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Tuesday, October 6, 2009

1 Year Old!!

I can't believe my little man is a year old. This last year has been more fun than I ever could have imagined! I know I'm a biased momma, but Brian and I have the best kid! He cracks us up everyday and somehow brings us more joy each day than the day before!

But how is it that just a year ago, my sweet baby boy looked like this??






New this month

He's not walking but he did officially take a step. I wouldn't call it a horribly intentional nor an extremely graceful one, (in fact it was more of a falling step) but his feet moved while his hands were not attached to anything, so it counts! He did it twice, but I missed the 1st time, so that doesn't count. Only the one witnessed by the momma counts!

I really thought he'd be walking by now, but he just likes to take his time. He's actually very cautious about some things. He's acting similar to when he was learning to sit down. He wouldn't let go of what he was holding onto until one hand was fully on the ground. Then he'd gradually start being a little more aggressive. With walking, he's slowly getting more brave with his cruising. He used to only transfer from one object to another as long as both hands could be touching something at the same time, but now he's lunging for the table or the couch. He's getting more confident in his standing too. He can stand and clap and wave without holding on. So I think it's just a short matter of time before he's running laps around me.

He's getting very good at waving hello & goodbye. Sometimes he'll only wave if we're waving too, but occasionally and more frequently he'll wave just when we say "Say hello."

He's starting to point at things that he wants. It's really handy at meal times when trying to figure out what he'd like more of. He won't sign at all, even though I've been doing sign language with him from virtually day one, but hopefully the pointing will lead to that.

He loves his cars and trains and balls. He will push and roll them around the floor for hours. He can push and crawl at the same time, but he'll also roll it away and then chase after it. And if you get down with your own car with him, he just gets ecstatic!

Austin loves bath time. Part of his favorite game is to see how far he can get into the bathroom before you can catch him. But mostly he just goes to the bathtub and bounces up and down, hoping that it's bathtime. And if you turn the water on, he goes nuts and splashes the water as it's coming out of the faucet. Bathtime used to be such a struggle because Austin wouldn't sit down for anything and would throw a fit if I tried to make him. So we did away with the blowup tub and he doesn't try to stand up nearly as much in the regular tub. He just crawls around like a madman. It's very cute to watch.

He's learned to throw things. It's more like a forceful drop, but it's very cute. Just tonight he was "helping" me sort socks, which amounted to taking them all off the table very forcefully and frantically chucking them on the floor. I think he could have done it for hours but I got tired of putting the socks back up on the table!

This was a rough sleep month. Austin added at least one nighttime feeding for several weeks. I think being pregnant affected how much milk I have, so we started Austin on whole milk for during meals and his last bottle of the day and it has made such a huge improvement. Naps are getting better too, but being sick, teething and being on the very of so many new milestones were making it difficult for him to settle down. Plus he likes to chuck his blanket and pacifier out of the crib and then complains that he can't sleep without them. :| He's getting close to losing them both. Oh but he thinks it freakin' hilarious to watch me crawl around on my hands and knees trying to find his binkie under his crib. It's really hard to be mad that he's not sleeping when he's laughing hysterically!

Austin loves to pretend to talk on the phone. Apparently he thinks just about everything is a phone though, which makes sense since our cell phones look vastly different from each other and from the house phone. So anytime there's a phone or a remote control or even a thumb drive around, he puts it up to his ear and starts talking into it. Then he holds it out as if the call if for us! Cutest thing ever!! Funny though that he doesn't actually like to talk on the phone when someone is trying to talk to him. He cringes away and usually doesn't say anything.

I must have the slowest teether ever! I could have sworn the reason he was so fussy a few months ago was because his top teeth were coming in. They have been moving steadily down but they're not through yet. So he still only has 2 teeth.

Peekaboo and chase are still his favorite games. I love that when you're chasing him he laughs so hard that has to put his head down while he crawls. And he loves it when we peek over the back of the couch.

We just started working on "So big" for his birthday and he's got it down most of the time. He's back to doing high fives and we're working on a fist-bump for Uncle Jemery.

He loves to find my belly button. If he's on our bed and I'm standing near him and ask "where's momma's belly button?" he'll lift my shirt and poke it! We're trying to teach him that the correct response to that is to go "hee hee" like the Pilsbury Dough Boy.

I can tell this month for the first time that he's really understanding a lot of what we say. He'll still do what he's not supposed to half the time, but you can tell he's thinking hard about it! Plus he's starting to recognize the names of a bunch of his toys - like the difference between the ball and the box. I love seeing the little wheels turning in his head as he figures this stuff out!


1 comment:

Karen, Scott, and Jared said...

Happy Birthday Austin! He's an amazing kid for sure! Love you guys. :-) Oh, and happy birthday Brian, too!