Monthly Newsletter: Month Eleven

Dear Caleb,

You are now almost a year old… you are eleven months old today.

Already when I look at you, you look like a little boy to me instead of a baby.

Everyday you seem to be discovering new skills that are taking you father away from babyhood and into toddler land. I don’t know if I’m ready for this yet. This is our last month together before I go back to work. I know you’ll do great without me… but I don’t think I’m ready to let you go yet.

You love to stand up now. Sometimes you are even brace enough to let go of things and stand freely for a few seconds. You also love to cruise along furniture- you can move yourself around the bathroom without once getting down to crawl. And you love to walk around holding our hands. Sometimes you even try to run (especially if you are trying to chase ducks in the park). But you are still quickest at crawling – and you are super fast. I know that if you hear the sound of the dishwasher or the dryer door opening, I have about 2.4 seconds to finish up my chores before you have crawled over and are grabbing hold of my leg to stand up beside me and help.

You are such a big help to daddy and I. You have also figured out how to remove all the child safety locks off the cabinets and empty out the contents, how to clear off a shelf in five seconds, how to grab the mouse off the desk and click it until you start downloading webpages, and how to pull all the plastic containers and small appliances out of the kitchen cupboards.

This month you have also developed real taste preferences, and definately have favorite foods – cheese, kiwi, bananas, veggy booty… and not so favorite foods -baby cereals, bland flavors, lumpy textures… to which you will shake your head “no” to.

You are very good at shaking your head. Anytime someone says NO to you or you are caught doing something you shouldn’t be – you shake your head NO. You have also learned some sign language – you can sign “more”, “banana” and a combination of eat drink and water. You understand when we sign to you, and get very excited when we sign “bath” or “banana”. You even yell NANANA! (Did I mention you really like bananas right now?) I’m still waiting for you to start signing “milk” – it’s a sign I’ve shown you at least a thousand times… yet banana I did three times before you started trying to sign it!

Speaking of milk, we introduced cows milk to you… and you are drinking it out of a bottle!! You seemed to have forgotten your inate hatred of the plastic nipples and will now happily suck away. You only take a few ounces at a time, but it’s a great start. You also love to drink water out of your sippy cups. YAY!

Another wonderful change in you has been your sleep. You now sleep through the night most nights. If you wake up, and we have to go to you, it’s usually because you have gotten yourself wedged inthe corner of your crib, or you are stuck in some ackward sitting position. It usually only takes a few minutes to settle you back down to sleep – and you are able to do this without boob! This is such an incredible difference compared to the 4 plus night wakings – each time needing me to boob you back to sleep- we had going on a few months ago. I’m so proud that we have managed to get to this point together. I also think it’s adorabley cute that you like to sleep on your tummy with your bum in the air!

You also nap better- and without my having to hold you the whole time. You are starting to move to one nap a day – right int he middle of the day. I still have to give you cuddles, but once you are asleep you’ll go down in your crib and stay asleep for hours. One day last week you slept for four hours – I called your dad worried that you were never going to wake up!

We celebrated your first Easter this last month. You had so much fun with the egg hunt, and you were a very cooperative little bunny.

We also did a family first – we climbed up Mount Doug with you in the Kelty carrier backpack. You loved it – you fell asleep half way up the moutain!

I’m so sad, that I have to leave you and all the fun we’ve had this year… the playdates, walks, trips to the park, swimming, movies, shopping, baby games classes, mother goose classes, babytalk groups… it’s going to be hard to cram all that fun stuff intot he weekends – especially since I’ll have to share that time with daddy too. But I promise that I’m going to try to make this last month of Caleb and mommy time the very best it can be!

I love you baby… little boy!

Love always,
Mommy
XO XO XO