Fourteen Months Old

This past month you have turned into more of a person, stepping even further away from babyhood, and showing us your developing personality. You make you wants known and express your displeasure when things don't go your own way. Often this results in you stamping your feet before flinging yourself prostrate onto the floor.

You notice now when we all laugh at something and you join in by screwing up your face and making a very loud fake laugh. If you do something that causes us to laugh you will continue to do it, testing out your newly developed sense of cause and effect.

Your newest loves:

Bananas, you love eating them almost as much as squeezing them between your fingers and smashing them into the rugs and furniture.

Toilet brush, you try and push people down and out of your way when they open the bathroom door so you can go get it... and brush your hair.

The pile of garbage and dirt that results when one sweeps the floor, you try to grab the garbage out from in front of the broom and run away with it. I have to literally hold you back with the broom and sweep like I am an Olympic hockey skater going towards the goal. Who knew sweeping could be a full contact sport.

On and off switches, especially the one on the vacuum, which makes vacuuming a longer and infinitely more frustrating experience.

Laundry baskets, you love to push them around the house. It borders on an obsession. Any clothing that happened to be in the baskets you grab out while pushing and throw around the house, leaving a trail of clothing in your wake.

Ripping pages out of books and magazines, this just never gets old for you.

As I have said before, you don't like to sleep at night. But I'm okay with that. And so is your father. Last night, when you woke up for what felt like the 50th time, and Rob sat up in bed and yelled, "This is bullshit!" he meant that in a nice way.

You don't like to talk, preferring the point and scream method of communication instead. The one word you do say is "Eat" , though it sounds more like "EEEEEEEEEEE" You walk over to the cabinets where we keep the food and scream it.

You are never silent. You walk through the house with such purpose, swinging your arms and pointing at random things. Sometimes I like to "translate" your baby speak into what I think you are saying. For example, this morning your walked into the dining room and pointed to the fireplace mantle. I think you said, "What is that up there? You call that decorating? Why the hell do people put their wallets, toys, and papers up there?" Why indeed.



You are still teething, getting your fifth tooth in right now. It doesn't really seem to bother you. And aside from the constant stream of drool pouring out of your mouth, one would never know that you were teething. It amazes me the variety of foods you are able to eat with only those four little teeth. You eat everything that we eat. This past month, in a belated celebration of you being a year old you ate part of a peanut butter and honey sandwich. We throw caution to the wind here, botulism and allergies, we laugh at you! Ha!

You are such a happy baby. You constantly laugh and smile, from the moment you get up in the morning we are greeted with your grin and dimples. I don't think I have ever seen a baby smile so much. Surely your cheeks must ache by the end of the day. Just this morning when Rob's alarm went off you popped up in bed and looked back and forth from your father to me smiling. "How can anyone wake up so happy?" Rob had asked. You laid back down and closed your eyes for a few minutes before climbing over us to try and get the books off of our bedside table.

I look forward to the day when you can eat without having to take the chewed food out of your mouth and examine it every few bites. Similarly it would be nice if you could understand the concept of a napkin instead of using your hair. Though since most of your siblings still haven't grasped the whole napkin concept, I realize this will be a long time coming.

You like to clap your hands, give high fives, and wave bye-bye. But on your own terms. You don't like to perform like a trained circus animal, much to the disappointment of your siblings.





As I was sitting here typing you walked over to me and reached up with your chubby arms. I picked you up and held you close. You wrapped your sticky hands around the back of my head tangling them in my hair. You brought your face close in to mine. I smelled your sweet baby breath, a mixture of your morning nursing, pancakes with syrup, and magic marker. I thought I was going to be the receiver of one of your highly coveted, not often given, kisses. Instead you head butted me.

And then you got down and walked away, laughing and babbling. I think you were saying, "She falls for it every time."