The big "one"

For this month's picture, here he is with Trilby, his kangaroo (wearing the outfit Dex wore home from the hospital a year ago). And, as usual, Dex is gnawing at something -- a new gift that he needs to cover in saliva immediately.

He is now 20 pounds. That's four times his birth weight! We were at the doctor's yesterday for the weigh in and he got his one-year shots then, too. These ones were in the arms rather than the thighs and he felt the sting. Ouch!

He is definitely on the move now so baby gates have been installed. The cats are so confused by these additional barriers. Now they sit behind the other side of the gate waiting to be allowed up/down the stairs (Can't you guys jump?!!)

Other highlights for the month:
- self-weaned off the 3 am feeding and now sleeps through the night in his own bed in his own room
- eating a lot!
- now showing food favourites (loves bananas and would eat some every meal if I let him, sometimes rejects green veggies)
- more words, mostly food related: bananas, num-nums, hmmmmmm (for yummy, I think)
- signing for more food
- can point to the light
- if he notices that there is no music, he will look at the stereo and point me in that direction
- bounces to music
- can climb three steps
- has chewed off every corner of every book he owns
- understands the use of some things and can play pretend (see this story about the tissues)
- can follow simple directions like "kiss the bear," "give me that"
- now brushing his teeth with assistance from parental units

As far as new adventures:
- been to the dentist to get his chipped tooth looked at (just a minor one, said the dentist, and no cause for worry). Still a mystery as to how he chipped it.
- tasted his first bite of cake

As far as mortal fears/neuroses of mine, here's a partial list of things we managed to dodge so far:
- no cracked skull or major spills requiring stitches or x-rays
- no disfiguring scars
- no falls down the stairs
- no allergic reactions to new foods
- no choking on coins, toys or other small objects
- no cat food ingested (not under my watch anyway...)
- no visits from social services
Not a bad list of things he hasn't experienced at age one, I thought.

Seeds

Sesame seeds are to babies what corn are to adults. Freaked out this morning when I opened his diaper and found what I thought were little bugs. While contemplating going in for a closer inspection, I remembered: Ah, yes. I gave him some of my sesame bagel yesterday morning.

Birthday highlights

Jon and I just celebrated 365 days without dropping the baby! Hooray! (Dex seemed relieved.)

Some highlights from today's party:
- Open House between 1 to 4 pm
- Forty friends in our wee house
- two dozen balloons
- two popped balloons and one crying child (not ours)
- two birthday cakes (one French orange cake and one chocolate cake)
- two unhappy cats locked in Jon's office

Milestones for Dex:
- first bite of cake
- followed shortly after by first sugar rush
- first encounter of the balloon kind (he was thrilled!)
- 365 days without being dropped

Dex had a very busy day, but he did so well. We are really lucky to have such a happy baby.

He was a little on the overstimulated side -- so many people in the house, lots of noise and activity, and the sugar for the first time!-- yet he stayed together with no tantrums. He was very tired and after everyone left, he managed to settle down for a nap. We were going to bathe him tonight to wash the cake from his hair and everything, but he was so tired, we just gave him a quick wipe to remove the first layer of sticky stuff and settled him in. He was ready for a sleep. Shhhhh... he's still sleeping now.

Will post his 12-month picture in the next few days. I'm a little pooped tonight.

This time last year...

...our little boy was born.

Tissue

Yesterday morning, Dexter was in bed with me and he got a hold of the box of tissues on the nightstand. He started to pull off one after another -- and would probably still be doing it if I hadn't accidentally "disappeared" the box. Anyway, he was sitting there with a bunch of tissues around him and I was lying down next to him. Then I noticed that he would lift up the sheet and tuck a tissue below my belly. What game is he playing? Then it occurred to me: he's giving me a diaper change. Let me explain.

There are various techniques for changing a boy because of the added water hazard (there is even such a thing as pee-pee teepees), but the way we do is by placing a tissue over the...how should I put this delicately.... let's just say ummm ... the source of the water hazard ... to prevent an unexpected shower.

So, that's exactly what Dex was doing. He was putting a tissue over my crotch the way we do for him "n" times a day. Funny guy!

Combination lunch

We're at the stage where we are combining feeding and entertainment. Read: he wants to self-feed a.k.a. play with his food before putting it in his mouth.

On today's menu: slow-poached organic chicken, carrots, peas, with toasted wholewheat bread followed by rice cereal, applesauce and baby num-nums for dessert. I'm not sure how much of the food actually made it to his belly but after about an hour in the high chair he seemed sated. I was a little skeptical that he actually ingested anything because I fished out lots of carrots, chicken, and bread from every nook and cranny of his high chair and his clothes, plus Hoovered the equivalent of another quarter of the bread from the floor.

His belly seemed full, so I was not too worried. I managed to coax him into taking spoonfuls of vegetables and chicken in between so I guess he might have eaten enough.

Besides, he combined the feeding and playing with another natural activity after a meal -- you know, the kind that nicely fills the diaper and puts a proud smile on his face -- so I suspected there was enough incoming that forced that out of his system.

---

Another thing today: he oscillated between being a toddler and a baby. One minute he is pushing my hand away because he wants to do it himself, then one minute I will offer him a spoonful of food and he would open his mouth without reaching for the spoon. This is the baby who has been using a spoon since he was six months old! I heard that this might happen. You can almost see the internal struggle between "see what I can do" (independence) and "please, baby me, mommy" (dependence). Aaah, my cute little boy.

Bummer

Why oh why are diapers suddenly a bother? It is impossible to diaper this little squirmy guy! He twists and turns, arches his back and scampers off with his little bum exposed to the elements while I chase after him with a diaper (I change him on the floor now because I'm afraid he'll fall if I tried to change him on the change table).

Sometimes, Jon and I need to tag-team it to perform a simple diaper change. Imagine us, two adults with a combined weight of well over 300 hundred pounds, and one of us with martial arts training (Jon has a black belt in karate), unable to restrain a 20-pound baby long enough to affix the adhesives on his Pampers Cruisers size 4!

The "T" word

When did he turn into a toddler?

The "T" word is cropping up surprisingly often -- he's eating cereal especially formulated for toddler's needs, he's wearing clothes for toddlers, the What To Expect Book now refers to the baby at month 12 as a toddler, etc. etc. How did this happen? Where did the time go?

Looking back, this time last year, I was still sporting a nice belly bump and complaining about my swelling ankles. Fast forward almost a year and here we are with Dex crawling on the floor, cruising around on the furniture, and scattering cats, toys, pot lids and other debris along the way.

One constant: I'm still exhausted and sleep-deprived, but having a great time. He is an adorable baby and I'm enjoying every fleeting minute.

I thought as he got more independent, I would have more time, but it turns out the reverse is true. Now that he is on the move, I'm on the move. Speaking of moving...well, gotta go. Must grab something to eat just in case the little toddler wakes up!

Cheerio monster

I'm so hoping that Cheerios are safe. He loves Cheerios (and/or Nutrios, the same cereal, but made by Heinz). We get a double bang for the buck. He gets to eat iron-fortified cereal and I get entertained watching him figure out this self-feeding thing. Right now, there's about a 70 per cent completion rate of food transfer from hand to mouth. Sometimes, he even remembers that he has teeth and manages to bite the oat cereal in half first.

Here's a short video of a Cheerio picnic. Notice the soaking wet bib and the dripping glob of drool.