Is it Christmas Yet? (11 months, 3 weeks)

Hello!

We got our pictures back from our photo shoot! There are lots of cute pictures to share with you but Mommy said I can only post two today. She's going to make a "best of" slideshow and put it to music. We'll post it when we get it done. For now..here's a sneak preview!


I look so angelic in this picture. You'd never imagine the trouble I can get into!

I still really like to play peek-a-boo. I'm pretty good at it now. I peek around corners, under tables, and, of course, underneath blankets.

This week I got a birthday present and a Christmas present in the mail from Uncle Mark, Aunt Angelica and cousin Lauren. They live in Virginia so they won't be able to come to my birthday party. I'm sure the presents are nice (Mommy said I couldn't open them yet) but the box with a bunch of crumpled up newspaper was AWESOME! This provided many minutes of entertainment.

I found a new set of cupboards to explore this week. I can't believe it took me this long to discover all the neat things in the dining room. Here is me with some parts to the video camera.

So far I've been pretty good about leaving Christmas decorations alone but I really can't help myself when it comes to Mrs. Claus and Mommy's snowman collection. Here I am caught red handed (more like Mrs. Claus handed!). Shucks! Mommy says she actually has a lot more snowmen that she usually puts out but not this year. She said it was for my own safety as many have little parts that I might swallow. She's probably right... I do put anything in my mouth.

I don't spend all of my time getting into trouble. I also have some quiet reading time.

This is my favorite magazine. It's all about toys for babies based on their age. I can't think of better reading material than toys!

On Friday Grandma and Grandpa Dalton picked me up and took me to their house! It was my first time going to their house without my parents. I had a blast! Mommy and Daddy were busy getting the house and food ready for their annual Christmas gathering. Although I love a good party, I had much more fun. On Saturday they brought me back home. Mommy and Daddy slept in on Saturday, went out for breakfast, and did some Christmas shopping while I was gone. They said they accomplished a lot because they weren't chasing after me all day.

This morning I had a better day in nursery. Mommy and Daddy didn't get paged and I only cried when they dropped me off. Otherwise I had fun playing with my friends and all of the neat toys. In honor of the Army-Navy game yesterday (Yay Navy!) I posed for my best "I want YOU for the US Army" impersonation after church.

Then I had fun climbing all over Mom.

What's new with my development? I'm getting much better at standing. I can stand up all by myself and stand unassisted for quite awhile. I'm taking more and more steps. I'm getting really close to just taking off across the room. For now, I'm still a bit cautious when it comes to walking. Also, I learned how to go down the steps. Mommy and Daddy have tried to show me many times and I always resist. But when I got home from Grandma's yesterday I crawled down a few stairs properly. I did it again today. Mom and Dad are so happy!

I've been eating some more table foods. I really like shredded cheese. For awhile I wouldn't self feed cheese (or bananas, or eggs, etc) because I didn't seem to like anything that sort of stuck to my fingers. I seem to be getting better at this. I still really like reading books and dancing to music. We've been listening (and dancing) to a lot of Christmas music lately. Other than that I'm just getting ready for my Grandpa and Grandma Vance to visit this week and for my big BIRTHDAY PARTY on Sunday! That's right! I'm turning one next Monday but my party is Sunday. I can't wait!!

I'm going to leave you with a video of me playing with my cake pan. Mommy posted this on Facebook earlier this week but Grandpa Dalton requested I also post it on my blog so here you go!