day at the park.

today we met mimi marti, aunt kelly, and cousins, tyler and vaida, at the park. stetson loved it...he crawled all over the place and really loved going down the slides with me.

he is getting so big! i can hardly believe he will be 18 months old in a week. he was taking more steps last night than i have seen him take so far. he walked from our coffee table to the chair i was sitting in (about 4 ft away). every time he took steps i gave him an m&m and clapped. so hopefully he will keep up the good work and the doctor will be happy with his progress at his 18 mo appointment.

needing a breakthrough.

stetson has been having a little bit of a hard time lately...first and foremost, he is teething...a couple of weeks ago it was his bottom 2 molars and now the bottom 2 eye teeth. he went from teething with his molars to having a cold to having hand, foot, & mouth to teething again. considering all of this, he hasn't been too terrible but we can just tell he hasn't felt good. today and yesterday his afternoon naps have just been getting back to normal. and apparently, thanks to the time change, we'll be waking up an hour earlier than usual until the time changes again. UGH! i'm seriously hoping he'll adjust at some point.

today was my first real experience with him having separation anxiety. his mimi (marti) came to keep him today while i went to work. he was upset when i left but i called her a few minutes later and he was fine...of course. ripped a little piece of my heart out, though. first of many, i'm sure.

he is still just taking a few steps here and there and crawling the rest of the time. tonight he was taking 5 or 6 little steps at a time and once he took 3 steps like he was walking for real. at one point tonight i really thought he was going to take off. i don't think it'll be long.

my little punkin.

we had yet to take any fallish pictures of stetson this year...so i had a little photo sesh with him yesterday. he was pretty cooperative. he's looking more and more like a little boy every day. he wanted to go outside after james left yesterday morning so he crawled into my lap and kept saying "bye" (which is a very country sounding bye). we don't have any stairs in our house so he loves to go up and down the front steps...over and over and over. even if there are wet leaves and mud. he was filthy by the time we went inside. (grandpa dan would've been proud!) he learned last time we were at my parents' house how to go down stairs by turning around and putting his feet down first...when he crawled to the first step i reminded him "feet first" and he said "otay". so every step he went down after that he would say "otay". so cute! and then he had picked up a little acorn hat and was studying it...so i picked up a hatless acorn and showed it to him. when i put the little hat on top of the acorn i told him "see this little acorn hat goes on top of the acorn" and he looked at it and gave me a long, drawn out "oooooh". i don't know if he actually got what i was saying but i love when he answers me like he does.

these feet are made for walkin'.

just wanted to mark it down before my swiss~cheese~of~a~brain forgot...stetson took his first steps last night...3 times he took one step...and then today he took 2 steps a few different times. we're so excited to see him FINALLY trying to walk. a couple of weeks ago he started standing up in the middle of the room (without pulling up) and can dance not holding on...so i'm pretty sure he could walk if he wanted. he is doing and learning more and more every day...it's so much fun to watch him developing. he now can say mama, dada or daddy, hey, hi, byebye, otay (ok), nuh nuh (no no), pee pee (please), ah duh (all done), uh oh, baby, guh (milk), ha (hot), yeah and wow...he can also tell you what a dog, cat, and cow say. he is still obsessed with trying to stand everything up on it's end and he loves to try to put lids on containers. he has a riding firetruck that he loves to play with but has just gotten into sitting on and tonight he was able to get off it by himself without falling. we're still working on getting on. he has a cold right now...it's sad but it's only the 2nd cold he's ever had so it's been over a year. we've been fortunate in that area. also, his 2 bottom molars have finally broken through in the last week. ptl.

my two mimis.

james has been on an 11 day trip (he gets home today!) so my mama and james' mama were both able to help me with little man. my mama was with us from last sunday to friday...keeping stetson on tuesday and wednesday while i was working and then just keeping me company the rest of the time. and then marti kept him on saturday for me. it was such a treat to have our moms here to help! it made the long trip much more bearable, although it was still hard. but we made it. dada's plane just landed and we are about to go pick him up! i can tell stetson has been missing him...he says dada alot..especially when he's going to bed. and i think he's a little tired of just being with me. james is really busy these days, so he's only home for 3 days and then he's off to california next weekend.

marti took these photos last saturday...the top on is at our house...my mom bought him a tunnel from ikea and he loves it! and the bottom one is him at a bookstore...apparently he crawled around like a maniac in there!

busybody.

