Happy 1st Birthday Maxwell!

It's been an amazing first year! We love you SO much!

Max, months 10 &11

It's been a crazy weekend. Max was pretty grumpy on Friday and I figured it was teething. Saturday he just wanted to sleep and cuddle most of the day, he had a fever. Today he was acting happier but his fever still hadn't gone down. By the afternoon I called the Doc and they said that because he's had an ongoing runny nose and cough and now fever to bring him in, turns out he has an ear infection :(. Just the right ear though. Thankfully he's still eating and sleeping ok. This is the sickest he's ever been. Poor litte guy! Hopefully he'll feel better within the next couple days with the medication. Enjoy this enormous post!

I better get this down before Max turns ONE next week!!

Fun things about Max between 9-11months:

- He can drink from a sippy, suck out the water, although he still needs help tilting it up. He drinks from cups and water bottles when we hold them.

- cruises very well and walks with his walker toy.

- goes up stairs, but still tries to sit back sometimes (which scares mama!). We'll work on going down!

- loves to take things out of a container and then put them back in, toys in a bin, cheerios in a bowl or cup. produce in the fridge doors, he loves the fridge!

- He loves to play with the water dripping from the bath spout, I turn it to a trickle for him. Also is fascinated by the drain and the water going down it.

- He can reach higher things and wants to climb over things but sometimes will end up smashing his face or he'll catch himself with his hands and get stuck. He tried to climb into the bathtub one night and ended up smashing his face on the bottom and got a bloody nose :(.

- Loves his Fisher Price Little People Farmer and Little People book "On the Farm". They are kind of like his comfort toys. He doesn't like blankies or stuffed animals as much.

- He loves to shake things that make noise, rattles, baby food jars with a coin in them . . .etc. He'll always test out new toys to see if they make noise when he shakes them.

- Everything still goes in the mouth.

- He has gotten two new teeth in the last month, he had the front four by 9 months, but now has another on the bottom left and top left.

- He will eat anything once you get it into his mouth but it's hard to get him seated in his high chair and interested in his food, he would rather be crawling around or playing with toys.

- He feeds himself very well, cheerios, crackers, pieces of cheese . . .etc.
- When he's pulled himself up to a table and grabs a toy sometimes he'll hold a toy in both hands and stand by himself for a few seconds! No steps yet.

- He's getting more cuddly, especially when he's tired, kisses on his face make him laugh but he will push my face away when he wants to be done.
- He loves me to hold him around the house and still nurses 4-5 times a day I'd say. We'll figure this weaning thing out once he hits one.
- He comes and stands up against our legs, holding onto our pants when he wants to be picked up, so cute!

- He has more hair, I think he has his daddy's hair and eyelashes, though he's looking more like my baby pictures lately. Jared wants to cut his hair, I say no!

- He has the sweetest smile and cutest laugh, very ticklish. I like to tickle him on his legs.

- He likes to bounce when he hears music, I am just so happy about this one, I am the same way!
- He also likes to bounce when he's holding onto something that wiggles. Sometimes I hear squeaking on the monitor and will go up to his room and he's holding on to the side of his crib and bouncing the mattress, then I come in and he just starts laughing.
- He has a pretty large "vocabulary" but most recently he's been saying "whoa!", "dis" and "yugo yugo yugo"
- Still loves to be outside and explore, loves to watch and follow the older kids.

(i'm sure this won't be the last time!)

- Still napping twice a day, 6-6 at bedtime but up once or sometimes twice at night. Often though, he'll sleep a stretch from 6pm-5am with a quick snack and back to bed till 6 or even 7am!

enough pictures mom!

He just has so much personality these days. He's just his own little person with his own little character. Can't believe he's almost ONE! We love our little Max-man!

and a cute video . . .

A Few Thoughts . . .

I have a new update on Max that is almost ready to be posted, I just need to get a few more pics off my camera. It is way overdue, he'll be ONE next week!

Just felt like spilling some thoughts . . .
- I subbed for my friend in primary on Sunday, 4 year olds, so cute! I only had two boys, one was named John, I honestly had to ask him his name 3 times I just wasn't expecting such a normal name as John! There are so many different names out there these days . . I thought he said "Tron" at first!

- One day in like 2007 at work the power was out after a wind storm hit Salt Lake, after a few hours they sent all the kids (and teachers) home, I headed over to Anthropologie in the Gateway to buy this blue and white bath mat I'd had my eye on. It was so cute, and way too expensive for a bathmat but I bought it. Now it is so yucky, I just can't get the dirt out of it! I wash it over and over, I even used a carpet cleaner on it, maybe it's disinfected but it doesn't look clean, argh.

- Max pulled an entire carton of eggs out of the fridge and dumped them on the kitchen floor today, it really was my fault for not putting them away properly and then letting him play in the fridge, oh well! It was all cleaned up in like 5 minutes.

- I love that it feels like May, and it's February, and we play outside everyday! After Christmas I kind of forgot that it was winter and snowing in other places!

- I went to Utah two weekends ago because Jared was out of town. Love my nieces and nephews!

- I'm having a hard time getting excited about the Olympics, I don't know why. Last time in 08 I watched every night while I was packing up our apartment, it was right before we moved. What are you looking forward to?

- The mail, I'm expecting a letter that should've already been here. Isn't it amazing that anything gets to us via the mail? millions and millions of letters and some how we usually get most things, I'm pretty impressed, fascinated actually, I've always wanted to work at a post office.

- Regina Spektor, The New Moon Soundtrack, and pink dish gloves make doing the dishes a lot more fun! Thanks to my Mother in Law for all of those things!

- Max has talked in his sleep two or three times, most recently tonight, so cute.

- I cut Jared's hair the other night. My husband has so much hair, it is crazy. I love it, it's really hard to mess up cutting it, unless you leave the attachment off the clippers (just did that once though!)

- I keep hearing "oh man!" and "come ON!" coming from downstairs, the Lakers are on, and they're playing the Celtics.

Ok, enough thoughts! I'll get that post up this weekend, I promise!

Never too Old . . .

. . . to flirt with your spouse.

Max likes to look at people. Sometimes seriously, sometimes smiley. At the grocery store an older couple was in front of us at the check out. When they were through, the husband went back in the store to get something and the wife waited at the end of the checkstand.

While I'm getting rung up, Max is just staring at the wife, she's talking and smiling at him, he smiles, but just keeps staring.

Her husband returns and she says to him, "Honey this baby just can't stop staring at me!" and without a thought he replies "well, neither can I!"

How cute is that?

New Years & 1st Surfing Lesson!

We arrived back home in California a few days after Christmas. Max slept almost the entire flight! We celebrated Christmas at our house . . .


and again with the White's on New Years Eve . . .


Santa brought Jared a surfboard for Christmas, it's great that Jared already had a surfing buddy, his sister Jessica!
On New Years Day we headed out to Doheny Beach to play and we watched Jess surf with some friends. It was a bit chilly but Max had a blast receiving his first surfing lesson . . .
Step 1: paddle with all you've got!Step 2: Stand up and enjoy the ride!I've never seen the tide so low at Doheny, very rocky, but still beautiful.

I've decided a little sand never hurt anyone, since he started crawling, I can't keep him out of it. I guess he can only eat so much(?!).
LOVE this photo!