Good thing he has a cute behind...

William is on the move.

I mean, like, constantly. 

People would say - "Watch out when he starts walking!" and I would think - "Umm...he does a pretty dang good job of being a non-stop mover getting into trouble now and he's crawling...I know what I'm doing, yo."

And now I wish to go back to my past self and slap her across the face because I should never assume I even had a clue.  Seriously.  And that makes me scared of what's to come. 

So moving on - I take a lot of pictures with my cell phone.  More pictures there than with my camera these days just because it's handy. 

Cell phone pictures plus toddler on the move all.the.time equals lots of pictures from behind (or fuzzy because who has time to stop a pose for a picture, mom...).  Here are some of the priceless gems recently. 

Mr. Independent at the pool last week.  Mom who?

OK, he's not moving in this picture, but that didn't last for long.  If I can't get one from the front, I have to sneak up behind him to catch one.  On another note, my kid is in love with American Idol and Glee and anything that has music.

Yeah...he's the cool kid with a box on his head and one pants leg up.  What of it?

He's too cool to sit and watch a basketball game, he'd rather dance in front of this audience that obviously was assembled just for him...

Exploring during a trip to the mall.  He spent about 25 minutes running circles around this magical, musical and talking vending machine. 

Wordless Wednesday - Baby's 1st Haircut

It was time...to get rid of baby mullet...

Nothing an orange sucker can't help with...

"Who is that?  Who cares...this is delicious!"

"Yup, I'm a stud."

Christmas Recap

I realize I'm like two weeks late for a Christmas update, but I still wanted to get some notes and pictures down before it's Christmas again.

Since we have families that live over five hours apart, with families that both celebrate the big holiday on Christmas Eve, the hubby and I have compromised that we do every other year at eachother's families.  This year was our year to be with my family in Cincinnati, Ohio.  We got there on the 23rd and since I (and my sister and brother) haven't changed since I was a little kid, I wanted to open presents.  The opening not being nearly as fun as the giving as I've gotten older.  So we went to town with our family gift exchange before bed!  Christmas Eve was spent with my mom's side of the family - family, lots of kiddies, a fun gift exchange, tons of great food and good times.  It is, without a doubt, my favorite day of the entire year.  It always has been.  Christmas morning, it was fun to watch Wiliam open presents from Santa!  We stayed another few days before heading back to Illinois, and it was wonderful - some wedding planning for my sister, a trip to the Cincinnati museum center with Adam, overall relaxing. 

Hope everyone also had wonderful holidays and happy new year!!

Hanging with Grandpa

The newly engaged couple

"It's a....it's a....A BOX!!"

First music lesson with Uncle Jordan

"Santa? You still coming tonight?" 

Hurry, snap the shot with Auntie Mel before meltdown...

Christmas morning snuggles with mom

"Merry Christmas!!"

Hugs for Grandma

Congrats, baby sister!!

So today something awesome is going to happen!  It's actually could be happening right now!  (I've obviously scheduled this post)  My baby sister is getting engaged! The man of her dreams is probably going to get down on his knee to ask her to spend the rest of her life with him!  [Josh fooled me!!  He couldn't wait until Christmas Eve when this post was scheduled for and he proposed Friday!!!]  I'm so happy for them and I couldn't ask for a better guy for my new brother-in-law.  She has always been there for me and I can't wait to help her along the way to plan her wedding and to marry her man!

Congrats, sissy.  So happy for you and Josh.  Love you both so much!!

Let the wedding planning begin!!!!!!!!

(Not so Wordless) Wordless Wednesday - cell phone pics

Stay-at-home-daddy's important job is sending mommy pictures during the day!  Here are some of my favorites recently.

Not only does William love Cheerios for breakfast, Tressel does too.  He waits for his daily rations...

This kind of picture is just able to make me happy no matter what is going on at work that day!

Having fun with his daddy!  Another type of picture that could put a smile on my face regardless of how

much I wanna pull my hair out at work.

We aren't exactly parents that plop their kids in front of the TV to watch it endlessly, but

 I guess as of yesterday, our son is loving on Dora!  Who knew?!

My favorite things about my one year old

1. He is starting to take one or two steps at a time!  So cute to watch him try but he's not fast enough that I'm chasing him around everywhere.  hehe
2. The surprises I find now that he's putting toys everywhere and in everything.  A surprise block in my shoe.  A hidden car in the laundry.  Makes me smile.
3. He is loving music.  He wakes up from his nap and points to the CD player in his room and says "Dat!"  He wants me to turn on the music.  He hears music coming from anywhere and he dances.  I sing to him and he hums and mumbles in a singing voice along with me.  It's so fun and adorable!
4. He is starting to learn that the dog toys are for the dog, not him.  He will go get it and bring it to Tressel.  He's already learning to share!  Melts my heart!
5. Speaking of sharing, he's now to the age of handing you some of the food he's eating so you can eat it.  He thinks it's hilarious if you eat it.  You just need to work up the courage to stomach the half eaten cracker or soggy with slobber cheerio. 
6. He can totally give out hugs!  Talk about making my heart burst in my chest....he will hold his hands out wide and dive in.  He hugs his stuffed animals too (and calls them all "babies").
7. If he gets so excited at something, he will crawl so fast in any direction with his head down and make gleeful sounds.  It's so funny until he runs into the wall or furniture from not looking where he's going.
8. So it's one of those things your parents probably did to you and now we do it with our son.  "How big is William?  SO BIG!!!"  And he stretches both arms up in the air to show that he, is indeed, so big.  hehe
9. We have a bedtime routine and one of the tasks involves brushing his teeth.  We walk into the bathroom and he knows what this means.  He smiles really big to show me his teeth so we can brush them.  It's one of my favorite things we do at night.  Always makes us both laugh.
10. He's really getting into playing with books.  It seems that he's obsessed with the covers because whenever we read a story, he likes to flip back and forth from the page we are on to the cover.  He's slowly getting better and we can almost get thru all the pages of a book! 

Hugs for bear....

OK, so the game in this picture is something I like to call take-all-the-books-

off-the-shelf-and-then-put-them-back-on....

(not so wordless) Wordless Wednesday - Lesson in Sharing

William likes toys.

Pretty sure that since his first birthday, William believes all toys belong to him.

The dog has a whole collection of only two, yes two, toys/chew things.

William naturally gravitates to exactly those two toys.  Not the Elmo guitar.  Not the magical singing train.  Not the large number of Caterpillar trucks.  Exactly the two disgusting, dog chewed, slobber-covered toys.

The dog doesn't mess with William's toys.  He just asks that he gets to chew in peace.

William learned an important lesson in sharing when the dog (rightfully) took his toy back.

Wordless Wednesday - I can make him laugh

[OK...so not entirely wordless...]

You are so so tired.  Make sure you do not smile or laugh....make sure of it...

OK, even if you decide to look less sleepy, make sure to not smile.

Oooo, mom's funny face and noise gets you everytime.  If you must smirk, make sure it doesn't go any further than that. 

OK....you let that smile slip.  No giggling though.  Absolutely NO giggling.

Oh, man.  Mom gets you everytime!

This boy makes my heart melt.  I can always make him laugh unlike anyone else.  I may not be able to do too much but I can do that and I feel pretty good about that.

Discovery

Look what we found in the yard (just before Tressel would have destroyed it!).  We figured we would see what William thought about it....

Do you see the intensity in Tressel's eyes?  He's thinking dinner...

Hello, there!

Can we keep him?

OK, there's no toad in this picture....he's just cute :)