Nine, Ten, Eleven

Ethan is 11 months old.  Wow.  I try not to think about how close he is to being one now.  I've got incredible mommy guilt that I have been so horrible about recording his babyhood.  I've got the pictures, but I haven't written down all his cute little habits that he has had at every stage.  I feel bad about that.  I guess there's no going back, so here's a snapshot of him the past couple of months:

Ethan's first tooth finally broke through October 9th.  It was a doozy. He worked on it for months.  A week later, the second one peeked out. Sometime this month I bought a bell intending to use it for Family Home Evening, and he was instantly enamored.  He thinks ringing a bell is super exciting.  I think this is also about when he got into playing the piano and his recorder.  He'd done it before, but became more enthusiastic about it all.  I think it was also during this month he found the joy of kitchen cupboards.

Mama was Ethan's first word (sometime early summer), followed closely by Dada. During his tenth month a third word became firmly entrenched in his vocabulary.  "Uh-oh" is a very versatile word, in case you didn't know.  It can be used when you drop something, when you toot, or if you want to warn your parents you're about to do something you know you're not supposed to.  In the last case, it is sometimes helpful to repeat the first syllable several times to denote the severity of whatever you're about to do. This is also the month Ethan learned to hold a phone (as well as other random objects) up to his ear and say something close to "hello".  He learned that it's kind of fun to stick your finger up your nose, and yes, sometimes into your mouth afterward.  He got pretty good at walking with his car/walker in the upright position.

So far in his eleventh month, he has become fairly fearless in his climbing attempts.  He climbs into boxes (whether or not they are filled with books—that we got for free! Score!), climbs on people, any seat that is low enough, and recently tried to climb onto the filing cabinet next to the couch.

 He's been having fun finding hide-y-holes.

I've been having fun finding them too. :)

(12/08/11)

And this week he has finally decided that there might be something to this walking thing after all.  We're really excited about this!  He took his first multiple solo steps on October 16th.  We would catch him standing and even walking when he was excited about a toy or something, but he would always sit down the moment he realized what was going on.  Now we can get him to walk upon request, and he will try walking first instead of crawling if he's already standing.  He's walked quite frequently the past few days, and even distances as long as across the room (although our rooms are admittedly small), so I think it's safe to officially declare that we have a walker!

 

(12/12/11)

Some people would rather have their kids walk later than sooner, but we figured it wouldn't make much difference as far as him getting into stuff.  He's been pulling himself up onto whatever he can grab for quite a while, and man, that kid has a reach!  We tried not to push him into something he wasn't ready for, but this is one milestone we've been quite excited for. :D