Dear Julien,
I’ve missed two updates from life being so hectic in the past few months and here we are staring your first birthday down way too soon.
You’re starting to have that look, that toddler look instead of an infant’s look. You’ve been so busy crawling and cruising the furniture that you’ve slimmed down some, though you still have nice chubby thighs and dimples in your cheeks.
Mobility has been the big milestone of the past two months since I last updated. You’ve gone from uncertain to expert crawling baby and from crawling baby to cruising baby, tentative pulling up that started about a month ago giving way to constant, capable pulling up and the first trial steps between pieces of furniture, holding onto one and stepping to the other without letting go until a hand is firmly in place at destination.
Like your big brother before you, you’ve drastically reduced the amount of milk you’re drinking over the last few weeks as your overall consumption of solid foods increases and the range of foods you can eat broadens. I’m looking forward to serving ice cream at your first birthday party so you can have some at last after months of “not for baby” while serving you sorbet.
You’ve grown a lot too, you now weigh just a few ounces shy of 20lbs and you’re 30.5 inches tall (last well-baby visit was on May 29), again matching your big brother’s growth curve with your height up in the 90th percentile or higher and weight hovering around average. You’re comfortable in 6-12 month sizes and starting to edge into the 12-18 stuff, especially pants, due to your height.
Verbally speaking, you’re starting to make more and more speech-like sounds and you correctly use “m” and “d” sounds to identify me and your father. It’s not quite “Mama” and “Dada” yet, but it’s close. You also enthusiastically say “Umyumyumumum” during mealtimes, lunging for the next spoonful of eats with eager appetite. You vastly prefer feeding yourself in fact and I’m thinking of ways to let you do that without turning mealtime into a total smear-fest of baby food. My best ideas are veggie breads and meatloaf, but I’ve yet to sit down and bake any of these for you.
Emotionally you’re starting to show signs of separation anxiety. You don’t like it if I leave the room you’re in and follow doggedly after on all fours, wailing at changes in direction that take me out of sight. You’re also showing affection these days, tilting your head to rest on shoulders with a sweet look, giving slobbery kisses and proto-hugs.
You only get sweeter as you grow up.
