15 months

We had such a great month with lots of time spent with friends, family, and just playing at home.  With the weather beginning to change, Jude has discovered that he LOVES to be outside.  His favorite thing is to run back and forth in between two of our trees to play with the wind chimes. If he is not doing this, he is busy chasing and kicking the ball. It seems he has also found a new love of gardening like his daddy.  He likes to play with the tools and "water" the plants.  We also spent a lot of time driving his car, taking walks, playing at the park, and swinging in the front yard!  His world pretty much revolves around balls these days.  He still plays with his vacuum, blocks, and cars but the majority of every day he spends throwing and chasing balls. At any given time, there is easily 15-20 different types of ball strewn about the downstairs area.  Watch your step when you walk!!  We are fixing to have to take some balls away due to the fact that he is learning to throw them pretty hard.  He is also getting good at catching balls.  They usually have to be bigger balls, but he'll get a smaller one every now and then.  He gets so excited when he catches one and yells daaaayy (yay)!  He is so proud! Jude's sweet personality just keeps growing and growing.  He is 100% boy and 100% active, but he has the sweetest demeanor.  He is so polite too.  People are always amazed when he tells them "thank you" or "please".  I pray he always has this sweetness within.  Getting this little guy to snuggle though is almost impossible.  Thankfully we still get some good cuddle time in the mornings, but after that its constant movement.  He loves to play by himself and then every few minutes will come climb in our laps to give us some lov'n, and then its off again! It is so fun to watch this little guy live life with such joy.  Seeing the world through a child's eyes brings a whole new perspective.

Daddy daycare day!  

Playing with ZaZa at Uncle Rico & Aunt Jen's

He loves playing in daddy's closet - shoes, socks, and belts are is favorite!

Helping pick weeds

Playing with Grancy 

 Day at the Dallas Zoo 

(Grancy, Pops, Uncle Rico, Mia, and Tripp)

Playing in daddy's shoes again

He could do this ALL day!!

Trip to Lubbock to visit the Ingram's and Cherry's

Jude and Hollis sharing blueberries 

Ice cream and junk box dancing 

Playing with Olivia 

This lasted about .2 seconds!

Walking the TTU campus

This is the best we could get of the 3 babies 

Daddy & Jude on the TTU football field 

 All the kiddos - Emery, Olivia, Kayt, Jude, Owen, Hollis, & Noah

(we sure wish we could play with them all the time)

Stats:

- Weight: 21 lb 5.5oz (20%)
-Height: 31.6" (50%)
-Head: 45.8 cm (20%)

-Still hates cows milk/almond milk and wants absolutely nothing to do with it.  Also will pretty much not eat any pureed foods, which worries mommy since we get a lot of veggies in this way!!  Still nursing once a day.  

- Doing great using his spoon and fork, and even leaving the plate/bowl on the table!

-Found a new love for books this month.  He has always enjoyed reading, but mainly just at bedtime.  He has always had a hard time sitting still long enough.  Now he loves to read and asks often - "buh" (book).  He loves to point things out, especially daddy's, balls, and doggies.   

-Favorite toys: Balls are still in first place, but close behind is his vacuum, blocks, and cars.  He has also started making his planes fly with cute little noises.  

-Each morning or after every nap when we go to his room to get him,without fail, he either says ball, dada, or uh-oh.  

-We had his first dentist appointment and he did great.  They gave him a cow toothbrush and he loves to brush his teeth.  

-We finally took the plunge and put him in the church nursery.  We have been staying in the cry room or taking turns going to church this whole time! He has gone 3 times now and done pretty well.  Each time we pick him up though, someone is holding him!!

-Loves his shoes and putting them on.  Also trying to put on mommy and daddy's shoes!

-Getting some pretty funny dance moves! Anytime he hears music he'll start sing and/or dancing. Its more like bounce-squats, but he thinks he's dancing!

-Loves to turn the lights on and off with the light switches.  Its fun to see him learn about cause and effect.

-The new words for the month are teeth (toothbrush or wants to brush his teeth), cookie (we give him what he thinks is a "cookie" after dinner and he thinks its the best thing ever), ni ni (night night), petty (pretty), & hat.

- He is still obsessed with dogs.  Pretty much every animal (besides a kitty cat) is a dog and barks in Jude's world!

