Wednesday, March 28, 2012

11 Months


This has been another crazy month with so much change! Will has really taken off and is learning new things every day. It makes me so proud and brings me so much satisfaction to watch him grow.
Will has learned how to clap this last month. Whenever he does something good, I'll clap and tell him good job. Then he gets really excited and starts to clap too.
Clapping
One of Will's new favorite games while eating is to pick up his food, lean over the edge of his high chair tray, and watch his food fall to the ground as he drops it. I've learned that this is a sign that he is done and isn't interested in eating any more. And no matter what I do, he just giggles and continues to do it until I take all the food off of his tray.
One of Will's favorite finger foods is vegetables. I buy the frozen vegetable medley that has carrots, corn, peas, and green beans. He always eats the green beans first, then the peas, leaving all the yellow and orange food behind. If I scoop the remaining vegetables up on a spoon, he'll eat them, but he wont pick them up himself.
Notice he's picked out all of the green vegetables.
Some of Will's favorite foods this month are mac and cheese, chicken nuggets, tater tots, vegetables, bananas, and noodles (with either spaghetti sauce or alfredo sauce).
Want my tater tot?
Will is such a little copycat. Anything you do, he will try to do it. It has made it so much fun and I love taking advantage of it.
Yesterday he had spilled a bag of raisins all over. So I decided to see if I could get him to copy me cleaning it up. Sure enough, as I showed him to pick them up and put them back in the bad, he started doing it to. He thought it was so fun that once it was all cleaned up, we had to dump it back out to do it again. I got a video of it, but it says there is an error when I try to upload it. :(

I took Will to the park last week and he had a pretty good time climbing and playing in the tubes. His favorite is still swinging, but he also enjoyed climbing around.
He's getting pretty good with his cups and he is learning that you have to tilt them back in order to get anything to drink.
Will now has a few little "tricks". Here are a few examples: If you put your hand up, he will give you a high five. If you say "touchdown!" and put your hands up, he will do it also. And he will clap if you start clapping.
He can't do "touchdown" without making a goofy face.
We didn't buy much in Hawaii, but we figure we needed to get Will something. We thought this shirt would look great on him.
One of his molars came in and the other is currently in the process of cutting. I've heard many horror stories of teething babies, but he is surprising mellow. Yes he is crankier than usual, but it's still really not that terrible. (Most of the time.)
He is definitely at that stage of getting into everything.
Will took his first official step at eleven months (to the day). He was standing a few feet away from me, then he took a step. Lance and I then spent a few minutes trying to get him to walk between us. At one point he took 2 steps, but he wasn't too interested. It'll come soon enough. I'm in no hurry to rush it along.
He absolutely loves to climb stairs. And my mom did a pretty good job of teaching him how to come back down. If he is on the stairs, he will slide down backwards. However, if he is at the very top, he doesn't know how to turn around and come down. It doesn't help that the stairs in our apartment are unusually steep. I'm sure he'd have an easier time if they were normal.
Will's currently obsessed with crawling over things, especially people. If you are sitting on the ground, he has to crawl over your legs. He refuses to go around, even though most of the time he ends of face planting.

Eyes something he wants then he climbs over to get it
Every time we have to change his diaper, he acts like its the end of the world. He will kick, scream, roll and try to get away. Its rare when I can get it changed without a fuss.
During this last month, Will had his first night away from mom and dad. And it wasn't just one night! Will stayed with my mom for 10 nights and he did so good! He slept through the night most nights, which is better than he was doing at home.
My mom said that Will would play pat-a-cake and clap and roll it, but I have yet to see it. He probably only does it for her or something.
Will throws EVERYTHING. As I am writing this, he just threw Lance's cell phone at his face. It's hard to teach this young that it's ok to throw balls but not other things. But he loves to play catch and will sit there and throw the ball to you. Or he'll even throw it, fetch it himself, then throw again. It's a great way for him to entertain himself for a bit.
He usually tightens up and makes a funny face as he's getting ready to throw.
If you couldn't tell from the first picture, Will also got his first major haircut this month. For the whole story and pictures, click here.
Another of his favorite games is peek-a-boo. If you put something over his face, he'll sit there until you say "Where's Will?" Then he'll rip it off and start laughing. Then he'll hide his face again and repeat. It's funny because sometimes when he's "hiding his face" he only has one eye covered.
He always has the biggest smile when he pulls the blanket off.
Looks like we need to find another obstacle to prevent Will from climbing the stairs. This worked for a few weeks, but he's trying to hard to get around/over it.



