15 Months

Things I want to remember about Asher between 12 and 15 months. . .

- He is obsessed with balloons! It all started when a couple of months ago when he noticed that there are always balloons hanging by the cash registers at Walmart and he thought they were pretty cool so he started reaching for them and got really excited about it. Now any time he sees a balloon he points and drags us over to it if he's walking and will screech out, "WHOOO WHOOO WHOOO!!" It is the funniest little quirk haha.

- He loves cars and has started making legit car noises when he drives them around. He has a bunch of hotwheels cars but he also has some bigger trucks and he always insists on trying to lift up the big cars to put them on top of the coffee table. I don't know why he decided that was something fun to do considering it takes all of his strength to get them up there and half the time he can't do it anyway, but I've stopped trying to figure out what goes on in the mind of that child, he does what wants!

- He is still a really good eater and at this point I've just started feeding him whatever we are eating for most of his meals. He still eats purees for fruits and veggies sometimes, but more often than not, he'd rather eat what's on our plates. He especially loves any form of pasta, cheese, yogurt, animal crackers, chicken, pizza, donuts, most soup he's tried. . . pretty much anything! He is getting better at drinking out of a regular cup, but the second he tries to do it himself he soaks himself.

- Here are a list of the words he's been saying lately

Baba - food/water 

Cheesh - Cheese 

Shoe-sh - Shoes
Gock - Sock 

Booka - Book

Buh bye Da - Bye bye Daddy 

Ba bowl - Ball

Kaka - Cracker

Awt - Hot

Caaw - Car

Woof woof - Dog
Buttaw - Button
Daw do - Thank You
 Monkey

Uh oh

Mama 

Dada

No no (of course!) 

- He loves being outside. When we go on walks he likes to pick up random leaves and sticks off of the ground. When he grabs a stick he'll do this funny thing where he swipes it on the ground like he's trying to dig a whole or something, it's the weirdest thing! He also likes climbing up the stairs and going down the slide at the playground in our neighborhood.

- He's usually stable on his feet but he's definitely had some pretty nasty falls. He face planted on the cement a couple of months ago and he had quite the fat lip. The other day he was running around the play ground and tripped head first into a pole, which left a bruise. As much as I feel bad for him and obviously don't want him to get hurt, I don't overly freak out about it and have just accepted the fact that scrapes and bruises will be the norm for the foreseeable future!

- He still loves dogs and gets so excited any time we see one.

- Sometimes if he's having a hard time falling asleep or if he wakes up after a nap and is hanging out in his crib, he will pull off his socks. It's so funny because he just starts with pulling at the toes, so I'll watch him on the baby monitor and all I see is this long stretch of fabric coming off his foot, cracks me up.

- He still doesn't have very much stranger danger. It's nice that he's not overly clingy and he doesn't mind being in large groups, but it would be nice if he was a little more cautious of total strangers!

- He almost always gets complimented on his long eyelashes when we are out running errands or if we meet someone new. They really are ridiculously long!

- For the most part he is a really easy going and content little guy, but there are definitely times when he is the most strong willed stinkin pill! Jared and I both have a bit of a stubborn streak and I think he's definitely inherited that from both of us. His temper tantrums include throwing himself on the ground and kicking his feet while screaming. . . awesome. . . I typically just ignore that dramatic behavior, I don't have the patience for it and luckilyy he's never done it while we've been out in public!

- Phrases/questions he understands: Are you hungry? (Runs over to his high chair)  Is it time for a nap? (Drops what he is doing and goes over to the baby gate) Go get your little (the blankie he sleeps with) books/cars etc.  Do you want some milk? Lets go for a walk. Lets put on your shoes. Go show mama/dada. Who's home? (I ask him that every time we hear the garage door open when Jared gets home from work, he runs over to the baby gate)  Can I have that please? (He'll let go of things if we ask him)   I feel like he honestly understands quite a bit of what we say to him, it's so crazy, but he really does.

Asher is 1!

Obviously my status as "best mom ever" has taken a big hit considering I'm more than two months late in posting this one. . . meh, I lost that status pretty much the second we got home from the hospital with our little bundle of joy last year ;)  Things I want to remember about Asher around the age of one:

- The best way to describe our nugget is that he is a busy body. He cannot sit still for more than 2 seconds. He's constantly moving and "working" haha

- He started walking right before he turned 11 months old. He was a little uncoordinated at first, but now he's cruising and likes to get around all over the place.

- He loves to "dance" which basically means rocking back and forth on his two feet and shaking his head back and forth too. He tends to do it more if there's music playing, but he still does it even when he's not thinking about it.

- He has learned how to clap for himself.  It took him forever to learn how to feed himself with his hands, so when he was trying to get the hang of it, I would always clap after he took a bite. So now he'll clap for himself after takes bites.

