We’re in the double digits! Madden’s one-year birthday is
just a little too close for comfort. I’m already thinking of party details and décor.
This has definitely been the fastest year of my life. No wonder people have so
many kids in medical school, it’s the best way to make the time go by faster! I
would give almost anything to stop time though, even if it meant being in
school for forever. I know one day we’ll look back on these schooling years and
really miss them. We’ve been able to spend so much more time together this year
than we did in the past two years, and we’re so grateful that Jeff has been
here for all of Madden’s little milestones. Those two have such a sweet little
bond, and I love seeing how much Jeff loves Madden and how much he loves being
a dad. He’s really good at it. We were just talking about how we’ve been in
Florida for five months now which means Madden has lived here just as long as
he lived in Missouri. Can we really have moved that long ago? Time is flying by
so fast. But we are loving life and our continued adventure here in Florida.
1.
Madden is a mama’s boy, which I adore about him.
He always wants me to be close to him and he follows me around the house as I
walk from room to room. And when I’m standing still, he pulls himself up on my
legs and wants me to hold him. All the time! When Jeff gets him out of his bed
in the morning, he brings him in to our room and he gives me the biggest smile,
it really is so sweet. We miss each other during the night nowadays since we don’t
have many middle of the night encounters anymore. Madden loves playing with his
dad- as soon as he hears the door open when Jeff comes home from work he flips
out and starts breathing really fast and crawls over to the door to see his
daddy. But whenever he’s sad or hurt, he doesn’t want anyone but me, he
scrambles and crawls to me as fast as he can. We love our baby boy!
2.
He is pulling himself up on everything and
walking along the furniture and the walls. He’s finally figured out how to sit
down after standing up which is awesome because before he would get stuck
standing and not know what to do. A couple weeks ago, I was in the kitchen and
Jeff was at the kitchen table and I looked over at Madden in the family room
and saw that he had climbed onto his toy walker and was balancing on top. We
couldn’t believe it, he’s so fearless! We made sure to get a picture before we
helped him down. Then, about a week or two ago Madden was in the family room
playing with toys while I was in the kitchen and when I looked over to check on
him, he had stood up and was walking with his toy walker for the first time!
Such a little champ! He’s getting big way too quickly but it was so exciting
watching him walk with his toy for the first time.
3.
Right around nine months he was having some
issues sleeping in his crib. I would nurse and rock him to sleep like I have
always done and usually he’d stay asleep when I put him down in his crib. But
for a while, as soon as he hit the mattress, he would be wide awake and start
crying. He would cry and cry and cry until I went back in to get him. Sometimes
the carpet would even be wet from his tears right beneath where he was
standing. So sad! This went on for a week or so, and then we had lots of
company here which temporarily solved the problem because he slept with us
while our family was here. After everyone left, I was determined to start sleep
training him since I need to start thinking in terms of weaning him in the
coming months. I’ve always nursed him to sleep which has worked great for us,
but I’ve been wondering how I’m going to get him to sleep once I stop nursing.
So about a week ago Jeff and I just decided that we’re going to let him cry it
out and see how it went. Well, Jeff cracked first after about 20 minutes of
tears and he went in to get Madden. But I was the bad guy that night and took
him right back to his crib and he was not a happy camper. He cried for another
45 minutes or so and finally fell asleep. It has always been so hard for Jeff
and me to let Madden cry like that, but we knew it needed to happen. I was
thinking it would take a couple weeks of crying and misery for Madden to get
the point, but the next night when I put him in his crib he curled right up and
fell asleep. What?? I thought we just got lucky that night, but the next night
the same thing happened. It’s been a whole week now and there have been no
night time tears! We have the best baby, seriously. So now our new routine is
nursing, brush teeth, books, bed. I always heard that babies thrive on routine,
and I’m thinking that they’re right!
4.
Madden had his nine-month doctor’s appointment
this past week on Dec 3, and he weighed in at 21 pounds and 31 inches long. Dr.
