11 Months

Billy the kid is 11 months old tomorrow. He can probably now qualify as a kid, too. He is fully walking, always blabbering, always getting into mischief. In one word, a HANDFUL. His personality is off the charts, and we sure do love him for it. Lots went down this past month, so let's get to it.

To the deets!

I wish I had his stats, but that will have to wait until his one year checkup next month. His growth slowed a lot when he became mobile, but he's definitely packed on a couple of pounds the past few weeks. He's grown out of most 12 month sized clothes and we just today realized that he has no business being in a size 3 diaper anymore (only 398472398 blowouts to come to this realization).

Still rocking the arm rolls.  In case you were wondering.

EATS.

He's down to one nursing session per day in the morning. I have to nurse him before turning on the light in his room when he wakes up in the morning, otherwise he is too distracted.

After he refused my efforts to feed him right before and after school, we were down to two nursing sessions a day in the morning and before bed. Well, it wasn't long before he was rejecting the nighttime feed, too. So, just the morning for now and we are hanging on. I don't think he's getting much, though. He gets a 6 oz. bottle of formula after his nursing sesh, a 6 oz. bottle of formula at noon, a third 6 oz. bottle of formula at 4pm, and then a few ounces of cow's milk with dinner at 5:30/6ish. He hasn't really taken to cow's milk, yet, though! 

A fun new development; he's started throwing food when he's done eating. Thank goodness for these dogs. Another weird thing he does is that he stuffs as much food as he can into his mouth and lets it slowly ooze out or grabs it from his mouth. He's like a little chipmunk storing nuts. It's kind of cute, but mostly scary because it seems like a choking hazard and it usually ends in a mess!

Another new trick: if he's on your lap drinking a bottle, he likes to take breaks and offer you some. Then he'll keep on chuggin'. This trick we like!!

He still eats pretty much everything under the sun. He eats what we eat, unless he gets his paws on some dog food (we don't eat dog food). For easy snacks, he's been eating lots of Cheerios, bananas, clementines, and peas lately.

SLEEPS.

He sleeps through the night!!!!!!!!!

Did you read that?

HE SLEEPS THROUGH THE NIGHT!!!!

In case your weary eyes skipped over it the first time. 

After months and months and MONTHS of being obsessed with getting him to sleep, he finally got with the program. As of last month's update, he was still waking up at least once per night in the early morning for a feeding. Finally, he just slept straight through. And then he slept through the next night, and the next night, and the next! TO MY GREAT SHOCK AND AWE. He's been going three straight weeks now, with only 2 nights where one of us had to go in and soothe him back to sleep. Once for a stuffy nose and once for teething. It is glorious. Thank you, Jesus. He goes down anytime after 6:30pm and wakes usually between 6 and 6:30. 

I really don't know what did it . . . It could have just been developmental. Period. He just got to be old enough. It could have been from being worn out at school all day. It could have been from changes to his diet (more formula and solids vs. breast milk). Who knows! I'll leave it until the sleep deprivation of (God-willing) our next baby to obsessively overanalyze what finally did it. 

Naps at school are reeeaally inconsistent. They say it really just depends on what's going on in the classroom. Someone slamming a door too hard can turn a two-hour nap into a 20-minute nap. Most are around 45 minutes. Weekend naps on the other hand are fantastic. He took two naps today, the first was 2.5 hours and the second was 2 hours long! When he finally gets the chance to nap in a dark, quiet environment, he naps hard, I guess.

Whenever he's home, he goes down for sleep super easily. No whining at all. Life is good.

POOPS.

Like I said we're in size 4 disposables now. Thankfully his pees slowed down and he is not leaking through disposables at night anymore. But his farts. His farts! He could out-fart a grown man. They rumble the foundations of our home, literally and figuratively.

MILESTONES

// Walking like a pro. He is definitely trying to make a run for it, too, but doesn't quite have the coordination. He does have the coordination to climb up stairs now, though.

// He really does love Chapstick. See below.

He carries around this unopened Chapstick all the time. He loves sucking on it. When he throws a fit for whatever reason, handing him a tube of Chapstick will calm him down 96% of the time.

// He signs "all done." It's the most consistent one we've been teaching him, so it's obvious why it's his only sign! 

// He is officially a daddy's boy. Will has tried passing William off to me to bring him up to his crib for bed time. William was NOT having it, cried, and tried diving out of my arms back to Will. This has happened twice in the past week!