- He loves being outside, but now that he's walking, it's almost exhausting to take him out because he's all over the place!

- He's in that stage where anything will provide him with entertainment. I took him to a splash pad last week and instead of playing in the water he was more interested in walking all over and playing in the dirt. He's such a funny little guy.

- He now has four teeth on top  and still just the two on bottom. The top teeth were definitely a little more trouble coming in than the bottom ones!

- He is constantly making boy sounds and he has conversations with himself, it's pretty cute.

- He loves watching anything that has a motor. Cars, trucks, lawn mowers, construction vehicles etc. He will sit and watch for at least 5 minutes, which may as well be an eternity in Asher time!

- He still doesn't know how to go down the stairs very well, but he is definitely aware that he doesn't want anything to do with going near the stairs if he's at the top. He'll always stop and look over the edge and then go somewhere else, so that is nice since I don't really have to worry about him falling down.

- He loves sleeping with his "little" and gets royally pissed if he chucks it out of his crib before he falls asleep. You'd think he'd figure it out and not drop it on the ground, but no, he still throws it overboard at least once a day before a nap.

Photo credit for the cake pictures goes to Lora Grady, she's amazing and we were lucky enough to have her take our family pictures a couple of months ago.

I survived. . .

Well, I've almost survived one year of being a first time mom, so here's some friendly advice and reminders to myself to recall before we have another baby. . .

- Take every single "sleep training" book/blog and drop kick their advice straight out the tallest window you can find. . . and squish your heel in it for good measure. Seriously, the worst idea I ever had was Googling baby sleep. You get these crazies who literally think that your 2 month old baby should be able to sleep through the night AND take several two hour naps throughout the day. They will swear by this method and that method blah blah blah. . . Yeah, I totally want to hear about how your baby took a 3 hour nap, outside, on the ground, in the rain, all because of Baby Wise (okay, maybe that's a slight over-exaggeration). Congratulations, you have what's called a good sleeper and I'm pretty sure it had nothing to do with all of that stupid sleep training advice!!

- Your emotions, within any given hour, will span from overwhelming happiness, as in, "my kid is the cutest little thing on the whole planet I just want to kiss him all day long!" to mind boggling frustration, as in, "I swear if he touches those damn blinds one more time, I'm going to bash my head against this wall!" (luckily for all parties involved, Jared is much more intelligent than I am and decided that we should just raise the blinds up to remove all forms of temptation from the little punk).

- No matter how much you'd love to control your baby, he will do everything in his own time, because he actually has a personality and mind of his own! Totally unfair that the tiny dude gets to decide when to start sleeping through the night, ditching the swaddle, feeding himself, drinking from a sippy, crawling, walking etc. You are one of those control freak people, so this concept will be slightly difficult for your OCD to handle, but once you realize that your baby is actually the boss over when and what he learns, things become a lot easier.

- A funny thing happens when your baby turns eight months old. It will seem as if everybody around you has lost their minds because they will start to ask you when you are going to have another baby! The first couple times I laughed it off thinking, that if they knew me they couldn't be serious. And then it happened again, and again, and again. I wish I were a rockstar parent like some family and friends I know, but sadly, I am not. Maybe I should have Jared design me a t-shirt that says, "I love my baby, but I DO NOT have the mental capacity and emotional stability to have another anytime soon (sorry to disappoint)!!"

- Remember when you felt like a self-conscious idiot because you didn't have a clue how to carry a car seat on your arm or get the stupid door open when pushing the stroller? Don't worry, I'm pretty sure nobody was looking at you and thinking that you were an idiot because most people actually have lives and don't care what strangers are doing out in public!

- Never let your baby nap without a onesie or bottoms on. All will seem well and your kid will be quiet up in his room, but then when you check the monitor you will be greeted by the sight of the cutest little baby butt cheeks you have ever seen, but then you will notice that he took the advantage of his new found freedom and peed all over his bed. . . awesome!

- Upon the arrival of the sweet babe, your existence becomes extremely less important to those around you. All anybody will want to see or talk about is your baby. It makes sense, they are just so tiny and squishy and cute! But don't be surprised when you find it takes a while for your presence to be acknowledged when you walk in the door to visit family or friends!

- You will continuously compare your kid to other babies and their skills. You won't be able to help it (because you certainly have issues). Half the time you will think your kid is a champ because he started walking at ten months. The other half, you will swear there is something wrong with him because he can't feed himself yet with his fingers, but so-and-so's kid was doing that months ago.

- Sometimes you will find yourself pinning your child down just to get some Tylenol down his throat so he will stop acting like a little hellion because he is teething. . . that's about as fun as it sounds!

