17 Months-Independence

I'm sure this is the story of our life for the rest of our life but I have really seen James start to become more and more independent this month. He started being able to go up and down the stairs without me fearing for his life so we took down the gate at the bottom of the stairs. Just recently he has decided that he can go upstairs to play in the playroom whenever he wants or just to go up there and get something he knows is up there. I'm not really sure how I feel about this.

As gross as this may sound James is starting to have control over his bladder. He especially likes to make himself pee when he is in the tub and he can watch it!

He now has the urge to climb on (or at least try) anything and everything he can. He can climb into his rocking chair in his room all by himself. Whenever I leave him by himself for a second I come back and he has found some kind of box and turned it into a stool and is on top of it...normally at this point just for the sake of being on top of it. It won't be long and he will be getting into things or crawling on the counters.

That's all I can think of for now...