11 months old

Good grief, Milo's 11 months old!  Well, two days ago to be exact.

- He's now an efficient crawler.  He still prefers sliding (I call him a cute little crocodile) on our hard wood floor, but once he hits carpet, he's good to go!

- He pulls himself up, and walks around all the furniture.

- He can go up our entire staircase (16 stairs) completely unassisted.

- He likes to wave 'hello', and practices while he's nursing.

- He has 5 beautiful teeth, and I love his smile more than anything.

- He likes to point quite often with his index finger, while muttering something really cute.

- He loves bath time!  

- He got his first mild diaper rash this month.  That's right, first!

- He often pulls this face (I call it his 'concentration face'; pictured below) while saying, "uhhhh."

- He's really fond of being outside.  And he also enjoyed tasting his first glob of dirt the other day...at least I hope it was just dirt...

- He's deathly afraid of the Target bathroom... The moment we walk in (which is often) he begins with the panic cry.  And then, if a toilet flushes, sink turns on, or hand dryer kicks on, all hell breaks loose!  It takes a solid 10 minutes to calm the poor frazzled fella after that.  It's so weird, sad, but really quite funny.  Hopefully he'll get over it soon, because I'm afraid our Target visits and potty stops will not be ending any time soon..

- He is really good at finding the most dangerous objects to play with.  His favorites are the 'choking hazard' type of things...

- I have to watch him always.  I basically only stop watching him if I have to blink or sneeze..

- He claps his hands, and is starting to understand sign language for 'food', 'more' and 'all done'.

- Speaking of food, he finally has a big appetite, and is significantly less picky!  He now enjoys: sweet potatos, parsnips, butternut squash (as long as it's mixed with something else), lentils, beans, mushroom soup, swiss chard, egg yolks, avocados, fish, blueberries and bananas!  He was grossed out at the applesauce I gave him yesterday though...silly boy!

- Oh, and night time sleeping is finally taking a turn for the better!!  He now only demands I feed him 2 times in the night, sometimes giving me a 5 or so hour stretch of sleep.  I'm finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel!  (Sadly he didn't decide this change on his own, I finally refused to go into his room between midnight and 4.  It was sad, but worth it.  I'm afraid I'm going to have to let him wail and wail at those other two times very soon.  Ugh...)

How can you not respond to the nighttime screaming from this beautiful face....?

We love our precious Milo, and can't believe he's having a birthday soon!