Brenson is 18 Months Old!

Hi, Everyone! I know it's been a while since I've posted, but I'm hoping to get back into the routine of posting regularly. I have a lot to update you on, so I thought I'd begin with a recent biggie. 

As of August 10th, Brenson is now 18 months old! It's crazy to me to think that he's closer to 2 years old now than he is to 1. Wasn't he just born?!?

Last week, Brenson had his 18 month well check with his pediatrician. We are so blessed that he is a healthy, growing little man. He weighed in at 25 pounds and 7 ounces (only up 14 ounces from his 15 month appointment) putting him in the 45th percentile. His head circumference was 48cm and in the 56th percentile. He is still off the charts in the height department, measuring a whopping 35 1/2 inches tall! He's a full inch taller than Brianna was at her 2 year appointment, and 2 full inches taller than he was at 15 months old. Yep, 2 inches in 3 months . . . he's definitely our growing boy!

Bren wears mostly 24 month sized clothing with a few 2T pieces thrown in there as well. He wears 3T sized pjs, though. He has always worn larger sized pjs than regular clothes for whatever reason. He recently had a foot growth spurt and outgrew all his size 6 shoes seemingly overnight. We had one pair of 6 1/2s that were a hand-me-downs and they fit well. However, I recently purchased him two pairs of size 7s, and while they are a touch big for now, I know they won't be for long.

Bren is also wearing size 2T-3T undies. Yep, you read that right, he is wearing underwear during the day and doing great with it! When he was about 16 months old, he began showing interest in the potty and telling us when he had a dirty diaper. He even took his own diaper off once, but we squelched that behavior quickly! So, about a month ago we began potty training. He LOVES wearing his little undies! He wears undies full time at home and on short outings. For longer outings we still do a diaper mainly due to the car ride (like for music class, we drive 45 minutes and I don't trust him to hold it that long), and he still sleeps in a diaper (obviously way too young to hold it during sleep). He wears a size 5 diaper during those times. We are thrilled with his progress in this area!

I worried just a bit about his language development because I mentally compared him to Brianna who began talking at a very young age. However, in the past couple of months, his language has absolutely exploded! He won't generally repeat any words if we ask him to, but he will pop out with all different words/phrases on his own. He'll say two, four, and nine when counting to ten, and he can identify the letters B and R (his name is on the wall in his room, so we talk about the letters in his name a lot). He uses several "spacial" words and phrases. For example, he loves to say "over there", "up there", "under there", etc. His favorite word is probably "ball". He loves all things ball and saying the word ball! He can identify some of his colors, but not if we ask him to. He will point to blue or purple things often and say those colors, though.

Bren can often be a bit shy at first, but he also loves to perform if he's comfortable. When we go to church, he will walk around to everyone he knows and shake hands with them. It's seriously so cute to watch him offer his little hand :-).

Chris plays on a league basketball team, and Brenson loves going on the court with him to "play". Really, just about anything that involves Daddy is approved in Brenson's book! He's very much an outdoor, dirt, and sports lovin' kid!

He also adores water. We have worn out our water table this summer, spent lots of fun afternoons in the pool, gone to the splash pad multiple times, and even played in the rain. If he's outside, Bren is happy. If you add water to the mix, all the better in his book!

We are still going to music class once a week, Bren goes to Bible class on Sundays and Wednesdays, and he participates in our Fridays preschool class as well. Fridays is actually a class for children between the ages of 2 1/2 and 5. However, Brenson has been tagging along with us (it's a class where parents stay with their student) for about a year. He began pretty much fully participating about 2 months ago and is doing great! We love watching him participate in his classes.

Bren thinks he is as big as Brianna and can do everything she does. He mimicks her constantly and always wants to play with her or with whatever she is playing with. While he does play differently than she does, he keeps up with her pretty well. He would much rather bang a baby doll's head on the table than cuddle her, but if Sister is playing with a doll, he wants one too.

She was hanging from this bar, so he had to do it as well. Strong boy!

Eating and sleeping are complete non-issues for us. He is great at both! He takes one nap a day that lasts about 2 1/2 hours. He will eat pretty much anything as long as he is feeding himself. He will refuse to eat if we try and feed him, but he uses utensils (forks and spoons) really well for his age, so we don't mind too much. We are often AMAZED at how much the boy can eat, but he is very active! In fact, he will not sit and watch TV or movies. He could really care less about either one (unlike his sister at this age). He will sit for books or coloring or painting, etc, but only for 15 to 20 minutes at a time. Lately, we've been struggling with him in church service but I think it's a phase and we'll get through it.

We have had a little trouble lately with Brenson hitting his sister and really just being rough in general. He knows better and will often give us the sweetest faces when he knows that he could get in trouble. He is so cute that it makes it hard to discipline him, but we want to be able to be around him when he's older, so we do it. He's definitely entered the "trying" behavior earlier than Brianna did!

Brenson gives the sweetest hugs. It's one of my favorite things that he does. He's very affectionate with us and we adore it. He will race up to us (he runs everywhere!), say "hug", hold out his little arms, and squeeze us tight. He even has sound effects to go with it :-).

We are blessed beyond measure with this little guy. We are so thankful that God entrusted us with him!

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!

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!