Brenson is 12 Months {1 Year} Old!

This past Sunday (February 10th), Brenson turned one year old! Our sweet baby has officially plunged into the world of toddler-hood. Sigh.

Here is Brenson in his last monthly growth photo that we'll take for a while:

I'm pretty frustrated with myself that I'm late on Bren's monthly update for the second month in a row. However, the benefit of being late is that he has already had his one year well check with Dr. F, so I have his official stats to include in this post. Brenson is currently wearing size 18 month clothes with just a few size 24 month pieces mixed in. He wears size 4 and 5 shoe, and size 4 diaper (although I bought a box of size 5s that he will be graduating to once we run out of 4s). At his one year appointment, he weighed 23 pounds and 7 ounces (60th percentile), was 32 1/2 inches tall (off the charts), and had a head circumference of 47 cm (68th percentile). At the same age, Brianna weighed 22 pounds and 9 ounces and was 29 1/2 inches tall. So, Brenson is a little less than a pound heavier than Brianna was, but is THREE inches taller!!! 

He did have a few immunizations at his appointment (which was Tuesday), and he's still not feeling back to 100 percent from those. He's been super clingy and just grumpy in general for several days. I'll be so glad when my sweet guy is back!

Bren is still a GREAT eater and sleeper. We are so blessed in those areas. For now, he is still taking one 8 ounce bottle of formula before bed, but as soon as this can of formula is gone, we are finished with the bottle! During meals and snacks, he is drinking whole milk from a sippy. He did struggle with this a bit at first, but I think it was that we served him the milk cold that bothered him more than anything. He is over this now and taking it like a pro. Just like his sister, the boy has never once held his own bottle while he's eaten :-). While on vacation this month, we let Bren have french fries. He immediately took a fry and dipped it in a small thing of ketchup like he had done it a hundred times. Then he just grinned at us! He was definitely proud. He sleeps around 11 hours at night, and takes two naps a day. His morning nap tends to be shorter (around an hour or so), while his afternoon nap lasts anywhere from 2 to 3 1/2 hours.

On January 15th, Brenson took his first steps. He would take 3 or 4 steps at a time before falling, and I was just sure that he would be walking before his first birthday. However, walking simply does not interest him at all. We encourage him to walk - and he will do it if we persuade him - but he much prefers crawling. I'm sure this will change soon enough, so I'm not worrying about it for now. He has taken up to about 10 steps in a row, so I know the ability is there.

There have been several new words coming out of Brenson's mouth this month. Those words include: Amen, me, bath, all done, book, and balloon. We have discovered that he talks on his terms and his terms only! He will rarely repeat us if we ask him to, but he will pop out with words on his own when he feels like it. Before each meal, we hold hands and pray as a family. Brenson has now started grabbing our hands and holding them during the prayer. Melts my heart.

Right now, pointing all the time seems to be Brenson's "thing". We saw this constantly while we were at Disney World:

The face in the photo below is also one that we see often. Brenson can be pretty stubborn with his smiles if he's not in the mood for play. I think the way that he sets that little jaw is just adorable.

Brenson still only has his four front teeth. I thought for sure since he cut those teeth when he was 7ish months old that he'd have more by now, but he doesn't. He has had teething symptoms for close to two weeks now, but nothing to show for it so far.

Some of Bren's favorite things include: finding mischief, rough play, putting things in and out of other things, hugging (still gives awesome hugs), eating, bath time, playing chase, playing peek-a-boo, and looking at books on his own (he doesn't really love being read to right now). He also loves playing with cars and noisy toys with lots of buttons. He is allllllll boy! He has also recently started recognizing himself in photos. He will point to the photo, point to himself (sometimes say "me") and just grin. So cute!

I'm planning a joint birthday party for Brianna and Brenson later this month, but we did celebrate his birthday on Sunday a bit as well. Here is the birthday boy with a few little gifts:

He was happy to be opening the gifts, but also very serious about it. He tends to be serious when he is concentrating.

Trying to see what is under the fun paper:

Sunday was also our monthly church potluck, so I brought a cake and we had a small celebration with our church family.

We went ahead and let Bren have his own piece of cake to dig in to. Ummmm, he LOVED that! It was a HUGE mess, but so cute! In the photo below, Chris had asked him, "Brenson, how old are you?" You can see his answer :-).

I helped him blow out his candle!

I'm not sure where he got the spoon, but he was really trying to use it. Eventually, he started flinging bits of cake and frosting all around with it, so it got taken away.

Happy as can be to be the birthday boy eating cake!

As hard as it is to believe you are already a year old, words cannot express how thankful we are to have you in our lives, Brenson! We marvel that God chose us to be your family. We love you forever!