11 Month Old Henry...

I absolutely cannot believe that next month he will really be a year old.

Most of you probably saw this video on Facebook, but i'll post it again on here for those of you that might have missed it. Here's the link...

http://vimeo.com/12382104

Today he's been letting go of furniture to take one or two steps towards me. He needs a little encouragement to do it, though. It makes me so, so sad that he's getting to be such a big boy but happy that I won't have to lug his 24 pounds around for much longer. He's so heavy to carry! (Although maybe when he starts walking he'll lose a pound or two.)

We found a used Fisher Price slide on Craigslist for him. We have it out on our deck and he loves it. We help him slide down and he tries so hard to climb back up it. He gets about halfway (or a little more) before he falls back down. Speaking of climbing... he climbs on everything these days. We were visiting Auntie Abby and the twin-a-roo's last week and Henry practically climbed to the top of their stroller. It was nuts. He also climbs on this tiered bookcase that we have. He stands on the bottom shelf and reaches all the way to the third shelf to store his pacifier. I never put it there, but apparently that's where he likes it. I also caught him "helping" me with dishes by climbing on the door to the dishwasher and sitting on it! I'm so happy it didn't break.

His sleep is slowly but surely still getting better. He now goes to bed between 8 and 9 almost every night. Usually it's 8:30. The only exceptions seem to be when we travel and he gets things messed up from sleeping in the car for extended periods. He still wakes up during the night, but now it's usually just twice. I do give him a bottle during the night still, but those days are coming to an end seeing as how we're going to start weening him off formula this week. I always thought I would just give him a nighttime bottle until he got teeth... who knew that he'd be off formula before he had a single tooth!

And no, there's no sign of teeth... no excessive drool, no temperature, no crankiness, etc.

We had the fun experience of installing the latches for the cabinets this past week. Henry was incessantly opening up the kitchen cabinets and pulling all the stuff out. It was cute at first, then it got annoying. I spent a good two weeks following him around cleaning things back up before Dustin could install them.

I'm super-excited to turn his car seat around next month. It will make our trips to Ohio much easier when we aren't struggling to reach him.

He still says 'Dada' and 'Baba'. No new additions there. He does go, "Oooooohhhhh" when he sees something that excites him. Usually it's the swings at the park, the outside when the windows are open or something fun at a store.

If I ask him, "Henry, give me a kissy", he will open his sweet little mouth and give me a drool-covered smooch on the lips. He's a very ambitious kisser.

He definitely has some separation anxiety now. We left him in the playroom at church last Saturday and he cried when we left. That's the first time he's ever done that at church. He's been in that room since he was 8 weeks old and usually loves it. When I was at my Dad's house, I walked out of his sight and he started crying and trying to crawl after me. I'm not sure what that was all about, but it seems to be worse when he's tired.

He's a little shy, or at least he pretends to be. When we're out in public and someone comments on his red hair (because that's the number one thing people comment about), he will smile back at them but then lay his head on the shoulder of whoever is carrying him. It's funny. This started about three weeks ago.

He love, love, loves baths and water. I take him to the pool everyday, as long as the weather is warm (which it is NOT this week). We also have a baby pool for the deck, which he likes, but not as much. I was fortunate enough to spend some time with my good friend Mandy at the Hilliard YMCA while she gave us/me some pointers for helping Henry in the water. He's a fish!

I'm going to try to get it on video soon, but we will put Henry in the living room (far away from his bathroom) and then one of us will go turn on the bath water. It's like a little chubby light bulb going off in his head when he hears the water. He crawls his little tush as fast as he can into the bathroom, stands up, and then leans over the tub to put his hands in the water.

The vacuum still scares the bejesus out him.

He loves grapes, goldfish, banana bread, green beans, crasins, strawberry yogurt and sweet potatoes. He seems to eat everything with no problems even though he just uses his gums. He's also started shaking his head "no" when we try to feed him and he's full.

I'm taking him to get his 11 month pictures tomorrow (on his 11 month birthday) and then I'll take him to get his one year pictures taken, but then I'll only do it every six months. I have way too many pictures as it is. I have stacks I haven't given away yet! Woops...