Having a toddler

Means that we can no longer rely on him to always sit like this,


because 5 minutes later he is doing this:


In a blink of an eye, we go from this:


to this little daredevil (I stood by him the entire time, but he pulled the seat back down and climbed onto it all by himself.)

12 month stats

Luke had his 12 month appt yesterday and did really well. The shots weren't fun, but he bounced back pretty quickly.

He weighed 25 lbs (clothed) - 79%
He is 30.5" tall (72%)
His head is 49cm (97%!) - He's always had a big noggin' :)

We also found out that his left ear is still infected, so onto antibiotic #2 for this one. Luckily our ENT appt is on Tuesday!

They were impressed with his sippy cup abilities, and now it's time to move from formula to milk. He also should be on table food all the time. We're struggling with that, but seeing as he's been sick almost constantly in some form or another since December, she wasn't surprised that it's hit or miss. We'll keep working on it!

Birthday party!

Luke had a great birthday party on Saturday! We are so blessed to have such wonderful friends and family. The party was pretty low key, but I think a great time was had by all.

We had a Sesame Street Beginnings themed party. It started with an adorable invitation with his picture on it, and then we had sesame street items and primary colors at the party. I think my favorite parts were the cookie monster cupcakes I made, and also the "growth" banner. I made it out of the monthly pictures that we took of Luke with his bear. (If you click on this picture (and then again if you want) you can see it bigger.)


Mommy and the birthday boy


Daddy and Luke looking at a book


Luke wasn't entirely sure what to expect.


Cake time wasn't what we expected at all. In the past, Luke has been known to lick icing off of the table. We thought for sure that he would love his cake. The look he had in this picture should have tipped us off.


Get this stuff away from me!


After we calmed down from the evil cake, it was time for presents! He got so many amazing things - some V-tech toys, a "future hoosier" sippy cup (go IU!), some books, personalized family magnets, a snack bowl that never spills, car keys (for his future Nissan), college savings money, a ball pit, a wagon, and an anywhere chair. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that his favorite were the balls. They are awesome to throw and all day long he's been yelling "ba! ba!"


A wagon full of balls? Woah!




I'm pretty sure this chair is not only going to be a good place to watch Signing Time and to read - but also to climb on and jump off.


Thanks everyone for a great birthday!!

1st birthday celebration!

We'll do this as a post per day, because we've had such a great birthday weekend!

Friday morning unfortunately started out with a return trip to the pediatrician for an ear recheck. Luckily those are looking better - his crankiness is due to the molars that are coming. He didn't let it completely affect his weekend though.

Then we went to lunch at McCallisters Deli - yum!


Next we went to a preview class at Gymboree - Luke had SO much fun! It's a place that's like a big gym for little kids. It's semi structured playtime.





His favorite part was pushing this roll thing. He had a hard time keeping up with it, but kept on going! At the end when everyone else was done, he kept pushing it, backing the teacher into the wall. (We stopped the taping too soon to see that though!)


After Gymboree, there was a quick nap in the car and then on to our other big event of the day - first haircut! He doesn't have tons of hair, but what he had was getting long - especially over the ears. We took him to Cookie Cutters, where he got to sit in at train. He did such a great job!



The best part was the balloon he got at the end of it.


Then it was time to go home and have another nap - such a worn out little 1 year old!


After naptime, he had a breadstick and his first bite of pizza (which he chewed for a little bit - and then spit out.)



Then we did our presents and he had a cupcake. No pictures of that, although it should have been a warning as to how he would respond to the cake at his party. Pictures of that later ... :)


What a great day!

Happy birthday Luke!

How are we to this day already? It seems like just yesterday that we met our little bundle of joy and now he's becoming a toddler. We had no idea just how much he would change our lives and how much joy we would experience this year. It has been, in a word, amazing. It obviously hasn't all been super easy (hello, 5 ear infections and 2 dislocated elbows!) but we wouldn't change any of it for the world.

On to what our little man is doing now!

His year checkup isn't until next Tuesday, but weighed at home this morning he was 24lbs, 3oz. I'm not sure how tall he is at all.