yesterday morning i finally got to witness stetson standing up by himself...not pulling up but just standing up in the middle of the floor. his mimi marti had already seen him do it a few times. every time he does it i clap and make a big deal out of it...so last night he was standing up over and over...for just a few seconds....and then he would stand up and clap with me. but he is, so far, NOT interested in taking any steps. and he certainly doesn't want any help...he still won't really let you hold his hands and walk him. i don't so much mind that he's not walking yet...except everywhere we go he doesn't want to be in his stroller but i can't let him crawl in just any ol' public place. i mean, i have let him crawl in places i didn't think i ever would...such as target and the mall. but the main problem with that is that when there are a lot of people around, we're either in the way or i'm afraid somebody is gonna step on him. not to mention he won't crawl in the direction you want him to.

which brings me to the fact that he hasn't been to the nursery yet at our church...i just haven't wanted to take him...it just makes me anxious...BUT i decided yesterday that we're gonna try it next time we go (we'll be in vidalia this coming weekend). he's so busy and all over the place that i was chasing him all around the perimeter of the church and if i picked him up to get him out of the way of people or keep him from getting hurt, he would kick and scream. needless to say, i was feeling a little frazzled when we left yesterday. i've just never left him with people he doesn't know and just thinking about it makes me start having anxiety. but i've got to do it. i'm never going to be able to actually pay attention to what is going on if i don't. and it's just for the preaching. the kids stay in there for worship...which is good because he loves the music. he gets his groove on.

and his bottom 2 molars are FINALLY breaking through. praise the Lord. he has been miserable with them.

precious moments.

awesome photos courtesy of wonderful uncle E.

lately.

i can't believe it's been a month since my last post...the days fly by.

stetson is growing so fast...still not walking on his own, still cruising the furniture. he's very cautious. he loves trying to stand various objects up on one end (remotes, hairbrushes, etc), closing things (doors, sippy cup, things that have lids), putting blankets over his head and/or back, throwing things from his high chair or car seat and saying "bye bye", and tearing tiny bits off the toilet paper roll. a couple of days ago he tore about a 6 inch piece of toilet paper off and i said "let's not do that buddy" and he picked it up and laid it on top of the roll. so cute. he also figured out how to the flush the toilet yesterday and he now knows how to pump lotion out of the bottle. we're also starting to notice how quickly he can ransack the entire house. i guess because he wasn't mobile for so long, we're just now having to deal with that. he's also in the process of getting his molars and it has not been fun. but thankfully he has been sleeping fine. he is a funny little fella which sometimes makes it hard to get on to him. we've just started doing time outs because on the occasion that he gets mad, he has started trying to pinch or grab at me and not in a cute way. yikes. i wasn't expecting this so soon. but the majority of the time he is so sweet and precious...giving kisses often. a couple of new words are "work" (when james is gone and i say where is da da? he says a slightly modified version...more like wor) and just this morning he said please without me asking him to (which sounded more like pee pee). james is on an 11 day trip to ireland and england right now and we miss him terribly. thankfully my mama is coming today to stay with us for a few days. she's going to keep stetson while i work and just help my feelings in general.

first family + friends vacay.

so we went on our first vacation with stetson. we went with our group of friends here in charlotte (we went with the same group 2 years ago). there were 14 adults and 2 kids in one house. our friends heather and andrae rode with us, hence the pic of our car packed to the roof.

stetson absolutely LOVED the beach. the first time i put him down near the water, he went charging in and i had to stop him before the water was over his head. he would crawl in and back out and sit and clap over and over. his poor little knees got rubbed raw on the sand. i will be glad when he can walk so that won't happen. and of course he had a few bites of sand, which he didn't seem to mind at all.

the weather wasn't cooperative every day but we still had a good time. it was so much fun to watch him enjoying it. i was so thankful that he loved it.

15 months.

today stetson is 15 months old and had a well check appointment. he now weighs 21 lbs even (10th %) and is 31 inches long (50th %). he's a little lightweight. the doctor wanted to see him to make sure he was making some progress on his feet. and he was happy with everything stetson is doing now...he's still not walking on his own, but he is taking steps holding onto furniture and occasionally letting go and balancing....tonight he stood in the tub without holding onto anything for a good 10 seconds or so...so he's on his way...the doctor says he'd like him to be walking by 18 months. i think he probably will be.

he is also still talking up a storm...most of which you can't understand...he only says a few words on his own...mama, dada, neh neh (no no), yeah, bye bye...but it seems like every day he repeats more words after me...he can say baby really well...yesterday he said it when he saw a baby on the tv without me prompting him...i was trying to teach him to say beach because we're leaving for the beach tomorrow...he says bee...and he had been saying kuh whenever i would ask him if he wanted milk, but now he says gulk. sometimes when he doesn't know how to say what we're saying, he'll use sounds he knows and do the same number of syllables. all in all he is quite communicative...i'm still surprised every time i tell him to do something and he does it.

another thing he really loves is brushing his teeth. he gets so excited when i take him into the bathroom before bed to do it.