-Still has 4 front teeth on top, 1 top molar, and 4 front bottom teeth.

-Wears size 3 diapers

-Wears 9-12 month clothes

-Most days takes 2 naps.

-Tongue continues to not be out as much, although we still have a ways to go.  

Month 14

Life got back to "normal" after the holidays, and with many cold/snowy days we spent most of the month taking it easy and enjoying each other.  I would have to say the theme for this month was independence for Jude.  He slowly emerged out of the attachment stage and has really been enjoying playing and discovering on his own.  After a few minutes, he'll come back to see what you are doing and play and bit, and then he's off to explore again.  He has also become obsessed with playing outside.  After we come in, he'll just stand at the door grabbing for the doorknob.  We found some great parks in the area that have toddler play areas, so he has really enjoyed going to play there with his friends.  I have a feeling we'll be outside a lot as soon as winter is over! I also started many learning activities with Jude.  This is easier said than done since sitting still and focusing on one thing is not his thing, but he is really starting to absorb a lot.  We practice counting to three all the time and he loves to throw his ball and say "Three".  We have also been working on the ABCs and he is really starting to catch on.  Being new parents we never realized all that they can learn and absorb at such a young age.  He is watching our every move whether we realize it or not!!  I feel like he has grown up and changed so much in just one short month.  My little baby is becoming in big boy!

Loves taking things out and putting them back in

Playing at the park

First Dallas Stars game

Taking a ride in his car.  We'll say, "do you want to go ride your car", and he'll run to the front door

Inside fun at the pet store on a snowy day

How do I look mommy?

Pure joy with daddy at the park

Vacuuming all those hard places to get!

Check out this stick I found!

Playing catch with Sam's cousin Austin.  He could do this for hours!

Looking for the birds with his PePaw

Slam dunk! 

More hats!

Where's Jude???

Helping mommy clean!  Least favorite job, so I will gladly allow him to do this!

Playing outside (he used to HATE the grass and now wants to be outside all day)

Making a business deal with Jacob

"Playing" pricesses with Landry (aka: taking the princesses away)

Hammering away with daddy

Not only did he get the sock off, but now he's eating it!

I won't tell daddy that you carried this purse around!!!

Using a spoon all by himself!

Taking a walk with daddy

Playing in the snow in his carhart pants!

Sliding with Jacob 

(please ignore the extremely short pants - tiny waist and long legs)

Riding the horsey

Jumping on the bridge

Stats:

- He did not get weighed this month, but I am hoping we have finally hit 20 pounds!!

-He had some pretty big changes in his eating this month.  We have started decreasing the pureed food, introduced cows milk (not going well), and he is almost fully weaned (his choice, not mine).  

- He has also started learning to use a spoon and fork.  He does really good, but then realizes that things are going too slow and just reverts back to using his fingers!

-Thanks to his Pops, he has started to say "ah" after each drink.  

-He has always fed himself primarily with his left hand, and has continued this with the spoon and fork.  He though primarily uses his right hand for most other things, including throwing the ball.  I guess we'll see where this leads us!

-Loves to take off his socks and thinks it is a pretty fun game.  The not so fun part is the amount of socks we have lost due to this!

-Favorite toys: Balls are still in first place, but close behind is his vacuum, blocks (he can stack up to 5 blocks on his own), hammering toy, and cars.  

- Can tell you where his tummy, eyes, ears, nose, and head are.  He also loves to find other people's belly buttons (awkward!) 

-Started blowing kisses.  This was the first "trick" I tried to teach him months and months ago.  I always knew he knew how, but randomly one day he just started doing it!

-Likes to help pick up trash and put it in the trash can.  He also likes to try to take things out of the trash can, which makes this a little less cute!

-He is OBSESSED with toothbrushes.  Although he has his own, more often than not he wants our toothbrushes.  We literally have to hide are toothbrushes!!

-He has also found a new love with our phones and gets mad when it turns itself off.  Sam found his original iphone, so we let him play with that.  Doesn't keep his interest too long though since it doesn't work!  I think we might have to break down soon and introduce the iphone and ipad.  

-We have said this since day one, but this kid is so observant.  When he wakes up from a nap and comes downstairs, in seconds he can find all the new things or anything that is out of place.  