- Let your husband help! You aren't a child rearing expert just because you are the mom and you gave birth. News flash: Nobody knows what they hell they are doing when it comes to parenting!! Let your husband parent how he wants. Who cares if he changes the diapers or dresses your baby differently than you?? Nobody likes to feel nit picked, so if you keep correcting him and trying to force "your way," then you will effectively turn yourself into an only parent because I bet he'll eventually stop trying. Be grateful that you have a husband who is just as capable a parent as you are and let the dude help!

- You thought you were done with getting up in the middle of the night, but you were wrong. It's real unfortunate that pregnancy permanently caused your bladder to shrink. You'll be getting up every night to pee. . .

- Breastfeeding is going to turn you into a crazy hormonal psycho! Seriously, you will think your life is over just because your dang kid does not take a freaking nap. You will question your sanity and swear that you were totally laid back and normal before having a baby when said baby does not eat very well, is unpredictable, fussy, and blows out of every stupid diaper (or in other words, acts like a baby!). You will blame it on baby blues and wonder how that could last so long. Then when you are done nursing, almost overnight, you will feel so much better. Like, praise the Lord I knew I wasn't that crazy, better!

- Do not, I repeat, DO NOT reach into the back of your baby's diaper to see if he's pooped. Hello dummy, you are going to end up with crap on your hand at some point!!

Eleven Months

I missed 10 months, so here is a combined 10-11 month post about what I want to remember about Asher. . .

- He likes to cross his feet when he is sitting down. It is the funniest thing! He does it more so when he is not paying attention, but it still happens pretty frequently.

- He has a receiving blanket that he loves to sleep with, we call it his "little." He can't go to bed without it and he gets really pissed if it drops out of his crib! Luckily he's only chucked out a handful of times, I think he realizes that it's not a good idea so he doesn't do it that often. He also has a stuffed animal, a lion, that we put in there with him too. He will sometimes lean his back against it when he sleeps, pretty stinkin cute!

- He has started to climb over anything that is on the ground and he's already attempting to try and climb up onto the couch (which is still impossible unless one of us is sitting on the ground and he uses us like a ladder!). One game he likes to play recently is hide and seek. So one of us will lay down on our side on the ground and he'll have a toy in his hand that we will steal and put behind our back. He'll lean way over until he can see the toy and then climb over us to get it. He gets so proud of himself!

- He still loves most food. He has become more picky about the order in which he wants to eat it though. When he wants a bite of something different, or a drink of water, then he will put his hands up by his face or turn his head to the side. He has gotten alot better at drinking out of a sippy cup. We found that the children's camelback water bottle with the straw is what he drinks out of the best. Random, I know. Water goes through him in about 2 seconds, so we've started limiting how much he drinks at dinner so that he doesn't pee out of his diapers at night.

- His obsession with having something in each hand at all times continues. His favorite thing is still getting one sock in each hand and crawling around like that. He has the weirdest little quirks about him!

- Now that summer is in full swing, we've taken advantage of the pool in our complex. He really likes to swim, which I'm not surprised about because he's always liked water.

- We decided to start putting him in a forward facing carseat. He hasn't hit the year mark yet, but he's already past the weight limit and I'd rather not have him melt in the back seat in his back facing one. So far he seems to enjoying being able to look out the window when we are out and about. He still doesn't like long road trips, but I don't blame him there.

- His one top middle tooth cut through maybe 6 weeks ago, something like that. I kept thinking the other one was going to come in with it, but it only just now is starting to come down. He looks pretty funny with just the one tooth up top, we call it his snaggletooth haha!

- We are trying to teach him how to go down the stairs, but that is still definitely a work in progress. Luckily he's always stopped when he gets to the top step and hasn't fallen yet, but hopefully he can get it figured out sometime soon.

- He has started saying "dadadada" and "mamama." I have found that mamamama means any of the following depending on his mood: I'm tired and need a nap, I'm hungry why are you not feeding me?, I'm pissed because I want something I can't reach or have,  I'm sad and need a love. Haha, one of these days he'll figure out that it means me, which I'm sure will be very cute for the first few months and then will get old after the millionth time that I've heard it :)

- He is still not a very cuddly baby at all, but every so often during the day he will crawl over and want to sit in our laps. He also likes to lean up against us if we are sitting on the ground with him. It's so funny, he's a little lounger.

- He doesn't really have any separation anxiety (thank goodness!) but he does get really mad if you leave him by himself in a room. I feel bad, but sometimes I have to run upstairs to get something and he'll scream the whole time up I'm there.

- He is able to stand by himself for several seconds at a time and has been doing that for the past couple of weeks. Then just yesterday he took his first steps by himself! One of his favorite things to do is walk around the computer chair since it's a spinning one and he can do the walking himself. He thinks it is pretty cool!

- He knows how to play the "chase" game and starts laughing when we play it with him.

- He has started to clap, it's pretty adorable!