Brenson is 11 Months Old!

Last Thursday, our Brenson-man turned 11 months old! It's hard to believe. This is the first time that I've been {days} late on a monthly update for him, but I have loved thinking about all the fun things he was up to this month.

First though, here is his monthly photo with his giraffe . . . and it was taken on the actual day that he turned 11 months. SO. BIG.

One of the biggest things this month was Christmas. The boy loved the holiday. He had a great time helping decorate the tree, but it certainly provided us with many learning opportunities! He would try to be really sneaky about touching the ornaments by laying on his back and barely kicking them with his foot. Silly boy thought that he could get away with that :-). Overall, he did fairly well with all the decorations.

Brenson is wearing size 12 and 18 month clothes (more size 18 month these days), size 4 diaper, and size 4 shoe. We recently graduated him to 24 month footed sleepers, as the 18 month ones were not long enough. He still wears 18 months pjs that don't have feet, though.

Brenson is still a fantastic eater! Baby food is not his favorite, but he loves to eat whatever we are eating during mealtimes. He is down to taking only two 8 ounce bottles of formula a day . . . one in the morning and one before bed. We have started giving him whole milk to drink (from a sippy) during mealtimes and so far he's doing okay with that. During our little family Christmas celebration, we did a fun craft that involved sugar cones and frosting. Chris gave Brenson a piece of cone with frosting on it and he LOVED it!

There wasn't much frosting on the cone, but somehow he managed to get it everywhere. Even in his hair :-).

He is such a happy little guy, especially when eating! This was great practice for his first birthday!

Speaking of Christmas, Bren LOVED opening up packages. He had tried pretty persistently to get into the presents, so when he was finally allowed to do so, he went to town! Just look at his face in this photo!

Since he began crawling several months ago, he has been super fast. People comment a lot about how fast he is. He stands and pulls up at everything, but doesn't stand much on his own. He can do it for about 5 seconds, then he gets excited and falls. He really wants to walk, and I have started having him practice walking behind a push toy that Brianna had as a baby. It took him about two days to master that skill, and now he wants to do it all the time. A few times, he has tried to take steps on his own, but the balance just isn't there quite yet. He's just sooooo tall that I think it's going to take a while.

Brenson is also trying to say more and more everyday. He will randomly repeat a lot of things, but still only says Momma, Dadda, and Hi consistently. He also consistently shakes his head no (and sometimes says no) when he doesn't want something. We are really working on getting him to say bite, yum-yum, or more at the dinner table when he wants a bite. Since he feeds himself a lot of what we're eating, this doesn't apply all the time. He does best with yum-yum so far. He is really good at mimicking, and often repeats sounds that Brianna makes (like coughs, sneezes, crying, laughing, etc). He has learned to blow kisses, point to his mouth, ears, nose, and hair, and raise his hands above his head on command. It is adorable to watch him mimick us!

Brenson adores Brianna and wants to do everything she is doing and play in her room whenever she's in there. While I love how much he loves her, she gets pretty tired of him sometimes. Also, not all the toys in her room are safe for him, so I do have to be careful about that. One day, the children and I had gone somewhere and Brianna had a snack in the car. She made a royal mess of her carseat, so I had to uninstall it and bring it in the house to be cleaned. During the 3 minutes I was in the garage taking care of that, Brianna decided to "fix" Bren's hair . . . with lotion. There was a big glop of lotion in the back:

And a nice greasy streak of lotion on the top. He didn't mind at all, although Momma wasn't too happy! They do seem to find trouble together already!

Make no mistake though, Brenson is really good at finding trouble on his own :-). He loves to climb, so I have to watch his every move. He can even climb up on the couch by himself already! He LOVES bathtime (like really, really loves it!), so this day he crawled into the bathroom and climbed into the {empty} tub on his own!

 

He was having a grand ole time when we found him. Silly boy.

We were all very sick on and off during the entire month of December. Unfortunately, Brenson had his first ear infection during this time :-(. I felt so bad because I had no idea that his ears were bothering him. I thought he just had croupe (which he did) until I took him to see our pediatrician, Dr. F. Oh, and he made quite the scene in Dr. F's office. Bren was not happy to be there, and he let everyone know it. Brianna was never a crier in the doctor's office, so this was new for me. After about three days on an antibiotic, he was back to his normal little happy self. We were so thankful!

A few more random things: Brenson loves books, anything with buttons (especially if those buttons make a noise), balls, and blocks. He still only has four teeth. His eyes are the most beautiful blue, and his dimples melt my heart. He loves to give hugs . . . we get comments from people all the time about what a great hugger he is. He will actually put his arms around your neck and pat your back. SO SWEET! He does not, however, like to be kissed. He is still a great sleeper, and soothes himself to sleep the majority of the time. His smile lights up our days.

As we {quickly} approach Brenson's first birthday, we are cherishing every last moment of his "baby" days. Love this little man so much!