out of me is that he is super weird about foods.  When he gets any food, he immediatly grabs a fistful (always left hand) and will scream for more food, even when he has a handful.  He also shoves food down the side of his highchair.  He's still hungry and demanding more food, even when hording the other stuff.  I just don't get it.  I've had to start only giving him one little thing at a time and at times literally forcing his other hand up to his face so that he realizes that he does indeed have food, he just needs to open up his fist and eat it.  So weird.  Because Ben isn't a fat baby like Josh was, I'm worried that he isn't eating enough.  He has been wearing the same size clothes for more than five months.  His next doctors appointment isn't until the end of March, so I'll be waiting to see what his growth looks like.  If the trend is going down, we might have to re-evaluate Ben's diet.

Josh may have had other issues, but at least I never had to worry if the kid was healthy.  I'm sure Ben is doing just fine, but I can't help but think that because he doesn't have four sets of fat rolls going down his arms that something must be wrong.