-He likes to put his hats and suspenders on and go look at himself in the mirror (aka: the glass door).  Funny thing is, we never taught him to do this!  Cracks us up!

-It has been very interesting watching Jude play with friends these past few weeks.  He learns a lot from them, but also struggles with not understanding when someone wants to play with his toys.  A very hard lesson to teach a baby that doesn't understand!  It is sweet though to see him interacting with other babies his age.  He walked up to a friend at church the other day grabbed his hand and they went and climbed the stairs together!  

-The only new words for the month are cheese and boo (when playing peek-a-boo).  He though has started to say thank you with out any prompting.  Its so sweet!

- Still loves animals and gets so excited any time he sees a cat or dog either in person, on the tv, in a book, etc.  

-Still has 4 teeth on the top and 4 on the bottom.

-Wears size 3 diapers

-Wears 9-12 month clothes

-Most days takes 2 naps.

-I can honestly say that the tongue is in a bit more.  I think we might be turning the corner!

-We are back to needing another haircut. We are not ready to take on that experience again though, so we are just waiting at this point.

13 Months

I have no idea how a month has already passed since Jude turned 1!!  I guess its due to the fact that we had such a fun and busy December! After the big birthday week things did NOT slow down.  The Christmas activities started, we traveled for a week, had New Years, and then got sick!!  Before I even knew what happened, my baby turned into a 13 month old toddler!  We try not to dwell on that fact though and simply concentrate on our active, adventurous, smart, loving little boy!
This was such a fun month of experiencing our favorite time of the year with our little guy.  He might not have understood all that was going on, but having him with us made it all so much more special.  He is the light of our lives and brings joy to so many others.  We treasure each moment we are given with him and pray that we would allow the Lord to guide our every step as we raise him.

First Haircut 

 Things started out ok, the cheerios were working!

 Then this happened

 Finally the finished product.  Lets just saw this wasn't the best haircut experience for many reasons (if you could see the sides and the back you would understand!!)

 Learning to rock a new hair style!

 Besides a day here and there, he was really good with not messing with the christmas tree!  Not this day!

 Mommy and her baby at our Christmas party

 Playing in his friend, Ethan's, new monster truck car

Laughing with daddy

- At his latest doctors appointment he weight 19 pounds 8 ounces (almost to 20 pounds!!)

- Continues to eat pretty much all the same food.  We are eating more finger foods and less puree food.  We haven't introduced milk yet, but are starting to think about it. 

- Not that we did not need to before, but we really have to keep an eye on this little guy!  He is starting to become our little climber!  Luckily so far he is pretty easy to redirect. He has also started to run a bit which tends to cause a few more falls!

-His favorite toys are still all of his many balls and throwing them, but he is really starting to become interested in his mega legos.  He likes to put them together and pull them apart, build towers (with our help), and of course knock the towers down.  He also loves carrying around a bag or bucket with balls or his "cell" phone in it. 

-New words for this month are ball, there it is, (although we might be the only ones that know what he is saying) and there he is.  

-When he comes into a room or sees something that excites him, he has started gasping and completely lights up.  Or he'll say ooooo when he really likes something. 

-His new favorite game is putting pillows on the floor and jumping and rolling on them. 

-He is obsessed with the vacuum.  Whether its the real one or the play one he got for Christmas.   

- Luckily we got through the Christmas holiday, but after New Years our little guy had his first fever.  He was still his happy self, but more cuddly and easily upset-able.  He was already going through a pretty strong attachment phase and being sick made things even worse!  He seems to be getting a bit better with this. 

-He will tell himself no when he knows that he is not supposed to touch something.  This though does not always detour him from not touching it! 

- Still loves animals and gets so excited any time he sees a cat or dog either in person, on the tv, in a book, etc.  

-Still has 4 teeth on the top and 4 on the bottom.

-Wears size 3 diapers

-Wears 9-12 month clothes, but can still wear some 6 month pants if they aren't too short. 

-Most days takes 2 naps.

-Tongue still out 24/7!

-His hair is starting to slowly grow back.  It may be quite awhile before we cut it again! For months he would play with his hair as he fell asleep.  We felt so bad for him when we cut it because we took away his comfort!  Its long enough again for him to play with it though!