so tomorrow we leave on our first vacation since he was born. we haven't been to the beach since before i was pregnant with him. i am hoping he will love it.

while i'm thinking about it.

these days i have to do stuff when i think about it because sometimes it's days later before it comes back to my mind...i thought it wasn't for real when i used to hear people talk about "mommy brain"...but apparently it exists. anyway.

in the past week stetson has started letting go for just a few seconds when he's standing up...he's also starting to figure out he can reach on top of tables, nightstands, etc. he has made so much progress in the past month...it was just a few weeks ago that he pulled up to a stand on his own.

he also likes to take things (his shoes, my phone, remotes, toys) and put them on top of things that are higher up. he spends lots of time doing this....moving things from one piece of furniture to the next. and it's so much fun to watch him figuring out how his toys work and how to play with them.

i've also noticed that he has started getting under the coffee table or the kitchen table to poop...i guess he needs some privacy...it's pretty funny though.

his naps are so crazy right now. we stopped his morning nap for a week and he took a good long afternoon nap on some of the days...but then he was acting so sleepy we started trying to put him down again in the mornings but that only worked for 2 days. yesterday he did go down for a morning nap but i had to wake him up and then he wouldn't go to sleep all afternoon. so you can imagine how fun that was. so today, we're back on staying awake all morning and taking an afternoon nap. but the other thing is that he's teething again with his molars and i can tell it's bothering him. i guess there's always something to throw a wrench into the schedule.

culture: part 2.

so we took stetson to the children's library here in town called imaginon...it is awesome and they have a baby & toddler area with all kinds of things for them to crawl on and play with. stetson loved it...he went from one thing to the next for an hour straight. we'll be making this a weekly venture.

his hand is blurry because he was waving "hi" to his daddy

he's so adorable i can hardly stand it.

uh oh.

he's officially pulling up on EVERYTHING...so the breakable mixing bowls, measuring cups, etc. that i had moved to the higher shelf on our little island will have to be moved again! when he first started pulling up, he couldn't get down and would cry until you helped him. it only took him a few days to figure it out...it's so cute to watch him slowly squat down onto his bottom.

catch up.

so obviously it's been a while with no updates...stetson is growing and changing so much. he has 8 teeth and is starting to gnaw on things toward the back of his mouth so i think he might be getting some back there soon. he started standing up on his own the day before he turned 14 months!...i'm partially relieved to have confirmation that he's developing...we have to go back to the doctor at the end of this month so they can see how he's doing and determine if he needs physical therapy. i'm hoping he won't. he hadn't started crawling on all 4s or putting weight on his legs at his 1 year appt. so we've had a lot of progress. i've finally figured out that he won't do anything until he's good and ready. he's also eating all kinds of table food now...a couple of months ago i couldn't get him to eat anything but baby food. he loves just about any kind of bean...green beans, black beans, refried beans...rice, chicken, potatoes, corn, strawberries, watermelon, cucumber, green bell pepper, toast, cheese grits, oatmeal...and just about anything you give him off your own plate. he still doesn't really like sweets which is just fine with me. and his favorite snack is the little gerber cheese puffs. his naps are a little chaotic right now. he just wants to practice standing up instead of sleeping. but he's still sleeping really well at night...most of the time from 8pm to 8am at least. that is a treat! he still tries to mimic us a lot...whatever sounds or words we say. and i'm still surprised when he actually does what i tell him to. it's amazing when you realize they know what you're saying and are capable of doing it. all in all, he is still such a joy and i'm so thankful to be his mama.

great's house.

stetson and i took a road trip to see his great grandparents and great aunts and uncles in tennessee...it was a 7 hour drive and he did really well considering he only slept 1 of those hours both ways! no total meltdowns, just some complaining here and there. we had such a good time staying at great aunt holly's and uncle T's...unfortunately i didn't take any pictures of him or us with them or grandma and grandpa. i always forget to take pictures...but i did manage to get a couple of him with my phone. he had just started standing up...not on his own but he would let you stand him up....this was major progress.

a little more culture.

every june charlotte has "pops in the park" which is where the charlotte symphony performs outside and tons of folks bring picnics and whatnot and listen...stetson went once last year when he was 5 weeks old but he enjoyed it a little more this year...it took him a few minutes to warm up (as usual) and he wouldn't get out of my lap at first...but then he was happy sitting on the blanket playing with whatever we gave him...he eventually kept trying to crawl to other people's blankets...we had no idea how long he would last because we didn't go until 6:30pm and the music doesn't start 'til 8 but he did great...he didn't start rubbing his eyes until 8:45...it was lots of fun picnicking with our friends and getting to hear the charlotte symphony.

the great outdoors.

this was stetson's first time in his own baby pool in our backyard...he liked it but eventually was more interested in the grass...he's been weird about textures so i was surprised he like crawling in the grass...and i was nervous that something was going to bite him...i'm trying not to pass on my bug phobia to him so i try to not completely freak out in front of him if there is some sort of bug...but you know...do the best you can.