I can't believe that his little guy is mine. He is far too cute and smart to be mine.

That little face just melts my heart! 

We love you, Will.

Saturday, March 24, 2012

Look who's all grown up!

Will's hair has been out of control lately. He's got tons of curls in the back, and on top it is SUPER long. We decided it was finally time for a "real" hair cut. I love his hair, but it simply needed to be cut. Plus with summer and warmer weather coming, I know he'll appreciate having it a bit shorter. And it'll grow fast.

So we snapped some before pictures and headed to Cookie Cutters.
 
 Check out all of those curls!
 His hair grows so fast. I feel like I just barely trimmed around his ears and they are covered already!
 
All ready for his cut!

And let me tell you, that place is awesome! The little chairs are adorable, they have a movie going, books to read, etc. Will wont let me get close to his hair so I was expecting chaos. But he did so great! He sat still (for the most part) and didn't cry once. Well, actually he started to cry when we were leaving. I guess he didn't want to go home.

I went a bit camera crazy and probably took over 100 pictures. Haha, so here are a few.
 His face just makes me melt! I have one cute kid!
 So many new and exciting things to see, the last place he wanted to look was me.
 She used clippers on the side, then cut the top with scissors.
 Aren't those seats just the cutest? I want one for home. He would love it.
 Top is wet and ready to be cut.
 Top was so long, it would just curl and fall over.
 
 Oh those cheeks....I'm in love.
 All finished and wanting to play.
 It looks so precise and neat!

 And here are just a few comparisons of what it was like before and after.
 
And a few more of the final product.

 
 

Isn't he just the most handsome little boy you've ever seen? I love it and I am so happy with how it turned out. My little baby doesn't look like a baby anymore. He's quickly growing out of that stage and looking more and more like a little boy.


Monday, March 12, 2012

Vacation Time!

The time has come: Lance and I are heading to Hawaii in the morning. My mom and sister came a few days ago to spend some time with Will and they took him back to Boise, ID yesterday. By the time we get back, it will have been around 9 days since we've seen him. We have never been a night without him, so it will be interesting. I think it will be much harder for us than for him. He's surrounded by cousins and aunts and grandma to spoil him. Everything seems fine so far and he slept great for them last night. Just hope it continues.

On a completely different tangent, today I ran 2.75 miles in 33 minutes. That is pretty close to a 5k which means I am almost half way to my goal of a 10k. I have no doubt that if I keep this training up that I will be ready for my race in June.

Well, just wanted to do a quick update. I'm sure the next post will be long and will with lots of beautiful pictures of Hawaii and our tanned selves (hopefully tanned and not burned!)

Everyone have a great week!

Saturday, March 3, 2012

My First Race

Running has NEVER been my thing. You'd think that I'd be a decent runner after playing soccer for 7+ years, but no. Even with daily practices, I somehow managed to never get in shape. Don't ask me how that is even possible.

But I've always wanted to be a runner. The few times in my life where I was actually in decent shape to be running, I actually quite enjoyed it. One of my New Year's resolutions was to start running and build my endurance with the intent of running a half marathon sometime this year.
As embarrassing as it is to admit, at the beginning of the year, I would get tired after a quarter of a mile. A half marathon seemed SO FAR out of reach and like it would take YEARS to get to that point. Then I started running...just a little bit each day. Suddenly, I was running half a mile a day. And then one day, I finally ran a full mile. Then I started the Couch to 5K program. And yesterday, I found myself running 1.80 miles and not feeling like I was about to die.

I know this doesn't sound like a big deal, but for me it really is. I'm still a long way off the half marathon, but I can feel my endurance building each week.

So I entered my first race. I signed up for the Utah Valley 10k on June 9th. I knew that by actually registering and paying the money would be a great motivation for me and force me to see this thing through. I'm actually quite excited for it..and if anyone wants to join me...please do! I run at a VERY slow pace, so you may not want to actually run with me, but I'd love for anyone to join me.