Merry Christmas

1 Year 8 Months

Dear North,

I am convinced you are Mister McGoo. You always seem to be walking on the brink of certain painful injury and are saved just in the nick of time. It's not due to blindness, as is the case of McGoo. Rather, you just cannot stop yourself from exploring all things dangerous. I know I've written about this before, but it's only getting worse as you gain confidence in your climbing abilities and electrical knowledge. Meanwhile, your dad and I stand guard beside you, attempting to catch you when you fall and keep you from electrocuting yourself. That's our job now and for a long time to come.

You spend a good amount of time with dad in the garage these days too, sorting bins and playing with the tape measure. Maybe that explains your recent pastimes like hammering on the sliding glass doors and taking a screwdriver to your train. You imitate everything you see us doing, which makes you somewhat of a mirror. It's terrifying really and means we have to start acting appropriately while driving.

Because you are a parrot, language is improving slowly but surely. You can say dada, mama, green, meow, daddy, baby. Those last 2 just came out this weekend and we've been practicing other "y" ending words ever since. Believe me when I say, your father would happily sit for hours listening to you say "da dee" over and over again. He would melt into a puddle each time too.

Between you and me, on the weekends, your dad has been dressing you in flannel shirts to compliment his own color palette of the day. On Saturday, you both wore red flannel and on Sunday, the hue was blue. It's pretty much the cutest thing I've ever seen.

And now, some pictures!

"Are you trying to trick me into eating vegetables again?"

"Alright I'll eat it, but don't try any funny stuff. I've got my eye on you."

Any guesses on what the cameraman is wearing?

1 Year 7 Months

Dear North,

Every month that goes by becomes our new favorite version of you. In the past month, your comprehension of what we are saying is more obvious than ever. You delight in pointing to body parts as we call them out to you. Chores are made more enjoyable with you as a helper, eager to follow our directions. Even being told no is more acceptable lately as long as we explain the reasoning behind the denial. With the chill in the air, you often grab a book and a blanket and plop down in the nearest lap for story time. Maybe being stuck indoors for the winter won't be so bad after all?

Left to your own devices, I can normally find you surfing the internets, squirting the cat (or any object really) with the spray bottle or moving a chair across the living room to access the light switch. Occasionally, you even touch your actual toys. You take them out one by one, pile them in a new location and then carefully put them back in your toy bin. I do not know where you get your OCD from though.

The other day as we played with blocks in the living room, I caught myself staring at you and studying your every feature. Had you noticed my glazed over eyes and strange smile, it might have freaked you out. You are our little boy! It's a stupidly simple realization that occurs to me less frequently as I allow myself to get caught up in meaningless day to day activities of life. But in that moment, I recaptured some of the awe I felt holding you in my arms those first minutes of your life. I promise to open myself up to that amazement more often. But I cannot promise that I won't smother you with kisses as a result.

I flipped the screen over so he could look at himself while I filmed him. He obviously liked what he saw.

A rare glimpse into life with a North.

1 Year 6 Months

Dear North,

You are a whopping eighteen months old already. Even if I didn't know it myself, the season change seems to be reminding me of how quickly time moves. I will always enjoy how your birthday is the beginning of Spring because it's pleasant to mark time in conjunction with the season changes of North Carolina.

Our early fall has been filled with camping trips to Jordan Lake. Around the campsite, you like to tidy up by mowing the pine straw and relocating rocks. The camping experience has changed with you in the picture. As always, you are independent and drawn to dangerous situations like investigating the fire pit and turning the knob on the propane tank. If not being watched at all times, you will wander off into the woods or down the road in search of new sticks, rocks and often, garbage. We always leave our campsite cleaner than we found it thanks to you.

One of our campsites had a marked path down to a private beach along the lake. You were free to roam up and down the sands pointing at the different debris that had washed ashore. Sticks seemed to be your favorite find. Sometimes it is pointless to take toys to the beach, although you always love a simple bucket and shovel. But you often abandon everything in search of adventure. Then one of your mean parents chases after you, cutting your quest short again.