He has a whopping 9 (yes, 9) teeth and is working on at least 1 of the other molars right now.

He's still sleeping great at night - goes down easily and unless he's sick - doesn't wake up until morning (about 11 1/2 hours.) Napping is a completely different story and is a struggle every day - especially days at school. He is just go-go-go and doesn't want to miss any of the action.

He eats a mixture of table food and purees, depending on his mood for the day. One day he ate half of a chicken sandwich at school. A few days later he threw one on the ground. Such a little turkey. We can pretty much always count on yogurt or yogurt melts though.

For the past 2 weeks he's been completely off the bottle! Still just formula, but all out of the sippy cup at breakfast, snack time, lunch, snack time, and dinner. We weren't really planning on it - it just sort of happened. We thought we'd try dropping the morning bottle and just doing a sippy with breakfast. That went so well that we did it the rest of the day and haven't looked back! Once he gets off of his current antibiotic (5th ear infection) then we're going to try some whole milk.

Speaking of ear infections - we have an appointment with an ENT in a little over a week to talk about tubes. I just feel so bad for the little guy!

Things he loves to do right now:
Clap - especially when he realized he's getting something he wants (yogurt melts, a sippy cup, signing time dvd)

Wave at people and sign milk - it can get very confusing as waving and signing milk look similar. When I get him in the morning is he waving at me? Or telling me he wants breakfast? (Probably both!)

He loves anything with buttons - remote control, Xbox controller, buttons on the tv, mommy's cell phone (he has so far made successful calls to grandma, Uncle Pat, and daddy)

He loves music - banging on his toy piano, banging on the real piano, beating anything like a drum ... Sometimes, but not always - when he hears music he'll start to bounce up and down like he's dancing.

He is crawling the "right" way now - up on his hands and knees. He cruises along furniture like a pro, and will take some steps if we're holding his hands.

He babbles all the time - says mama and dada and I think tried to say ball the other day while watching Signing Time (ba!) Otherwise it's a lot of babbles and yells. Sometimes he'll have little conversations - changing tone and inflection - just like he knows what he's saying.

We wanted to write a letter to Luke each year on his birthday. The official one will be in his baby book, but I thought what we started was pretty funny. See if you can tell where I stopped and Jason took over. :)

Luke,
Happy birthday sweet baby boy! This past year has been the most amazing year of our lives and we love you so much!

Daddy wants you to know that he loves you and will always be your best friend. He can't wait for you to get a little older so you can hang out with him in the garage and work on the cars (Nissan's only!). Make sure you are always a good boy and while you will most likely always be the center of attention anywhere you go, don't get to cocky. You'll never be funnier, smarter, better or better looking than daddy.

Love you buddy,
Daddy and Mommy

The transition room boys

There are 3 boys in Luke's room at school and this morning they all got there first. Jackson, Josh, and Luke decided to hold a little pre-breakfast meeting.

What a difference a year makes ...

My 30th birthday dinner (5 days before Luke was born)


My 31st birthday dinner:

Tortured Artist

Luke and I worked on some Valentine's today for his friends at school. I cut out the red hearts and he painted them. It went surprisingly well!





And then he decided he wanted to taste the paint.


Which led to our little tortured artist.

Babies Don't Keep

Luke was having a particularly clingy day this past Friday and I found myself getting frustrated. I had things to do - clean the house, laundry, taxes, birthday party prep, some work for work, etc. I happened to log in to facebook that afternoon and saw that a friend had posted this poem. Needless to say, I quit worrying about what I needed to get done and enjoyed the time with my little boy.

Mother, O Mother, come shake out your cloth,
Empty the dustpan, poison the moth,
Hang out the washing, make up the bed,
Sew on a button and butter the bread.

Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?
She's up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.

Oh, I've grown as shiftless as Little Boy Blue,
Lullabye, rockabye, lullabye loo.
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
Pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo

The shopping's not done and there's nothing for stew
And out in the yard there's a hullabaloo
But I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo
Look! Aren't his eyes the most wonderful hue?
Lullabye, rockaby lullabye loo.

The cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow
But children grow up as I've learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down cobwebs; Dust go to sleep!
I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep.