eleven months today

Hello World!



Today I turned 11 months old. Mom can’t believe it. She says we’re just one month away from the Celebration of the Century. I have no idea what she’s talking about, but I think I plan to be grumpy that day.

I’m not sure how much I weigh right now since I haven’t been weighed in a while. Last time I weighed 20 lbs. 9 oz., but Mom’s pretty sure I’m weighing more than that now. I’m heavy! I’m getting so big.

I’m too big for my blue chair.

And I'm too big for my swing.

But for some reason Mom keeps putting me in them anyway. Something about I don’t nap and she needs five freakin’ seconds to get some stuff done yadda, yadda, yadda. I don’t really know.

I’ve really come a long way in the last month or so. I’m sitting up really well, although I’m still toppling over when I lean to reach for things that are to the side.

Mom says I may or may not have fallen over as soon as she snapped this picture. And she may or may not have let me fall on my head. She couldn’t rightly say.

She wishes that were the excuse for my hair looking like this…

… but it’s not true. My hair always looks like this, especially in the mornings. I have a double crown in the back and it sure does make my hair do some crazy stuff. And Mom wants to keep it long so it will grow over my bald spots in the back, but it sure is wacky back there. Mom says it’s good that we get bath and dressing change done first thing. It’s still pretty crazy after nap, but not quite as wild.

I’m teething like crazy.

I have two teeth on the top (my second one has just started coming in – VERY crooked) and four on the bottom. You know my Mommy’s busy and distracted because Daddy had to point out my two new bottom ones yesterday, and they’re almost completely through!

Besides Mommy and Daddy, Deac is my best friend.

I think he is the greatest, and every time he pays attention to me or meets us at the top of the stairs I get so excited. I start flapping my arms and kicking my legs like crazy. And I just bust out laughing. Mommy thinks I’m really close to saying “Deac” because I consistently make a “ck” sound when he comes over. She’s always said that she’s pretty sure “Deac” will be my first word. We’ll see. I’m pretty good at proving her wrong.

My favorite shows are Jack’s Big Music Show and, much to Mom’s dismay, Yo Gabba Gabba. When Jack’s comes on and I hear the music, I start smiling so big. Lots of mornings I miss it since we do 7:30 dressing changes a lot so Mom says she might start DVRing it for me. Wow, my very own show on DVR. I’m getting so old.

I’m rolling over from back to tummy and tummy to back now.

I do it all day long. Mommy says she’s so happy I’m out of the “roll on my tummy and then scream about it” stage. I just roll all over the place these days.

I start out like this…

And five seconds later, I'm like this...

I’m really making all sorts of sounds these days, but they’re getting really hard to describe. I’m doing all my normal ma, ba, da, la stuff, but now I’m combining them and putting inflection in my voice. Mom thinks it’s just the cutest thing. I’m very vocal even though I’m not saying words yet. I still refuse to mimic sounds even though I know what the Big People want me to do. Instead, I just look at them like they’re crazy and do as I darn well please. If they want to sound like doofuses, that’s up to them, but don’t expect me to voluntarily repeat it. Who do they think I am?

When I get excited, I kick my legs and flap my arms and it looks like I’m trying to fly. You should see me when my Daddy comes home from work. I go crazy flapping and rocking , bouncing and kicking, and then I start crying until he changes out of his nice clothes and holds me. And Daddy doesn’t complain a bit about having to hold me first thing. Mommy says she knows he waits all day to hold me. It makes us both super happy.

Mom holds me for my morning bottle and nap at 9:15 so I can at least sleep for 45 minutes. If she doesn’t, I immediately wake up and then I am gruuuumpy. For my 12:45 bottle, she takes me up to my room and puts me in bed after I fall asleep. I sleep anywhere from 28 – 32 minutes, and then I’m all done. Sometimes I doze off with my 4:15 bottle, but not always. And if I do, Mom has to hold me again or I wake up and am ill as a hornet. Mom has to do a LOT of sitting around, something she’s not the greatest at. She knows one day she’ll be glad she did all that sitting, holding, and rocking.

But someday she says I’m going to have to learn not to rub my face and to put myself to sleep.

Whaaaat?

Please Mommy...

… that’s silly. You know I like to be held and rocked. AND you know I call the shots around here. Maybe when I move to a big boy bed, you can just come sleep with me. We’ll talk.

I am doing a much better job at sleeping at night though, and I’ll usually sleep three nights in a row and then have a rough night. Mommy thinks it’s funny that most babies start waking up when they are teething, and for me, that’s when I finally learned to sleep through the night… most nights anyway.

It’s been a big month for me, and I’ve changed a lot. Mom and Dad are so proud of me and how I just keep fighting every day. I’m a happy baby considering all the mess I have to go through, and Mom and Dad are so thankful for my fun personality and my resilient attitude. They say that are so excited to see the person I’m becoming. I’m pretty special, they say, and they love me more than they could ever put into words. And even though I can’t say it yet, I love them a lot too. We make each other very happy. Life is good.