This is your reaction to being told not to do something. We see this face a lot. I admit, it makes me laugh. Of course, I hate seeing you so unhappy, but I find it amusing that the simplest things can bring your world crashing down. Like both of your parents, you hate being told what not to do. To get back at us, you have mastered the art of fake crying. It sounds like a machine gun, a very fake machine gun that fires at the utterance of the word "no" that is.

Then it's right back to being adorable.

1 Year 5 Months

Dear North,

September is upon us and with it the end of summer. As we move into the thankfully cooler temperatures of fall, I welcome the relief from the oppressive heat and am excited by the prospect of many camping adventures in the next few weeks. We just bought a new to us pop up camper to make these adventures even more enjoyable for all of us.


You were particularly fond of playing in the galley sink, with your body snugly wedged between the back of the counter and the camper's screened window. Much of your time inside was spent squeezing the bubbles out of the sponge and then wiping the bubbles off everything. Thankfully, you haven't attempted to rotate the sink handles to turn the faucet on yet. Your dad and I work as a team, one of us distracting you while the other slyly uses the water as quickly as possible. I hate to think about the day you open the flood gates, but I promise to laugh when it inevitably happens since I've just jinxed myself.

You're still taking two naps per day and sleep about eleven hours per night, which was a great concern of mine going into this trip. You do great in a crib, but you've never slept in your own bed or with us. The first night we set up camp, we decided to have you sleep on the convertible bed/dinette area because it's the shortest bed. We stuffed the exposed side of the bed with pillows, just in case you rolled off in the night. Aided by the blue glow from the radio light, all night long, your father and I checked on you to make sure you were okay. Around three in the morning, I woke up and you were gone. My stomach dropped as my body sprung to action. I scanned the room but there was no trace of you, a lamby or a binkie in sight. Perched on top of the table bed, I reached under the table to the cubby area and felt your fuzzy head. I may have possibly poked you in the eye too. They say to never wake a sleeping baby and I'm certainly not disputing what "they" say so early in the morning. I heard murmurs from the table depths about an hour later and rescued you. You slept between us on the king sized mattress after that, which became one of our favorite memories of this trip.

When we needed a break from chasing you back and forth around the campsite, your dad would sit with you while you played in the truck. The inside of a vehicle is a wonderland for you, but the truck seems to be your favorite.


This will be the picture that will break my heart when I look back years from now and reflect on how little you were. So don't be surprised if I make you wear a sleep sack into your teenage years.

1 Year 4 Months

Dear North,

I'm a little late getting your letter out this month because we've been running on empty getting ready for vacation and then burning on fumes since we've been back. You were a little trooper all through vacation though (other than those early 5:30 AM mornings) and everyone commented on how well behaved you were. Being back at home, I think you miss the hustle and bustle of all the people around.

You must have learned quite a few tricks from all the other kids during vacation because you are playing games with us now that we have not taught you. For example, you love a new game where you sit on the couch holding the remote control and offer it to either your dad or me with your puppy noise that means everything. It's the same noise that means, "can I have that", "what is that", "pick me up", "can we go outside" etc. But in this case, the puppy noise means , "here, have the remote control." So I try to accept it from you, but you pull it back with both hands and snuggle it into your body while giggling madly. Rinse. Repeat. You could play this game for hours delighted with keeping the remote control out of our greedy paws.

One point of difficulty is getting you to eat new foods. Oh who am I kidding, sometimes you won't even eat the things that were your favorite only yesterday. I hope by the time you are reading this, it will make you laugh because by then, you will have conquered your hatred of all things vegetable and we can giggle over this hopefully short lived phase.

I've always promised myself that I won't give up on offering you new foods and vegetables, but living up to that promise is quite tiresome, not to mention wasteful. I've even tried pureeing vegetables and hiding them in pasta sauces. You caught on quickly to that game though and now shake off the noodles before putting them in your mouth. I worry you're going to be one of those kids that only eats chicken nuggets and bread and I feel guilty that I ever judged the parents of those kids in the first place. Now I can see that those children wore the parents down day by day, throwing green bean after green bean off their tray and onto the floor. The struggle has become less about the quality of food you let grace the inside of your mouth and more about the success of getting you to swallow, well, anything. Bill Cosby's rationalization of giving his children chocolate cake for breakfast comes to mind.

I'm sad to see your Midas Tire Guy arms slowly morph from baby fat into the slender arms of a little boy. Maybe this is the silver lining to your high carb diet though? Thankfully, you still have one or two pudgy little rings that we tickle with kisses while we still can. You are freshly tanned from the beach except for those baby rolls. It almost looks like you put rubber bands up your arms before laying out in the sun. This will be the one time in your life when untanned rolls of fat are considered desirable, so enjoy it son.

It's difficult being back at work after spending nine days in a row with you. I find myself staring at my screen saver and wishing I could kiss your plump cheeks and smell your fuzzy head all day long. Even when your hair is encrusted with your dinner and your cheeks are covered in dried drool you smell like the most expensive perfume to me.

1 Year 3 Months

Dear North,

Fifteen months we have shared with you and they have been the best of our life.

Our summer has started taking on a predictable routine over the last few weeks. You spend your morning with dad taking walks around the neighborhood touching trees and pointing at the sounds you hear. Afterwards, the two of you play in the living room for awhile. Your father builds lego towers which you destroy with gusto. He pushes trucks along right beside you as you both spit your vroom vroom noises all over the living room. You are most definitely all boy. Although I have caught you wearing my bra around your neck a few times now.

Afternoons are spent with me outside in the swimming pool. My goal is to get you floating on your back by the end of the summer. Initially, you hated laying your head back in the water, so step one was getting you comfortable with water on your head. When we are in the pool playing, I'll casually splash water in your face or dump a small cup of water over your head. The first time I did it, you gave me this look of "mom, what the HELL was that for?" But now, you are barely phased by it at all. In fact, you dump the water over your own head. So we are on to step two: blowing bubbles in the water. The easiest way I could figure how to do this is to do a raspberry into the water, submerging my mouth and nose just under the surface. You squeal at the bubbles and slap the back of my head deeper under water as if that will make more bubbles. You attempt to mimic my raspberry until you're about an inch from the water and then you open your mouth and take a sip of the pool water. Not exactly what I was going for, but I guess swimming makes you thirsty? Step two might take a little longer than I expected!

So far, you're not much of a talker. You still babble and squeal, but there are no real words in the jumble. Everything is still "dadadada" right now. Unless you get upset, in which case you often erupt in the most pitiful "maaaaaamaaaaa!" that's ever ripped my heart right out of my chest. People keep telling me about the vocabulary explosion that's in store for you, but right now you seem to be able to communicate just fine by pointing at objects and making puppy-like whines. Rather than get all freaked out by the monthly baby progress emails I signed up for that have somehow calculated how many words you should be saying at fifteen months, I'm trying to enjoy what are probably the last few quiet days we may have for many years to come.

You seem to be less of a talker and more of a doer though. You don't have time to say cat or point at your nose because you are a very busy thirty inch tall man. There are couches to climb and beer bottles to throw off the deck! How can I expect you to wave hi to me when there are so many tomatoes that need picking? There is no time to learn new words when it is your job to press the power button on the television every thirty seconds. Busy busy busy, you are our son for sure.

1 Year 2 Months

Dear North,

Our summer traveling plans have been in full swing this month and we've already taken you to the beach and up north to Pennsylvania. With all that time stuck in a car, we've been seeing a lot of this out of you:


All the traveling seems to be fine with you, especially since we discovered how much you love water. I told you I'd give you a cookie if you made super happy baby noises for the camera. That's my boy, bought off easily!


Each month, we try to take a photo of you, but I'm afraid you currently look like you went one round with Rocky Balboa. You have battle scars from all of your climbing monkey antics and thus, the inevitable crash landing that follows.

Yesterday, I came home from work and Miss Patty told me about an alarming goose egg on the side of your noggin. I wish someone had warned me about how horrible they look, so close to the brain and all. It was like your brain was pushing it's way out of your skull and into that perfect little bubble. You seemed unfazed by it though when I rubbed it with my finger. You are so strong like bull except when I won't give you the remote control and you melt into a screaming puddle of tears.

It's strange to me that you will grow up in a world where you can search any information you need quickly and efficiently. In my day, you had to call a radio station or if you were really serious, you had to consult what we called an "encyclopedia". Funny word right? In spelling bees of the future, that space kid will ask for it to be used in a sentence because he doesn't know what it is. We got our set "free" after buying a billion dollars worth of groceries back in the 80s.

I mention the computer searching because that's what I did to appease myself that you, in fact, were going to wake up from your nap. That was one big egg! But the article I read was obviously written with amped up overly cautious moms in mind because the first tip was not to panic. Followed by a quick #2 of "you do not need to page your doctor." That was all the further I needed to read. After all, humans came out of caves and survived, flourished even. It's so easy to forget how resilient the human head is when I see a protruding knot climbing its way out of your fuzzy hair.

We let you do your mostly supervised climbing around your play area, which includes the couch and dining room table. I don't know what the correct approach is on this, but I know that "no" doesn't stop you. Plus, it seems to me that "no" can become a lazy habit of parents too distracted to supervise their kid. I try to reserve my use of "no" to dangerous situations only. I figure, you're going to do whatever you want to do anyway and if you practice more with someone there, eventually you will get better at it. Don't get me wrong, if you insist on driving my car, the "practice makes perfect" philosophy ends there. We saw what happened last time we tried that.

All of this brings me to last night when I heard some papers shuffling behind your father and me as we sat on the couch. I turned my head to see you perched on top of the dining room table pushing newspapers over the edge. You had silently assembled a makeshift ladder out of your potty/step and a chair to ascend the table top. You beamed a prideful grin in our direction and threw another ad circular to its hardwood floor death below. I'm wondering if all those bananas you eat are turning you into part monkey.

North Discovers the Rain

Farmer in training

Living so close to the fairgrounds has its perks. Friday night, we spontaneously checked out the Got to Be NC Ag Festival. It was a mini fair really, except free, so a lot more awesome than the regular fair. There were old tractors on display, a petting zoo, mini pig races, rides, fair food and carnies galore. It was kind of like heaven for a certain little guy.

North attracted quite a crowd when this photo was shot. Dave was crouched down at the side of the tractor and I was behind him holding the back of his pants by their belt loops so he didn't fall off the high seat of the tractor. In other words, passersby couldn't see the parents of said baby. All they could see was this tiny cute person perched on the tractor pretending to drive it and they began snapping pictures too.

I love this one. It looks like he's surveying his fields considering how much plowing he has to get done before nightfall. A two foot farmer's work is never done.

Jake

Jake, our dog, passed suddenly on Monday night. The rain and cold weather have reflected the somber mood in our house ever since.

I find myself missing him at different moments throughout the day. I'm sure we all have our unique moments we shared with him. But mine mostly revolve around the kitchen and food. That was our special time; the only moment he would allow Dave to leave his sight, in fact. When Jake was home and I was cooking, he was a fixture laying in the middle of the kitchen looking up at me with his most pitiful puppy dog eyes. He pegged me for a sucker and guilted the carrots to jump right off my chopping board and into his mouth. We happily munched away, while Luna, our cat, glared at us from the sidelines. He was the best kitchen assistant I've ever worked with.

There is a missing energy in the house now. I suppose you take those energies for granted after awhile. It is almost too quiet.

I know we will be reminded of him for years to come, especially when finding little Jake furballs here and there. Bits of velcro white fur make me smile now.

1 Year 1 Month

Dear North,

The past month has been filled with a whirlwind of activity in our house. We've staged two garage sales, had family in town, installed new kitchen appliances and are currently in the middle of a garage and drainage construction project. All this and your father and I have both gone back to work full time.

But no matter what activity we are involved in, there you are right along side us. Some times watching, at other times busy playing with whatever object is nearby. Your happy baby babble is our soundtrack while we work. That is one of the last baby things you still do.

Overall, I see your transition happening right now from baby to toddler. You can sort of run. I mean, you can run, but I don't think you're going to get in the Olympics any time soon with that bad running form. You climb up and down stairs and if the front door is unlocked, you have figured out how to turn the handle to open it. You also have started to push chairs around and climb on them to get at items that were previously unreachable. Pretty soon, the only place left for me to store breakables will be the ceiling. But I'm sure the moment I move everything to the ceiling, there you would be rapelling off the fan or something.

Lately, your favorite activity is chasing our dog, Jake, around the house while holding his leash. You charge at him holding the connector part of the leash to take him for a walk. Meanwhile, Jake scampers around and around looking for an escape from your maniacal giggles and ear piercing squeals. I think he finds the whole thing terrifying.

Sadly, I imagine you will only remember him from pictures. Our poor Jake is not doing so good these days and his time left with us is likely to be limited. From what the x-rays show, the vet thinks his lungs are filled with tumors. All we can do is make him as comfortable and happy as possible. This translates to extra treats, like on Sunday when Dave made him his own blueberry pancake. It also means we are taking a camping trip while Jake still seems to feel pretty good. Even with all the medication he's on, he's still the same smiling Jake he's always been. He's had a good fourteen years for sure.

It's hard to let go of someone that has been such an integral part of the family for so long. I am thankful that we have time left with him to say goodbye and let our furry friend know how much we all love him.

Amazing things can happen to us when we are caring for a sick loved one with little time left. We put ourselves aside and they become our focus. Everything revolves around how we can make them happy, even if just for a moment. It's a good lesson to try harder to live that way for all people in your life every day.

When Dave took Jake, our dog, out for a walk early Sunday morning, he saw a Little Tykes jungle gym pushed to the edge of our neighbors driveway a few houses away. After North went down for a nap, we snuck away to check it out and see if we could transport it by hand. Stupidly, we brought Jake on the excursion with us. Excited and unable to contain his bowels, he squatted and pooped right in the driveway of the neighbor while we stood there figuring out how to move their free play set.

"Thank you for the free toy, here is some poop for you!"

Dave bagged up the poop and strapped Jake's leash through his belt loop and Jake squatted again in the road and shat three more times. Again, Dave bagged the poop, resituated our poopy puppy and took up his side of the jungle gym. Meanwhile, the neighbors giving away the item were surely watching our display and will now think twice before they do a good deed in the future. Strange, but some people do not like to be thanked in feces.

Dave later reported that he saw said neighbor power washing the end of his driveway where the transgression occurred. I need to make a point to thank them in a less crappy way.

12 Months

North's First Year from Dave Kilian on Vimeo.

April 6

Dear North,

One year ago today, you were thinking about saying hello to the world for the first time. Then you cuddled up with one of my ovaries and took a nap instead.

Those first cramps made me realize the reality of you. Pain forces you into the moment I suppose. My entire pregnancy felt too surreal to take seriously. But those first pains of labor forced me to grasp that you were headed into the world and our lives would never be the same.

Now, life before you feels like a movie I once watched. It was a good movie, but I like this new one much better.

Love,

Mama

11 Months

Dear North,

After 24 hours of walking, you think you are a big shot. Yesterday, as I made dinner in the kitchen, you played in the living room. I can normally see you the whole time or at least hear you when you crawl to the far end of the room. I should have known you were up to no good when suddenly not a peep was coming from you. This happens occasionally; it makes my heart pound in fear when I get to the living room and you are nowhere to be found. Then I'll see the tall metal lamp swaying back and forth as if possessed and find you have made your way behind the recliner to play with it. But yesterday, you were not in any of your usual hiding places. In fact, you were out in the open, but off the floor entirely. You had crawled onto the fireplace hearth and only your butt could be seen as your upper body was making its way inside the actual fireplace. You turned your head and gave me this big smile as if to say, "look what I found mom, black stuff!"

I removed you from the hearth and poorly attempted to block access to it by moving some large toys in front of it and hoped that you would just forget how you got up there in the first place. I returned to my cooking. A few minutes later, I heard our makeshift "gate" sliding ever so slowly across the floor. The gate is really a Radio Flyer wagon still in its box and we have it sort of wedged between the couch and the wall blocking access to the dining room. I made my way toward the noise to find you had escaped and were confidently walking across the dining room toward me.

From a parenting standpoint, I was in a pickle. Looking back on how I reacted, I chose badly because I praised you for walking across the room like a big boy. So it should have been no surprise that when I put you back in your makeshift living room prison you managed to escape three more times in the ten minutes it took me to finish dinner. Because I had moved the couch out to wedge the wagon box more securely, you found a new means of escape by rocking the heavy box toward you until it fell thereby allowing you to simply crawl over it. Kid, you are too smart for your own good.

The following day, I watched you jailbreak time and again and caught it on video.

With each month, the actual parenting of you is becoming more and more challenging. There are so many things you do that are hilarious and make your father and I want to fall over laughing. But some of these funny things are bad behaviors that we do not want to make into habits by positively reinforcing them with smiles and laughter. For example, you love to do raspberries while eating yogurt and even though I am often covered in yogurt spittle during one of your raspberry episodes, it still cracks me up. But I have to put my super serious mommy face on and swallow back my delight.

We are now paying the price for rewarding you with giggles, especially when it comes to changing your diaper. That first time your naked ass crawled off the changing pad and started a game of giggling chase what did I do? That's right, I laughed until tears streamed down my face. And it's still hilarious to this day. But it's also the reason changing your diaper is a real pain in the butt. I ask you though, how is it possible to get mad at a face like this?

Cake Walk

Dave was lucky enough to catch the little man strutting his machine gun stuff around the living room this morning.

10 months

Dear North,

Although I'm glad to see January gone for the year, it's bittersweet to find myself on the morning of your ten month birthday and know you are one month closer to being a year old. Lately, I find myself rocking you in my arms before naps and bedtime because I know you won't let me cuddle with you this way for much longer. The realization that your time as a baby is waning is so evident to me in your achievements. I already see you more as a little boy now than my tiny baby.

You're right on the verge of walking. Maybe some would even say you are walking, just very badly. Our living room is often situated like an obstacle course made up of your toys. You cruise along the couch and pivot to the ottoman to make your way to your Jeep and over to the fireplace hearth. It's hard to get anything accomplished because I find myself constantly interrupted watching to see what you are doing. I love the concentration on your face as you will your foot to take that step away from the security of whatever you are holding. Even when you fall, you impress me with your resilience. Thank goodness for your well padded bottom.

Your favorite game is to crawl around and around the ottoman playing peek-a-boo with us.

You have developed some strange fears in the last few months: the hairdryer, the coffee grinder, girl babies, to name a few. Last month, you played hard to get when one of your girlfriends came over to visit.

Most days, you happily play independently, rummaging through your toy basket and eventually covering every square inch of living room with your colorful baubles. Your playmate is Mr. Foot, an orange large-footed stuffed Seussian character (not to be confused with Lamby, your sleepy time love) and you'll carry him with you from toy to toy.

Occasionally, you will take a break from play and help me with the internets or assist me in folding laundry. You even helped me put your toys away a few days ago. We may need to start discussing allowance soon.

A new personality has emerged in you in the last month, we call it Evil North. You've always happily jibber jabbered to yourself during play, but every now and then it takes on a dark tone. I haven't been able to catch it on video in all it's glory. But your voice gets very low and sinister like a witchdoctor, as you utter incantations and presumably cast spells on us. The video shows your range and ability to go from Evil North straight into Pterodactyl Boy without missing a beat. (The volume needs to be up to actually hear Evil North.)

Today, I noticed the tulip tips are starting to sprout from the ground. They are always my favorite indicator of spring being right around the corner. But this year, they are also counting down to the anniversary of the day you arrived. Even nature is preparing to celebrate that day for you.

Mighty

"His intercourse with heaven and earth, becomes part of his daily food. In the presence of nature, a wild delight runs through the man, in spite of real sorrows." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

January has been a sad month truth be told. I think we are all feeling it. There are devastating things happening to good people all around the world and closer to home to people I love dearly.

I like to believe it is human instinct to want to help anyone forced to deal with such loss and yet it is also common to feel powerless to help in any real tangible way. I always wish that I could take on the pain of that person to lesson their burden. If only pain was something you could pick up and carry around for someone to lighten their load.

Today, as I pushed the stroller full of North around the neighborhood, the wind kicked up along the road. It filled my ears with exhilarating swooshes and felt almost warm against my skin even though the sun was falling fast. During a few more furious gusts, gumballs were flying around like lottery balls, threatening to velcro themselves to our fuzzy heads as they fell to the ground. If Jake, our dog, had been with us, he would already have a handful sticking to him. Gumballs stick to him like he was a cotton ball with legs running through a cactus patch. But he was at home while we were forced to dodge the stroller through the puddles of gumballs now littering the road.

There is nothing like being immersed in the power of the nature to remind yourself that you are alive. The wind felt like a physical being that could be reined in and ridden through the sky if only I had brought a lasso. It felt both wild and familiar, like memories swooshing by. I like to think that energy I felt was the spirit of all of those who have met their physical earthly end. But that energy will always live on.

Rest in peace Willie "Bill" Henderson.

9 Months

Dear North,

You are a very busy guy these days. There are not enough minutes in the day for all that you'd like to get done. For sure, you are your father's son. Most of your days are spent moving furniture and vehicles around the living room. I'm not sure if you were a valet or a worked for a moving company in a past life, but I'm considering getting you a lower back support so you don't hurt yourself.

I have to take credit for your bizarre outfit in the following clip. I often tease your dad for the way I find you dressed, but this one is all me and I'm sorry. It could be worse though. I took a video of you the other day where you were totally naked except for a pair of blue and green flamed legwarmers and you were flash dancing all over the living room. So I would advise you to be nice to me, my dear son.

One of my favorite things right now is going to get you when you've woken up after a nap. From upstairs, I'll hear the sound of you babbling, "da da da da bido iyeeeeeeee!" and turning your musical aquarium off and on. When I go to retrieve you, you're normally standing holding onto the bars of your baby prison and looking up at me as if to say, "lemme outta here warden, I done my time. I been in here for 60 minutes. I'm a changed baby I tell ya!" Other times you seem to be numb to your lot in life and can be found banging your binkie along the bars of your crib and making up nonsense songs to anger the guards.

You are now eating finger foods almost exclusively: pizza, grilled cheese, sweet potatoes, pasta, ham, vegetables, chicken, muffins, and your favorite, cheerios. When things aren't going your way and crying ensues, a simple cheerio can often bring you out of your misery. I guess they are a well named food after all.

Another food that makes you LOSE YOUR MIND is yogurt. A couple of weeks ago, you would start squealing as soon as I pulled the yogurt container out of the fridge. That was the same time that you started begging at our feet for food like a little pauper. Our meals were spent avoiding eye contact with the three sets of doleful eyes of our begging mammals. I'm pretty sure Jake and Luna formed an alliance to off you at one point because they didn't appreciate the competition. But Jake has since decided he likes you now that he is your highchair cleaner upper. I'm afraid Luna is still plotting to steal your breath in your sleep though. I bet she would forgive all of your transgressions, even the tail grabbing incident, if you would share some of your yogurt with her.

But who am I kidding, we both know that's not going to happen.

Changing your diaper has been a challenge for some time, but recently, it has become a hilarious game to you. You cry as soon as I lay you down on the floor. But the millisecond that diaper is off, you flip yourself onto your belly and take off like roadrunner. If roadrunner was a naked giggling little boy anyway. You get about two feet away, sit up and look back at me to make sure I'm chasing you. Then you squeal/scream in delight and you're off once again. Rinse. Repeat. Yesterday, you made it into the kitchen, stopped and sat there with a silly grin on your face, but no giggles. Turns out, that's the face you make when you're peeing.