Shapiro says he is growing into a perfect point guard (Jeff was so proud.) He
got one shot this time and he didn’t even cry! Such a little stud. He must have
been brave for me since he knows what a wuss I am with shots.
5.
Mad is eating just about anything now. We’re
done with baby food, he never really show much interest in it anyway. I
actually have a lot of fun making his meals because he is such a good eater. He
loves grilled cheese, quesadillas, blueberries, bananas (which he likes to feed
to himself and shoves his mouth completely full until he gags, but he won’t let
me take it out of his mouth), apples (he likes to finish off my apple core),
cooked carrots, quinoa, oatmeal, string cheese, goldfish, applestraws,
crackers, avocados, and noodles. Oh and toilet paper, he’s discovered how to
unroll the toilet paper dangit. He also
loves water, especially from my glass. And he’s still not holding his own
sippy. The funniest thing about how he eats is he shoves his mouth full of food
and he takes forever to swallow anything. Sometimes even a half hour after I
take him out of his high chair, he still has food in his mouth!
6.
His new favorite thing around the house is the
dishwasher. I used to let him stand up and play with the cups and things while
I had it open, but then he discovered the detergent slot with leftover soap in
it and he thinks its food, so now every time he sees the dishwasher open he
crawls over as fast as he can and sticks his finger in the soap. Why do babies
always find the dangerous stuff! I have to be really really fast opening and
closing the dishwasher now.
7.
Madden loves going to church. He loves the
scratchy walls, the long hallways to crawl down, the huge gym with dirty floors
that ruin his shirts, the pews to walk along during sacrament, and all the
young women that fight over who gets to hold him next. He’s such a social little butterfly- as long
as he’s being held, he’s a happy camper.
8.
This past month Jeff and I taught Mad how to do
high fives. He’s really good at it too! He gets really excited and slaps our
hand about a dozen times. He also claps his hands all the time now too, especially
when we start singing patty cake, or when we say, “YAY Madden!!”
9.
Yep, Mad is still a biter. I think all these
months of biting have only made his teeth more sharp. Whenever I’m holding him
he turns around and chomps on my shoulder so hard that I have bruises. He’s
also attacking my face more and more. Sometimes I get bitten on the cheek but
sometimes I get lucky and get a slobbery raspberry blown on my cheek. When I
pucker up for a kiss he leans in and eats my lips. I say it’s close enough to a
kiss.
10.
He hardly ever whines when he wants something,
instead he grunts and kicks his left leg until he gets it.
11.
We have a picture wall in our family room,
mostly of pictures of Madden, but there’s one of our little family of three. I
take Madden up to the wall and point to the pictures and say, “Mama, Dadda,
Baby, Mama, Dadda, Baby.” He smiles so big and jumps up and down in my arms. I
think he’s getting the rhythm of it too because every time I’m about to say, “Baby”
he looks up at me and smiles.
12.
Our baby is crawling normal now! It’s been all
army crawling up to this point, and he’s been so active walking around that we
kind of thought he’d skip the whole normal crawling thing. But last week when
we were at the beach with Jeff’s family, he was scooting around in the sand
naked and I think he finally realized that he didn’t want certain parts
touching the sand, so he picked his little tummy up off the ground and started
crawling like a big boy! I even got it all on video! It took a couple days to
start doing it at home, but now he’s crawling all over the place and he looks
like a little robot baby doing it too.
13.
My favorite thing Madden does these days is
smile. He’s always been the most smiley baby but he has a new smile that makes
us melt even more. He scrunches up his nose and squints his eyes and gives us
the cheesiest grin. It is so funny and the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. I hope
it’s not just a phase, I think I’d be totally fine if he flashed that cheesy
grin the rest of his life.
On to another month of kisses,
hugs, and lots of boy stuff! We’re excited for our first Christmas as parents
and we’re even braving the frigid weather and heading to Denver for a real snow
white Christmas this year. Christmas in Florida sounds nice, but it’s just not
very festive down here. We love our Madden more than anything and are grateful
that he’s ours!
