Letter to baby

Dear Owen,

I am so late in writing this letter this month.  I think I've been denial that my 11 month old is weeks away (now just 1 week away) from turning 1.  My baby is growing up.  Ugh, that's a tough pill to swallow.

But since you are still 11 months old, let's have a chat about all the awesome things you're doing.  Such as, you have mastered crawling!  There's nothing holding you back now, and you are so much happier now that you are completely mobile.  You pull up on absolutely everything and let those hands get you into a ton of trouble.  Case and point, I let Luke have his pancakes in the living room one morning while I went to fold the clothes.  Luke's plate was safe on the ottoman (or so I thought), but when I was done folding clothes I came back to find that you had pulled his plate off the ottoman and you and Baxter were having a good old time eating pancakes.  Meanwhile, Luke was engrossed in watching Netflix and could have cared less to come warn me that syrup was soaking into the carpet.  You both eat at the kitchen table for all meals now.  No exceptions.

You are learning more words!  In addition to 'mama, dada, baw (for ball)' you now say 'i by' for high five and 'ba' for bath and 'bye bye'.  You're one smart cookie.  You also blow kisses, but only when it's convenient, and you like to pretend sneeze and do it until someone joins in, in which case you get a pretty good case of the giggles.

You STILL aren't sleeping through the night and I've had about all I can take.  We're down to just nursing at night and I think you're so accustomed to waking up for a midnight snack (or three) that it's just part of the routine.  A few nights ago you were up and after being fed you refused to go back to bed.  I'd rock you until you were fast asleep and lay you down in your crib and you would wake right back up.  We did this a few times and finally I just left you in your crib and let you cry it out.  I was tired and we had to work the next day.  Eventually you fell asleep and as long as your fed, dry and safe, I say, cry it out.  Harsh?  Maybe.  Necessary?  Probably.

You love balls and it's the first thing you go for.  There can be a zillion other toys around and you will find the one ball to play with.  It's really entertaining watching you crawl around chasing that ball from one end of the house to the other.  Other than that, you really enjoy destroying Luke's train tracks and climbing all over daddy when he's in the floor with you.  You also love watching Luke to see what he'll do and if he'll engage you in play.  You two are so sweet!

You're eating table food now and won't hardly eat a container of baby food anymore.  It's great that you'l pretty much eat whatever we're having, it makes it easy when we're out to eat.  I'm hoping we can continue you on this path of eating what we eat so you won't be so limited as to what you like like your brother.  So far you're happy as long as you're fed.

We're getting ready for your first birthday and can't wait to celebrate!  You're a pretty awesome baby, so I know you'll be an amazing one year old.

We love you so much,
Mom and Dad