Dear Tyler, You're 11 months old!

Dear Tyler, 

You're 11 months old now. One month to go and you'll officially start becoming a toddler!  That's crazy. 

 You love me. You like to say "Go, go, go." It's not really counting as a first word though b/c you say it randomly. You might know sorta what it means, but I'm not sure. You point with one finger. You shake your head "no" and it really means no. You sometimes do it with a smile, but you do know it means no.
You wave your blanket like crazy when you're nursing. You stare up at me when you're nursing too and don't blink when your blankie crosses our eye contact path. If I look elsewhere, you're still staring when I re-connect with your cute eyes. And those eyes have not made their official color change yet either. They have brown, blue, and green. I like them and your long eye lashes.

You seem to have stopped growing. I don't weigh you, but your thighs aren't that huge. Your cheeks, hands, and feet are round enough for people to still say you're big/chubby/huge/cute, but you're still sporting the 6-9 month clothes. I feel lucky that I get to keep my little baby in the baby phase longer.

Your cousin Gracie is only 3 weeks older than you, but she seems to be much more advanced with first words, giving kisses, and even walking! I have to remember that you are officially a preemie baby and are quite content with the milestones you have achieved thus far. Plus, I really am not pushing the walking thing yet even though you do prefer to get around by pulling up and scaling around furniture and people legs since you're already proficient in your skill of crawling. You're a good climber too and can get up and down the blue couches fairly easily. You know to step on a brother's leg or to push a toy over to help you if it seems a littler taller than usual for you.

You can go up and down stairs although you much prefer to go up. You fell down 3 stairs yesterday and got a bruised goose egg on your forehead instantly. The baby gate has not been back down since. I'm so sorry.

You laugh when I sneeze. I discovered it on accident. I've actually tried to sneeze for you to look at the camera before but it didn't click until we were on the airplane on our way back from Aunt Kat and Uncle Preston's temple sealing in the Timpanogos temple.

I did it a couple of more times and you were facinated. You then mimicked my head throwing forward action; then added the "ah ah ah eh eh ah" part. Some day you'll end it with the "choo," but I like big little 4 tooth smile as the ending now.
You go to sleep easily. Our routine is to wait until we tuck your big brothers into bed and after you have a hay day climbing up and down their beds with throwing yourself backwards onto their beds making us very nervous, I put you in your crib and you cry for a couple of seconds then forget all of your worries. You actually don't cry a lot of the time and tuck your feet up under your tummy with your blanket in hand and close your eyes. I do put you down on your back, but you curl and move and groove. You take 2 naps, we're lucky if one lasts more than an hour.
You're way too wiggly on the changing table.

You love baths.

You like to play in the pool a little more now.

Your hair is a little long on the top front. I'm hoping people would tell me if I should cut it b/c looking back, Dylan's front patch of hair was ridiculous. You didn't really get the bald spot and mullet although I was keeping an eye on your nape with scissors ready. I can sometimes give you the perfect baby mow hawk, so I'm keeping your hair long and am hoping the rest of your hair will catch up soon.
You like your car seat. If you're getting antsy and I'm having a hard time getting stuff together to walk out the door, I put you in your car seat. You still fit perfectly well and haven't even used all of the slack in the strapps yet.

 If you're tired in your car seat, you do a sort of song with one sound: "eeeeeeeeeeh." That's how I know you're going to sleep.

You can play by yourself if you're rested, clean, and fed. You dump toys. It's cute now, but it will probably get old soon to your big brothers who have to do the cleaning up.
You like blocks. You don't do much sorting but do like to knock them over. You like to throw little toys too - like balls. It's a little short flip of the wrist and the toy will go up then down somewhere close to you so you can do it over and over again.

Peek-A-Boo can always make you smile, at least for a couple of seconds.

Your next post will be about being 1! No more months to go! I love you little guy!
Love,
Mommy