Wonderland Found: Ten Months Old

Dear Larkin,

Yesterday, you turned ten months old. It’s so hard to believe that we’re working on planning your first birthday party. I’m constantly wondering how on Earth you’ve grown up so fast. You are a dervish, a whirlwind, a tiny, handsome tornado, leaving fun and exhaustion and destruction in your wake.

And really, you are so handsome. You just keep getting cuter and cuter all the time. Your hair has grown so long in the back and on the sides (although you’re still rocking the receding hairline up top!) and looks so grown up when I can tame it down. Your eyes change colors all the time, just like mine, although they mostly go just from blue to grey. You’re tall and lean and you have the most amazing smile I’ve ever seen. I know you would say that I’m biased, but it’s true. Total strangers stop me all the time to remark on what a gorgeous baby you are. You love to hear these compliments, and never fail to greet one with a big grin.

Not that you’re ALWAYS happy, of course. In fact, you’ve turned into quite the little drama king. You have started defaulting to your “it’s the end of the world” cry for everything. So basically, I never know if you are crying because your diaper is wet or if a wild boar has snuck in and is chewing your leg off.

As you can tell from the above clip, you’ve started saying “mama”. It typically only comes out while you’re crying or whining, but you’ve said it while happy once or twice. I love it. I love it I love it I love it. I eat it up! And it’s about time too, since you’ve been saying “dada” quite expertly for awhile now. In fact, you’ve been making some great verbal leaps. Besides starting to talk, you also have started understanding us very well. If I ask you where daddy is, you look around in his usual places. When we were going home today from an afternoon out, I told you we were going to see Gaunie and Nana. Your eyes lit up and you asked, “Dada?” “Yes,” I said. “Dada will be there too.” You started clapping happily.

This new understanding has led us to your new favorite game:

You could do this for hours!

You’ve also started finger foods this month. Once you allowed me to give you table food, it’s like a light bulb went off – “Oh THIS is what you guys have been trying to convince me is so awesome!” Suddenly, you love food! Just last night, you gobbled up a meal of rice and spinach, some Greek yogurt with mango, two Mum Mum crackers with apple butter, and a fourth of my chicken breast. Then you immediately nursed for a long time! I was super impressed. You love meat, especially chicken and fish, and I still haven’t found much of anything you won’t eat.

You learned to wave this month, and you do so by putting your thumb and forefinger together, then waving from the wrist. It’s adorable, especially when you do it all through the grocery store from your perch in the cart – you look like a beauty queen on a parade float! You also do it in restaurants, waving frantically to everyone who passes, just waiting on a response.

You got to meet your other great grandmother a few weeks ago (Grandpa’s mom). You are such a lucky boy to have THREE great grandmothers who adore you.

This month, I got my first lesson today in the school of "If it's too quiet, they're probably doing something they shouldn't" when I went to throw a load of laundry in, and came back to find you had opened the jar of coconut oil (that I had closed tightly so you could play with it) and was finger painting the wood floor with it. You really are just into EVERYTHING! You’re also very mischievous. I’ve been working hard to lose weight. One day, I went to weigh myself on Gaunie’s large doctor's office-type scale. I set you down on the floor while I climbed on. I pushed the numbers to the area I expected them to stop - but they kept going. Eight, nine pounds past what I weighed last week, and they still did not balance. I started to tear up, and then looked down to check on you – only to find you sitting on the back of the scale. Not cool, little man!

We’ve had an amazing month together. It’s been full of summer time joys, like swimming and hiding out in the cool library. We keep our days full of fun – play dates and story times and visiting with friends. You’ve enjoyed splashing in the pool with your aunt and uncle and cousins, and love that we converted G&G’s game room into a giant play room for you to crawl around and spread your toys around.