Journey to Baby Lehman!: 2009

On February 14, 2008, Jeff and I received the greatest Valentine's Day gift of all - referral pictures of our beautiful son. I can't believe that a year has gone by since that day! We look back at all of the positive changes that he has brought into our lives and are so proud of the progress that he's made.

And to celebrate this important anniversary, Christian decided it was time to walk! He's been toying with the idea for quite some time - he would usually keep in contact with the furniture or do his patented 'two steps and a lunge' - but on Saturday, he decided to go to town and started walking across the room, down the hallway, etc. He's clearly very pleased with himself as we act like insane cheerleaders at his accomplishments. Truly, we're amazed! It takes him a little bit of time to 'warm up' in the morning but we think he's well on his way.

Here are some videos of his walking progress - they were taken the night before and morning of his big breakthrough. We haven't been able to capture his best walking moments but they should give you an idea. As a side note, I apologize for how annoyingly I say "Good job!" in all of the videos.

The first has a bit of "Blair Witch"-style camerawork towards the end...

We didn't get the whole thing on camera, but he walked (very carefully) from the ottoman to the edge.

His eating has also picked up dramatically as well. For the past couple of weeks he's been more interested in spitting food out, throwing it on the floor, wiping it all over the tray, and screaming than eating. However, for the past couple of days he's been shoveling it down as fast as we can give it to him! Mealtimes are much neater recently and we hope that this lasts for as long as possible (ha ha).

Christian is starting to communicate with us as well. He now points to things that he wants; I noticed this yesterday at dinnertime when he pointed to the spoon to prompt me to give it to him. In addition, after dumping all of his books on the floor (we think he views this as his job), he picked up his Elmo book and crawled into my lap. He's 'talking' a lot but apart from the occasional 'mama' or 'dada' it's more just random sounds. When he opens his cupboard he will exclaim 'Da!' or 'Dada!' - we're not sure if he's expecting Jeff to jump out or if he's simply making noise. We did think he said something like "Thank you!" once but I'm guessing that's a bit of wishful projection on our part. Still, we're working on it...

In the bath...

Enjoying a Valentine's Day card from Grandma and Grandpa Blackwell.

We love you, buddy!

*blows off dust* Wow, it's been a long time since the last update, eh? I would feel even guiltier except that I know that I'm the only one who is reading this!

Christian turned one year old on January 4! He is such a happy ~~baby~~ little boy and is curious about everything (such as cords, the carbon monoxide detector, outlets, the plant). Right now he is crawling around on all fours - no more army crawling! - and zooming along furniture and using his walkers. We can catch him sometimes standing by himself if he's distracted, but he prefers to have something to hold onto. He's just discovered our stairs and can make it up the first three before sliding down again on his belly.

Also, he's very proficient at pulling things out and throwing them on the floor. Putting them back in? That's for the servants (aka, Mommy and Daddy)! We have a toy that personally drives me insane, because it's a developmental toy with different shapes (circle, triangle, square, etc.) that you can fit into the proper holes. Christian loves to take each of them out and put them in the most obscure corners of the house. So, every night I'm on my hands and knees trying to find the green star or the orange circle! Ugh! On the plus side, this talking toy always tells me what a great job I'm doing putting the shapes back in.

He can now wave bye-bye (sometimes with both hands!), clap his hands, place a ball back into a container, and turn a book page. He's just starting to imitate us and we're having lots of fun with him.

Some of Christian's likes:

His Elmo Live doll (Typical interaction: (1) Christian knocks Elmo over, usually by grabbing his eyeballs or mouth and hurling him on the ground; (2) Elmo then says, "Uh oh, Elmo fell down! Can you help Elmo up, please?" (So polite, delicately avoiding the cause of his current state); (3) Mommy or Daddy then rights Elmo; (4) Elmo then thanks Christian and tells him, "You're Elmo's best friend." Either Elmo is not too bright or (my pet theory) is trying some secret passive/aggresive method to guilt Christian into a less abusive relationship. So far...not working)
Walking along the furniture and his walker. Especially the walkers, although steering is an issue for him. Usually when he runs into an obstruction such as a wall (every 5 seconds), Christian will first attempt the brute force method of banging this walker against it repeatedly. When this fails, he starts this complicated series of movements (with a lot of grunting, unsure walking, and grabbing parts of the walker) to move it himself. So cute. (UPDATE: 1/26: he can now steer!)
Pulling his refrigerator magnet toys on the floor, hoping that they will go underneath the frig and drive Mommy insane (see my comments on the shapes toy above)
Being held upside down (Daddy) and having raspberries blown on his stomach (also Daddy)
Grabbing Mommy's hair and glasses. We're trying to break him of this one. When he starts staring at me very intensely, I know that he's plotting the best way to remove my glasses.
Sucking his right index and middle fingers - especially when he's tired.
Getting hold of a 'forbidden' item, such as a TV remote or mouse. We have several fake remotes but he's completely uninterested in them. Figures.
Grandpa Kurokawa is his favorite playmate, bar none. As soon as grandpa walks in the room he looks at us like, "I'm sorry, do I know you?"
Opening cabinets.
Being sung to. Wait until he discovers that we are tone deaf, ha!

Some of Christian's dislikes (aka, what a hard knock life he has!):

Getting his nose wiped. He'll try and grab it away from you and wave his hands as if to say, "You don't need this." Already trying Jedi mind tricks!)
Having cream rubbed on his face.
Getting cleaned up after a meal (wiping his hands and face). I even have a special song that sing during clean up to make it better. And no, it doesn't help at all.
(Hmmm...I'm starting to notice a pattern with the first three items.)
Sometimes, putting pants on and wearing hats. I long for summer when we don't have to put so many clothes on him.
Getting out of the bath ("Hey, I'm having fun in here!")
Being told no. He shakes his head at us.
Pretty much anything to do with hygiene is pretty high on this list.

Physically, he's doing great and has been healthy except for one scary bout of pneumonia in December and the perpetual runny nose: 18 lbs., 7 oz. at his year check up on January 12, which keeps him between the 3-5% for weight and he's still at the 75th percentile for height. He has six teeth and we suspect he's getting more, although we no longer stick our fingers in to root around for those back molars as he has a pretty serious bite! He has completely rejected baby food and now eats lots of grown up food (some current favorites: avocado, fruit (such as bananas or pears), rice - either plain or mixed with veggies and/or meat, toast, yogurt, eggs, oatmeal, and pretty much anything we are eating at the moment). He also eats cooked veggies such as broccoli and can handle meat as long as it's cut very small - he still has a hard time chewing big pieces of meat stuff. And I can't forget his drug of choice: cheerios. I don't know what General Mills puts into this product to make it so attractive to kids.

All in all, it's been a very busy six months, but he's changed so much and learned so much and we're just so proud of him! We love him to pieces and are so, so blessed and thankful that he's home.

And now, some recent pictures (the only interesting part of this post!):

With all of his loot at Christmas

With his birthday cake. Look how neat he was - I personally wanted the crazy picture of him with cake in his hair and all over his face, but some people (ahem, grandpa and Daddy) wouldn't let it get to that point. Such party poopers!