Blaine at One

I am constantly saying to Blaine these days, "When did you become a boy??". He has become so much more boyish-looking with his slimmer face and front teeth. And he's quite the little chatter these days too from first thing in the morning until bedtime. I absolutely love listening to his little voice and his attempts to mimic the words we say. There are many times we'll tell him to say a specific word and I swear he does! You can tell he knows exactly what he's saying.

He's getting closer to walking and every now and then will stand on his own in a somewhat squatting position for a few seconds. He just did his longest stretch today in the backyard pool!

He also has this really cute face he does when he is whining or upset. We call it his "ooooo" face. He scrunches his mouth into an "o" and knits his eyebrows while saying "oooo". It's so cute!

We've had some battles lately with eating big boy food with both boys. Blaine usually prefers to chuck it across the room instead of even tasting it. We think recent back to back viruses might be causing part of the problem, but we're trying to teach "no" and we've even started a short time out if they continue to throw food after we've told them no. We scoot their chairs to the wall and leave them for one minute. It's actually turned out to be really cute because they usually just sit there, strapped into their chair without the tray, and chat to themselves happily. We're not sure we're getting anywhere, but we're trying! He still loves waffles, sometimes bananas, goldfish,

Blaine's favorite toy right now is probably his little boom box that makes an incredibly annoying grinding sound while spinning to land on different nursery rhymes. He's also learned how to play catch which seems very advanced to us. He loves to have a ball rolled to him and then he throws it back. And he's pretty good and he grins the whole time. He also has a new affection for stuffed animals- especially his new birthday monkeys and Mr. Tiger at Nana and Papa's. He's very good at giving kisses, but also likes to throw them. :) He loves to swing outside and has really loved the new wading pool they got for their birthday. He's gotten pretty good at climbing up the slide!

His favorite song is "If you're happy and you know it", especially when we sing "Hooray!" He still enjoys reading books and likes turning the pages and a new favorite TV show has been The Wiggles.

Blaine is still our little adventurer and rarely stops moving. We still remember him as "Kick Kick" and his energy and excitement have carried through today. I look forward to each day with him and his smile melts my heart.