10 months

I remember the start of December 2008... thinking that with some friends coming to visit us and then the holidays, our baby would be here in the blink of an eye. I was wrong. It wasn't just a couple months that flew by, a whole year has passed in that blink.

We are so fortunate to have a happy, healthy, loving baby boy. Family and friends surrounding us. And to be celebrating a wonderful life this Christmas season. Our baby will be celebrating his first Christmas at 10 months old.

From the beginning, Van has been a curious sort. It has not lessened in later months. He's into EVERYTHING. One of his favorite pastimes is to stand up next to bookshelves and remove all the books. He's also taken to poking his head into the shelf to see what he can find in the verrrry back. Other than dust, I'm not sure what could be so interesting. While in my arms, if he sees something of interest, he twists and pokes his head around my shoulder to get a better look. And he's still a little ham for the ladies when we're out and about.

Other favorite things: reading (and flipping the pages himself, sometimes faster than I can read the words - no worries, I have most of the books memorized by now!), taking a bath, pulling himself into a standing position (then sitting, then standing, and repeating many, many times), hitting his open palm on chairs/daddy's head/the floor/etc while we say 'tap, tap, tap', and the christmas decorations (when someone is being a bit fussy, I like to take him over to the christmas tree and explain each of the ornaments and where they came from - he's amazed and pays such close attention!). He's also a mama's boy. It wont be like that forever, so I can't help but love it. Tim has his own niche with Van... when they play, he can get him to laugh with such crazy glee (yes, glee). Big hearty belly laughs that go on and on.

Watching daddy decorate the tree

Despite his interest, unless I take him to the tree, he leaves it alone. Our ornaments are happy about that.

This is such a huge exploratory time for Van, it's really fun to be part of his learning and discovery of the world around him.

We love you snuggle bug. Happy 10 month birthday!

Crawling II

I already mentioned that when we came home from Hawaii, Van was crawling. We scrambled to get some baby gates up (especially at the top of our hardwood stairs!). Here's a video to show our fast mover:



Our expert crawler. Van is so fun. With every change (big or small) and in every way, I am thankful.

Thanksgiving

Home for the holidays. Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Aloha Baby

Wanting to eat the sand

We've been in another world this past week. To go from cold, rainy Seattle to sunny, warm Maui... it felt like paradise, and was verrry tough to return home. At least we have the holidays to look forward to. I've also been thinking of making some soups lately, and we have some fun things happening over the next couple weeks. See, we don't need Maui. (bah! I am soooo missing Maui)

My favorite picture

Considering how much Van loves the bath, it was no surprise that he also loved a swimming pool. He's a water baby, just like his daddy. But while Tim and I took turns going in the ocean, we didn't get that adventurous with Van (he seemed content enough trying to eat the sand). The current seemed really strong, even for me to simply keep balance. Next trip, Van can dip his little toes in the salt water. As a matter of fact, Tim can't wait to teach Van how to boogie board. And he already has plans for the two of them to take surf lessons together. Guess we'll be going back in the future - yay!

Water baby

Poolside

Boogie-boarding daddy

As I mentioned before, Van started to crawl the day before we left. He became a crawling expert while we were there (thank goodness our hotel room was pretty baby friendly!), but has had to relearn his skills since returning home... slippery hardwood floors are much more difficult vs. plush carpet. It took him very little time to start motoring again. I'm so proud.

So much fun stuff to explore in Hawaii!

Lunch with our feet in the sand

Kaanapali beach

And... drum roll for this one... Van slept through the night IN HIS CRIB while on vacation. I don't know if he was so exhausted each day, loving the warm ocean air, or just preferred his rented super soft crib mattress, but he didn't have his usual 1am wake-up. I willed it so hard to continue once we returned home, and so far it's mostly worked! Fingers crossed that the little munchkin starts to love long nights of sleep, like I do (or did, back in the day, which I can barely remember these days).

We ate well, relaxed a lot and enjoyed our family. Thank you Maui!

Watch out! He's on the move.

Someone hit a major milestone the day before our trip to Maui! Here's a hint:

That's right peeps, Van is a crawler. When I first saw him pull a knee forward and reach for something, I was soooo overwhelmed and happy, I couldn't stop smiling. We were in our baby class on Tuesday, so I had to try really hard not to cry out and swing him into the air, peppering him with kisses!

I'm so excited for him to explore and get some satisfaction out of reaching things himself. He could get a little huffy at not having things within reach, although he became quite efficient at the 'roll and scoot back, push up to sitting and then turn' trick. It always put him in a new spot, unfortunately, not always the spot he wanted to be in. Luckily, he's still pretty easy going and was generally happy with whatever new objects were within his grasp.

Ready, set... go Van! Go!