QT with dada.

james was in town father's day weekend and he took stetson to our friends' pool that saturday while i was at work...it was his first time in a big pool and he loved it but got bored eventually...guess it's not quite as fun for him as a baby pool where he can crawl around and play with toys.

busy little bee.

it's officially getting crazier at our house.  stetson is (finally) crawling on all fours and starting to pull up so he is all over the place.  for right now i'm enjoying it because we didn't know if he was ever going to.  he hasn't actually pulled up to a stand yet but is either on his knees or one foot, one knee...baseball picture style.  he's tearing up all our magazines and trying to eat them.  he's just being funny in general.  he claps all the time now (especially when he's eating) and shakes his head no when he's done eating or i tell him no.  he loves big boy milk...we're just trying to get him to eat more table food.  (the pediatrician would like that to improve over the next few months.)  he's had refried beans a few times and liked them...we've gotten him to take a few bites of scrambled eggs.  and of course he LOVES baby goldfish and the baby cheese puffs.  he's more open to crunchy textures.  he is still such a good baby and sweet boy.  he catches on to things really quickly...i am discovering that they understand  much more than you think they do.  

other firsts.

his mimi (vicki) took him to striderite to get his FIRST pair of walking shoes...he's still not actually standing up yet...but james and i both had to wear special shoes to correct our feet when we were babies, so we're starting early...we just put them on him for an hour a day and put him in either his jumper or walker.

FIRST ride in his new car seat...i couldn't even get him to look at me or smile...he would just stare  straight ahead at the windshield...and i have to say, it's so nice to not have to haul him to the car in the carrier!

long live the king.

stetson's first birthday party was a success...other than the dramatic gagging on the cake...he did really well despite the fact that there were 30 people at our house...he isn't as shy as he was so he acted like his usual happy self in the midst of all the chaos...he wore the little crown the whole time and didn't even try to take it off...and he loved all the cards he got the most.

a year ago.

so much to catch up on from the last few weeks...2 more teeth...(finally) forward army crawl/inchworm...pulling up in his bed...gagging on birthday cake...getting really good at feeding himself...going from formula to milk...big boy walkin' shoes...first trip away from him...so much going on...

but i was just sitting  here (tearfully) remembering that this time last year i was having contractions...that lasted all night, every five minutes....until they became irregular early in the  morning...went to the doctor around 9 am...5 cm...sent me to the hospital...contractions stayed irregular until she broke my water i think around 1:30pm...epidural maybe an hour later...and he arrived at 7:50pm.

while showing pictures of him during my first trip away last weekend, i got asked if i walk around feeling like my heart is gonna explode all the time...that would be a yes.

what an incredible joy he has been.  

i can't believe it's been a year.

slowly but surely.

stetson is slowly starting to be interested in moving around...he can scoot backwards on his belly but hasn't figured out how to go forward yet.  when he's in his bed, he is constantly getting up on all fours and rocking until he goes forward onto his belly...he even pushed himself up onto his bottom in a sitting position the other day.  he also moves around in his walker (backwards) and has started jumping in his johnny jump up.  now that he's trying to move around, he has become more interested in the things around our house...i guess this means sometime soon we need to babyproof.  he's still super content playing with his toys and will play with the same one for long periods of time.  his babbling is so funny to listen to...he can make so many sounds now and he puts them all together like he's really trying to tell you something.  he tries to copy any sounds you make with your mouth and will randomly repeat a word.  unfortunately, the one sound he hasn't made yet is MAMA.  i'm pretty sure he calls both of us da da...sometimes da dee...or the other morning when i went in to get him he said "hey deedee".  i keep saying mama to him but that's one of the few things he doesn't try to repeat.  he also has started trying to push me away when i'm kissing on him, but i keep reminding him i waited a long time to have my own baby to kiss.  his birthday is less than 3 weeks away and i can't believe it.

dirt don't hurt.

stetson and i sat out on the front steps after lunch today...he liked picking up dirt out of the pot and dropping it on the ground...and i finally got a good shot of his new teeth!...his cheeks are chapped again from sleeping in his drool...i think he's about to get another tooth.

i love my bed.

i took this monday night...he had just had a bath and he was so excited to be in his bed.  we had been out all day and he napped in his stroller so he was thrilled when i put him in the bed...he kept rubbing his hands across the sheet and smiling!...i know how he feels...i feel the same way about my bed.