One Year Old Boy!

Russell just turned one! I can’t believe my baby is growing up so fast. Here is a little about what he is up to.

He is still crawling. When he started crawling (at about 6 or 7 months, maybe) he would only army crawl, dragging himself on his belly. At about 9 months he started to learn how to really crawl on his hands and knees, but he would switch off with both styles. In the last month or two he has given up the army crawl, now that he can crawl really fast. He has been pulling himself up to standing for a month or two, and will walk along furniture if he has a specific destination, but he doesn’t do it very often. Even when I hold his hands while he is standing, he doesn’t seem interested in taking steps, so I think walking is still a bit away. He is a pretty good climber, though. He climbs onto the kids bed, up all the stairs, onto the kitchen chairs, into the bath tub and even onto the fireplace hearth.

In the last month or two he has come to realize that he is a kid just like his siblings and wants to do everything they do. Sadly, he is no longer content to just sit in the stroller and watch the kids play—he has to do it to. He loves playing in sand, in the water, in the grass. He loves eating sticks, and leaves, and dirt. He loves swinging, and slip’n’sliding. He can crawl up our Little Tikes slide and slide down on his own. He climbs into the Little Tikes red car and closes the door, and pretends he’s driving. He loves playing cars—he pushes toy cars around the house making little vrooming sounds. He is starting to look at books on his own. It is adorable to see him sitting there, looking and turning pages. He loves to crawl around and explore the house. He loves emptying out all my kitchen cabinets.

He gave up babyfood a few months ago. His favorite foods right now are grapes and blueberries. He also likes cheese, PB&J sandwiches, oatmeal, and most fruits. And finally in the last few months he has started to use a sippy cup. From about 4 or 5 months to 9 or 10 months he refused to take a bottle, so it was nice to have that option with him. He still puts everything in his mouth, and I find little things in there all the time. He also loves feeding other people his food.

When we first moved to Michigan he started having problems sleeping and was waking up in the middle of the night. That lasted about a month. Since then he is back to going to sleep pretty easily and sleeping all night.

He picked up on the kids shrieking screams a few months ago, and he uses a loud, high-pitched scream whenever he needs anything or just wants attention. Often he’ll get himself stuck somewhere and then scream for help.

I think his first official word is duck—“duh”. When we lived in W. Bloomfield we would go to the lake and he would sit in the stroller and we would look at the ducks. He was always SO excited to see them and would point to them and say “duh! Duh! Duh!”. He can also say “mama” and “dada” but I still don’t think he has related those words to us.

He loves to laugh along with others when he hears other people laughing. He is pretty easy going when his siblings try to pick him up, move him, etc, although he is starting to get mad when they take things out of his hands. He is generally a very happy and smily baby.

As he has gotten older I think he is looking more and more like Bill. I feel like he looks so much like Bill’s baby pictures. Aliyah and Spencer both have very dark brown hair and almost black eyes. Somehow Russell has light brown hair. After the summer in the sun, it almost looks blond! His eyes are a lighter brown, you can almost see some green in them. He has a lighter complexion than the other two kids, but that may be because I try to keep him in the shade more. We will see as he gets older and is running around with the big kids.